Puffin Into Nuffin

In Kings Bench Division last week Mr. Justice Avory fixed a stern eye upon wealthy Martin Coles Harman.

"Who did you say is the sovereign of Lundy Island?" demanded the King's judge.

"I am," stoutly repeated Mr. Harman, "and as the sovereign of Lundy, I coined puffins and half-puffins as I have a right to do!" Counsel for Mr. Harmun argued that his 1,150-acre-island, 12 mi. off the north coast of Devon, is "not only outside the British Realm but outside the rest of the world.'' They declared that it was chiefly this circumstance which attracted Mr. Harman to Lundy, caused him to buy the island in 1925 for the round sum of -L-10,000 ($50,000). Since then, self-styled Sovereign Harman has successfully exacted rent from the Lundy Post Office. He has coined his famous puffins & half-puffins (TIME, Jan. 20, 1930), coins bearing his likeness and that of Lundy's "national bird,'' the parrot-beaked, fat-bellied puffin. The 45 citizens of Lundy have not minded in the least. Trouble first began when a Devonshire court fined Sovereign Harman -L-5 because he "did unlawfully, as a token of money, issue a piece of metal of the value of one penny [or puffin] contrary to section five of the Coinage Act of 1870." In his appeal before the higher court last week Mr. Harman said: "As is very well known, when anything serious occurs in Lundy the British Government disclaims responsibility. They have done so whenever the entire population have been murdered!" "Indeed?" observed Mr. Justice Avory with interest. "And does murder of the entire population often occur?" "Yes," snapped Mr. Harman. "Pirates often used to do it." "But at the present time does it ever happen that any one assaults anyone else on Lundy Island?" "Yes, and I can tell you such assaults are put down with a heavy hand! My agent is six feet four and weighs 252 pounds." After much more of this--both Sovereign Harman and the judge maintaining very great solemnity--the lower court's fine of -L-5 was sustained, Mr. Harman was made to realize that he is a mere subject of King George, that Lundy is in the Empire.

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