The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-11-09
HISTORICAL "REMINISCENCES
Connecting indianapolis and Naples, Italy
Old and New Times.
Correspondence of Y e India napOIis Journal.


A. Morris, then boy, got into fight with an
other boy as to the right name of small Span
ish coin then in vogue. Young Tom Morris con-
tended that Zip was the right term, the other
boy said it was so pence" so they fought it out
on that line. Nap. Taylor, Berry SulGrove,
John Coburn, William and Lew Wallace Il put
down these Old Seminary Boys in the order Of
age, although William W. may be older than
John Coburn) can remember when we went to
school to Holiday, and afterward to kemper,
that American quarters, dimes and half dimes
were scarce articles. In their stead we had any
quantity of Spanish quarters, 'levys," or bits
fps" and these last were otherwise called Zip
penny bits" half bits" so pence" or ''pica-
yunes" Spanish half dollars were not so plenty
as the quarters and the old Spanish mill dol
lar" was the rarest of all these coins. Now. If
these and other old Indianapolis boys will recall
this coinage they will remember that while the
pillars peculiar to Spanish coinage were on one
side there was on the other the portrait of an
old gentleman, whose headdress was, in our
youthful imagination, like that of George Wash
ington but whose head was anything but like
Georges Indeed, the sloping forehead and the
tremendous nasal organ that appeared on most
of the quarters, 'levys" and fps indicated
man of a most homeopathic dose of brains, and
of most aopathc amount of nose. If one
were to examine little closer it would be
found that all these coins were not the
same-that there were two coinages,
containing two portraits, which at
first sight had a certain resemblance, and
hence many people thought they were one and
the same They were not portraits of the same
individual. One set of coins contained the image
and superstition of "Carolus III, Rex Hispan,"
and the other set THAT which had the brainless,
big-nosed head) contained the image aud super
scrption of "Carolus ", and who was the son
of Carolus Ill" The titles, after leaving out
the Roman figures were exactly the same, and
being translated would read thus: Charles by
the grace of God, king of Spain and the Indies
The earlier coins of both kings contained SIN
dies" because America" up to a late date in the
first quarter of this century, did not appear in
Spanish official documents as America, but was
only one of the Indies" Those old coins es
pecially the small ones to which 1 have referred,
constituted the greater part of the coinage which
we saw in Indianapolis in our boyhood, for cents
or 'coppers" as called them were so rare up
to l834-5, that boy who got hold of one kept it
as pocket piece and although all our State
banks were provided with them when they began
financial operations, it was not until much later
date that cents entered into general circulation,
and into the petty commerce of the market
house. the grocery, the butcher-shop, and the
| store.
who, when living" it may be asked, "were
the owners of these big nosed heads, represented
in medallion on the Spanish coins in circulation
forty years ago, not only In Hoosierand, but
| all through the United Statesp L will answer
that the owners of these heads were both born
in Naples, and that the first Charles ILL., was q
man with great deal of go about him in war
and in peace-in palace and road building, canal
digging, and in many other things in the civil
and political line. He was in some respects man
of enlarged views and opposed to the narrow
illiberal and meddling tendencies of the Jesuits,
and he readily combined with the Marquis of
Pombal the great minister of Portugal, in driv-
ing out the Jesuits from the possessions of Spain
and Portugal in Europe, Asia Africa and Amer
lea. This same Charles III was king of Spain
| when our present Florida was taken from him
| by the English, but in 1881, under him the
British we're whipped in Florida, and it remained
Spanish possession until 1920, when we bought
that almost tropical State from Charles the HIS
grandson, Ferdinand VII, the grandfather of
the present king, Alfonso of Spain.
Charles III was, as I said born in Naples, and
was the king of Naples and Sicily But it will
be said "How, then, did he become king of
| Spain2" By legitimate succession. He was a
| Spanish Bourbon, and it was his father Philip,
| Duke of Aniou, the grandson of Louis XIV,
| who, first by the will of Charles II of SPAIN and
| second by the abritrament of the sword, became
| after the 'warS for the Spanish succession" the
| King of Spain, under the title of Philip V, and
| he was the ruler over the large possessions of
Spain in Italy, for part of his title WIS King
| of Spain Naples and Sicily" For his second
wife Philip married Elizabeth Farnese, the
niece of the last Duke of Farnese. Through her
uncle, at his death, she inherited that magnificent
collection of classic antiquities which had been
| collected in Rome and elsewhere by the Farnese
| Pope Paul HI in the sixteenth century. That
! is the reason that the famous Naples Museum
| has in addition to the immense treasures from
| Hercuaneum, Pompeii Stabi@ Paestum, Puteo
| H. Baiae and Cuma, the vast and precious col
| lection of objects to which the name of Farnese
is appended, as the "Farnese Bull the ''Farnese
| Hercules" the Farnese Flora" Elizabeth Far
nese or rather Philip V, had them brought from
| Rome i'll the last century.
| Now, Charles ILL., as he is called, was the
| younger son of Philip V 1.-THE first Spanish Bour
hon) and Elizabeth Farnese. He inherited the
Duchy of Parma from his mother and thence
ruled as Don Carlos" But he ambitious,
and was not to be confined to little
Parma-the home of ParmeSan violels and Par
mesan cheese-so he kicked up such shindy
that his father had to yield him that which is to-
| day known as the old Kingdom of the Two Sic
lilies" In 1874, when he was but eighteen, he
was crowned at Palermo as Charles VII of Ma
| pies and Sicily, and four years afterward his ii
tle was acknowledged at Vienna flor Austria
still had great claims in Italy,. but Austria could
not think of yielding all that Charles wanted.
So in 1744 he went boldly after the Austrians.
defeated them at Veetri, and compelled them to
leave the kingdom. The result was that his ii
tie was acknowledged and confirmed in 1748 by
the celebrated treaty at Aix-la -Chapelle, which
terminated the war of the Austrian succession.
Eleven years after this his elder brother, Ferdi
nand vi, who was the King of Spain, died, and
.