The Chief of Police was asked by the committee of investigation whether he thought it was the proper thing for him, as Chief of Police of Chicago, "to give to a man to go out among business men, corporations and manufacturing establishments of the city a letter telling them that everything this man did and said you would be responsible for, if you knew he had been indicted and arrested in different cities of the United States for defrauding the people out of money on this same identical scheme?" He answered, "I don't believe it." Immediately he was asked, "Have you heard A. was arrested a number of times?" and in reply said, "I read in the newspapers that he was arrested and had trouble in Detroit." Again he was asked whether A. had given him any information as to the number of times he had been arrested for getting money on false pretenses, and his answer was, "I can give you some information on that subject." These extracts from the sworn testimony of this official, speak in no commendatory manner of his sense of official responsibility. They point to a mind deadened to all sense of the duties of his position; they elevate him before his force as a conspicuous example for them to follow, in his disregard of the principles of official decency. In themselves they urge upon that force, by their silent influence, an emulation of such a blackmailing course, even though in its accomplishment the assistance of a swindler is required, and deliberately accepted. A brother of the Chief, a member of the detective force, was frequently found in poolrooms, assisting in their management, and yet the Chief seems to have been unable to acquire the knowledge that poolrooms were running wide open throughout the city. He probably knew it as an individual. In response to a question as to his information on this subject he answered, that no particular complaints were made--"the newspaper boys often came around and said there was pool selling going on at different places," and he presumed "if a desperate effort had been made to look that kind of thing up, we might have possibly been successful." More open admissions of official incompetency it would, perhaps, be difficult to make, and no more flagrant instances could be cited of official degeneracy than are these extracts from the sworn testimony of a defiant and dangerous public servant.