Page:Notes on the State of Virginia (1853).djvu/198

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THE WEIGHTS, MEASURES, AND THE CURRENCY OF THE HARD MONEY? SOME DETAILS RELATING TO THE EXCHANGE WITH EUROPE?

Our weights and measures are the same which are fixed by acts of Parliament in England. How it has happened that in this as well as the other American States the nominal value of coin was made to differ from what it was in the country we had left, and to differ among ourselves too, I am not able to say with certainty. I find that, in 1631, our House of Burgesses desired of the Privy Council in England a coin debased to twenty-five per cent.; that, in 1645, they forbid dealing by barter for tobacco, and established the Spanish piece of eight at six shillings, as the standard of their currency; that, in 1655, they changed it to five shillings sterling. In 1680 they sent an address to the King, in consequence of which, by proclamation in 1683, he fixed the value of French crowns, rix dollars, and pieces of eight at six shillings, and the coin of New England at one shilling. That in 1710, 1714, 1727, and 1762, other regulations were made, which will be better presented to the eye, stated in the form of a table, as follows: