Chapter 3

United States, Millbury, 1847, 5 c.--In the United States the general adoption of postage stamps was preceded by what may be termed preliminary issues, of a more or less local character, and known as "Postmaster stamps." These "Postmaster stamps" were issued by various country postmasters by way of experiment. The Providence stamp is the commonest example. One of the rarest is the 5 c. stamp, with a portrait of Washington, issued by the postmaster of Millbury, in Massachusetts, in 1847. This stamp is said to be worth about £300. There are others reputed to be equally rare. Among the local stamps issued by various unofficial carriers and express agencies, there are many of which very few copies are known, and as they are practically all held by enthusiastic collectors, and never come into the market, there are no data as to their current value.

Cape of Good Hope, 1861. _Errors of Colour_.--In making up the plate of a provisional issue of triangular stamps, pending the arrival of supplies from England, a stereo of the 1d. got inserted by mistake in the 4d. plate, and a 4d. in the 1d. plate. Consequently each sheet of the 1d. contained a 4d. printed in red, the colour of the 1d., instead of blue. And the sheets of the 4d., in like manner, each contained a 1d, which, when the 4d. was printed in its proper colour of blue, was also printed in blue instead of red, the proper colour. These errors are very scarce, especially in an unused condition. The 1d., blue, is the rarer of the two, and is worth about £70 used; it is not known unused.

Tuscany, 1860, 3 lire.--In the early days of stamp production high values, such as we are now accustomed to get from most countries, were very rarely issued. For nearly thirty years Great Britain was content with a shilling stamp as its highest value. In 1860 the Provisional Government of Tuscany issued a stamp of 3 lire, for which there seems to have been very little use. It represented but two shillings and sixpence of English money, but it is nevertheless one of the great rarities to-day, especially in an unused condition. Used copies are worth about £65, and unused about £120.

Transvaal, 1878. _Error_ "Transvral."--This error occurred once in each sheet of eighty of the 1d., red on blue, of the first British Occupation. It was evidently discovered before a second lot was required, as it does not recur in the next printing of 1d., red on orange. It is a very rare stamp. Used it is worth about £50, but unused it is one of the great rarities, and has changed hands at about £150.

Ceylon, 1859, 4d. and 8d., imperforate.--Several of the first issues of this colony, designed and engraved by Messrs. Perkins Bacon and Co., and issued in 1857-9, are esteemed as great rarities in an imperforate and unused condition. The 4d., 8d., 9d., 1s., and 2s. are the rarest. The 4d., so long ago as 1894, fetched £130 at auction. These stamps are amongst the few great rarities that may be entitled to rank as works of art, and every year they are more sought after and more difficult to get in fine condition.

IX.

The Romance of Stamp Collecting.

The story of the development of stamp collecting, and of the trade that has sprung up with it, is full of romance.

Our publishers' business, with its world-wide ramifications, was begun by young Gibbons putting a few sheets of stamps in his father's shop window. The father was a chemist, and it was intended that the lad should follow in his father's footsteps; but the stamps elbowed the drugs aside, and eventually yielded a fortune which enabled this pioneer of the stamp trade to retire and indulge his globe-trotting propensities to the full. He sold his business for £25,000, and, still in the prime of life, retired to a snug little villa on the banks of the Thames. The business was converted into a Limited Liability Company, and the Managing Director may be said to be a product of the original business, for it was a present of a guinea packet of Stanley Gibbons's stamps that first whetted his appetite for stamp collecting, and eventually for stamp dealing. Mr. Gibbons had for a great many years conducted his business from his private house. The new broom changed all that, and opened out in fine premises in the Strand, W.C., where the Company now occupy the whole of one house and the greater part of the adjoining premises. In every room busy hands are at work all the day long endeavouring to keep pace with a world-wide business which began with a few sheets in the corner of a chemist's shop window in the town of Plymouth.

And now, looking back on the humdrum days of the beginnings of the stamp trade, what opportunities do they not seem to have missed! Could they but have foreseen the present-day developments, a few unconsidered trifles, valued at a few pence in those days, put away in a bottom drawer, would to-day net a fortune. Young Gibbons, amongst his early purchases, bought from a couple of sailors at Plymouth for £5 a sackful of triangular Cape of Good Hope stamps, a large proportion being the rare so-called Woodblocks, with many of the Errors described in the list of great rarities in another chapter. Those Errors he disposed of at 2s. 6d. each. They are now worth from £60 to £75 each. And the ordinary Woodblocks, which were so plentifully represented in that sackful, are now catalogued at from 50s. to £9 apiece. Strange as it may seem, those were the common stamps of those days, and they are the rarities of to-day.

