amusing. For instance, I was calling one day at a house where a government servant resided, and I was surprised to see him stagger into the room with a large bag in each hand. Asked what made him bend and sway, he replied "My salary", and he poured on to the carpet a load of O. S. rupees that would eventually go to the local branch of the Bank of Bengal and be placed there to his credit.
The official rate of exchange between the Hyderabad rupee and the British Government rupee varies to-day between 16 and 20; and the official standard in 1,000 O. S. rupees is 818.1 pure silver and the rest alloy.
Into the intricacies of the copper coinage I will not enter, for the ghandas and dubs that are the delight of servants, I found to be in the districts a great nuisance. Thus if a railway ticket was a little more than a rupee, I received from 80 to 90 small copper coins, and the servant and the ticket babu then began to quarrel over the rate of exchange and the number of dubs that I ought to have. Only in Hyderabad City and Secunderabad can a railway ticket be taken in British Government money, and at the small stations it is difficult and some-
