The general crime of this period was enormously increased by the extensive fabrication of false money. Coining was extraordinarily prevalent, and a wide, far-reaching system had been created for distributing and uttering the counterfeits, not only at home but on the Continent. All England, all Europe, was literally deluged with false money, the largest proportion of which was manufactured in this country. Not only was the current coinage of the realm admirably counterfeited--guineas, half-guineas, crowns, half-crowns, shillings, sixpences, and coppers, but the coiners could turn out all kinds of foreign money--louis d'ors, Spanish dollars, sequins, pagodas, and the rest, so cleverly imitated as almost to defy detection. So prosperous was the business that as many as forty or fifty private mints were constantly at work in London and various country towns fabricating false money; as many as 120 workpeople were engaged, and the names of some 650 known coiners were registered at the Royal Mint. There was a steady demand for the base coin; it went off so fast that the manufacturers seldom had any stock on hand. As soon as it was finished it was sent off, here, there, and everywhere, by every kind of conveyance. Not a coach nor a carrier left London without a parcel of bad money consigned to country agents. It was known that one agent alone had placed five hundred pounds' worth with country buyers in a single week. Some idea of the profits may be gathered from the fact that Indian pagodas, worth 8s., could be manufactured for 1-1/2d. apiece; and that the middleman who bought them at 5s. a dozen retailed them at from 2s. 3d. to 5s. each. The counterfeiting of gold coins was the least common, owing to the expense of the process and the necessary admixture of at least a portion of the precious metal. It was different with silver. It was stated that two persons alone could manufacture between two and three hundred pounds' worth (nominal value) of spurious silver in six days. There were five kinds of base silver, known in the trade as flats, plated goods, plain goods, castings, and "pig things." The first were cut out of flattened plates of a material part silver, part copper; the second were of copper only, silvered over; the third were of copper, turned out of a lathe and polished; the fourth were of white metal, cast in a mould; the "pig things" were the refuse of the rest converted into sixpences. Copper coins were also manufactured largely out of base metal. [Illustration: IMITATION BANKNOTE ETCHED BY GEORGE CRUIKSHANK IN 1818, SATIRISING THE INFLICTION OF CAPITAL PUNISHMENT FOR FORGERY.]