The Mystery of Marie Roget.: by Edgar Allan Poe

THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET.
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET.

by Edgar Allan Poe
A SEQUEL TO "THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE."
Es giebt eine Reihe idealischer Begebenheiten, die der Wirklichkeit parallel

lauft. Selten fallen sie zusammen. Menschen und zufalle modifieiren
gewohulich die idealische Begebenheit, so dass sie unvollkommen
erscheint, und ihre Folgen gleichfalls unvollkommen sind. So bei der
Reformation; statt des Protestantismus kam das Lutherthum hervor.
There are ideal series of events which run parallel with the real ones. They
rarely coincide. Men and circumstances generally modify the ideal train of
events, so that it seems imperfect, and its consequences are equally
imperfect. Thus with the Reformation; instead of Protestantism came
Lutheranism.
by Edgar Allan Poe 2
- Novalis. {*2} Moral Ansichten.
THERE are few persons, even among the calmest thinkers, who have not
occasionally been startled into a vague yet thrilling half-credence in the
supernatural, by coincidences of so seemingly marvellous a character that,
as mere coincidences, the intellect has been unable to receive them. Such
sentiments - for the half-credences of which I speak have never the full
force of thought - such sentiments are seldom thoroughly stifled unless by
reference to the doctrine of chance, or, as it is technically termed, the
Calculus of Probabilities. Now this Calculus is, in its essence, purely
mathematical; and thus we have the anomaly of the most rigidly exact in
science applied to the shadow and spirituality of the most intangible in
speculation.
The extraordinary details which I am now called upon to make public, will
be found to form, as regards sequence of time, the primary branch of a
series of scarcely intelligible coincidences, whose secondary or concluding
branch will be recognized by all readers in the late murder of Mary Cecila
Rogers, at New York.
When, in an article entitled "The Murders in the Rue Morgue," I

endeavored, about a year ago, to depict some very remarkable features in
the mental character of my friend, the Chevalier C. Auguste Dupin, it did
not occur to me that I should ever resume the subject. This depicting of
character constituted my design; and this design was thoroughly fulfilled in
the wild train of circumstances brought to instance Dupin's idiosyncrasy. I
might have adduced other examples, but I should have proven no more.
Late events, however, in their surprising development, have startled me into
some farther details, which will carry with them the air of extorted
confession. Hearing what I have lately heard, it would be indeed strange
should I remain silent in regard to what I both heard and saw so long ago.
Upon the winding up of the tragedy involved in the deaths of Madame

L'Espanaye and her daughter, the Chevalier dismissed the affair at once
from his attention, and relapsed into his old habits of moody reverie. Prone,
at all times, to abstraction, I readily fell in with his humor; and, continuing
to occupy our chambers in the Faubourg Saint Germain, we gave the Future
to the winds, and slumbered tranquilly in the Present, weaving the dull
world around us into dreams.
But these dreams were not altogether uninterrupted. It may readily be

supposed that the part played by my friend, in the drama at the Rue
Morgue, had not failed of its impression upon the fancies of the Parisian
police. With its emissaries, the name of Dupin had grown into a household
word. The simple character of those inductions by which he had
disentangled the mystery never having been explained even to the Prefect,
or to any other individual than myself, of course it is not surprising that the
affair was regarded as little less than miraculous, or that the Chevalier's
analytical abilities acquired for him the credit of intuition. His frankness
would have led him to disabuse every inquirer of such prejudice; but his
indolent humor forbade all farther agitation of a topic whose interest to
himself had long ceased. It thus happened that he found himself the
cynosure of the policial eyes; and the cases were not few in which attempt
was made to engage his services at the Prefecture. One of the most
remarkable instances was that of the murder of a young girl named Marie
Rogêt.
This event occurred about two years after the atrocity in the Rue Morgue.
Marie, whose Christian and family name will at once arrest attention from
their resemblance to those of the unfortunate "cigar- girl," was the only
daughter of the widow Estelle Rogêt. The father had died during the child's
infancy, and from the period of his death, until within eighteen months
before the assassination which forms the subject of our narrative, the
mother and daughter had dwelt together in the Rue Pavée Saint Andrée;
{*3} Madame there keeping a pension, assisted by Marie. Affairs went on
thus until the latter had attained her twenty-second year, when her great
beauty attracted the notice of a perfumer, who occupied one of the shops in
the basement of the Palais Royal, and whose custom lay chiefly among the
desperate adventurers infesting that neighborhood. Monsieur Le Blanc {*4}
was not unaware of the advantages to be derived from the attendance of the
fair Marie in his perfumery; and his liberal proposals were accepted eagerly
by the girl, although with somewhat more of hesitation by Madame.
The anticipations of the shopkeeper were realized, and his rooms soon
became notorious through the charms of the sprightly grisette. She had
been in his employ about a year, when her admirers were thrown info
confusion by her sudden disappearance from the shop. Monsieur Le Blanc
was unable to account for her absence, and Madame Rogêt was distracted
with anxiety and terror. The public papers immediately took up the theme,
and the police were upon the point of making serious investigations, when,
one fine morning, after the lapse of a week, Marie, in good health, but with
a somewhat saddened air, made her re-appearance at her usual counter in
the perfumery. All inquiry, except that of a private character, was of course
immediately hushed. Monsieur Le Blanc professed total ignorance, as
before. Marie, with Madame, replied to all questions, that the last week had
been spent at the house of a relation in the country. Thus the affair died
away, and was generally forgotten; for the girl, ostensibly to relieve herself
from the impertinence of curiosity, soon bade a final adieu to the perfumer,
and sought the shelter of her mother's residence in the Rue Pavée Saint
Andrée.
It was about five months after this return home, that her friends were
alarmed by her sudden disappearance for the second time. Three days
elapsed, and nothing was heard of her. On the fourth her corpse was found
floating in the Seine, * near the shore which is opposite the Quartier of the
Rue Saint Andree, and at a point not very far distant from the secluded
neighborhood of the BarriËre du Roule. {*6}
The atrocity of this murder, (for it was at once evident that murder had been
committed,) the youth and beauty of the victim, and, above all, her previous
notoriety, conspired to produce intense excitement in the minds of the
sensitive Parisians. I can call to mind no similar occurrence producing so
general and so intense an effect. For several weeks, in the discussion of this
one absorbing theme, even the momentous political topics of the day were
forgotten. The Prefect made unusual exertions; and the powers of the whole
Parisian police were, of course, tasked to the utmost extent.
Upon the first discovery of the corpse, it was not supposed that the
murderer would be able to elude, for more than a very brief period, the
inquisition which was immediately set on foot. It was not until the
expiration of a week that it was deemed necessary to offer a reward; and
even then this reward was limited to a thousand francs. In the mean time
the investigation proceeded with vigor, if not always with judgment, and
numerous individuals were examined to no purpose; while, owing to the
continual absence of all clue to the mystery, the popular excitement greatly
increased. At the end of the tenth day it was thought advisable to double the
sum originally proposed; and, at length, the second week having elapsed
without leading to any discoveries, and the prejudice which always exists in
Paris against the Police having given vent to itself in several serious
émeutes, the Prefect took it upon himself to offer the sum of twenty
thousand francs "for the conviction of the assassin," or, if more than one
should prove to have been implicated, "for the conviction of any one of the
assassins." In the proclamation setting forth this reward, a full pardon was
promised to any accomplice who should come forward in evidence against
his fellow; and to the whole was appended, wherever it appeared, the
private placard of a committee of citizens, offering ten thousand francs, in
addition to the amount proposed by the Prefecture. The entire reward thus
stood at no less than thirty thousand francs, which will be regarded as an
extraordinary sum when we consider the humble condition of the girl, and
the great frequency, in large cities, of such atrocities as the one described.
No one doubted now that the mystery of this murder would be immediately
brought to light. But although, in one or two instances, arrests were made
which promised elucidation, yet nothing was elicited which could implicate
the parties suspected; and they were discharged forthwith. Strange as it may
appear, the third week from the discovery of the body had passed, and
passed without any light being thrown upon the subject, before even a
rumor of the events which had so agitated the public mind, reached the ears
of Dupin and myself. Engaged in researches which absorbed our whole
attention, it had been nearly a month since either of us had gone abroad, or
received a visiter, or more than glanced at the leading political articles in
one of the daily papers. The first intelligence of the murder was brought us
by G ----, in person. He called upon us early in the afternoon of the
thirteenth of July, 18--, and remained with us until late in the night. He had
been piqued by the failure of all his endeavors to ferret out the assassins.
His reputation - so he said with a peculiarly Parisian air - was at stake.

Even his honor was concerned. The eyes of the public were upon him; and
there was really no sacrifice which he would not be willing to make for the
development of the mystery. He concluded a somewhat droll speech with a
compliment upon what he was pleased to term the tact of Dupin, and made
him a direct, and certainly a liberal proposition, the precise nature of which
I do not feel myself at liberty to disclose, but which has no bearing upon
the proper subject of my narrative.
The compliment my friend rebutted as best he could, but the proposition he

accepted at once, although its advantages were altogether provisional. This
point being settled, the Prefect broke forth at once into explanations of his
own views, interspersing them with long comments upon the evidence; of
which latter we were not yet in possession. He discoursed much, and
beyond doubt, learnedly; while I hazarded an occasional suggestion as the
night wore drowsily away. Dupin, sitting steadily in his accustomed
arm-chair, was the embodiment of respectful attention. He wore spectacles,
during the whole interview; and an occasional signal glance beneath their
green glasses, sufficed to convince me that he slept not the less soundly,
because silently, throughout the seven or eight leaden-footed hours which
immediately preceded the departure of the Prefect.
In the morning, I procured, at the Prefecture, a full report of all the

evidence elicited, and, at the various newspaper offices, a copy of every
paper in which, from first to last, had been published any decisive
information in regard to this sad affair. Freed from all that was positively
disproved, this mass of information stood thus:
Marie Rogêt left the residence of her mother, in the Rue Pavée St. Andrée,
about nine o'clock in the morning of Sunday June the twenty-second, 18--.
In going out, she gave notice to a Monsieur Jacques St. Eustache, {*7} and
to him only, of her intent intention to spend the day with an aunt who
resided in the Rue des Drômes. The Rue des Drômes is a short and narrow
but populous thoroughfare, not far from the banks of the river, and at a
distance of some two miles, in the most direct course possible, from the
pension of Madame Rogêt. St. Eustache was the accepted suitor of Marie,
and lodged, as well as took his meals, at the pension. He was to have gone
for his betrothed at dusk, and to have escorted her home. In the afternoon,
however, it came on to rain heavily; and, supposing that she would remain
all night at her aunt's, (as she had done under similar circumstances before,)
he did not think it necessary to keep his promise. As night drew on,
Madame Rogêt (who was an infirm old lady, seventy years of age,) was
heard to express a fear "that she should never see Marie again;" but this
observation attracted little attention at the time.
On Monday, it was ascertained that the girl had not been to the Rue des
Drômes; and when the day elapsed without tidings of her, a tardy search
was instituted at several points in the city, and its environs. It was not,
however until the fourth day from the period of disappearance that any
thing satisfactory was ascertained respecting her. On this day, (Wednesday,
the twenty-fifth of June,) a Monsieur Beauvais, {*8} who, with a friend,
had been making inquiries for Marie near the BarriËre du Roule, on the
shore of the Seine which is opposite the Rue Pavée St. Andrée, was
informed that a corpse had just been towed ashore by some fishermen, who
had found it floating in the river. Upon seeing the body, Beauvais, after
some hesitation, identified it as that of the perfumery-girl. His friend
recognized it more promptly.
The face was suffused with dark blood, some of which issued from the
mouth. No foam was seen, as in the case of the merely drowned. There was
no discoloration in the cellular tissue. About the throat were bruises and
impressions of fingers. The arms were bent over on the chest and were
rigid. The right hand was clenched; the left partially open. On the left wrist
were two circular excoriations, apparently the effect of ropes, or of a rope
in more than one volution. A part of the right wrist, also, was much chafed,
as well as the back throughout its extent, but more especially at the
shoulder-blades. In bringing the body to the shore the fishermen had
attached to it a rope; but none of the excoriations had been effected by this.
The flesh of the neck was much swollen. There were no cuts apparent, or
bruises which appeared the effect of blows. A piece of lace was found tied
so tightly around the neck as to be hidden from sight; it was completely
buried in the flesh, and was fasted by a knot which lay just under the left
ear. This alone would have sufficed to produce death. The medical
testimony spoke confidently of the virtuous character of the deceased. She
had been subjected, it said, to brutal violence. The corpse was in such
condition when found, that there could have been no difficulty in its
recognition by friends.
The dress was much torn and otherwise disordered. In the outer garment, a
slip, about a foot wide, had been torn upward from the bottom hem to the
waist, but not torn off. It was wound three times around the waist, and
secured by a sort of hitch in the back. The dress immediately beneath the
frock was of fine muslin; and from this a slip eighteen inches wide had
been torn entirely out - torn very evenly and with great care. It was found
around her neck, fitting loosely, and secured with a hard knot. Over this
muslin slip and the slip of lace, the strings of a bonnet were attached; the
bonnet being appended. The knot by which the strings of the bonnet were
fastened, was not a lady's, but a slip or sailor's knot.
After the recognition of the corpse, it was not, as usual, taken to the
Morgue, (this formality being superfluous,) but hastily interred not far front
the spot at which it was brought ashore. Through the exertions of Beauvais,
the matter was industriously hushed up, as far as possible; and several days
had elapsed before any public emotion resulted. A weekly paper, {*9}
however, at length took up the theme; the corpse was disinterred, and a
re-examination instituted; but nothing was elicited beyond what has been
already noted. The clothes, however, were now submitted to the mother and
friends of the deceased, and fully identified as those worn by the girl upon
leaving home.
Meantime, the excitement increased hourly. Several individuals were

