Part 97

In this way he remained at his mother’s for nine years, when he again disappeared, without any apparent cause, and no one knew how. It may be supposed, however that the motive or feeling which induced his first disappearance influenced the second. Some time afterwards it was reported that an inhabitant of Lierganès again saw Francis de la Vega in some port of Asturias; but this was never confirmed.

When this very singular man was first taken out of the sea at Cadiz, it is said that his body was entirely covered with scales, but they fell off soon after his coming out of the water. They also add, that different parts of his body were as hard as shagreen.

Father Feyjoo adds many philosophical reflections on the existence of this phenomenon, and on the means by which a man may be enabled to live at the bottom of the sea. He observes, that if Francis de la Vega had preserved his reason and the use of speech, he would have given us more instruction and information in marine affairs, than all the naturalists combined.

* * * * *

ANTIPATHIES.

Erasmus, though a native of Rotterdam, had such an aversion to fish, that the smell of it threw him into a fever.

Ambrose Paré mentions a gentleman, who never could see an eel without fainting.

There is an account of another gentleman, who would fall into convulsions at the sight of a carp.

A lady, a native of France, always fainted on seeing boiled lobsters. Other persons of the same country experienced the same inconvenience from the smell of roses, though they were particularly partial to the odour of jonquils or tuberoses.

Joseph Scaliger and Peter Abono never could drink milk.

Cardan was particularly disgusted at the sight of eggs.

Uladislaus, king of Poland, could not bear to see apples.

If an apple was shown to Chesne, secretary to Francis I., he bled at the nose.

A gentleman, in the court of the emperor Ferdinand, would bleed at the nose on hearing the mewing of a cat, however great the distance might be from him.

Henry III. of France could never sit in a room with a cat.

The duke of Schomberg had the same aversion.

M. de Lancre gives an account of a very sensible man, who was so terrified at seeing a hedgehog, that for two years he imagined his bowels were gnawed by such an animal.

The same author was intimate with a very brave officer, who was so terrified at the sight of a mouse, that he never dared to look at one unless he had his sword in his hand.

M. Vangheim, a great huntsman in Hanover, would faint, or, if he had sufficient time, would run away at the sight of a roasted pig.

John Rol, a gentleman in Alcantara, would swoon on hearing the word _lana_, wool, pronounced, although his cloak was woollen.

The philosophical Boyle could not conquer a strong aversion to the sound of water running through a pipe.

La Mothe le Vayer could not endure the sound of musical instruments, though he experienced a lively pleasure whenever it thundered.

The author of the Turkish Spy tells us that he would rather encounter a lion in the deserts of Arabia, provided he had but a sword in his hand, than feel a spider crawling on him in the dark. He observes, that there is no reason to be given for these secret dislikes. He humorously attributes them to the doctrine of the transmigration of the soul; and as regarded himself, he supposed he had been a fly, before he came into his body, and that having been frequently persecuted with spiders, he still retained the dread of his old enemy.

* * * * *

THE LACTEALS IN A MOLE.

A curious observer of nature will be delighted to know, that the lacteal vessels are more visible in a mole, than in any animal whatever. The view, however, is not of long duration. These vessels are rendered visible by the mode of killing the animal, which is by a wire gin that compresses the thoracic duct, thereby preventing the ascent of the chyle upwards. The time of demonstration is about half an hour after death. This curious fact was unknown to anatomists, till mentioned by Dr. A. Hunter, in his volume of maxims on men and manners.

* * * * *

LOUIS GONZAGA

TO

MARIE MANCINI.

FLORENCE, 1649.

* * * * *

Il cantar che nel anima si sente. Il pin ne sente l’alma, il men l’orecchio.

* * * * *

I worshippe thee thou silverre starre, As thron’d amid the vault of blue, Rushes thy queenlye splendoure farre, O’er mountain top and vale of dewe.

Yette more I love thy infante ray, As risinge from its easterne cave, With circlinge, fearfulle, fonde delaye, It seemes to kisse the crimsone wave.

I love the proud and solemne sweepe Of harpe and trumpette’s harmonye, Like swellinges of the midnighte deepe, Like anthemes of the opening skye.

