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"There ought to be a hanging penalty attached to it," Digby grunted.

"Quite right, it ought to be a capital offence," the Jew snuffled.

"I should like to come to the execution," Digby was recovering.

"You shall all of you come to mine," Wendern told them cynically" if it takes place. I fear you must wait to assure yourself of that probability till after the meeting, of which a notice will be sent you. Good morning."

Shaw turned back and held out a hand. "I believe you'll get us out of the hole if you can," he said cheerily.

Wendern's face lighted up as he answered, "There isn't going to be any hole, but if there is I'll get you out."

"Good morning, Mr Wendern," the parson said severely.

"He takes it pretty coolly," Digby was heard telling the others as they went downstairs, "but we shall hear what Mr Christopher Lant has to say."

Wendern gave a gasp of relief when they had gone, and pulled out the latest cablegram of the Dock case. "They shall be safe in any case," he said to himself. He looked at Lant's telegram. "He can't be a scoundrel," he thought; "reckless and easy-going, but not a scoundrel."

Suddenly he remembered and rang the bell. "Is Mr Parker here?" he asked the boy.

"Yes, sir, waiting."
"Tell him to come up."

(To be continued.)

PITFALLS FOR COLLECTORS.

BY MRS ANDREW LANG.

"C'EST un vieux truc mais toujours bon" is 8 classic phrase familiar to the readers of French sensational novels, and dear to their hearts, for does it not promise another success to the "chenapan de la pire espèce" so much beloved by all of us? M. Paul Eudel's book, 'Trucs et Truqueurs,' Tricks and Tricksters, is a collection of "trucs" old and new in every branch of art and literature, combined with a few hints to enable us to detect imposture when we see it, and an endless number of amusing stories.

Yet many of the modern forgers are not only artists, but great artists, and in the opinion of an English archæologist the art of Greece may be restored by means of their nefarious skill. More than one precious object in our museums, to which the attention of the public was especially called by a slip pasted on the foot, expatiating on the beauty of the workmanship, has recently been discovered to be the work of one of the living Greek brotherhood. Their forgeries are to be found amongst the finest collections, and in many "A collector should know cases it is only some unforeeverything," so says M. Eudel, seen accident that leads to and those of us who possess their exposure. But though even the humblest curiosities the technical ability of these will close his book with some- men is often nearly as great thing of the depression Alnas- as that of the artists they char must have felt when he imitate, there is one gift the saw the basket of glass which lack of which fixes a great was to have led to fortune gulf between them-that want in fragments at his feet. Our of imagination which may engravings, our gems, our be said to be characteristic vases will never give us the of modern art in all its thrill of pride that thrilled branches. us before we ate of M. Eudel's apple. Instead of displaying them to every new-comer, we shall avoid the subject of antiquities, and if we are wise, shall follow the example of one of his friends, who refused to allow him to examine his collection for fear of the revelations that might follow.

Forgery, it is needless to remark, is as old as art itself, but it is only in this epoch of millionaires that it has assumed such terrific proportions. To an ignorant man, a high price is often the only criterion of value. "It must be a button off Napoleon's coat or they would never charge

1 Librairie Molière, 17 Rue Richelieu, Paris.

me five hundred francs for it," he reasons, and in the face of such encouragement Napoleonic buttons naturally spring up under his feet. The forger grows bolder every day, and the contents of his workshop are given a place beside undoubted antiquities in some international exhibition or world-famous sale at the Hôtel Drouot. They are frequently veritable works of art, demanding costly materials, skill, time, and patience. Why, one may ask, under these conditions, do forgers shelter themselves behind the name of a man or a period? Well, we have only ourselves to thank for it. It is not the object and the skill that we want, but merely the name and the period. And this is probably the cause of the indulgence shown even by experts to these kinds of frauds. They understand the temptation, and are amused by the cleverness of the execution. "Il faut de l'audace doctrine which will always find friends.

is a

A century since, antiquities were of comparatively small account, or Charles Sauvageot, a very poor young violinist of the French Opera House, could hardly have made a collection which even fifty-five years ago was valued by the Louvre at £16,000. Now the valuation would be enormously greater, though it is hardly likely to be as much as ten millions of francs, the figure given by M. Eudel. During the thirty years or more that Sauvageot

he

remained at the Opera retired for good in 1829,— every spare instant was spent in collecting. Beginning with Chinese curiosities, he soon abandoned them for French art, especially that of the Valois period, and Francis I. was "son roi de prédilection." For once, the time and the place and the lover were all together. The treasures of centuries, scattered by the Revolution, were to be found all over Paris, and to be picked up for nothing by any one who knew their worth. The hours passed by Sauvageot in bricà-brac shops taught him patience, experience, taste, and a rapid judgment. During many years he was perhaps the only person in Paris who possessed an eye-and a taste for Renaissance art, and the two small rooms in which he lived were crowded with pictures, engravings, pottery, furniture, chests, and everything else that might have decorated the house of a Valois noble. He was lucky, too, which all collectors are not, and on many occasions sold a work of art for at least fifty times the amount he had paid for it. But in one respect he differed from the majority of collectors. It was the "match" he liked, and not "the manner of the wooing," and when, at seventy, signs of his last illness began to manifest themselves, a mortal dread fell upon him that the collection which had grown under his hand slowly and lovingly should be dispersed, so, while he was yet living, he presented it to the Louvre.

