August i6, 1894] 



NATURE 



391 



few years, and among others one from the Council of this Associa- 

 tion, which originated in a resolution of this Section, adopted 

 by the General Committee at the meeting at Edinburgh in 1892, 

 to this effect : 



"That the Council be requested to draw the attention of 

 Her Majesty's Government to the Anthropometric Method for 

 the measurement of criminals, which is successfully in operation 

 in France, Austria, and other continental countries, and which 

 has been found effective in the identification of habitual crim- 

 inals, and consequently the prevention and repression of crime." 



In consequence of these representations a Committee was 

 appointed, on October 21, 1893, by Mr. Asquith, consisting 

 of Mr. C. E. Troup, of the Home Office ; Major Arthur 

 Griffiths, Inspector of Prisons ; and Mr. Melville Leslie Mac- 

 naghten. Chief Constable in the Metropolitan Police Force ; 

 with Mr. H. B. Simpson, of the Home Office, as Secretary, 

 "to inquire [a) into the method of registering and identifying 

 habitual criminals now in use in England ; (/') into the ' An- 

 thropometric ' system of classified registration and identification 

 in use in France and other countries ; (r) into the suggested 

 system of identification by means of a record of finger marks : 

 to report whether the anthropometric system or the finger- 

 mark system can with advantage be adopted in England either 

 in substitution for or to supplement the existing methods ; and, 

 if so, what arrangements should be adopted for putting them 

 into practice, and what rules should be made under Section 8 

 of the Penal Servitude Act, 1891, for the photographing and 

 measuring of prisoners." 



The Report of this Committee, with minutes of evidence and 

 appendices, was issued as a Parliamentary Blue-book in March 

 last, and not only contains a lucid and concise description of 

 the methods of identification already in use in this country, 

 but also most striking testimony from impartial but well- 

 qualified persons to the value of a more scientific mode of 

 dealing with the subject. No pains seem to have been spared 

 to obtain, both by personal observation and by the examina- 

 tion of competent witnesses, a thorough knowledge of the 

 advantages of the Bertillon system as practised in France, and 

 the result has been the recommendation of that system, with 

 ciriain modifications, for adoption in this country, with the 

 addition of the remarkably simple, ingenious, and certain 

 method of personal identification first used in India by Sir 

 William Herschel, but fully elaborated in this country by 

 Mr. Francis Galton, that called the "finger-mark system," 

 about which I shall have a few more words to say presently. 



With the concluding words of the Committee's Report I 

 most fully concur: "We may confidently anticipate that, if 

 fairly tried, it will show very satisfactory results within a .''ew 

 years in the metropolis ; but the success of its application in 

 the country generally will depend on the voluntary co-opera- 

 tion of the independent county and borough police forces. 

 This, we feel sure, will not be withheld. When the principles 

 of the system are understood and iis usefulness appreciated we 

 believe it will not only save much time and labour to the police 

 in the performance of an important duty, but will give them 

 material assistance in tracing and detecting the antecedents of 

 the guilty, and will afford, so far as its scope extends, an 

 absolute safeguard to the innocent." 



It is very satisfactory to be able to add that in the House of 

 Commons on June 26, in answer to a question from Colonel 

 Howard Vincent, the Home Secretary announced that the 

 recommendations of the Committee have been adopted ; and 

 that, in order to facilitate research into the judicial antecedents 

 of international criminals, the registers of measurements would 

 be kept on the same plan as that adopted with such success in 

 France, and also in other continental countries. 



I have just mentioned the "finger-mark system " and of all 

 the various developments of Anthropology in recent times none 

 appears to be more interesting than the work done by Mr. 

 Galton upon this subject ; for though, as indicated above, he is 

 not quite the first who has looked into the question or shown 

 its practical application in personal identification, he has carried 

 his work upon it far beyond that of any of his predecessors, both 

 in its practical application and into regions of speculation un- 

 thought of by anyone else. Simple and insignificant as in 

 the eyes of all the world are the litile ridges and furrows 

 which mark the skin of the under-surface of our fingers, exist 

 ing in every man, woman, and child born into the world, they 

 have been practically unnoticed by everyone until Mr. Galton 

 has shown, by a detailed and persevering study of their pecu- 



NO. 1294, VOL. 50] 



liarities, that they are full of significance, and amply repay the 

 pains and time spent upon their study. It is not to be supposed 

 that all the knowledge that may be obtained from a minute 

 examination of thein is yet by any means exhausted, but they 

 have already given important data for the study of such subjects 

 as variation unaffected by natural or any other known form of 

 selection, and the difficult problems of heredity, in addition to 

 their being one of the most valuable means hitherto discovered 

 of fixing personal identity. 



