"We are possibly not giving this matter a fair trial," he said.
"The paper is spread out upon a plane surface; but the human
throat is cylindrical. Here is a billet of wood, the
circumference of which is about that of the throat. Wrap the
drawing around it, and try the experiment again."
I did so; but the difficulty was even more obvious than before.
"This," I said, "is the mark of no human hand."
"Read now," replied Dupin, "this passage from Cuvier."
It was a minute anatomical and generally descriptive account of
the large fulvous Ourang-Outang of the East Indian Islands. The
gigantic stature, the prodigious strength and activity, the wild
ferocity, and the imitative propensities of these mammalia are
sufficiently well known to all. I understood the full horrors of
the murder at once.
"The description of the digits," said I, as I made an end of
reading, "is in exact accordance with this drawing. I see that no
