A COSTLY CASE.
The necessary expenses of the detection of crime are often considerable. Information must be obtained, even if it has to be paid for liberally. Officers must be in concealment for weeks, and sometimes for months. Long journeys must not unfrequently be made; and in a hundred ways large expenditures will be called for. We were told of a case where a treasury note of the government was counterfeited with consummate skill, and it became a matter of vital importance to obtain the plate from which the counterfeit was printed. One of the most successful detectives was employed to work up the case, who soon found that the cost of securing it would be so great that there was little probability that the treasurer would audit his accounts. He therefore told the government that the cost would be so great that he declined to undertake it; but the possession of the plate, and the information that its capture would give, were so exceedingly important, that the detective was authorized to go on with it. He did so; the plate was obtained; all the information sought for was procured, and the counterfeiters and their abettors were captured. But it cost the government one hundred and twenty thousand dollars to accomplish this result. There were regular vouchers for every payment, and each was carefully scrutinized and verified. There was no doubt whatever that all the expenditures had been made in good faith, and with the utmost economy. Doubtless the government felt that the possession of that plate, and the knowledge gained, were worth all they had cost.