The Right Hon. Henry Campbell-Bannerman, M.P., is the second son of the late Sir James Campbell, of Stracathro, Forfarshire. He was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge (B.A., 1858--M.A., 1861). He is a magistrate for the counties of Lanark and Kent, and has represented the Stirling Boroughs in the Liberal interest since December, 1868. He was Financial Secretary at the War Office from 1871 to 1874; was again appointed to that office in 1880; and in May, 1882, succeeded Mr. Trevelyan as Secretary to the Admiralty. On the resignation of Mr. Trevelyan he was appointed Chief Secretary for Ireland, 1884-5, and has held the office of Secretary of State for War since 1892. _Crimes and Criminals._ No. III.--COINERS AND COINING. [Illustration: FIG. 1.--BURNISHING BOARD.] The up-to-date counterfeit-money coiner is one of the most difficult individuals with whom the police have to deal. He is a positive artist. He no longer cuts shillings with a pair of scissors out of brass and silvers them over, as was done in the early part of the present century. He employs more scientific means, and his methods are such that only men of considerable ingenuity and inventive powers could possibly hope to bring them to a successful issue. But, alas! as in most things--woman's in it!--and to the fair sex belongs the first case on record in which any person appears to have been executed for counterfeiting the coin of the realm. In May, 1721, Barbara Spencer had the crime brought home to her of indulging in the--in those days--highly treasonable pastime of manufacturing shilling pieces. She employed two other women, Alice Hall and Elizabeth Bray, to act as her agents, or "passers," and it is a significant fact that in almost every case of counterfeiting up to the present day women are employed in this particular branch of the profession. Barbara, it should be mentioned, was strangled and burned at Tyburn, on the 5th July, 1721, her accomplices being acquitted. The question may be asked: Is the manufacture of counterfeit coin in a flourishing condition? The answer is a very decided affirmative. True, the convictions against counterfeiters are few and far between; but that is owing to the very elaborate measures adopted by the counterfeiters themselves of preventing a knowledge of their whereabouts becoming the property of the police. Your next-door neighbour may be a magnificent hand at turning out "five-bob" pieces; your butcher, greengrocer, and milk purveyor may all be adepts at the game. In proof of this, examine this bell and its companion. One is an ordinary electric bell--the other an invalid's bell-push.