ANNUAL ASSAY. An annual trial of the gold and silver coins of the United States, to ascertain whether the standard fineness and weight of the coinage is main tained.
2. At every delivery of coins made by the chief coiner to the treasurer, it is made the duty of the treasurer in the presence of the assayer to take indis criminately a certain number of pieces of each va riety for the annual trial of coins (the number being prescribed by the director of the mint), which must be carefully labelled and deposited in a chest ap propriated for the purpose, kept under the joint care of the treasurer and assayer, and so secured that neither can have access to its contents with out the presence of the other. Sect. 27, act of Jan. 18, 1837; 5 U. S. Stat. at Large, 141. At the branch mints the assay-pieces are required to be taken in the same manner as is prescribed for the mint, after which the coins so reserved are directed to be carefully secured and enveloped, and trans mitted monthly by mail to the director of the mint at Philadelphia. The number of pieces reserved is as follows : one double-eagle for every fifteen hundred double-eagles delivered to the treasurer by the coiner; one eagle for every two thousand eagles; one half-eagle for every five thousand half eagles ; one quarter-eagle for every two thousand five hundred quarter-eagles; and ten gold dollars for every delivery of fifty thousand gold dollars ; if a less amount is delivered, the assay-pieces are proportionately less. In silver coins, one piece is reserved out of every five thousand pieces of silver, without regard to the denonimation. Regulations of the Director of the Mint, pp. 12, 13.
3. To secure a due conformity in the gold and sil ver coins to their respective standards and weights, it is provided by law that an annual trial shall be male of the pieces reserved for this purpose at the mint and its branches, before the judge of the district court of the United States for the eastern district of Pennsylvania, the attorney of the United States for the same district, and the collector of the port of Philadelphia, and such other persons as the president shall from time to time designate for that purpose, who shall meet as commissioners foi the performance of this duty on the second Mon day in February annually, and may continue their meetings by adjournment, if necessary ; and if a. majority of the commissioners shall fail to attend at any time appointed for their meeting, then the director of the mint shall call a meeting of the commissioners at such other time as he may deem convenient, and that before these commissioners, or a majority of them, and in the presence of the officers of the mint, such examination shall be made of the reserved pieces as shall be judged sufficient ; and if it shall appear that these pieces do not differ from the standard fineness and weight by a greater quantity than is allowed by law, the trial shall be considered and reported as satisfac tory; but if any greater deviation from the legal standard or weight shall appear, this fact shall he certified to the president of the United States, and if, on a view of the circumstances of the case, he shall so decide, the officer or officers implicated in the error shall be thenceforward disqualified fiom holding their respective offices. Sect. 32, Act of
Jan. 18, 1837; 5 U. S. Stat. at Large, 141. As to the standard weight and fineness of the gold and silver coins of the United States, sec sections 8, 9, and 10 of the last-cited act, and also section 7, Act of March 3, 1853; Statutes at Large, vol. 10, p. 188. The limit of allowance for deviation from the. standard weight and fineness is fixed by the 22d and 25th sections of the Act of January 18, 1837, and by sect. 4, Act of March 3, 1849; 5 U. S. Stat. at Large, 139; 9 id. 397.
4. For the purpose of securing a due conformity in the weight of the coins of the United States, the brass troy pound weight procured by the minister of the United States (Mr. Gallatin) at London, in the year 1827, for the use of the mint, and now in the custody of the director thereof, shall be the standard troy pound of the mint of the United States, con formably to which the coinage thereof shall be regulated; and it is made the duty of the director of the mint to procure and safely keep a series of standard weights corresponding to the aforesaid troy pound, and the weights ordinarily employed in the transactions of the mint shall be regulated according to such standards at least once in every year under his inspection, and their accuracy tested annually in the presence of the assay commission ers on the day of the annual assay. Act of May 19, 1828; 4 U. S. Stat. at Large, 277.
5. In England, the accuracy of the coinage is reviewed once in about every four years; no spe cific period being fixed by law. It is an ancient custom or ceremony, and is called the Trial of the Pyx; which name it takes from the pyx or chest in which the specimen-coins are deposited. These specimen-pieces are taken to he a fair representa tion of the whole money coined within a certain period. It having been notified to the government that a trial of the pyx is called for, the lord chan cellor issues his warrant to summon a jury of gold smiths, who, on the appointed day, proceed to the Exchange Office, Whitehall, and there, in the pre sence of several privy councillors and the officers of the mint, receive the charge of the lord chan cellor as to their important funotions, who requests them to deliver to him a verdict of their finding. The jury proceed to Goldsmiths' Hall, London, where assaying apparatus and all other necessary appliances are provided, and, the sealed packages of the speoimen-coins being delivered to them by the officers of the mint, they are tried by weight, and then a certain number are taken from the whole and melted into a bar, from which the assay trials are made, and a verdict is rendered accord ing to the results which have been ascertained. Eneyo. Brit., title Assaying.