The Japanese committee, it was soon seen, came to the conference with their minds made up to adhere to the valuation they had already set upon our coins, even if the alternative was the immediate cessation of trade. The basis upon which they made their calculation was the nominal rate at which the government sells bullion when it is purchased from the mint, and which seems also to be that by which the metal is received from the mines. The Japanese have a decimal system of weight, like the Chinese, of catty, tael, mace, candareen, and cash, by which articles in general are weighed; but gold and silver are not reckoned above taels. In China a tael of silver in weight and one in currency are the same, for the Chinese have no silver coin; but in Japan, as in European countries, the standard of value-weight and that of currency-weight differ. We were told that a tael weight of silver has now come to be reckoned, when it is bullion, as equal to 225 candareens, or 2 taels, 2 mace, 5 candareens; but when coined, the same amount in weight is held to be worth 6 taels, 4 mace. It is at the bullion value that the government has decided to receive our dollar, the same at which they take the silver from the mines; asserting that, as its present die and assay give it no additional value, it is worth no more to them. In proportion to a tael, a dollar weighs 7 mace, 1 1-5 candareen, which, at the rates of bullion value, makes it worth 1 tael, 6 mace, or 1,600 cash. Thus the Japanese government will make a profit of 66-2/3 per cent. on every dollar paid them of full weight, with the trifling deduction of the expense of recoining it. The injustice of this arrangement was shown, and the propriety of paying to the seller himself the coin we gave at this depreciated rate urged, but in vain.