Evening Bulletin

The matter of "punched" or mutilated coins is one of much annoyance in this country at present. One of the most common methods of debasing coins is to punch out pieces of silver and fill the holes with tin foil. When the filling is neatly done it is not difficult to pass such mutilated pieces on the unwary. Judge Lovell, of the United States Circuit Court, in a Boston case has held the punching and filling to be an act of counterfeiting, and an attempt to pass a coin thus punched and filled to be an attempt to pass counterfeit money. The great mass of mutilated silver has been driven out of circulation by the refusal of people to touch the stuff. It will surprise most persons to learn that they render themselves liable to severe penalties for "shoving" this specific kind of "queer," and as Bradstreet's justly puts it, "Judge Lovell's decision should, through wide publication, be a timely warning."