But lovelier to my heart the tone That dies along the twilighte’s winge, Just heard, a silver sigh, and gone, As if a spiritte touch’d the stringe.

Sweete Marie! swiftlye comes the noone That gives thy beautye all its rayes, And thou shalte be the rose, alone, And heartes shall wither in its blaze.

Yette there are eyes had deeper loved That rosebudde in its matine-beam, The dew droppe on its blushe unmoved-- And shalle mye love be all a dreame?

PULCI.

* * * * *

POINTS OF CHARACTER.

A PRIME MINISTER.

The late sir Robert Walpole was from his youth fond of field sports, and retained his attachment to them until prevented by the infirmities of age from their further enjoyment. He was accustomed to hunt in Richmond Park with a pack of beagles. Upon receiving a packet of letters, he usually opened that from his gamekeeper first; and in the pictures taken of him, he preferred being drawn in his sporting dress.

A PRELATE.

Bishop Juxon, who attended Charles I. on the scaffold, retired after the king’s death to his own manor of Little Compton, in Gloucestershire, where, as Whitlocke tells us in his Memorials, “he much delighted in hunting, and kept a pack of good hounds, and had them so well ordered and hunted, chiefly by his own skill and direction, that they exceeded all other hounds in England for the pleasure and orderly hunting of them.”

A HUNTSMAN.

Mr. Woolford, a sporting gentleman, as remarkable for politeness in the field as for the goodness of his fox-hounds, was one evening thus addressed by his huntsman: “An’ please your honour, sir,” twirling his cap and quid at the same time, “I should be glad to be excused going to-morrow to Woolford-wood, as I should like to go to see my poor wife buried.” “I am sorry for thee, Tom,” said his master, “we can do one day without thee: she was an excellent wife.” On the following morning, however, Tom was the first in the field. “Heyday!” quoth Mr. W., “did not I give you leave to see the remains of your poor wife interred?” “Yes, your honour, but I thought as how we should have good sport, as it is a fine morning; so I desired our Dick, the dog-feeder, to see her _earth’d_.”

Vol. II.--34.

_For the Table Book._

Every one will agree with me, that this is the favourite article of furniture. Every one is fond of it as of an old friend--a faithful and trustworthy one--to whom has been confided both joys and sorrows. It is most likely the gift of some cherished, perhaps departed being, reminding us by its good qualities of the beloved giver. We have no scruple in committing our dearest secrets to its faithful bosom--they are never divulged. The tenderest billet-doux, the kindest acknowledgments, the sweetest confessions of a mistress--the cruellest expressions and bitterest reproaches of a friend lost to us for ever through the false and malignant representations of an enemy--or perhaps the youthful effusions of our own brain, which we occasionally draw forth from the recesses of the most secretly contrived _pigeon-hole_, and read over _à la dérobée_, with a half blush (at our self-love) and a smile partly painful from revived recollections of days gone, never to return--all these we may unhesitatingly deposit in this personification of _deskretion_.

The very posture assumed at a desk bespeaks confidence and security. The head inclined over it, and the bosom leaning in gentle trustingness against this kind and patient friend.

By this description I would present to the “mind’s eye” of the reader a plain unostentatious piece of furniture, of too simple an exterior to be admitted any where than in the study--square in shape, mahogany, bound with brass at the corners, a plate of the same metal on the top, of just a sufficient size to contain one’s own initials and those of the giver. I detest those finicking machines one finds wrapped up in an oilskin case in a drawing-room; made of rosewood, inlaid with silver, or mother-of-pearl, and lined with blue velvet. It seems like an insult to the _friendly_ character of a desk, to dress him smartly, seat him in a fine apartment, and refuse to avail yourself of the amicable services he tenders you.--The contents of these coxcombical _acquaintances_ are seldom better than its fair owner’s private journal, (which no one thinks worthy of perusal--herself of course excepted,) her album, and scrap-book, the honourable Mr. Somebody’s poetical effusions, and the sentimental correspondence of some equally silly young lady, her dearest friend.

