Page:Memory; how to develop, train, and use it - Atkinson - 1919.djvu/129

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
To Remember Faces
123

surrounding him was an old man, with one eye missing. The old fellow pressed forward crying out that he was sure that Henry Clay would remember him. Clay took a sharp look at him and said: “I met you in Kentucky many years ago, did I not?” “Yes,” replied the man. “Did you lose your eye since then?” asked Clay. “Yes, several years after,” replied the old man. “Turn your face side-ways, so that I can see your profile,” said Clay. The man did so. Then Clay smiled, triumphantly, saying: “I’ve got you now—weren’t you on that jury in the Innes case at Frankfort, that I tried in the United States Court over twenty years ago?” “Yes siree!” said the man, “I knowed that ye know me, ’n I told ’em you would.” And the crowd gave a whoop, and Clay knew that he was safe in that town and county.

Vidocq, the celebrated French detective, is said to have never forgotten a face of a criminal whom he had once seen. A celebrated instance of this power on his part is that of the case of Delafranche the forger who escaped from prison and dwelt in foreign lands for over twenty years. After that time he re-