A HUMAN MAGPIE.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XLII, Issue XLII, 22 April 1907, Page 1

A HUMAN MAGPIE.

It is evident that soma thirty years ago Messrs Jlappin and Webb the well-known London firm, harbored an employee with the instincts of a magpie, and with but little of tho common-senso required of even the most ordinary human thief. ,Thd firm is at present ongagod in demolishing:, tho premises it now occupies, starting; from the comer of Winsley-street down Oxford-street, in order to provide for its customers a niag-nificent marble: palaco in wTiich to mako their purchases. In the process of pulling the thind story Ho pibces the workmen wwo astonished under the double flooring; of a-Wge room which had been usod as a workshop for- the manufacture of speciall classes of silver and plated' goods, an immense number of packets of varying size, wrapped more or less oarefunly in paper.. When opened, tho bundles, scores in number, wore found to contain articles of silver and platei .of tho most varied description — coffee andi teapots, Candlesticks, wine holders, claret jugs, spirit lamps, centre idjshes, bitscuit boxes, and so on through a bewildering catalogue of -different iteina. '''And all from the best goods of that time, too," said Mr Walker Thorpq Haddock, tho managing director, who showodi tjhe Daily Telegraph representative over the scene of Vhn. fiatl, Phe mo-sti singular part of the affair ia that all the recovered goods date back for from twenty-five to thirty years, and must have beon gradually accumulated by -thiei; during a considerable period', and at the cost of infinite toil. It would* seem plain that in a firm lik-a that of Messrs Mappin and Webb tho stolen artticlca could only have been annexed piecemeal, and at different and* carefully, calculated times, or they would h a ve been mis sed, an alarm raised, and enquiry set on foot-. The trouble taken to hide the goods may thus be gauged. They were all found stowed under. a part of the flooring near the doon but away from the run of gas and other pipes, repairs wliich might .ab any time havo necessitated the planking boing pulled up; while there is some ev-idenoe to show that* boards some distance a*way. had occasionally bcen|J removed and replaced. The theory, therefore, is that wj-joever concloaled the goods got between the floor-joists of the workroom and the ceiling of tho room beneath, a space of about two feet, and cra-wling along, push-, ed his booty to the plaoe where it was *fou*ttd. As Mr Thorp Haddock pointed out the articles were sufficient in number and value (between £500 and £600) to stock a small shop. But then cornea the question, to the enqiuiring mind, why should a thief, who evidently had many opportunities of petty theft, store tha result of his nefarious practices in Ibfulk in* a placo whence their conveyance outside the premises must be most dangerous to his chance of success. '■'No," said Mr Thorpe Haddock, in reply to a question, "we heve no evidence as to who took theso things, and in all probability whoevier committed such an incomprehensible theft as dead.