down, but that was all. Said fate was against him, and had saved the
man he thought to hang in his stead, and he knew how it must end, and
couldn’t wait any longer. I cautioned him, of course—told him to sleep
on it before he said anything; but make a statement he would. The short
of it all is, that the idea of murdering the old lady for her money
had come into his mind in a flash when he saw that poor drunken fool
exhibiting his knife in the tavern. He followed him, and picked his
pocket of the knife, and then hung about the house, meaning to get
in after dark. Then he saw the girl come out and go off, leaving the
door closed but not latched, the careless hussy! Then in slips the
gentleman, and does what he’d made up his mind to—for you see the old
woman knew him well, so he couldn’t afford to leave her alive—gets the
cash, and slips out. All in gold it was, two hundred and fifty pounds.
When he heard that Harden couldn’t be found, he got uneasy in his mind,
and has been getting worse ever since, though he did well enough in
trade with the money. Seems he considered he wasn’t safe until some one
had been hanged. So, when he recognised Harden, he was naturally down
on him at once, and was intensely eager to get him convicted—which I
noticed myself, sir, as of course you did, and thought it queer too,
I don’t doubt. He took too much pains, you see—he must employ you to
make certain, instead of leaving it to us; whereas if he hadn’t come to
you, your evidence would never have been given, and I think you’ll say
nothing could have saved the prisoner.’
It was true enough. The wretched man had insured the failure of his own
fiendish design by employing me, of all the solicitors to whom he might
have gone!
I learned next morning, how Harden, after trying in vain to light his
pipe on that memorable evening, had wandered for hours through the
hard-hearted streets, until at daybreak he had found himself in the
docks, looking at a large ship preparing to drop down the river with
the tide. How he had managed to slip aboard unseen and stow himself
away in the hold, with some idea of bettering his not over-bright
fortunes in foreign parts. How he had supported his life in the hold
with stray fragments of biscuit, which he happened to have in his
pockets, until, after a day or two of weary beating about against
baffling winds, when they were out in mid-channel, the usual search for
stowaways had unearthed him. How the captain, after giving him plenty
of strong language and rope’s-end, had at length agreed to allow him
to work as a sailor on board the vessel. How on landing at Sydney he
had gone into the interior, taken service with his present master—under
another name than his own, wishing to disconnect himself entirely with
his former life—and by honestly doing his duty had attained his present
position.
By the light of this narrative, that which had puzzled me became
perfectly clear—namely, how it was that he had contrived not only to
get so entirely lost in spite of the hue and cry after him, but also to
remain in ignorance of his aunt’s fate.
My client was tried, convicted, and executed in due course; his plea of
guilty and voluntary surrender having no weight against the cruel and
cowardly attempt to put an innocent man in his place.
When I last saw John Harden, he was married to a serious lady, who had
been his late master’s housekeeper, and was possessor of a prosperous
general shop in a country village, stocked by means of the money which
Mr Slocum had generously left him.
COIN TREASURES.
Man is a collecting animal. It would be absurd to ask what he collects;
more to the point would it be to ask what he does _not_ collect.
Books, pictures, marbles, china, precious stones, hats, gloves, pipes,
walking-sticks, prints, book-plates, monograms, postage-stamps,
hangmen’s ropes; the list might be increased indefinitely.
What is it that impels us to heap up such treasures? We say ‘us,’
because we are convinced that few escape untouched by the disease. It
may be dormant; it may possibly never show itself; but it is there, and
only wants a favourable conjunction of circumstances to bring it to
life.
Of all the forms of the collecting mania, few have been so long in
existence as that of coins, and few seize us so soon. The articles are
portable, nice to look at, and of some intrinsic value. Every one knows
what a coin is, and when a lad happens to get hold of one struck, say,
two hundred years ago, he naturally is impressed by the fact. Every one
knows how easily the very young and the ignorant are taken by the mere
age of an article. The writer dates his acquaintance with numismatics
(the history of coins) from his receiving in some change a half-crown
of Charles II. when he was eleven years old. It was worn very much, but
it was two hundred years old, and that was enough. After that, a good
deal of pocket-money went in exchange for sundry copper, brass, and
silver coins, with the usual result. The collection was discovered to
be rubbish; but experience had been gained, and that, as is well known,
must be bought.
