3 Pence Beaver Odd Cancelation Mark?

So I'm scanning some stamps to help make a record of whats there, and I see an odd mark on a 3 pence #12 stamp. Any idea what it is?



A little face just above the beavers tail.

OK its in the 5 cent version too just I hadn't seen it in online versions.

A happy Canadian sun. It always smiles like that. Pretty annoying.

Are you serious? There is actually a sun with a face on the beaver stamps??

Yeah well, still getting used to the new glasses! LOL! Besides none of the online examples I could find showed that very well!

Looks like someone invented emoticons long before computers :-)

Well it did seem unlikely there would be a smiley sun at the time! Live and learn!

Ok so maybe someone with some experience could critique these two stamps then. they are 600 dpi scans (best my machine will do) I'm too new at this but let me make a stab at it. The 3 pence stamp is not well centered, The cancellation is faint (is that a plus?) The stamp is worn and rubbed off somewhat and I know that it is hinged. So less than ideal example but I still like it.

The 5 cent version could have been a better scan I cropped the left perforations. its hinged too and except for being slightly brighter not very different from the 3 pence. I am certainly new at this!

Here is a sharp example of the 5c with the "smiley"

That 3P perf is the first perf stamp of canada and quite a rare one. Many will accept a very faulty one for their collection as nice ones can be $1000++ . If that is in your collection consider it a big bonus. Its actually well centered since a vast majority of them do not show all 4 margins. The 5cent is quite common although again centering is hard to find with all 4 margins.
Also on the happy face sun you can occasionally see rays of light from it on very good copies.

They are in the collection yes and were singled out with some others. My intention is to pass them on as with a lot of the others.

Hey BeeSee...looks like a smiley on the beaver stamp, but it is the sun with the rays worn off..But, looks like a smiley dosen't it..??

For history buffs, you may be interested to know that the Three-Pence Beaver was designed by Sir Sandford Fleming, it was Canada's first stamp. He also came up with the idea of standard time zones. Way to go Canada.
The smiling sun of course was his idea. (the original smiley). It is often faint, or even invisible due to the wearing of the printing plates over time.
Here is a picture courtesy Canada Post Corporation.

Just in case it is hard to see 3Dadeo's picture...I darkened it so you can see the sun's rays.

Ross...The strange cancellation on your 5cent beaver could be what you see on the 1891 cover I have posted.

Regarding the pen cancel, the early Canadian stamps (I only collect Canada, so I don't know if this is true for other countries) were often cancelled with a quick X using a pen.
Later, some postmasters made simple (or fancy/artistic) cork cancels, and of course eventually, a whole series of cancelling devices arrived at various offices.