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the Emperor's visit to the Mint, June 16, 1814.

The

The Corporation of Cork having determined to celebrate the Anniversary of the Centenary of the accession of the House of Brunswick to the throne of these Realms, by three days public rejoicing, I suggested to Sir David Perrier, who then filled the Civic chair, that it would be advisable to have a medal struck, to record the event, and to wear on the occasion. Sir David immediately acceded to the plan, and authorized me to direct Mr. Wyon to engrave one with his Majesty's bust, from Marchant's, with suitable inscriptions. I wished for, and had designed a Figure reverse, but this was overruled by the higher powers. It has therefore only his Majesty's bust, with the neck bare. workmanship I consider very masterly, particularly the mild quiescent expression about the eye. It was presented on the 1st Aug. at Carleton-house to the Prince Regent, and at Dublin-castle to the Lord Lieutenant, by the directions, and in the name of Sir David Perrier, and gave great satisfaction. I recommended Mr. Wyon to eugrave a Figure reverse for this head, to commemorate the English Centenary, which he did by simplifying and improving my design for the Cork medal. He has placed Britannia on a rock in the sea, her right hand grasps the trident, and in her left she holds Victory on a globe; the lion on one side of her, and the royal shield and crown on the other; Britannia has a commanding appearance, and the rock and trident are very elaborately finished.

Reverse of a medal of the Prince Regent, published by Messrs. Rundle and Co. Britannia raising Europe, herself crowned by victory. This.noble subject is engraved in the flat style of the an tique bas reliefs, with a decided outline. It is very fine throughout, but the right arm of Europe is peculiarly beautiful.

Minimi medal of the Duke of Wellington, weighing 7 grains, quite a little gem. Reverse, a sword and shield.

1815. Liverpool Pitt Club. Obverse, the bust of Mr. Pitt, admirably reduced from Mr. Nollekins. I think this the finest head that has been engraved of Mr. Pitt. Reverse, Britannia protecting Europe, and Commerce, with Tyranny overthrown at her feet, and Victory and Peace de scending to crown and bless Britannia, two most beautiful figures, whose appearance is perfectly aerial. Some person of Birmingham has since published this head with an inscription on the reverse: and the Figure reverse, with a most miserable head of the Prince Regent, indented apparently by a button-mould manufacturer.

Head of the Prince Regent. I believe this is unpublished.

The same head, still more reduced, I' apprehend for a broach for Messrs. Rundle and Co.

Messrs. Rundle and Co's Jubilee Medal on the Peace of 1814. Obverse, the bust of the Prince Regent, from a drawing taken for the purpose by Sir Thomas Lawrence, exquisitely engraved with great spirit and animation, the hair and laurel particularly admirable. Reverse, Britannia seated between Peace and Victory, and crowning herself with a wreath of flowers, and producing a very rich, bold, and masterly effect.

Minimi medal of the Prince Regent, weight 7 grs.

A Twenty Franc of Louis XVIIIth, coined at our Mint for that Sovereign while at Ghent, in which Mr. Wyon has produced an almost fac-simile of thut coined at Paris. It may be distinguished from the French by the Mint marks of a fleur de lis, and the letter R. on the reverse, and not having the engraver's name under the King's bust, as is usual in the French and most other Mints, except the English, and as I think, with great propriety: for as there is always more than one engraver in the Mint, if the artists' names were on the coins they severally executed, the publick would be enabled to judge of their respective merits, and a spirit of emulation would be excited to obtain the approbation of the publick.

The Right Hon. W. Wellesley Pole having been made Master, great alterations took place at the Mint; and, if I may judge by those respecting the engravers, I should presume they were great improvements. Mr. Pingo and Mr. Marchant, the Chief and Second Engravers, were superannuated; Mr. Wyon was made Chief Engraver; the number of Engravers limited to two, and the salaries rendered certain, instead of depending on fees. This appointment of Mr. Wyon's took place in October 1815, when he was only in the 23d year of his age, a singular instance of eminence for so young an artist.

Two Stiver, One Stiver, and Half Stiver, Copper coins for Ceylon. Obverse, the bust of the King. Reverse, an Elephant, and the value of the coin; they are of the size of our Penpy, Half, and Farthing.

1816. Honorary medal for the Heroes of Waterloo. Obverse, the bust of the Prince Regent, from Sir Thomas Lawrence, admirably engraved, and with an uncommon softness, particularly in the hair. Reverse, a Victory, the wings of which are very highly finished, seated, with a palm-branch in one hand, and an olive in the other.

