Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1881-12-07

business as housebreaker as is required to
open store?"
s. If the cracksman had to buy his tools it
would indeed, replied the thief taker, ''for any
sort Of decent kit cannot be procured under
at least 81 900, and the tools for big job will
cost three times as much. But nowadays there
are ways Of getting them without purchase"
what are they?"
swell, one way is to rent them"
"From whom2"
''Either from the makers or from capitalist
who keeps up supply for the purpose. There
are two very distinct classes of tool-makers for
burglars, professional and non professional, that
is. Any mechanic will make tools which are or
dered from him without troubling his conscience
as to what use they are to be put to. Conse-
quently burglar will get kit together some
times by ordering one tool from one honest
smith. another from another, and SO on. The
| same man is never called on to make two ar
ticles for the set, and where tools are required
In sections, the different sections are generally
ordered to accurate measurements OF different
artificers and put together by the operators
themselves. By this means q kit can be made
up at half the. usual price, but the method has
several serious objections to it. 1t is slow and
cumbrous, and there is always the peril of be-
trayal by some of the outsiders employed; but
above all, tools made in this way are never as
good as those made by the regular thieves
| smith.
''It is safe to say that the finest smithy work
done anywhere is that carried on in the secret
workshops of the burglars tool makers The
knowledge of these lawless artifcers is vast and
thorough. They possess curious secrets of
toughening and refining metal, know every
scientific fact bearing on their trade and are
quick to conceive and skillful to execute i'm
prOvements in their tools. They will temper
and harden steel blade till it will cut the plate
of safe-dOOr as can-opener will cut into sar-
dine box, and make tearing-vise or drag that
will tear the door from safe as one will force
the lid from box. The metal and make of their
tools are out of the best. No honest workshop
ever turned out more beautiful specimens foran
exhibition than these right-hand men of the
cracksmen furnish as ordinary productions.
" And they charge for their work. too. The
demand being limited, the trouble great, and
the inconvenience of working in secret by no
means pleasant necessity, all these items go
/ down in the bill The result is that it takes
craftsman with capital to own his own tools,
and to lose them on an unsuccessful job is
serious matter. AS a rule the fence who backs
the burglar in his schemes buys the necessary
tools for him, and their cost is made good out
of the common pot before the swag is divided.
OF course the fence adds handsome commits
sion to the real cost of the implements. There
may be honor among thieves, but there is none
about the scoundrels who aid, abet, and grow
rich Of their spoliatiOns. Sometimes gang
will make pool to pay for their tools. Ere
quently, when half dozen men make up
party, they will own nearly enough tools be-
far the greatest portion of burglars implements
in use are hired for the purpose
There are several men here who own
splendid collections of tools for all kinds of bur
glary. from simple house-breaking to bank
vault opening. Everything required is forth
coming from them, or often in Consideration of
a share of the plumber, the craftsman is SUP
piled with an outfit. If any tools are lost the
loser pays for them; but if the game is spoiled
and the whole kit sacrificed, the lessor has to
stand the loss. 1t is not really great in proper
ton to the gains Of the business for the owner
is generally a tOOl-maker himself. and his labor
and the first cost of material constitute the ex-
tent of his sacrifice.
Not all of the tool-renters are tool-makers.
though. There is a bar room On the east side
whose proprietor makes business of supply
ing his best customers with the means of carry
ing on their trades, and female fence. who has
been frequently written Of but has generally
kept out Of serious trouble owns couple of
chests full of the best and most improved forms
ofinstruments. Several old cracksmen are now
extensively engaged in tOOl-renting trade.
Some OF these make their own tools. BY the
bye it may Interest you to know that about 50
per cent of the burglars Of note in this country
are practical smiths, and can forge Jimmy as
we'll as use one.
"Tool-makers for burglars have their special
ties. There are a couple of men here famous
iOI IHt steer WeuSeS anu CnISeiS tney make. An
other has great reputation for fashoning pom
derous hammers Of lead and copper, which do
all the work of steel sledges and make mach
less noise. Anew years ago an ingenious tool
maker experimental in hardening steel. He
ended by making drill that will bore the hard
est steel ever turned out of foundry, an in
strument more useful to the burglar and more
dangerous to the public than any other in his
kit. A tOol-maker's wife once asked him to
sharpen her can-opener for her While doing so
the idea suggested itself to him to apply the
principle upon which that little instrument was
constructed to safe-opener. He made tool
out of a powerful bar, with sharp steel Jaw at
tached to it, pretty much as the can-opener is
built, which will cut the front of a SAFE out like
tin once it gets hold.
Il have seen skilled mechanics go into
ecstacies over some Of the burglars tools now
In use. There is no more simple vet terrible in
vention than the great safe-drag. 1t originated
in England, but has been extensively improved
on here. By judicously operating it the burglar
can tear an ordinary safe literally to pieces. The
greatest improvement American ingenuity has
made in the drag is in the matter of weight
The first drags weighed from three hundred to
five hundred pounds 1t was almost as serious
job to lug one about as it was to commit a
burglary. Now the weight is reduced to less
than one hundred and fifty pounds, and twice
the effect secured at that. Indeed, this i'm
provement is observable in all sorts of burglars
TOOLS, and an entire kit can now be carried by
OF tools which twenty years ago required a
wagon to move them. In 1850 there W ere very
few cases in which the inferior safes of the day
were drilled into. Now there is not a safe
made, for all the improvement in materials,
which the craftsman cannot make hole in
with his cutters and drills. There is one instru-
ment, the invention, it Is said of the burglar
Howard, whose body was found up in West
en- ester county few years back, having been
placed there by the pals who had murdered him,
which is known as the double ratchet drill.
With this tool it is possible to bore hole
through solid block of steel without making
much more noise than you would in gimleting
a hole in plank"
Prophet More Popular Than Vennor.
From the Louisville Post.
The goose-bone has long been an honored
weather prophet. In some of the back counties
OF Kentucky the farmers make all their arrange
ments in accordance with the predictions of the
goose-bOne. In some localities the goose-Done
Is laid aside. labeled with the year. and it is said
that one old farmer in Breathitt county has the
bones extending back for more than forty years.
To read correctly the winter of any year take
the breast bone of goose Matched during the