Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-09-09
EARS AND NOSES CLEWS
PARTISAN POLICE NOW MEASURE
FEATURES OF CRIMINALS.
Means of Accurately Describing Men
Classification of Features-Spoken
and Written Portraits.
From the New York Tribune.

From the New YORK Tribune.
lie portrait parle ct ecrit." the descrip-
five portrait, is the latest trap with which
the police of Paris have beset the ways of
evldoers. The rascals of Paris seem to
Sharpen the wits of their hunters more
than the rascals of other parts Of the globe
lstimulate the constabulary of other mu-
inequalities, for the most efficient systems
nof registering the personal appearance of
criminals have originated in the French
capital. Every one knows of the Bertillon
plan of infinitely measuring everything
mea surable about the human features, and
recording the measurements against the
time when the same person shall have to
submit again to the same application Of the
tape and be so identified.
LIE portrait parle'' is novel only in Its
mlnutenesS and accuracy. Who has not
tried to make the personal appearance of
another known to a person who has never
seen him? Short, stout, brown hair, be-
coming gray, blue eyes, small mustache
and'-the rest of the description which is
usually given in the newspapers of missing
men fits equally well any one of several
thousand of the worlds population.
The Spoken Picture.
The portrait parle'' lies between this
futile generality and the formidable Ber-
itillon. 1t is an attempt to record accurately
THE minutiae of the unchanging features IN
terms that speak more quickly to the eye
than so many centimeters. So many chang
ing features are recorded by the photo
graph that lapse OF decade makes II
valueless. But the length, outline, angle,
breadth Of the nose. the size. shape. sin
uosties Of the ear. remain the same from
tfcribes these. Briefly and accurately as
words may-facilitated in this regard by o
slang of its own-it registers the breadth
of the rim of the ear and the shape ana
kct1 0Pt Ga 1nha In, GaY w a.
| tail of the nose and eyes Is described Only
an extensive surgical remodeling could put
q man beyond Identification with the 'por-
trait parle." He may not dye his hair and
grow beard, and so become a new man.
For the nose. for example, the police ex-
anime separately the shape and the size. In
the dos" or bridge, and the base" the
line from the tip of the nose to the point
where 1t joins the upper lip. Few persons
describing face would think Of that line,
and yet 1t affects the form of the nose as
much as does the shape of the bridge. The
bridge may be either concave 0urned up),
convex (aouilne), retilique (straight. or
busque Roman).- The direction Of the base
line may be relevee (rising), horizontal or
abaissee falling). In the slang of the po-
lice. concave is abbreviated to cave and
convex to ''vex." So noses are described as
combining these two lines. as, for instance,
''cave-relevee," ''snubrising" "retilque-
horizontal" straight horizontal" 'vex-
abaissee." "aquiline-falling," etc. In addi-
ton to these facts. the length and breadth
and the prominence of the features are re-
corded.
Types Of Ears.
The ear is, of course more complicated
than the nose and offers greater oppor-
tunities for the portrait parle." In fact,
the French scientists assert that there are
100000 different types Of ears, 50 that
there are enough to go around among
large part of the human race without much
chance of dupltca ton. The ear. moreover,
IS of the features that never change In
shape from youth to old age.
Those who are skilled in 1t, as the French
police, can make in a few moments sim
gularly accurate notes of the features of a
person before them. Armed with this de-
scription they have no difficulty in Identify
Ing the same person whenever seen again.
Error is impossible, so 1t is said, though the
errors of the police partake somewhat of
the nature of the errors of physicians. At
any rate. 1t is said that innumerable ex-
perienceS have shown that with the "por-
trait parle' it is impossible to arrest an in
nocent person because of supposed resem-
blance to a guilty one.
The security of the righteous cannot bet
ter be shown than by this little fable Of the
prefecture Among 100000 portraits and
anthropometric descriptions preserved In
the bureau of identification only two men
were found to resemble each other closely.
animation 1T was discovered that there
We're slight differences between them, prov
ing that 1t was not one and the same tndi-
Sidual arrested and measured twice.
The system has been in use for a decade
among a number of the Paris agents, and
has been adopted into more general use in
Austria. Russia. Denmark and Belgium.