Rensselaer Republican, Volume 24, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 September 1891 — The Smallest Coin. [ARTICLE]

The Smallest Coin.

Utica Observer. Probably the smallest coin in point of value in use in the world is that used by the natives of the Malay Peninsula. It is a small wafer made from the gum of a tree, and is estimated to be worth the one tenthousanth part of a penny. As the penny is equal to about 2c, 5000 ol these coins would be equal to a cent. The abstract statement does not with it a very definite idea ol the small value of this standard of exchange. To the human mind any number beyond a certain limit is great and expressive only by comparison with other measurements known and appreciable. If 500 U equals lc, $1 would call for 500,000. Imagine paying a tailor’s bill (pro vided you are able to imagine such a thing) in such coin. You have a bill of, say, $68.50. A small handful ol 34,250,000 of these wafers would entitle you to a rp£eipt ou the bill. A tip to a sleeping car porter of 125,000 wafers would cost you 25c. To “ascertain your correct i weight” on one of these penny machines would be 5000 Wafers. If you earn SSO a month you would have to hire a cart to get vour pil£ of 25,000,000 home. Wm. H. Vnnderbilt's $300,000,000 would be worth only S4OO had they been wafers, but on the Malay Peninsula he could have exchanged hia wealth for 100,000,000,000,000 —one hundred trillions—of wafers—prop vided tho entire country could have supplied that number, whichia highly improbably.