arrested and discharged. St. Eustache fell especially under suspicion; and
he failed, at first, to give an intelligible account of his whereabouts during
the Sunday on which Marie left home. Subsequently, however, he
submitted to Monsieur G----, affidavits, accounting satisfactorily for every
hour of the day in question. As time passed and no discovery ensued, a
thousand contradictory rumors were circulated, and journalists busied
themselves in suggestions. Among these, the one which attracted the most
notice, was the idea that Marie Rogêt still lived - that the corpse found in
the Seine was that of some other unfortunate. It will be proper that I submit
to the reader some passages which embody the suggestion alluded to. These
passages are literal translations from L'Etoile, {*10} a paper conducted, in
general, with much ability.
"Mademoiselle Rogêt left her mother's house on Sunday morning, June the
twenty-second, 18--, with the ostensible purpose of going to see her aunt, or
some other connexion, in the Rue des Drômes. From that hour, nobody is
proved to have seen her. There is no trace or tidings of her at all. . . . There
has no person, whatever, come forward, so far, who saw her at all, on that
day, after she left her mother's door. . . . Now, though we have no evidence
that Marie Rogêt was in the land of the living after nine o'clock on Sunday,
June the twenty-second, we have proof that, up to that hour, she was alive.
On Wednesday noon, at twelve, a female body was discovered afloat on the
shore of the BarriËre de Roule. This was, even if we presume that Marie
Rogêt was thrown into the river within three hours after she left her
mother's house, only three days from the time she left her home - three days
to an hour. But it is folly to suppose that the murder, if murder was
committed on her body, could have been consummated soon enough to
have enabled her murderers to throw the body into the river before
midnight. Those who are guilty of such horrid crimes, choose darkness
rather the; light . . . . Thus we see that if the body found in the river was
that of Marie Rogêt, it could only have been in the water two and a half
days, or three at the outside. All experience has shown that drowned bodies,
or bodies thrown into the water immediately after death by violence,
require from six to ten days for decomposition to take place to bring them
to the top of the water. Even where a cannon is fired over a corpse, and it
rises before at least five or six days' immersion, it sinks again, if let alone.
Now, we ask, what was there in this cave to cause a departure from the
ordinary course of nature? . . . If the body had been kept in its mangled
state on shore until Tuesday night, some trace would be found on shore of
the murderers. It is a doubtful point, also, whether the body would be so
soon afloat, even were it thrown in after having been dead two days. And,
furthermore, it is exceedingly improbable that any villains who had
committed such a murder as is here supposed, would have throw the body
in without weight to sink it, when such a precaution could have so easily
been taken."
The editor here proceeds to argue that the body must have been in the water
"not three days merely, but, at least, five times three days," because it was
so far decomposed that Beauvais had great difficulty in recognizing it. This
latter point, however, was fully disproved. I continue the translation:
"What, then, are the facts on which M. Beauvais says that he has no doubt
the body was that of Marie Rogêt? He ripped up the gown sleeve, and says
he found marks which satisfied him of the identity. The public generally
supposed those marks to have consisted of some description of scars. He
rubbed the arm and found hair upon it - something as indefinite, we think,
as can readily be imagined - as little conclusive as finding an arm in the
sleeve. M. Beauvais did not return that night, but sent word to Madame
Rogêt, at seven o'clock, on Wednesday evening, that an investigation was
still in progress respecting her daughter. If we allow that Madame Rogêt,
from her age and grief, could not go over, (which is allowing a great deal,)
there certainly must have been some one who would have thought it worth
while to go over and attend the investigation, if they thought the body was
that of Marie. Nobody went over. There was nothing said or heard about
the matter in the Rue Pavée St. Andrée, that reached even the occupants of
the same building. M. St. Eustache, the lover and intended husband of
Marie, who boarded in her mother's house, deposes that he did not hear of
the discovery of the body of his intended until the next morning, when M.
Beauvais came into his chamber and told him of it. For an item of news like
this, it strikes us it was very coolly received."
In this way the journal endeavored to create the impression of an apathy on

the part of the relatives of Marie, inconsistent with the supposition that
these relatives believed the corpse to be hers. Its insinuations amount to
this: - that Marie, with the connivance of her friends, had absented herself
from the city for reasons involving a charge against her chastity; and that
these friends, upon the discovery of a corpse in the Seine, somewhat
resembling that of the girl, had availed themselves of the opportunity to
impress press the public with the belief of her death. But L'Etoile was again
over-hasty. It was distinctly proved that no apathy, such as was imagined,

existed; that the old lady was exceedingly feeble, and so agitated as to be
unable to attend to any duty, that St. Eustache, so far from receiving the
news coolly, was distracted with grief, and bore himself so frantically, that
M. Beauvais prevailed upon a friend and relative to take charge of him, and
prevent his attending the examination at the disinterment. Moreover,
although it was stated by L'Etoile, that the corpse was re-interred at the
public expense - that an advantageous offer of private sculpture was
absolutely declined by the family - and that no member of the family
attended the ceremonial: - although, I say, all this was asserted by L'Etoile
in furtherance of the impression it designed to convey - yet all this was
satisfactorily disproved. In a subsequent number of the paper, an attempt
was made to throw suspicion upon Beauvais himself. The editor says:
"Now, then, a change comes over the matter. We are told that on one
occasion, while a Madame B---- was at Madame Rogêt's house, M.
Beauvais, who was going out, told her that a gendarme was expected there,
and she, Madame B., must not say anything to the gendarme until he
returned, but let the matter be for him. . . . In the present posture of affairs,
M. Beauvais appears to have the whole matter looked up in his head. A
single step cannot be taken without M. Beauvais; for, go which way you
will, you run against him. . . . For some reason, he determined that nobody
shall have any thing to do with the proceedings but himself, and he has
elbowed the male relatives out of the way, according to their
representations, in a very singular manner. He seems to have been very
much averse to permitting the relatives to see the body."
By the following fact, some color was given to the suspicion thus thrown
upon Beauvais. A visiter at his office, a few days prior to the girl's
disappearance, and during the absence of its occupant, had observed a rose
in the key-hole of the door, and the name "Marie" inscribed upon a slate
which hung near at hand.
The general impression, so far as we were enabled to glean it from the

newspapers, seemed to be, that Marie had been the victim of a gang of
desperadoes - that by these she had been borne across the river, maltreated
and murdered. Le Commerciel, {*11} however, a print of extensive

influence, was earnest in combating this popular idea. I quote a passage or
two from its columns:
"We are persuaded that pursuit has hitherto been on a false scent, so far as
it has been directed to the BarriËre du Roule. It is impossible that a person
so well known to thousands as this young woman was, should have passed
three blocks without some one having seen her; and any one who saw her
would have remembered it, for she interested all who knew her. It was
when the streets were full of people, when she went out. . . . It is impossible
that she could have gone to the BarriËre du Roule, or to the Rue des
Drômes, without being recognized by a dozen persons; yet no one has come
forward who saw her outside of her mother's door, and there is no evidence,
except the testimony concerning her expressed intentions, that she did go
out at all. Her gown was torn, bound round her, and tied; and by that the
body was carried as a bundle. If the murder had been committed at the
BarriËre du Roule, there would have been no necessity for any such
arrangement. The fact that the body was found floating near the BarriËre, is
no proof as to where it was thrown into the water. . . . . A piece of one of
the unfortunate girl's petticoats, two feet long and one foot wide, was torn
out and tied under her chin around the back of her head, probably to
prevent screams. This was done by fellows who had no
pocket-handkerchief."
A day or two before the Prefect called upon us, however, some important
information reached the police, which seemed to overthrow, at least, the
chief portion of Le Commerciel's argument. Two small boys, sons of a
Madame Deluc, while roaming among the woods near the BarriËre du
Roule, chanced to penetrate a close thicket, within which were three or four
large stones, forming a kind of seat, with a back and footstool. On the upper
stone lay a white petticoat; on the second a silk scarf. A parasol, gloves,
and a pocket-handkerchief were also here found. The handkerchief bore the
name "Marie Rogêt." Fragments of dress were discovered on the brambles
around. The earth was trampled, the bushes were broken, and there was
every evidence of a struggle. Between the thicket and the river, the fences
were found taken down, and the ground bore evidence of some heavy
burthen having been dragged along it.
A weekly paper, Le Soleil,{*12} had the following comments upon this

discovery -- comments which merely echoed the sentiment of the whole
Parisian press:
"The things had all evidently been there at least three or four weeks; they
were all mildewed down hard with the action of the rain and stuck together
from mildew. The grass had grown around and over some of them. The silk
on the parasol was strong, but the threads of it were run together within.
The upper part, where it had been doubled and folded, was all mildewed
and rotten, and tore on its being opened. . . . . The pieces of her frock torn
out by the bushes were about three inches wide and six inches long. One
part was the hem of the frock, and it had been mended; the other piece was
part of the skirt, not the hem. They looked like strips torn off, and were on
the thorn bush, about a foot from the ground. . . . . There can be no doubt,
therefore, that the spot of this appalling outrage has been discovered."
Consequent upon this discovery, new evidence appeared. Madame Deluc

