The orator drank off half a glass and continued:  “However, let us leave aside the philosophical, social, and economic aspects of the question.  I do not wish to fatigue your attention.  I must nevertheless point out that our profession very closely approaches the idea of that which is called art.  Into it enter all the elements which go to form art—­vocation, inspiration, fantasy, inventiveness, ambition, and a long and arduous apprenticeship to the science.  From it is absent virtue alone, concerning which the great Karamzin wrote with such stupendous and fiery fascination.  Gentlemen, nothing is further from my intention than to trifle with you and waste your precious time with idle paradoxes; but I cannot avoid expounding my idea briefly.  To an outsider’s ear it sounds absurdly wild and ridiculous to speak of the vocation of a thief.  However, I venture to assure you that this vocation is a reality.  There are men who possess a peculiarly strong visual memory, sharpness and accuracy of eye, presence of mind, dexterity of hand, and above all a subtle sense of touch, who are as it were born into God’s world for the sole and special purpose of becoming distinguished card-sharpers.  The pickpockets’ profession demands extraordinary nimbleness and agility, a terrific certainty of movement, not to mention a ready wit, a talent for observation and strained attention.  Some have a positive vocation for breaking open safes:  from their tenderest childhood they are attracted by the mysteries of every kind of complicated mechanism—­bicycles, sewing machines, clock-work toys and watches.  Finally, gentlemen, there are people with an hereditary animus against private property.  You may call this phenomenon degeneracy.  But I tell you that you cannot entice a true thief, and thief by vocation, into the prose of honest vegetation by any gingerbread reward, or by the offer of a secure position, or by the gift of money, or by a woman’s love:  because there is here a permanent beauty of risk, a fascinating abyss of danger, the delightful sinking of the heart, the impetuous pulsation of life, the ecstasy!  You are armed with the protection of the law, by locks, revolvers, telephones, police and soldiery; but we only by our own dexterity, cunning and fearlessness.  We are the foxes, and society—­is a chicken-run guarded by dogs.  Are you aware that the most artistic and gifted natures in our villages become horse-thieves and poachers?  What would you have?  Life is so meagre, so insipid, so intolerably dull to eager and high-spirited souls!

“I pass on to inspiration.  Gentlemen, doubtless you have had to read of thefts that were supernatural in design and execution.  In the headlines of the newspapers they are called ‘An Amazing Robbery,’ or ‘An Ingenious Swindle,’ or again ‘A Clever Ruse of the Gangsters.’  In such cases our bourgeois paterfamilias waves his hands and exclaims:  ’What a terrible thing!  If only their abilities were turned to good—­their