My numismatic haunts and providers have not, especially of late, been numerous. I once took a small lot of a house in Rathbone Place—a silver medaglia of Marguerite de Foix, Marchioness of Saluzzo, 1516, which came from Lyons, and a bronze piece of Ragusa in Sicily, found in the island of Sardinia, with others. But Messrs Lincoln & Son were my earliest furnishers, and they, with MM. Rollin & Feuardent of Paris, Messrs Spink & Son of London, and Mr Schulman, of Amersfoort, have mainly contributed to build up my unpretending cabinet.

The influence of Messrs Lincoln & Son in forming my taste was more or less considerable. Their stock was miscellaneous, and I perhaps incautiously suffered it to reflect itself in my collection. The firm indeed, after a while, thought that my lines were too general, for whatever series they put on view from time to time gave up its choicer elements to me; and eventually my good friends perceived that, although I was certainly not a specialist in one sense, I was in another. I took only the best; and this proved an invaluable safeguard.

For, by making a hard and fast rule, that no coin whatever shall be admissible in the presence of a defect or of imperfect condition, one shuts out the bulk of the objects submitted to notice. A thousand average lots in a dealer’s hands are not apt to yield above five per cent. of eligible purchases, which are not duplicates. In a continental stock the proportion would be much lower. The gold coins do not so signally fail; it is in the inferior metals, especially the billon and copper, that the difficulty lies.

I emerged, it is fair to own, from my researches and selections at the Lincoln establishment without serious damage or trouble, considering that I entered into relations with the house as a perfect stranger, and was in my numismatic infancy. They began, as time went on, to see that I was in earnest, and would at length scarcely allow me to buy any article likely to appear on farther examination unsatisfactory; and by a few exchanges of early acquisitions, on which they were generous enough to let me lose nothing, I stood in the end better than I perhaps deserved. Mr Lincoln has told me that he started on his numismatic career by advertising on the back page of the catalogues of his father, who was a book seller, a short list of coins on sale by him at the same address.

The strength and spirit, which the father infuses into his child, the latter is now and then prone to use against the giver; and I am afraid that I have appeared ungrateful to my original source of supply—in fact, my dry-nurses—inasmuch as I outgrew by insensible degrees their power of satisfying my wants, and directed my attention elsewhere.

Messrs Lincoln & Son filled in the groundwork of my scheme, and continue to fill up gaps at intervals; but it was impossible for me to shut my eyes to the fact, that the rate of progress, which my numismatic studies were attaining, rendered a restriction to a single firm out of the question. I could never have committed to writing my Notes, imperfect as they may be, on the Coins of all countries and periods with certain exceptions, had I not left the original groove, and entered the market, prepared to avail myself of every particular, which was to be gleaned both at home and abroad, alike in the shape of information, correction, and addition.

It was through the Lincolns I became acquainted with Mr Atkins, author of the two works on Tokens and Colonial Coins, and he introduced to me the name of Schulman of Amersfoort. This was about ten years since; and the result was that Schulman thenceforward sent me periodical consignments for selection and his well-compiled catalogues. From this quarter I derived, rather contrary to the expectation which I had been led to form, a highly valuable assortment of coins at fair prices. I surmise that a considerable proportion of my correspondent’s picked acquisitions has found its way to me. His parcels from season to season embraced an alarming and chronic percentage of hopeless specimens, notwithstanding my exhortations to him to be more select; and I am persuaded that this circumstance proceeded from the sender’s inability, in common with all the continental dealers, to distinguish and appreciate condition, as he has often offered a proof at a slight advance on the figure asked for an ordinary and mediocre example.

Schulman has been during his career in the constant habit of falling in with a variety of continental coins, which are scarcely ever seen in England; and as a rule his tariff is moderate enough—not quite so moderate, perhaps, as it used to be, especially the fine early copper, since he discovered my partiality for it.

But I feel nevertheless that my collection owes a great deal to my Amersfoort correspondent. Our business has been necessarily conducted by letter. In 1889 I was at Utrecht, and went over to his place. I had previously called, when I was at Amsterdam, at Bom’s, and there I was shown the priced catalogue of a quite recent local auction. Against a silver daalder of Louis Napoleon, King of Holland, of an excessively rare type, I observed my friend’s name as the purchaser for 105 gulden, and the first object which met my eyes in Schulman’s room was this very piece. I took it in my hand. ‘Ah!’ cried he, ‘that won’t suit you; I want 150 gulden for it.’ I laid it down again, implying in my manner a sort of apology. I made a few purchases, and left him.

