What Philately Teaches Part 4

Here is one from Travancore, it represents a sh.e.l.l sacred to the G.o.d Vishnu. On the stamps of Shanghai we find these Chinese characters. They read Kung Pu, literally labor board, otherwise Munic.i.p.al Council, by whose authority the stamps were issued.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Watermark, Sh.e.l.l]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Watermark, Chinese Characters]

The watermarks on the preceding page are from envelopes of the United States and Russia. Of course there are many more watermarks than those we show. On many sheets there are watermarked borders with the name of the country, the word "postage," or other inscriptions.

There is much that is interesting in paper making. The best paper is made from linen rags but many other substances are used, cotton rags, esparto gra.s.s, straw, etc. Very common paper, such as that used for the daily newspapers, is made from wood pulp. Paper is made in two ways, by hand and by machinery.

Hand made paper is made by means of a mould and a deckle. A mould is a piece of fine wire gauze, tightly stretched on a wooden frame. If the paper is to be laid, coa.r.s.er lines are woven in the gauze. If it is to be watermarked, the designs, made of wire bent in the desired shape or of bits of metal, are fastened to the surface. A deckle is a narrow wooden frame which fits on and around the sides of the mould. The deckle is movable, in order that it may be used with more than one mould. The mould is dipped in paper pulp and a quant.i.ty taken upon it. It is then shaken, to make the pulp cover the whole surface evenly and rid it of water. The edges of the resulting sheet are, naturally, rough and irregular and are called deckle edges.

To make the paper pulp the rags are first boiled with soda and lime, to rid them of dirt and grease. They are then macerated in a vat, through which fresh water continually flows. When thoroughly ground the pulp is treated with a bleaching fluid which removes all color. It is then pressed and is ready for use. When about to be used the pulp is mixed with water and color is added if desired. When the paper is to be made by machinery the pulp is allowed to flow slowly from the vat upon a wide, endless band, usually made of fine wire gauze but occasionally of canvas or other form of cloth. This band is stretched upon rollers and travels slowly forward while, at the same time, it is shaken from side to side to distribute the pulp. Two narrow bands of India rubber are stretched lengthwise of the gauze band and resting upon it. They serve to confine the pulp and regulate the width of the paper. These bands are also called deckles and produce the same edge as the frame used in making hand-made paper.

As the pulp moves along with the gauze band it pa.s.ses under a roller called the "dandy roll." The covering of this roll determines the character of the paper. When the paper is to be wove, it is covered with wire gauze. If it is to be watermarked the designs are attached to the surface of the roll and duly pressed into the paper. To make laid paper the surface of the roll is covered with longitudinal wires, with s.p.a.ces the width of a wire between them. Rings of wire pa.s.s around the roll at regular intervals and hold the longitudinal wires in place. For _batonne_ paper, there are thick longitudinal wires at intervals and between them either smaller wires or gauze, as the paper is to be laid _batonne_ or wove _batonne_. After pa.s.sing the dandy roll the paper goes over a number of rollers covered with felt and cylinders heated by steam, until it is dry. It is then sized, dried again, pressed between heavy rollers, to give it a surface, and the edges trimmed by revolving cutters. It is then wound up in a roll or cut into sheets, as may be required.

Having duly considered the design, printing and paper of stamps, the next thing to attract our attention is the gum. Most gums are prepared from potato starch, dextrin or gum arabic. Gelatin is sometimes added to supply body and glycerine to give smoothness. Gum varies much in thickness and color. The first three cent stamp of the Danish West Indies furnishes an instance of this. The stamps were sent from Denmark without gum, as is frequently done with stamps for tropical countries.

When they reached the islands the stamps were given to two druggists to be gummed. One used gum of good quality and, light color, while the other used poor material and of so dark color as to stain the paper and even darken the ink of the stamps. In Hanover rose-colored gum was used for a number of issues. Some of the earliest local prints of the South African Republic were made upon paper sent out ready gummed from Germany. The paper was much wrinkled by the gum and the effect may be seen in the wavy and broken lines of the ink.

