Coin

“ All the coins that have figured prominently in history are in some shape or other among us still. Twenty-four hundred years of active use are needed to wear out a coin completely. How long will it last with moderate use, and with intervals of lying buried for hundreds of years, as much of the coinage of antiquity now extant in its original condition has done? We have among us the rings, bolts, chains bracelets, drinking-vessels, and vases that glitter in the narratives of all the chroniclers, and embody the pomp and luxury of all the ages. ”

“ I at once felt something round and suggestive. "Look at this!" I cried. It was a blackened gold coin! In the darkness we hurriedly sifted the sand with our fingers; and each one soon found several pieces of money. ”

“ Let the charge of coinage be fairly reckoned; and the kingdom informed of it, as well as of the price of copper. Let the coin be as well and deeply stamped as it ought. Let the metal be as pure as can consist to have it rightly coined (wherein I am wholly ignorant) and the bulk as large as that of king Charles II. And let this club of ten gentlemen give their joint security to receive all the coins they issue out for seven or ten years, and return gold and silver without any defalcation. ”

“ So little is this metal in circulation that I do not deem it any exaggeration to say that there are millions of people in the United States, "native here, and to the manner born," who have never in all their lives seen a gold coin. ”

“ A coin indubitably presents, within the smallest compass, the fullest view of ancient times that we possess. Though silent, it is always waiting to communicate knowledge; though small, it is always ready to teach great things. “Inest sua gratia parvis,” is the motto of the Cabinet. It would be difficult, indeed, to say what department of ancient lore—whether in mythology, or economics, or politics, or chronology, or geography—may not be elucidated and explained by the study of coins. ”

“ Then, sometimes, as the slow labourer lingers over the ground, with eyes ever bent downwards, he spies a faint glitter, and picks up an antique coin in his horny fingers: coins are generally found after a shower, on the same principle that the gold-seekers wash away the auriferous soil in the ‘cradle,’ and lay bare the yellow atoms. ”

“ The idea of coin being the representation of all the industry and manufactures of a country, is pretty; and has been invented for the sake of making a general rule for operating an easy distribution of things extremely complex in their nature. ”

“ It is Alfred's silver penny struck in London mint. The character of a coinage is quite conclusive evidence in national history, and there is no great empire in progress, but tells its story in beautiful coins. Here in Alfred's penny, a round coin with L.O.N.D.I.N.I.A. struck on it, you have just the same beauty of design, the same enigmatical arrangement of letters, as in the early inscription, which it is "the pride of my life" to have discovered at Venice. ”

“ The coin left in the sleeve can be secretly got away by dropping the arm and allowing it to fall into the hand and then pocketed.
AN ORIGINAL COIN SWINDLE
Palm a halfpenny in your right hand and ask a friend (be sure he is your friend) to lend you a shilling. Pick up a glass, invert it, and place the borrowed shilling on its bottom. Then ask your friend whether the coin is on the top or bottom of the tumbler. He will naturally look surprised at such a question; and you then say,—“Ah, I see you know the trick.” ”

“ Should you desire to regain possession of the coin, have the outside pocket made communicating with an inside one on the same side of the coat; when, having shown the right hand unmistakably empty, you produce the coin thence, in a magical manner. ”

“ One of the members present then takes from his pocket what he announces as one of the rarest coins in existence—passes it around the table. Coin travels back and forth, every one examining it, and the conversation goes to another topic, say the influence of the automobile on domestic infelicity, or some other such asininely intellectual club topic—you know? All at once the owner calls for his coin.
"The coin is nowhere to be found. Every one looks at every one else. ”

“ What little gold and silver coin there is found in circulation is mutilated; every piece of money, large and small, has been subjected to the ingenious punch, and thus has lost a portion of its intrinsic value. ”

“ Not exactly; by money is understood any matters, such as metal, wood, leather, glass, horn, paper, fruits, shells, &c., which have currency as a medium in commerce. Coin is a particular species always made of metal, and struck off according to a certain process called coining; it is not of equal antiquity with money. In fact, the very commodities themselves were the first moneys, that is, were current one for another by way of exchange. Coin is a piece of metal converted into money, by the impression of certain marks or figures thereon. ”

“ Almost immediately they all rise again: one holds up at arm's length above the water the recovered coin, and then puts it into his mouth for safe-keeping. Coin after coin is thrown in, and as speedily brought up; a shower of small silver follows, and not a piece is lost. ”

“ Coin pointed, as he said this, to the three globes on the platform by him, and then picked up the two smaller ones and held them in his hand that the audience might see them. He then continued:
"The large one represents the value of all the real and personal property in the world; the larger of the two small ones represents the face value of the silver and gold in the world available for use as money; and the smallest represents the amount of gold in the world available for use as money. ”

“ The imagination of the spectators having been excited by the expectation of beholding a shower of money, the adept in sleight-of-hand, keeping one of the two coins in his right hand concealed, must advance the other coin to the end of his forefinger and thumb, while he pretends to pick a coin out of the candle, or of the rim of a hat, or from a lady’s fan or shoulder, or may pretend to clutch a coin floating in the air. ”

“ The coin of these times in England was chiefly of gold and silver. The gold coin consisted of nobles, half-nobles, and quarter-nobles, originally equivalent to guineas (the exact value of a noble in Henry IV.'s reign was 21s. 11⁄2d.) , half-guineas, and quarter-guineas, or dollars of 5s. 3d. The silver coins were groats, half-groats, and pennies. But it must be remembered that all these coins were of ten times the intrinsic value of our present money; so that the labourer who in the fifteenth century received 11⁄2d. per day, received as much as fifteen pence of the present money. ”

“ The longer a coin remains in circulation, the rapidity of circulation remaining the same, or the greater its rapidity of circulation within the same period of time, the greater the discrepancy between its form as coin and its actual gold or silver substance. ”

