CHAPTER   XXXVI.

BANK SNEAK-THIEVES AND THEIR CHARACTERISTICS — PLOTS
AND SCHEMES FOR ROBBING MONEYED INSTITUTIONS — A
DARING LOT  OF ROGUES.

Characteristics of Bank Sneak-Thieves — Rogues of Education and Pleasing
Address—Nervy Criminals of Unlimited Cheek — How Bank Thieves
Work — Some of their Exploits — Carefully Laid Plots — Extraordinary
Attention to Details — A Laughable Story — A Wily Map-Peddler —
Escaping with Twenty Thousand Dollars — A New Clerk in a Bank —
Watching for Chances — A Decidedly Cool Thief—A Mysterious Loss
— A Good Impersonator—Watching a Venerable Coupon-Cutter — Story
of a Tin Box — Mysterious Loss of a Bundle of Bonds — How the Loss
was Discovered Three Months Afterwards—An Astonished Old Gentle¬
man— A Clerk in an Ink-Bedabbled Duster—How tlie Game is Worked
in Country Banks — Unsuspecting Cashiers — Adroit Rogues and Impu¬
dent Rascals — A Polite Thief.

FOR many years sneak-thieving from banks flourished to an
alarming extent in New York city, and under the old
detective system it seemed impossible to put a stop to this
form of robbery. In those days notorious thieves Y'ere per¬
mitted to loiter unmolested about the streets, and on more
than one occasion it was alleged that well-filled cash boxes
disappeared from bankers' safes in Wall street while detectives
were on watch outside. All this has changed. Well-knoY'n
thieves no longer haunt that famous locality, and since the
establishment of a sub-detective bureau there, a few years ago,
not a dollar has been stolen by professional criminals from any
of the moneyed institutions in this great financial center. The
inauguration also of a patrol service by experienced detectives
during business hours, and the connecting by telephone of
banking institutions with the detective bureau, have been the
means of putting a stop to the operations of bank sneak-thieves.
Stfll, in other cities where these precautions have not been or