INSIDE THE LONDON MINT.

Waikato Times, Volume XVIII, Issue 1549, 8 June 1882, Page 4

INSIDE THE LONDON MINT.

I muft say the Tower, .of, opinion, just opposite ' the 'Miht,"is decidedly more romantic and impressive-looking than thfe horse-guard looking 1 - 'bidet? °bf buildingb from which, since 1815, has issued the cu'rretit coin 6f the realm. For two'hundred years' previously " the ' coining was done' in the ancient "square 1 * Arsenal of William 1,, and > before that in various small buildings, l and evori iirthe'ihidat of ■ Royal camps. There is not milch to see inside the Mint, but what' there is, is well worth that stingy 'half-hour allowed to any innocents abroad — four at a time only— who may wish to " prospect." I was one of those ' four last week. A bland gentleman received me in a side room. (By the way, the entrance door to the Mint of England is more like the modest side-door of a pawnshop, than •anything ' else. How foreigners nnlsfc stare to note the awful absence of pride about the British' Lion, even in his central lairs.) I wrote my name in a book — then the three other names. I was given to understand that I was responsible for th(J whole party. ' I eyed 1 them suspiciously from that moment, and morally turned ' ' my own ' pockets inside out. A genial sort of foreman soon arrived. He did* his work well from begining to end ; there was no nonsense about him, and, I may add, no delay. We turned at once into a sort of factory-room, in which very little was going on, but the little was of an excitingly costly nature. I watched a small fw-nace, out of which kept pouring, like a stream of white barley sugar, the molten silver, , which was then < passed under a roller and flattened into strips, and the strips were soon chopped into bars and piled. The noise was considerable, but nothing to the slam and jingle of the next room, Avhere the bars Avere flattened into very thin strips, like laths, to about the thickness of the half-crown. They were coining nothing but halfcrowns that day. Thers was a strange fascination about every detail of the process. We had not nearly reached the half-crown yet. Theflat strips were cut up into lengths of about three feet ; eacli had now to be "adjusted or passed between more rollers, which exactly tested the even thickness. In the next room we saw rounds cut out of these strips. These soon accumulated, XQO being punched out in a minute, then 80 a minute were shot through a hole; which trimmed the edges ; and then they had to be fire softened, and washed, and dried in sawdust-, before they wero fit to receive the final "die" with the milling and the Queen's head. Even then, all was not over. The weighingmachine was certainly the prettiest thing J saw ; each coin fell on a ledge, which according to its exact weight, dropped the coin into one of three boxes beneath ; I if it were a shade too heavy it went into I a box oij the right, and if exact in weight it fell into a middle box. The middlebox coins w.crc teady for'oircnlation ; the light and heavy ones wero taken away to be melted attain. This machine lias been in use since 18.V2, and is the invention of a bank director named Mr Cotton. I f-aw on a table liaid by, in themeasuiinglooin, some goodly bags. "What are those"'" I' iiskcd. " Kiioh," said my {.'irido, " widths 7-0 oz,, ,md contains C2OO in h.ilf-ciows.'' The propensity to handle the ?>il\er wu& irresistible, and was duly recognised by my official friend, who, liowc\er, would let us touch nothing except what he himself handed to us. He handed a blank, and a new half-crown ; but I was not allowed to touch the beauti-fully-symmetrical perforated bheets of .silver that lay piled in ornamental patterns ready for re-melting. Silver chips and shavings lay all about, but the Ica&t (involuntary, of course) propensity to stoop was checked by the gentle admonition that time was short, and another detachment of would-be burglars were waiting in the anteroom to be ''personally conducted." Everywhere ropes prevented us going too near the scene of action ; none of the machines could be easily approached, and we were all kept well in hand together. I felt grateful for this, for a man does not find himself every day on such a Tom Tiddler's ground ; and temptation always makes my knees very weak, and my fingers twitched several times most unaccountably. However, we got safe into the Coinroom, where all was under glass, and I grew more calm, and asked several intelligent questions— such as why we had seen no gold or copper '! None was being coined. They had coined no gold at the English Mint for twelve months, so I infer that there are no sovereigns with 1881 on them, except, perhaps, a few from the Colonial Mint. These have all a tiny M. for Melbourne or S. for Sydney on them. The interesting collection of coins and medals I was hurried through. I saw silver pennies fiom a.d. 850 to the present day ; a gold "noble," value 13s Sd (Edward III.) ; a very flat sovereign of Henry VII. ; and guineas which came in with Ob arles 11. Alarge piece, called a petition crown, of Charles 11. has now a fancy value of £275, the actual price fetched by one three months ago. A noble 20s piece in silver of Charles the First's reign suggested an enormous pouch ; it might just lit into the brim of a common tea-cup. The square, rough seige-pieces, coined' from plate and ornamental metal, and with a rude crown, in the camp of the unhappy Charles 1., were to me full of pathetic interest ; although I dont say hut Cromwell, whose ugly face stared from a gold coin at them hard by, was right in the main. I hereabouts became decidedly communicative, and began to ask a few historical conundrums, but this was soon put a stop to by my guide, who observed that the British Museum, and not the Mint, was the place for that. The time was up. I hope my half-hour has not been wasted. — Exchange.

" Ready set" matter is handy for Sawback Journalism. A young Chinaman lias been admitted to practice at the French Bar. This implies that he has taken his degree of lirciicieen flroit (license by right), and that he is a naturalised Frenchman. The* oath was administered in the' Court of; Appeals in Paris last month. A like grade has rarely,, if ever, been obtained' by one of his countrymen. ( ' Lawyer— Then you admit that you squeezed the young lady's li and so hard as to make her, cry, out?" Reporter — " Yes: sir." 'Lawyer-—" Yet you say you were pursuing your legitimate calling. Do ypu mean, to i say, sii*, i that squeezing a "young lady until she is forced to scream; from pain is part of a reporter's business?", Reporter— " Yes 1 , sir j'l' was taking pi'ess notes." Judge (very ) sternly) — "No' cause of action ; next case." J The gambling hell of Monte Carlo, Jn' the principality of Tuscany, is apparently^reservedexcla^i^ly for *ke-, R urjppse of fleecing foreigners. A" notice in the, American. '^isteVy/jiublfshefl at Nice,! reads as follows : — " In conformity with a! rule of the Cercle dcs Estranges de Monte Carlo, admittance to the saloons is only given to persons furnished with tickets, -.Admittance to the gatning-rooms-is -for-j bidden %6 the. itfhalaitiWflaHoi! Jtlfe prinoi-j pality ; it is equally'forbidden to the in-^ habitan^6f>}i^BsP#t^l#JtHe.Mai'i-r time Alps, .with^the« exception - of mem-} admission are deliyered^^t»tlie;SeQC?t»(nat; •«C ft» Onto.* ; — r^l;