Then there is the clerk’s desk in a counting-house--there are no pleasant associations connected with that mercantile scaffolding, with its miniature balustrades at the top, partly intersected with accounts, bills, and papers of all sorts, (referring to business,) and surrounded by files clinging by their one hook. Above all this is seen the semicircular scalp of a brown wig, which, as it is raised to reply to your question, gradually discovers two eyes scowling at you from beneath a pair of glaring spectacles, a little querulous turned-up nose, and a mouth whose lines have become rigid with ill-humour, partly occasioned by a too sedentary life.

Again, there is the pulpit desk, with its arrogant crimson cushion--telling a tale of clerical presumption.

Lastly, there is the old bachelor’s desk. (Nay, do not curl up the corners of your pretty mouths at me, sweet ladies--it may be worth while to take a peep at it--at least, I cannot prevail upon _myself_ to omit it in this notice of desks.) It is of the plain and quiet description formerly mentioned, and very neatly and orderly arranged, both inside and out. The latter is kept bright and shining by the indefatigable hands of Sally the housemaid; who, while she breathes upon the plate to give it a polish, at the same time breathes a wish (to herself) that her breath possessed the magic power of unfastening locks, and so enabling her to see “what the old gentleman keeps in this here box to make him so fond on it.” The interior he takes infinite care to keep in complete and exact order himself. Each particular compartment has its appropriate contents consigned to it. The fold-down nearest to him, as he sits at it, contains a small miniature within a red morocco case, of a placid and gentle-faced girl, whose original sleeps for ever in the bosom of the cold earth--a little box, containing a ring set with brilliants, and enclosing a lock of _her_ hair--all _her_ letters carefully tied up with green ribbon--a miniature edition of Shakspeare, and Milton, with his name written in them in _her_ hand-writing. In the opposite fold, near the receptacle for the pens, wafers, ink, &c. are his own little writings, (for we are to suppose him fond of his pen, and as having occasionally indulged that fondness,) of all of which he preserves neat copies, some private memoranda, and an old pocket-book, given to him by his old friend and school-fellow, admiral ----, when he left England that year as a midshipman.

In the drawer are different letters from his friends; and, perhaps, at the very back of it, a little hoard of gold pieces, bright and new from the mint.

As I now lean upon my old friend and companion--my desk--I render it my grateful acknowledgments for the many pleasant hours I have spent over it; and also for its having been the means of my passing an agreeable quarter of an hour with my gentle reader, of whom I now take a courteous leave.

_July, 1827._

M. H.

* * * * *

WRITING DESKS.

There is not any mention of writing-desks among the ancients. They usually wrote upon the knee in the manner wherein Angelica Kauffman represents the younger Pliny, as may be seen in a modern engraving; and yet it appears from Stolberg, quoted by Mr. Fosbroke, that desks resembling ours have been found in Herculaneum. Writing-desks in the middle ages slanted so much, as to form an angle of forty-five degrees: their slant till within the last two centuries was little less.

* * * * *

~Topographiana.~

WILTS’ LOCAL CUSTOM.

DANCING ROUND THE HARROW.

_To the Editor._

Dear sir,--I hand you the following authentic particulars which happened in the pleasant village of S****n B****r, and gave rise to “dancing round the harrow:” if worthy of being chronicled in the _Table Book_, they are yours.

John Jones, not finding his lovesuit successful with his master’s daughter, because her father, a farmer, rebuked him, took umbrage, threw down his whip on the “harrow” in the field, left the team, and, _sans cérémonie_, went to sea.

The farmer and his daughter Nancy were variously affected by this circumstance.--“Comfortable letters” were hoped for, news was expected from some corner of the world, but no tidings arrived as to the fate or designs of honest John. Village gossips often talked of the poor lad. The farmer himself, who was a good sort of man, began to relent; for Nancy’s cheeks were not so rosy as formerly; she was dull at milking time. Observers at church whispered,--“How altered Nancy R* appears!” * * *

