Mr. Holt White's information from a passage in Latimer's sermons, that the tester was then worth _more_ than _six-pence_, is so far correct; but as an inference might be drawn from the quotation that it was actually worth _ten-pence_, it becomes necessary to state that at that time, viz. in 1550, the tester was worth _twelve-pence_. It is presumed that no accurate account of this piece of coin has been hitherto given; and therefore the following attempt, which has been attended with no small labour, may not be unacceptable. The term, variously written, _teston_, _tester_, _testern_, and, in _Twelfth night_, _testril_, is from the French _teston_, and so called from the king's head, which first appeared on this coin in the reign of Louis XII. A. D. 1513, though the Italians seem previously to have had a coin of the same denomination. In our own country the name was first applied to the English shilling (originally coined by Henry the Seventh) at the beginning of the reign of Henry the Eighth, probably because it resembled in value the French coin above described; so that _shilling_ and _teston_ were at that time synonymous terms. Although the teston underwent several reductions in value, it appears to have been worth twelve-pence at the beginning of Edward the Sixth's reign, from three several proclamations in his second and third years for calling in, and at length annihilating, this coin, on account of the forgeries that had been committed; Sir William Sharington having falsified it to the amount of 12,000_l._, for which by an express act of parliament he was attainted of treason. In the above proclamations the testons are specifically described as "pieces of xiid commonly called testons;" and in the last of them, the possessors are allowed twelve-pence apiece on bringing them to the mint. Sir Henry Spelman, who has asserted in his glossary that the teston was reduced to nine-pence in the _first_ year of King Edward, must be mistaken. Stowe more correctly informs us that on the 9th of July 1551 (the _fifth_ year of the King's reign), the base shillings of Henry VIII. and Edward VI. were called down to _nine_-pence, and on the 17th of August following to _six_-pence. He afterwards, under the year 1559, cites a proclamation for reducing it still lower, viz. to fourpence halfpenny. We must conclude that it again rose in value as the coin became improved; for it appears from _Twelfth night_, Act II. Scene 3, that it was in Shakspeare's time the same as the six-pence, and it has probably continued ever since as another name for that coin. SCENE 2. Page 185. JUL. I see you have a _month's mind_ to them.