A larger medal on the same subject, I believe unpublished. It has a fine martial head of the Prince Regent, in similar costume to Rundle and Co's Jubilee. The

Victory

Victory is also a great improvement on the preceding. This medal, I understand, was considered as being too large to be worn; but it is much to be wished that it had been, or might yet be struck, and given or sold to the publick in record of the national triumph at Waterloo. The honorary medal, by the deaths of those to whom they were given, are to be procured with great facility, but they are generally very much damaged, and unfit for the cabinet. In France and Italy medals are strack and sold at the Mint, by which means a school of able artists is formed. As Sterne says, in the person of Mr. Shandy, "was I King of England," if I did nothing more for the encouragement of medal-engraving, I would at least offer a design every year, to record some national event, which any artist in the three kingdoms should be at liberty to engrave; and whoever engraved it best, his dies should be bought, with a restriction that the successful competitor would be incapacitated from engraving for the next year, to give encouragement to those who might not be quite his equals.

During the remainder of this year, I should imagine, Mr. Wyon was engaged with the New Coinage, for which he engraved the Sixpence, Shilling, and Halfcrown of 1816, and the Maundy Money, or Penny, Two pence, Three-pence, and Four-pence, of 1817. As specimens of able workmanship, the Half-crown more especially, I think they do Mr. Wyon very great credit. My friend to the right of the President (T. C. C.) will, I am aware, object, that the busts bear no resemblance to his Majesty, and I grant that I think so with him, but I am firmly persuaded that it was no fault of Mr. Wyon's; he does not notice the subject in his letters, as on Mint affairs he was always extremely reserved; but I remember, in answer to my letter respecting the Cork Centenary medal, in which I requested that his Majesty's portrait might be taken from Marchant's, he stated that he was glad we had made that selection, as it was the head he should always engrave from when he had a choice of his own.

For the opening of the Waterloo Bridge, the 18th June, 1817, Mr. Wyon engraved a small medal of the Prince Regent. Reverse, the Standard of the United King. dom. It has the same relief as a coin, and ranking it in that class, I think it is bis most successful effort.

Battle of Algiers. This was the last medal on which Mr. Wyon was engaged, having just finished the obverse at the period of his lamented decease. It is a most splendid performance, and his sun may truly be said to have set in meridian splendour. From an impression in wax sent me, it has the Prince Regent's bust,

in antient, armour, most spiritedly and elaborately executed. I trust that his Father, whose superior abilities are well known to be peculiarly distinguished in Buildings, Shipping, &c. will execute, the reverse, which was to be a view of the action.

Such, as far as my means of information extend, was the progress of Mr. Wyon's labours, to which, no doubt, considerable additions must be made to render it complete. To his family and friends, his health had been for years an object of great solicitude and apprehension; but in the course of this summer it had visibly and alarmingly declined; and having removed to the neighbourhood of Hastings for change of air, he there closed his short but valuable life, on the 22d of September 1817, in the twenty-fifth year of his age.

The private life of Mr. Wýon was as amiable as his public was splendid: his habits were strictly religious and domestic; and as a son and a brother, he was all that a parent or relative could wish for: his manners were uncommonly mild and unassuming; though it would not have been wonderful if abilities, which at so early an age placed him at the undisputed head of his profession in this country, had rendered him otherwise he was also perfectly free from that envy and jealousy, which, while it exists among all classes of society, is perhaps more visible among artists. No person could be more ready at all times to point out merit wherever it existed, and no one more severely criticised, or had so humble an opinion of his own labours as himself.

Since the adoption of the present mode of coining with the press in England, there have been four Chief Engravers worthy our notice. Simon, Roettier, Croker, and Wyon. Simon's great excellence is in his Coins, which are deservedly considered as the boast of England; for they defy all competition, either at home or on the Continent, from his time to the present. Simon appears to have deeply studied Nature, and in his works he endeavours to give a characteristic representation of the living person-and not a highly finished but stiff and lifeless model, which is, in my opinion, the great error of modern artists in general. The readiest mode of appreciating Simon's excellences is by comparing his works with those of other artists; and the superiority speaks for itself. Nor, while he was thus successful in the higher departments of his art, did he neglect those which, though mechanical, are yet essential to complete the excellences of a coinage. The inscriptions on the edges of his Crowns and Half Crowns of Oliver Cromwell, I am sorry for the honour of the English Mint to be obliged to say, remain to this day with

out

out the remotest approach at competition; and the double line of inscription on his Petition Crown of Charles II. continues a Unique, of which there has not been an attempt at rivalry.