A well-known collection, full of rare stamps of the value of from £5 to £50, has been largely formed by the fortunate possessor out of stamps for which he paid 2s. per dozen just a little over twenty years ago.

A leading collector once conceived the idea of scouring the little-visited country towns of Spain for rare old Spanish stamps, and a most successful hunt he made of it. He secured most valuable and unsuspected hauls of unused and used blocks and pairs of rare Portuguese; but before returning home he decided to treat himself to a trip to Morocco, and during that ill-fated extension of his tour he lost nearly the whole of his patient garnerings of rare Spanish stamps, for during an inland trip some very unphilatelic Bedouins swooped down on his escort in the desert and carried off the whole of his baggage. He, being some distance ahead of his escort, escaped, and brought home only a few samples of the grand things he had found and lost.

In all forms of collecting the hunt for bargains adds zest to the game, and probably more so in stamps than in any other hobby, not even excepting old china; and, as in other lines of collecting, the bargain hunter must be equipped with the expert knowledge of the specialist if he would sweep into his net at bargain prices the unsuspected gems to be found now and again in the philatelic mart. Many a keen stamp collector turns his years of wide experience to good account as a bargain hunter, and at least one innocent amateur is credited with netting a revenue which would make many a flourishing merchant green with envy.

Many a match has probably been due to stamp collecting. Not long ago we were told of a young lady who wrote to an official in a distant colony for a few of the current stamps issued from his office. The stamps were forwarded and a correspondence ensued. There was eventually an exchange of photographs, and finally the official applied for leave, returned home, and married his stamp collecting correspondent.

Truly the scope of the stamp collector for pleasure, for profit, and for romance is as wide as the most imaginative could desire.

X.

Philatelic Societies and their Work.

Most of the great cities of Europe, the British Colonies, and the United States have their Philatelic Societies. They are associations of stamp collectors for the study of postage stamps, their history, engraving, and printing; the detection and prevention of forgeries and frauds; the preparation and publication of papers and works bearing upon postal issues; the display and exhibition of stamps, and the exchange of duplicates.

The premier society is the Philatelic Society of London, which was founded so long ago as 1869, and has as its acting President H.R.H. the Prince of Wales. For over thirty years, without a break, this Society has held regular meetings during the winter months. Its membership comprises most of the leading collectors in Great Britain and her Colonies and many of the best-known foreign collectors. On the membership roll are three princes, several earls, baronets, judges, barristers, medical men, officers in the Army and Navy, and many well-known merchants. This society has published costly works on the stamps of Great Britain, of the Australian Colonies, of the British Colonies of North America, of the West Indies, of India and Ceylon, and of Africa. It publishes an excellently-got-up monthly journal of its own, which now claims shelf-room in the philatelic library for ten stately annual volumes. It has held two very successful International Philatelic Exhibitions, one opened by the late Duke of Edinburgh and the other by the Prince of Wales, then Duke of York. At its fortnightly meetings, papers are read and discussed on various matters relating to the hobby. Other meetings are held for the friendly exchange of duplicates.

In the provinces, the principal societies are those of Manchester and Birmingham. The Birmingham Society possesses a collection of its own, which it keeps up to date, as a work of reference for its members. Several of the societies hold periodical exhibitions, in which members compete for medals, and in many other ways they lay themselves out to encourage and promote the collection of postage stamps as a popular pastime.

The names of the various societies and the addresses of the secretaries are published at the commencement of each winter season in Stanley Gibbons' _Monthly Journal_.

Apart from their pleasant sociability, these societies are of immense help to the collector, especially to the beginner. At each meeting papers are read and discussed, in which the most experienced collectors retail, for the benefit of the less experienced, the result of their latest researches, and eminent specialists display their splendid and carefully-arranged collections for the inspection, edification, and enjoyment of their fellow-members. This continual meeting and comparing of notes, this concentration of study upon the issues of a particular country, gradually ripens even the veriest tyro into an advanced and experienced collector.

Under such conditions difficulties are cleared up, and the way made plain for wise and safe collecting. In too many lines of collecting the specialist carefully guards his knowledge for his own ultimate personal profit. The Philatelist, on the other hand, is more frequently than not generously and candidly helpful to his less advanced fellow-collector, especially if he happens to be a fellow-member of the same philatelic society.

XI.

The Literature of Stamps.

Few hobbies, if any, can boast of such a varied and extensive literature as stamp collecting. Expensive works have been published on the postal issues of most countries. They have been published in English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Danish, and Swedish. Those published in English alone would make a library of some hundreds of volumes.

