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. Contributed J
POSTAGE STAMP COLLECTING.
By J. Lewis Howe.
The passion lor making collections
is natural to the boy. Birds' eggs, shells,
hllttarfliac oio-or Kor?rle
Vtbt4l uuuuo, vtgaicnc pa*
lures, postal cards, coins, postage
stamps, all have their fascination, and
while the collection is often, perhaps
generally, ephemeral, sometimes the interest
awakened remains through life.
Nor is this collecting habit to be deprecated;
observation is cultivated, judgment
exercised, and often valuable information
acquired. This is particularly
the case where postage stamps are
the objects of interest.
It is the purpose of the writer to
call attention to some of the lessons that
uia.y ue pieasanny learxiea irom tnese little
pieces of paper, which bear the imprints
of the governments of the earth.
Perhaps the lesson in geography
stands first. I heard a little boy say
recently that he would have failed in
his geography examination had he not
been a collector of postage stamps. Every
civilized land, and many that we do
not count civilized, has its stamps. How
often would we hear of Labuan, and
Straits Settlements, and Nigeria, and
Cook Islands, and Angola, and Surinam,
and Diego Suarez, and a host of other
little-known places, were it not for their
stamps, which every boy has or hopes
to have in his collection. Maps themselves
are not infrequently found on
stamps, as on those of Reunion, and
Panama, and Nicaragua, and Hayti (regarding
which San Domingo entered a
protest that her sister republic had appropriated
too large a share of the island),
and the current two-cent stamp
of Newfoundland. On the Canadian
Christmas stamps of 1898 is found an
ambitious map of the world with the
British Empire in red, and the rather
boasting legend, "We hold a vaster Empire
than has been."
In collecting stamps one becomes familiar
with the multifarious systems of
money of the world. The relative value
of cents and centimes and centavos, of
pence and annas and atts, of kopecks
and reis and paras, is quickly apparent
today from the regulation of the International
Union that stamps for domestic
paper postage (about one cent) shall be
green, for domestic letter postage (about
two cents) shall be red, and for foreign
letter postage (about five cents) shall
be blue. The boy who gets a red stamp
of current issue knows that whatever
its inscription, its face value is about
two cents. Changes in monetary systems
are also noted, as from the early values
in pence of the British North American
colonies the cash and candareen of
China, the centimos of the Philipines and
Cuba, to cents and dollars of today. ..
One learns something of the extent
of British colonial government when he
notes the great number of stamp-issu.
M
2 PRESBYTERIAN OF THE SO
ing colonies, most of them using stamps
of a somewhat similar type, which are
the finest specimens of the engraver's
art. One is surprised at the large number
of Portuguese colonies, while those
ui opaiu, once iairiy numerous, have
shrunk to such unfamiliar places as
Fernando Po, Elobey, Spanish Guinea
and Rio d'Oro. Germany and Italy have,
according to their stamps, hardly more
colonies than Denmark. It is a commentary
on the esteem in which the
Post Office Department of some countries
is held, to find stamps of England,
Germany, France, and even Russia, surcharged
""China," or with surcharged
values in paras and piasters, and Japanese
stamps surcharged "China" and "Koare,"
showing that these countries maintain
their own post offices among strangers.
History is interestingly exemplified on
the stamps of many countries. Forty or
fifty years ago there were stamps for
dozens of little German States and cities,
Prussia, Saxony, Hanover, Hamburg,
Bremen, and many others. These
were followed by the stamps of the
North and South German Confederations,
and then by those of the German
Empire. When the Germans occupied
Alcase and Lorraine in 1870, special
stamps were issued for these provinces,
and a little later when they were annexed
to Germany, their stamps were
replaced by those of that country. Now
one stamp is used for all the German
empire except Bavaria and Wurtemburg.