If we consider the low state of mechanics in Simon's time, compared with the present, we must admit that his own abilities must have been very superior, when, with his scanty means, he has left works, which in 160 years have not even been equalled. It was the misfortune of the English mint, to be deprived of the talents of this great artist, to make room for a minion of Charles II. who came over in his train, Roettier, a man undoubtedly of abilities, but no more to be compared with Simon, than a Jerusalem Artichoke is to our national staff of life, the Potatoe. Roettier's excellence appears to me to consist chiefly in the busts on his medals; the figures on his reverses that I have seen are poor, and his coinage is inferior to that of Queen Anne's by Croker, which takes precedence next to Simon's in the cabinets of collectors; and as, from the present rarity of Simon's, the latter are seldom seen but in the possession of collectors and connoisseurs, Croker's with the Nation at large are in the highest estimation; and, in family hoards, the first place is usually occupied by "the pretty money of Queen Anne:" and this general estimation must have arisen chiefly from intrinsic excellence; something I willingly grant to the traditional veneration of "the good Queen." Croker also executed many fine medals, particularly a series on the victories of Anne: the portraits in general possess high excellence; but when there are figures on his reverses, he is not much more successful than Roettier. It was reserved for Wyon to triumph in this most difficult trial uf an artist's abilities. requisites which appear necessary to ensure success are, not only a liberal and classical education, which will thoroughly embue the artist with a knowledge of the subjects he has to represent, but also a taste to exhibit them to most advantage. Thus prepared, we yet require professional ability to identify what he has happily arranged in his imagination. That Mr. Wyon came to his profession with these advantages natural and acquired, the composition of his prize subject, Peace checking the fury of War, is a full and sufficient testimony. Had he never engraved another medal, his professional ability would have ranked as considerable; but, when from this we follow him to the Manchester Pitt reverse, the improvement in execution is absolutely astonishing, and fully warrants the conclusion, that, had health and life been granted, he would have equalled, probably surpassed, any engraver with whose works we

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are acquainted. We must remember that Mr. Wyon was but in his 25th year (an age at which we scarcely expect an artist to have more than entered on his profession) when he died. In our common calculations we always allow for increasing excellence till forty. Indeed instances of progressive improvement are common at much more advanced periods of life, of which the venerable President of the English Royal Academy is an illustrious example. Mr. Wyon's mind and leisure were devoted to the honour of his profession. It was his delight as well as his employment. In whatever he might be engaged, his study was, not how he could get rid, but how he could make the most of it; and his anxiety to be correct in his works can be appreciated only by those who were in familiar intercourse or correspondence with him: an evidence of this is supplied by one of the specimens of his works now before us, which he sent in return for some leaves of shamrock, supplied at his request from the garden of a young lady (S. L.) at Blackrock, as he wished rather to engrave from a plant itself, than a drawing. I could relate many similar instances; but one, as effectually as a thousand, indicates "the ruling passion." Coins, I should more properly say Modern Coins with their stupid wearisome monotony of coats of arms, unlike the godlike taste and freedom of the antients! and yet this age calls itself enlightened! and admires, or pretends to admire, the classical taste of Greece, and is enraptured with the Elgin marbles! Would that we could see a little Grecian taste in the coinage! A dawn does indeed seem to be opening; may it brighten to clear noon-day! But at present we are at a sad long distance from any thing that can be deemed classical in our coinage. In what are commonly called the barbarous ages, the coins present variety, and sometimes elegance; but from Charles II. what does the English collection afford us Silver and Gold with the dull uniformity of armorial bearings, and Copper with a Britannia, alike insignificant and unmeaning in Peace and War. Glance at the coinage of the pettiest state in Greece, and we blush at the contrast. I do not mean by these remarks to say that I would banish the Royal Arms from the Coinage. As connected with the history of the Empire, it is highly proper that they should appear; and, when executed with ability, and disposed with elegance, they are capable of forming a very pleasing reverse. But they should be confined to the larger Coins, Pence, Crowns, and Five Pounds, where the field of the Coin allows a sufficient space for all the charges to be distinctly defined, which it is utterly impossible to do when on a small scale,

