SOCIETY OP THE UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN. 

 TABLE VI. 



The couplets are closely alike in every instance, the resemblance 

 being even closer than that found in Gallon's statistics. The complete 

 agreement of the results shows that the relationship of any one particu- 

 lar digit to any other particular digit is the same whether the digits in 

 question are of the same or opposite hands. 



These tables, though of great value and interest from a statistical 

 point of view, are of little practical importance. The value of finger- 

 prints to-day depends not so much on statistics as upon their use for 

 purposes of identification. The first of our countrymen to recognise 

 this use was Sir William Herschel, who, while in India forty years 

 ago, frequently took the finger-prints of natives for this purpose. He 

 used them to identify persons who had executed bonds, and so cases 

 of fraud were obviated. They were likewise used somewhat later for 

 the identification of Government pensioners in India. Among these 

 personation was not difficult, for both in appearance and in name 

 they were often exactly alike. The taking of finger-prints, however, 

 was found sufficient to settle any doubt as to identity. The system 

 attracted no great attention at the time, and it was not until Galton 

 took up the subject and elaborated it that public interest was aroused. 



For purposes of personal and individual identification the primary 

 Arch, Loop, Whorl classification was found to be insufficient, as there 

 were so many varieties of patterns, especially among loops and whorls. 



Galton introduced a system of suffixing, which he called " second- 

 ary classification ". Here an index was added to the A. or L. or W., 



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