Edward J. Nankivell

“ What more do we want of a hobby? We cannot ensure, even for the British Empire, an eternity of durability: nations decay and fashions change. Some day even stamp collecting may be superseded by a more engrossing hobby. The indications, however, are all in favour of its growing hold upon its universal public. The wealth invested in it is immense, its trading interests are prosperous and international, and no fear of changing fashion disturbs either dealer or collector. ”

“ Then, again, an ever-increasing supply of new issues from one or other of the many groups of stamp-issuing countries periodically revives the interest of the flagging collector, and binds him afresh to the hobby of his choice. Old, seasoned collectors, whose interest once set never flags from youth to age, relegate new issues to a back seat. They find more than enough to engage their lifelong devotion in the grand old issues of the early settlements. But the collector of modern [13] issues who cannot afford to indulge in the great rarities, finds new issues a source of perpetual enjoyment. ”

“ Of all pastimes, and of all the forms of recreation, not one can claim more lifelong devotees than this same stamp collecting. And where is another pastime with such international ramifications? In every civilised country, in every city, and in every town of any importance, the wide world over, thoughtful men and women are to be found formed into sociable groups, or societies, quietly and pleasantly enjoying themselves in the harmless and enduring pursuit of stamp collecting. ”

“ The great stamp collections of to-day are in a few hands, and have been built up by lavish wealth and lavish industry. Wealth alone will not suffice to gather together a really great philatelic collection. There must be patient research, and there can be no research apart from that full knowledge which comes only to the industrious and painstaking Philatelist. The gem that is wanted to complete the finest page in the rich man's collection has not unfrequently to be personally sought for in the byways, the alleys, and lanes of stamp collecting ”

“ Wiser and keener Philatelists nowadays retain their general collections, so far as they have gone with them, and upon their basis give play to their specialist inclinations. That is to say, they single out a country, and work at that exclusively on specialist lines; and when they tire of that country, or exhaust it so far as their means allow, they have in their general collection the nucleus of another country with which to build up another specialist collection. On this plan a collector can always be working in sympathy and on the lines of the fashionable country of the day. ”

“ We are all—Governments, people, and weather—going to the bad as fast as we can go, according to the croakers, the wiseacres, and the self-appointed prophets. Nevertheless, stamp collecting has survived the sneers and the evil prophecies of forty years, and so far as human foresight can penetrate the future, it seems likely to survive for many a generation yet.
And why not? In the busy, contentious bustle of the competition of the day, the brain, strained too often to its utmost tension, demands the relaxation of some absorbing, pleasure-yielding hobby. ”

“ 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 [53] 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. ”

“ To-day it is the fashion to look back with regret on those lost opportunities, and to nurse the belief that such opportunities are never likely to return. But experience shows that in every decade of stamp collecting the common stamp of to-day may be the rarity of to-morrow. In many a series of stamps some one of the lot from some cause or another gets scarce, and the price appreciates from year to year till the original price paid for the stamp in pence is represented by pounds. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Local attempts at engraving in some of our own early colonial settlements were of the crudest possible description, and yet they are, because of their very crudeness, far more interesting than the finished product supplied by firms at home, for the local effort truly represented the country of its issue in the art of stamp production. The amusingly crude attempts which the engravers of Victoria have made from time to time, during the last fifty years, to give us a passable portrait of Her late Majesty Queen Victoria, have no equal for variety. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Fashions change from one line of collecting to another without in the slightest degree affecting the stability or popularity of collecting as a whole. Precious stones and pearls minister to the pride of the individual, and stamps to his pleasure; and each has its own strong and unshakable hold upon the devotees of fashion and pleasure. ”

“ Stamp collectors may fairly claim that their hobby serves the double purpose of a pastime and a recreation. As a pastime, it certainly makes time pass most agreeably; for the true student of the postal issues of the world, it turns work into a pastime. As a recreation, it is of such an engrossing character that it may be relied upon to afford the pleasant diversion from business worries that so many tired mental workers need nowadays. ”

“ It is true it may be contended that all collectors do not go thus deeply into stamp collecting as a study; nevertheless the tendency sets so strongly in the direction of combining study with the pleasure of collecting, that the man who nowadays neglects to study his stamps is apt to fall markedly behind in the competition that is ever stimulating the stamp collector in his pleasant and friendly rivalry with his fellows. ”

“ The philanthropist who builds and endows hospitals and churches is "a crank," following a mere craze. The earnest student of social problems is "off the track," on a craze. The man who seeks relaxation by any change of employment is certain to be classed by some idiot as one who goes off on a craze. You cannot, in fact, step off the beaten track tramped by the common herd without exciting some remark, some sneer, perchance, at your singularity.
The most ignorant are the most positive that stamp collecting is only a passing fancy of which its votaries [15] will tire, sooner or later ”

