But the item that interests us particularly in this report reads:—
To promote the general convenience in prepaying letters to the United Kingdom at the new rate, postage stamps of the value of 10d. Currency, equal to 8d. sterling, were procured and issued for sale to the public.
Thus part of the recommendation contained in the report for the preceding year was carried out.
In the accounts for the fiscal year we find the following entries:—
| 1st. Quarter, Rawdon, Wright & Co., Postage Stamps for P. O. Dept. | £12.12.6 |
| 3rd. Quarter, Rawdon, Wright & Co., Making Stamps | 42.18.6 |
| 4th. Quarter, Rawdon, Wright & Co., Postage Stamps for P. O. Dept. | 17.13.6 |
From this it would appear that the bill for engraving ("making") the new 10d. stamp was paid in the third quarter of the fiscal year, corresponding to the last quarter of 1854. According to the table of receipts from manufacturers in the "summary" already quoted,[35] the 10d. stamp was first received by the Post Office Department on Jan. 2, 1855. In Mr. King's "Reference List,"[36] however, the date "Dec. 5, 1854" is given as being "taken from used stamps on the original covers," but this must certainly be a mistake. The "summary" also gives the quantities issued to postmasters by quarters, and there were none issued (naturally) in the quarter ending Dec. 31, 1854. In the next quarter, ending Mar. 31, 1855, there were 16,200 issued to postmasters, so that the first issue probably took place soon after receipt, that is, in January, 1855. The total number received from the manufacturers in this first delivery was 100,080.
The plate for this stamp is stated to have been made up for printing sheets of 100 impressions in ten rows of ten, like the three values of 1851, and also to have had the eight marginal imprints. But there are reasons for
thinking it may have been made to print 120 impressions, ten rows of twelve each, concerning which more will be said later. Suffice it to remark here that the number delivered (100,080) is exactly divisible by 120, making 834 full sheets, which is not the case if 100 is used. The normal color of the stamp is a very deep blue.
The design of the new 10d., illustrated as No. 3 on [Plate I], corresponds in general style to the 6d. and 12d. of 1851, but the portrait in the central oval is of Jacques Cartier, the explorer and founder of Canada. There has been some discussion over the identity of the original, it having been claimed that the subject was Sebastian Cabot, the discoverer, just as the portrait on the 6d. stamp has been assigned to Lord Elgin, Governor-General of Canada from 1846 to 1854.[37] Unfortunately no circular announcing the issue of the stamp has come to hand, and, as seen from the quotation already given, the report of the Postmaster General does not give us the information. It is nevertheless a fact that the portrait represents Cartier, the original being a three-quarter length painting in the Hotel de Ville at St. Malo, France, the birthplace of Cartier. The inscriptions in the oval frame are in this case separated by a small picture of the beaver at the right, and three maple leaves at the left. The value is expressed as TEN PENCE, with the numerals "10" in the lower spandrels, followed by the letters "cy" for "currency." In the upper spandrels is the corresponding value in sterling money, expressed as "8d stg". The relation between sterling and currency values and their equivalents in the decimal coinage of the United States was fixed by law, and the matter seems important enough to reproduce the statute here.