There is another class of forgers, generally bankers, who speculate with
trust funds. To cover up the shortage they sign notes expecting that
they will never be presented and will deceive no one but the bank
examiner. If luck goes against them too long, the bank fails and the
forgery is discovered. These are really not forgers, as they never
intend to get money on the note. It is only a part of a means to cover
up the use of trust funds. Of course, these men are never professional
forgers, and are much more apt to die from suicide or a broken heart
than to repeat.

But with few exceptions, the criminal comes from the walks of the poor
and has no education or next to none. For this society is much to blame.
Sometimes he is obliged to go to work too soon, but often he cannot
learn at school. This is not entirely the fault of the boy's heredity;
it is largely the fault of the school. A certain course of study has
been laid out. With only slight changes this course has come down from
the past and is fixed and formal. Much of it might be of value to a
professional man, but most of it is of no value to the man in other
walks of life. Because a boy cannot learn arithmetic, grammar or
geography, or not even learn to read and write, it does not follow that
he cannot learn at all. He may possibly have marked mechanical ability;
he may have more than the ordinary powers of adaptation to many kinds of
work. These he could be taught to do and often to do well. Under proper
instruction he might become greatly interested in some kind of work, and
in the study to prepare him for the work. Then too it is more or less
misleading to say that an uneducated man commits crime because he is
uneducated. Often his lack of education as well as his crime comes from
poverty. Crime and poverty may come from something else. All come
because he had a poor make-up or an insufficient chance.