The Corvallis gazette. [volume] (Corvallis, Or.) 1862-1899, 1890-08-22
THE WAYS OF PIcKPocKETs.
A Veteran Boston Detective Tells How
They Ply Their Trade.

1t was Police Inspector Knox who
said it. and he knows. Nobody in town
would dispute his right to be called the
best man in town in this line of detect
i've service. He uses almost his entire
time in watching for pickpockets, and
what he says about them is peculiarly
interesting.
Said the Inspector, in explanation OF
the somewhat surprising statement
quoted above. 1.-The female professional
pickpockets always seek victims among
their own sex, as the women of to-day
are given to carrying their pocket
books and watches in exposed places.
Then, too, the thieves are less apt to be
suspected because of their sex, and,
most important of all. for the reason
that in the wide range of style of
womeu's wraps nowadays they find
plenty of opportunity to hide their
hands while at work. A shawl or wrap
of any sort, which seems to be care
lessly carried on the left arm, hides
the right hand while it feels for the
location of pocket and then makes its
way to the pocket opening, where the
top of the lining is seized by the fingers.
1t is then but moments work to draw
the lining up until the pocket is practi-
cally turned inside out and the contents
drop into the pickpocket's hand. The
fingers which do this work are never
inserted deep into the pocket. They
just catch the lining of the upper edge.
The trick is done in a crowd where
everybody's attention is riveted on a
special object where a touch of a
strangers hand or even rough jostling
itself is not Needed"
Generally pickpocket has confed-
crate. Then if, as sometimes happens
the loss of pocketbook is Immediately
discovered, the real thief, having
passed the purse to the confederate,
can be as sympathetic as anybody, and,
if suspicion makes it absolutely
necessary. can submit to an examina-
ton with the same confidence in the
result that might be felt by the most
innocent person present. 1t is the
wrap, however, that gives the female
pickpockets the great advantage over
the light-fngered thieves of the other
sex, and the latter try to overcome this
by usiug an overcoat, if the weather is
not SO cold that an Overcoat carried on
the arm will attract attention, or q
linen duSter in summer. Sometimes
the men make newspaper answer the
purpose. Ii the male pickpockets are
not the more successful they are at
least the more adroit and audacious.
They have to be so, for they don't con-
fine themselves to women's pockets.
They seldom try to take money from
mems pockets, as close-fitting clothes
make the risk of detection too great;
but they find it an easy matter to steal,
or, as it is termed, ''ring" watches
from men. This is done while the VIC
tim, with unbuttoned coat and expand
ed watch chain, stands in a street
crowd. The thief slyly gets the watch
from the pocket with one hand, while
with the other he graSps the chain
at the lower end. A short. quick jerk
with both hands in opposite directions,
and the ring which is the connecting
link between the chain and the watch
becomes separated from the watch
stem. The watch is then in the hands
of the thief, while the chain and ring
are dangling down the front OF the vic
TINS wa stcoat.
A person has but to try this trick
with his own watch to see how easily it
may be done. Pickpockets do these
things in crowds, but they cannot al
ways find u crowd, and sometimes have
to resort to making one themselves.
They do this generally on railroad
trains, where the general hustle and
hustle give them opportunity to get a
well-dressed man in their clutches. AS
the victim is about to enter the car he
is brought face to face with u man who
is in Il hurry to get out. The two
squeeze together in doorway, and
two other men, both in u hurry, as
cend the platform and also try to get
into the same Car. Three of the men
are pickpochets, and the stranger is
Water Monopoly in the Far West.
! As the quick-witted Westerner stands
by the side of one of the great rivers
and looks over thousands of acres of
desert land along its banks he sees
fortune in the situation. Only get cap
-ltal enough together, organize great
company. dig an immense canal which
will appropriate" all the water in the
river, and you command the whole
valley. 1t is the position of the West
ern railroads repeated. Instead of
waiting for settlers to come and dig
little bitches as they need them, an i'm
mense capital digs one huge canal,
watering thousands of farms, and then
draws settlers by advertisement and
boom. So all over the West, through
out Colorado, in Central and Southern
California, in Montana and Idaho, on
the Salt and Gila Rivers in Southern
Arizona, there are great companies
with capital running into the millions
putting this idea into effect.
The canals they dig are twenty,
thirty, or even fifty miles long. The
largest are 100 feet wide and ten feet
deep, rivers in themselves. They fol-
low the contour of the country, run
ming, running back farther and farther
from the river as the latter falls away.
The main canal gives off literal
branches at frequent intervals, and by
an ingenious system of gates, crossings
and bitches sends water to every foot
OF arabic ground between it and the
river. The land belongs to the Gov
ernment, and is taken up by individual
settlers at merely nominal prices under
the Dessert Land act" But the water
belongs to the land company, and it is
this water that the settler pays for
Scri6ner.