He subsequently inserted the daalder in a catalogue at 135 gulden. He had tried the higher sum without success. I did not take any notice, and forgot all about it, till in a parcel sent on approval this was one of the items, the price 100 gulden. Allowing the usual discount, the piece remained with me at 90. I always cherished a suspicion that it was put into the sale in the Spuistraat by Master Schulman himself, and bought in.My good friend acquired for me at Amsterdam a ¼ stuiver of Batavia, 1644 which he reported to me as beau. When it reached my hands, I was not altogether satisfied, nor did he reassure me, when he stated that my specimen was far finer than those in the museums at the Hague and at Batavia. The ¼ is considerably rarer than the ½. Schulman once advertised an example of the former at 10 gulden or 16s. 8d., describing it as ‘de toute beautÈ’; but I missed it.

I have had repeated arguments both with Schulman and Bom on the subject of a rather numerous and important class of Dutch coins, which almost habitually present themselves fleur de coin. I used to contend that these are re-strikes; but I have been assured over and over again that the Netherlands Government will not suffer any of the ancient dies to be employed for this purpose, and that they are jealously guarded at Utrecht. Schulman added, that he had endeavoured in vain to prevail on the authorities to allow him to take a few impressions of certain patterns of Louis Napoleon, which were never issued, and are almost unknown.

Like many of his foreign confrÈres, Schulman undertakes the compilation and conduct of sales by auction, and favours his clients with the catalogues. I have taken the line, under these somewhat delicate circumstances, of simply mentioning that if such or such a lot answers the printed description, and fetches so much or thereabout, I shall not object to it. I put no questions as to ownership; they do not concern me at all. I listen to a variety of tales about artificial sales and fictitious names; but the grand point is, that a coin is a coin, and if it is sold under unpropitious surroundings, it is likely to prove cheaper, and where it is misdescribed, it returns whence it came.

It was while I was at Utrecht, that I hunted through a huge mass of rubbish in the shape of obsolete currencies, and found at the conclusion that my bill only came to three-halfpence for a most beautiful double liard of Maria Theresa, struck for the Austrian Netherlands in 1749.

I had an interview at Brussels with a very pleasant fellow, who keeps, or at least kept, a curiosity-shop near Ste. Gudule. He had a few patterns and other pieces belonging to the first French revolutionary era, which I was glad to secure, and some bracteates, for which he asked £5, and as to which my courage failed me a little. I feared that they were too dear. He wrapped them up carefully, and said, ‘Take them with you, and if you do not care for them, let me have them back again.’ I had to return them with my acknowledgments, which were sincere. My misgivings were correct.

Once for all, it is well to explain that any ostensibly egotistical details, which are here given, have for their motive the guidance and enlightenment of new enterers on the scene, with which the writer has during nearly twenty years been agreeably and profitably familiar. If I had not exercised discretion in my relationship with foreign houses, I might have been overwhelmed by an avalanche of worthless rubbish, the refuse of the auctions. But by keeping a watchful eye and a tight hand over myself, as it were, I have retained only a limited residuum, which answers my purpose best on every account. The plan affords me illustrations in the best state of all the European schools of numismatic art, ancient, mediÆval, and modern, no less than medallic portraits of the most celebrated men and women of all ages; and I ask the question advisedly: What advantage accrues to a private collector from possessing every minute variety of type, every mint-mark, and every date? The idea is surely a fallacy. The Mint and other public institutions may fitly preserve them for reference and record; but for individuals they appear to be surplusage.

Schulman obliged me with a set of his catalogues, about thirty in number, issued between 1880 and the present time, and I found them fruitful in suggestions. They are not bare lists, but, where it is needful, carefully annotated; and in the unavoidable absence of some originals I have experienced from them and other similar compilations the greatest assistance. The method, which the continental houses pursue in drawing up their accounts of the property on sale by auction or otherwise, constitutes the result a work of permanent reference and authority. Such is especially the case with those specified in the Bibliography to the Coin Collector, 1896. They are of course secondary evidences; but where one cannot describe a coin from the coin they are admirable, and in general trustworthy, substitutes. Our English numismatic catalogues are improving, but still lack the profuse and laborious detail, which is extended on the continent even to lots of minor significance.

