Strange Devices for Hiding Money.

Otago Witness, Issue 2360, 18 May 1899, Page 61

Strange Devices for Hiding Money.

Many and strange were the devices of our grandmothers for hoarding away their wealth. An elderly spinster of one of the many ancient houses to be found in Chester had a set of large stationery drawers topped by cupboards specially built into a huge closet in one of" the rooms. The lower drawer, instead of resting directly on the floor, ran on grooves about 2in above it. The lower drawer she would pull out, and place large sums of money and all her jewel eases in the.space left below, and then replace the drawer, which she kept filled with linen. The old lady would always declare that if the house were broken into and the drawers ransacked, no one would think of pulling them right out, and that her hiding place was far Bafer s than any bank.

Equally shrewd v/as a woman in Liverpool, who, whenever she had occasion to leave her home at all, would put her money and jewellery in the coalscuttle, covering them up carefully with several layers of coal. This might have proved a somewhat risky experiment in the winter months, when the fire had to be fed, but the owner felt no burglar would ever dream of looking in a coalscuttle for valuables.

Another lady once confided to the writer that if she had occasion to leave her house empty, she invariably placed her jewellery in her old shoes, which were placed alongside the new ones. Quite a lot of valuables can be forced down into the toes without giving the slightest evidence of the value therein.

Of other hiding places perhaps the most popular, especially for paper money, is the big family Bible. It is quite a customary thing in out-of-the-way country houses to thus secure any valuable papers in the possession of the family,.

Tea-caddies and sugar bowls make excellent temporary safes, and the pocket of an old dress hanging in an unconcealed way in a wardrobe is regarded by many women as one' of the safest places imaginable for spare rings, brooches, and bracelets.