In addition there must be the affidavit of two witnesses (each of whom must swear that he is himself a citizen of the United States), who must declare on his oath that he knows the petitioner to have been a resident of the United States at least since a certain specified date five years ago, and of the particular state at least since a certain specified date not less than a year ago; and that he personally knows the petitioner to be a person of good moral character, attached to the principles of the Constitution, well disposed toward the good order and happiness of the same, and generally qualified in every way to be admitted as a citizen of the United States. To the petition _at the time of filing_ (that is rigidly required by the law and the decisions of many courts) must be physically attached the declaration of intention made at least two years before, and the certificate of arrival. For filing the declaration of intention the alien will have paid to the clerk a fee of one dollar; upon filing his final petition he has to pay another fee of four dollars. There are strict penal provisions in the law for the punishment of clerks who charge or collect any more. Under the law, one-half of each fee is retained by the clerk, ostensibly for the purpose of reimbursing him for such additional clerical assistance as the naturalization business may necessitate, but not always used for that purpose. This subject is discussed elsewhere. The petitioner, with certain exceptions noted below, must sign his petition in his own handwriting. It is, however, usually permitted him to sign it by “his mark,” properly witnessed, and even this was not required of those who filed their declarations of intention before the passage of the Act; but lapse of time has made that no longer a practical exception. It has usually been held that a signature, even in another language, such as Arabic, is sufficient. There has often been controversy as to whether the extraordinary arrangement of marks constructed by the petitioner is in fact a signature, the author insisting that he has achieved one when it is utterly illegible to both judge and naturalization examiner. In this, as in a host of other details, the fate of the petitioner hangs upon the intelligence and humanity of the judge, who has to choose between a strict insistence upon the technicality and a more generous adjudication--in a case, for example, in which a poor old deaf woman homesteader might lose all she has in the world, simply because he cannot see an intelligible “signature” in the conglomeration of hieroglyphics which she intends to represent her name.