PHILATELY.

Otago Witness, Issue 2295, 24 February 1898, Page 53

PHILATELY.

By Old iaTAarp.

SOME PHILATELIC NONSENSE.

(By "Missour ienses," in Mekeei'd Weekly Stamp News.)

Pbiiatelicus grew drowsy, aud as he grew drowsy he nodded and he napped, and possibly he dreamed. Truth to say Philatelicus was very weary, for had he not done a long day's work, had he nofc spent the evening in stimulating stamp study and reading, and had he not taken a welsh rabbit to crown all ? Now a welsh rabbit under these circumstances is more thaG enough to account for th^ f-iefc that Philatelicus suddenly foucd hinmlf r Hiking, and as suddenly coming out into what •■<-enaed to be a vast ballrorm, brilliantly lighted :.u-i a warming with the most motley throng fchas; h H.d ever greeted hie g&ze. We don't usually expect to find seals, alligator?, swans, lions, peacocks, and fcigei'3 at halls, but Philafcelicus in some way was not in the least surprised to meet these and many - others in tho throng, as well aa many distinguished and royal personages, deceased statesmen, and even some of the gods of ancient Greece. Ifc all seemed perfectly natural to him, and indeed fche faces of the whcU company had a. slraugely familiar lok, ill-assorted as they Wr-re, Q,ueen Victoria seemed to be the belle of the ba!i. Thi« did not seexa ca strange in view of me good Queen's personal popularity a/fld of the f tot that she was probably tiK> most powerful - sovereign present, but if Philatelicus had stopped fca think ifc «rou!d have seemed strange that the. queeuly Victoria appeared successively ia 'so many different garbs acd with such •"ctireJy different faces. Afc one time she was in Vu.-". che next mom-nfche men her again in red, <isjm> in green, yellow, violet, Drown, aud so 0-1 clown ihe whele possible list oi colours, shades, acs combinations. One moment she was the fair, fragile maiden of 18, 6fae nexf; a substantial ccwager of 60, ■ or again the joung married w->man, and still again a widow in cap and Sometimes she wore her crown, or even t^e" complete imperial regalia, and r,he very next memenfe appeared in the (severest and plainest of <.» duiary attire. Toe game peculiarities were to be observed about many other distinguished pernonages who nnre present. The most of them Beemed to Uxve the protean gif*; of reappeAring afc every turn in new forma a-nd mo«t unexpected »fcfcire. Now who would have thought of the father n l his country doiog anything so giddy iv the rir«t place as attending a fancy dress bill where his motley group was assembled ? But. was » ot the frivolity of his aufcire an ad'Jed subject lor amszement? Here Philatilious salutes him, robed all in red, nexb in green, then in i.lue and finally in the most brilliant carmine. Oa, revered George Washington, is this what; va* to be expected of y<..u — to wear afc one aiuaneijfc a wig frivolously bepowdertd, afc another yuuc hair done up in classic style ? Do you wonder that we are amazed and even grieved at this ? Christopher Columbus was conspicuously present, and seemed fco have fche greatest penchant; fos striking all kinds of attitudes. Now he appeared as if standing on the- prow ot his vea-*-l, again he is kneeling beforj Ferdinand and Isabella ; but his specialty, as might have been expected, was the attitude ia which is ia currently reported fchafc he discovered America. Indeed ifc appeared fchat to discover America had tiecome such an inveterate habit with the great Gtnoan that ha was utterly unable to abitain tor five minutes at a time from drawing his s word aud sfcrik'tig this atfci'uda. Neatly everywhere he turned Philatelicus caught him at it, ia red, or green, or purple, or yellow, or blue, aa fche casa might be. (To he continued.) THE NEW POSTAGE STAMP. The London correspondent of the Daily Times writes on Desember 23 : — A few days ago I had the opportunity of inspecting the new postage stamps whish are beiug engraved for N*w Zeal&nd by Messrs Waterloo, whose firm may be regarded as facile princeps in such work. Certainly the specimens shown to me were most exquiaifce * xampies of that branch of art. Perhaps the fiotSu of ail is the 9d stamp, which shows a loarvelloußly clear little view of the loat White Terrace of Rotomahana. It is remarkable to notice how the skilful artist has improved on ihe original prize design sent Home from New Zealand. He has quite got rid ot the rather awkward diagonal straight lines which appeared to bound the terrace on each side, and by slightly shifting the view-point he has substita'ed a gracefully-curved wooded spur of land m the foreground, while the backgrouad has Kea similarly improved. A slight mistake, however, seems lo have baen made in tLe treatment of the terrace ifcgelf, the upper part of wh'ch is made convex where ifc should hava baen concave. This is being rectified on Mr Hefcves'fl suggestion, Messrs Waterlow have spared no paint to ensure a successful result, bat have bunted up all possible photographs and illustrations, so Chat they might have fche moat vcc.ura.te possible idea of the scenes and things they had to reproduce in suefa, delicate miaiatare. As an illustration of tho care they displayed, I may mention fchat fcheir artist called one day on fche Agent-general and pointed out to him an error in the New Zealand rlepielic- of the pair of huias which form the Illur.tu.ilon of one stamp. " They are both female lirus," he observed, and on exatnitiatioa ifc prove-! that he was quite right. Tho error w«o rorreo'ed by the substitution of & male bird. Taz uiktm

palm which £Unk3 the illustraticn on one side is presented with singularly exquisite perfection. The tree fern on the other S&nlr. is also very good, though leas noteworthy, aud all the subordinate details are admirably executed. The expense, of course, will be hen.vy, but this will be recouped not only by the economy resultiug from fche superior quality of the process and the consequent durability of the results, but also from the large demand for the stamps by phil&telists which will sefc iv as soon aa thfy arc re*dy for issue. Ifc is quite likely that the entire cost can be thus recouped. Exception has been taken by a critic to the kiwi which forms the feature of one stamp. I forget ab -fche moment; which. He eempiains that the hairy plumage which is a specialty of fcbafc curious bird has been made fco look too much like actual hair. I believe, that an attempt is now bemg made to give it more the accurate appearance of some'hiug bsfc«ean hair and feathers, as in fche ease of fche real bird. • . ' Our new issue of stamps has nob yet been placed in circulation ; in facb I do not think they have yet been received in Wellington. ■ . • The United Sfcates Post Office department appears to be a very locg-sutf. ring instilu ion, to judge by the following extract trom Mekeel's Weekly Stamp News: — "We read in a daily paper that the po»t office authorities, after trying for 11 years to gee a reporfc from the postmaster at Shrenburg, Arizona, and during all this time not; receiving at»y answer fco their numerous? communications, decided to send an inspector to investigate. The officer found, after waiting five days for the postmaster to return from a huntiog trip aud unlock fche office, fcbat; fche greater pare of fche mail received there for 11 years had been thrown aside and not delivered, including the ommusious of two postmasters appointed 10 succeed the one who held fche office, o^e of whom had died in ignorance of his appointment." • . • Everybody iv fche world on an average sends something' through fche post every three weeks, which means that something like 25,000,000,000 despatches pns? through the world's post offices every year. Reckoning these at Id a piece — which, including juos*; cards and parcels, is about the average — we fi-:d tha»; about £100,000,000 sterling is spent oa (stamps every year. Tatse stamps, assuming them to be all Id ones, would i-over all the .London park*?— T thnb is, 25,000,000,000 stamps would cover 2400 acres.