Frequently educational and newspaper critics compare unfavorably American writing with that of other nations. The writer has investigated the subject by collecting from many countries copy-books and specimens of writing from leading teachers of writing, students in various grades of schools, clerks and business men.
America is so far in advance of any other country in artistic and business penmanship that there is really no second. Americans as a whole write at a much higher rate of speed and with a freer movement than any other nations, and, consequently, many critics stop when they have criticized form alone, not making allowance for quantity. Nervous, rapid writers (and such the Americans are) produce writing more or less illegible, but it is not the fault of the standard so much as the speed with which the writing is done.
The writing of England is either angular (for rapid business style), or the civil-service round-hand—too slow for the every-day rush of business. England's colonies, influenced by her copy-books and teachers, write about as England does. Canada is an exception, as her proximity to the United States causes her to mix the English and American styles, with the American gaining ground.
The German and French write two radically different styles. Hence the identity of the nation producing the writer as well as the identity of the writer himself usually can be established. Before the writer is known this frequently is of great benefit to the cause of justice as it narrows down the search.
A case such as the Dreyfus affair has a tendency to confuse the public mind and leads to wrong conclusions. In initiating the prosecution of Dreyfus the French government submitted the documents to expert Gobert, of the Bank of France, who is considered the leader in this line in France. Gobert reported that Dreyfus did not write the incriminating documents. The prosecutors then placed the papers in the hands of Bertillon, the inventor of the anthropometric system of measurements (used principally on criminals) which bears his name. It mattered not that Bertillon had never appeared in a handwriting case before, or that his skill in this line was unknown. He was a man of science, of great renown in other lines, and the government relied on these facts to bolster up its claim that Dreyfus wrote the incriminating papers Bertillon reported in favor of the government's contention, and it was an easy matter to get some alleged experts—weak as to will and ability—and one or two honest but misguided men to agree with him. Some of these afterward changed their opinions when better standards of writing were given to them.
Dreyfus' friends sent engraved reproductions of standards and disputed documents to the best-known experts all over the world, and without exception these reported that Dreyfus was not the writer of the disputed papers. On the side of the French government were a few so-called "experts," headed and dominated by a man with no experience whatever. The experts of skill and experience in France and the world over were practically unanimous in favor of Dreyfus. A critical examination of the documents in question produced an absolute conviction that they could not possibly have been written by Dreyfus.
Unless the individual is fitted by nature and inborn liking for investigations of this character, no amount of education and experience will fit him. But, given natural equipment and inclination, it is necessary first of all that the expert have a good general education. He should have a sufficient command of language to make others see what he sees. He should have a good eye for form and color, and a well-trained hand to enable him to describe graphically as well as orally what his trained eye has detected. A few strokes on a blackboard or large sheet of paper will often make a clouded point appear much plainer to court, jury and lawyers than hours of oral description. The ability to handle the crayon and to simulate well the writings under discussion is a great aid.
A very interesting case was involved in the will of Miser Paine in New York in 1889. Here a deliberate attempt to get away with something like $1,500,000 was made, which was frustrated by a handwriting expert. When quite a young man, James H. Paine was a clerk in a Boston business house. He absconded with a lot of money and went to New York, where all trace of him was lost. He speculated with the stolen money, and everything he touched turned to gold. He soon became a millionaire. Then he became a miser. He went around the streets in rags, lodged in a garret with a French family on the West Side, who took him out of pure charity, and lived on the leavings which restaurant-keepers gave him. There was only one thing that he would spend money on; that was music. He was passionately fond of music, and for years was a familiar figure in the lobby of the Academy of Music during the opera season. He would go there early in the evening, and beg people to pay his way in. If he didn't find a philanthropist he would buy a ticket himself, but he never gave up hope until he knew that the curtain had risen.
Finally Paine was run over by a cab in New York. He was taken to a hospital, but made such a fuss about staying there that he was finally removed to his garret home. He died there in a few days. Then a man came forward with a power of attorney which he said Paine gave him in 1885 and which authorized him to take charge of Paine's interest in the estate of his brother, Robert Treat Paine. The closing paragraph empowered him to attend to all of Paine's business and to dispose of his property without consulting anybody, in the event of anything happening to him. Nothing was known then of Paine's possessions. Later the French family with whom Paine lived opened an old hair trunk they found in the garret. In this trunk they found nearly half a million dollars in gold, bank notes, and securities. Chickering, the piano man, came forward then and said that some years before Paine gave him a package wrapped up in an old bandana handkerchief for safe keeping. He had opened this package and found that it contained $300,000 in bank notes. Other possessions of Paine's were found. Relatives came forward and employing handwriting experts proved that the power of attorney presented was a forgery and the estate went to the relations of Paine. This was a celebrated case in its day and called attention to the value of experts in this line.
Ovid, in his "Art of Love," teaches young women to deceive their guardians by writing their love letters with new milk, and to make the writing appear by rubbing coal dust over the paper. Any thick and viscous fluid, such as the glutinous and colorless juices of plants, aided by any colored powder, will answer the purpose equally well. A quill pen should be used.