Collectors are divided in their opinions upon this question, and although not ready to hazard a guess at the engraver, the present writer believes the plate was engraved in England, and would place the date nearly a decade earlier. As the friend of the Fairfax family, Washington might have had the plate made upon the occasion of their ordering work of the same kind from England, or, indeed, it might have been a gift to him from them, or from some admiring friend. As he was a methodical man, the fact that no entry of an expense for such an article is found in his records may lend color to the presentation theory. As to the errors in heraldry, there is a plate of one Richard Washington, which has all the peculiarities of this plate, and this is signed by Bickham, who was an English engraver of some note. He was a trifle early perhaps to have been the engraver of the _George Washington_ plate, but he may have made the plate which served as a copy for it. But whether the plate was of domestic or foreign make, we know that the copper was in this country, and that impressions were made from it not so very many years ago. The late Mr. Mauran of Newport knew the man who owned this, and it seems that having printed what he deemed a sufficient number of re-strikes from it, this man, fearing lest others would in time get it and make more prints, cut the copper into pieces and going out on a bridge over the Schuylkill River, threw them in! There they may be looked for by any who choose. The counterfeit of this plate appeared in an auction sale of books, in the city of Washington, about the year 1863. The late Dr. W. F. Poole with Dr. J. M. Toner was present at the sale. The plate was placed in these books for the purpose of getting a higher price for them than could [Illustration: George Washington]