The Camden Journal

THE PHRENOLOGIST.
BY H. R. ADDISON, ESQ.
I never recollect a warmer enthusiast than Professor Leyden. When he spoke, he seemed to forget all other worldly circumstances, all other subjects, save the one engrossing topic on which he was engaged.
His eye, wide dilated, saw no object save the bright imagery created by his fertile brain. His voice was impassioned. His every pulse beat high. The professor, at the time I speak of, was just two-and-thirty. and he ranked himself as the very leader of Gall and Spurzheim's energetic disciples.
On the subject of phrenology he was discoursing when I entered the dining room of the Baron Hartmann.
It was a fine summer evening. Strawberries and other fruits decorated the board. The well iced Johannisberg, the cellar-cooled Lafitte stood temptingly on a table, around which about a dozen young men, with the worthy baron and the professor, sat.
It appeared that, in the height of his enthusiasm. Leyden had, to please the company, examined their heads, and with many wise looks pressed the bumps. which he declared to be the unerring indications of the human character and passions. Some unfortunate wight in company, however, had evidently shocked the examiner by a demonstration of wicked propensities, for he strenuously refused on the occasion to pronounce upon the several organs, declaring he might give offence,' he 'might be wrong, indeed it might appear invidious,' in short. after making several excuses. the professor sat down in meditative silence; nor could he again be brought to speak. save and except upon the general merits of this system, a subject on which he never failed to enlarge.
It is a curious fact that I never in my life heard the subject of phrenology broached without a laugh being raised at its expense. which very naturally annoys the supporters of this theory and brings on the warmest argument. It was a discussion of this kind that probably had raised the fire, which flushed the cheek of Leyden on the evening of which I speak.
The conversation had now taken a new channel. A dreadful murder had been committed in the neighborhood of the Black Forest. A young girl had eloped from her parents some weeks before. The companion of her flight was supposed to be a young man who had been staying in the neighborhood; he had disappeared about the same time. She had just been found savagely murdered. while the supposed partner of her guilt had re-appeared, and declared that he had with difficulty escaped from the hands of banditti, who had, without any apparent motive, seized and imprisoned him. To prove this. he showed several severe wounds which he had received in the successful struggle he had with two of the gang in his endeavour to liberate himself. This story. however, appeared so improbable, that no belief was attached to it, and the young man was hurried to prison, there to abide his trial.
This story had been repeated with painful minuteness by Carl Hoffmann, a handsome young man, who had lately arrived at Baden. whose mild and gentlemanly manners had already won for him the golden opinions of all the society assembled there.
No one was more pleased with him than the old baron. It was even believed that he ranked so high in the good old man's opinion, that it was rumoured he had proposed and was actually accepted by Clara Hartmann, with the full satisfaction of her father.
As a narrator, few could excel him. His vivid descriptions lent life to his stories: and when he chose (as on the present occasion,) he could harrow up the nerves of even the most apathetic, by depicting horrors in their most glaring, most appalling colours.
One burst of indignation, as he concluded. bespoke how truly he had interested his auditory. A thousand execrations were heaped upon the head of the unhappy youth, who appeared plainly, incontrovertibly, from the details given by Carl, to be the perpetrator of the bloody deed.
'I'll go to see his execution myself. I could enjoy the death tortures of such a wretch,' indignantly exclaimed the Prince of Olsebach. a young Russian, as he took a pinch of snuff, and handed to his next neighbour his splendid box, which dazzled the eye by the richness of the diamonds encircling it.
'If such a wretch existed on my estates, I'd have him racked.'
'And well would he deserve it, cold-hearted assassin.' chimed in another.
May he be banished in the world to come! fervently ejaculated Carl
Nay, nay,' said the old baron, that is saying too much. It is true the man deserves an earthly punishment; but you are allowing your anger against a vice my dear boy. to carry you too far.' And the old noble good-naturedly patted Carl on the arm.
Thus various subjects were discussed and argued; but during the whole evening Leyden spoke not a word. At last the hour for breaking up arrived; and according to etiquette the prince moved first. Ere he did so, he requested the return of his snuff-box.
'The person to whom he had handed it declared that he had passed it to the next, who in his turn denied all knowledge of it, as did the rest of the company.
