The first issue of Fiji—a series printed from ordinary printers' type at the office of a local newspaper, and known amongst philatelists as the "Fiji Times Express" stamps—has been twice "reprinted" from a special setting-up of similar type; but, as the original printing forme had been "distributed," even a re-setting of the actual type would produce little less than a forgery of a class euphemistically described as "official imitations."
The greatest sinners in this respect were the officials at Jassy, Roumania, who, in response to numerous applications for copies of the four very rare stamps of July, 1858, caused to be made, at different times, no less than three varying types of the 54, 81, and 108 paras—which they sold as genuine. It was only in the late 'seventies that this official fraud was thoroughly exposed.
As I have indicated, it is impossible, within the limits of a single chapter, to do more than touch the fringe of the subject of forgery and "faking," and the dissection of a few skilful imitations would not materially add to the warning which the previous few pages will have conveyed—that the interest taken by the forger in Philately is a purely mercenary one, detrimental to our scientific hobby and damaging to our pockets; the collector must always be on the defensive and on the look-out for pitfalls, not relying too much on a guarantee of genuineness (which only secures reimbursement of money paid) to prevent the admission into his album of a forgery or clever fake.
The prevalence of forgery—and the almost equally reprehensible "reprinting"—should be no insurmountable obstacle to the collector; rather it should be a spur to prick the sides of his intent to intimate study and patient research. By collecting in a thorough and scientific manner, the collector will so impress on his memory the general features of the majority of the world's issues, together with the details of the safeguards afforded by paper, watermark and perforation, that the first glimpse at a forgery or fake will reveal a something which at once rouses suspicion that the particular label is not the legitimate offspring of the Post Office.
The "bogus" stamp, that is, the fraudulent label which has never existed as an original, is not to be feared: standard catalogues of the present day contain a practically accurate list of the designs of all issued stamps, and information as to new issues is so widely disseminated by the philatelic press that the chances of successfully placing a bogus stamp or issue are very small.
There have been frauds of this kind, but they are so few, and their character is so easily ascertained from the perusal of any catalogue deserving of the name, that it will suffice to merely mention two or three countries which have had bogus issues foisted on them.
A place supposed to be named Sedang and said to be ruled by a Frenchman was credited with a set of stamps for its non-existent Post Office; Brunei, in 1895 or thereabouts, was reported to have issued a set of stamps, which eventually turned out to be the private speculation of some European trader; and Cordoba (a province of Argentina) had her two legitimate stamps of 5 and 10 centavos supplemented by four higher values of similar design made for the delectation of collectors.
There are a good many more, including the so-called issues for Clipperton Island, Torres Straits, Principality of Trinidad, Counani (the character of these last named is, I believe, still contested), Spitsbergen; and certain labels purporting to hail from Hayti, Hawaii, German East Africa, and Mozambique.
For the novice it may be well to add that the absence of a variety of a known stamp from the catalogue does not necessarily signify that it must be so rare in that particular form that it is unknown to the cataloguer. It may, of course, be a new discovery, but it is not less likely to be a variety which has been built up by some one interested in beguiling you with a fancy of his own. Forgers have been known to add new denominations to the sets of stamps they have been counterfeiting, that is to say, bearing face values unknown in the genuine series, and sometimes fictitious overprints or surcharges are applied to genuine stamps. The most remarkable instance of the latter I can recall is the "Two Cents" overprint on the 3 cents brown on yellow Sarawak, which even the local authorities had come to believe in as having been applied by an up-country official in need of Two Cents stamps, but which were surcharged in London, where the dies of the surcharge and the very genuine-looking combinations of postmarks were subsequently found during an important cause celèbre.