The numismatist can head his list of devotees by the illustrious name
of Petrarch, who made a collection of Roman coins to illustrate the
history of the Empire. He was followed by Alfonso of Aragon; Pope
Eugenius IV.; Cosmo de’ Medici; Matthias Corvinus, king of Hungary;
the Emperor Maximilian I. The man dear to all book-lovers, Grolier,
had his cabinet of medals; Politian was the first to study them with
reference to their historical value. Gorlaeus succeeded him. Early in
the sixteenth century, Goltzius the engraver travelled over Europe
in search of coins, and reported the existence of about one thousand
cabinets. Our own collections appear to have begun with Camden; he was
followed by Sir Robert Cotton, Laud, the Earl of Arundel, both the
Charleses, the Duke of Buckingham, and Dr Mead in the early part of
last century. Later on, we come to the celebrated William Hunter—not
to be confounded with his still greater brother, John—who left to
the university of Glasgow his magnificent collection of Greek coins.
Archbishop Wake, Dr Barton, Dr Brown, and Dr Rawlinson formed cabinets
of considerable extent and value, all of which found a resting-place in
the colleges of Oxford. All these, however, were surpassed by Richard
Payne-Knight, who was born in the middle of the last century, and
formed the finest collection of Greek coins and bronzes that had ever
been brought together. It was valued at fifty thousand pounds, and he
left it to the nation. The catalogue drawn up by himself was published
in 1830 by the Trustees of the British Museum.
At the date of this magnificent legacy, our national collection of
coins was of no importance; but since then, by purchase and bequest,
it has so greatly increased its stores, that it undoubtedly stands on
an equality with the French national collection, long above rivalry.
Donations during the lifetime of the owner, too, are not unknown. In
1861, Mr De Salis made the nation a present of his extensive cabinet of
Roman coins. In 1864, Mr E. Wigan called one morning on Mr Vaux, the
keeper of the coins and medals, and producing a case, told him that was
his cabinet of Roman gold medals. Would he be good enough to examine it
carefully, and choose for the Museum what he thought best? Needless to
say, no scruples were made by the head of the department; consultations
were held with the staff, with the result that two hundred and
ninety-one were chosen, representing a value, at a modest computation,
of nearly four thousand pounds. In 1866, Mr James Woodhouse of Corfu
left to the nation five thousand six hundred and seventy-four specimens
of Greek coins, mostly in the finest preservation; of these, one
hundred and one were gold, two thousand three hundred and eighty-seven
silver, three thousand one hundred and twenty-eight copper, and
fifty-eight lead. That year was particularly fruitful in acquisitions,
for no fewer than eleven thousand five hundred and thirty-two coins
were placed in the national cabinets.
But it is impossible that mere donations could be depended on. In
every sale, the British Museum is a formidable competitor, and if, as
not unfrequently happens, it is outbidden by a private collector, it
has the advantage of an institution over a person, in that it lives
longer, and often has the opportunity of acquiring what it wants at
the dispersal of the cabinet of its rival. One of the most important
purchases ever made was that of the collection of the Duc de Blacas
in 1867, for which government got a vote of forty-five thousand seven
hundred and twenty-one pounds. Amongst its treasures were some two
thousand Greek and Roman coins, chiefly gold.
All good and rare specimens gravitate naturally to the chief museums
of Europe, which would thus stand in the way of a private individual
forming a cabinet, were it not for the fact, that finds are continually
taking place, either unexpectedly or in consequence of excavations in
ancient countries. Only the other day, we noticed the sale of a large
lot of medieval coins at Paris, which had been discovered when pulling
down some ancient buildings. During the German excavations at Olympia,
extending over six years, some six thousand pieces of all ages from
500 B.C. to 600 A.D. were brought to light. These, however, became the
property of the Greek government, and are not likely to come into the
market. Some of the finds are most extraordinary. In 1818 were fished
up out of the river Tigris two large silver coins of Geta, king of
the Edoni; a Thracian people of whom we know only the name, and whose
king’s name is all that we have to tell us of his existence. These are
now in the British Museum, and are especially interesting as being
the earliest pieces we have stamped with a monarch’s name. Their date
is placed prior to 480 B.C. We have seen a coin of Philip Aridæus,
successor of Alexander the Great, struck at Mitylene, which was found
in the roots of a tree which was being grubbed up in a park in Suffolk.
