The Five Shillings value is a striking stamp, both in its size and design, which is very artistic, and it is altogether a fine example of the line-engraved work of its makers, Messrs. Perkins, Bacon & Co. The central portion of the design portrays the Arms of the Government of St. Vincent, and represents “Justice pouring out a libation to Peace,” which illustrates the motto of the Colony, PAX ET JUSTITIA—“Peace and Justice”—given on the scroll above the Arms. The plate contained twenty stamps, arranged in four horizontal rows of five, and the same star paper was used for printing the issue as for the other stamps of smaller dimensions; the consequence of this being that each stamp is watermarked with at least more than _one_ star. There seems to have been very little demand for the stamp for postal purposes in the Island, and genuinely postmarked specimens are now of great rarity. Used Five Shillings stamps have always been eagerly sought for by philatelists, who for many years declined to have anything to do with unused specimens, as they looked upon the stamps as fiscals only. This belief seems to have arisen from the way they were chronicled in the _Philatelic Record_ of August, 1880, which said—“The 5s. fiscal stamp has lately been used for postal purposes.” The _Timbre-Poste_, in announcing the stamp, quoted from the _Philatelic Record_, and so the error came to be perpetuated, until the true character of the stamp was explained in the London Society’s _West Indian Catalogue_, published in 1891. In that work will be found an official notification, dated 15th September, 1882, in which it is called “the existing five shilling postage stamp,” and in which it is directed to be “over-stamped _Fifty Pounds—Revenue_,” and “used as a Revenue stamp of that value.” Its use as a Revenue stamp was not confined to this high denomination, as it exists with “Revenue” only on it, and fiscals with this surcharge are fairly common. We are of opinion that the great majority of the 2,000 stamps printed were so treated, and that only a very small number were ever used for postage, or escaped the fiscal surcharge. This readily accounts for the great rarity the stamp has acquired of recent years, and this rarity cannot, we think, but increase still further in the future. The official notification quoted above contains a clause which “directs that the present six penny postage stamps may be cut diagonally in half—each half to be over-stamped _3d. Revenue_, and be used as a revenue stamp of that value.” It was further used, with the surcharge “Revenue,” as a fiscal Sixpence. This fiscal use of the Six Pence, bright yellow-green, of Issue 14, is an additional reason for its now being so rare in an unused state. Issue 15. _September 1881._ ½d. in red on half 6d., bright yellow green, of Issue 14.