[pg 38] rupees, and make it a legal tender for a limited period, when it might be readjusted and again valued, and made a legal tender for a similar period at the new rate; (3) to introduce the English sovereign as a legal tender for Rs. 10, but limited in legal tender to the amount of Rs. 20 or two sovereigns; or (4) to substitute a gold standard for the silver standard. Of these projects the first three were evidently unsafe as currency expedients. Fixity of value between the various components of the currency is an essential requisite in a well-regulated monetary system. Each coin must define a fixed value, in terms of the others realizable by the most untutored intellect. When it ceases to do so it becomes a mere commodity, the value of which fluctuates with the fluctuations of the market. This criterion ruled out the first two projects. To have introduced a coin as money, the value of which could not be vouched for—as would have been the case under the first project—from one day to another, apart from the trouble of computing and ascertaining the fluctuations, would have been a source of such embarrassment that the Government, it must be said, acted wisely in not adopting it. There was no saving grace in the second project to recommend its adoption in preference to the first. If it had been adopted the result would have been that during the period that a rate was fixed, gold would have been forced into circulation supposing that its market value was lower, and at the end of the year, if it was known that the rate would be revised and the value of the coin be reduced in conformity with the fall of gold, a general struggle to get rid of the overrated gold coin and shift the inevitable loss to the shoulders of others would have certainly ensued. The third was a somewhat strange proposal. It is possible with a low-priced metal to strike coins of less than full value for the purposes of small payments and limit their tender. But this is not possible with a high-priced metal, the _raison d’être_ of which is to facilitate large transactions. The objections to the plan could hardly be concealed. So long as gold was undervalued it would not circulate at all. But once it became overvalued owing to changes in [pg 39] the market ratio the rupee would go out of circulation, and shopkeepers and traders would remain possessed of a coin which would be of no use in liquidating large transactions.