Every one had seen it, every one had handled it, but none could now produce it. The room was searched, the servants had not even entered the apartment. the door had never been enclosed, none had stirred from the table. The affair began to wear a serious aspect. The old baron felt his honour wounded, but still hoped it might prove to be an ill-timed pleasantry. Under this impression he rose.
'Gentlemen, some person amongst you has doubtless concealed the box, intending thereby to give our illustrious friend a fright, and in good faith he deserves it for thus carelessly forgetting to look after a trinket said to be worth 5,000 florins; but as he seems really uneasy about it. I must beg the person who has taken it, instantly to return it, and confess the joke.'
And the noble affected to laugh, None, however, responded, and Hartmann saw with increased uneasiness that he must now take up the matter more seriously.
'My friends, you cannot feel offended when I offer myself as the first person to undergo the ordeal, an ordeal I almost blush to say we must all submit to. We must all be searched! None but the guilty can feel annoyed at this proposal,'
Professor Leyden started up. By Heavens I'd sooner die.
Another was of the same opinion, and objected to undergoing such an operation. which at the very least implied a doubt.
Poor Hartmann looked like a ghost. He glanced appealingly towards Leyden, who now rose.
'Let the door be locked.' he said in a grave voice; 'let it be well secured.' This was done. Now, gentlemen, you must either acknowledge the correctness of the measure I adopt, or I. the disciple of a juggling science, perish! and he drew from his pocket a small pistol. Nay, start not. my friends against myself alone I mean to use this weapon, and that only in case I wrongfully accuse an individual now present. You may remember before dinner I phrenologically examined you all. There was little to say about you generally; but there was one amongst you in whom I could not be mistaken-one whom I wished not to have named. whose presence ever since has made me shudder. I see the gentleman to whom I allude already turn pale. Nay, attempt not a smile. I am either a villain for allowing a false theory to mislead me, or you. Carl Hoffmann. are both a robber and a murderer!!'
A thunderbolt would have caused less consternation, The baron started up in a rage and agony. The prince believed the professor had suddenly gone mad; while the other looked with searching glances alternately at Leyden and Carl. The former had coolly resumed his chair. The latter sat pale, immovable; what could it mean?
Old Hartmann was about to speak in indignant terms to the man who thus had insulted his future son in-law. when waving his hand. Leyden quietly added, Search him.'
The baron, in his eagerness to defend his protege, at once flew to do so. The worthy old man sank overcome in a chair. In the breast pocket of Carl's blouse he had found the box, which he unresistingly allowed him to draw forth.
For a few moments there was a dreadful. death-like pause. The party seemed petrified, while the trembling Carl seemed, to struggle with his feelings, At length, as if suddenly awaking. he started up, and incoherently pronounced,
'The hand of God is on me! I would. but cannot fly his judgement. Professor Leyden speaks the truth, I am a robber and a murderer! Under the name of Gratz I wooed and won the peasant maid of whom we spoke just now. In madness I espoused her. Tired!. however, in a few short days of being tied for life to one uneducated and low born, hearing that Clara Hartmann possessed unbounded wealth. and knowing that my rustic wife alone presented an obstacle to my wedding this fair heiress. I slew her: aye, cruelly slew her, and caused her lover to be seized-to turn the finger of suspicion towards him. Had he not fled, to. morrow he would have been stabbed, As for robbery, I can only say, I long have headed a bold band, whom even now I'll not betray. although they'll laugh at me with scorn, when they first hear how foolishly I fell into the hellish net that Satan laid for me, and call me fool for not having the power to resist temptation. That cursed box was too brilliant. Let monks go pray. it is too late for me: let common felons suffer on the block. it is too mean a death for me. Thus I laugh at Fate--I'm never unprepared.' And ere a single arm could move to prevent him, he had swallowed the contents of a small phial, which afterwards proved to have been filled with prussic acid,
The unhappy wretch who confessed himself to be the same who, under the assumed name of 'Sand,' had filled the country with terror, died in tortures too horrible to describe. The accused (but innocent) youth was liberated from the jail, and in three months-Clara Hartmann became the bride of the professor, whose love of phrenology had thus led to the discovery of guilt, the manifestation of innocence, and the acquisition of the prettiest girl in Germany.