The ablest defence of the claims of antiquity that I have seen is by a Japanese writer, Kumagusu Minakata, whose letter to 'Nature', Dec. 27, 1894, appears to be as exhaustive as it is able; but I hope that this paper will satisfy him that the finger-print system of our day has no connexion with the methods he describes. The 'nail-marks' of which he speaks must be utterly useless for identification; yet he treats all manner of impressions alike, and tells us indeed that they are all known by the one name of 'hand-mark'. I fear that he has failed, like some other writers,[9] to see the definite force of the word 'identification' in the finger-print system. It means that if a man can be indicated whose finger-print agrees with that on a document, he is identified with the man who put that one there. That is all we want. But it will be seen that there must be two impressions at least, that will bear comparison, to constitute 'identification'. [9] I include a too brief notice of the subject by Professor Giles of Cambridge, in his recent work 'Civilization of China', p. 118, and an article in the 'Nineteenth Century' of December 1904. None of the writers who have undertaken the defence appears to perceive this need of a second impression if the issue of identity turns on any kind of finger-mark. Repudiations cannot have been rare; tribunals must occasionally have been invoked; yet no instance is quoted of decision by demand for a second impression. It seems then that these marks were not made, as ours are, expressly to challenge comparison; that, in fact, they offer no points for comparison. In conclusion, it is hard to believe that a system so practically useful as this could have been known in the great lands of the East for generations past, without arresting the notice of Western statesmen, merchants, travellers, and students. Yet the knowledge never reached us. FINIS. End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Origin of Finger-Printing, by William J. Herschel