edom from abnormal characteristics is more rare than among ordinary
individuals.

Just as a musical theme is the result of a sum of notes, and not of any
single note, the criminal type results from the aggregate of these
anomalies, which render him strange and terrible, not only to the
scientific observer, but to ordinary persons who are capable of an
impartial judgment.

Painters and poets, unhampered by false doctrines, divined this type
long before it became the subject of a special branch of study. The
assassins, executioners, and devils painted by Mantegna, Titian, and
Ribera the Spagnoletto embody with marvellous exactitude the
characteristics of the born criminal; and the descriptions of great
writers, Dante, Shakespeare, Dostoyevsky, and Ibsen, are equally
faithful representations, physically and psychically, of this morbid
type.

THE CRIMINAL IN PROVERBIAL SAYINGS

The conclusions of instinctive observers have found expression in many
proverbs, which warn the world against the very characteristics we have
noted in criminals.

A proverb common in Romagna, says: "Poca barba e niun colore, sotto il
cielo non vi ha peggiore" (There is nothing worse under Heaven than a
scanty beard and a colourless face), and in Piedmont there is a saying,
"Faccia smorta, peggio che scabbia" (An ashen face is worse than the
itch). The Venetians have a number of proverbs expressing distrust of
the criminal type: "Uomo rosso e femina barbuta da lontan xe megio la
saluta" (Greet from afar the red-haired man and the bearded woman);
"Vardete da chi te parla e guarda in la, e vardete da chi tiene i oci
bassi e da chi camina a corti passi" (Beware of him who looks away when
he speaks to you, and of him who keeps his eyes cast down and takes
mincing steps); "El guerzo xe maledetto per ogni verso" (The squint-eyed
are on all sides accursed); "Megio vendere un campo e una ca che tor una
dona dal naso leva" (Better sell a field and a house than take a wife
with a turned-up nose); "Naso che guarda in testa e peggior che la
tempesta" (A turned-up nose is worse than hail); etc.

There are innumerable cases on record, in which persons quite ignorant
of criminology have escaped robbery or murder, thanks to the timely
distrust awakened in them by the appearance of individuals who had tried
to win their confidence. My father once placed before forty children,
twenty portraits of thieves and twenty representing great men, and 80%
recognised