With iron lips his rapid rollers seize
The lengthening bars, in thin expansion squeeze;
Descending screws with ponderous fly-wheels wound
The tawny plates, the new medallions round;
285 Hard dyes of steel the cupreous circles cramp,
And with quick fall his massy hammers stamp.
The Harp, the Lily and the Lion join,
And GEORGE and BRITAIN guard the sterling coin.


[_Mona's rifted crest_. l. 279. Alluding to the very valuable copper-
mines in the isle of Anglesey, the property of the Earl of Uxbridge.]

[_With iron-lips_. l. 281. Mr. Boulton has lately constructed at Soho
near Birmingham, a most magnificent apparatus for Coining, which has
cost him some thousand pounds; the whole machinery is moved by an
improved steam-engine, which rolls the copper for half-pence finer than
copper has before been rolled for the purpose of making money; it works
the coupoirs or screw-presses for cutting out the circular pieces of
copper; and coins both the faces and edges of the money at the same
time, with such superior excellence and cheapness of workmanship, as
well as with marks of such powerful machinery as must totally prevent
clandestine imitation, and in consequence save many lives from the hand
of the executioner; a circumstance worthy the attention of a great
minister. If a civic crown was given in Rome for preserving the life of
one citizen, Mr. Boulton should be covered with garlands of oak! By this
machinery four boys of ten or twelve years old are capable of striking
thirty thousand guineas in an hour, and the machine itself keeps an
unerring account of the pieces struck.]