Page:Origin of metallic currency and weight standards.djvu/191

 divided in four portions, each of which contained four other units. It will presently be a question as to whether similar influences have not produced our pound avoirdupois, with its 16 sub-multiples.

M. Moura found a difficulty regarding the Cambodian neal or cocoanut catty; because a neal of rice only weighs half the weight, at which the neal is rated as a weight. But we saw in Java that the chapa or cocoanut measure is estimated at 2-1/2 pounds avoirdupois. It is then not improbable that some liquid or substance far heavier than rice was used to fill the cocoanut, when the value of its contents was being ascertained by weighing so as to serve as a general unit. The same variation in weight, owing to the different nature of its contents, has, as mentioned before, given rise in Ireland to barrels of various weights. Thus a barrel of wheat contains 20 stone avoirdupois, a barrel of potatoes 24 stone, a barrel of barley 16 stone, and a barrel of oats 14 stone. This diversity simply arose from comparative lightness or heaviness of the different commodities which were measured by one and the same unit of capacity: the barrel itself, having been fixed by a process of measurement, similar to that by which the milk-pan was regulated among the Welsh, and the pannier among the natives of Laos. The principle by which higher units of capacity or weight are formed is likewise well illustrated by the instance given above of the cartload of rice, which is simply regarded as the multiple of the pannier or bag, which forms the smaller unit for rice. The size of the cartload would be conditioned by the size of the cart usually employed, which in turn would depend on a variety of other things, such as the nature of the country, or its roads, or the kind of animals employed for draught. The vagueness in amount of the koyan or multiple of the picul noticed by Crawfurd, may thus meet with a reasonable explanation.

We may now return to the mainland of Asia, where we shall find in the weight system of the Hindus at least one remarkable point of affinity with that of Sumatra. Marsden has told us that the rakat or scarlet pea with a black spot is one of the chief weights employed for gold in Sumatra. This