This Department is conducted in the interest of stamp and coin collectors, and the Editor will be pleased to answer any question on these subjects so far as possible. Correspondents should address Editor Stamp Department.
Owing to the enormous quantity of Columbian stamps bought as a speculation by dealers and by collectors, the prices advance very slowly. In fact, the only advances have been made as the result of "corners." One dealer bought up all the $1, and advanced the price to $5, and later on to $6. Another dealer bought up all the $2, and will not sell any at less than $4.50, and probably will run up the price to $5 or $6 shortly. Probably some of the other values will be bought up by other dealers, and the net result will be that a set of Columbians will cost $75 or $100. Or perhaps this speculation will work its own destruction through the diminution of collectors, in which case the speculators will lose the interest on their investments, and possibly some of their capital.
I am glad to see that the Round Table readers in the South are taking special interest in Confederate stamps. With a few exceptions these are very rare, and in compliance with several requests I will give illustrations of almost all the Confederate stamps known. If space permits I shall begin with next week's issue.
G. N. C.—A number of coins issued previous to 1850, and valuable. For instance, the 1796 and 1797 half-dollars are quoted by dealers at $75 each. The coins mentioned by you are not rare. Dealers supply them at about double the face value.
A. Simon.—As a beginning, to make up a stamp-collection, I advise you to purchase packets of stamps from responsible dealers. You can buy twenty-five different packets from the oldest stamp dealer in America, and probably from others, for 25c. to $25 per packet. The packets contain from 10 to 1500 different stamps, according to price and rarity of the stamps.
V. M. Wakeman.—The stamps were used from 1851 to 1861, and have no value, as hundreds of millions were used during that time.
S. Young.—The Spanish dollar you have is worth its weight as silver. "Correos y Telegs" means "Postage and Telegraph." "Helvetia" means "Switzerland." "Oesterr Post" means "Austrian Post."
G. France.—The Internal Revenue stamps were first used during the war. Most of the stamps were discontinued after 1878, but some are still used. A few of the early ones are rare, but the most are so common that they have little value.
F. Gardner.—The coins mentioned can be bought of coin dealers at a slight advance on face.
T. F. McDermott.—The stamp is the 2c. U.S. Internal Revenue Proprietary used during the last war. If unperforated and with good margins it is worth $1.50; if perforated it is worth nothing.
S. B. Stephens.—You will find illustrations and descriptions of the last Mexico stamps in Harper's Round Table for May 7, 1895. You can buy Mexican Revenues from the larger stamp dealers in New York, also U.S. Revenues. There are five J. F. Henry stamps worth from 10c. to $10 each, according to rarity and condition.
C. M.—Very few philatelists have any doubt as to the advisability of leaving Abyssinian stamps severely alone.
R. Baker.—The ordinary foreign coins are so little collected in this country that no values can be obtained.
Try it for just one wash. Ivory Soap costs a little more, but it takes less to do the work, and how much whiter clothes are when they have been washed with it.