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