M^cSWEENY AND THE CHIMNEY-SWEEP, • 308 THE FAMILY BIBLE, • 320 CONSCIENCE MONEY, • 332 A WOLF IN SHEEP’S CLOTHING, • 343 TRACED AND TRACKED. A PEDESTRIAN’S PLOT. I have alluded to the fact that many criminals affect a particular line of business, and show a certain style in their work which often points unerringly to the doer when all other clues are wanting. A glance over any record of convictions will convey a good idea of how much reliance we are led to place upon this curious fact. One man’s list will show a string of pocket-picking cases, or attempts in that line, and it will be rare, indeed, to find in that record a case of robbery with violence, housebreaking, or any crime necessitating great daring or strength. Another shows nothing but deeds of brute strength or bull-dog ferocity, and to find in his record of _prev. con._ a case of delicate pocket-picking would make any one of experience open his eyes wide indeed. The style of the work is even a surer guide than the particular line, as the variety there is unlimited as it is marked. This is all very well; and often I have been complimented on my astuteness in thus making very simple and natural deductions leading to convictions. But the pleasure ceases to be unmixed when the criminal is as cunning as the detective, and works upon that knowledge. To show how a detective may be deceived in working on this—one of his surest modes of tracing a criminal—I give the present case. Dave Larkins was a Yorkshire thief, who had drifted northwards by some chance and landed in Edinburgh. Street robbery was his line, and, as he was a professional pedestrian, or racing man, he was not caught, I should say, once in twenty cases. The list of his previous convictions in Manchester, Liverpool, Preston, and other places showed with unvarying monotony the same crime and the same style of working. He would go up to some gentleman on the street and make an excuse for addressing him, snatch at his watch, and run for it. More often the victim was a lady with a reticule or purse in her hand, and then no preliminary speaking was indulged in. He made the snatch, and ran like the wind, and the whole was done so quickly that the astounded victim seldom retained the slightest recollection of his appearance. Yet Dave’s appearance was striking enough. He was a wiry man of medium height, with strongly-marked features, red hair, and a stumpy little turned up nose, the round point of which was always red as a cherry with bad whisky, except at those rare intervals when he was “in training” for some foot race which it was to his advantage to win.