Dried pressed fruit cakes, are heavy so the Gemora says one may assume that it is not Yiush shelo midaas for the owner must already know, questions;
1. Maybe the owner had 10 of them and didn't feel one drop?
2. Maybe the owner was not the person carrying the items (fruit, money all the other cases of the mishna) it could have even been his child?
THank you
A Ehrentreu, Modiin, Israel
Sholom Rav,
Why do you confine your questions to a cake of figs. Surely it applies just as much to money and to anything else that one finds - How do we know ... ? be'Kitzur, on what grounds can one keep anything at all on account of Yi'ush? Why is it not always Yi'ush she'Lo mi'Da'as for the same two reasons that you cited? Li'Che'orah one is forced to say that we go after the majority of cases, where it is the owner who lost the article and that he would have noticed that he did.
In fact, it may well be that in the event that the finder saw the person drop it and knows that he is not the owner and noticed that he was carrying ten of them, that he would not be permitted to keep them for himself.
Be'Virchas Kol Tuv,
Eliezer Chrysler