SPURIOUS COIN IN SYDNEY.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 204, 22 May 1908, Page 2

SPURIOUS COIN IN SYDNEY.

———» — There is always a'certain number of spurious coins in circulation in the city (says the Sydney " Daily Telegraph but at present the number is greater than usual, and wise people should take a glance at their change boforo pocketing it. ' Only recently a-largo, number of cleverly forged £5 notes were dis- - covered at the llandwick Racecourse, in a spot where they had evidently been hidden, for safety. A few were passed into circulation and passed out again quickly into the posses- • sion of the polico, but it is quite probable that some wore not discovered* and are still being paid and accepted by unsuspecting . mombers -of tlio public. , Shopkeepers complain of an unsually high percentage of sweated sovereigns and half-sovereigns, • for which the banks rofuse to allow full value. The smart individual who refuses notes-and suspicious-looking gold is quite apt . 'to be . victimised, however, by "silver," for "silver" is easier to coin and easier to pass than other metal. The florin is usually the most popular coin amongst counterfeiters, . but owing to tlio largo numbers of " crook 'una " recently discovered, and consequent vigilance 011 the part of the detectives where florins wore concerned, whoever "is responsible for.. tlioir being current, has stopped the,supply, and substituted half-crowns.- Tlio regularity with which those spurious "coins are distributed has led to the belief that a systematic gang is at work in the city. '

In literature, the amateur, has beoomo hopelessly' confused with the professional.* Half the novels published' am the offspring of dilettantism. Tlio dilettante sucks sweeta. but is iucapablo of making honey.—"Lady."