nevertheless the arrangement apparently met with mutual approval."

To guard against this and similar omissions on the woman's part, more
than one agency which deals with family desertion requires the deserted
wife to sign an affidavit that she has given all the information she
possesses.

Although in practice the possibility of a collusive desertion is not the
first and most important thing to keep in mind, it is frequent enough
not to be entirely forgotten. And for yet other reasons it is well to
keep a watchful eye upon the neighborhood in which the family is living
for reports about the man. Often obscure impulses seem to bring him
back; jealousy of the wife or a desire to show himself in a spirit of
bravado, or even sometimes a fugitive affection for the children he has
abandoned may cause him to appear in the neighborhood. "The deserter,
like the murderer, harks back to the scene of his misdeeds" was the
generalization of one district secretary.

Even when he does not appear in the flesh the deserter may seek news of
his family. "One deserter was found through the Attendance Department
[of the public school system] to which he wrote after a three years'
absence asking the address of one of the children of whom he was
especially fond."

There is little in the literature of the subject covering methods of
discovering deserters, nor do case workers generally appear to have
developed a special technique. The decided reaction against detective
methods which has been apparent in the profession during later years may
help to explain this fact. Most social workers feel a subconscious sense
of injustice in having to do this work at all, since it is properly a