The Confessions of a Collector

by William Carew Hazlitt

The influence of Messrs Lincoln & Son in forming my taste was more or less considerable. Their stock was miscellaneous, and I perhaps incautiously suffered it to reflect itself in my collection. The firm indeed, after a while, thought that my lines were too general, for whatever series they put on view from time to time gave up its choicer elements to me; and eventually my good friends perceived that, although I was certainly not a specialist in one sense, I was in another. I took only the best; and this proved an invaluable safeguard.

For, by making a hard and fast rule, that no coin whatever shall be admissible in the presence of a defect or of imperfect condition, one shuts out the bulk of the objects submitted to notice. A thousand average lots in a dealer’s hands are not apt to yield above five per cent. of eligible purchases, which are not duplicates. In a continental stock the proportion would be much lower. The gold coins do not so signally fail; it is in the inferior metals, especially the billon and copper, that the difficulty lies.

I emerged, it is fair to own, from my researches and selections at the Lincoln establishment without serious damage or trouble, considering that I entered into relations with the house as a perfect stranger, and was in my numismatic infancy. They began, as time went on, to see that I was in earnest, and would at length scarcely allow me to buy any article likely to appear on farther examination unsatisfactory; and by a few exchanges of early acquisitions, on which they were generous enough to let me lose nothing, I stood in the end better than I perhaps deserved. Mr Lincoln has told me that he started on his numismatic career by advertising on the back page of the catalogues of his father, who was a book seller, a short list of coins on sale by him at the same address.

The strength and spirit, which the father infuses into his child, the latter is now and then prone to use against the giver; and I am afraid that I have appeared ungrateful to my original source of supply—in fact, my dry-nurses—inasmuch as I outgrew by insensible degrees their power of satisfying my wants, and directed my attention elsewhere.

Messrs Lincoln & Son filled in the groundwork of my scheme, and continue to fill up gaps at intervals; but it was impossible for me to shut my eyes to the fact, that the rate of progress, which my numismatic studies were attaining, rendered a restriction to a single firm out of the question. I could never have committed to writing my Notes, imperfect as they may be, on the Coins of all countries and periods with certain exceptions, had I not left the original groove, and entered the market, prepared to avail myself of every particular, which was to be gleaned both at home and abroad, alike in the shape of information, correction, and addition.

It was through the Lincolns I became acquainted with Mr Atkins, author of the two works on Tokens and Colonial Coins, and he introduced to me the name of Schulman of Amersfoort. This was about ten years since; and the result was that Schulman thenceforward sent me periodical consignments for selection and his well-compiled catalogues. From this quarter I derived, rather contrary to the expectation which I had been led to form, a highly valuable assortment of coins at fair prices. I surmise that a considerable proportion of my correspondent’s picked acquisitions has found its way to me. His parcels from season to season embraced an alarming and chronic percentage of hopeless specimens, notwithstanding my exhortations to him to be more select; and I am persuaded that this circumstance proceeded from the sender’s inability, in common with all the continental dealers, to distinguish and appreciate condition, as he has often offered a proof at a slight advance on the figure asked for an ordinary and mediocre example.

Schulman has been during his career in the constant habit of falling in with a variety of continental coins, which are scarcely ever seen in England; and as a rule his tariff is moderate enough—not quite so moderate, perhaps, as it used to be, especially the fine early copper, since he discovered my partiality for it.

But I feel nevertheless that my collection owes a great deal to my Amersfoort correspondent. Our business has been necessarily conducted by letter. In 1889 I was at Utrecht, and went over to his place. I had previously called, when I was at Amsterdam, at Bom’s, and there I was shown the priced catalogue of a quite recent local auction. Against a silver daalder of Louis Napoleon, King of Holland, of an excessively rare type, I observed my friend’s name as the purchaser for 105 gulden, and the first object which met my eyes in Schulman’s room was this very piece. I took it in my hand. ‘Ah!’ cried he, ‘that won’t suit you; I want 150 gulden for it.’ I laid it down again, implying in my manner a sort of apology. I made a few purchases, and left him.

He subsequently inserted the daalder in a catalogue at 135 gulden. He had tried the higher sum without success. I did not take any notice, and forgot all about it, till in a parcel sent on approval this was one of the items, the price 100 gulden. Allowing the usual discount, the piece remained with me at 90. I always cherished a suspicion that it was put into the sale in the Spuistraat by Master Schulman himself, and bought in.

My good friend acquired for me at Amsterdam a ¼ stuiver of Batavia, 1644 which he reported to me as beau. When it reached my hands, I was not altogether satisfied, nor did he reassure me, when he stated that my specimen was far finer than those in the museums at the Hague and at Batavia. The ¼ is considerably rarer than the ½. Schulman once advertised an example of the former at 10 gulden or 16s. 8d., describing it as ‘de toute beautè’; but I missed it.