ing photographed.

As to signatures especially, attention is called to the "tremor of
fraud," which is to be detected by the microscope, and stress is laid
upon the necessity of observing just where this tremor falls. If it is
in a difficult flourish of the signature and not elsewhere it indicates
fraud; or if it be tremulous to the eye, in imitation of the signature
of an aged person, a smooth, curved line may be the index of "the
difficulty experienced by a good penman in feigning to be a bad one."

The microscope is useful and valuable in determining whether erasures
have been made on paper. Also it will discover which of two crossed
lines was last written. It may determine whether the ragged edges of
the ink lines are those of fraud, illiteracy, or old age.

The practice of forging the names of depositors in banks to checks,
drafts, notes, and in fact to all papers representing a money value,
has been practiced, probably, since the creation of man. Of course the
law recognizes forgery as a serious crime, and everywhere the
punishment is severe. In the seventeenth century it was a capital
offense in England, and there were more persons executed for that
crime than there were for murder. Notwithstanding the rigorous penalty
prescribed in every state in the Union, forgery is carried on to an
alarming extent, sometimes by trusted employees, as well as
professionals.

The raising of checks and drafts is the principal method employed by
the men who make a business of defrauding the unwary. The simplest way
of explaining the operation of raising a draft or check is as follows:

Two men are necessary for success at any given point, and hence they
are not so liable to detection as if a number of confederates were
engaged. It is the business of one of these men to enter a bank, and
purchase a draft on New York City, for a certain amount of money,
usually about fifteen hundred dollars, and a short time after this
another draft would be procured from the same bank for a small amount,
seldom over ten dollars. These drafts procured, they are handed to the
"raiser," or the man who is to alter the paper for their dishonest
purposes. In a short time the small draft is raised to be a perfect
duplicate of the large one, in every sense of the word, both as
regards number, amount, place of presentation, etc.

This work of alteration being fully completed, one of the men would
then remove to another city, and forward the "raised" d