Notwithstanding all that had been said upon the efficacy of the guillotine, we much question its being a more merciful mode of death than Mr. Marwood’s “long drop,” as it is termed, as in many cases death has taken place instantaneously, and as a sequel to this chapter we subjoin a correct account of the leading phrenological characteristics of the present public executioner.
Mr. Max Greger, our local phrenologist, whose description of the “casts” of the convicts Wardlaw and Docherty was contributed at the time of the executions, has just added the following analysis of the phrenological characteristics of the “dread finisher of the law”:—
General size of head—very large.
Temperament—fibrous-nervous.
Posterior lobe of the brain—small.
Anterior lobe of the brain—rather large.
Portion of the brain above Cautiousness—moderate.
Portion of the brain above Causality—moderate.
Circumference at the base—23¾ inches.
He is only 5 ft. 5 in. in height; as to age, he will be on the shady side of fifty; of remarkable muscular power, which is lost sight of in the face, the narrowness of which, compared with the enormous width of head, is strikingly peculiar—the disproportionate size of the latter giving a drooping posture to the body, and seemingly indicating that Nature had not intended this personage to hold up his head in society.
Though fully developed in the region of the reflective powers, those faculties which judge of the relative size, shape, and design of things, and which constitute the understanding proper, are conspicuous by their absence—accounted for in him by want of education and sedentary nature of previous calling (shoemaker). There is also a decided want of balancing power, which, taken in conjunction with his possession of large imaginative powers, and stimulated by his active temperament, constitute him an enthusiast, and consequently he is naturally prone to an erratic course of life, and to be in some respects impracticable and visionary.
His large acquisitiveness denotes an inordinate desire to acquire wealth, while his enormous caution will assist in holding fast the same. His large reflective faculties will confer considerable penetration and perception of character and events. His sense of the ludicrous, with humour and mimicry, is large.
He, however, must be considered a somewhat grim joker, and he is not at all likely to desire to be made the subject of his own fun. He is ambitious of being thought knowing and deep. He has an inordinate amount of vanity and self-conceit—must be foremost in his business: “Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven.”
Being highly sensitive to praise or the admiration of his fellow-men (which, however, he seldom gets), he is likely to consider the execution of Wainwright—a criminal of the first degree—as bringing both himself and his office still more prominently before the public; but this weakness, which is manifested in the manner in which he gloats over the modus operandi of his profession, may in time bring his office more and more into contempt, and thus defeat the very object he is anxious to attain.
From the development we find he is not wanting in energy, with considerable shrewdness and tact, and his mechanical and constructive talents would have enabled him to succeed in life either as a manufacturer, a machinist, or an agriculturist.
MARWOOD’S CARD.