testified that she keeps a roadside inn not far from the bank of the river,
opposite the BarriËre du Roule. The neighborhood is secluded --
particularly so. It is the usual Sunday resort of blackguards from the city,
who cross the river in boats. About three o'clock, in the afternoon of the
Sunday in question, a young girl arrived at the inn, accompanied by a
young man of dark complexion. The two remained here for some time. On
their departure, they took the road to some thick woods in the vicinity.
Madame Deluc's attention was called to the dress worn by the girl, on
account of its resemblance to one worn by a deceased relative. A scarf was
particularly noticed. Soon after the departure of the couple, a gang of
miscreants made their appearance, behaved boisterously, ate and drank
without making payment, followed in the route of the young man and girl,
returned to the inn about dusk, and re-crossed the river as if in great haste.
It was soon after dark, upon this same evening, that Madame Deluc, as well
as her eldest son, heard the screams of a female in the vicinity of the inn.
The screams were violent but brief. Madame D. recognized not only the
scarf which was found in the thicket, but the dress which was discovered
upon the corpse. An omnibus driver, Valence, {*13} now also testified that
he saw Marie Rogêt cross a ferry on the Seine, on the Sunday in question,
in company with a young man of dark complexion. He, Valence, knew
Marie, and could not be mistaken in her identity. The articles found in the
thicket were fully identified by the relatives of Marie.
The items of evidence and information thus collected by myself, from the
newspapers, at the suggestion of Dupin, embraced only one more point --
but this was a point of seemingly vast consequence. It appears that,
immediately after the discovery of the clothes as above described, the
lifeless, or nearly lifeless body of St. Eustache, Marie's betrothed, was
found in the vicinity of what all now supposed the scene of the outrage. A
phial labelled "laudanum," and emptied, was found near him. His breath
gave evidence of the poison. He died without speaking. Upon his person
was found a letter, briefly stating his love for Marie, with his design of self-
destruction.
"I need scarcely tell you," said Dupin, as he finished the perusal of my
notes, "that this is a far more intricate case than that of the Rue Morgue;
from which it differs in one important respect. This is an ordinary, although
an atrocious instance of crime. There is nothing peculiarly outré about it.
You will observe that, for this reason, the mystery has been considered
easy, when, for this reason, it should have been considered difficult, of
solution. Thus; at first, it was thought unnecessary to offer a reward. The
myrmidons of G--- were able at once to comprehend how and why such an
atrocity might have been committed. They could picture to their
imaginations a mode - many modes - and a motive - many motives; and
because it was not impossible that either of these numerous modes and
motives could have been the actual one, they have taken it for granted that
one of them must. But the case with which these variable fancies were
entertained, and the very plausibility which each assumed, should have
been understood as indicative rather of the difficulties than of the facilities
which must attend elucidation. I have before observed that it is by
prominences above the plane of the ordinary, that reason feels her way, if at
all, in her search for the true, and that the proper question in cases such as
this, is not so much 'what has occurred?' as 'what has occurred that has
never occurred before?' In the investigations at the house of Madame
L'Espanaye, {*14} the agents of G---- were discouraged and confounded by
that very unusualness which, to a properly regulated intellect, would have
afforded the surest omen of success; while this same intellect might have
been plunged in despair at the ordinary character of all that met the eye in
the case of the perfumery-girl, and yet told of nothing but easy triumph to
the functionaries of the Prefecture.
"In the case of Madame L'Espanaye and her daughter there was, even at the
beginning of our investigation, no doubt that murder had been committed.
The idea of suicide was excluded at once. Here, too, we are freed, at the
commencement, from all supposition of self- murder. The body found at
the BarriËre du Roule, was found under such circumstances as to leave us
no room for embarrassment upon this important point. But it has been
suggested that the corpse discovered, is not that of the Marie Rogêt for the
conviction of whose assassin, or assassins, the reward is offered, and
respecting whom, solely, our agreement has been arranged with the Prefect.
We both know this gentleman well. It will not do to trust him too far. If,
dating our inquiries from the body found, and thence tracing a murderer,
we yet discover this body to be that of some other individual than Marie;
or, if starting from the living Marie, we find her, yet find her unassassinated
-- in either case we lose our labor; since it is Monsieur G---- with whom we
have to deal. For our own purpose, therefore, if not for the purpose of
justice, it is indispensable that our first step should be the determination of
the identity of the corpse with the Marie Rogêt who is missing.
"With the public the arguments of L'Etoile have had weight; and that the
journal itself is convinced of their importance would appear from the
manner in which it commences one of its essays upon the subject - 'Several
of the morning papers of the day,' it says, 'speak of the conclusive article in
Monday's Etoile.' To me, this article appears conclusive of little beyond the
zeal of its inditer. We should bear in mind that, in general, it is the object of
our newspapers rather to create a sensation -- to make a point - than to
further the cause of truth. The latter end is only pursued when it seems
coincident with the former. The print which merely falls in with ordinary
opinion (however well founded this opinion may be) earns for itself no
credit with the mob. The mass of the people regard as profound only him
who suggests pungent contradictions of the general idea. In ratiocination,
not less than in literature, it is the epigram which is the most immediately
and the most universally appreciated. In both, it is of the lowest order of
merit.
"What I mean to say is, that it is the mingled epigram and melodrame of the
idea, that Marie Rogêt still lives, rather than any true plausibility in this
idea, which have suggested it to L'Etoile, and secured it a favorable
reception with the public. Let us examine the heads of this journal's
argument; endeavoring to avoid the incoherence with which it is originally
set forth.
"The first aim of the writer is to show, from the brevity of the interval
between Marie's disappearance and the finding of the floating corpse, that
this corpse cannot be that of Marie. The reduction of this interval to its
smallest possible dimension, becomes thus, at once, an object with the
reasoner. In the rash pursuit of this object, he rushes into mere assumption
at the outset. 'It is folly to suppose,' he says, 'that the murder, if murder was
committed on her body, could have been consummated soon enough to
have enabled her murderers to throw the body into the river before
midnight.' We demand at once, and very naturally, why? Why is it folly to
suppose that the murder was committed within five minutes after the girl's
quitting her mother's house? Why is it folly to suppose that the murder was
committed at any given period of the day? There have been assassinations
at all hours. But, had the murder taken place at any moment between nine
o'clock in the morning of Sunday, and a quarter before midnight, there
would still have been time enough ''to throw the body into the river before
midnight.' This assumption, then, amounts precisely to this - that the
murder was not committed on Sunday at all - and, if we allow L'Etoile to
assume this, we may permit it any liberties whatever. The paragraph
beginning 'It is folly to suppose that the murder, etc.,' however it appears as
printed in L'Etoile, may be imagined to have existed actually thus in the
brain of its inditer - 'It is folly to suppose that the murder, if murder was
committed on the body, could have been committed soon enough to have
enabled her murderers to throw the body into the river before midnight; it is
folly, we say, to suppose all this, and to suppose at the same time, (as we
are resolved to suppose,) that the body was not thrown in until after
midnight' -- a sentence sufficiently inconsequential in itself, but not so
utterly preposterous as the one printed.
"Were it my purpose," continued Dupin, "merely to make out a case against

this passage of L'Etoile's argument, I might safely leave it where it is. It is
not, however, with L'Etoile that we have to do, but with the truth. The
sentence in question has but one meaning, as it stands; and this meaning I
have fairly stated: but it is material that we go behind the mere words, for
an idea which these words have obviously intended, and failed to convey. It
was the design of the journalist to say that, at whatever period of the day or
night of Sunday this murder was committed, it was improbable that the
assassins would have ventured to bear the corpse to the river before
midnight. And herein lies, really, the assumption of which I complain. It is
assumed that the murder was committed at such a position, and under such
circumstances, that the bearing it to the river became necessary. Now, the
assassination might have taken place upon the river's brink, or on the river
itself; and, thus, the throwing the corpse in the water might have been
resorted to, at any period of the day or night, as the most obvious and most
immediate mode of disposal. You will understand that I suggest nothing
here as probable, or as c incident with my own opinion. My design, so far,
has no reference to the facts of the case. I wish merely to caution you
against the whole tone of L'Etoile's suggestion, by calling your attention to
its ex parte character at the outset.
"Having prescribed thus a limit to suit its own preconceived notions; having
assumed that, if this were the body of Marie, it could have been in the water
but a very brief time; the journal goes on to say:
'All experience has shown that drowned bodies, or bodies thrown into the
water immediately after death by violence, require from six to ten days for
sufficient decomposition to take place to bring them to the top of the water.
Even when a cannon is fired over a corpse, and it rises before at least five
or six days' immersion, it sinks again if let alone.'
"These assertions have been tacitly received by every paper in Paris, with
the exception of Le Moniteur. {*15} This latter print endeavors to combat
that portion of the paragraph which has reference to 'drowned bodies' only,
by citing some five or six instances in which the bodies of individuals
known to be drowned were found floating after the lapse of less time than
is insisted upon by L'Etoile. But there is something excessively
unphilosophical in the attempt on the part of Le Moniteur, to rebut the
general assertion of L'Etoile, by a citation of particular instances militating
against that assertion. Had it been possible to adduce fifty instead of five
examples of bodies found floating at the end of two or three days, these
fifty examples could still have been properly regarded only as exceptions to
L'Etoile's rule, until such time as the rule itself should be confuted.
Admitting the rule, (and this Le Moniteur does not deny, insisting merely
upon its exceptions,) the argument of L'Etoile is suffered to remain in full
force; for this argument does not pretend to involve more than a question of
the probability of the body having risen to the surface in less than three
days; and this probability will be in favor of L'Etoile's position until the
instances so childishly adduced shall be sufficient in number to establish an
antagonistical rule.
"You will see at once that all argument upon this head should be urged, if at
all, against the rule itself; and for this end we must examine the rationale of
the rule. Now the human body, in general, is neither much lighter nor much
heavier than the water of the Seine; that is to say, the specific gravity of the
human body, in its natural condition, is about equal to the bulk of fresh
water which it displaces. The bodies of fat and fleshy persons, with small
bones, and of women generally, are lighter than those of the lean and
large-boned, and of men; and the specific gravity of the water of a river is
somewhat influenced by the presence of the tide from sea. But, leaving this
tide out of question, it may be said that very few human bodies will sink at
all, even in fresh water, of their own accord. Almost any one, falling into a
river, will be enabled to float, if he suffer the specific gravity of the water
fairly to be adduced in comparison with his own - that is to say, if he suffer
his whole person to be immersed, with as little exception as possible. The
proper position for one who cannot swim, is the upright position of the
walker on land, with the head thrown fully back, and immersed; the mouth
and nostrils alone remaining above the surface. Thus circumstanced, we

shall find that we float without difficulty and without exertion. It is evident,
however, that the gravities of the body, and of the bulk of water displaced,
are very nicely balanced, and that a trifle will cause either to preponderate.
An arm, for instance, uplifted from the water, and thus deprived of its
support, is an additional weight sufficient to immerse the whole head, while
the accidental aid of the smallest piece of timber will enable us to elevate
the head so as to look about. Now, in the struggles of one unused to
swimming, the arms are invariably thrown upwards, while an attempt is
made to keep the head in its usual perpendicular position. The result is the
immersion of the mouth and nostrils, and the inception, during efforts to
breathe while beneath the surface, of water into the lungs. Much is also
received into the stomach, and the whole body becomes heavier by the
difference between the weight of the air originally distending these cavities,
and that of the fluid which now fills them. This difference is sufficient to
cause the body to sink, as a general rule; but is insufficient in the cases of
individuals with small bones and an abnormal quantity of flaccid or fatty
matter. Such individuals float even after drowning.
"The corpse, being. supposed at the bottom of the river, will there remain
until, by some means, its specific gravity again becomes less than that of
the bulk of water which it displaces. This effect is brought about by
decomposition, or otherwise. The result of decomposition is the generation
of gas, distending the cellular tissues and all the cavities, and giving the
puffedappearance which is to horrible. When this distension has so far
progressed that the bulk of the corpse is materially increased with. out a
corresponding increase of mass or weight, its specific gravity becomes less
than that of the water displaced, and it forthwith makes its appearance at
the surface. But decomposition is modified by innumerable circumstances -
is hastened or retarded by innumerable agencies; for example, by the heat
or cold of the season, by the mineral impregnation or purity of the water, by
its depth or shallowness, by its currency or stagnation, by the temperament
of the body, by its infection or freedom from disease before death. Thus it
is evident that we can assign no period, with any thing like accuracy, at
which the corpse shall rise through decomposition. Under certain
conditions this result would be brought about within an hour; under others,
it might not take place at all. There are chemical infusions by which the
animal frame can be preserved foreverfrom corruption; the Bi-chloride of
Mercury is one. But, apart from decomposition, there may be, and very
usually is, a generation of gas within the stomach, from the acetous
fermentation of vegetable matter (or within other cavities from other
causes) sufficient to induce a distension which will bring the body to the
surface. The effect produced by the firing of a cannon is that of simple
vibration. This may either loosen the corpse from the soft mud or ooze in
which it is imbedded, thus permitting it to rise when other agencies have
already prepared it for so doing; or it may overcome the tenacity of some
putrescent portions of the cellular tissue; allowing the cavities to distend
under the influence of the gas.
"Having thus before us the whole philosophy of this subject, we can easily
test by it the assertions of L'Etoile. 'All experience shows,' says this paper,
'that drowned bodies, or bodies thrown into the water immediately after
death by violence, require from six to ten days for sufficient decomposition
to take place to bring them to the top of the water. Even when a cannon is
fired over a corpse, and it rises before at least five or six days' immersion, it
sinks again if let alone.'
"The whole of this paragraph must now appear a tissue of inconsequence

