As a brief observation it may be added that Professor Orlandini is a sculptor of the old school who deals chiefly with hard materials. This fact greatly contributes to give his art that stern sobriety of line that is a characteristic mark of the Renaissance artist. In the present flood of imitations it has been urged that honest artists should put their signatures to their modern antiques, thus preventing the danger represented by imitations when launched on the market by able imposters. There are a few who do sign their productions, but we must say such an act does not win the deserved success. The buyer seems to demand a certain amount of illusion which would inevitably be destroyed by a signature in full sight. Besides, supposing that to prevent any possible fakery all imitators should decide to sign their work, what guarantee would such a movement represent? Nothing is easier to erase than a signature on a painting, and so far as a sculptor is concerned it is a baby trick to cover the artist’s mark. Commerce has its risks, risks placing an elective stigma on any enterprise, rendering it more difficult and eliminating the incapable. In our artistic _milieu_ such risks are doubled, thus while “imitation,” and its black sister “faking,” represent a formidable danger, they also, through the said magnified risk, confer upon the elect ones, the true connoisseurs, the exclusiveness of an aristocratic caste. And yet, unlike the beginner, these superior beings who have in a way learned through experience how to cope with dangerous odds repeat with Bonnaffé: “Do not trust the collector who never makes a mistake. The strongest is he who makes the fewest mistakes.” CHAPTER XVII FAKERS, FORGERS AND THE LAW Faking and fakers--Views of art forgers--Too great a productiveness aids the exposure of fakers--The chink in the armour of silence and mystery--Collector’s view of the dangerous trade in counterfeited objects--Laws and tribunals-- Grotesque cases in court--M. Chasles’ autographs--A collector who lacks a Rameses--The faker for gain and the one for fun-- Some moral considerations on fabricators of modern antiques. Moral considerations apart, the faker of objects for collections is far more interesting a personage than some of his duped victims. His artistic personality separates him from the commoner class, the peculiarity of his trade, while not redeeming the disreputableness of his conduct, confers upon him the poetical nimbus of art and mystery, just as an undefined feeling of heroism or chivalry may, to an imaginative mind, turn an old-fashioned brigand into a classical type of buccaneer. These mute workers, who actually earn their money by false pretences, deluding and deceiving with callous energy in what a commercial mind might call “their line of business,” are not infrequently people of scruples and probity in all other respects, men to whom credit might be given with safety.