Page:British India Adhesive Stamps Surcharged for Native States.djvu/16

Rh unnecessary values to these States. The stamps particularly- objected to by jealous collectors are those of the 9 pies, 2½ annas, and the 2, 8, and 5 rupee values. Of these the first is now obsolete and it is not likely that the second will ever be re-issued surcharged. Only some of the States have dabbled in these values, and that only to a very limited extent. It will be good news to all collectors to hear that it has been definitely decided not to surcharge in future any stamp above Re. 1 in value. The issue* of the three highest value stamps have been very small indeed, and their number will not be added to.

One frequently hears another complaint against these stamps. It is that the proportion sold to collectors is very large as compared with the number actually used for postal purposes. But this objection is absurd on the fare of it. The number of current stamps of any country (excluding the Seebeckised States) required for collections is to all intents and purposes the same whatever that country be. The number of stamps required for purely postal purposes is enormously greater in Great Britain than in Gibraltar, so that the proportion that stamps sold to collectors bears to the total issues is very much greater in the case of the latter. Still no one thinks of denouncing Gibraltar stamps.

I have, however, been at considerable pains to gauge the actual wants of each State in the way of postage stamps. I have done this, n<>t by the plausible method of working out a sum of which the divisor is the total population of that State, but have confined my arithmetical operations to the number of inhabitants returned at the last census as able to read and write. The result thus obtained errs seriously in the direction of under-estimating the actual requirements, because it excludes the very large number of illiterate people who, all over India, employ letter- writers. Still, as a com-