ow; even people who despise him are pitying
him; they think this is a hard ordeal for a young fellow who has lost his
benefactor by so cruel a stroke--and they are right." He resumed his
speech:
"For more than twenty years I have amused my compulsory leisure with
collecting these curious physical signatures in this town. At my house I
have hundreds upon hundreds of them. Each and every one is labeled with
name and date; not labeled the next day or even the next hour, but in the
very minute that the impression was taken. When I go upon the witness
stand I will repeat under oath the things which I am now saying. I have
the fingerprints of the court, the sheriff, and every member of the jury.
There is hardly a person in this room, white or black, whose natal
signature I cannot produce, and not one of them can so disguise himself
that I cannot pick him out from a multitude of his fellow creatures and
unerringly identify him by his hands. And if he and I should live to be a
hundred I could still do it. [The interest of the audience was steadily
deepening now.]
"I have studied some of these signatures so much that I know them as well
as the bank cashier knows the autograph of his oldest customer. While I
turn my back now, I beg that several persons will be so good as to pass
their fingers through their hair, and then press them upon one of the
panes of the window near the jury, and that among them the accused may
set THEIR finger marks. Also, I beg that these experimenters, or others,
will set their fingers upon another pane, and add again the marks of the
accused, but not placing them in the same order or relation to the other
signatures as before--for, by one chance in a million, a person might
happen upon the right marks by pure guesswork, ONCE, therefore I wish to
be tested twice."
He turned his back, and the two panes were quickly covered with
delicately lined oval spots, but visible only to such persons as could
get a dark background for them--the foliage of a tree, outside, for
instance. Then upon call, Wilson went to the window, made his
examination, and said:
"This is Count Luigi's right hand; this one, three signatures below, is
his left. Here is Count Angelo's right; down here is his left. Now for
the other pane: here and here are Count Luigi's, here and here are his
brother's." He faced about. "Am I right?"
A deafening explosion of applause was the answer. The bench said:
"This certainly approaches the miraculous!"
Wilson turned to the window