Let us now turn from the lucky to the unlucky collector. Some years ago the famous Egyptologist, Professor K

of

determined to in

dulge himself with a visit to the Nile, and stopped near the first cataract in order to explore the temples of Philæ. The usual crowd of fellaheen with scarabs to sell pressed round him, but one sharper than the rest noted the Professor's eyes wandering eagerly towards the ruins, and in a mysterious whisper invited him to come and examine a necropolis on the river bank, which was, so far, unknown to the savants. The suggestion was one after K-'s own heart, and he signed to the Arab to lead on and he would follow. Silently they walked for some distance, and then the guide stopped before a mud hut and pointed to to a sarcophagus a few paces off, still half-buried in the sand. "Mine. Sell," said the Arab, and K- needed no more words, but flung himself on the sand to inspect the painted sarcophagus. With trembling hands he scratched away the sand till at length there lay before him the procession of harvesters, reapers, threshers, kneaders, and water-carriers so familiar in Egyptian art. "Anubia," the name of the occupant, was duly written, and beneath it the inscription

"Let Osiris give the funeral meats, that the dead may eat of them."

As he read, the enthusiasm of the Professor waxed as hot as the sun itself. No doubt

VOL. CXCI.-NO. MCLVI.

was possible. The sarcophagus dated from the twelfth dynasty, and was admirably preserved. Turning, he made a sign to the fellah, who appeared to misunderstand it, for the man uncrossed his legs and rose, holding out a handful of dried dates and a cake.

"No, no; not that! Help me to dig out the sarcophagus from the sand and lift the cover."

The Egyptian did not need to be told twice. He called to some friends who were squatting in the distance, and between them the sarcophagus was set free, and the Professor was able to lift the lid. There lay the mummy in its linen wrappings surrounded by a bead necklace, ivory needles, sandals, and a mirror for its "double" to use, while in place of its head was painted mask, with two black eyes in a setting of white enamel. What joy to present it to his museum at

! The price was high,higher than K expected,

but he agreed to it without hesitation, only stipulating that it should at once be placed in a boat and taken down the Nile to Alexandria and there put on board a vessel bound for the North. On the quay of Alexandria the purchase-money was to be paid down.

Two months later the precious case was deposited in one of the rooms of the museum of where the Committee of Antiquities hastened to inspect it. The packing

P

had been carefully done, and him. Leaning against a pilProfessor K-noted with lar, the Professor listened in relief that everything was in silence while his colleagues as good a condition as when consulted together how to asthe coffin had quitted the certain the truth. Of course banks of the Nile. But his the endless spirals of linen glow of triumph faded as could be unrolled, but once the examination proceeded, and exposed to the air might not doubts were writ large on the embalmed figure collapse the faces of his colleagues. into dust? Yet it was imOne tapped the side of the possible to give this mummy case, and shook his head as "snug lying" among its felthe dull sound of mill-board lows when beneath the maniresponded; another objected fold coverings might repose that there was a lack of style in the prayer to Osiris; a third was struck by the modern look of the decoration; while a fourth-most damning of all-declared that from the smell of the varnish it was quite plain it had been put on recently.

The poor discoverer was now ready to weep, yet a little hope still lingered in his heart that, even if the case were a fraud, the mummy within might somehow prove a reality. But the removal of the lid was a signal for fresh discussions, all tending to prove to the unfortunate Professor how easily he had been taken in. The linen wrappings were whiter than they should have been after more than three thousand years of seclusion; the eyes of the mask suggested glass rather than enamel; and the bands wound round the body after the embalmers had done their work were made of different material from those of other mummies. A few of the committee upheld the judgment of K, but the greater number sided against

not even a sacred cat, but some unclean creature. A museum, like the wife of Cæsar, must be above suspicion.

What was to be done? "At this moment of acute tension a shout of viotory burst from the Professor of Physical Science. 'Eureka!' he cried, and dashing from the room returned in a few minutes with an apparatus under his arm.

Now,' he said, 'the Röntgen rays will tell us.' And what the Röntgen rays told them was that Anubia of the period of the twelfth dynasty was a wicker-work dummy.

"Never believe in the authenticity of any object you have not seen dug up yourself,” is the counsel of M. Eudel, "and even then you may be tricked;" and he gives examples of savants who have set their seal on forgeries which would never have been found out had their authors not grown careless with impunity, and flooded the market with rarities till the suspicions of the experts were awakened. In Italy, where the excava

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