Now 2000 Chihli cash are represented by 325 coins, and 1000 by 162 coins, and 6000 by 975 coins, which again count as 1000 large cash and equal on an average one Mexican dollar.

Therefore to convert Lanchow cash into Tientsin cash you must divide the Lanchow cash by 3, count 975 as 1000, and consider this equal to a certain percentage of a theoretical amount of silver known as a tael, which is always varying of itself as well as by the fluctuations in the market value of silver, and which is not alike in any two places, and may widely vary in different portions of the same place.
Could anything be simpler?
And yet there are those who say that the system of money exchange in China is both cumbrous and exasperating.
Take as a further instance the cash in Yunnan.

Everyone knows that theoretically there are 2000 cash in the tael, each tael containing 20 "strings," and each "string" 100 cash, but in Yunnan 2000 cash are not 2000 cash--they are only 1880 cash.

This does not mean that 1880 cash are represented by 1880 coins, not at all; because 62 cash in Yunnan are counted as 100.

Eighteen hundred and eighty cash are therefore represented by only 1240 cash coins and all prices must be paid in this proportion.