From its foundation, in 1869, the Philatelic Society of London has set itself the task of studying and writing up the postal history of Great Britain and her Colonies. Towards the accomplishment of this great task, it has already presented its members with splendid monographs on the Australian Colonies, the Colonies of North America, of the West Indies, of India and Ceylon, two volumes on the British Colonies of Africa, a separate monograph on Tasmania, and last, and most ambitious of all, a massive and comprehensive history of the postal issues of Great Britain. All these works are expensively illustrated with a profusion of full-page plates and other illustrations, and they represent years of patient toil, far-reaching investigation, and untiring research. The _History of the Adhesive Postage Stamps of Europe_ has been written in two volumes by Mr. W. A. S. Westoby, and the same author, in collaboration with Judge Philbrick, some twenty years ago published a work on _The Postal and Telegraph Stamps of Great Britain_. Messrs. W. J. Hardy and E. D. Bacon, in a work entitled _The Stamp Collector_, have sketched the general history of postage stamps. Other works too numerous to mention here have been written from time to time for the edification of the stamp collector, and the list is continually being increased by the addition of even more important works.

One of the most interesting and comprehensive series of philatelic works, still in course of publication, was commenced by Messrs. Stanley Gibbons, Ltd., in 1893, in the form of philatelic handbooks. These handbooks are written by leading philatelic authorities. Each important country, _i.e._ important from the stamp collector's point of view, has a separate volume devoted to it, and into each handy volume is condensed as much as may be necessary to guide the advanced collector in specialising the postal issues of the country which he favours. There have already been published:--_Portuguese India_, by Mr. Gilbert Harrison and Lieut. F. H. Napier, R.N.; _South Australia_, by Lieut. F. H. Napier and Mr. Gordon Smith; _St. Vincent_, by Lieut. F. H. Napier and Mr. E. D. Bacon; _Shanghai_, by Mr. W. B. Thornhill; _Barbados_, by Mr. E. D. Bacon and Lieut. F. H. Napier; _Reprints and their Characteristics_, by Mr. E.D. Bacon; and _Grenada_, by Mr. E. D. Bacon and Lieut. F. H. Napier.

For the instruction of the beginner, Major Evans, R.A., has compiled an excellent glossary of philatelic terms, under the title of _Stamps and Stamp Collecting_; and there is, further, _A Colour Dictionary_, by Mr. B. W. Warhurst, designed to simplify the recognition and determination of the colours and shades of stamps--a by no means unimportant matter when the value of a stamp depends upon its shade.

But the most popular of all the philatelic publications are, of course, the monthly periodicals. The first stamp journal is said to have been _The Monthly Intelligence_, published at Manchester in 1862. It had but a short life of ten numbers out of the twelve required to complete Vol. I. But other journals followed in rapid succession, with more or less success, from year to year, till in 1893 a list of the various ventures in this line totalled up to nearly a couple of hundred. _The Stamp Collectors' Magazine_, started in 1863, may be said to survive in Alfred Smith and Son's _Monthly Circular; The Philatelic Record_, established in 1879, is now in its twenty-fourth yearly volume; Gibbons' _Monthly Journal_ is in its twelfth yearly volume; and _The London Philatelist_ is in its eleventh yearly volume; and all may be said to be going strong. How many ordinary periodicals can boast of equally robust lives? And yet some people are still to be found who speak in all seriousness of stamp collecting as only a passing craze.

Properly speaking, tradesmen's catalogues can scarcely be regarded as literature, and yet it would be very remiss on my part to close this chapter without a reference to the excellent catalogues with which stamp collectors are provided. What other hobby can boast of such comprehensive and detailed catalogues, giving the actual selling price of almost every item, and regularly revised and brought up to date from year to year? Messrs. Stanley Gibbons' Priced Catalogue is comprised in four volumes:--Part I., The British Empire, 244 pages; Part II., Foreign Countries, 458 pages; Part III., Local Postage Stamps, 122 pages; Part IV., Envelopes, Post Cards, and Wrappers, 317 pages; in all, 1,141 closely printed double-column pages of small type, with thousands of illustrations. This excellent catalogue is at once guide, philosopher, and friend to the stamp collector. Some people irreverently style it "the Philatelist's Bible." It does not profess to be anything more or less than a mere catalogue of goods for sale, but it is an open secret that it represents the combined work and the combined knowledge of the best Philatelists of the day, and that neither trouble nor expense is spared to include within its pages everything that a collector needs to know to enable him to gather his treasures together, and to arrange them in the best possible and most authoritative order.

Much the same story might be told of the literature of stamp collecting in other countries. In the United States, in France, and in Germany there are numbers of robust periodicals, some stretching back into the early days, and there are scores of volumes of philatelic lore, many of which find a well-deserved place on the shelves of English collectors.

