"Shopkeepers of what class soever, particularly retailers, cannot be too much on their guard; they should never forget that in Paris there are thousands of male and female thieves _à la detourne_, I here only speak of robbers by profession; but there are also _amateurs_, who, beneath the cover of a well-established reputation, make small acquisitions slyly and unsuspectedly. They are very honest people they say, who with little scruple indulge their propensity for a rare book, a miniature, a cameo, a mosaic, a manuscript, a print, a medal, or a jewel that pleases them; they are called _Chipeurs_. If the _Chipeur_ be rich, no heed is paid to him, he is too much above such a larceny to impute it to him as a crime; if he be poor, he is denounced to the attorney-general, and sent to the galleys, because he robbed from necessity. It must be owned that we have strange ideas as to honesty and dishonesty." This is what we call _Shoplifting_. A milliner once told us that ribands and flowers not unfrequently attach themselves to the cuffs and sleeves of fair purchasers. _Careurs_ Belong to the same class of thieves, and are gipsies, Italians, or Jews. The female Careurs are very expert in robbing priests; and Vidocq apprehended a mother and daughter for more than sixty such offences. "The gipsies do not confine themselves to these means of appropriating to themselves the property of another: they frequently commit murder, and they have the less objection to commit a murder, because they have no feeling of any kind of remorse; and they have a peculiar kind of expiation whereby they purify themselves. For a year they wear a coarse woollen shirt, and abstain from '_work_' (robbing). This period elapsed, they believe themselves white as snow. In France, the majority of the persons of this caste call themselves Catholics, and have every external show of great devotion. They always carry about them rosaries and a crucifix; they say their prayers night and morning, and follow the service with much attention and precision. In Germany, they seldom exercise any other calling than that of horse doctor, or herbalist: some addict themselves to medicine, that is to say, profess to be in possession of secret means of effecting cures. A vast number of them travel in bodies, some tell fortunes, others mend glass, china, pots, and pans; woe to the inhabitants of the country overrun by these vagabonds. There will infallibly be a mortality amongst the cattle, for the gipsies are very clever in killing them, without leaving any traces which can be converted into a charge of malevolence against them. They kill the cows by piercing them to the heart with a long and very fine needle, so that the blood flowing inwardly, it may be supposed that the animal died of disease. They stifle poultry with brimstone; they know that then they will give them the dead birds; and whilst they imagine that they have a taste for carrion, they make good cheer, and eat delicious meat.