t should the
curiosity of any future generation tempt the men of that day to peer
into this receptacle of the dust of tyrants, the skull of the murdered
Alexander will be found to be toothless. And all sorts of suppositions
and theories may be based on this singular fact, and credited, until
some antiquary of the period discovers in an ancient magazine
published at the period of a former examination of the sepulchre this
record, in which I am obliged to declare--with a blush for the decency
of the Florentines--that the teeth were all stolen by persons who were
permitted to be present at the opening of the tomb. A certain special
historical interest is attached to those teeth of the murdered man.
The story goes that when Lorenzino stabbed him as he slept on a bed in
Lorenzino's own house, to which he had been inveigled in the hope of
meeting there a certain lady, the wife of a Ginori of the time,
Alexander started up, and, seizing the thumb of the murderer between
his teeth, held him so firmly that he could not have escaped had not a
bravo whom he had hired to aid him come to his assistance. These,
then, were the teeth that held so well in the death-grip of their
owner! Some Florentine historically-minded virtuoso (!) appreciated
the significance of the fact, and stole them from the head some three
centuries and a half after that last bite of theirs. There were
several gaps in the range of teeth still remaining in the skull of
Alexander, which has appeared strange to some who remember that he
was only twenty-seven when he died. But I think that any medical man,
taking into consideration; the manner of his death, would find nothing
strange in the circumstance, but on the contrary a confirmation of the
truth of the facts which the chroniclers of the time have preserved
for us.

Perhaps, however, the most curious and interesting fact which the
opening of this tomb has ascertained is that testified to by the hair
still remaining on the skull which was that of Alexander. It is a
black curly hair of a coarse quality, such as a man of mixed black
blood may be supposed to have had. It is recorded that one of the
wounds given by the bravo Scoronconcolo, whom Lorenzino had hired to
assist him in the murder, and who ran up to complete the job when his
master was disabled by being fast held by the teeth of Alexander, was
a stab in the face. And of the truth of this tradition also the skull
of the murdered man still affords evidence