IN SOUTHERN INDIA. 
183 
a Dutch mint was at one time established, and where most 
of the specimens in my collection were procured. Of these 
figures 52 and 53 represent two specimens of the same issue, 
the one showing the upper, the other the lower portion of the 
reverse die. On these, three incomprehensible figuxes occur, 
one above another, the upper somewhat resembling the em- 
blematic Sim and moon, frequently met with on the products 
of the native mints. The two lower figures appear similar, 
and may be rude imitations of boats, on either side of which 
are two others equally, if not more, inexplicable, and beneath 
all what looks like an illiterate attempt to copy a Persian 
word. Figm-e 54 is equally incomprehensible, and on the 
obverse of this even the P is inverted and wi'itten, 1, 
while the reverse reduces the whole of the figures I have 
tried to describe to a nearer resemblance to an unintelligible 
Hindustani word. Another coin in my collection, bearing 
a V above the monogram, bears on the reverse what, by a 
vast stretch of imagination, might be taken to read o-^. 
(Zerb Palicat), while another has a II above, with a reverse 
which is so confused that I have never been able to get the 
most imaginative numismatist to get further than the sug- 
gestion that it must be double Dutch. When one looks at 
these rude caricatures of coins (and, as we shall presently see, 
we were not far ahead of our Dutch neighbours at the time), 
and then compare them with the clear cut issues of the 
Moghals and Pathans struck centuries before, fine in design 
and exquisite in workmanship, with every letter well defined 
and clear, one can hardly believe that we were posing among 
them as a civilized and civilizing power, though for our own 
credit, be it said, we had not then got so far as the establish- 
ment of " Schools of Art." 
Early Dutch coins in silver are somewhat rare. Small 
one and two stiver pieces of 1820-30 are perhaps the com- 
monest of the silver issues of the Dutch in the East. On the 
reverse they usually bear the arms of the respective states 
