Fire Marshal Whitcomb has been pretty busy taking testimony in regard to fires lately, and while speaking about examining witnesses the other day he mentioned several curious things he had noticed. He says that in every case where he has discovered a pyromaniac he has had his suspicions of the person’s guilt aroused by a peculiar smile which plays around the mouth of the guilty one when under examination. It is hardly a smile, rather a peculiar puckering of the corners of the mouth, an expression almost indefinable, but it seems to mean, “Well, I’m too smart for you to catch me, anyhow.” The marshal says he can recall a dozen cases where he noticed this smile and at the time had no other cause to suspect a witness, yet by following these smiling ones he has obtained the most convincing testimony of their guilt an almost invariably confession from the guilty ones themselves.–Boston Transcript.
[tags]Ann Arbor Register, April, 1896[/tags]