Thibet, so poor in agricultural and manufacturing products, is rich, beyond all imagination, in metals. Gold and silver are collected there so readily, that the common shepherds have become acquainted with the art of purifying these precious metals. You often see them, in the ravines, or in the hollows of the mountains, seated round a fire of argols, amusing themselves with purifying in a rude crucible the gold-dust they have found while tending their herds. The result of this abundance of the precious metals is, that specie is of low value, and that, consequently, goods always maintain a very high price. The monetary system of the Thibetians consists entirely of silver coins, which are somewhat larger, but not so thick as our francs. On one side they bear inscriptions in Thibetian, Parsee, or Indian characters; on the other, a crown composed of eight small, round flowers. To facilitate commerce, these coins are cut into pieces, the number of flowers remaining on each piece determining its value. The entire coin is called Tchan-Ka. A Tche-Ptche is one-half of the Tchan-Ka; or, in other words, is a piece of four flowers only. The Cho-Kan has five flowers, the Ka-Gan three. In the larger commercial operations, they employ silver ingots, which are weighed in a Roman balance, upon the decimal system. Generally speaking, the Thibetians reckon up accounts upon their beads; some people, however, and especially the merchants, use the Chinese Souan-pan, while the learned employ the numerals which the Europeans call Arabic, and which appear to have been of very ancient date in Thibet. We have seen several Lamanesque manuscripts, illustrated with astronomical figures and diagrams, all of them represented by Arabic numerals, which were also used in the paging of the volumes. Some of these figures differed slightly from the Arabic numerals used in Europe; the most marked difference we noticed was that of the 5, which, in these manuscripts, was turned upside down, thus: [Picture: Upside-down five]