“ Every mark, letter, number and bit of decoration is deeply cut in the metal. Even the "reeding," or roughened edge, is stamped sharply, and we can tell just what the coin is by feeling of it with the finger, even in the dark. This last step finishes the work. The money is made, coined and ready for exchange in the shop and market. Sometimes you may have noticed that coins, like the nickel five-cent and the silver twenty-cent piece, have smooth edges. ”

“ The money of any particular country is, at any particular time and place, more or less an accurate measure or value, according as the current coin is more or less exactly agreeable to its standard, or contains more or less exactly the precise quantity of pure gold or silver which it ought to contain. ”

“ When the silver is bright, and presents the appearance of a new coin, take it between the thumb and forefinger of your right hand, look at it carefully, and then pretend to drop it into your left hand, but instead palm it in your right. ”

“ But when the coin is degraded below its standard weight, the annual coinage must, besides this, fill up the large vacuities which exportation and the melting-pot are continually making in the current coin. ”

“ The intention of coinage, for circulation, being to ascertain the quantity of the fine metals in every piece, and not to represent the effigies of the sovereign, we see a manifest difference every where between the impressions struck upon medals, and those of the current coin: in the first, the head is raised, in the last, it is purposely made flat. ”

“ The young men who can afford the expense trade for dollars and silver coin of less denomination—coin as a currency is not known among them—which they flatten thin, and fasten to a braid of buffalo hair, attached to the crown lock, which hangs behind, outside of the robe, and adds much to the handsome appearance of the wearer. ”

“ The science of Numismatics (from the Greek word νὁμυὁμα, a legally current coin) embraces the study of the coins of all the nations of the earth who have at any period impressed upon pieces of metal—gold, silver, bronze, brass, copper, iron, tin, lead, etc. etc.—any devices (types) , or inscriptions, indicating that such pieces of metal were issued by authority for public use as money. ”

“ The invention of coin comes in when pieces of metal are made of a fixed weight and standard, and marked with a figure or inscription to certify them, so that they may be taken without weighing or testing. This looks a simple thing to do, but the old Egyptians and Babylonians are not known to have hit upon it. Perhaps the earliest money may have been the Chinese little marked cubes of gold, and the pieces of copper in the shapes of shirts and knives, as though intended to represent real shirts or knives. ”

“ We all know that it is more convenient to make our payments, so far as possible, in one coin than in two or more, let it be of gold, silver, or copper. Now, as a matter of ascertained fact, the Mint produces a larger number of shillings than of any other denomination of silver coin. ”

“ These three are gold, silver, and paper. Gold and silver are generally used in the form of coins of definite weight and fineness. Paper money is a promissory note issued by the government, or by authorized banks, promising to pay the bearer, on demand, the amount of coin specified on its face. ”

“ Coins, being in fact merchandise, will follow the same rules of exchange, and will be attracted to those parts where they bear a greater exchangeable or market value. The actual value of a coin in currency must be that of its intrinsic value ”

“ Coin, whether gold or silver, is used all over the world as the medium of exchange. But gold and silver available for the purpose of coin are limited in amount and totally inadequate to serve as mediums of exchange without the assistance of other devices. ”

“ To order that silver and gold coin shall be struck of such denominations as the King shall think fit to appoint; in which the proportion of the metals above determined, shall be constantly observed through every denomination of the coin, until necessity shall make a new general coinage unavoidable. ”

“ You now take a duplicate coin and vanish it by means of the "Pocket Vanish," or any other convenient method, counting "One! two! three!" when, acting according to your instructions, the person will close the box, and the coin will be heard to fall inside.
Coin, Wine-glass, and Paper Cone.—This very pretty and amusing table trick consists in causing a coin placed under a wine-glass, the whole being covered with a paper cone, to disappear and return as often as desired. ”

“ Do you not see that our coin is discredited already among strangers, which evermore desired to serve us before all other nations at all our needs for the goodness of our coins; and now they let us have nothing from them, but only for our commodities, as wool, felt, tallow, butter, cheese, tin, and lead. And whereas before time they were wont to bring us for the same either good gold or silver, or else equally necessary commodities again, now they send us other trifles as I spake of before, as glasses, gelly pots, tennis balls, papers, girdles, brooches, etc.... ”

“ The list includes "swallowing a knife; burning a card and reproducing it from the pocket of a spectator; passing a coin from one pocket to another; converting money into counters, or counters into money; conveying money into the hand of another person; making a coin pass through a table, or vanish from a handkerchief ”

“ A HALF-DALER PIECE, WHICH MEASURES THREE INCHES SQUARE.
Amongst the most civilised races gold and silver coin, or "bank-notes," secured by deposits of gold and silver or by Government guarantees, are the recognised media of exchange. Modern coinages exhibit many specimens of beautiful and artistic moneys, and the notes—bills, as they are called in America—issued by the Bank of England, the French, United States, and other Governments, are, if not exactly artistic, wonderfully ingenious devices for baffling the skill of the forger. ”

“ Seventeen thousand pounds' worth of coin was thus uttered during 1722–3. It was better coin than had been minted by former patentees under Charles II and William and Mary, and a small currency was greatly in demand throughout Ireland. ”

“ The coinage in England is entirely defrayed at the expence of the state. The mint price for the metals is the very same with the price of the coin. Whoever carries to the mint an ounce of standard silver, receives for it in silver coin 5s. ”

“ Receiving the coin in his right hand, the performer makes believe to transfer it to his left; wherein he already has a shilling of his own. Surreptitiously depositing the coin lent to him behind the pack of cards on the table, he exhibits the substitute on the palm of the left hand and rubs it with the fingers of the right. ”