The palm of beauty will be a.s.signed _nem. con._ to the current pair of Nova Scotia types. There are three of each, one representing the full front bust of our gracious Queen in state attire; the other Her Majesty's profile: the former in _scarlet_, _green_, and _black_; the latter in _lilac_, _blue_, and _black_. Of these the pair of _black_ are by far the most effective. One of them is more or less perfectly rendered by the Newfoundland 12 cents, and the South Australian two shilling, and fourpenny stamps; the other by the 24 cents of the former colony.

There are numerous other exquisite specimens of the engraver's art to be found in a collection of postage stamps. The French republics, the Greek Mercuries, the Russian and Polish adhesives, and the Hong Kongs are admirable.

The current Saxons, Bavarians, all the Portuguese, and the lately emitted Heligolands are the best examples of the relief or cameo style: engravings of these give but a poor idea of the original. The same method of type is much less effective in the Prussians, Oldenburgs, Schleswigs and Holsteins; but radiates in full effulgence in the faultless envelopes of our own country, in those of Baden, Hanover, and the extinct Saxons and Prussians; with our colonials of Ceylon and the Mauritius.

The American Bank Note Company, we must perforce, most unpatriotically, admit to be unrivalled in plain engraving; of which the Nova Scotias, and some others noted above are instances: the trio of large newspaper and periodical labels issued last year in the United States, which bear the profiles of Washington, Franklin, and Lincoln respectively, and the Central-Fair locals too, are wellnigh perfection. The symbolical Newfoundlands are equally noteworthy.

To the same, or a branch firm, we believe ourselves indebted for the lovely landscapes of Guatemala, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Salvador.

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The swans of Western Australia, repeated in such variety of colour, ever attract attention; as do the keys of Bremen, the castles of Hamburg, the compounds of mysterious Bergedorf, the eagles of Lubeck, the quaint emissions of the Argentine Confederation, and the crossed keys and tiara of the Papal States, after the eye is wearied by the incessant array of heads and armorial bearings exhibited by the majority of stamp-emitting countries.

The adhesives of the kingdoms once composing the Two Sicilies are both equally remarkable; that of Naples for its singularity, that of Sicily from its peculiar boldness of design and rich colouring.

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The first stamps of Luxembourg, those of the Dutch East Indies, and Holland, exhibit marvellous variations in the portraiture of one and the same individual sovereign.

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The marketable value of a postage stamp for collections does not, however, by any means, depend upon its beauty or deformity. The greater portion of the more attractive in appearance are purchasable at a very low figure: the most beautiful of all, the Nova Scotian black profile, can be had at its natal place for one cent, or an English halfpenny. The circular specimen of meagre ugliness below may be worth a couple of sovereigns, even when cancelled; a moderately well-stored juvenile alb.u.m could be purchased for the price of an unused specimen, were such existing, which we strongly doubt. That of Romagna and the early Van Diemen's Land are little better.

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Some of the frightful libels on the august countenances of the Emperor Napoleon, the Queen of Spain, and our own Sovereign, fetch also exorbitant fancy prices. The French affair goes by the name of the Cayenne essay; possibly because its concoctor was, or at least, deserved to be, transported thither for his impudence. The Queens' profiles on their colonial stamps for the Philippines and the Mauritius are mere caricatures.

Slight improvement on the British Guiana stamp is made by some of the Honolulu emissions; also the local Bavarian; the Bollo Straordinario of Tuscany; the 10 and 15 centimes a percevoir of France; and the Land Post trio of Baden. The latter have the advantage of being printed on yellow paper.

Some of the Sandwich Islands stamps, nevertheless, far outstrip the productions of some countries that were highly civilized long ere the full dress of one of their natives consisted of aught save a few beads.

Portraits of the great, the late, and the regnant kings bearing the joint name of Kamehameha exist on stamps: the one given does but scant justice to its chastely designed original.

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The French labels just alluded to are placed by the postal authorities on insufficiently paid letters. They are only surrept.i.tiously purchasable at the post-offices, not being for public use; but this bit of red-tapeism is easily evaded for a con-sid-er-ation. Of similar character are the Bavarian before-mentioned, and the Italian segnata.s.sa, figured above. A collector in Leghorn, unable to procure one of these latter, wrote a letter to himself without stamping it, expecting one of the then new labels to be affixed before delivery. Such was the case; but the letter lying on the hall-table, a friend of ours innocently abstracted the stamp and inclosed it to ourselves as the last new postal curiosity.

