All Sorts of Friviolous Theories as to the Whitechapel Murderer Discussed.
London, Oct. 8.
In deference to the general desire that bloodhounds be used in the search of the Whitechapel murderer, the police have procured several of these animals and put them in training. They are not stationed at Whitechapel district, however, but are located in stalls in out of the way places, so that nobody will know from what quarter to expect them.
An American who used to live in New York keeps a herb shop now in the Whitechapel district. A detective called at his place this week and asked him if he had sold any unusual compound of herbs to a customer since August. Similar enquiries were made at other shops in the neighborhood. The basis of this investigation has a startling Shakespearean flavor. An eminent engineer in London suggested that the murderer was a medical maniac trying to find the elixir of life, and was looking for the essential ingredients in the parts taken from the murdered bodies; that, like the witches in "Macbeth", he spent the time over a bubbling cauldron of the hellbroth made from the gory ingredients looking for the charm.
A rather sensible suggestion is that all the police should be shod in the night time with rubber, in order that the regular monotonous foorfalls of the regulation police boot may not warn the murderer of danger whilst he is still hundreds of yards away. England is informed that some American detectives are shod in that way, a statement perhaps founded on the fact that rubbers, which are plentiful in America, are unknown here. The police themselves are not friendly to this suggestion of noiseless shoeing, if it is to be applied to roundsmen, for the foorfalls of the latter sizes are very useful in warning ordinary policemen of the necessity of postponing a drink of beer or a quiet rest, or any other policemanlike task he may have on hand.
A gentleman to-day sent the police and press a very detailed description of the murderer, which he says is based upon a scientific comparison of certain things about which he is not very explicit. He makes out that the man is very powerful, which is already known; that he has short fingers, with thumbs thick and stunted, but his feet are broad in proportion to their length; that his ears are situated low down on his head; that he is forty years old, and that he wears dark clothes, flannels, and dark silk handkerchief round his neck, also dark gloves and thin side-spring boots. This fanciful description of the murderer is solemnly printed and discussed by the public, as is every other thing that can be put forward.
