desk, and that she had written none of the alleged copies upon
it. The door of the courtroom then opened, and James Parker
was led to the bar and pleaded guilty to the forgery of the
check in question. (For the benefit of the layman it should
be explained that as a rule indictments for forgery also
contain a count for "uttering.") He then took the stand,
admitted that he had not only uttered but had also written the
check, and swore that it was his handwriting which, appeared
on the pad.

The prosecutor was nonplussed. If he should ask the witness
to prove his capacity to forge such a check from memory on the
witness-stand, the latter, as he had ample time to practise
the signature while in prison, would probably succeed in doing
so. If, on the other hand, he should not ask him to write the
name, the defendant's counsel would argue to the jury that he
was afraid to do so. The district attorney therefore took the
bull by the horns and challenged Parker to make from memory a
copy of the signature, and, much as he had suspected, the
witness produced a very good one. An acquittal seemed
certain, and the prosecutor was at his wit's end to devise a
means to meet this practical demonstration that the husband
was in fact the forger. At last it was suggested to him that
it would be comparatively easy to memorize such a signature,
and acting on this hint he found that after half an hour's
practice he was able to make almost as good a forgery as
Parker. When therefore it came time for him to address the
jury he pointed out the fact that Parker's performance on the
witness-stand really established nothing at all--that any one
could forge such a signature from memory after but a few