and incoherence. All experience does not show that 'drowned bodies'
require from six to ten days for sufficient decomposition to take place to
bring them to the surface. Both science and experience show that the period
of their rising is, and necessarily must be, indeterminate. If, moreover, a
body has risen to the surface through firing of cannon, it will not 'sink again
if let alone,' until decomposition has so far progressed as to permit the
escape of the generated gas. But I wish to call your attention to the
distinction which is made between 'drowned bodies,' and 'bodies thrown
into the water immediately after death by violence.' Although the writer
admits the distinction, he yet includes them all in the same category. I have
shown how it is that the body of a drowning man becomes specifically
heavier than its bulk of water, and that he would not sink at all, except for
the struggles by which he elevates his arms above the surface, and his gasps
for breath while beneath the surface - gasps which supply by water the
place of the original air in the lungs. But these struggles and these gasps
would not occur in the body 'thrown into the water immediately after death
by violence.' Thus, in the latter instance, the body, as a general rule, would
not sink at all - a fact of which L'Etoile is evidently ignorant. When
decomposition had proceeded to a very great extent - when the flesh had in
a great measure left the bones - then, indeed, but not till then, should we
lose sight of the corpse.
"And now what are we to make of the argument, that the body found could
not be that of Marie Rogêt, because, three days only having elapsed, this
body was found floating? If drowned, being a woman, she might never
have sunk; or having sunk, might have reappeared in twenty-four hours, or
less. But no one supposes her to have been drowned; and, dying before
being thrown into the river, she might have been found floating at any
period afterwards whatever.
" 'But,' says L'Etoile, 'if the body had been kept in its mangled state on
shore until Tuesday night, some trace would be found on shore of the
murderers.' Here it is at first difficult to perceive the intention of the
reasoner. He means to anticipate what he imagines would be an objection to
his theory - viz: that the body was kept on shore two days, suffering rapid
decomposition - morerapid than if immersed in water. He supposes that,
had this been the case, it might have appeared at the surface on the
Wednesday, and thinks that only under such circumstances it could so have
appeared. He is accordingly in haste to show that it was not kept on shore;
for, if so, 'some trace would be found on shore of the murderers.' I presume
you smile at the sequitur. You cannot be made to see how the mere duration
of the corpse on the shore could operate to multiply traces of the assassins.
Nor can I.
" 'And furthermore it is exceedingly improbable,' continues our journal,

'that any villains who had committed such a murder as is here supposed,
would have thrown the body in without weight to sink it, when such a
precaution could have so easily been taken.' Observe, here, the laughable
confusion of thought! No one - not even L'Etoile - disputes the murder
committed on the body found. The marks of violence are too obvious. It is
our reasoner's object merely to show that this body is not Marie's. He
wishes to prove that Marie is not assassinated - not that the corpse was not.
Yet his observation proves only the latter point. Here is a corpse without
weight attached. Murderers, casting it in, would not have failed to attach a
weight. Therefore it was not thrown in by murderers. This is all which is
proved, if any thing is. The question of identity is not even approached, and
L'Etoile has been at great pains merely to gainsay now what it has admitted
only a moment before. 'We are perfectly convinced,' it says, 'that the body
found was that of a murdered female.'
"Nor is this the sole instance, even in this division of his subject, where our
reasoner unwittingly reasons against himself. His evident object, I have
already said, is to reduce, us much as possible, the interval between Marie's
disappearance and the finding of the corpse. Yet we find him urging the
point that no person saw the girl from the moment of her leaving her
mother's house. 'We have no evidence,' he says, 'that Marie Rogêt was in
the land of the living after nine o'clock on Sunday, June the twenty-second.'
As his argument is obviously an ex parte one, he should, at least, have left
this matter out of sight; for had any one been known to see Marie, say on
Monday, or on Tuesday, the interval in question would have been much
reduced, and, by his own ratiocination, the probability much diminished of
the corpse being that of the grisette. It is, nevertheless, amusing to observe
that L'Etoile insists upon its point in the full belief of its furthering its
general argument.
"Reperuse now that portion of this argument which has reference to the
identification of the corpse by Beauvais. In regard to the hair upon the arm,
L'Etoile has been obviously disingenuous. M. Beauvais, not being an idiot,
could never have urged, in identification of the corpse, simply hair upon its
arm. No arm is without hair. The generality of the expression of L'Etoile is
a mere perversion of the witness' phraseology. He must have spoken of
some peculiarity in this hair. It must have been a peculiarity of color, of
quantity, of length, or of situation.
" 'Her foot,' says the journal, 'was small - so are thousands of feet. Her
garter is no proof whatever - nor is her shoe - for shoes and garters are sold
in packages. The same may be said of the flowers in her hat. One thing
upon which M. Beauvais strongly insists is, that the clasp on the garter
found, had been set back to take it in. This amounts to nothing; for most
women find it proper to take a pair of garters home and fit them to the size
of the limbs they are to encircle, rather than to try them in the store where
they purchase.' Here it is difficult to suppose the reasoner in earnest. Had
M. Beauvais, in his search for the body of Marie, discovered a corpse
corresponding in general size and appearance to the missing girl, he would
have been warranted (without reference to the question of habiliment at all)
in forming an opinion that his search had been successful. If, in addition to
the point of general size and contour, he had found upon the arm a peculiar
hairy appearance which he had observed upon the living Marie, his opinion
might have been justly strengthened; and the increase of positiveness might
well have been in the ratio of the peculiarity, or unusualness, of the hairy
mark. If, the feet of Marie being small, those of the corpse were also small,
the increase of probability that the body was that of Marie would not be an
increase in a ratio merely arithmetical, but in one highly geometrical, or
accumulative. Add to all this shoes such as she had been known to wear
upon the day of her disappearance, and, although these shoes may be 'sold
in packages,' you so far augment the probability as to verge upon the
certain. What, of itself, would be no evidence of identity, becomes through
its corroborative position, proof most sure. Give us, then, flowers in the hat
corresponding to those worn by the missing girl, and we seek for nothing
farther. If only one flower, we seek for nothing farther - what then if two or
three, or more? Each successive one is multiple evidence - proof not added
to proof, but multiplied by hundreds or thousands. Let us now discover,
upon the deceased, garters such as the living used, and it is almost folly to
proceed. But these garters are found to be tightened, by the setting back of
a clasp, in just such a manner as her own had been tightened by Marie,
shortly previous to her leaving home. It is now madness or hypocrisy to
doubt. What L'Etoile says in respect to this abbreviation of the garter's
being an usual occurrence, shows nothing beyond its own pertinacity in
error. The elastic nature of the clasp-garter is self-demonstration of the
unusualness of the abbreviation. What is made to adjust itself, must of
necessity require foreign adjustment but rarely. It must have been by an
accident, in its strictest sense, that these garters of Marie needed the
tightening described. They alone would have amply established her

identity. But it is not that the corpse was found to have the garters of the
missing girl, or found to have her shoes, or her bonnet, or the flowers of her
bonnet, or her feet, or a peculiar mark upon the arm, or her general size and
appearance - it is that the corpse had each, and all collectively. Could it be
proved that the editor of L'Etoile really entertained a doubt, under the
circumstances, there would be no need, in his case, of a commission de
lunatico inquirendo. He has thought it sagacious to echo the small talk of
the lawyers, who, for the most part, content themselves with echoing the
rectangular precepts of the courts. I would here observe that very much of
what is rejected as evidence by a court, is the best of evidence to the
intellect. For the court, guiding itself by the general principles of evidence -
the recognized and booked principles - is averse from swerving at particular
instances. And this steadfast adherence to principle, with rigorous disregard
of the conflicting exception, is a sure mode of attaining the maximum of
attainable truth, in any long sequence of time. The practice, in mass, is
therefore philosophical; but it is not the less certain that it engenders vast
individual error. {*16}
"In respect to the insinuations levelled at Beauvais, you will be willing to

dismiss them in a breath. You have already fathomed the true character of
this good gentleman. He is a busy-body, with much of romance and little of
wit. Any one so constituted will readily so conduct himself, upon occasion
of real excitement, as to render himself liable to suspicion on the part of the
over acute, or the ill- disposed. M. Beauvais (as it appears from your notes)
had some personal interviews with the editor of L'Etoile, and offended him
by venturing an opinion that the corpse, notwithstanding the theory of the
editor, was, in sober fact, that of Marie. 'He persists,' says the paper, 'in
asserting the corpse to be that of Marie, but cannot give a circumstance, in
addition to those which we have commented upon, to make others believe.'
Now, without re-adverting to the fact that stronger evidence 'to make others
believe,' could never have been adduced, it may be remarked that a man
may very well be understood to believe, in a case of this kind, without the
ability to advance a single reason for the belief of a second party. Nothing
is more vague than impressions of individual identity. Each man recognizes
his neighbor, yet there are few instances in which any one is prepared to
give a reason for his recognition. The editor of L'Etoile had no right to be
offended at M. Beauvais' unreasoning belief.
"The suspicious circumstances which invest him, will be found to tally

much better with my hypothesis of romantic busy-bodyism, than with the
reasoner's suggestion of guilt. Once adopting the more charitable
interpretation, we shall find no difficulty in comprehending the rose in the
key-hole; the 'Marie' upon the slate; the 'elbowing the male relatives out of
the way;' the 'aversion to permitting them to see the body;' the caution
given to Madame B----, that she must hold no conversation with the
gendarmeuntil his return (Beauvais'); and, lastly, his apparent determination
'that nobody should have anything to do with the proceedings except
himself.' It seems to me unquestionable that Beauvais was a suitor of
Marie's; that she coquetted with him; and that he was ambitious of being
thought to enjoy her fullest intimacy and confidence. I shall say nothing
more upon this point; and, as the evidence fully rebuts the assertion of
L'Etoile, touching the matter of apathy on the part of the mother and other
relatives - an apathy inconsistent with the supposition of their believing the
corpse to be that of the perfumery- girl - we shall now proceed as if the
question of identity were settled to our perfect satisfaction."
"And what," I here demanded, "do you think of the opinions of Le

Commerciel?"
"That, in spirit, they are far more worthy of attention than any which have
been promulgated upon the subject. The deductions from the premises are
philosophical and acute; but the premises, in two instances, at least, are
founded in imperfect observation. Le Commerciel wishes to intimate that
Marie was seized by some gang of low ruffians not far from her mother's
door. 'It is impossible,' it urges, 'that a person so well known to thousands
as this young woman was, should have passed three blocks without some
one having seen her.' This is the idea of a man long resident in Paris - a
public man - and one whose walks to and fro in the city, have been mostly
limited to the vicinity of the public offices. He is aware that he seldom
passes so far as a dozen blocks from his own bureau, without being
recognized and accosted. And, knowing the extent of his personal
acquaintance with others, and of others with him, he compares his notoriety
with that of the perfumery-girl, finds no great difference between them, and
reaches at once the conclusion that she, in her walks, would be equally
liable to recognition with himself in his. This could only be the case were
her walks of the same unvarying, methodical character, and within the same
species of limited region as are his own. He passes to and fro, at regular
intervals, within a confined periphery, abounding in individuals who are led
to observation of his person through interest in the kindred nature of his
occupation with their own. But the walks of Marie may, in general, be
supposed discursive. In this particular instance, it will be understood as
most probable, that she proceeded upon a route of more than average
diversity from her accustomed ones. The parallel which we imagine to have
existed in the mind of Le Commerciel would only be sustained in the event
of the two individuals' traversing the whole city. In this case, granting the
personal acquaintances to be equal, the chances would be also equal that an
equal number of personal rencounters would be made. For my own part, I
should hold it not only as possible, but as very far more than probable, that
Marie might have proceeded, at any given period, by any one of the many
routes between her own residence and that of her aunt, without meeting a
single individual whom she knew, or by whom she was known. In viewing
this question in its full and proper light, we must hold steadily in mind the
great disproportion between the personal acquaintances of even the most
noted individual in Paris, and the entire population of Paris itself.
"But whatever force there may still appear to be in the suggestion of Le