“ When stamps are printed by the million, used supplies will be available for no one knows how long; but in the case of unused, when a new issue is made, the obsolete stamp is on the road to an advance in value. It is true dealers stock large quantities of all stamps, but there are so many countries to be stocked now that no dealer can afford to hoard unused to any great extent, and even if he did, the dead capital would be an item which would compel him to advance the price of unused to protect himself from loss. Let us say a stamp becomes obsolete this year, and a dealer buys £100 worth. ”

“ They are surprised at the clannishness of stamp collectors, and their lifelong devotion to their hobby. They are thunderstruck at the enormous prices paid for rare stamps, and at the fortunes that are spent and made in stamp collecting. ”

“ Shrewd business men are those who frequently invest large sums in stamps. The amounts spent annually by some wealthy collectors range from £1,000 to £10,000. One well-known Parisian collector, whose life has been largely devoted to his philatelic treasures, and who employs two secretaries to look after his collection, has, it is estimated, spent at least £200,000 on his stamps since 1870.
If investment were the Alpha and Omega of stamp collecting, every collector of standing would bemoan lost opportunities. Many a great rarity of to-day could have been had for a few shillings a few years ago. ”

“ The wholesaler sells to the retail dealer at a small advance per thousand. Those stamps the ordinary dealer makes up into packets at a further profit, but still at a comparatively low price. Good copies he picks out for sale in sets and separately. Those have to be catalogued. Therefore, the catalogue price of common stamps bought and sold by the million eventually comes before the general collector at "one penny each," and the man who makes a collection of common stamps of the "one penny each" class can scarcely be expected to realise a fortune out of his stamp collecting. ”

“ The more pleasant the task can be made, the more ready will be the obedience with which the task will be performed. The openings for the judicious and helpful admixture of study and entertainment are so few, that one wonders that such a helpful form of play as stamp collecting has not become more popular than it has in our colleges. ”

“ For nearly half a century it has maintained unbroken its hold as one of the most popular of all forms of relaxation, and its popularity extends to all classes and to all countries.
But this very devotion of stamp collectors to their [8] hobby has puzzled and excited the uninitiated. The ordinary individual, especially the man who has no soul for a hobby of any kind, regards it as a passing fancy, a harmless craze, a fashion that must have its day and disappear, sooner or later. ”

“ It cannot be satisfactorily accounted for as a passing fancy or fashion. It has too long stood the test of years to be so easily explained away. Fancies and fashions come and go, but stamp collecting flourishes from decade to decade. Princes and peers, merchants and members of Parliament, solicitors and barristers, schoolboys and octogenarians, all follow this postal Pied Piper of Hamelin,
"Grave old plodders, gay young friskers, Fathers, mothers, uncles, cousins,"
all bent upon the pursuit of this pleasure-yielding hobby. ”

“ Those who have tried it attest the fact that few things more completely wean the attention, for the time being, from the vexations and worries of the day than the collection and arrangement of postage stamps. In fact, stamp collecting has an ever-recurring freshness all its own, a [16] scope for research that is never likely to be exhausted, a literature varied and abundant, and a close and interesting relation to the history and progress of nations and peoples that insensibly widens the trend of human sympathies and human knowledge. ”

“ There are collectors throughout South Africa, in Rhodesia, and even in Uganda. Wherever a postage stamp is issued there may be [18] found a collector waiting for a copy for his album. In no part of the world can an issue of stamps be made that is not at once partially bought up for collectors. If any one of the Antarctic expeditions were to reach the goal of its ambition, and were to celebrate the event there and then by an issue of postage stamps, a collector would be certain to be in attendance, and would probably endeavour to buy up the whole issue on the spot. ”

“ Not a few countries are every year rescued from absolute bankruptcy by the generosity with which collectors buy up their postal issues; and many other countries would have to levy a very much heavier [19] burden of taxation from their peoples if stamp collecting were to go out of fashion.
So widespread indeed is our hobby that a well-known collector might travel round the world and rely upon a cordial welcome at the hands of fellow-collectors at every stopping-place en route. ”

“ 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. ”

“ It is impossible to get away from the necessity of regarding stamps as an investment. Even the schoolboy cannot afford to put his shilling into stamps unless he can be fairly assured that he may get his money back at critical periods, which will crop up even in school life. Indeed, it may be said that there are few, if any, stamp collectors nowadays who do not put more money into stamps than they could afford to do if there were not some element of investment in view. ”

“ 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 [52] 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. ”