DESIGNS AND COLOURS OF THE STAMPS THAT WILL BE IN USE AFTER APRIL THE 1ST 1884.] [Illustration: THE FIRST POSTAGE STAMP OF THE PRESENT REIGN, TOGETHER WITH THE POST OFFICE NOTICE CONCERNING ITS ISSUE ON NOVEMBER 4, 1910. _Union of South Africa._ It is notified that a new postage stamp of the 2½d. denomination will be on sale from the 4th November the day of the opening of the Union Parliament and will be practically, therefore, a stamp commemorative of the culminating fact of Union. The denomination represents the Universal Postal Union unit of postage, and the stamp is being issued in advance of, and apart from, any general issue for the South African Union. By Order. Pretoria, 1st October, 1910.] This class of document should be the more accessible to collectors from the little interest attached to them by the officials to whom they are generally sent. How little they appreciate their evidential value was brought home to me in a painful disappointment a year or so ago. Having been on the Continent for a few days, I returned to find among my correspondence an offer from an elderly man who had kept a post-office for a long period of years, and he had saved in a series of portfolios all the printed notices sent out from the General Post Office to postmasters from the 'fifties until the end of the nineteenth century. I had had some curiosities from this individual before, which led him to offer me these papers when he came upon them in a clearing-up mood. I was then engaged on a section of my history of the English stamps, and wrote off immediately upon my return home. To my utter dismay he replied that, not having heard from me, after a few days of waiting he had burnt the lot to get rid of them! [Illustration: THE OFFICIAL NOTICE OF THE ISSUE OF THE NEW STAMPS OF GREAT BRITAIN FOR THE REIGN OF KING GEORGE V. INTRODUCTION OF GEORGE V. POSTAGE STAMPS SALE OF LETTER CARDS, THIN POST-CARDS AND BOOKS OF STAMPS AT FACE VALUE. REDUCTION IN PRICES OF EMBOSSED ENVELOPES & WRAPPERS Halfpenny and Penny adhesive Postage Stamps of new design bearing the effigy of His Majesty King George, and registered letter envelopes and thin post-cards bearing impressed stamps with the same effigy, will be placed on sale on the 22nd of June, the day of His Majesty's Coronation, at all Post Offices open on that day. At other Post Offices they will first be sold on the 23rd of June, or, at Offices which are closed on that day also on the 24th of June. New adhesive stamps of other denominations and other articles of stationery bearing impressed stamps of new design will be issued as soon as possible afterwards