a few heraldic lapses in the
arms as blazoned by the secretary of Congress, such as the omission of
the tincture of the scroll, and the denominating the collection of stars
a crest. By a somewhat similar error in the law by which our flag was
adopted, no method of arrangement of the stars in the union is
prescribed.

Notwithstanding that the great seal as adopted had an obverse and a
reverse, there is nothing to show that the reverse was ever made. Why
this was neglected does not appear of record. Nor does there seem to be
any means of ascertaining by what authority one half of the seal is made
to do duty for the whole. It is certainly not authorized by any law. Is
not its use then by the State department technically illegal?

But this is not all. The seal as originally engraved was in accordance
with the requirements of the law, but in 1841, Daniel Webster then being
Secretary of State, a new seal was made, probably because the old one
had become worn, and for some reasons not now discoverable, several
alterations were made in the design. In the shield of the seal thus
made, the red pales are twice the width of the white ones, so that it
reads heraldically, argent, six pales gules, instead of "palewise of
thirteen pieces, argent and gules," as expressed in the adopted report.
In the original, too, the eagle held in his sinister talon a "bundle of
thirteen arrows," but the poor bird grasps but a meagre six in the new
seal. There was some significance in the former number, all of which is
lost in the change. Application to the State department for the reasons
for these deviations from the original seal resulted in only the
following: "This change does not appear to have been authorized by law,
and the cause of it is not known."

Is it possible that an arbitrary alteration can be made in the great
seal of the United States by officials temporarily in charge of it? And
if so, what is to prevent some future Secretary of State, with notions
of his own in regard to heraldic bearings, from discarding the old seal
altogether, in favor of some creation of his own? The nation was
providentially saved from the artistic efforts of Jefferson, Adams, and
Franklin; but what guaranty have we for the future?

JOHN D. CHAMPLIN, JR.

DRIFT-WOOD.

THE TIMES AND THE CUSTOMS.

It will be four years in September since the crash of Jay Cooke
announced that hard times had come. During the _debacle_ continuing
from that day to t