statutes, fixing penalties from penal servitude for life downwards, were consolidated by the Forgery Act 1861. It would take too much space to enumerate all the varieties of the offence with their appropriate punishments. The following condensed summary is based upon chapter xlv. of Sir J. Stephen’s Digest of the Criminal Law:
1. Forgeries punishable with penal servitude for life as a maximum are—
(a) Forgeries of the great seal, privy seal, &c.
(b) Forgeries of transfers of stock, India bonds, exchequer bills, bank-notes, deeds, wills, bills of exchange, &c.
(c) Obliterations or alterations of crossing on a cheque.
(d) Forgeries of registers of birth, &c., or of copies thereof and others.
2. Forgeries punishable with fourteen years’ penal servitude are—
(a) Forgeries of debentures.
(b) Forgeries of documents relating to the registering of deeds, &c.
(c) Forgeries of instruments purporting to be made by the accountant general and other officers of the court of chancery, &c.
(d) Drawing bill of exchange, &c., on account of another, per procuration or otherwise, without authority.
(e) Obtaining property by means of a forged instrument, knowing it to be forged, or by probate obtained on a forged will, false oath, &c.
3. Forgeries punishable with seven years’ penal servitude:—Forgeries of seals of courts, of the process of courts, of certificates, and of documents to be used in evidence, &c.
By the Merchandise Marks Acts 1887 and 1891, forgery of trade marks is an offence punishable on conviction by indictment with imprisonment not exceeding two years or to fine, or both, and on conviction by summary proceedings with imprisonment not exceeding four months or with a fine.
The Forged Transfers Act 1891, made retrospective by the Forged Transfers Act 1892, enables companies and local authorities to make compensation by a cash payment out of their funds for any loss arising from a transfer of their stocks, shares or securities through a forged transfer.
United States.—Forgery is made a crime by statute in most if not all the states, in addition to being a common law cheat. These statutes have much enlarged the common definition of this crime. It is also made a crime by a Federal statute (U.S. Rev. Stat., ch. 5), which includes forgery of national banknotes, letters patent, public bid, record, signature of a judge, land warrants, powers of attorney, ships’ papers or custom-house documents, certificates of naturalization, &c.; the punishment is by fine or by imprisonment from one to fifteen years with or without hard labour.
In Illinois, fraudulently connecting together different parts of several banknotes or other genuine instruments so as to produce one additional note or instrument with intent to pass all as genuine, is a forgery of each of them (Rev. Stats. 1901, ch. 38, § 108). The alleged instrument must be apparently capable of defrauding (Goodman v. People [1907], 228, Ill. 154).
In Massachusetts, forgery of any note, certificate or bill of credit issued by the state treasurer and receiver general, or by any other officer, for a debt of that commonwealth, or a bank bill of any bank, is punishable by imprisonment for life or any term of years (Rev. Laws 1902, ch. 209, §§ 4 and 5).
In New York, forgery includes the false making, counterfeiting, alteration, erasure or obliteration of a genuine instrument (Penal Code, § 520). An officer or agent of a corporation who with intent to defraud sells, pledges or issues a fraudulent scrip, share certificate, is guilty of forgery in third degree. Falsely making any instrument which purports to be issued by a corporation bearing a pretended signature of a person falsely indicated as an officer of the company, is forgery just as if such person were in truth such officer (id. § 519). Counterfeiting railroad tickets is forgery in the third degree. Falsely certifying that the execution of a deed has been acknowledged is forgery (id. § 511). So also is the forging a fictitious name (People v. Browne [1907], 103 N.Y. suppl. 903). Punishment for forgery in the first degree may be twenty years, in the second degree ten years, in the third degree five years.
In Pennsylvania, fraudulently making, signing, altering, uttering or publishing any written instrument other than bank bills, cheques or drafts, was punishable by fine and imprisonment “by separate or solitary confinement at labour for a term not exceeding ten years” (L. 1860, March 31); forging bank bills, &c., for a term not exceeding five years. Defacing, removing, or counterfeiting brands from lumber floating in any river is punishable by imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years or a fine (L. 1887, May 23). Fraudulently using the registered mark of another on lumber is punishable by fine or imprisonment by solitary confinement for a term not exceeding three years (id.).
