Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 April 1892 — How Hotels Are Robbed. [ARTICLE]

How Hotels Are Robbed.

The large hotels in all the cities of this country earn’ upon their annual expense account from one thousand to fifteen hundred dollars chargeable to paper, envelopes, matches and toothpicks supplied to guests and strangers. The strangers use more of them than the guests. A square box, in which are kept a dozen necessary things—such as cards, matches, envelopes and toothpicks—stands on the counters of most hotels. This box has to be constantly replenished. The proprietor of a large New York hotel furnishes some interesting information regarding the way in which his hotel is systematically robbed by guests and strangers. Five hundred envelopesand l,«00 sheets of paper are required daily. Strangers appear at the desk, and with the utmost nonchalance ask for writing materials, which are furnished if the person be respectable in appearance. It is a common thing to see strangers enter a hotel writing-room and fill, their fountain-pens from the ink-bottles. Blotting-paper given away costs $lO a month. Every visitor to the hotel believes himself entitled to toothpicks and matches. He takes a handful of the former and tills hfs pocketr matchbox at the counter with the latter. It costs sls a month to supply these trifling articles. Pen and penholders and ink-bottles disappear at the rate of a gozen a day. But, alas! these are not the only losses to which hotel men are compelled to submit. The attendants in the wash-room will tell you that strangers enter and slip cakes of soap into their pockets. The small handtowels that are supplied to guests are carried oil at the rate of hundreds every year. There is a difference in the class of men who merely take what is supposed to be free and those who filch what is known to be the property of the hotel. The latter men are thieves! Tidies are carried away from the chairs, and sheets and pillow-cases from the beds. The hotels on the European plan suffer most from pilferers and dishonest patrons.—Once-a-Week.