The Penguin Book of Gaslight Crime: Con Artists, Burglars, Rogues, and Scoundrels from the Time of Sherlock Holmes / Edited by Michael Sims

Collected here for the first time: the best crime fiction from the gaslight era. All the legendary thieves are present - A. J. Raffles, Colonel Clay, Simon Carne, Get-Rich-Quick Wallingford, and the Infallible Godahl - burgling London and Paris, conning New York and Ostend, laughing all the way to the bank. Also featured are stories by distinguished writers from outside the mystery and detective genres, including Sinclair Lewis, Arnold Bennett, and William Hope Hodgson.

"Thieves respect property. They merely wish the property to become their property that they may the more perfectly respect it."
-G. K. Chesterton