The tricks of rogues change their names, but remain the same; what is now known as the ’confidence trick,’ which, though it has been exposed in police-courts and reported in the press thousands of times, even in our day finds ready victims, was formerly called ’coney-catching,’ and there were generally three confederates—the Setter, the Verser, and the Barnacle. The Setter, strolling along the Strand, Fleet Street, or Holborn, on the look-out for flats, on espying a coney, whom his dress and general appearance pronounced to be a man from the country, would make up to him, and, as a rule, quickly find out what county he came from, his name, and other particulars. If he could not induce him to have a drink with him, he would manage to convey to his confederate, the Verser, close by, the information gained, whereupon the Verser would suddenly come upon the countryman, salute him by his name, and ask after friends in the country. He proclaimed himself the near kinsman of some neighbour of the coney, and asserted to have been in the latter’s house several times. The countryman, though he could not remember these visits, was yet taken unawares, and readily accepted the invitation to have a drink. They then induced him to play at cards, and soon left him as bare of money as an ape is of a tail, for in those days coney-catching was practised by the assistance of a pack of cards. But if all these lures were wasted on the coney, the Setter or Verser would drop a shilling in the street, so that the coney must see it fall, when he would naturally pick it up, whereupon one of the confederates would cry out, ’Half-part!’ and claim half the find. The countryman would readily agree to exchange the money, but the Setter or Verser would say, ’Nay, friend; it is unlucky to keep found money,’ and the farce would end in the money being spent in drink at a tavern; then cards would be called for, and the coney induced to take an interest in them by being initiated into a new game called ’mum-chance,’ at which he was allowed to win money. While so engaged, the door would be opened by a stranger, the Barnacle, who, on seeing the players, would say, ’Excuse me, gentlemen: I thought a friend of mine was here.’ The stranger would be invited to have a glass of wine, and join in the game, which he would readily do, ’to oblige the company’; and the end would be that the coney, after having been allowed to win for some time, would gradually begin to lose his money, then his watch, or any other valuables he might have about him, and finally be left with no property but the clothes he was standing up in. This, as we have stated, was called ’coney-catching,’ or ’coney-catching _law_,’ for those rogues possessed a great regard for law; all their practices went by the name of ’law’—’high law’ meant highway robbery; ’cheating law,’ playing with false dice; ’versing law,’ the passing of bad gold; ’figging law,’ the cutting of purses.