Commerciel, will be much diminished when we take into consideration the
hour at which the girl went abroad. 'It was when the streets were full of
people,' says Le Commerciel, 'that she went out.' But not so. It was at nine
o'clock in the morning. Now at nine o'clock of every morning in the week,
with the exception of Sunday, the streets of the city are, it is true, thronged
with people. At nine on Sunday, the populace are chiefly within doors
preparing for church. No observing person can have failed to notice the
peculiarly deserted air of the town, from about eight until ten on the
morning of every Sabbath. Between ten and eleven the streets are thronged,
but not at so early a period as that designated.
"There is another point at which there seems a deficiency of observation on

the part of Le Commerciel. 'A piece,' it says, 'of one of the unfortunate girl's
petticoats, two feet long, and one foot wide, was torn out and tied under her
chin, and around the back of her head, probably to prevent screams. This
was done, by fellows who had no pocket-handkerchiefs.' Whether this idea
is, or is not well founded, we will endeavor to see hereafter; but by 'fellows
who have no pocket-handkerchiefs' the editor intends the lowest class of
ruffians. These, however, are the very description of people who will
always be found to have handkerchiefs even when destitute of shirts. You
must have had occasion to observe how absolutely indispensable, of late
years, to the thorough blackguard, has become the pocket-handkerchief."
"And what are we to think," I asked, "of the article in Le Soleil?"
"That it is a vast pity its inditer was not born a parrot - in which case he
would have been the most illustrious parrot of his race. He has merely
repeated the individual items of the already published opinion; collecting
them, with a laudable industry, from this paper and from that. 'The things
had all evidently been there,' he says,'at least, three or four weeks, and there
can be no doubt that the spot of this appalling outrage has been discovered.'
The facts here re-stated by Le Soleil, are very far indeed from removing my
own doubts upon this subject, and we will examine them more particularly
hereafter in connexion with another division of the theme.
"At present we must occupy ourselves with other investigations You cannot
fail to have remarked the extreme laxity of the examination of the corpse.
To be sure, the question of identity was readily determined, or should have
been; but there were other points to be ascertained. Had the body been in
any respect despoiled? Had the deceased any articles of jewelry about her
person upon leaving home? if so, had she any when found? These are
important questions utterly untouched by the evidence; and there are others
of equal moment, which have met with no attention. We must endeavor to
satisfy ourselves by personal inquiry. The case of St. Eustache must be
re-examined. I have no suspicion of this person; but let us proceed
methodically. We will ascertain beyond a doubt the validity of the
affidavits in regard to his whereabouts on the Sunday. Affidavits of this
character are readily made matter of mystification. Should there be nothing

wrong here, however, we will dismiss St. Eustache from our investigations.
His suicide, however corroborative of suspicion, were there found to be
deceit in the affidavits, is, without such deceit, in no respect an
unaccountable circumstance, or one which need cause us to deflect from the
line of ordinary analysis.
"In that which I now propose, we will discard the interior points of this
tragedy, and concentrate our attention upon its outskirts. Not the least usual
error, in investigations such as this, is the limiting of inquiry to the
immediate, with total disregard of the collateral or circumstantial events. It
is the mal-practice of the courts to confine evidence and discussion to the
bounds of apparent relevancy. Yet experience has shown, and a true
philosophy will always show, that a vast, perhaps the larger portion of
truth, arises from the seemingly irrelevant. It is through the spirit of this
principle, if not precisely through its letter, that modern science has
resolved to calculate upon the unforeseen. But perhaps you do not
comprehend me. The history of human knowledge has so uninterruptedly
shown that to collateral, or incidental, or accidental events we are indebted
for the most numerous and most valuable discoveries, that it has at length
become necessary, in any prospective view of improvement, to make not
only large, but the largest allowances for inventions that shall arise by
chance, and quite out of the range of ordinary expectation. It is no longer
philosophical to base, upon what has been, a vision of what is to be.
Accident is admitted as a portion of the substructure. We make chance a
matter of absolute calculation. We subject the unlooked for and
unimagined, to the mathematical formulae of the schools.
"I repeat that it is no more than fact, that the larger portion of all truth has
sprung from the collateral; and it is but in accordance with the spirit of the
principle involved in this fact, that I would divert inquiry, in the present
case, from the trodden and hitherto unfruitful ground of the event itself, to
the contemporary circumstances which surround it. While you ascertain the
validity of the affidavits, I will examine the newspapers more generally
than you have as yet done. So far, we have only reconnoitred the field of
investigation; but it will be strange indeed if a comprehensive survey, such
as I propose, of the public prints, will not afford us some minute points
which shall establish a direction for inquiry."
In pursuance of Dupin's suggestion, I made scrupulous examination of the

affair of the affidavits. The result was a firm conviction of their validity,
and of the consequent innocence of St. Eustache. In the mean time my
friend occupied himself, with what seemed to me a minuteness altogether
objectless, in a scrutiny of the various newspaper files. At the end of a
week he placed before me the following extracts:
"About three years and a half ago, a disturbance very similar to the present,
was caused by the disappearance of this same Marie Rogêt, from the
parfumerie of Monsieur Le Blanc, in the Palais Royal. At the end of a
week, however, she re-appeared at her customary comptoir, as well as ever,
with the exception of a slight paleness not altogether usual. It was given out
by Monsieur Le Blanc and her mother, that she had merely been on a visit
to some friend in the country; and the affair was speedily hushed up. We
presume that the present absence is a freak of the same nature, and that, at
the expiration of a week, or perhaps of a month, we shall have her among
us again." - Evening Paper - Monday June 23. {*17}
"An evening journal of yesterday, refers to a former mysterious

disappearance of Mademoiselle Rogêt. It is well known that, during the
week of her absence from Le Blanc's parfumerie, she was in the company
of a young naval officer, much noted for his debaucheries. A quarrel, it is
supposed, providentially led to her return home. We have the name of the
Lothario in question, who is, at present, stationed in Paris, but, for obvious
reasons, forbear to make it public." - Le Mercurie - Tuesday Morning, June
24. {*18}
"An outrage of the most atrocious character was perpetrated near this city
the day before yesterday. A gentleman, with his wife and daughter,
engaged, about dusk, the services of six young men, who were idly rowing
a boat to and fro near the banks of the Seine, to convey him across the
river. Upon reaching the opposite shore, the three passengers stepped out,
and had proceeded so far as to be beyond the view of the boat, when the
daughter discovered that she had left in it her parasol. She returned for it,
was seized by the gang, carried out into the stream, gagged, brutally
treated, and finally taken to the shore at a point not far from that at which
she had originally entered the boat with her parents. The villains have
escaped for the time, but the police are upon their trail, and some of them
will soon be taken." - Morning Paper - June 25. {*19}
"We have received one or two communications, the object of which is to

fasten the crime of the late atrocity upon Mennais; {*20} but as this
gentleman has been fully exonerated by a loyal inquiry, and as the
arguments of our several correspondents appear to be more zealous than
profound, we do not think it advisable to make them public." - Morning
Paper - June 28. {*21}
"We have received several forcibly written communications, apparently

from various sources, and which go far to render it a matter of certainty that
the unfortunate Marie Rogêt has become a victim of one of the numerous
bands of blackguards which infest the vicinity of the city upon Sunday. Our
own opinion is decidedly in favor of this supposition. We shall endeavor to
make room for some of these arguments hereafter." - Evening Paper -
Tuesday, June 31. {*22}
"On Monday, one of the bargemen connected with the revenue service, saw
a empty boat floating down the Seine. Sails were lying in the bottom of the
boat. The bargeman towed it under the barge office. The next morning it
was taken from thence, without the knowledge of any of the officers. The
rudder is now at the barge office." - Le Diligence - Thursday, June 26. ß
Upon reading these various extracts, they not only seemed to me irrelevant,
but I could perceive no mode in which any one of them could be brought to
bear upon the matter in hand. I waited for some explanation from Dupin.
"It is not my present design," he said, "to dwell upon the first and second of
those extracts. I have copied them chiefly to show you the extreme
remissness of the police, who, as far as I can understand from the Prefect,
have not troubled themselves, in any respect, with an examination of the
naval officer alluded to. Yet it is mere folly to say that between the first and
second disappearance of Marie, there is no supposable connection. Let us
admit the first elopement to have resulted in a quarrel between the lovers,
and the return home of the betrayed. We are now prepared to view a second
elopement (if we know that an elopement has again taken place) as
indicating a renewal of the betrayer's advances, rather than as the result of
new proposals by a second individual - we are prepared to regard it as a
'making up' of the old amour, rather than as the commencement of a new
one. The chances are ten to one, that he who had once eloped with Marie,
would again propose an elopement, rather than that she to whom proposals
of elopement had been made by one individual, should have them made to
her by another. And here let me call your attention to the fact, that the time
elapsing between the first ascertained, and the second supposed elopement,
is a few months more than the general period of the cruises of our
men-of-war. Had the lover been interrupted in his first villany by the
necessity of departure to sea, and had he seized the first moment of his
return to renew the base designs not yet altogether accomplished - or not
yet altogether accomplished by him? Of all these things we know nothing.
"You will say, however, that, in the second instance, there was no
elopement as imagined. Certainly not - but are we prepared to say that there
was not the frustrated design? Beyond St. Eustache, and perhaps Beauvais,
we find no recognized, no open, no honorable suitors of Marie. Of none
other is there any thing said. Who, then, is the secret lover, of whom the
relatives (at least most of them) know nothing, but whom Marie meets upon
the morning of Sunday, and who is so deeply in her confidence, that she
hesitates not to remain with him until the shades of the evening descend,
amid the solitary groves of the BarriËre du Roule? Who is that secret lover,
I ask, of whom, at least, most of the relatives know nothing? And what
means the singular prophecy of Madame Rogêt on the morning of Marie's
departure? -- 'I fear that I shall never see Marie again.'
"But if we cannot imagine Madame Rogêt privy to the design of elopement,

may we not at least suppose this design entertained by the girl? Upon
quitting home, she gave it to be understood that she was about to visit her
aunt in the Rue des Drômes and St. Eustache was requested to call for her
at dark. Now, at first glance, this fact strongly militates against my

