e method of coining by
the screw-press, and I believe his improvements related chiefly to a
method for 'rounding the pieces before they are sized, and in making
the edges of the moneys with letters and graining,' which he
undertook to reveal to the king. Special stress is laid on the
engines wherewith the rims were marked, 'which might be kept secret
among few men.' I cannot find that there is any record in the Paris
mint of Blondeau's employment there, and the only reference to his
invention in the Mint records of this country refers to the
'collars,' or perforated discs of metal surrounding the 'blank'
while it was struck into a coin. There is, however, in the British
Museum a MS. believed to be in Blondeau's hand, in which he claims
his process, 'as a new invention, to make a handsome coyne, than can
be found in all the world besides, viz., that shall not only be
stamped on both flat sides, but shall even be marked with letters on
the thickness of the brim.' The letters were raised. The press
Blondeau used was, I believe, the ordinary screw-press, and I
suppose that the presses drawn in Akerman's well-known plate of the
coining-room of the Mint in the Tower, published in 1803 ['Microcosm
of London,' vol. ii., p. 202], if not actually the same machines,
were similar to those erected in 1661-62 by Sir William Parkhurst
and Sir Anthony St. Leger, wardens of the Mint, at a cost of L1400,
Professor Roberts-Austen shows that Benvenuto Cellini used a similar
press to that attributed to Blondeau, and he gives an illustration
of this in his lecture (p. 810). In a letter to the editor the
professor writes: "Pepys's account of the operations of coining, and
especially of assaying gold and silver, is very interesting and
singularly accurate considering that he could not have had technical
knowledge of the subject."]

10. They mill them, that is, put on the marks on both sides at once with
great exactness and speed, and then the money is perfect. The mill is
after this manner: one of the dyes, which has one side of the piece cut,
is fastened to a thing fixed below, and the other dye (and they tell me
a payre of dyes will last the marking of L10,000 before it be worn out,
they and all other their tools being made of hardened steel, and the
Dutchman who makes them is an admirable artist,