The stamps of the first issue of Reunion were sold ungummed and were affixed to letters in any way that pleased the writers. Some were fastened by wafers and some even were pinned on.

Formerly, sheets of stamps to be gummed were fastened in a frame and the gum applied by hand with a large brush. They were then sent to the drying room and hung up to dry. Now the process is entirely mechanical.

The sheets are fed into a machine in which they first pa.s.s under a gummed roller. Then they are carried on an endless chain through a long box filled with steam pipes and emerge at the further end dry and ready to be pressed and perforated.

The subject of perforations is also worthy of some brief attention. The first stamps were imperforate, necessitating the use of scissors or other instrument in separating them. This was a manifest inconvenience.

In 1847, Henry Archer, an Irishman, began experimenting with machines for perforating stamps. After a number of attempts he succeeded in making a machine which was accepted by the English government and for which, in 1852, he was allowed a compensation of 4,000. James M. Napier greatly improved on this machine and adapted it for steam power.

The general principle of all perforating machines is a series of hollow needles, which remove rows of small disks of the paper from between the stamps, and thus fit them to be readily torn apart. For convenience of reference and description philatelists have adopted, as a standard of measurement, the s.p.a.ce of two centimetres. The gauge of a perforation is determined by the number of holes in this distance. Scales have been prepared for measuring perforations but it would be superfluous to attempt to describe them here. One of the largest perforations that has been used for stamps has seven holes in two centimetres. This was used on the stamps of France by Susse Freres, a firm of stationers. It was done for the convenience of themselves and their customers. Some of the stamps of Mexico have a still larger perforation gauging 5. The finest gauge is about 19. This is an unofficial perforation and was applied to some of the early stamps of Tasmania.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Perforation]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Perforation]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Perforation]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Perforation]

We show you here a variety of perforations. The first two are ordinary perforations of different gauges, 9 and 14. The third shows a perforation in square holes instead of round. The next is an example of pin perforation, the holes being far apart and small. Two sides of the stamp show the holes before the stamps have been torn apart and a third side shows the ragged effect produced by separating them. Another form of pin perforation is made by needles which are not hollow and merely p.r.i.c.k holes in the paper without removing any of it. This sort of perforation has sometimes been made by a sewing machine with an unthreaded needle.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Perforation]

The last form of perforation shown is called lozenge. In this the machine removes small diamond shaped pieces from the paper. The effect before the separation is shown between the pair of stamps, while the outer edges show the appearance of single copies.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Perforation]

A variety of machines are used in perforating stamps. One perforates only a single row of holes at a time. This is known as the guillotine machine because its action suggests that unpleasant instrument. Another machine is called the comb machine because the needles are arranged to perforate across the top of a row of stamps and at the same time between the stamps of that row. This arrangement somewhat resembles a comb. It will be seen that the first application perforates the stamps of one row on three sides. The application of the machine to the next row below completes the fourth side. In the best perforating machines the needles are arranged in circles around a spindle. The sheets pa.s.s under this roller and are perforated in one direction. A similar machine makes the perforations in the other direction.

There is another form of separation called rouletting, from the French "roulette", a little wheel, its simplest form being produced by a small wheel with an edge of sharp points. By this process a series of small cuts is made between the stamps but none of the paper is removed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Rouletting, Large Gauge]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Rouletting, Small Gauge]

In these two ill.u.s.trations are shown roulettes of large and small gauge.

The same result is also obtained by setting printers rules which have a notched edge between the _cliches_ which compose the plate. These rules are set a trifle higher than the _cliches_ so that, when the sheet of paper is pressed against the plate in printing, the points of the rules are forced through it. These points receive ink the same as other parts of the surface of the plate and the effect thus produced is called rouletting in colored lines.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Rouletting Forms]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Rouletting Forms]

There are a number of systems which produce the effect of rouletting in a variety of fancy forms. One is called _perce en arc_. This produces a series of arches on one stamp and a series of scallops on the adjacent one. Here is an example of this rouletting, in a small gauge. A similar form is called serpentine perforation. It is here shown.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Rouletting Forms]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Rouletting Forms]