suggestion; - but let us reflect. That she did meet some companion, and
proceed with him across the river, reaching the BarriËre du Roule at so late
an hour as three o'clock in the afternoon, is known. But in consenting so to
accompany this individual, (for whatever purpose -- to her mother known
or unknown,) she must have thought of her expressed intention when
leaving home, and of the surprise and suspicion aroused in the bosom of
her affianced suitor, St. Eustache, when, calling for her, at the hour
appointed, in the Rue des Drômes, he should find that she had not been
there, and when, moreover, upon returning to the pension with this
alarming intelligence, he should become aware of her continued absence
from home. She must have thought of these things, I say. She must have
foreseen the chagrin of St. Eustache, the suspicion of all. She could not
have thought of returning to brave this suspicion; but the suspicion
becomes a point of trivial importance to her, if we suppose her not
intending to return.
"We may imagine her thinking thus - 'I am to meet a certain person for the
purpose of elopement, or for certain other purposes known only to myself.
It is necessary that there be no chance of interruption - there must be
sufficient time given us to elude pursuit - I will give it to be understood that
I shall visit and spend the day with my aunt at the Rue des Drômes - I well
tell St. Eustache not to call for me until dark - in this way, my absence from
home for the longest possible period, without causing suspicion or anxiety,
will be accounted for, and I shall gain more time than in any other manner.
If I bid St. Eustache call for me at dark, he will be sure not to call before;
but, if I wholly neglect to bid him call, my time for escape will be
diminished, since it will be expected that I return the earlier, and my
absence will the sooner excite anxiety. Now, if it were my design to return
at all - if I had in contemplation merely a stroll with the individual in
question - it would not be my policy to bid St. Eustache call; for, calling, he
will be sure to ascertain that I have played him false - a fact of which I
might keep him for ever in ignorance, by leaving home without notifying
him of my intention, by returning before dark, and by then stating that I had
been to visit my aunt in the Rue des Drômes. But, as it is my design never
to return - or not for some weeks - or not until certain concealments are
effected - the gaining of time is the only point about which I need give
myself any concern.'
"You have observed, in your notes, that the most general opinion in relation
to this sad affair is, and was from the first, that the girl had been the victim
of a gang of blackguards. Now, the popular opinion, under certain
conditions, is not to be disregarded. When arising of itself -- when
manifesting itself in a strictly spontaneous manner -- we should look upon
it as analogous with that intuition which is the idiosyncrasy of the
individual man of genius. In ninety-nine cases from the hundred I would
abide by its decision. But it is important that we find no palpable traces of
suggestion. The opinion must be rigorously the public's own; and the
distinction is often exceedingly difficult to perceive and to maintain. In the
present instance, it appears to me that this 'public opinion' in respect to a
gang, has been superinduced by the collateral event which is detailed in the
third of my extracts. All Paris is excited by the discovered corpse of Marie,
a girl young, beautiful and notorious. This corpse is found, bearing marks
of violence, and floating in the river. But it is now made known that, at the
very period, or about the very period, in which it is supposed that the girl
was assassinated, an outrage similar in nature to that endured by the
deceased, although less in extent, was perpetuated, by a gang of young
ruffians, upon the person of a second young female. Is it wonderful that the
one known atrocity should influence the popular judgment in regard to the
other unknown? This judgment awaited direction, and the known outrage
seemed so opportunely to afford it! Marie, too, was found in the river; and
upon this very river was this known outrage committed. The connexion of
the two events had about it so much of the palpable, that the true wonder
would have been a failure of the populace to appreciate and to seize it. But,
in fact, the one atrocity, known to be so committed, is, if any thing,
evidence that the other, committed at a time nearly coincident, was not so
committed. It would have been a miracle indeed, if, while a gang of
ruffians were perpetrating, at a given locality, a most unheard-of wrong,
there should have been another similar gang, in a similar locality, in the
same city, under the same circumstances, with the same means and
appliances, engaged in a wrong of precisely the same aspect, at precisely
the same period of time! Yet in what, if not in this marvellous train of
coincidence, does the accidentally suggested opinion of the populace call

upon us to believe?
"Before proceeding farther, let us consider the supposed scene of the

assassination, in the thicket at the BarriËre du Roule. This thicket, although
dense, was in the close vicinity of a public road. Within were three or four
large stones, forming a kind of seat with a back and footstool. On the upper
stone was discovered a white petticoat; on the second, a silk scarf. A
parasol, gloves, and a pocket-handkerchief, were also here found. The
handkerchief bore the name, 'Marie Rogêt.' Fragments of dress were seen
on the branches around. The earth was trampled, the bushes were broken,
and there was every evidence of a violent struggle.
"Notwithstanding the acclamation with which the discovery of this thicket

was received by the press, and the unanimity with which it was supposed to
indicate the precise scene of the outrage, it must be admitted that there was
some very good reason for doubt. That it was the scene, I may or I may not
believe - but there was excellent reason for doubt. Had the true scene been,
as Le Commerciel suggested, in the neighborhood of the Rue Pavée St.
Andrée, the perpetrators of the crime, supposing them still resident in Paris,
would naturally have been stricken with terror at the public attention thus
acutely directed into the proper channel; and, in certain classes of minds,
there would have arisen, at once, a sense of the necessity of some exertion
to redivert this attention. And thus, the thicket of the BarriËre du Roule
having been already suspected, the idea of placing the articles where they
were found, might have been naturally entertained. There is no real
evidence, although Le Soleil so supposes, that the articles discovered had
been more than a very few days in the thicket; while there is much
circumstantial proof that they could not have remained there, without
attracting attention, during the twenty days elapsing between the fatal
Sunday and the afternoon upon which they were found by the boys. 'They
were all mildeweddown hard,' says Le Soleil, adopting the opinions of its
predecessors, 'with the action of the rain, and stuck together from mildew.
The grass had grown around and over some of them. The silk of the parasol
was strong, but the threads of it were run together within. The upper part,
where it bad been doubled and folded, was all mildewed and rotten, and
tore on being opened.' In respect to the grass having '.grown around and
over some of them,' it is obvious that the fact could only have been
ascertained from the words, and thus from the recollections, of two small
boys; for these boys removed the articles and took them home before they
had been seen by a third party. But grass will grow, especially in warm and
damp weather, (such as was that of the period of the murder,) as much as
two or three inches in a single day. A parasol lying upon a newly turfed
ground, might, in a single week, be entirely concealed from sight by the
upspringing grass. And touching that mildew upon which the editor of Le
Soleil so pertinaciously insists, that he employs the word no less than three
times in the brief paragraph just quoted, is be really unaware of the nature
of this mildew? Is he to be told that it is one of the many classes of fungus,
of which the most ordinary feature is its upspringing and decadence within
twenty-four hours?
"Thus we see, at a glance, that what has been most triumphantly adduced in
support of the idea that the articles bad been 'for at least three or four
weeks' in the thicket, is most absurdly null as regards any evidence of that
fact. On the other hand, it is exceedingly difficult to believe that these
articles could have remained in the thicket specified, for a longer period
than a single week - for a longer period than from one Sunday to the next.
Those who know any thing of the vicinity of Paris, know the extreme
difficulty of finding seclusion unless at a great distance from its suburbs.
Such a thing as an unexplored, or even an unfrequently visited recess, amid
its woods or groves, is not for a moment to be imagined. Let any one who,
being at heart a lover of nature, is yet chained by duty to the dust and heat
of this great metropolis - let any such one attempt, even during the
weekdays, to slake his thirst for solitude amid the scenes of natural
loveliness which immediately surround us. At every second step, he will
find the growing charm dispelled by the voice and personal intrusion of
some ruffian or party of carousing blackguards. He will seek privacy amid
the densest foliage, all in vain. Here are the very nooks where the unwashed
most abound - here are the temples most desecrate. With sickness of the
heart the wanderer will flee back to the polluted Paris as to a less odious
because less incongruous sink of pollution. But if the vicinity of the city is
so beset during the working days of the week, how much more so on the
Sabbath! It is now especially that, released from the claims of labor, or

deprived of the customary opportunities of crime, the town blackguard
seeks the precincts of the town, not through love of the rural, which in his
heart he despises, but by way of escape from the restraints and
conventionalities of society. He desires less the fresh air and the green
trees, than the utter license of the country. Here, at the road-side inn, or
beneath the foliage of the woods, he indulges, unchecked by any eye except
those of his boon companions, in all the mad excess of a counterfeit hilarity
- the joint offspring of liberty and of rum. I say nothing more than what
must be obvious to every dispassionate observer, when I repeat that the
circumstance of the articles in question having remained undiscovered, for
a longer period - than from one Sunday to another, in any thicket in the
immediate neighborhood of Paris, is to be looked upon as little less than
miraculous.
"But there are not wanting other grounds for the suspicion that the articles
were placed in the thicket with the view of diverting attention from the real
scene of the outrage. And, first, let me direct your notice to the date of the
discovery of the articles. Collate this with the date of the fifth extract made
by myself from the newspapers. You will find that the discovery followed,
almost immediately, the urgent communications sent to the evening paper.
These communications, although various and apparently from various
sources, tended all to the same point - viz., the directing of attention to a
gang as the perpetrators of the outrage, and to the neighborhood of the
BarriËre du Roule as its scene. Now here, of course, the suspicion is not
that, in consequence of these communications, or of the public attention by
them directed, the articles were found by the boys; but the suspicion might
and may well have been, that the articles were not before found by the
boys, for the reason that the articles had not before been in the thicket;
having been deposited there only at so late a period as at the date, or shortly
prior to the date of the communications by the guilty authors of these
communications themselves.
"This thicket was a singular - an exceedingly singular one. It was unusually

dense. Within its naturally walled enclosure were three extraordinary
stones, forming a seat with a back and footstool. And this thicket, so full of
a natural art, was in the immediate vicinity, within a few rods, of the
dwelling of Madame Deluc, whose boys were in the habit of closely
examining the shrubberies about them in search of the bark of the sassafras.
Would it be a rash wager - a wager of one thousand to one -- that a day
never passed over the heads of these boys without finding at least one of
them ensconced in the umbrageous hall, and enthroned upon its natural
throne? Those who would hesitate at such a wager, have either never been
boys themselves, or have forgotten the boyish nature. I repeat -- it is
exceedingly hard to comprehend how the articles could have remained in
this thicket undiscovered, for a longer period than one or two days; and that
thus there is good ground for suspicion, in spite of the dogmatic ignorance
of Le Soleil, that they were, at a comparatively late date, deposited where
found.
"But there are still other and stronger reasons for believing them so
deposited, than any which I have as yet urged. And, now, let me beg your
notice to the highly artificial arrangement of the articles. On the upper stone
lay a white petticoat; on the second a silk scarf; scattered around, were a
parasol, gloves, and a pocket-handkerchief bearing the name, 'Marie Rogêt.'
Here is just such an arrangement as would naturally be made by a not
over-acute person wishing to dispose the articles naturally. But it is by no
means a really natural arrangement. I should rather have looked to see the
things all lying on the ground and trampled under foot. In the narrow limits
of that bower, it would have been scarcely possible that the petticoat and
scarf should have retained a position upon the stones, when subjected to the
brushing to and fro of many struggling persons. 'There was evidence,' it is
said, 'of a struggle; and the earth was trampled, the bushes were broken,' -
but the petticoat and the scarf are found deposited as if upon shelves. 'The
pieces of the frock torn out by the bushes were about three inches wide and
six inches long. One part was the hem of the frock and it had been mended.
They looked like strips torn off.' Here, inadvertently, Le Soleil has
employed an exceedingly suspicious phrase. The pieces, as described, do
indeed 'look like strips torn off;' but purposely and by hand. It is one of the
rarest of accidents that a piece is 'torn off,' from any garment such as is now
in question, by the agency of a thorn. From the very nature of such fabrics,
a thorn or nail becoming entangled in them, tears them rectangularly -
divides them into two longitudinal rents, at right angles with each other,
and meeting at an apex where the thorn enters - but it is scarcely possible to
conceive the piece 'torn off.' I never so knew it, nor did you. To tear a piece
off from such fabric, two distinct forces, in different directions, will be, in
almost every case, required. If there be two edges to the fabric - if, for
example, it be a pocket- handkerchief, and it is desired to tear from it a slip,
then, and then only, will the one force serve the purpose. But in the present
case the question is of a dress, presenting but one edge. To tear a piece
from the interior, where no edge is presented, could only be effected by a
miracle through the agency of thorns, and no one thorn could accomplish it.
But, even where an edge is presented, two thorns will be necessary,
operating, the one in two distinct directions, and the other in one. And this
in the supposition that the edge is unhemmed. If hemmed, the matter is
nearly out of the question. We thus see the numerous and great obstacles in
the way of pieces being 'torn off' through the simple agency of 'thorns;' yet
we are required to believe not only that one piece but that many have been
so torn. 'And one part,' too, 'was the hem of the frock!' Another piece was
'part of the skirt, not the hem,' - that is to say, was torn completely out
through the agency of thorns, from the uncaged interior of the dress! These,
I say, are things which one may well be pardoned for disbelieving; yet,
taken collectedly, they form, perhaps, less of reasonable ground for
suspicion, than the one startling circumstance of the articles' having been
left in this thicket at all, by any murderers who had enough precaution to
think of removing the corpse. You will not have apprehended me rightly,
however, if you suppose it my design to deny this thicket as the scene of
the outrage. There might have been a wrong here, or, more possibly, an
accident at Madame Deluc's. But, in fact, this is a point of minor
importance. We are not engaged in an attempt to discover the scene, but to
produce the perpetrators of the murder. What I have adduced,
notwithstanding the minuteness with which I have adduced it, has been
with the view, first, to show the folly of the positive and headlong
assertions of Le Soleil, but secondly and chiefly, to bring you, by the most
natural route, to a further contemplation of the doubt whether this
assassination has, or has not been, the work of a gang.
"We will resume this question by mere allusion to the revolting details of
the surgeon examined at the inquest. It is only necessary to say that is
published inferences, in regard to the number of ruffians, have been
properly ridiculed as unjust and totally baseless, by all the reputable
anatomists of Paris. Not that the matter might not have been as inferred, but
that there was no ground for the inference: - was there not much for
another?
"Let us reflect now upon 'the traces of a struggle;' and let me ask what these
traces have been supposed to demonstrate. A gang. But do they not rather
demonstrate the absence of a gang? What struggle could have taken place -
what struggle so violent and so enduring as to have left its 'traces' in all
directions - between a weak and defenceless girl and the gang of ruffians
imagined? The silent grasp of a few rough arms and all would have been
over. The victim must have been absolutely passive at their will. You will
here bear in mind that the arguments urged against the thicket as the scene,
are applicable in chief part, only against it as the scene of an outrage
committed by more than a single individual. If we imagine but one violator,
we can conceive, and thus only conceive, the struggle of so violent and so
obstinate a nature as to have left the 'traces' apparent.
"And again. I have already mentioned the suspicion to be excited by the

