Old Specie, the Treasury Detective; or, The Harbor Lights of New York — page 15: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

he ee i RE ER ee ee te em aA) te ae Me ake : ‘ 7 : : 1 * ' * wy v ¥ OLD SPECIE. 7 “I believe you have been called an expert at de- tecting counterfeits, Mr.—ah—Swanzy.’’ “My experience and long study have given me some knowledge in that line.’’ “You are modest, but I have heard that from no less authority than the Secretary of the Treasury. Take a look at that bill, please.’’ The government detective did so. He examined it minutely for five minutes. Then he laid it down. ‘Well?’ “A counterfeit.”’ ‘“Ah! four expert bank tellers have pronounced it genuine within twenty-four hours.”’ “They were mistaken,’’ quietly. ‘What do you think of it?”’ ‘The most remarkable piece of work I ever saw.”’ ‘So they said when I told them it was bogus.’’ “The plates——’’ ‘‘Have not been stolen.’’ ‘Then only one man could have done that work— August Delmar, known also as Colonel Blood.’’ “Yet you detected the cheat-—how?”’ “T will show you. I have ten ways of telling an ordinary counterfeit of this nature. This bill passed through nine of them, but caught on the tenth, Have you a genuine handy??’’ ‘*Here is one.”’ “T see. You clipped the corner of the bogus.’’ “T was really afraid of getting them mixed.”’ Thereupon the government detective proceeded to explain the trifling defect that had proven the bill a bad one. ‘IT never before knew a counterfeit to pass more than five of these points. In some the whole ten Eomicbooks Eo =}