where

where certain forms which are supposed to indicate Lions and Horses, are equally applicable to any other quadrupeds; and in engraving heraldic animals, it is much to be wished that artists would endeavour to represent them a little according to Nature in outline and relief, whereas in general they give us merely legs and heads, and as flat as though they had suffered the fate of poor Marsyas, and their skins only were nailed on the shield. Redlinger's medal on the marriage of Christian VI. of Denmark, 1732, is a fine specimen of the style which should be followed for these subjects. No one will mistake his Eagles or Lions, which have the living characteristics of true Birds and Beasts.-To return, however, from this digression, Modern Coins, in which Genius is the slave of Mechanism, afford so little scope for the exertion of an artist's abilities, compared with Medals, that it is in these latter that we must look for the highest evidences of Mr. Wyon's great abilities; and as I have briefly noticed all with which I am acquainted, I must now refer you from my inadequate commentary to the originals themselves. My list, I have no doubt, is extremely imperfect; for, until he was made Chief Engraver, he engraved a great number of Seals, &c. of which I have no memorandum or information, and the rapidity of his execution was seldom equalled. From the time he became Probationer Engraver, all the business of the Mint appears to have been executed by him, at least the only coin I have seen which is not his work is the Guinea of the year 1813.

Besides the works which Mr. Wyon bad completed, he had many others in contemplation. The principal of these was a Series of 20 Medals to record the most memorable Naval achievements of this reign. I had selected the subjects, and in his last communication he mentioned that he had designed several. This was his favourite plan; and in the execution it was his intention to avoid all allegory, with the exception of one head of Britannia, and to confine himself strictly to a representation of actual occurrences. The battle of Trafalgar would have occupied two medals; besides which, he intended to have engraved a medallion on the same event, to match one which he had begun for the victory of Waterloo. - Another work was a medallion of Sir Joseph Banks, the President of the English Royal Society; and his extreme anxiety that this should be an absolute specimen of workmanship, and not being able to please himself in the design of the reverse, occasioned his delaying it till he should have leisure to complete it to his wishes. For this meGENT. MAG, February, 1818.

dallion he had modelled a portrait, for which Sir Joseph honoured him by sitting, and which I have heard highly spoken of for its faithful resemblance. The patronage which Sir Joseph has always afforded to the Arts and Sciences are too well known for me to dwell on; and Mr. Wyon, among others, was honoured with his kind notice and encouragement, for which he was most desirous to make that return which his professional pursuits best enabled him.-A medal of Mr. Miles, as a counterpart to that of Snelling, for which he had partly modelled the head from memory.-One of the Mint, I believe he had begun; but I am doubtful as to a piece which was to have been in rivalry of Simon's Petition Crown, with an inscription on the edge of equal length. The obverse, his Majesty's portrait, cloathed, from a correct portrait. Reverse, the Arms surrounded by the Garter and Collar, as Mr. Wyon subsequently placed them on the Half Crown. It was proposed by some of the London collectors, and the subscription to this trial of the state of the Arts was immediately filled up. Fifty pieces only were to have been struck, at 5 Guineas each, in silver, and the dies destroyed. It is much to be regretted that he did not execute it. Left to his own leisure, aud in direct rivalry with the great Father of the English School, we were authorized to expect a performance equally honourable to himself and to his Country.

I have now, to the best of my ability, laid before the Society the information I possess, and the opinion I entertain of an Artist, whose works while they exist (and of all records of Art the numismatic are the most durable) will do honour to England, and be always anxiously sought by those who possess taste and discernment. Nor can I express the lingering unwillingness with which I bring these few pages to a conclusion. While I have been occupied at my leisure intervals in arranging scattered materials, and balancing respective merits, I seemed still to hold communion with my friend, and not quite to have lost him: but with the closing lines, his sepulchre also appears to close, and hide him from my view. To those who have felt what it is to be bereft of those who are dear to us-and the effec which the mind makes to persuade itself that the separation has not, cannot have taken place I need not describe the delusions to which it willingly surrenders itself when oppressed with sorrow: and to those who have not, it is as needless, as useless, to attempt it.

J. HUMPHREYS, P. Sec.
Cork, November 9, 1817.

DEATHS,

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DEATHS.

