m orient to
Occident, and culminating in that latest triumph of the engraver's
cunning skill--the Philadelphia Sanitary Fair medal, commemorating for
our children and children's children the magnificent benefactions of the
people and the self-devotion of the Commissions--Christian and
Sanitary--the angels of mercy and charity, scattering blessings in the
furrows of war.

The _utile_ and the _dulce_ of the study of numismatics are shown in
many ways. Caraccio, Aretine, and Raphael studied the figures on the old
oboli and drachmas. So did Le Brun. Rubens was the most conscientious
coin and medal gatherer of his time, and applied them sedulously to the
furtherance of his divine gifts. Petrarch found time between his sonnets
to Laura to make the first classified collection on record, which he
presented to the emperor of Germany, with his well-known and remarkable
letter. Alphonso, king of Naples, visited all parts of Europe gathering
coins in an ivory casket. The splendid Cosmo de' Medici commenced a
cabinet which formed the nucleus of the Florentine collection. Matthias
Corvinus, king of Hungary, made a cabinet, and Francis I. of France laid
the foundation of the Paris collection--the finest in the world. All
artists recognize the value of coins, medals, and medallions. From them
they get the model faces and heads of the Greek and Roman, the copies of
lost statues, the folds of the chlamys and the graceful sweep of the
toga, the eagles and ensigns, rams and trophies, the altars, idols, and
sacrifices, the Olympian games, and the instruments of music,
mathematics, and mechanics. They reveal the secrets of a thousand
antiquated names and ceremonies, which but for the engraver's chronicle
must have been utterly lost.

Coins throw additional light upon history. They illuminate the dark
passages, clear away the obscurities, and bridge over the gaps. Hugo, in
'Les Miserables,' says men solidified their ideas in architecture before
the printed page came from the brain of Faust. He might have added, they
wrote their histories upon these bits of gold, silver, iron, brass, and
bronze. Vaillant wrote the chronicles of the kings of Syria from a jar
of medals, as Cuvier would build up the mastodon and give you the
monster's habits from a tooth or a tibia. The Roman denarii give the
best idea of Caesar's well in the forum. The Epidaurian coins with the
snake of AEsculapius tell in brief characters how the Roman senate sent
an embassy