In Tennessee, forgery may be committed by typewriting the body of and signature to an instrument which may be the subject of forgery (1906; State v. Bradley, 116 Tenn. 711).
In Vermont, the act of 1904, p. 135, no. 115, § 24, authorizes licensees to sell intoxicating liquors only on the written prescription of a legally qualified physician stating that it “is given and necessary for medicinal use.” It was held that a prescription containing no such statement was invalid and the alteration thereof was not forgery (1906; State v. McManus, 78 St. 433).
Authorities.—Pollock and Maitland, History of English Law; Stephen, Digest of Criminal Law; History of Criminal Law; L. O. Pike, History of Crime in England, 1873–1876; Russell, On Crimes; Archbold, Criminal Pleadings.
FORGET-ME-NOT, or Scorpion-Grass (Ger. Vergissmeinnicht,
Fr. grémillet, scorpionne), the name popularly applied to
the small annual or perennial herbs forming the genus Myosotis
of the natural order Boraginaceae, so called from the Greek
μῦς, a mouse, and οὖς, an ear, on account of the shape of the
leaves. The genus is represented in Europe, north Asia, North
America and Australia, and is characterized by oblong or linear
stem-leaves, flowers in terminal scorpioid cymes, small blue,
pink or white flowers, a five-cleft persistent calyx, a salver- or
funnel-shaped corolla, having its mouth closed by five short
scales and hard, smooth, shining nutlets. The common or true
forget-me-not, M. palustris, is a perennial plant growing to a
height of 6 to 18 in., with rootstock creeping, stem clothed
with lax spreading hairs, leaves light green, and somewhat
shining, buds pink, becoming blue as they expand, and corolla
rotate, broad, with retuse lobes and bright blue with a yellow
centre. The divisions of the calyx extend only about one-third
the length of the corolla, whereas in the other British species
of Myosotis it is deeply cleft. The forget-me-not, a favourite
with poets, and the symbol of constancy, is a frequent ornament
of brooks, rivers and ditches, and, according to an old German
tradition, received its name from the last words of a knight who
was drowned in the attempt to procure the flower for his lady.
It attains its greatest perfection under cultivation, and, as it
flowers throughout the summer, is used with good effect for
garden borders; a variety, M. strigulosa, is more hairy and erect,
and its flowers are smaller. In M. versicolor the flowers are
yellow when first open and change generally to a dull blue;
sometimes they are permanently yellowish-white. Of the species
in cultivation, M. dissitiflora, 6 to 8 in., with large handsome
abundant sky-blue flowers, is the best and earliest, flowering
from February onwards; it does well in light cool soils, preferring
peaty ones, and should be renewed annually from seeds or
cuttings. M. rupicola, or M. alpestris, 2 to 3 in., intense blue,
is a fine rock plant, preferring shady situations and gritty
soil; M. azorica (a native of the Azores) with purple, ultimately
blue flowers about half an inch across, has a similar habit but
larger flowers; M. sylvatica, 1 ft., blue, pink or white, used for
spring bedding, should be sown annually in August.
FORGING, the craft of the smith, or “blacksmith,” exercised
on malleable iron and steel, in the production of works of constructive
utility and of ornament. It differs from founding
(q.v.) in the fact that the metal is never melted. It is essentially
a moulding process, the iron or steel being worked at a full red,
or white, heat when it is in a plastic and more or less pasty
condition. Consequently the tools used are in the main counterparts
of the shapes desired, and they mould by impact. All the
operations of forging may be reduced to a few very simple ones:
(1) Reducing or drawing down from a larger to a smaller section
(“fullering” and “swaging”); (2) enlargement of a smaller
to a larger portion (“upsetting”); (3) bending, or turning round
