Page:The London Guide and Stranger's Safeguard.djvu/124

108 coats. The prosecution of one of them, a Mulatto boy of twenty, for an offence of this precise nature, in Air Street, Piccadilly, put an end to the depredations of that gang; and the magistrate at Marlborough Street in thanking our informant for having secured the offender, assured the bystanders, that no affected gloss of a sportive sort, should guarantee to this nursery for thieves, impunity for their early offences. They begin with small wares, imd in time deal at wholesale.

Those who all day upon the look-out, make a dead stand-still whenever people are getting out of hackney, or stage coaches, to see what may turn up to their profit. If a box, or other package, is left a little astray, while the passenger is overjoyed at the meeting of his or her friend, advantage is taken of the circumstance, and it becomes fair game. It may so happen, if it be a hackney coach, that the driver and the thief may be acquainted; and then the former places some of the luggage conveniently for carrying off, as thus: standing rather wide, he puts the article to be boned between his legs, and then reaching into the coach for more, he steps forward a little, so that his coat conceals from the view his fare both that part of the luggage and the thief; the latter stooping down behind the hind-wheel