fact that the articles in question were suffered to remain at all in the thicket
where discovered. It seems almost impossible that these evidences of guilt
should have been accidentally left where found. There was sufficient
presence of mind (it is supposed) to remove the corpse; and yet a more
positive evidence than the corpse itself (whose features might have been
quickly obliterated by decay,) is allowed to lie conspicuously in the scene
of the outrage - I allude to the handkerchief with the name of the deceased.
If this was accident, it was not the accident of a gang. We can imagine it
only the accident of an individual. Let us see. An individual has committed
the murder. He is alone with the ghost of the departed. He is appalled by
what lies motionless before him. The fury of his passion is over, and there
is abundant room in his heart for the natural awe of the deed. His is none of
that confidence which the presence of numbers inevitably inspires. He is
alone with the dead. He trembles and is bewildered. Yet there is a necessity
for disposing of the corpse. He bears it to the river, but leaves behind him
the other evidences of guilt; for it is difficult, if not impossible to carry all
the burthen at once, and it will be easy to return for what is left. But in his
toilsome journey to the water his fears redouble within him. The sounds of
life encompass his path. A dozen times he hears or fancies the step of an
observer. Even the very lights from the city bewilder him. Yet, in time and
by long and frequent pauses of deep agony, he reaches the river's brink, and
disposes of his ghastly charge - perhaps through the medium of a boat. But
now what treasure does the world hold - what threat of vengeance could it
hold out - which would have power to urge the return of that lonely
murderer over that toilsome and perilous path, to the thicket and its blood
chilling recollections? He returns not, let the consequences be what they
may. He could not return if he would. His sole thought is immediate
escape. He turns his back forever upon those dreadful shrubberies and flees
as from the wrath to come.
"But how with a gang? Their number would have inspired them with
confidence; if, indeed confidence is ever wanting in the breast of the arrant
blackguard; and of arrant blackguards alone are the supposed gangs ever
constituted. Their number, I say, would have prevented the bewildering and
unreasoning terror which I have imagined to paralyze the single man.
Could we suppose an oversight in one, or two, or three, this oversight
would have been remedied by a fourth. They would have left nothing
behind them; for their number would have enabled them to carry all at
once. There would have been no need of return.
"Consider now the circumstance that in the outer garment of the corpse
when found, 'a slip, about a foot wide had been torn upward from the
bottom hem to the waist wound three times round the waist, and secured by
a sort of hitch in the back.' This was done with the obvious design of
affording a handle by which to carry the body. But would any number of
men hare dreamed of resorting to such an expedient? To three or four, the
limbs of the corpse would have afforded not only a sufficient, but the best
possible hold. The device is that of a single individual; and this brings us to
the fact that 'between the thicket and the river, the rails of the fences were
found taken down, and the ground bore evident traces of some heavy
burden having been dragged along it!' But would a number of men have put
themselves to the superfluous trouble of taking down a fence, for the
purpose of dragging through it a corpse which they might have lifted over
any fence in an instant? Would a number of men have so dragged a corpse
at all as to have left evident traces of the dragging?
"And here we must refer to an observation of Le Commerciel; an

observation upon which I have already, in some measure, commented. 'A
piece,' says this journal, 'of one of the unfortunate girl's petticoats was torn
out and tied under her chin, and around the back of her head, probably to
prevent screams. This was done by fellows who had no
pocket-handkerchiefs.'
"I have before suggested that a genuine blackguard is never without a

pocket-handkerchief. But it is not to this fact that I now especially advert.
That it was not through want of a handkerchief for the purpose imagined by
Le Commerciel, that this bandage was employed, is rendered apparent by
the handkerchief left in the thicket; and that the object was not 'to prevent
screams' appears, also, from the bandage having been employed in
preference to what would so much better have answered the purpose. But
the language of the evidence speaks of the strip in question as 'found
around the neck, fitting loosely, and secured with a hard knot.' These words
are sufficiently vague, but differ materially from those of Le Commerciel.
The slip was eighteen inches wide, and therefore, although of muslin,
would form a strong band when folded or rumpled longitudinally. And thus
rumpled it was discovered. My inference is this. The solitary murderer,
having borne the corpse, for some distance, (whether from the thicket or
elsewhere) by means of the bandage hitched around its middle, found the
weight, in this mode of procedure, too much for his strength. He resolved to
drag the burthen - the evidence goes to show that it wasdragged. With this
object in view, it became necessary to attach something like a rope to one
of the extremities. It could be best attached about the neck, where the head
would prevent its slipping off. And, now, the murderer bethought him,
unquestionably, of the bandage about the loins. He would have used this,
but for its volution about the corpse, the hitch which embarrassed it, and the
reflection that it had not been 'torn off' from the garment. It was easier to
tear a new slip from the petticoat. He tore it, made it fast about the neck,
and so dragged his victim to the brink of the river. That this 'bandage,' only
attainable with trouble and delay, and but imperfectly answering its purpose
- that this bandage was employed at all, demonstrates that the necessity for
its employment sprang from circumstances arising at a period when the
handkerchief was no longer attainable -- that is to say, arising, as we have
imagined, after quitting the thicket, (if the thicket it was), and on the road
between the thicket and the river.
"But the evidence, you will say, of Madame Deluc, (!) points especially to
the presence of a gang, in the vicinity of the thicket, at or about the epoch
of the murder. This I grant. I doubt if there were not a dozen gangs, such as
described by Madame Deluc, in and about the vicinity of the BarriËre du
Roule at or about the period of this tragedy. But the gang which has drawn
upon itself the pointed animadversion, although the somewhat tardy and
very suspicious evidence of Madame Deluc, is the only gang which is
represented by that honest and scrupulous old lady as having eaten her
cakes and swallowed her brandy, without putting themselves to the trouble
of making her payment. Et hinc illÊ irÊ?
"But what is the precise evidence of Madame Deluc? 'A gang of miscreants
made their appearance, behaved boisterously, ate and drank without making
payment, followed in the route of the young man and girl, returned to the
inn about dusk, and recrossed the river as if in great haste.'
"Now this 'great haste' very possibly seemed greater haste in the eyes of
Madame Deluc, since she dwelt lingeringly and lamentingly upon her
violated cakes and ale - cakes and ale for which she might still have
entertained a faint hope of compensation. Why, otherwise, since it was
about dusk, should she make a point of the haste? It is no cause for wonder,
surely, that even a gang of blackguards should make haste to get home,
when a wide river is to be crossed in small boats, when storm impends, and
when night approaches.
"I say approaches; for the night had not yet arrived. It was only about dusk
that the indecent haste of these 'miscreants' offended the sober eyes of
Madame Deluc. But we are told that it was upon this very evening that
Madame Deluc, as well as her eldest son, 'heard the screams of a female in
the vicinity of the inn.' And in what words does Madame Deluc designate
the period of the evening at which these screams were heard? 'It was soon
after dark,' she says. But 'soon after dark,' is, at least, dark; and'about dusk'
is as certainly daylight. Thus it is abundantly clear that the gang quitted the
BarriËre du Roule prior to the screams overheard (?) by Madame Deluc.
And although, in all the many reports of the evidence, the relative
expressions in question are distinctly and invariably employed just as I
have employed them in this conversation with yourself, no notice whatever
of the gross discrepancy has, as yet, been taken by any of the public
journals, or by any of the Myrmidons of police.
"I shall add but one to the arguments against a gang; but this one has, to my
own understanding at least, a weight altogether irresistible. Under the
circumstances of large reward offered, and full pardon to any King's
evidence, it is not to be imagined, for a moment, that some member of a
gang of low ruffians, or of any body of men, would not long ago have
betrayed his accomplices. Each one of a gang so placed, is not so much
greedy of reward, or anxious for escape, as fearful of betrayal. He betrays
eagerly and early that he may not himself be betrayed. That the secret has
not been divulged, is the very best of proof that it is, in fact, a secret. The
horrors of this dark deed are known only to one, or two, living human
beings, and to God.
"Let us sum up now the meagre yet certain fruits of our long analysis. We
have attained the idea either of a fatal accident under the roof of Madame
Deluc, or of a murder perpetrated, in the thicket at the BarriËre du Roule,
by a lover, or at least by an intimate and secret associate of the deceased.
This associate is of swarthy complexion. This complexion, the 'hitch' in the
bandage, and the 'sailor's knot,' with which the bonnet-ribbon is tied, point
to a seaman. His companionship with the deceased, a gay, but not an abject
young girl, designates him as above the grade of the common sailor. Here
the well written and urgent communications to the journals are much in the
way of corroboration. The circumstance of the first elopement, as
mentioned by Le Mercurie, tends to blend the idea of this seaman with that
of the 'naval officer' who is first known to have led the unfortunate into
crime.
"And here, most fitly, comes the consideration of the continued absence of
him of the dark complexion. Let me pause to observe that the complexion
of this man is dark and swarthy; it was no common swarthiness which
constituted the sole point of remembrance, both as regards Valence and
Madame Deluc. But why is this man absent? Was he murdered by the
gang? If so, why are there only traces of the assassinated girl? The scene of
the two outrages will naturally be supposed identical. And where is his
corpse? The assassins would most probably have disposed of both in the
same way. But it may be said that this man lives, and is deterred from
making himself known, through dread of being charged with the murder.
This consideration might be supposed to operate upon him now - at this late
period - since it has been given in evidence that he was seen with Marie -
but it would have had no force at the period of the deed. The first impulse
of an innocent man would have been to announce the outrage, and to aid in
identifying the ruffians. This policy would have suggested. He had been
seen with the girl. He had crossed the river with her in an open ferry-boat.
The denouncing of the assassins would have appeared, even to an idiot, the
surest and sole means of relieving himself from suspicion. We cannot
suppose him, on the night of the fatal Sunday, both innocent himself and
incognizant of an outrage committed. Yet only under such circumstances is
it possible to imagine that he would have failed, if alive, in the
denouncement of the assassins.
"And what means are ours, of attaining the truth? We shall find these
means multiplying and gathering distinctness as we proceed. Let us sift to
the bottom this affair of the first elopement. Let us know the full history of
'the officer,' with his present circumstances, and his whereabouts at the
precise period of the murder. Let us carefully compare with each other the
various communications sent to the evening paper, in which the object was
to inculpate a gang. This done, let us compare these communications, both
as regards style and MS., with those sent to the morning paper, at a
previous period, and insisting so vehemently upon the guilt of Mennais.
And, all this done, let us again compare these various communications with
the known MSS. of the officer. Let us endeavor to ascertain, by repeated

