But when we ask
bow it chanced that gold and silver came to be used as money, and why it
is that gold is regarded as so much more valuable than silver, no answer
presents itself. It was impossible to make either of them into pots or
pans, swords or spears; they were not necessarily more beautiful than
glass or the combinations of tin and copper. Nothing astonished the
American races more than the extraordinary value set upon gold and
silver by the Spaniards; they could not understand it. A West Indian
savage traded a handful of gold-dust with one of the sailors
accompanying Columbus for some tool, and then ran for his life to the
woods lest the sailor should repent his bargain and call him back. The
Mexicans had coins of tin shaped like a letter T. We can understand
this, for tin was necessary to them in hardening their bronze
implements, and it may have been the highest type of metallic value
among them. A round copper coin with a serpent stamped on it was found
at Palenque, and T-shaped copper coins are very abundant in the ruins of
Central America. This too we can understand, for copper was necessary in
every work of art or utility.
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