In another case, a poor German had stolen a volume of the classics which he pawned for a small sum to get bread for himself, being long out of work, and in a condition bordering closely upon starvation. He was released, the book reclaimed, and the offender turned over to the agencies of public charity.
A librarian of New York gave it as his experience that some ministers are not to be trusted any more than other people. Some of them like to write their opinions on the margins of the books. He found one of the library books written on in thirty pages, recognized the hand-writing, and wrote to the reverend gentleman asking an interview. He came, admitted the fact, and said that his notes made the book more valuable. This ingenious excuse did not satisfy the librarian, who said, "others do not think so, sir; so if you will get us a new book, you may keep the more valuable one." He soon brought in a new copy, and the matter ended.
At the New York Mercantile Library, a young lady, amply able to buy all the books she could want, was discovered going out of the library with one book in her hand which she was entitled to, it being charged, and with five others hidden under her cloak, without permission.
Mr. Melvil Dewey has truly said that it is very hard to tell a library thief at sight. Well-dressed, gentlemanly, even sanctimonious looking men are among them, and the wife of a well-known college professor, detected in purloining books, begged so hard not to be exposed, that she was reluctantly pardoned, and even restored to library privileges.
A prominent lawyer of Brooklyn, of distinguished appearance and fine manners, did not steal books, but his specialty was magazines and newspapers, which he carried off frequently. Being caught at it one day, and accused by the librarian, he put on an air of dignity, declared he was insulted, and walked out. The librarian found the periodical he had taken thrown down in the entry, and he never after frequented that library.
It is curious and instructive to know the experience of some libraries regarding the theft or mutilation of books. Thus, in the public library of Woburn, Mass., a case of mutilation occurred by the cutting out of a picture from "Drake's Historic Fields and Mansions of Middlesex County." On discovery of the loss, a reward of $10 was offered for information leading to detection of the culprit. This was published in the town paper, and an article was printed calling attention to these library thefts and abuses, followed by citing the State law making such depredations a penal offense. Within a week the missing plate came back to the librarian through the mail—anonymously of course, the person who had abstracted it finding that it was rather an unsafe picture to keep or exhibit, and so choosing to make his best policy honesty, though rather tardy in coming to that wise conclusion.
This experience, and others here cited, may serve as a hint what course to pursue under similar circumstances, in the reclamation of library books.
In the Library of the London Institution, continuous thefts of valuable editions of the classics had occurred. Putting a detective in the library, a young man of suspicious demeanor was soon identified as the thief, and was followed and arrested in the very act of selling a library book. He proved to be a young man of good family, education and previous good character; but the library had suffered such losses from his depredations, that no mercy was shown, and he received and underwent the sentence to two months imprisonment.
It may be added as an instance of methods availed of in London to trace missing books, that the librarian, knowing from the vacancies on the shelves what books had been abstracted, printed a list of them, sent it to every second-hand book-dealer in London, at the same time supplying it to the police, who circulate daily a list of missing property among all the pawn-brokers' shops in the city, and recovered all the books within twenty-four hours.
The Mercantile Library of Philadelphia missed a number of valuable books from its shelves, and on a watch being set, a physician in the most respectable rank in society was detected as the purloiner, and more than fifty volumes recovered from him.