The Lords of the Committee think it very strange, that there should be such great difficulty in prevailing with persons, who had already given their evidence before the Parliament of Ireland, to come over and give the same evidence here, and especially, that the chief difficulty should arise, from a general apprehension of a miscarriage, in an enquiry before your Majesty, or in a proceeding by due course of law, in a case, where both Houses of Parliament had declared themselves so fully convinced, and satisfied upon evidence, and examinations taken in the most solemn manner.
At the same time that your Majesty sent your orders to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, to send over such evidences as were thought material to support the charge against the patent, that your Majesty might, without any further loss of time than was absolutely necessary, be as fully informed as was possible, and that the abuses and frauds alleged to be committed by the patentee, in executing the powers granted to him, might be fully and strictly enquired into, and examined, your Majesty was pleased to order that an assay should be made of the fineness, value, and weight of this copper money, and the goodness thereof, compared with the former coinages of copper money for Ireland, and the copper money coined in your Majesty's Mint in England; and it was accordingly referred to Sir Isaac Newton, Edward Southwell, and Thomas Scroope, Esqs. to make the said assay and trial.
By the reports made of this assay, which are hereunto annexed, it appears,[2] "That the pix of the copper moneys coined at Bristol by Mr. Wood for Ireland, containing the trial pieces, which was sealed and locked up at the time of coining, was opened at your Majesty's mint at the Tower; that the comptroller's account of the quantities of halfpence and farthings coined, agreed with Mr. Wood's account, amounting to 59 tons, 3 hundred, 1 quarter, 11 pounds, and 4 ounces; That by the specimens of this coinage, which had from time to time been taken from the several parcels coined, and sealed up in papers, and put into the pix, 60 halfpence weighed 14 ounces troy, and 18 penny-weight, which is about a quarter of an ounce above one pound weight avoirdupois; and 30 farthings weighed 3 ounces and 3 quarters of an ounce troy, and 46 grams, which is also above the weight required by the patent. It also appears, that both halfpence and farthings when heated red-hot spread thin under the hammer without cracking; that the copper of which Mr. Wood's coinage is made, is of the same goodness and value with the copper of which the copper money is coined in your Majesty's mint for England, and worth in the market about 13 pence per pound weight avoirdupois; That a pound of copper wrought into bars of fillets, and made fit for coinage, before brought into the mint at the Tower of London, is worth 18 pence per pound, and always cost as much, and is coined into 23 pence of copper money by tale, for England; It likewise appears, that the halfpence and farthings coined by Mr. Wood, when compared with the copper money coined for Ireland, in the reigns of King Charles II. King James II. and King William and Queen Mary, considerably exceeds them all in weight, very far exceeds them all in goodness, fineness, and value of the copper, none of them bearing the fire so well, not being malleable, wasting very much in the fire, and great part of them burning into a cinder of little or no value at all; Specimens of all which, as likewise of Mr. Wood's copper money, upon trials and assays made by Sir Isaac Newton, Mr. Southwell, and Mr. Scroope, were laid before this Committee for their information."