Our rival, the rascal : a faithful portrayal of the conflict between the criminals of this age and the defenders of society, the police . by the police and themselves, becausealmost every safe breaker now carries a can of powder ordynamite cartridges to use, if necessary, and, with the im-provement of safes, ex-plosives have usuallybecome necessary ordesirable in order tobreak open a safe inthe few hours availa-ble. If, however, the safeto be opened is an old-fashioned one, or acheap, so-called fire-proof safe,—and toomany of these safesare still lingering orare even now sold inthis country,—t
Our rival, the rascal : a faithful portrayal of the conflict between the criminals of this age and the defenders of society, the police . by the police and themselves, becausealmost every safe breaker now carries a can of powder ordynamite cartridges to use, if necessary, and, with the im-provement of safes, ex-plosives have usuallybecome necessary ordesirable in order tobreak open a safe inthe few hours availa-ble. If, however, the safeto be opened is an old-fashioned one, or acheap, so-called fire-proof safe,—and toomany of these safesare still lingering orare even now sold inthis country,—the bur-glar of to-day with hismodern kit of toolswill smash the lock orbreak in or cutthrough the door orside as if it were paste-board. These cheapor old safes are merely a laughing stock to burglars. Theironly possible service is for the protection of papers from fire,for a common band-box would be cheaper and just about asstrong a safeguard, if assailed by a robber. A practical object lesson to this effect was given someyears ago in a New York court. A notorious burglar,one Patrick Cody, designed a little boring machine for. FILLING SAFE WITH GUNPOWDER. 58 OUR RIVAL, THE RASCAL. his own private use in opening fire-proof safes. Whenhe was captured by the poHce, his machine was taken also,and, in the course of his trial, a common safe was broughtinto the court room for the sake of an instructive illustra-tion. Cody obligingly consented to serve as the oper-ating lecturer and bored a hole through the door with hisunpatented drill in just forty-five seconds, without using adrop of oil. In actual practice he had entered a room, openeda safe, taken out its contents and got ofT clear in less thansix minutes, without disturbing a sleeper in the adjoiningchamber. Johnny Dobbs, another of the leading artists in safe-breaking, was even more expert and successful than Cody,and there are scores of others who can open an ordinarysafe much more handily than the ordinary servant girl wi
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, booksubjectcr, booksubjectpolice