As an example of the importance of some ready method to 

 prove identity, apart from its application to the detection, 

 punishment, and prevention of crime, to which I have already 

 referred, I may recall to your recollection that remarkable trial 

 which agitated the length and breadth of the land rather more 

 than twenty years ago ; a trial which occupied so many months 

 of the precious time of our most eminent judges and counsel, 

 and cost the country, as well as several innocent persons — I 

 am afraid to say how many — thousands of pounds, all upon 

 an issue which might have been settled in two minutes if 

 Roger Tichborne, before starting on his voyage, had but taken 

 the trouble to imprint his thumb upon a piece of blackened paper. 

 It is wonderful to me, on reading again the reports of the trial, 

 to see how comparatively little atlention was paid by counsel, 

 judge or jury, to ihe extremely different physical characteristics 

 of the two persons claimed to be identical, but which were so 

 strongly marked that they ought to have disposed of the claim, 

 without any hesitation, at the veiy opening of the case. It 

 was not until the 102nd day of the first trial that the attention 

 of the jury was pointedly called to the fact that it was known 

 that Sir Roger Tichborne had been tattooed on the left arm 

 with a cross, anchor, and a heart, and that the Claimant ex- 

 hibited no such maiks. When this was clearly brought out 

 and proved, the case broke down at once. The second trial 

 for perjury occupied the court iSS days, the Lord Chief Justice's 

 charge alone lasting eight days. The issues were, however, 

 more complex than in the first trial, as it was not only neces- 

 sary to prove that the Claimant was not Tichborne, but also to 

 show that he was someone else. I feel convinced that at the 

 present time the greater confidence that is reposed in the 

 methods of Anthropometry or close observance of physical 

 characters, and in the persistence of such characters through 

 life, would have greatly simplified the whole case ; and I would 

 strongly recommend all who have nothing about their lives 

 they think it expedient to conceal to place themselves under 

 the hands of Mr. Galton, or one of his now numerous disciples, 

 and get an accurate and unimpeachable register of all those 

 characteristics which will make loss of identity at any future 

 period a sheer impossibility. 



Partly with this object in view, the Association has, for 

 several years past, during each of its meetings, opened, under 

 the superintendence of Dr. Garson, an Anthropometric Labora- 

 tory, on the plan of the admirable institution of the same name 

 which has been carried on in the South Kensington Museum 

 since the beginning of the year 1SS8, under the direction and 

 at the sole cost of Mr. Francis Gallon, in which up to the pre- 

 sent time more than 7000 complete sets of measurements have 

 been made and recorded. The results obtained at the British 

 .\ssociation meetings have been published in the Annual Re- 

 ports of the Association, and though on a smaller scale than 

 Mr. Galton's, the operations of the laboratory have been most 

 useful in diffusing a knowledge of the value of anthropometric 

 work, and of the methods by which it is carried on. 



For many years an "Anthropometric" Committee of the 

 Association, in which the late Dr. W. Farr, Mr. Y. Galton, Mr. 

 C. Roberts, Dr. Bcddoe, Sir Rawson Rawson, and others, 

 took an active part, was engaged in collecting statistical in- 

 formation relating to the physical characters, including stature, 

 weight, chest-ginh, colour of eyes and hair, strength of arms, 

 &c., of the inhabitants of the British Isles ; and their reports, 

 illustrated by maps and diagrams, were published in the annual 

 volume issued by the Association. This Committee terminated 

 its labours in 1883, although, as was fully acknowledged in the 

 concluding report, the subject was by no means completely 

 exhausted. 



.\ great and important work which the .\ssociation has now 

 in hand, in some sense a continuation of that of the Anthropo- 

 metric Committee, though with a more extended scope of 

 operation, is the organisation of a complete ethnographical 

 survey of the United Kingdom based upon scientific principles. 

 In this work the Association has the cooperation of the Society 



