Section CXVIII.. The Different Kinds of Money.

The Different Kinds Of Money.

Very different kinds of commodities have, according to circumstances, been used as money; but uniformly only such as possess a universally recognized economic value.(704) On the whole, people in a low stage of civilization are wont to employ, mainly, only ordinary commodities, such as are calculated to satisfy a vulgar and urgent want, as an instrument of exchange. As they advance in civilization, they, at each step, choose a more and more costly object, for this purpose,(705) and one which ministers to the more elevated wants.

A. Races of hunters, at least in non-tropical countries, usually use skins as money; that is the almost exclusive product of their labor, one which can be preserved for a long period of time, which constitutes their principal article of clothing and their principal export in the more highly developed regions.(706)

B. Nomadic races and the lower agricultural races,(707) pass, by a natural gradation, to the use of cattle as money; which supposes rich pasturages at the disposal of all. If it were otherwise, there would be a great many to whom payments of this kind had been made, who would not know what to do with the cattle given them, on account of the charges for their maintenance.(708)