The "thief Account."

"Steal! ' 6aid the old man, in accenfa of intense scorn. "Stcal! Why, ju would be astonished to fiud how lare proportion of the traveling public ure infernal thieves. They steal the bed. elothee, pillows, boot-jacks, soap, soap. dishes - everything, in fact, whieh t]1(.T can carry off. Everyb-jdy stcals noap. We expect that, and don't kick. Yon'd be surprised to hear that (a noted Indiana politician) makes a practie of putting the soap into his valise tvory time he pays his bill. He doesu't seini to use muoh of it himself, but I tlriafc he takes it home to his children. 'fhe first thing to be done wben a fellow comes to the office to pay his bill is to send the porter up to his room to see if . anything is missing. When a fellow comes down with his valise iu his haai we are unusually suspicious. The onlj wuy to get even with the thieves is to keep a ' tb ief account.' Whenever any. thing is misscd I charge it up at n fsjj value, and the next time I catch a tliief in the act I make him pay the entire amouut or go to jail. One day a aicclooking fellow came down with a valise in his hand and inquired the amonntof his bill. The minute I saw him I kntn he had stolen something, so I rnug the bell and gave the porter the wink, I pottered about the books while the port'r was gone, and I could see lie was getting uneasy. He had a notion to bolt, but just then the porter canie doivi, and I saw by his eye that something ms missing. I jumped over the counter and grabbed the rasoal by the throat. ' Opea that valise, you d - d thief,' says I. He got very white about the gills, and bcgai to beg. WThen the vaiise was opened, Bure cuougli tlieie was a new bed-spread for which I had paid S5. 'Bill,' saj-sl, ' bring me the thief account. ' I footel it up, and it amounted to just $$5fi. ' ïo-, pay that,' says I, 'or goto jail.' He tliouglit it was d - d had to have to pay for other men's stealings, but on the whole concluded thatit was cheaperlhsii to go to the penitentiary. Compoundiug a felony? Well, yes; it did have that complexion. But maybe it nipped i thief in the bud. The girls are generally honest, though once in a while w catch one of them. One time therewis au infernal tree-peddler stopped witlins. anó he had a black satin vest stolen. I paid him $5 for it. He dcscribed it verr accurately. There was a yellow spot on the collar, where he had dropped soae acid on it, and his name in fnll was writ ten on the leather with which it vat bound at the bottom. I suspected the girl Mary. We watched her for a week or two, and concluded we were misteken, when one day a fellow came in with i black satin vcet, and there was a round yellow spot on the collar. It was Marvs 'sweetheart. I oollared him, jerked np his vest and found the name of the treepeddler on the leather. He owned np that Mary had stolen the vest nnd given it to him. At that time the thief aeconnt was only $7, and so he g jt off cheap."