But apart from the scores of recognised ways in which this nefarious business of planting frauds on the innocent is carried on, there are many less obvious and consequently more dangerous traps for the unwary. Of these one only hears from the victims themselves. Thus one, attracted by a specimen in a shop window, may become an interested listener to a conversation in which the beauty of the said piece and its phenomenal cheapness are the theme. It probably never occurs to the dupe that the respectable-looking lady and gentleman are in the employ of the shopkeeper, and that their conversation was arranged entirely for his benefit. Then comes the great question of sales, private or otherwise. There is the complete clearance owing to the proprietor’s death. There is a window full of miscellaneous stock, including certain good pieces. There is also the notice, “Nothing sold until the 21st.” By the 21st the few good pieces, having achieved their object, have disappeared. But the crowd they have attracted is there, and is there with the intention of buying--and buys! Again, there is the family compelled by misfortune to realise immediately all its assets, and in so doing to sacrifice everything. Who would not pick up a bargain when to do so is to do a good turn? All such methods are transparent enough if one stops to consider and to analyse. But how seldom one does! A very fine and lucrative trade is carried on in Old Bristol and Nailsea glass, for the reason that in no other kind of glass is it so difficult to distinguish the false from the true. The milky white surface lends itself particularly to imitation. I remember some specimens brought to me by a well-known collector. They were a pair of small bottles, pepper and vinegar, and my visitor was mightily proud of his “find” and his bargain. But on a careful examination I fear that he realised, with some sense of discomfiture, that the “deceased ancestor” who had been dangled before him was something of a myth, and that the specimens were only modern reproductions and probably foreign at that. To my surprise, on visiting a local museum on the West Coast recently, I found the same two pieces exhibited as specimens of early Bristol glass. The best test for this description of glass is carefully to scrutinise the decoration with a strong magnifying glass. The magnification will reveal alike the perfection of the workmanship of the real old Bristol manufacture and the poverty and roughness of the imitation. Further, Bristol glass is soft to the touch, with a beautiful smooth body. Often, too, on turning the glass upside down you find in the centre a clear spot devoid of the opal tint, probably due to the workman running all his colour off at this point. The “fake” will probably in addition to being rough in texture be light in weight and of a milk and watery hue, possibly even with a greyish tinge.