SPURIOUS SOVEREIGNS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume III, Issue 25, 26 November 1880, Page 3

SPURIOUS SOVEREIGNS.

--.*. .... - The Daily News states that for some years past there has been an influx into Kngland of spurious sovereigns, which it is Wlievcd me manufactured in the United States. Rich coin is true* in weigh I, and so peifeei in its ring as to deceive any but the most skilled ear ; while the workmanship and execution are such as to make it morally certain that the offenders have discarded electrotypy as a clumsy process, and possessed themselves of coining-presses and dies " of hardened steel, such as arc actually in use at the Mint itself. The " New Yoik " sovereigns, as they are termed, j consistof gold alloyedwith alluminium, and there is enough of the precious metal in each to give it an intrinsic value of some fourteen shillings. They pass the oidinary tests of ocular inspection, ringing, weight, and bending. Nitric acid seldom discovers thpir true character, and the best practical method of distinguishing them from good coin is hy measurement. They are of precisely the same diameter as a genuine soveieign, but considerably thicker, and it was by the appreciable Jifference they effected in the height of rouleaux that their existence first became known to the authorities of the Bank. It is a strange thing that the factory from which they issue should still remain undiscovered, in spite of all that the police have done to unravel the secret. The truth, however, is that the police ai'e more or less powerless against crime when it assumes the proportions of a scientific craft.