258 



The Correct Arms of the State of Neiu York. 



reach the truth. The face, neck, hands and fore-arms only are exposed. 

 It is so also with the second. In the third nearly the whole arm is 

 bared. 



Her feet are covered with socks in the first two, and sandalled in 

 the last specimen. The first two have no belt at the waist, in the last 

 one Justice is belted. 



Motto. The word Excelsior, painted upon a scroll, upon the ends 

 of which stand the supporters, alike in all three of the specimens. 

 There is a mantling of scroll-work over all the three specimens. 



The next representations of the Arms, the nearest in time to the 

 Chapel painting, were on the New York copper tokens of 1786 and 

 178'^. There were issued four varieties of copper coins in those years 

 known by that name, and even a gold piece of the same size. They 

 were struck at Birmingham, England, as a means of profit for specu- 

 lators in New York City, and all bore upon them some portion of the 

 Arms of the State.* One of them, having on the obverse the figure 

 of an armed Indian chief, had on the reverse, a rudely cut but lively 

 picture of the complete Arms, the supporters markedly holding up the 

 shield, although each one is on the wrong side of it, and the head of 

 the eagle is turned to the left. None of these can be appealed to for 

 official evidence of the original device of Arms, as they were issued 

 without authority of law, the legislature declining to recognize the 

 undertaking. 



A lithographic picture of the Arms, obtained from a study of the 

 three specimens first described, and conformed largely to the one from 

 the military commission specimen, has been prepared by Mr. S. C. 

 Ilutchins and will be published as a vignette on the title page of the 

 edition of the New York Civil List for 1880. The volume will con- 

 tain from his pen many of the facts which I have mentioned. In the 

 year 1875, a copy of the St. Paul's Chapel painting of the Arms was 

 cut on wood with the legend. Saint J^icholas Club, 1875, as a design 

 for the seal of that institution, and it may yet be adopted as such. 



No peculiar significance or meaning has been attached hitherto to 

 some of the emblems constituting the original Arms of the State ; yet 

 it is well worthy of our inquiry whether they had not a yery distinct 

 and positive meaning in the minds of the original proposers of them. 

 If the interpretation of them which I shall venture to give shall be 

 received as correct, I am confident it will enhance our respect and 

 attachment for them. This significance disappears from most of the 

 modera representations of the Arms; nor does any one of the three 

 express all the meanings with equal force. 



*Hickcox's American coinage, pp. 78, 79. — Historical Magazine, 1869, p. 117. 



