1888.] 



on Personal Identification and Description. 



361 



tliink tliat this apparatus, which is contrived for other purposes, might, 

 after obvious modifications, supj^ly it. 

 The aj)j)aratus consists, in prin- 

 ciple, of a large number of strips of 

 card or metal c 1, c 2 (Fig. 6), say 8 

 or 9 inches long, and having a 

 common axis A passing through all 

 their smaller ends. A tilting-frame 

 T, which turns on the same axis, 

 has a front cross-bar F (whose section 

 is seen in Fig. 5), on which the tips 

 of the larger ends of all the cards 

 rest whenever the machine is left 

 alone. In this condition a counter- 

 poise at the other end of T suffices 

 to overcome the weight of all the 

 cards, and this heavier end of T 

 lies on the base-board S. When the 

 heavy end of T is lifted, as shown 

 in Fig. 5, its front-bar F is of course 

 depressed, and the cards being indi- 

 vidually acted on by their own 

 weights, are free to descend with the 

 cross-bar unless they are otherwise 

 prevented. The lower edge of each 

 card is variously notched to indicate 

 the measures of the person it repre- 

 sents. Only four notches are shown 

 in the figure, but six could be em- 

 ployed in a card of 8 or 9 inches 

 long, allowing compartments of 1 

 inch in length to each of six dif- 

 ferent measures. The j)osition of 

 the notch in the compartment 

 allotted to it, indicates the corre- 

 sponding measure according to a 

 suitable scale. When the notch is 

 in the middle of a compartment, it 

 means that the measure is of medi- 

 ocre amount ; when at one end of it, 

 the measure is of some specified 

 large value or of any other value 

 above that ; when at the other end 

 the measure is of some specified small 

 value or of any other value below it. Intermediate positions represent 

 intermediate values according to the scale. Each of the cards cor- 

 responds to one of the sets of measures in the standard collection. 

 The set of measures of the given person are indicated by the positions 