The incident was inquired into at the time, and no doubt seems to have
arisen as to the fact of its having been found as alleged. Nearly
twenty years ago, General Philips discovered at Peshawur twenty milled
sixpences of Elizabeth. There was a tradition in the place that an
Englishman had been murdered there a very long time before, and the
tomb was shown. It is naturally inferred, therefore, that the coins had
belonged to him, or how else explain the find? When the railway was
being made from Smyrna to Aidin, a few dozen very ancient coins were
turned up, which were all sold at once at a few shillings each; but the
dealers hearing of this, soon appeared on the spot, and the original
buyers had the satisfaction of reselling the coins at four or five
pounds apiece.
Smyrna is, as the most important city of Asia Minor, naturally the
headquarters of the dealers in Greek antiquities. Mr Whittall, a
well-known merchant there, had formed a very fine collection of coins
which was dispersed in London in 1867, and fetched two thousand seven
hundred and twenty-nine pounds. When excavating at the base of the
colossal statue of Athena, in her temple at Priene, Mr Clarke found
five tetradrachms of Orophernes, supposed to be the one who was made
king of Cappadocia by Demetrius in 158 B.C. These were absolutely
unique. In Cyprus, some years ago, the British consul at Larnaca
obtained a large hoard, which had been discovered during some building
operations. This was a particularly rich find, as amongst them happened
to be no fewer than thirty-four undescribed pieces of Philip, Alexander
the Great, and Philip Aridæus. Mr Wood, when excavating on the site
of the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, came upon a lot of more than two
thousand coins of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. In 1876,
some workmen, when digging, came upon a vase containing, amongst
other relics of antiquity, some fifty electrum staters of Cyzicus and
Lampsacus, all of the end of the fifth century B.C. Only a few years
ago, in that most out-of-the-way part of Central Asia, more than a
hundred miles beyond the Oxus, was discovered a hoard of coins chiefly
of the Seleucidæ, dating from the third century B.C.—showing how far,
even in those early days, trade had been carried. A few of them, too,
were unknown pieces of Alexander the Great. Without being prepared to
go into exact particulars, we should imagine that a find in 1877 of
twenty-nine thousand eight hundred and two Roman coins in two vases in
Blackmoor Park, Hampshire, was one of the most extensive ever known.
That coins are interesting, as giving us portraits of those who have
made some show in the world, is undoubted. It is equally true that by
their means we are made acquainted with the existence of kings and
kingdoms of whom history has left no records. The fact of a Greek
kingdom of Bactria occupying that even yet comparatively unexplored
region, half-way between the Caspian and the Himalaya, was revealed to
the world only some fifty years ago by the finding of coins bearing
portraits and legends of the Greek-speaking rulers. An extremely large
silver piece in the British Museum, supposed to belong to a period
anterior to 480 B.C. and struck by the Odomanti of Thrace, a tribe of
whom we know nothing, was found at Ishtib. In the same collection is
a large silver coin of the Orrescii, an unknown Macedonian people,
which was found in Egypt, along with a very early drachma of Terone,
and a large decadrachm of Derronikos, a king unknown to history. These
are supposed to have been carried to Egypt by some of the soldiers of
Xerxes, during their retreat from Greece after the battle of Platæa.
The greatest sale of coins by public auction, we should imagine,
was that of Lord Northwick, in December 1859, and April 1860. The
former consisted of Greek coins only, and produced eight thousand
five hundred and sixty-eight pounds; the latter, of Roman and later
pieces, fetched three thousand three hundred and twenty pounds. The
Greek coins were especially fine and rare, and some of them unique.