Besides such slightly abnormal deviations from the general run of postage stamps, may be enumerated the "too late" label formerly used by the colony of Victoria, now particularly _recherche_ by philatelists, especially in an uncancelled state. This individual is unique in its application; but there are several impressions exclusively devoted to the _registration_ of letters. Those of Victoria, New South Wales, and Queensland (like the cut, but the word "registered" subst.i.tuted for the value) are well known; and the recently emitted Prussians, one of which is given on the next page, are of somewhat kindred nature.

The quaint centre device is an offshoot from that fertile field for philatelists, New Granada, alias the United States of Columbia; the R standing for _registrados_ (registered).

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Besides strictly governmental issues, many private firms and individuals have been tacitly allowed to issue postage stamps, more or less partaking of the character of regular official emanations. Such are those of the United States, amounting to upwards of five hundred; some of which, though catalogued, never did duty, and were only concocted for sale. They are now, we believe, all extinct. Some of them are represented on previous pages. The City of Hamburg has produced upwards of a hundred, of which the greater part are impostors. An unimpeached one will be found depicted farther on.

The pages devoted to the U. S. locals by those who collect them, present a most varied and extraordinary appearance, from the endless varieties of device and colour employed. Profiles, busts, figures of men and animals, numerals, plain inscriptions, symbolical and allegorical representations meet the eye, varied with all the colours in and out of the rainbow.

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Dresden, Breslau, Montreal, Shanghai, Constantinople, Edinburgh, Glasgow, and London, also contribute their quota towards the ranks of locals. These are all emissions of private firms: those of the third place mentioned are more than doubtful; the latter are now prohibited by law.

To these may be added those of Throndhjems (Drontheim), Tammerfors, Helsingfors, with the Levant, Danubian, and Pacific Steam Companies. The legally authorised issues of Malta, the Danish West Indies, &c. and the very low values of continental stamps, may be likewise termed locals; not being available out of their own birthplace. The La Guairas, one of which is figured at page 754, must not be omitted from the list.

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Still farther than the unaccredited locals from a strictly legitimate postal collection are the numerous labels issued by the several railroads. They amount to a considerable number altogether, ranging in value from one farthing to five shillings.

Many of the foreign telegraph stamps are extremely tasty, especially the Belgian and Spanish: these, however, are not usually admitted into collections. Still less are our own now disused "Customs" labels, which far exceed the postals in beauty; as do our receipt, bill, and legal adhesives, some of which are as high as 5_l._ or more in value.

The "needle-gun" war of 1866 introduced quite a novel genus of postage envelopes. They were employed in Prussia, Saxony, &c.; some for the use of civilians writing to their friends or relatives at camp; others for the exclusive service of the military. Some Brazilian youths, of more ingenuity than probity, concocted an imitation of these, and pa.s.sed them off _at a price_ among dealers and amateurs, as being employed for a similar purpose in the conflict between the Brazilians and Paraguayans.

The highest priced postage stamps were the once rare Pony Expresses (see page 753), one of which cost 4 dollars (16_s._ 8_d._) The 2 dollar one ranks next; then the five shilling of New South Wales, the Mauritius, and our own; the 96 cents of Hong Kong, the 8 reales of Mexico, the 90 cents of the United States, the 1 scudo of Rome, and the 25 piastres of Turkey. The Ceylons are the most numerous in varieties of value, having no fewer than thirteen, from one halfpenny to two shillings. From four to six is the average number of monetary denominations for the same country. Some have more, as Hong Kong, which counts ten. The United States have the same number, besides four additional values in envelopes. New South Wales has eight, and Victoria nine values. France has nine at present, but a higher priced stamp is announced. Liberia, Turk's Island, and British Honduras have only three; Grenada, Nicaragua, British Columbia, and Antigua, issue but two; and Vancouver's Island, Malta, Sierra Leone, and Corrientes, only one. The last-named locality, being a small province of the Argentine Republic, has issued the same die for two several values. It was originally marked _un real_, but this was subsequently erased, no designation of value appearing. Three centavos was then its price. It is impressed in _black_, on _blue_, as well as _green_ paper. Like the New Caledonian, it was printed in sheets from a single block, each impression slightly differing.

