Auguste Dupin. Called upon to solve the brutal murder of two women, Dupin discovers a hair at the murder scene that does not appear to be human. What song the Syrens sang, or what name Achilles assumed when he bid himself among women, although puzzlingquestions, are not beyond all conjecture. — Sir Thomas Browne, Urn Burial The mental features discoursed of as the analytical, are, in themselves, but little susceptible of analysis. We appreciate them only in their effects. We know of them, among other things, that they are always to their possessor, when inordinately possessed, a source of the liveliest enjoyment. As the strong man exults in his physical ability, delighting in such exercises as call his muscles into action, so glories the analyst in that moral activity which disentangles. He derives pleasure from even the most trivial occupations bringing his talent into play. He is fond of enigmas, of conundrums, hieroglyphics; exhibiting in his solutions of each a degree of acumen which appears to the ordinary apprehension praeternatural.