Still another form leaves the edges of the stamps in sharp points. This is called _perce en scie_ or saw-tooth perforation. When this perforation is very fine it is called serrate. There is still another form of rouletting, which we also show you. It is called rouletting in oblique parallel cuts and consists of a row of short cuts placed obliquely and parallel to each other. Stamps thus rouletted have a very ragged edge when torn apart. This roulette was only used in Tasmania and was a private production.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Burelage]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Control Number, 70]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Moiree Pattern]

One of the nightmares of every government is the fear that its securities will be counterfeited or tampered with. I have several times mentioned precautions against such abuses in the shape of fine engraving, watermarks, enameled paper, sensitive inks, etc. There are numerous other devices which have been used with the same end in view.

The patterns here shown were printed on the backs of the stamps in blue ink. The first is a band of interlaced lines, called a _burelage_. The second is a sort of control number. The number differs for each stamp on the sheet. The third resembles the lines in watered silk and is called _moiree_. It covers the entire back of the sheet. Sometimes the stamps are covered with a network which only becomes visible on the application of certain chemicals. In this country the experiment has been tried of breaking the fibre of the paper by pressing into the stamps a group of tiny pyramids, called a grill. The idea was that the cancelling ink would penetrate the broken paper and could not be removed.

We cannot finish our study of the material side of stamps without reference to another feature, i.e., surcharges. Correctly speaking, a surcharge is an added charge, but in philately the term is applied to a variety of overprints, the majority of which indicate a reduction rather than an increase in value. Years ago the word surcharge usually suggested a makes.h.i.+ft, something of a temporary nature prepared to meet an emergency and, therefore, interesting and likely to become valuable.

But our little weaknesses are now well understood by those who are exploiting the commercial side of postage stamps and we have reason to fear that many recent surcharges were made for revenue only and not from any real necessity. The majority of surcharges are made to supply a value which has been temporarily exhausted. For example, many of the British Colonies obtained their supplies of stamps in London. It may happen that an order is not placed early enough or there is delay in filling it and delivering the stamps. Owing to this, the values most in use may be exhausted. Under such circ.u.mstances, it is customary to provide a temporary supply by printing the needed value on some other stamp, usually one of higher value. To use a lower value would tempt the counterfeiting of the surcharge, for the profit to be made through the increased value.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Stamp, "Mauritius", surcharged 4 cents]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Stamp, "Gibraltar", surcharged 5 centimos]

There are, however, a variety of other surcharges, a few of which may interest you. The first two stamps indicate a change in the form of the currency of the country, from pence to cents in Mauritius and from the English half penny to its Spanish equivalent in Gibraltar. The Seych.e.l.les stamp was prepared to meet a change in the rate for letters to countries in the International Postal Union.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Stamp, "Seych.e.l.les", surcharged 8 cents]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Stamp, "St. Helena", surcharged 1 penny]

The first stamp made in St. Helena was a six pence. For a long time no other value was engraved but the six pence stamps were printed in a variety of colors and surcharged with the desired values. The Ceylon stamp has been made available for revenue purposes, as well as postal.

The last stamp shown is from Shanghai. Its original value was 100 cash.

This was overprinted "20 cash" and the equivalent Chinese characters in a double-lined frame, and again surcharged "100 cash."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Stamp, "Ceylon", 15 cents, surcharged 5 cents, Postage, Revenue]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Stamp, "Shanghai LPO", 100 cash, surcharged 20 cash, surcharged again 100 cash]

There is an interesting bit of history connected with these surcharges.

The supply of 20 cash stamps was exhausted and the postmaster surcharged that value on eight hundred of the 100 cash stamps. A tourist, learning this and knowing that the regular 20 cash stamps were expected to arrive at any moment, bought the entire lot. But the expected stamps failed to arrive and the postmaster made a second lot of surcharges but on the 80 cash this time. When the tourist learned this he wished to return the stamps he had bought. The postmaster refused to take them back but, pressure being brought through the Munic.i.p.al Council, finally consented.