Page:Waylaid by Wireless - Balmer - 1909.djvu/43

Rh that this series of scandals which has been visited upon our sober cathedral cities is in no way native to them. These robberies cannot now, as was first feared, be attributed to a sudden and general outbreak of theft in our church cities. They have shown themselves too clearly, in their similarity and slow progression, as the work of one man—and that man not even an Englishman.

"The thief, who is moving about the circle of our cathedral cities with our American visitors, shows too intimate knowledge of the ways and manners of his victims in general, and makes too precise selections of those from whom he may make his invariably easy and profitable hauls, to be other than an American himself, born, bred, and travelled as such.

"As he clearly must mingle freely with his victims at their favorite stopping places and must, indeed, often be registered at the same hotels with them, it should be no great feat for our police to take him almost at once— 25