Note on the Communication of J. R. Steuart, Esq., (page 273,)

Extract

Some of the coins of which Mr. Steuart possesses so extensive a collection, and of which he has favoured the Society with such full and valuable illustrations, have from time to time found their way to Calcutta, and been noticed and delineated by Mr. James Prinsep in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. Knowing the active interest which that gentleman has displayed in the investigation of the different important numismatic discoveries recently made in India, and anticipating from his singular talent for deciphering novel forms of Indian characters, the possibility of his finding the key of those which occur on Mr. Steuart's coins, I requested Captain Harkness to transmit to Mr. Prinsep a copy of the engravings now published. The advantages expected from this communication have been more than realized, as the characters have been deciphered and the inscriptions satisfactorily read. The May number of the Bengal Journal just received, contains an interesting account of Mr. Prinsep's success, and repeats the legends of Mr. Steuart's plate arranged in the order in which each is to be read, differing chiefly in this respect from the plate, in transferring to the head of the line the two or three letters which there stand at the end of it.