questionings of Madame Deluc and her boys, as well as of the omnibus
driver, Valence, something more of the personal appearance and bearing of
the 'man of dark complexion.' Queries, skilfully directed, will not fail to
elicit, from some of these parties, information on this particular point (or
upon others) - information which the parties themselves may not even be
aware of possessing. And let us now trace the boatpicked up by the
bargeman on the morning of Monday the twenty-third of June, and which
was removed from the barge-office, without the cognizance of the officer in
attendance, and without the rudder, at some period prior to the discovery of
the corpse. With a proper caution and perseverance we shall infallibly trace
this boat; for not only can the bargeman who picked it up identify it, but the
rudder is at hand. The rudder of a sail-boat would not have been
abandoned, without inquiry, by one altogether at ease in heart. And here let
me pause to insinuate a question. There was no advertisement of the
picking up of this boat. It was silently taken to the barge-office, and as
silently removed. But its owner or employer - how happened he, at so early
a period as Tuesday morning, to be informed, without the agency of
advertisement, of the locality of the boat taken up on Monday, unless we
imagine some connexion with the navy - some personal permanent
connexion leading to cognizance of its minute in interests - its petty local
news?
"In speaking of the lonely assassin dragging his burden to the shore, I have
already suggested the probability of his availing himself of a boat. Now we
are to understand that Marie Rogêt was precipitated from a boat. This
would naturally have been the case. The corpse could not have been trusted
to the shallow waters of the shore. The peculiar marks on the back and
shoulders of the victim tell of the bottom ribs of a boat. That the body was
found without weight is also corroborative of the idea. If thrown from the
shore a weight would have been attached. We can only account for its
absence by supposing the murderer to have neglected the precaution of
supplying himself with it before pushing off. In the act of consigning the
corpse to the water, he would unquestionably have noticed his oversight;
but then no remedy would have been at hand. Any risk would have been
preferred to a return to that accursed shore. Having rid himself of his
ghastly charge, the murderer would have hastened to the city. There, at
some obscure wharf, he would have leaped on land. But the boat - would he
have secured it? He would have been in too great haste for such things as
securing a boat. Moreover, in fastening it to the wharf, he would have felt
as if securing evidence against himself. His natural thought would have
been to cast from him, as far as possible, all that had held connection with
his crime. He would not only have fled from the wharf, but he would not
have permitted the boat to remain. Assuredly he would have cast it adrift.
Let us pursue our fancies. - In the morning, the wretch is stricken with
unutterable horror at finding that the boat has been picked up and detained
at a locality which he is in the daily habit of frequenting - at a locality,
perhaps, which his duty compels him to frequent. The next night, without
daring to ask for the rudder, he removes it. Now where is that rudderless
boat? Let it be one of our first purposes to discover. With the first glimpse
we obtain of it, the dawn of our success shall begin. This boat shall guide
us, with a rapidity which will surprise even ourselves, to him who
employed it in the midnight of the fatal Sabbath. Corroboration will rise
upon corroboration, and the murderer will be traced."
[For reasons which we shall not specify, but which to many readers will
appear obvious, we have taken the liberty of here omitting, from the MSS.
placed in our hands, such portion as details the following up of the
apparently slight clew obtained by Dupin. We feel it advisable only to state,
in brief, that the result desired was brought to pass; and that the Prefect
fulfilled punctually, although with reluctance, the terms of his compact
with the Chevalier. Mr. Poe's article concludes with the following words. -
Eds. {*23}]
It will be understood that I speak of coincidences and no more. What I have

said above upon this topic must suffice. In my own heart there dwells no
faith in prÊter-nature. That Nature and its God are two, no man who thinks,
will deny. That the latter, creating the former, can, at will, control or
modify it, is also unquestionable. I say "at will;" for the question is of will,
and not, as the insanity of logic has assumed, of power. It is not that the
Deity cannot modify his laws, but that we insult him in imagining a
possible necessity for modification. In their origin these laws were
fashioned to embrace all contingencies which could lie in the Future. With
God all is Now.
I repeat, then, that I speak of these things only as of coincidences. And

farther: in what I relate it will be seen that between the fate of the unhappy
Mary Cecilia Rogers, so far as that fate is known, and the fate of one Marie
Rogêt up to a certain epoch in her history, there has existed a parallel in the
contemplation of whose wonderful exactitude the reason becomes
embarrassed. I say all this will be seen. But let it not for a moment be
supposed that, in proceeding with the sad narrative of Marie from the epoch
just mentioned, and in tracing to its dénouement the mystery which
enshrouded her, it is my covert design to hint at an extension of the parallel,
or even to suggest that the measures adopted in Paris for the discovery of
the assassin of a grisette, or measures founded in any similar ratiocination,
would produce any similar result.
For, in respect to the latter branch of the supposition, it should be

considered that the most trifling variation in the facts of the two cases
might give rise to the most important miscalculations, by diverting
thoroughly the two courses of events; very much as, in arithmetic, an error
which, in its own individuality, may be inappreciable, produces, at length,
by dint of multiplication at all points of the process, a result enormously at
variance with truth. And, in regard to the former branch, we must not fail to
hold in view that the very Calculus of Probabilities to which I have
referred, forbids all idea of the extension of the parallel: - forbids it with a
positiveness strong and decided just in proportion as this parallel has
already been long-drawn and exact. This is one of those anomalous
propositions which, seemingly appealing to thought altogether apart from
the mathematical, is yet one which only the mathematician can fully
entertain. Nothing, for example, is more difficult than to convince the
merely general reader that the fact of sixes having been thrown twice in
succession by a player at dice, is sufficient cause for betting the largest
odds that sixes will not be thrown in the third attempt. A suggestion to this
effect is usually rejected by the intellect at once. It does not appear that the
two throws which have been completed, and which lie now absolutely in
the Past, can have influence upon the throw which exists only in the Future.
The chance for throwing sixes seems to be precisely as it was at any

ordinary time - that is to say, subject only to the influence of the various
other throws which may be made by the dice. And this is a reflection which
appears so exceedingly obvious that attempts to controvert it are received
more frequently with a derisive smile than with anything like respectful
attention. The error here involved - a gross error redolent of mischief - I
cannot pretend to expose within the limits assigned me at present; and with
the philosophical it needs no exposure. It may be sufficient here to say that
it forms one of an infinite series of mistakes which arise in the path or
Reason through her propensity for seeking truth in detail.
FOOTNOTES
{*1} Upon the original publication of "Marie Roget," the foot-notes now
appended were considered unnecessary; but the lapse of several years since
the tragedy upon which the tale is based, renders it expedient to give them,
and also to say a few words in explanation of the general design. A young
girl, Mary Cecilia Rogers, was murdered in the vicinity of New York; and,
although her death occasioned an intense and long-enduring excitement, the
mystery attending it had remained unsolved at the period when the present
paper was written and published (November, 1842). Herein, under pretence
of relating the fate of a Parisian grisette, the author has followed in minute
detail, the essential, while merely paralleling the inessential facts of the real
murder of Mary Rogers. Thus all argument founded upon the fiction is
applicable to the truth: and the investigation of the truth was the object. The
"Mystery of Marie Roget" was composed at a distance from the scene of
the atrocity, and with no other means of investigation than the newspapers
afforded. Thus much escaped the writer of which he could have availed
himself had he been upon the spot, and visited the localities. It may not be
improper to record, nevertheless, that the confessions of two persons, (one
of them the Madame Deluc of the narrative) made, at different periods, long
subsequent to the publication, confirmed, in full, not only the general
conclusion, but absolutely all the chief hypothetical details by which that
conclusion was attained.
{*2} The nom de plume of Von Hardenburg.

{*3} Nassau Street.
{*4} Anderson.
{*5} The Hudson.
{*6} Weehawken.
{*7} Payne.
{*8} Crommelin.
{*9} The New York "Mercury."
(*10} The New York "Brother Jonathan," edited by H. Hastings Weld, Esq.
{*11} New York "Journal of Commerce."
(*12} Philadelphia "Saturday Evening Post," edited by C. I. Peterson, Esq.
{*13} Adam
{*14} See "Murders in the Rue Morgue."
{*15} The New York "Commercial Advertiser," edited by Col. Stone.
{*16} "A theory based on the qualities of an object, will prevent its being
unfolded according to its objects; and he who arranges topics in reference
to their causes, will cease to value them according to their results. Thus the
jurisprudence of every nation will show that, when law becomes a science
and a system, it ceases to be justice. The errors into which a blind devotion
to principles of classification has led the common law, will be seen by
observing how often the legislature has been obliged to come forward to
restore the equity its scheme had lost." - Landor.
{*17} New York "Express"

{*18} NewYork "Herald."
{*19} New York "Courier and Inquirer."
{*20} Mennais was one of the parties originally suspected and arrested, but
discharged through total lack of evidence.
{*21} New York "Courier and Inquirer."
{*22} New York "Evening Post."
{*23} Of the Magazine in which the article was originally published.
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THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET.

THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET.

Es giebt eine Reihe idealischer Begebenheiten, die der Wirklichkeit parallel

- Novalis. {*2} Moral Ansichten.

When, in an article entitled "The Murders in the Rue Morgue," I

Upon the winding up of the tragedy involved in the deaths of Madame

But these dreams were not altogether uninterrupted. It may readily be

His reputation - so he said with a peculiarly Parisian air - was at stake.

The compliment my friend rebutted as best he could, but the proposition he

In the morning, I procured, at the Prefecture, a full report of all the

Meantime, the excitement increased hourly. Several individuals were

In this way the journal endeavored to create the impression of an apathy on

over-hasty. It was distinctly proved that no apathy, such as was imagined,

The general impression, so far as we were enabled to glean it from the

and murdered. Le Commerciel, {*11} however, a print of extensive

burthen having been dragged along it.

A weekly paper, Le Soleil,{*12} had the following comments upon this

Consequent upon this discovery, new evidence appeared. Madame Deluc

"Were it my purpose," continued Dupin, "merely to make out a case against

and nostrils alone remaining above the surface. Thus circumstanced, we

"The whole of this paragraph must now appear a tissue of inconsequence

" 'And furthermore it is exceedingly improbable,' continues our journal,

tightening described. They alone would have amply established her

"In respect to the insinuations levelled at Beauvais, you will be willing to

"The suspicious circumstances which invest him, will be found to tally

"And what," I here demanded, "do you think of the opinions of Le

"But whatever force there may still appear to be in the suggestion of Le

"There is another point at which there seems a deficiency of observation on

"And what are we to think," I asked, "of the article in Le Soleil?"

character are readily made matter of mystification. Should there be nothing

In pursuance of Dupin's suggestion, I made scrupulous examination of the

"An evening journal of yesterday, refers to a former mysterious

"We have received one or two communications, the object of which is to

"We have received several forcibly written communications, apparently

"But if we cannot imagine Madame Rogêt privy to the design of elopement,

at dark. Now, at first glance, this fact strongly militates against my

coincidence, does the accidentally suggested opinion of the populace call

"Before proceeding farther, let us consider the supposed scene of the

"Notwithstanding the acclamation with which the discovery of this thicket

Sabbath! It is now especially that, released from the claims of labor, or

"This thicket was a singular - an exceedingly singular one. It was unusually

"And again. I have already mentioned the suspicion to be excited by the

"And here we must refer to an observation of Le Commerciel; an

"I have before suggested that a genuine blackguard is never without a

the known MSS. of the officer. Let us endeavor to ascertain, by repeated

It will be understood that I speak of coincidences and no more. What I have

I repeat, then, that I speak of these things only as of coincidences. And

For, in respect to the latter branch of the supposition, it should be

The chance for throwing sixes seems to be precisely as it was at any

{*2} The nom de plume of Von Hardenburg.

{*3} Nassau Street.

{*5} The Hudson.

{*9} The New York "Mercury."

{*11} New York "Journal of Commerce."

(*12} Philadelphia "Saturday Evening Post," edited by C. I. Peterson, Esq.

{*14} See "Murders in the Rue Morgue."

{*15} The New York "Commercial Advertiser," edited by Col. Stone.

{*17} New York "Express"