Book of Remarkable Criminals, A
{keller – the upper outside corner of page 15 and 16 has been torn from the hardcopy.
The spots are marked with ?? and a best guess at missing words is in brackets. footnotes
have been moved from end of page to end of paragraph positions, sequentially numbered
There are a number of lines ending with hyphens and a hard return to an empty
line-might have missed some.
A BOOK OF REMARKABLE CRIMINALS
«For violence and hurt tangle every man in their toils, and for the most part fall on the
head of him from whom they had their rise; nor is it easy for one who by his act breaks the
common pact of peace to lead a calm and quiet life.»
Lucretius on the Nature of Things.
A BOOK OF REMARKABLE CRIMINALS
«The silent workings, and still more the explosions, of human passion which bring to
light the darker elements of man's nature present to the philosophical observer
considerations of intrinsic interest; while to the jurist, the study of human nature and human
character with its infinite varieties, especially as affecting the connection between motive
and action, between irregular desire or evil disposition and crime itself, is equally
indispensable and difficult.» – Wills on Circumstantial Evidence.
I REMEMBER my father telling me that sitting up late one night talking with
Tennyson, the latter remarked that he had not kept such late hours since a recent visit of
Jowett. On that occasion the poet and the philosopher had talked together well into the small
hours of the morning. My father asked Tennyson what was the subject of conversation that
had so engrossed them. «Murders,» replied Tennyson. It would have been interesting to
have heard Tennyson and Jowett discussing such a theme. The fact is a tribute to the interest
that crime has for many men of intellect and imagination. Indeed, how could it be
otherwise? Rob history and fiction of crime, how tame and colourless would be the residue!
We who are living and enduring in the presence of one of the greatest crimes on record,
must realise that trying as this period of the world's history is to those who are passing
through it, in the hands of some great historian it may make very good reading for posterity.
Perhaps we may find some little consolation in this fact, like the unhappy victims of famous
