274 Tlie Correct Arms of the State oj New Yorh. 



and were influential enough to secure for the distinctive word Arms a 

 place in the law. 



I will now proceed to present in order the work that has been done, 

 and the additions made to our stock of knowledge regarding the 

 State Arms, or other important observations, since the reading of my 

 paper in December 2, 1879, before the Institute. 



1. At the time when that paper was read, no other copy of the 

 military commission of 1778 was known to be in existence than the 

 one of Lieutenant Mortine. During the past year, however, upon unty- 

 ing files of papers in the office of the Secretary of State, a consider- 

 able number of similar military commissions, perfect in every par- 

 ticular, have been discovered. Other copies have been given to the 

 State Library by citizens of the State, and are also known to be in 

 the possession of individuals, thus establishing clearly the fact, which 

 had been doubted by some persons, that this engraved military com- 

 mission was in common use. One of these commissions, given to the 

 State Library by a descendant, is that of Kilian Van Eensselaer, as 

 colonel of the Albany county regiment in 1778. 



2. It is one of the discoveries of the past year, that the use of this 

 vignette of the initial letter T was not limited to the military depart- 

 ment, but was also used on civil commissions. Among the papers on 

 file in the office of the Secretary of State, there is an engraved head- 

 ing of a civil commission with the Arms identical with the heading 

 of the military commission, printed upon parchment, and recorded 

 Angust 19, 1778, as a commission to Gen. Philip Schuyler, to be 

 a delegate from Xew York to the Continental Congress, thus estab- 

 lishing the fact that this was also the drawing of the Arms adopted 

 for use in the civil service of the government. A difference of 

 opinion existed at the time in the convention regarding the nomina- 

 tion and appointment of delegates by the Governor ; and Gen. Schuy- 

 ler was not actually chosen a delegate until the 25th or 26th of 

 September, at Poughkeepsie. 



It is natural to ask the question, why this engraved form of the 

 commissions did not continue in use ? The answer is that it was 

 not essential that the Arms should be found in the initial letter; it 

 was the privy seal of the Governor which stamped the commissions 

 with authority. It is probable that in transferring the seat of govern- 

 ment from Kingston to Poughkeepsie, the plate was mislaid and lost. 

 It may have been purposely abstracted by the engraver, of whom a 

 sketch was lately published in the Magazine of American History very 

 little to his credit. It disappeared during the year of confusion of the 

 revolutionary war, resulting from the battle year of 1777 in the State 

 of New York. 



