Automatic Weighing at the Royal Mint, 75 



pulator might bring to the work, he could not — as has been 

 oyer and over again proved — weigh planchets of gold or silver 

 to the extreme nicety which the Mint machines have been made 

 to reach. Through their media the infallible and beautiful law 

 of gravitation is enlisted into the service of her Majesty's coiners, 

 and the results obtained thereby are as unfailingly constant and 

 exact as is the action of that law. 



Before proceeding to describe more closely the principle 

 and the peculiarities of construction of the automatic balances, 

 it may not be improper to offer a few remarks upon the great 

 importance to the Mint and to the community at large, of 

 the accurate weighing, or "sizing," as the ancient term 

 stands, of pieces of gold or silver intended for transfor- 

 mation into the circulating medium. From the very earliest 

 period in the annals of minting, its consequence and value 

 have been recognized. Even before coins were in use at all 

 in the British islands, and when slips or cuttings of the pre- 

 cious metals represented money, the sizing of those slips was 

 necessarily attended to, and that with as much care and exacti- 

 tude as the rude appliances of the time admitted. It was usual 

 at that remote era — which was immediately preceded by the age 

 of barter — for the inhabitants of Britain to go to market, or out 

 shopping, laden with sufficient metal for effecting their intended 

 purchases, and to carry with them instruments for dividing, 

 and scales and weights for weighing it. This primitive process 

 was found to be inconvenient, uncertain, and very troublesome, 

 and soon the expedient was resorted to of having pieces of 

 metal cut and weighed before going out marketing. These 

 clippings were at once the prototypes of, and the substitutes for, 

 coins. 



At length, and owing to frauds practised by buyers and 

 sellers, both in respect of the weighing, and the debasement of 

 the metallic symbols, it became necessary to interpose the 

 authority of the law, and thus to regulate and systematize the 

 rude and unshapely currency. Then appeared stamps or im- 

 pressions, emblems of that authority, and guarantees of the 

 weight and fineness of the metallic dumps upon which they were 

 imprinted. To these marks of genuineness were subsequently 

 added the names of the authorized moneyers by whom they 

 were struck or stamped. The next step in the march of im- 

 provement was to decorate — as well as the artists of the day 

 could accomplish that operation — the pieces of metal with re- 

 presentations of the monarch, prince, or prelate under whose 

 sanction they were issued. Dates, legends, and inscriptions 

 followed in process of time, but, as has been shown, the accurate 

 sizing or weighing of the metals was always a subject of grave 

 I'onsidei'ation. . 



