If more evidence were required, I was prepared, without hesitation, to call on any person whose mark I had taken since I began. It was in fact from among those very persons, Natives as well as English, that thirteen years later, at Mr. Galton's request, I obtained the repeats which, by their much longer persistence then, went so far to prove his case to universal conviction. I close this record with a comparison between three of my own prints, taken, one in 1859, one in 1877, and the last to-day, after fifty-seven years. For length of persistence they cannot at present be matched. [Illustration: (_a_) (_b_) W. J. H., 1859, Arrah (aet. 26). (_c_) W. J. H., March 31, 1877 (aet. 44). (_d_) W. J. H., February 22, 1916 (aet. 83).] It goes beyond the proper scope of this narrative, but I cannot refrain from offering my readers here a striking instance of the almost incredible persistency of atomic renovation that takes place in the pads of our fingers, in spite of their being more subject to wear than any other part of the body. The first was taken at the age of 7¾; the next, for Mr. Galton, nine years later. In 1913 my son was in Canada when I asked him to send me several repeats. Every print showed the minute tell-tale dot which Mr. Galton's sharp eye had noticed twenty-two years before. No doubt it was a natal mark. It has anyhow already persisted for thirty-two years. [Illustration: A. E. H. Herschel, r. 3. 1881, aet. 7¾. 1890, aet. 17. 1913, aet. 40.] APPENDIX When I speak of the 'discovery' of finger-prints nigh sixty years ago, I should wish to be understood correctly. I cannot say that I thought of it as such until Mr. Galton examined old records in search of earlier notices of the subject. What he found had been beyond my ken, and I never inquired for myself. The fascination of experiments and the impelling object of them were all I cared about. Had it been otherwise I should have had an open field for egoism to any extent, for no one questioned the novelty of the thing. The time that has elapsed since Galton's inquiries, without any material addition to his ascertained facts, justifies me, I venture to think, in speaking of my work as the 'discovery' of the value of finger-prints. I proceed to show what has been brought to light from other sources. Bewick. Of modern cases the first known is that of Thomas Bewick. He was a wood-engraver, as well as an author, and had a fancy for engraving his finger-mark. He printed, as far as I can ascertain, only three specimens, by way of ornament to his books. 1. 1809. 'British Birds', p. 190. The impression of the finger appears as if obliterating a small scene of a cottage, trees, and a rider, but the paper between the lines of the finger is almost all clean.