1817. AT Broughton, near Preston, Dec. 25. aged 101, Mrs. Susan Mayor. Dec. 26. At Great Barr, near Birmingham, after an apparently slight indisposition of a few hours, in his 84th year, Isaac Dixon, gent. In the early part of his life he stood in the first rank as a penman and arithmetician, in which he was excelled by none. He was well informed in sacred history, and that of his native country, possessing strong natural talents, a most retentive memory, a mind replete with vivacity, and stored with pleasing and interesting anecdote; and in worldly pursuits most assiduous and persevering. His conduct towards his pupils was attentive, most exemplary, and worthy of imitation, ever bearing in mind those beautiful proverbial precepts of Holy Writ, which were often rehearsed with such forcible propriety, for their improvement and advantage. The warmest testimony to his merits will never be wanting while he has a pupil left to survive him. He raised himself, by his own deserts and perseverance, from an humble situation, to affluence and independence, having left his family in the full enjoyment of the comforts and conveniences of life. He was born at West Bromwich, co. Stafford, May 4, 1734, O. S. and went as a waggoner's boy to live with (the husband of his mother's sister) Mr. Waltho of Albrighton Hall, near Donnington, co. Salop, farmer. From over-much pedestrian exercise, he became afflicted with a tenderness in the feet, and, through improper advice, was induced to do an act which brought on a swelling of the right knee, and total stiffness which ever afterwards attended him. Owing to this circumstance, he was prevented from pursuing that line of life his friends had intended for him. He continued a short time in Mr. Waltho's family, and began the rudiments of penmanship, in which he afterwards so eminently excelled. Mr. Waltho was prevailed upon to place him under the tuition of old Mr. Addison B.omhall, of Albrighton, for the short space of 18 months, where he obtained every information that school could afford. He returned to his father's house, and sometime afterwards engaged himself as a tutor in the seminary of the Rev. Mr. Howells, a Dissenting Minister at West Bromwich, and removed with that Divine to Winson Green. After conducting himself with respectability and propriety in that situation, and with great satisfaction to his superior and the pupils for 12 years, he in 1770 took the house and premises at Great Barr, called Snails Green, under Mr. Turner, with the advice and importunity of his friend, · Parrot, M. D. the brother-inlaw of that gentleman. In Sept. 1771, he married a lady of fortune, and of a very

antient family, near Bridgnorth, in Shropshire, by whom he had seven children: of these one son and three daughters still survive. He superintended this great commercial seminary with diligence, punctuality, and strictness, till Midsummer 1788, when, from vepeated attacks of the gout, his constitution became impaired, and he was no longer able to withstand the confinement of the school, which he then resigned in favour of his worthy and able successor, the late Mr. John Mayne. In the latter part of his life he suffered much from the stone and gravel, which must eventually have destroyed him, had he not been removed by an incidental disease in the mean time.

Dec. 27. At Brafferton, Rev. Leonard Sedgwick, vicar of Brafferton, and one of the magistrates of the North Riding.

Dec. 31. Louisa Mary, fifth daughter of Ashton Ashton Shuttleworth, esq. of Hathersage Hall, near Sheffield.

1818, Jan. 1. At Doncaster, aged 60, Mr. Leadbetter, civil engineer to the Rochdale Canal; he was eminently qualified for the duties of his office, by his attainments in the higher branches of the mathematics, and a practical knowledge of masonry; and the experience of 31 years had furnished him with such a local knowledge of the canal as will render his loss irreparable.

Jan. 5. In his 10th year, Edward-Taylor, second son of Robert Webber, esq. of Spanish place, Manchester-square.

Jan. 21. At St. Stephen's, near St. Alban's, Alicia Carolina, second daughter of the late Sir Charles Sheffield, bart, and widow of Chichester Fortescue Garstin, formerly captain lieutenant of the reduced 89th regt. and afterwards major of the Hampshire militia, who died March 5,1815.

Jan. 22. Anne, wife of Charles Lukin, esq. of Leigh-street, Brunswick-square.

Jan. 23. At Norbiton, Kingston, aged 29, Jane, wife of Rev. Jas. Toll Hutchins.

At Fordham, co. Cambridge, aged 48, Mrs. Gedge, widow of the late Mr. William Gedge, surgeon, of Mildenhall, and eldest daughter of the late Mr. Thomas Archer,' formerly of Barton Mills.

At Bristol, John Pinney, esq. merchant, of that city and of Somerton Erle, co. Somerset.

At Fern Tower, Miss Esther Caroline Baird, second daughter of the late Majorgen. Jos. Baird, and niece to Gen, Sir David B. bart. G.C.B. and of Lord Riversdale. Jan. 24. At Durrington, Wills, in his 77th year, Jonathan Moore, esq.

At Rathmines, of the typhus fever, John Fox, esq.

Jan. 25. At Lee, Kent, aged 37, Mr. John Maxwell Thornhill, late of the East India Company's service.

At Dublin, aged 74, Mrs. Ursula Ahmuty,

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