I was brought into contact with the English representative of the Paris firm of Rollin & Feuardent in a perfectly accidental way. I had detected in a forthcoming sale at Sotheby’s, among a heap of miscellanies in a bag, a well-preserved double in piedfort of Henry III. of France. I pointed it out to Lincoln; but he missed it, and Mr Whelan was the acquirer. It was destined for a client, and I did not secure it; but the matter made Mr Whelan and myself acquainted, and we have been very pleasantly so ever since. His father was in the same line of business before him, and knew Edward Wigan and other men of that generation. I have already observed that the Agency in Bloomsbury is the resort of well-nigh all the most eminent hunters, not only for coins and medals, but for antiquities of every description.

It is not that I am able to speak of myself as a conspicuous figure in the circle, which frequents this spot, or as an appreciable element in the large mercantile transactions, which are conducted here and at headquarters. But I am indulgently tolerated, and now and then I find a trifle or two to my liking. Mr Whelan stands in due awe of my excruciating and almost outrageous passion for state, and looks upon me (with much good-nature) as a most difficult party to please and to fit. He is fully aware, how narrow my means are, and seldom tenders me, except as a compliment or for numismatic purposes, his grander bijoux. Yet in all my series there are some few, which I highly prize, and which came to me thence; and I may particularise a very rare British copper coin of Cunobeline, which brought £7, 17s. 6d. at the Montagu sale, but cost its former possessor £40, 10s. This fact did not appear in the catalogue.

The last time I met Mr Montagu was at Mr Whelan’s. I shewed him two pieces which I happened to have just had from Schulman; one was the Campen imitation of the gold sovereign of Mary I. of England, and far scarcer than the original; and Montagu admired them both. A few weeks, and he was no more. We had met at the Numismatic Society’s Rooms, where I attended a meeting as a guest; and I recollect Montagu pulling out of his pocket for my inspection a coin he had exhibited that evening to the members and others present. It was the unique half George noble of Henry VIII. discovered by Curt the dealer at Paris, sold by him to the Rev. Mr Shepherd for £90, and at the Shepherd sale in 1885 acquired by its late owner for £255.

The Montagu cabinet was naturally rich in pedigree coins, and had, I believe, all the English, although not all the Greek, rarities. It even possessed the five-broad piece of Charles I. by Rawlins, which fetched the extraordinary sum of £770. Spink & Son secured it at that price, and sold it to the British Museum for 10 per cent. profit. I was tempted by the Edward VI. half-crown and threepence, and by the James I. silver crown of the QuÆ Deus type, which had been Bergne’s and Bryce’s, and which I preferred to the Exurgat one as superior in tone, while it was nearly equal in preservation.

The five-broad piece is said to have been given by the King on the scaffold to Archbishop Juxon; it is a pattern, and apparently unique. The type resembles that of the ordinary broad, of which there are impressions in silver. I have one of unusually medallic fabric.

I heard an odd story of a F.N.S. to whom some ignorant correspondent offered the noble itself—a piece of great value—and who pronounced it worth 6s. 8d.—the current rate at the time of issue, about 1528. The Forster example in 1868 fetched £17, 17s.

A rather distressing incident occurred to ‘Pedigree’ Wells of Piccadilly during his absence one day from business. He had in his window a coin advertised as ‘a three-pound piece of Charles I.’ to which the astute owner attached no price, leaving that detail to be regulated by the circumstances. A person entered the shop, and saw Mrs Wells, who was unversed in numismatic subtleties, and laying down £3, said, ‘I will take that coin in the window,’ which accordingly he did, greatly to Wells’s satisfaction, no doubt, and to the promotion of domestic harmony.

The hero of this small anecdote owed his sobriquet to his fertility of resource in providing his fine-art acquisitions with a genealogical tree.

