WISER AND SADDER

New Zealand Times, Volume XLVII, Issue 10896, 10 May 1921, Page 10

WISER AND SADDER

A >JDWELLER. WHO DEALT IN SOVEREIGNS. In these days when there is apparently more inclination in many parts of the world—not excluding New Zealand—for thieves to break In and steal than ever before, the man with valuables takes all sorts of precautions to prevent being unwillingly parted from them, (says the “Otago Daily. Times’’). One Inan—a jeweller, it mnst be explained —has lost all confidence in his bank as a safe place to lodge valuables. By a stroke of what to him at the time appeared to bo great good fortune ho managed to secure 126 sovereigns at a premium of 2s 6d per sovereign. Visions of having them stolen from him were not absent and the bank appeared safer than the office safe. Sut be.fore handing them over to the bank the jeweller obtained a promise—but not a written promise—that he could get them again whenever he wanted them. Alas, he will probably never Bee them again. The bank officials simply declined to return them when he called roxtnd at an interval of a few days. They have credited him with £IOO, however, which he can have in notes if fie desires, but one does not have to pay 2s 6d premium per pound for notes. Many sovereigns have gone into the jewellers’ melting pots since the war, but it is an illegal thing to thus destroy a coin of the realm.