The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-05-28
THIEVES CORRESPONDENCE.

| To the habitual criminal it is often of vital importance that he should be able 1 to communicate swiftly and secretly
 with an accomplice, either to elaborate
 scheme of rescality or send a warn 1 ing of imminent danger from the po- 1 lice. Nobody knows better than he, 1 however, that by availing himself of the
 orthodox channels he runs the risk of discovery. Hence it is becoming a common practice for celever rogues
 never to communicate in a straightfor-
 ward way if they can avoid it. but, in- stead to set up and use peculiar post offices which are essentially their own. ! A typical case was that of man who was wanted" in connection with cer- tain notorious turf frauds When the warrant was issued he sought shelter in shabby lodgings in a back street not five miles from the Bank of England. He had friends who strongly objected to his capture, mainly because his ap- pearance in the dock would have led to unpleasant consequences to themselves. But they were all so well known to the police and detectives that it was i'm possible for them to send a message di- rectly to the fugitive, even though he had adopted an alias, much less to pay him visit. All of them, however, agreed to keep watch on his behalf, and to send him word immediately they had reason to fear his place of refuge was in danger of discovery and the time come for him to make a final bolt.
 One of the watching gang learned of
 the coming danger to the fugitive by methods he saw fit not to talk about, and carelesly sent the servant of his lodgings to dispatch a wire to another of the allies in Edinburgh, to the effect that his aunt was dead. The bereaved nephew mastered his grief so far as to in turn dispatch a wire, accompanied by
 telegraph money-order to a hosier in the City of London, desiring him to send half-a-dozen black ties to a given ad- dress without delay, The articles were duly taken to the gentleman in retire
 ment by an unsuspecting errand-boy,
 and the trick was done Every appar-
 ently insignificant detail was part of
 previously arranged code. The firm
 sending the ties their number and
 cCior-all conveyed a hint to the person
 most interested as to the safest mode of flight, the best port at which to attempt
 embarkation, and the very street in
 which he was to jostle against a sup
 posed stranger who was to surrep-
 titiously transfer to him a store of
 money and his passage counterfoils
 which had been taken under a false
 name.
 Nothing is too elaborate or ingenious
 ly audacious to men playing a game the
 loss of which means penal servitude to
 them. In a Midland town lived in lord
 ly style and the odor of outer respecta-
 bility a person who was strongly sus-
 pected of being in league with gang
 of "snlashers"-that is, coiners-who also disposed of sham foreign notes and
 did quite a brisk, business in worthless securities. There was no doubt that,
 while they were all scattered about the country, their opera tions were being di-
 rected by a master mind, whom the authorities had no moral doubt was identical with the aforementioned gen. tleman, who may be called Smith. Smith was never to be seen in dubious company, and the postman never brought him a letter which he was not
 NllllllS tO dllcDlS SllON lt allNDOUN. E or months there came to Smiths house ev- cry morning a young milkuan, with a placid smile and a shiny brow of inno- cence. He had set himself up, he ex- plained to his customers generally with a legacy left to him by his uncle: and every morning he handed a quart can of milk in at Smiths area -door-and every morning Smiths illegal correspondence was lying at the bottom of that quart can in q metal box, and the sout cook who took it in Appearances are shock igly deceitfuD was one of the most cool and daring of all Smiths tools. while the milkman was another The smash CTS had set him up in business simply and solely that they might have an in- nocent address to which to send the missives it was his duty to deliver.- Casselrs Saturday Journal.