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346 appendix f Currency and Measures Several types of currency are used in the Castorland Journal to reckon costs and purchases. The dollar, or piastre, is the primary medium of exchange. Mention too is frequently made of pounds (divided into shillings and pence). One pound = 20 shillings, and 1 shilling = 12 pence. In eighteenth-century America, the value of the pound varies from state to state, and differs in value from the pound sterling in England. The Journal also mentions French currency. The French monetary system, like the English, is an inheritance from the coinage values of the Roman Empire , and is based on a similar tripartite division. The basic French unit is the livre (or livre tournois), which means, literally, pound. Like the English pound, the French livre is further divided into twenty units, the sol (plural, sous); and this latter, again like the English money, can be divided into units of twelve, the denier. At the time of the writing of the Journal, the French franc will come to replace the livre, and will carry the same value (see Alexander Macomb’s letter to William Constable, 30 November 1793: “huit francs per acre”: ConstablePierrepont Collection: NYPL). The Journal’s authors sometimes compare various values, and we can derive from the Journal the following equivalencies: Values according to the Journal 1) 23 September 1793: Desjardins records that 20 shillings = 21 ⁄2 piastres. Since 20 shillings = £1, then 8 shillings = 1 piastre (dollar). This equivalency is for pounds and shillings of New York currency. 2) 19 September 1796: Desjardins records the drafts drawn by Rodolphe Tillier on William Constable, and we learn that one piastre (dollar) = 5 livres, 5 sous. Hence, in contemporary New York State currency, 1 livre is worth about $0.19, and the value of one share of the New York Company’s stock, at 800 livres per share, is about $150. Measuring Length To measure distances, two French measures are often used, the league (lieue) and the toise. The latter is used to estimate distances that can be estimated at sight, much as we use the yard today. The former is used as we use miles, to measure longer distances. From entries in the Journal, we can establish the following equivalencies: —league (lieue): 1 league (lieue) = 3 miles. (28 November 1793; cf. 6 October 1793) —toise = about 61 ⁄2 English feet (= six “royal feet” in France). For example, the length of the course of the falls at Little Falls measures “more than one hundred toises,” that is, over two hundred yards (7 October 1793); the length of Currency and Measures 347 the portage at the falls on the Oswego River: “The batteaux are made to slide on rollers for a distance of about 60 toises, to the foot of the falls,” that is, over one hundred yards (16 October 1793). Measuring Surface Area In the Journal, the English acre is often used; but occasionally too the French arpent. Brissot de Warville gives for the French arpent the following equivalence in acres: 11 American acres = 13 arpents. Therefore, one arpent = .85 acres, and one acre = 1.18 arpents. See Brissot de Warville, New Travels, trans. Vamos and Echeverria, 26–27. For further details on these measures, see Zupko, French Weights and Measures. ...

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