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perforated by one strike and the bottom by the next. To quote Easton (Ref.8, p.219): "The principle of the
[Napier] comb machine is the perforation at one operation of a complete horizontal line of perforation plus
the vertical sides of the stamps below that horizontal line... The paper is then pushed further under the
machine head ... and the operation is repeated."

The fact that De La Rue used line perforators for four despatches raises the possibility that some portion of
one of the other despatches might also have been prepared using these or other line perforators. Similarly,
the fact that stamps from a certain despatch exist with one type of perforation does not unequivocally
establish that the whole of the despatch utilised that perforator. I would be most interested to learn of any
extant material that might support the hypothesis of a mixture of perforation types, particularly with
reference to the early despatches and specimen overprints.

Conclusions

The Napier machines used at Somerset House for the Sierra Leone 6d stamps produced comb perforated
sheets, gauge 14, including stamps with wing margins. Wing margin copies are known for the 1st, 2nd,
5th-8th and revenue despatches, and these all appear to possess comb perforations. Panes from the line-
perforated 9th and 10th despatches do not possess wing margins, while no wing margin copies have been
found for the line-perforated 3rd and 4th despatches. Although I have examined many examples of stamps
from the 9th and 10th despatches, I have yet to encounter any that might appear to have comb perforations,
due to fortuitous alignment of the corner holes. Similar considerations apply to the stamps from the "wing
margin" despatches; none of the stamps seen by me have presented with apparent line perforations, with the
exception of the type of anomaly discussed above. This gives me some confidence that it is possible
successfully to distinguish comb from line perforations for these printings.