f the States; but the opinion of the committee was, that the
Order in Council regulating the currency ought not to be suspended or
revoked, but carried into execution. His Majesty in Council, therefore,
on the 9th of July, 1730, ordered that the said Order in Council of the
22nd of May, 1729, be carried into execution: but that during the term
of six months from the date hereof all creditors in the said Island do
receive their debts, if tendered to them at the rate at which the coins
went current immediately before making the aforesaid Order in Council;
and, in case of refusal, that such creditors do forfeit one-third of
their debts to the benefit of the debtors."

In 1774, in France, from whence the small change for the Channel Islands
was being obtained, the _sou_ was equivalent to twelve deniers, the
_double-liard_ or _half-sou_ to six deniers, and the _liard_ or
_quarter-sou_ to three deniers.

"Established custom, and the relative value of coins, proved of greater
force than the Orders in Council. Livres, and sous, and liards tournois
continued, in fact, the currency of the Island at their old rate; and
many of the native inhabitants of the Island still keep their accounts,
or make their reckonings, in the livre tournois--the livre being
estimated at twenty sous, and the sou at four liards or twelve deniers.
When the English currency was, in the year 1835, adopted as the legal
currency of the Island, it was done by declaring the relative value
which it bore in circulation to the livre tournois. This was to meet the
objections which were raised to the adoption of the English standard
with regard to wheat rents, and other mortgages, which were estimated in
the old currency tournois. Twenty-six livres tournois, or old French
currency, were declared to be equivalent to one pound sterling, which
was, and is now, the current rate.

"Allusion is still made in some legal and official documents to
order-money or, as it is called, argent d'ordre, or argent selon l'ordre
du roi. But the question may reasonably be asked, 'What is order-money?
What is the standard of order-money? Does order-money really exist, or
has it ever existed?' The livre of order-money is considered worth fifty
per cent. more than the livre-tournois; and the distinction is supposed
to be derived from the Order in Council of the year 1729. But that Order
in Council did not establish that difference: it did not change the
relative value of the sou and th