16 



seditious. These inferior coins of Edward VI. are the first EngUsh 

 money bearing a date, and are interesting on that account. They are, 

 therefore, not to be confounded with the broad shillings of the second 

 coinage struck in 1551, without a date. I have brought a specimen of the 

 broad shilling with me, and you will perceive that it is of better silver, an 

 advance being made in the right direction, in that the standard of the 

 coinage of silver is raised to iioz., idwt. of silver to igdwt. of alloy. It 

 may be as well to state that the broad shillings are so called from the 

 nearly full faced portrait of the King on the obverse side. He appears 

 dressed in parliamentary robes, collar of the garter, with a rose, and the 

 Roman numerals XII. at the sides. On the reverse, the old Latin motto, 

 " Posui Deum Adjutorem Meum," " I have made God my Help," again 

 appears, with the arms traversed by a cross. The broad shillings seem 

 to have been used in the time of Shakspeare, at the game of shovel- 

 board. Slender, in the Merry Wives of Windsor, complains that 

 "Pistol" has robbed him of two "Edward shovel-boards" or broads. 

 But to return to our base testoons. Later on, by proclamation of 

 Elizabeth in 1560, these shillings were marked with a particular 

 mint mark, such as a portcullis, and ordered to pass for 4|^d., so that 

 a fraud on the public of three-fourths of the amount of the base 

 coinage was effected. Some were also stamped with a greyhound, and 

 ordered to pass for so low a sum as 2|d. None of these Elizabethan 

 mint marks appear on this find of coins, so we may conclude that they 

 were put in their hiding place prior to her reign, either in the time of 

 Edward VI. or Queen Mary. 



FLINT IMPLEMENT. 



BY F. C. J. SPURRELL. 



At the meeting held on April i8th, 1882, Mr, H, W. Smith brought a 

 flint implement to show me. It was found in the " Old" Darenth bed in 

 Erith Village. As he, being in doubt as to its nature, did not bring it 

 forward publicly, and there are so few searchers for these relics of a far 

 off time, I think it right to notice this, the first find in that gravel. 



It is very symmetrical (except where injured by a pick), is carefully 

 chipped, and does not appear to have been much rolled. It is somewhat 

 remarkable, for the end opposite to the butt is a cutting edge, being very 

 thin, and in a perfectly straight line of over two inches in length. 



Maximum dimensions — inches 4.4x3.7x1.8. Colour — warm brown. 