This is one of the few exceptions to the rule of postage stamps bearing a facial value. The earlier issues of the Mauritius, Trinidad, and Barbadoes partake of the same defect, being distinguishable by colour only. The Ionian Islanders were in a like category: but the sole existing specimens of this inconvenience are the halfpenny and penny Barbadians, and the whole set of St. Lucias.

The result of this is, that the values of more than one of the early stamps of the Mauritius are still a subject of debate among some erudite philatelists. One of these stamps is sometimes found endorsed with "eightpence" in black letters, another with "fourpence." This clumsy method is even yet being adopted in a few instances, we suppose to save the expense of a new plate. The original sixpenny of St. Helena is printed in three different colours besides its own _blue_, and does duty in _green_, _carmine_, and _red_, cruelly tattooed with printed characters according to the stated value. The ninepenny of South Australia, doffing its modest hue for a bright orange, hand-stamped with black, is worth a penny more than heretofore. In like manner, the Italian government, wishing to put the screw on its faithful subjects, raised the tariff on home letters from 15 to 20 centesimi, and barred out the original value. The provisional East Indian may be joined to this uncomely group of disfigured ident.i.ties, as also the newly emitted set for Singapore.

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The impressions of Nevis; those now current of the Cape of Good Hope; and what are termed the Sydney stamps of New South Wales, are elegantly symbolical of their respective localities.

The adhesives of British Columbia, Sierra Leone, and British Honduras, claim a very high rank for elegance of design and correctness of execution among our colonials. The extinct shilling stamp of Victoria may worthily dispute with its lately superseded sixpenny the unenviable distinction of ugliness.

Excluding the railway stamps, and the United States newspaper labels, Liberia produces the largest stamps; Mecklenberg Schwerin and Brunswick the smallest. The latter two countries present the singularity of allowing the four small stamps to be used singly or in combination.

The inscriptions on stamps being of course in the language of their native country, many impressions necessarily bear a particularly quaint appearance; as those of Egypt, Turkey, Cashmeer, Shanghai, Poland, Moldavia (see page 765), and Servia (see p. 756). The early emission of the Argentine Confederation is also an oddity.

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The shapes of postage stamps present but little variation; a very large majority being more or less unequally sided rectangles. Few are perfectly square. The set of Bergedorf, and the disused Danish and Thurn and Taxis adhesives are instances, the former showing the further peculiarity of different sizes in regular gradation according to value.

The impressions run sometimes on upright, sometimes on oblong rectangles. The narrowest of the latter is one of those of Wells, Fargo, and Co.; of the former, a very rare English essay, too elaborate for description.

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Some few are octagonal, more or less irregular; some oval; some perfectly round; some indescribable, as the one-and-ninepenny Ceylon; and the ninepenny envelope of the Mauritius. The earlier emissions of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick were printed in such a way as to render the stamp lozenge-shaped.

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A small minority are triangular; the superseded stamps of the Cape of Good Hope, a solitary type of Newfoundland, and one of New Granada, are the only ones we can recollect ever seeing, except a black Austrian newspaper adhesive. The Langton local is unique in form.

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Many stamps have been issued exclusively for newspapers, _feuilletons_, and printed matter in general, such as some Austrian and Venetian impressions. The B. G. and ta.s.sa gazzette of Modena, the 6 c. and 9 centesimi of Parma, and others, were of like nature; as are the lower priced French, Italians, and Belgians. That of Frankfort is not adhesive, but hand-stamped, like those on our own newspapers, and is by some considered inadmissible in strictly postal collections.

The _returned letter_ stamps must not pa.s.s unmentioned. That of Wurtemberg was long "alone in its glory;" but Munich, Augsburg, Nuremberg, and other Bavarian cities, have lately adopted them. Those forming the seal on returned letters in our own country are collected by some amateurs.

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The enormous acc.u.mulation of proofs and essays, all which are ignored by many philatelists, are not to be lightly rejected. The former are certainly _articles de luxe_ or _fantaisie_, being simply veritable stamps printed in abnormal colours, as some of the United States, &c. Of the latter are three sorts--those by authorisation; those proposed by enterprising individuals to various governments; and those invented for sale to entrap the unwary.