Democratic Sentinel, Volume 13, Number 28, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 August 1889 — Something About Stamps. [ARTICLE]

Something About Stamps.

Not a week passes that numerous readers do not write to inquire the value of some more or less rare stamps in their possession, not realizing how difficult it is to fix such values. Stamps, apart from their intrinsic value of two or three cents (when uncanceled), are merely curiosities and have no actual value.

Some people would not give a dollar for a hundred of the rarest stamps in the world, while others would mortgage a house to obtain possession of a single stamp. Some of the prices paid for stamps in this country are such as may well amaze the young stamp collector, and in Europe the mania is so great that some collections are almost priceless. M. Philippe de Ferrari has a collection of 250,000 stamps, and he has sold one collection to a Parisian stamp lover for $50,000.

Mr. Burnett, an English collector, has stamps valued at SIIO,OOO, and many collections, by no means remarkable, have been sold in England for $5,000. The late Duchess de Galliera accumulated three thousand albums, which are now valued at $210,000. At the Paris mint there is a remarkable collection, and the Rothschild collection in Paris is so costly and so hirhly prized by its owner that it is guarded like the Koliinoor, and only experts are allowed to see it. At a recent London auction some remarkable prices were realized. British Guiana stamps brought the following prices: A “blue 4c” of 1850, canceled, $185; uncanceled, $250; four lc., issue 1853, $5 each; and a pair of 4c Magentas of 1850, S6O. These prices are paralyzing to the ordinary reader, but much higher figures have been reached in other sales. Here are a few samples: < The 15c and 30c Reunion stamps bring SSOO, and the New Brunswick 5c stamp finds a ready purchaser at $l5O. The set of four 1852 Hawaiian stamps are valued at $1,500, and the 1847 Mauritius stamps, 2c and 4c, can rarely be had undei’ SSOO. Old Brazil black stamps range in value from $5 to $12.50; the erreen and yellow ones of Buenos Ayres bring as high as $25 each, while the red ones are worth S3O. The vermilion one-franc French stamp of 1849 and “V. R.” black English penny stamp are considered cheap at fifty dollars apiece, while the Mulready wrapper on India paper, issued in 1840, has been sold for S4OO.

The prices are enough to send a cold chill down the back of the youthful collector who is reflecting whether he can afford to invest fifty cents for an 1858 Peruvian one-penny red. But that is no reason why the collector should not collect, if it gives him pleasure. It is a harmless amusement and incidentally teaches history to the collector. But there is a drawback, as there is to every amusement. Many a collector, young and old, has a stamp he prizes as the gem of his collection, supposed to be worth dollars, when it is not worth cents. However, it is a consolation to know that a counterfeit gives just as much satisfaction as a genuine stamp, until its spurious character is discovered, and such discovery very rarely happens.— Golden Days.