From Zerah Colburn’s Memoirs.

A REMARKABLE INCIDENT.

“In the beginning of 1815, a circumstance took place that excited much interest in Paris. A surgeon in the army, named Dautun, was arrested in a gambling house, in the Palais Royal, on the testimony of a scar on his wrist. Some time previous, the officers of the night had found while passing their rounds, in different parts of the city, four parcels tied up; one containing the head, another the trunk, a third the thighs, and a fourth the legs and arms of a man. In the teeth, tightly compressed, was a piece of human flesh, apparently torn out in the dying struggle. The parts were collected, and put together in their regular order, and exhibited for a number of days at the Morgue. The mystery which involved this dark transaction excited quite an interest, and numbers went to see the corpse. The general and only conviction was that he must have been murdered; but for a number of weeks no clue was obtained to elicit information on the subject. When it became at length improper to keep the body any longer above ground, a cast in plaster was taken, fully representing the murdered victim, and this remained a much longer time for the public to see. At length Dauton happened to be engaged in gambling at the Palais Royal; he played high and lost, called for liquor to drink, and angry because the waiter was somewhat tardy, when he came with it Dauton emptied the glass and threw it at the waiter. It was shivered into a thousand pieces, and a fragment was carried into Dautun’s wrist, under the cuff of his coat. The spectators gathering around, and learning the accident, wished to see the gash; he drew down his sleeve, and firmly pressed it round his wrist; they insisted on seeing it, he obstinately refused. By this course, the bystanders were at length led to suppose that something mysterious was involved in this conduct, and they determined at all events to see his wrist. By force they pushed up his sleeve, and behold a scar recently healed, as if made by tearing out of flesh, appeared. The landlord had been at Morgue, and seen the murdered man with the flesh between the teeth, and it struck him in a moment that the flesh was torn from this man’s wrist. Charging them to keep him safe, he hastened to call in the legal authorities, and arrested him.

In the event, Dautun confessed that being quartered at Sedan, and out of money, he came to Paris to try some adventure. Knowing that his brother had a large sum by him, directly on his arrival, he went to his lodgings in a retired part of the city, about eight in the evening. He entered the house unnoticed by the porter, and passing to his apartment, found his brother asleep. He immediately commenced the work of death; his brother waking up defended himself, but in addition to the surprise and horror of the moment, being in a feeble state of health, all the desperation of his struggle was overpowered. In the scuffle he tore out the flesh. Being killed, the surgeon cut up the body, tied it up in four parcels as before mentioned, secured the money and retired.

He also confessed that eleven months previous he had murdered an aunt, who was living with a second husband, to obtain money. Her husband was arrested and imprisoned for a number of months, but as nothing appeared to criminate him, he had been discharged. The writer saw the unhappy fratricide on his way from the prison to the place of execution.