We had a controversy in Bloomsbury on one occasion about a gold Athenian stater sent to me on approval. All gold Athenian staters are ipso facto doubtful. Whelan condemned it. Canon Greenwell, who was present, was not sure. I shewed it to Dr Head; and he supported Whelan. The coin was returned. At another time I obtained from a dealer who avouched, and still avouches, it to be absolutely genuine, a gold ??e?t?? of the same State; and at this Whelan equally shook his head. But I took it to be right, and retained it. The fact is, that the Athenians struck gold very sparingly, and there have been modern attempts to supply the deficiency.

One leading inducement to fabricate pieces lacking in series or of signal rarity has been the cheapness of labour and the more limited conversance with the discrepancies between originals and copies or absolutely fictitious examples, partly arising from the absence of means of communication among numismatists in various countries. These inventions or contrefaÇons were calculated, again, for different markets. The false gold staters of Nicomedes II. of Bithynia, which are executed with unusual skill, and the far less clever imitations of the Athenian gold, could only answer the purpose, where they found an English or French customer able to pay a handsome price for the means of supplying a hopeless or almost hopeless lacuna in his Greek cabinet. But those of such common coins as the tetradrachms of Athens or Alexander the Great appealed rather to still more inexperienced buyers, whom a low figure was apt to tempt; and these even occur plated or washed with silver.

Whelan once amused me and himself by submitting to atmospheric treatment a large copper coin of the Two Sicilies—a 10-grana piece of Ferdinand IV. 1815. He offered it to me, and I declined it, because the surface was unsatisfactory in my eyes. He said nothing; but about three months later he brought it to me from a window sill, where it had been taking an aËrial bath of rather prolonged duration; and the effect was certainly surprising. All the repellent aspect of the superficies had vanished. I took it, and laughed, when he told me that there was only a shilling to pay for a quarter’s incessant scientific manipulation.

I have been studiously frugal in my adoption of Oriental coins, because, frankly speaking, I have no faith in them as an investment. But I have retained a few early acquisitions, including a square gold mohur of the Emperor of Hindostan, the famous Akbar, and a dinar in the same metal of the good caliph, Haroun el Reschid. Whelan helped me to both these. The latter formed part of a parcel of such pieces, the property of a Parsee at Calcutta, and sold in London. The dinars of El Reschid were rather numerous, and were not recognised. The British Museum got several, and I got the finest. How were the public to guess that they were connected with so celebrated a personage, when the catalogue described them as of El Reschid?

There also remains with me a gold dinar of the 13th century, of the last Caliph of Bagdad. My learned friend, Mr Michael Kerny, deciphered for me many years ago the inscriptions in the older Arabic character in the inner circle on either side. They read: Praise to God Mohammed the Apostle of God God bless him and protect the Iman there is no God but God only He has no Peer al Mustansir b—illah Prince of the Faithful by the grace of God.

An ill-starred Swede visited England, or rather London, several years ago, and endeavoured to find a customer for a rather weighty package of old currency of the Northern Kingdoms, which he had borne with him across the sea, and after fruitless essays elsewhere he tried Whelan. The latter did not see his way, and the stranger re-embarked for his native country with his burden, so to speak, on his back. On the floor in Bloomsbury Street, however, he left two small pieces (schillings of Christian IV. 1621 and 1622), which, as Whelan had no idea who he was, or what his address, he presented to me.

He gave me, too, a fine 5-lire piece of Napoleon I. 1808, struck at Milan. What a gain it is to be thought poor and deserving!

Many have been the good turns, many the valuable hints and items of information, and many, again, the pleasant hours, which I have spent in Bloomsbury Street. There is a huge black cat there, which is very friendly with habitual visitors; it used to make a practice of squeezing itself into Sir John Evans’s bag, and remaining there, while he stayed.

At Bloomsbury Street is one of my numismatic libraries of reference, to which I have long enjoyed free access. The custodian is not only well versed in coins and other curiosities, but is a reader and a repository of much entertaining literary and theatrical anecdote. I know that I take more than I give; but Whelan now and again consults me about an old book or a continental coin, which he does not happen to have seen.