The ups and downs of government in
France is shown by the early stamps
of the second republic with the head
of liberty. Then the head of Napoleon
appears; then the inscription changes
to 'empire.' A little later and Napoleon's
head is crowned with the laurel
wreath; again a turn Ln the wheel of
fortune and the head of liberty appears
for the second time with the legend
'republic.' Soon after the head of liberty
gives way to the figures of Mercury
and Commerce.
History is also shown by the scenes
depicted on the interesting and often
beautiful commemorative issues, in
which our country has taken the lead.
The Columbian issue at the time of the
Chicago exposition is particularly rich
in this respect, giving on the stamps
the principal scenes in the life of Columbus.
The later American Commemorative
have been for the most part poorer
from an artistic standpoint, as nota
bly in the recent Yukon and HudsonFulton
stamps.
Closely akin to history is biography,
a.nd a goodly proportion of stamps, like
most of our own, give a prominent place
to the likenesses of rulers nnd other
important characters. The stamps of
Holland have portraits of Wilhelinina
as a little girl, and at several later periods.
Alfonso XIII appears on the
Spanish stamps as a boy of three, then
as a boy of fourteen, and later as a
man. Perhaps most remarkable is th?
head of the Prince of Roumania, appearing
first with slight side whiskers ajid
UTH. March 23, 1910.
the suspicion of a mustache, a little later
with a small beard and partly grown
mustache, and finally with full beard
and heavy mustache, it evidently being
felt necessary to portray his attempts
and successes at facial adornment. The
finest specimens of portraiture are found
in the engravings of Queen Victoria, especially
on the colonial stamps, as the
early stamps of Ceylon and the Bahamas,
and the later ones of Canada and the
Niger Coast Protectorate.
Legends too sometimes appear, as the
dragon on Chinese stamps, St. Michael
on the Belgian stamps lor the Brussels
Exposition, and St. Anthony preaching
to the fishes on a set of commemoratives
of Portugal.
The industries of various lands are
well shown on stamps. Transportation
was illustrated on the Pan-American (
(Buffalo) Exposition stamps by steamer,
train, and motor-car. Boats have appeared
on many stamps as on those of British
Guiana and Newfoundland, the railroad
train on those of Mexico, New
Brunswick and even the Congo, while
the mail carrier also has his place on a
Mexican stamp and the messenger boy
on his bicycle on our own special delivery.
Gold washing is found on the
stamps of French Guiana and of Victoria,
salt gathering on the new'issue of
Turk's Island.
One can get a good idea of the finest
scenery of many lands from their stamps.
Some of the views are excellently en
graved and make beautiful pictures, as
in those of New Zealand and Tasmania,
Nicaragua and the Bahamas, Dominica,
St. Helena, and Roumania, while a picture
of the scene of St. Paul's shipwreck
is found on the stamps of Malta.
If we turn to natural history one can
find a pretty large menagerie in its
postage stamp collection. The tiger appears
on the stamps of French Congo
and on those of several of the Malay
States and of Abyssinia, the beaver on
those of Canada, the seal and the codfish
on those of Newfoundland, the
llama on those of Peru, the elephant on
those of the Congo and of Liberia, the
kangaroo on those of South Australia,
and the ornithorhynchus on those of Tas
mania, West Australian stamps give
the swan, Guatemalian the sacred queztal,
Cook Islands a supposed bird of paradise,
New South Wales the emeu and
the lyre-bird, and New Zealand the apteryx.
The Liberlan stamps ajid those
of Labuan give a whole zoo in themselves.
Many oddities are found, as triangular
stamps of Cape of Good Hope and
of New Foundland, the big stamps of
Obock, of which it takes very few to
fill the page of one's album, or some of
thp littlo
Diauiiie oi victoria, south
Australia, and the Somali Coast. Crete has
excellent reproductions of ancient coins,
while the Greek stamps commemorative
of the Olympic games give appropriate
representations of Greek sculpture. Afghan
and many of the Indian Stntpo h?vo
stamps covered with curious hetroglyphics.
On those of the Virgin Islands ap