money than there was in the bank, I went to Mr. Lynch, and said there must be some mistake somewhere, and told them to stop taking in any more money till it was cleared up. The next day Mr. Lynch being ill in bed, sent for me, and made a confession that he had committed frauds; but he stated no amount. I then seized his books and papers and everything I found connected with the bank, and swore information as to the facts." The books were then subjected to a thorough examination, and "frauds of every possible character," to the extent of 36,000_l._, were found to have been committed. At the trial which ensued, Lynch pleaded guilty, and was sentenced to fourteen years' transportation. The other modes of enriching himself to which we have not yet referred may be given in Lynch's own words. Soon after his apprehension he made a confession of his malpractices, in order to exonerate a clerk of the bank who had been arrested at the same time, and who was at first thought to be an accomplice, and we take the man's own account of his ingenious trafficking in forged pass-books as the most lucid one that could possibly be given. "A depositor lodged money with me," said the actuary; "I entered it in the pass-book, but not in the receipt-book. He subsequently lodged more, say with Mr. Fitzgerald, and it was duly entered in the pass-book and the receipt-book. For these depositors there necessarily was no account to be found in the bank books, and the party paying him upon notice given would thus be presumptively implicated." He proceeded to give another instance of his artifice: "I frequently took an old pass-book and tore out the _bonâ fide_ deposit leaf; I made an entry therein in a fictitious name, and a _quasi_ deposit, as if it were some years antecedent. During bank hours I used to hand in those books to whoever might be in the bank, directing notice to be given for the amount, as though the depositor had left it with me for that purpose, as it were, some days antecedently. The manager entering such notice was thus presumptively implicated; and as the course of the bank unfortunately was to 'keep' and not relodge sums 'noticed for,' the manager of the day marked it as 'kept,' which meant, given to me to give to the _quasi_ depositor." "Kept!" What a fund of irony there is in that one word so applied! In one or other of the modes described, this actuary, "respected by all who knew him," contrived to "keep," and, what is worse, to spend, 36,000_l_. of the hard-earned savings of the poorest classes around him. His estate at the time of his apprehension was worth something like 3,000_l_.; this property Lynch offered to give up in full, "leaving not even a bed for his daughter;" but on Mr. Pratt's being applied to for advice, that gentleman recommended the treasurer not to fall in with the offer, inasmuch as it would be "a compounding of the felony." (825.)[119] Mr. Pratt had arrived by this time at Tralee, and was engaged in the