I owed to my excellent acquaintance my introduction to Lord Grantley, whom I first met under his roof and from whom I have received kind help in my work and otherwise. His lordship, however, does not quite follow the same lines as I do. He is understood to be engaged in deciphering and elucidating the Merovingian or Merwing series—one, about which we have learned a good deal of recent years, and have a good deal more, I apprehend, to discover.

I knew the late Mr Cockburn of Richmond in consequence of having met him at Dr Diamond’s at Twickenham House. He was a Fellow of the Numismatic Society, and when I first became acquainted with him possessed a small cabinet. He hinted at an intention of discontinuing the pursuit, and even of realising. He next offered me the collection for £800. I had to let him understand that I had not so much money to spare; but I ascertained that he had been a buyer in bygone years, and had certain desirable items in his hands. I timidly inquired whether it would be possible to select a few desiderata, and Mr Cockburn agreed to that proposal. He had many coins in poor state, and many which were duplicates; and by concentrating my strength, such as it was, on the best things, I procured for about £70 nearly all that I wanted. Two Anglo-Saxon pennies which puzzled me a little, and as to which the British Museum authorities did not give me a reassuring opinion, I unfortunately missed. The residue Cockburn sold en bloc to Montagu, and when the latter parted with the said two pennies in a sale of duplicates, I had the satisfaction of seeing them printed in the catalogue in capital letters! They might have come to me at £2 the couple. I thanked the British Museum, and applauded its discrimination.

It appears, by the way, to be almost going too far to say that the portrait on the later groat and on the shilling of Henry VII. is the earliest resemblance of an English king as distinguished from a conventional representation; for surely the bust on the groats of Richard III. makes a distinct movement in the same direction; and even on the money of Edward IV. there is discernible a commencing tendency to realism.

Apart from the English coins, Cockburn had purchased in the course of time about eighty Roman second brass, which he insisted on selling in the lump, although I frankly told him, that very few would suit me. I gave him £5 for them, selected a dozen or so of the finest, and let Lincoln have the remainder for £4, 7s. 6d.—his own valuation.

Cockburn did not seem to sell for profit, and I admired his independence. He professed to pass on to me at cost price. For the sovereign of Edward VI. (4th year) he had paid £5 to Lincoln; it was f.d.c.; and for an equally fine Biga farthing of Anne he charged me on the same principle 26s. Other pieces, as the half-groat of Mary I. at £8 and the pattern shilling and sixpence of the Commonwealth by Blondeau at £16, struck me as dear enough. For eight varied cunetti in mint-state he charged 16s. His Anglo-Saxon pennies were not unreasonable; Harthacanut at £3 was the highest; a halfpenny of Edmund of East Anglia was judged to be worth £1.

Had not Montagu swooped down on the quarry, I might have left yet less behind me in a few weeks. I was snugly nibbling at it.

The name, which deserves on some grounds the greatest prominence in these numismatic memorials—that of Spink & Son—not inappropriately crowns the list of my auxiliaries and caterers. I cannot recollect the precise circumstances, under which I first approached the firm—then in Gracechurch Street only; but I quickly discovered its enterprising spirit and friendly sentiment. It was a house, which had not at that period—about 1886—long devoted special attention to the numismatic side; and through the possession of capital it rapidly came to the front. The stock of coins of all kinds grew in a marvellously short time only too varied and abundant, and under the auspices of Spink & Son, who behaved toward me as a person in humble circumstances with the utmost generosity and kindness, my collection developed in such a degree as to become almost serious, considering that this was another new outlet for my limited funds, and the largest of all. I had originally conceived the notion, which soon enough proved itself a chimerical one, that by investing my pocket-money to the extent of £150 or so over a course of years in these instructive relics of the past I should satisfy all reasonable requirements, and pose as the owner of a rather conspicuous cabinet. My riper conclusions pointed to £4000 as the minimum, under the most advantageous and careful management, for a representative gathering like mine in first-rate state, an amount equivalent with good husbandry to £10,000 under normal conditions, where folks exercise too little circumspection, or are in too great a hurry. The moral may be, that no man should mount a hobby in the dark. I have persevered, where many would have, I am sure, despaired. But I imagine that the motive for early relinquishment is not by any means the unexpected outlay so often as the distaste arising from errors of judgment and the annoying sense of imposition. The cost to myself in labour and thought has been quite equal to that in cash; but I have thus steered clear of the dangers, which beset inexperienced and desultory collectors. If you lean upon other people’s knowledge, you have to buy two articles instead of one.

