There is no date, but the name of Thomas Harper, printer, Smithy Door, may be read in the Manchester Directory for 1788, and the slightest examination of the Guide to Heaven will show that its typography belongs to that period. From whence, then, did Ford get the date of 1664? If we turn to the fly-leaf the mystery is explained, for on it we read "Imprimatur, J. Hall, R.P.D. Lond. a Sac. Domest. April 14 1664." The book, in fact, was first printed in London in 1664, and Thomas Harper, when issuing it afresh, reprinted the original imprimatur, which Ford then misconstrued into the date of the Manchester edition. The book is entered as Bamfield's Guide to Heaven in Clavell's Catalogue, and the publisher is there stated to be H. Brome. Either Francis or Thomas Bamfield might have been the author, but the former seems the more likely. Thomas Bampfield was Speaker of Richard Cromwell's Parliament of 1658, and he was a member of the Convention Parliament of 1660, but he is not known as a writer. Francis was a brother of Thomas, and also of Sir John Bampfield, and was educated at Wadham College, Oxford, where he graduated M.A. in 1638. He was ordained, but was ejected from the Church in 1662, and died minister of the Sabbatarian Church in Pinner's Hall. He wrote in favour of the observation of the Saturday as the seventh day and therefore real Sabbath, and whilst preaching to his congregation was arrested and imprisoned at Newgate, where he died 16th February, 1683-4. His earliest acknowledged writing was published in 1672, and relates to the Sabbath question. The first book printed in Manchester, so far as the present evidence goes, was Jackson's Mathematical Lectures, but it was the fruit of the second printing press established. We shall soon have the opportunity of celebrating the tercentenary of Manchester typography.

THE EARLY COINAGE OF HENRY

UPON

PON the death of Stephen, Henry II., called Plantagenet, came to the throne without opposition.

The new king's father was Geoffrey, count of Anjou, who used to wear in his hat a piece of broom, or plante-degenet, and from this circumstance his son derived the designation of "Henry Plantagenet."*

The pennies of the previous reign had been principally minted by the barons and other illustrious personages, without any legal sanction, and were of uncertain weights, thus rendering commercial transactions exceedingly difficult.

The baronial and other castles from whence this unauthorised money was issued were very numerous, and Henry, immediately on his accession to the throne, caused them to be destroyed.

This coinage of Henry II. is of uniform type, though ill struck and irregular in shape, but is nevertheless very

* A different account is given by chronicler Matthew Paris. The reader is referred to Agnes Strickland's Lives of the Queens of England, 1851, vol. i., page 231-2,

correct in weight, and was first issued A.D. 1156 from some

The coins are all pennies of fine silver, and have on the obverse the king's head, nearly full faced, and crowned; a sceptre with a cross patée is held in his right hand, and the crown is ornamented with a fleur-de-lis, surrounded by the king's name and title, "HENRI [CVS] REX ANGL (ORVM)," variously abbreviated, and have on the reverse a cross potent, with rays issuing from the centre, and a small cross of the same kind in each quarter, surrounded by the name of the moneyer and the mint (see woodcut).

His coins have been found at four different places: first, at Royston, Hertfordshire; secondly, at Bramham Moor, Yorkshire; thirdly, at Tealby, Lincolnshire; and fourthly, at Ampthill, Bedfordshire.

C

There cannot now be any reason to doubt that these coins belong to Henry Plantagenet, as it was discovered by Sir Henry Ellis," that whereas the names of the moneyers on coins of this type struck at Wilton are ASCHETIL, LANTIER, and WILLEM. There is a record [called the Chancellor's Roll] in the British Museum of the eleventh year of Henry II., in which the two former, whose names are both very uncommon, and occur as of this town on no other type, are mentioned as moneyers at Wilton."*

The hoard found at Tealby numbered five thousand seven hundred specimens, all of one type, and had been examined by the late Dr. Taylor Combe; particulars of which were communicated by him in a paper read before the fellows of the Society of Antiquaries on the 24th of February, 1814 who, when referring to the whole find, stated:

"The coins were as fresh as when they were first issued from the mint, yet their execution was so bad that on many of them scarcely two letters could be discerned. The workmanship of these coins can, indeed, confer no credit on the state of the arts in the time of Henry II.; yet it is deserving of attention, that the weights of them, though apparently regulated by a pair of shears, were adjusted with extraordinary accuracy."

The following is the analysis of Dr. Taylor Combe's examination :

"50 pieces were weighed separately and found to be 22 grains each.

100 were weighed against 100, the difference was 6 grains. 100 were weighed against 100, the difference was 14 grains. 200 were weighed against 200, the difference was II grains. 300 were weighed against 300, the difference was 13 grains. 400 were weighed against 400, the difference was 22 grains.

* Hawkin's Silver Coins of England.

500 were weighed against 500, the difference was 19 grains. 600 were weighed against 600, the difference was 6 grains. 700 were weighed against 700, there was no difference, 1⁄2 a grain turned the scale.

800 were weighed against 800, the difference was 14 grains. 900 were weighed against 900, the difference was 2 grains. 1000 were weighed against 1000, the difference was 14 grains.

100 weighed 4 oz. 11 dwt. 17 grains.

100 weighed 4 oz. 11 dwt.

100 weighed 4 oz. II dwt. 14 grains.

100 weighed 4 oz. 11 dwt. 18 grains. 100 weighed 4 oz. 11 dwt. 8 grains.

5127 weighed 19 lb. 6 oz. 5 dwt.

They should have weighed 19 lb. 6 oz. 19 dwt. 18 grains. The difference is 14 dwt. 18 gr., which, divided amongst the whole number, makes each coin to have weighed nearly within of a grain of its proper weight."

The hoard found at Ampthill numbered one hundred and forty-two specimens, all of one type, and was examined by the late Rev. Canon Pownall, particulars of which were communicated by him in a paper read before the members of the Numismatic Society of London on the 15th of May, 1862, and in reference to the irregular shape of the whole find stated: "There are not more than twelve of the one hundred and forty-two coins before me which can with justice be described as round; out of sixty-seven more, it might be said they are certainly not round; thirtysix of the remainder approach more nearly still to a rude