One, a large piece of Camarina, bearing as reverse a nymph carried by
a swan, a specimen of highest Greek art, went for fifty-two pounds to
the British Museum. A splendid piece of Agrigentum, with reverse of the
monster Scylla, fetched one hundred and fifty-nine pounds. A coin of
Cleopatra, queen of Syria, daughter of Ptolemy VI. of Egypt, and wife
successively of Alexander I., Demetrius II., and Antiochus VII., and
mother of Seleucus V., and the sixth and seventh Antiochi—all kings
of Syria—was bought by the British Museum for two hundred and forty
pounds. It is said to be the only one known. Altogether our national
collection obtained one hundred specimens at a cost of nine hundred
pounds. Lord Northwick had lived to a great age; but up to the last
he preserved his faculties, and indulged his passion for ancient art
by buying and exchanging objects. His pictures, statuary, everything,
in fact, came to the hammer after his death. The years between
1790 and 1800 were spent by him in Italy, and he gained his early
initiation into antiquities under the eye of Sir William Hamilton,
the well-known ambassador at Naples. His first purchase is said to
have been an after-dinner frolic in the shape of eight pounds for a
bag of Roman brass coins. He and Payne-Knight bought and divided the
fine collections of Prince Torremuzza and Sir Robert Ainslie—for the
latter of which they gave eight thousand pounds. Since his lordship’s
sale, there has been nothing to approach it. Fine though small cabinets
have not been wanting, however, and the enthusiast can always find
something with which to feed his passion. At Huxtable’s sale, in 1859,
the collection fetched an unusually large sum. Hobler’s Roman cabinet
of brass coins was sold for one thousand seven hundred and fifty-nine
pounds; Merlin’s, containing one hundred and forty-one lots of Greek
and Roman, produced eight hundred and seventy-eight pounds; Sheppard’s
Greek, nineteen hundred pounds; Huber’s, containing some hundreds of
unpublished Greek, three thousand; Ivanoff’s, three thousand and eight
pounds; Bowen, one thousand five hundred and fifty-three pounds; Brown,
three thousand and twelve pounds; Sambon, three thousand one hundred
and forty-eight pounds; Exereunetes, containing several supposed to be
unique, one thousand four hundred and twenty-one. The Sambon sale is
memorable for the fact that a brass medallion of Geta, of the intrinsic
value of twopence, was knocked down at five hundred and five pounds!
Every one who has read the _Antiquary_, whether bibliomaniac or not,
can enjoy the glowing description by Monkbarns: ‘Snuffy Davie bought
the _Game of Chess_, 1474, the first book ever printed in England, from
a stall in Holland, for about two groschen, or twopence of our money.
He sold it to Osborne for twenty pounds and as many books as came to
twenty pounds more. Osborne resold this inimitable windfall to Dr Askew
for sixty guineas. At Dr Askew’s sale, this inestimable treasure blazed
forth in its full value, and was purchased by royalty itself for one
hundred and seventy pounds.—Could a copy now occur,’ he ejaculated with
a deep sigh and lifted-up hands—‘what would be its ransom!’
The progress of intelligence has affected coins in these days no less
than books. It is only in the very out-of-the-way places that coins
are to be picked up for a song. The chief hunting-ground, Asia Minor,
is well looked after by the dealers, and the private collector has, of
course, to pay them their profit. The increase in value may be gauged
by the following instance: A gold coin of Mithridates, the size of our
half-sovereign, fetched twenty-five guineas in 1777. In 1817 it came
to the hammer, and was knocked down at eighty pounds to a well-known
collector. Unfortunately for him, a duplicate soon afterwards appeared
in a sale, and he had to pay ninety pounds for that. Later on still,
a third turned up, and that fell to his bid at a hundred pounds. Yet
a fourth came to light in 1840. The owner of the three bid up to a
hundred and ten pounds, but had to give in to a bid of a hundred and
thirteen pounds from a rival. Fancy his feelings! The rare brass
medallions of Commodus, intrinsic value twopence or threepence, fetch
up to thirty pounds, and the large pieces of Syracuse, the finest coins
perhaps that we know of, regularly run up to fifty and sixty pounds.
It is evident, therefore, that it is not every one who can indulge the
passion for coin-collecting. At a little expense, however, electrotypes
which are absolute facsimiles can be obtained from the British Museum,
and this fact, which is not generally known, should result in the
spread of a knowledge of Greek art; for it must not be forgotten that
in the early coinage of the Greek race the progress of art can be
traced as completely as in any now existing remains.
MY FELLOW-PASSENGER.
IN TWO CHAPTERS.—CHAPTER I.