This thesis has no immediate bearing on Spink & Son, who never urged me to purchase anything against my judgment, and were always prepared to exchange a coin, if I altered my mind about it. They certainly put aside all pieces likely to be of interest to me, but the interest was not invariably commercial. It might be an example, which I desired to register, just as I was in the habit of doing with Early English Books; and when I had taken my note, and did not care to invest, the bargain was open to the next comer.

A signal feature and facility in transactions here I have found to be the prompt exhibition with the marked price of every purchase and all purchases within the briefest possible interval. Coins are no sooner acquired, than they are placed on view with the exception of certain specialities, which are temporarily laid aside, till one or two clients have had the opportunity of seeing them. I have long rather undeservedly been on this favoured list; and I believe that no coin, thought to be in my way, has been sold during some years past, till I have refused it. I had the unexpected good fortune to meet here with the thaler of Nicholas Schinner, Bishop of Sion, 1498, absolutely f.d.c., and the Kelch thaler of Zurich, 1526, nearly as fine. The Zurich thaler of 1512, with the three decapitated martyrs, was reported from Germany, and alleged to be in mint state; but when it arrived, I identified it with the indifferent example in the Boyne sale, and of course rejected it accordingly. Such coins as these have a future.

I had put in my pocket, and taken home, just prior to the issue of the monthly catalogue, a gold Russian coin attributed to the reign of Ivan the Terrible, one of the numerous suitors of our Queen Elizabeth; but it was a century later. Still I might have liked it, had not a telegram from Russia arrived, and induced me to surrender the piece to some one, who evidently felt a peculiar interest in it. I was less considerate to the Prince of Naples, who is forming a private cabinet, and who ordered a rare grosso of the Roman republican era (13th century), which I had forestalled. It was fleur de coin, and I could not make up my mind to let it go, even to so exalted a personage. The most striking point is, that I had merely signified my wish to have the coin, and that Spink & Son might have sent it to the Prince, on the plea that I had not actually bought it.

I occasionally have the pleasure of making my good friends a slight return for their consideration. They had obtained at a sale for fifty shillings in a lot two examples of the very rare mezzo scudo struck in 1530 in the name of the Florentine Republic with the monogram of the Standard-Bearer for the year, just prior to the establishment of the Medici family in power. They shewed both to me, and permitted me to select the better for 30s. I then pointed out that at the Rossi sale in 1880 one had fetched £10, 5s., and recommended them to mark the remaining specimen £7, 10s., at which figure a foreign dealer jumped at it. At the Boyne sale in 1896 a third was carried to £8, 10s. by the same individual. The piece is remarkable as the heaviest denomination so far struck in Florence in silver.

Piccadilly, to which the Coin and Medal Department has been transferred, constitutes my second library of reference, as Spink & Son have spared no cost to bring together all the most valuable and important numismatic books and catalogues in all languages. This has formed a largely serviceable and welcome element in my connection with the firm, and has conferred on me without the slightest expense all the advantages attendant on the personal possession of the volumes. The English collector of foreign coins has, as a rule, as slight an acquaintance with these rich sources of information as I should have had in the absence of such facilities.

The monthly Numismatic Circular has tended in a direct and an indirect manner to draw Spink & Son into closer touch with holders and purchasers of coins everywhere; and the prospect of being able to examine, if not to acquire in all cases, an incessant volume of these interesting monuments seems to me likely to go on improving. I shall return to the subject of the Circular in a succeeding chapter.

A characteristic injustice was perpetrated on this firm by a divine, who honoured it with an order for a certain early English silver penny, and to whom, though a stranger and in the country, the coin was sent, packed up in the customary manner, on approval. The reverend gentleman reported in due course that it arrived at his address broken in half, and declined to pay for it. There was no absolute plea of negligence in the method of enclosure; the client authorised its transmission to him; and he did not even propose to defray the cost or part of it. The dealers took him before the magistrate, and the latter decided in favour of the client on the ground that the coin was a very old one, and had lasted long enough. Verily, as there are land thieves and water thieves, there are paid magisterial owls as well as unpaid.