DIFFERENT TYPES OF EARS FROM THE CLASSIFICATION-BOOK.
We have the authority of our cleverest modern humorist for the statement that the burglar and the cut-throat like a little innocent amusement occasionally; what wonder, then, if the austere detective does also? His chiefs, therefore, thoughtfully turn these examinations into occasions of grave merry-making by giving one or other of the examinees a descriptive portrait of some high functionary, perhaps of the Prefect of Police himself, should he be present. The fledgeling is thus placed in a dilemma; he must either display his incompetence or do violence to all his notions of respect for the official hierarchy, and put a disrespectful hand on one of the few shoulders in the world that he has looked upon as sacred. The manner in which the luckless wight acquits himself of his invidious task forms the theme of many a conversation in the "highest detective circles" of the French capital for the next week or so.
M. Bertillon has recently compiled an album containing about fifteen hundred photographs of the most notorious French criminals, classified exclusively by the shape of their ears and noses and their height. The man whose portrait figures in this blackest of black books has, at any rate, the satisfaction of knowing that his physiognomy will not disappear from the world without leaving some memories behind it.
Other black books contain portraits of foreigners of different nationalities. The writer was allowed to peep into that relating to "English and American" malefactors who are at loggerheads with the Paris Prefecture of Police, and was patriotically pleased to find that their total number—five hundred—is only one-fifth that of the Belgians. A very large proportion, too, of these soi-disant English and American citizens, if their names are any criterion, might be Russians, Danes, Turks, or Prussians, but are certainly not Englishmen. Anglo-Saxondom may flatter herself that, in so far as France is concerned, she is a most exemplary race.
When the practice of portraits in words becomes generalized, as will no doubt very soon be the case, members of all those professions at which the laws of most countries persist in looking askance will have but a sorry time, if, indeed, they are able to subsist at all. Within the space of an hour or two telegraph and telephone will have carried a brief but unmistakable word-portrait of them to every corner of the civilized world if necessary. In large towns like London and Paris, twenty thousand pairs of trained eyes, covering the entire area of the city, can be set simultaneously on the search for the fugitive murderer or burglar, who will discover that the old methods of disguise are of but little use to him. A rumour that certain London banks contemplated having all their employés measured and photographed on M. Bertillon's system caused a considerable amount of murmuring recently, the measure being considered as somewhat derogatory by the clerks. By this extension of the method, however, their portraits can be taken without their knowledge, since neither camera nor measuring rule is necessary. Absconding cashiers will, in future, therefore have to be remarkably circumspect in their choice of foreign residence. Impostors like the claimant to the Tichborne estates, whose trial convulsed the Anglo-Saxon world over thirty years ago, will be given short shrift. It may be remarked, however, that one of the principal points brought forward at the trial to prove that the Claimant was not the man he pretended to be was precisely that the lobe of his ear was quite differently formed to the lobe of the real Roger Tichborne. This only proves once more the old adage that under the sun there is nothing new.
DETECTIVES RECEIVING A LESSON ON EARS.
From a Photo.
The writer would here express his thanks to M. Lepine, the Prefect of Police, and M. Bertillon for their extreme courtesy in acceding to his request to be allowed to attend the course of lessons, and also for permission to use the photographs now reproduced.