HKB
The Question of Condition considered More at Large--How One most Forcibly Realises Its Importance and Value--Limited Survival of Ancient Coins in Fine State--Practical Tests at Home and Abroad--Lower Standard in Public Institutions and the Cause--Only Three Collectors on My Lines besides Myself--The Romance of the Shepherd Sale--Its Confirmation of My Views--Small Proportion of Genuine Amateurs in the Coin-Market--Fastidious Buyers not very Serviceable to the Trade--An Anecdote by the Way--The Eye for State more Educated in England than Abroad--American Feeling and Culture--What will Rare Old Coins bring, when the Knowledge of Them is more developed?--The Ladies stop the Way--Continental Indifference to Condition--Difficulties attendant on Ordering from Foreign Catalogues--Contrast between Them and Our Own--D'une Beauté Excessive--Condition a Relative Term--Its Dependence on Circumstances--Words of Counsel--Final Conclusions--Do I regret having become a Collector?--My Mistakes.
Condition, with the majority of coin-collectors, does not rule at all. A man wants a particular piece for the sake of study or of possession; and so long as the type is there, he is satisfied. That is the general religion of amateurs.
With a second section this quality becomes a merit; if the coin is a good one, so much the better, if it is not too dear. With half-a-dozen perchance in each generation, if with so many, the state is a postulate; the purchaser of the item depends on that above everything else; and the price is secondary.
I have known very few persons in my time, who seemed thoroughly to understand what a fine coin was. It is not sufficient that it is well-preserved or even fleur de coin; for it may have been badly struck, or it may be damaged by a flaw or by the cleaner. It should be well struck, perfectly preserved, and unsophisticated. If there is a tone or patina, that should be pure and uniform.
The value and force of condition in coins are not fully recognisable, till one is fortunate enough to accumulate a body similar in style and rank. In a collection of first-rate examples each new-comer enhances the rest, and is enhanced by them, and the converse is true of the presence of inferior productions, which demoralise and deteriorate their companions. It seemed to me that this was signally demonstrated, where at Sotheby's rooms a ten-shilling piece in silver of the Oxford Declaration type, 1643, occurred among an assortment of poor material, and brought £14. It was in mint-state, and in a sale with others of similar stamp would have doubtless attracted wider attention, and commanded at all events twice the money. I exchanged it with Lincoln for an indifferent one in my possession, which had cost me five guineas, and for which he allowed me eight, so that it came to me at about ten per cent. on the auction price.