As an indication of the value attached to philatelic literature, I may mention the fact that an English collector recently paid over £2,000 for a by no means complete collection of works relating to stamp collecting.

XII.

Stamps as Works of Art.

Some artists scout the idea of attempting anything that may be considered a work of art in the ridiculously limited space of a postage stamp. The restriction of a postage stamp when viewed alongside a canvas measuring several yards in length and height is probably hopeless enough. Nevertheless, many a stamp collector who is not devoid of art can find stamps which seem to him to be entitled to rank high even in the art world. In beauty of design, in the exquisite workmanship of the best modern steel engraving, aided by the most delicate machinery, and in unequalled printing, there are many gems within the very limited space of a postage stamp that excite and deserve, and not unfrequently win, the admiration of the most exacting critics. There are scores of little medallions, mostly on the postage stamps of foreign states, that surely would pass muster with an impartial judge of art. They are not the rarities of the stamp album. Some are even regarded as weeds in the philatelic garden. They are too often made to serve the revenue-producing necessities of the issuing state, and for that reason probably, more than for any other, they are made as attractive as modern art applied to stamp production can make them.

Great commercial countries, producing their postage stamps by hundreds of millions, are as contemptuous in their consideration of the art possibilities of a postage stamp as the cynical artist whose days and years are devoted to the disfigurement of wall space. This country has no cause to be proud of the designs or the printing of its postage stamps. The chief consideration seems to be a low contract price for the production of recognisable labels for the indication of the prepayment of postage. That is the commercial view. And yet there are some foolish people who believe that an artist who could design an effective and acceptable postage stamp for the British Empire would add materially to his own fame and to the art standard of the Empire itself.

Brother Jonathan across the sea is not unmindful of art in the production of his postage stamps, despite his commercial inclinations and training. From the first he has put his patriotism into his postage stamps. The portraits of the Presidents, from George Washington to Lincoln, and from Lincoln to McKinley, who have ruled, wisely and well, the destinies of the great Republic, Jonathan engraves in his best style, in his own official engraving establishment, and proudly places upon his postage stamps for the admiration of all good citizens and the edification and envy of the effete old countries beyond the seas.

We, with our richer memories and our stately galleries of great men who have ruled or governed or fought through the centuries, must be content with an Empire postage stamp that is little better, from an art point of view, than an ordinary beer label, and we must be content to be told that it is the penalty of success, of the dire necessity of long numbers, and of a needy Treasury that sorely hungers for still greater profits from the Post Office.

Meanwhile, small struggling states revel in beautiful stamps. The latest trend is in the direction of miniature portraiture. The Argentine Republic and Bolivia have in recent years issued some very fine examples in this direction. A very useful innovation is the addition of the name under the portrait. In this way thousands have been familiarised with the names and faces of men who before were almost unknown beyond their own country. Historic features, such as those of Columbus and Pizarro, have occasionally been added to the growingly interesting gallery of stamp portraits.

The recently issued New Zealand picture series, illustrating most effectively some of the choicest bits of colonial scenery, and some of the rarest birds of the colony, engraved by Messrs. Waterlow and Sons, afforded an interesting and successful experiment in an art direction. As a result it is said that a strong demand has been generated in other colonies for similarly beautiful and localised designs in preference to the stereotyped mediocrity supplied by the ordinary label process.

XIII.

Stamp Collecting as an Investment.

When a stamp collector is charged with being extravagant, with spending money lavishly and foolishly on a mere hobby, he may very justifiably reply that even his most extravagant spendings may be regarded as an investment.

The ordinary investor in, say, industrial securities is fairly content if he can, with a little risk, secure a steady six or seven per cent. If he launches out into more speculative shares, yielding higher rates of interest, he must be content to face a much greater risk of the capital invested. Now, the severest test of an investment is the yield of interest over a series of years covering periods of depression as well as periods of prosperity. The stamp collector who has used ordinary discretion in his purchases may confidently submit his investment to this test.

Some years ago, when I was writing in defence of stamp collecting as an investment, I received a very indignant letter from a collector who had made a large collection, complaining that he had then recently endeavoured to sell, but could get only a very small percentage of his outlay back, and that the very firms from whom he had bought most of his stamps scouted the idea of paying him anything like what they had cost him. He therefore ridiculed the idea that stamp collecting could be regarded as a safe investment, as in his case it had been a delusion and a snare. He was quite right, and it is still possible to make big collections--of, say, five thousand, ten thousand, and even larger--of stamps that are never likely to appreciate, and it is possible to buy those stamps at such a price that any attempt to realise even a small percentage of the original outlay must result in a woeful eye-opener.