314 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2»4 S. VIII. Oct. 15. '59. 



line, in illustration of the splendid edition of the 

 plays, which was the professed object of the 

 scheme. The utter impossibility of carrying this 

 out, in any reasonable time, on a scale commen- 

 surate with what was held out in the prospectus, 

 and on the faith of which the subscriptions were 

 entered into, was the undoubted cause of its 

 failure as a pecuniary speculation. First-rate 

 line engravings were promised; there being at 

 that time but few hands in that line, and but few 

 of the prints appear to have been executed by 

 the best of them. Some of the line engravings 

 were such as would not now be tolerated ; and 

 the greater part of the large prints were executed 

 in that inferior style of stipple which about that 

 time had got into general practice. Some of tlie 

 worn-out impressions of this class, I apprehend, 

 are what are alluded to by Mr. Boys as " hideous 

 reproductions." 



To compensate in some degree for this failure, 

 the Boydells obtained an Act of Pai'liaraent to 

 dispose of the Gallery by lottery. To the best of 

 my recollection the tickets were three guineas 

 «ach ; the great temptation being that there were 

 no blanks, the holder of each ticket being entitled 

 to receive prints to that value, by which means 

 the Boydells got rid of their heavy stock of im- 

 pressions from the plates, the catalogue of which 

 is secondly noticed in Mr. Boys's letter. One of 

 my sisters had a present of a ticket, for which 

 she got three prints, which together I aiii sure 

 would not have fetched 5s. 



The great prize (I do not think there were any 

 on an intermediate scale) consisted of the pre- 

 mises in Pall Mall, with the pictures contained in 

 them. Mr. Tassie, of Leicester Square, was the 

 fortunate holder ; and it was on his account that 

 the sale by Christie took place which is men- 

 tioned in Mr. Boys's letter ; and it was no doubt 

 on this account that within a few years after- 

 wards Mr. Tassie relinquished the business long 

 carried on by him and his father before him, and 

 to which he left no successor or representative 

 that I ever heard of. That is a subject which I 

 was under the impression had been noticed in 

 some volume of yours not long since, but I cannot 

 find it. I should like to make it the subject of 

 some remarks; but if so, it must be at some future 

 time in a separate communication, the present 

 one having far exceeded what I had anticipated. 



M. H. 



FORGED ASSIGNATS. 



(2"^ S. vi. 70. 134. 255.) 

 I am obliged by the various replies received 

 through the medium of "N. & Q." to my inquiries 

 on this subject. Mb. Penstone (p. 134.) thinks 

 the report of the case tried before Lord Kenyon to 

 Tae "very insufficient evidence" on which to re- 



ceive a charge against the government of the 

 day. With all deference to his conclusion I would 

 just remark that the case (Strongi'th'arm v. 

 Lakyn) did not require to be probed farther as 

 against the government, inasmuch as the question 

 at issue was not the bona fides of the English go- 

 vernment, but a mere question of right or wrong 

 between the litigants. I take Lord Kenyon's 

 summing up to be strong confirmation, if not ab- 

 solute proof of the charge. Sir W. C. Trevel- 

 yan's assertion (p. 255.) that "the transaction 

 was managed for Mr. Pitt by Mr. (afterwards) 

 Alderman Magnay," is conclusive enough, and goes 

 far to vindicate that much vilified and occasionally 

 erring personage " it-is-said " from any sin of 

 invention or exaggeration. Sir W. C. T. states 

 that the paper was made at Haughton paper-mill 

 near Hexham ; but it is probable that more than 

 one manufacturer was engaged in the work, as I 

 find the following in the Financial and Monetary 

 History of England by Mr. Thomas Doubleday 

 of Newcastle. I may premise that Mr. D. is a 

 north counti'yman by birth, and must have had 

 ample means of verifying his assertions : — 



"When he joined in the war Mr. Pitt had ' predeter- 

 mined to complete the discredit of the assignats by forg- 

 ing, and distributing the forgeries over France: which 

 he did. The consequence was that the assignats became 

 ' waste paper,' and they may to this hour be seen pasted 

 against the walls of cottages in France as memorials of 

 tlie time they fell. This act of Pitt has been confidently 

 denied ; and it has been asserted that, if done, it was not 

 with the knowledge of the heads of the government. 

 Both denial and assertion are however false. In conse- 

 quence of the fraudulent dishonour of a bill of exchange 

 the whole was divulged in a court of law ; and the paper 

 of which the forgeries were made is now known to have 

 been manufactured by direct order ofgovernment at Lang- 

 ley paper-mill, situated near the city of Durham, a site 

 chosen probably for this purpose on account of its remote- 

 ness from the seat of government ; and indeed the whole 

 transaction was worthj' of the genius of the minister, who 

 was singularly destitute of militarj' notions excepting in 

 so far as they were intertwined with the pure question of 

 ways and means." — Pp. 134-135. 



Mr. D.'s remark as to the reason for the choice 

 of Langley paper-mill for the manufacture will 

 apply with equal or greater fitness to the secluded 

 locality of Haughton, on the North Tyne. One 

 more authority is Dr. Belsham, who (in his His- 

 tory of England, published in 1805), says of the 

 failure of the Vendean expedition in 1794 : — 



" A considerable sum in specie became likewise the pro- 

 perty of the captors, together with prodigious quantities 

 of assignats fabricated in England, and issued under the 

 mock authority of the infant monarch of France." — Vol. 

 V. p. 376. 



If farther confirmation be needed by the ultra- 

 sceptical, I may add that I have this day con- 

 versed on this subject with a veteran naval ofiicer 

 of undoubted veracity, who tells me that he was 

 in Quiberon Bay with the ill-fated expedition to 

 La Vendee, and is perfectly clear as to the fact of 



