Draft of MINT00625 (Mint 19/2/363)
To the Right Honorable the Lords Commissioners of his Majesties Treasury.
May it please yoer Lordships
According to yoer Lordships Order signified to us by Mr Lowndes his Letter of 28 October last: We humbly lay before yoer Lordships the following method of coyning copper money vizt
That it be made of fine English Copper malleable under the hammer without cracking when made red hot. For such Copper is free from mixture & is of about the same degree of fineness with the Swedish copper money & with copper vessels made at the battering mills.
That such copper be made into fillets of a due breadth & thickness either at the battering mills or at the drawing mills & be received at the Mint upon the Master & Worker's Note expressing the weight thereof: & that the Master & Worker upon delivering back to the Importer the same weight of Copper in scissel & money together be discharged of his Receipt; the Importer at the same time paying the Master a certain seigniorage for bearing the charges of the Mint & coinage & the Master & Worker being accountable for the seinioroage
The Fillets imported may be assayed by heating a few of them red hot at one end & trying if they will beare the hammer without cracking. The Assays may be made by the Kings Assaymaster or his Clerk or by the Smith, & the Importers &c may be present if they please.
The moneys may be assayed before delivery in the following manner. Let a Tunn of Copper money (more or less) be very well mixed together, & at each of the four sides of the heap let so much copper money be counted our for a trial as should make a pound weight. And if each of the parcells counted out makes a pound weight without the error of the weight of an half penny & one or two pieces taken out of each parcel endures the assay by the hammer, the money to be deliverable.
If the said four parcells differ not in weight from one another above the weight of a farthing the tale of the whole Tunn may be estimated in proportion to its weight as the tale of all the four parcells is to their weight. And these four assays with the weight & tale of every Tunn of copper money so assayed & determined may be entered in books. And if the money prove at any time too light or too heavy, the weight may be corrected in the coynage of the next copper imported, so as to make the whole tale of all the copper money beare a just proportion to the whole weight.
Two or more pieces of money may be taken out of every Tunn & put into a Pix & tried yearly by such person or persons as the Lord High Treasurer or Lords Commissioners of the Treasury shall appoint
Mr Eyres a Refiner of Copper proposes to make & size the fillets by a drawing Mill for fifteen pence per pound weight of the blancks cut out of them when the price of fine copper in the market is no higher then at present, vizt 100£ pr Tunn.. And if a penny more be allowed to him for putting away the copper money, & four pence be added for seigniorage the whole will be answered by cutting a pound weight of copper into twenty pence. If the price of fine copper in the market rises or falls the price of the Fillets to rise or fall as much.
Out of the Seigniorage, the Master & Worker may have for himself, the Graver & Smith one penny & for the Moneyers two pence, & the remaining penny may be for bearing the charges of weighing Assaying, entring in books, making a controllment Roll, repairing the buildings buying coyning tools & putting them into repairs & buying barrels boxes & baggs to put the money into &c.
After the coyning Tools are once put into repairs the moneyers are to keep them in repairs.
2 The charge of making the fillets at the battering mills will amount unto more then at the drawing mills bythree half pence per pound weight of the blanks.
1 Mr Eyres hath not yet erected a drawing Mill but proposes that he can do it & be ready to deliver Filleths of Copper within the space of two months.
3 The buildings in the Mint where the coynage is to be performed are out of repairs.
The Proposalls of Mr Eyres & the Moneyers are hereunto annexed The Moneyers demand 1d per Lwt for coyning the blanks, but in the reign of K. Charles II had only 1d per Lwt. Mr Eyres demands 7 per cent for putting off the copper money but is willing to abate something & we think 5 per cent or 1d per Lwt sufficient.
All which &c
