It is in the defining of these limitations that many collectors are constantly seeking for guidance. "Can you tell me a good country in which to specialise?" is an ever-recurring query. The answer should, of course, be extracted from the experience of the individual who sets the question. It may be laid down as a maxim that the general collector is not yet ripe for specialism until his general experience has turned his inclinations to some well-defined speciality. The trend of one's inclinations may be clearly reflected in the general collection, where it is seen that one country has been by some—possibly unconscious—bias developed beyond all others. Every stamp-lover knows that there are some stamps which exert over him personally a peculiar fascination. It may be due to some interest in the country of their issue, or to some special attractions in their style of production, and indeed to a variety of other causes.

It was a solitary—rather bilious-looking—stamp that first obsessed me, a good many years ago now. It was the 3 cents Sarawak, 1869, printed in brown on yellow paper, which was in the collection of my schooldays, and I had always wanted to make it the nucleus of a special collection. But, before the opportunity came for realising this ambition, a different interest had arisen in that adventure-story republic of Hayti, which led me first to try to specialise its stamps, which having done, after my notions of specialising at that period, the next start was made with my early friend the peculiar yellow-brown label which a Scottish firm lithographed for the Rajah of Sarawak. I suppose the spice of adventure suggested by both Hayti and Sarawak, and subsequently China and Abyssinia, was responsible for turning one's specialistic tendencies into definite channels.

But whatever the influence may be with some, the question is so constantly being put that it may be useful to outline some skeleton plans, which are all capable of providing good scope for the exercise of philatelic talent.

The close study of detail, and particularly the increasing interest taken by collectors in the manner of production, has led some students to devote themselves to the stamps produced by a particular firm of manufacturers. The finest collection on these lines would be that dealing with the stamps produced by Messrs. Perkins, Bacon & Co. during the period of, say, 1840-80. This would include the low-value English stamps of the line-engraved series, the early imperforate and perforated Ceylons, which in themselves afford ample scope for a big collection, those old favourites the triangular Capes, the majority of the stamps of the West Indian Islands, a few from Mauritius and Natal, the most interesting of the issues for New Zealand, and several of the Australian States, some of our North American possessions, with many others, not forgetting Chili's early issues. The stamps in such a collection would all be line-engraved.

Messrs. De La Rue & Co., the greatest stamp-printers in the world, would also provide an interesting sphere for special study, embracing line-engraved stamps from the old Perkins-Bacon plates, printed in a superb series of pigments, distinctive from those of the earlier printers, and also the long range of surface-printed stamps for which this firm has been noted.

There are other printers whose work could be dealt with by the collector in a like manner, and the would-be specialist on these lines has an opportunity of choosing a very small field or a very large one, the two I have expressly mentioned being capable of treatment on a very large scale indeed.

A more general limitation begins with political or geographical grouping. "Europeans" are in constant demand, as there are many collectors who confine themselves to the stamps of the European States as a group. It is, however, a very large group, and few could hope to successfully cope with the whole of it on anything approaching specialist lines. The Castle-Mann collection, sold in 1906 for nearly £30,000, was limited to European stamps. But Europe for the collector naturally subdivides into lesser groups, e.g., the German States, Italian States, Balkan States, &c., and these in their turn yield single countries, many of which will provide in themselves an abundance of work and study for the enthusiast.

The fashion which has for many years kept the stamps of the British Empire in constantly increasing demand is rather curious, in that what may be attributed—at least partly—to patriotism at home has yet prevailed in foreign countries, where British Colonials are collected even more than the national products. In the United States, for example, the collector has until quite lately somewhat neglected the grand series of beautifully engraved stamps of the Republic and has followed the crowd of collectors of British Colonials. This may be explained in some measure by the shrewdness of the American investor, whose confidence in the security of his money in good old British Colonial stamps is still unbounded. At the same time philatelic experience is that every country is gradually being taken by the students and getting its turn, so that as the United States has a growing family of its own, it is not unlikely that in due course we shall find more United States collectors working out their philatelic salvation on their own lines on a national, or American, basis. The American field is a particularly fine one and offers the most virgin philatelic soil. Nearly every other group has been pretty well collected and studied, though not exhaustively. The United States itself has had much attention, but Mexico and South and Central America, Cuba, Hayti, the Dominican Republic are comparatively fresh soil, and the student can invest at present prices with a good assurance that, as United States expansion and influence become more overwhelming in the Western Hemisphere, all these countries will enjoy increased popularity with the stamp-collector.

THE WEST COAST OF AFRICA.

National African Company, Ltd. (No stamps)
Royal Niger Company (Charter of July 10, 1886)
1892—————1893
Sierra Leone,Gambia,Gold Coast,Oil Rivers Protectorate (Africa Order in Council, 1889)
186018691875
Niger Coast Protectorate, 1893
Northern Nigeria,Southern Nigeria,Lagos,
190019011874
Southern Nigeria,
Feb. 16, 1906