To say that the real zest of an Englishman’s delight in England and
English home-life is only attained after residence or travel in other
countries, is to quote something like a truism. To this influence at
least was owing in great measure the feeling of quite indescribable
pleasure with which, after a not altogether successful six months of
big-game hunting in the interior of Africa—a very far-away country
indeed in those days, when no cable communication existed with
England—I found myself on board the good ship _Balbriggan Castle_
(Captain Trossach), as she steamed slowly out of the Cape Town Docks
on a lovely June evening in 187-, homeward bound. I had come from one
of the eastern ports of the colony in sole occupation of a cabin;
and though I knew we had taken on board a large number of passengers
that afternoon, I was not a little put out to find, on going below,
that the berth above mine had been filled, and that the inestimable
blessing of solitude was to be denied me for the next twenty days
or so. However, there was no help for it; and with the best grace I
could command, I answered my fellow-traveller’s courteous expressions
of regret with a hope that the voyage would be a pleasant one. The
new-comer was a tall, slightly-built, and strikingly handsome man, of
about thirty, remarkable for a slow deliberative manner of speech, with
which an occasional nervous movement of the features seemed oddly at
variance. On a travelling-bag, as to the exact disposition of which he
was especially solicitous, I caught sight of the letters P. R. in big
white capitals. These being my own initials, the coincidence, though
commonplace enough, furnished a topic of small-talk which sufficed to
fill up the short time intervening before dinner, and ended, naturally
enough, in the discovery of my new friend’s name—Paul Raynor—given, as
I afterwards remembered, with some little hesitation, but producing a
much finer effect of sound than my own unmelodious Peter Rodd.
At dinner, I found my place laid opposite to Raynor; and thus,
notwithstanding the claims of an excellent appetite and the desire
to take stock of other passengers, I had again occasion to observe
the painful twitching of the fine features, recurring with increased
frequency as he, too, looked round at those about him, and seemed
to scan each in turn with more than ordinary deliberation. The man
interested me greatly; and as I listened to his conversation with some
Englishmen near, and noted the dry humour with which he hit off the
peculiarities of the worthy colonists we were leaving behind, I saw at
once that here at least was promise of relief to the monotony of the
voyage, of which I should be constantly able to avail myself.
A sea like glass, and a temperature of unusual mildness for a June
evening in those latitudes, drew every one on deck, and ensconcing
myself in a pleasant corner just behind the too often violated
legend, ‘No smoking abaft the companion,’ I proceeded to illuminate
a mild Havana cigar, when I was joined by Raynor, with whom, after
a good-humoured joke anent my unsuccessful attempt to obtain that
solitude which the cabin could no longer afford, I renewed our
conversation of the afternoon, passing from generalities to more
personal matters, and sowing in a few hours the seeds of a friendship
destined to grow and ripen with that marvellous rapidity only to be
attained by the forcing process of life on board a passenger-ship.
Nothing could exceed the frankness of Raynor’s own story, as he told
it me in brief before we turned in that night. One of a large family
of sons, he had conceived an unconquerable dislike to the profession
of teaching, to which, in lieu of one of a more lucrative nature,
he had found himself compelled to turn. The suggestion of a friend,
that he should try his luck in the colonies, was hardly made before
it was acted upon; and a few weeks found him in an up-country town
at the Cape, where his letters of introduction speedily brought him
employment in a well-known and respected house of business. Here he
rose rapidly; and having, by care and occasional discreet speculation,
saved a few hundreds, was now on his way home, with four months’ leave
of absence, professedly as a holiday trip, but really, as he admitted
to me, to see what chances presented themselves of investing his small
capital and procuring permanent employment in England. In answer to my
question, whether his absence after so short a time of service might
not conceivably affect his prospects in the firm, he replied, that his
intention of remaining at home had not been communicated to any one;
and that, should no suitable opening offer in England, he would, upon
returning to the colony, resume his former position with Messrs ——,
whose word to that effect had been given.
‘Do you know any one on board?’ said I carelessly, when his short
narration was over, and after I had in turn imparted to him a few dry
and unrefreshing facts as to my own humble personality.
‘Why do you ask?’
I was taken aback at the sharp, almost angry voice in which the words
were uttered; but, strong in the harmless nature of my question, I
replied: ‘Because I thought I saw a man at the next table to ours at
dinner trying to catch your eye, as if he knew you.’
‘Daresay he did. One gets to know such an unnecessary lot of skunks in
the colonies!’ Uttering these remarkable words hurriedly and in a tone
of intense irritation, Paul Raynor strode away, and I saw him no more
that night.
* * * * *