After a lapse of about six years appearances change favourably. John returns from sea auspiciously--meets his Nancy with open arms--her father finds him disposed to make her happy--John requests forgiveness, and is pardoned--his steadiness and attachment are tried and approved--and--suffice it to say--John and Nancy are married. He assists her father in the duties of the farm as his years decline, while she supplies the absence of her mother, buried in the family grave of the church-yard of her native village. * * * *

As soon as the wedding took place, a “harrow” was brought on the grass-plot in the fore-close, when the villagers invited danced round it till daybreak. * * * *

This “dancing round the harrow” was kept on several anniversaries of the wedding-day; a young family and the old projector’s decease occasioned its discontinuance; but, on each of these occasions, John does not forget to present, instead, a not less acceptable offering, a good supper to his workfolks in remembrance of his advance in life.

I am, dear sir,

Yours very truly,

JEHOIADA.

_Goat and Boots,_

_August 3, 1827._

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_For the Table Book._

BAKEWELL, DERBYSHIRE.

ANCIENT MONUMENTS AND INSCRIPTIONS IN THE CHURCH.

Upon the tablet over the mural monument in the chantry of the Holy Cross, is the following inscription:

Godfrey Foljambe, Knight, and Avena his wife, (who afterwards married Richard de Greene, Knight,) Lord and Lady of the Manors of Hassop, Okebrook, Elton, Stanton, Darley, Overhall, and Lokhawe, founded this Chantry in honor of the Holy Cross, in the 39th year of the Reign of King Edward the 3rd, 1366. Godfrey died on Thursday next after the Feast of the Ascension of our Lord, in the 50th year of the reign of the same King; and Avena died on Saturday next after the Feast of the Nativity of the blessed Virgin Mary, in the 6th year of the reign of Richard 2nd, 1383.

N. B. The Dates are taken from the Escheat Rolls, which contain the Inquisitum post mortem, 50th Edward 3. No. 24.

_In the Vestry_, there is an effigy in alabaster, of sir Thomas Wendersley de Wendersley, who was mortally wounded at the battle of Shrewsbury, 4th Henry IV., 1403, and was buried at Bakewell, where formerly were several shields of the arms of his family carved in wood. (See Brailsford’s “Monumental Inscriptions of Derbyshire.”)

Adjoining the vestry are several handsome monuments of the Vernon and Manners’ families.

In the centre is the tomb or cenotaph of sir George Vernon, inscribed thus:

Here lyeth Sir George Vernon, Knight, deceased, y^{e} daye of An^{o} 156 and Dame Margaret his Wife, dowghter of S^{r} Gylbert Tayllboys, deceased the daye of 156 and also Dame Mawde his Wyffe, dowghter to Sir Ralphe Langfoot, deceased the daye of An^{o} 1566, whose solles God p--don--.

On the right is a monument to sir John Manners, with this inscription:

Here lyeth Sir John Manners, of Haddon, Kn^{t}. Second Sonne of Thomas Erle of Rutland, who died the 4th of June, 1611, and Dorothy his Wife, one of the Dawghters and heires of Sir George Vernon, of Haddon, Kn^{t}. who deceased the 24th day of June, in the 26th yeere of the Rayne of Queene Elizabeth, 1584.

To the right of the window, on a mural monument, is the following:

Heere lyeth buryed John Manners, Gent^{n} 3 Son̄e of Sir John Man̄ers, Knight, who dyed the 16th day of July, in the Yeere of our Lord God 1590, being of the Age of 14 yeeres.

To the left is an elegant monument to sir John Manners, with this inscription:

George Manners of Haddon, Kn^{t}. here awaits the resurrection of the just in Christ. He married Grace, second daughter of Henry Pierrepoint, Kn^{t}. who afterwards bore him 4 sons and 5 daughters, and lived with him in Holy Wedlock 30 years, she caused him to be buried with his forefathers, and then placed this monument at her own expence, as a perpetual Memorial of their conjugal faith, and she united the figure of his body with hers, having resolwed that their bones and ashes should be laid together. He died 23rd Ap^{l}. 1623, aged 54--She died - - - aged - - -.

Beneath this monument, on an alabaster grave-stone on the floor, are some figures engraved round them, with an inscription, now obliterated, and the arms of Eyre impaled with Mordaunt.

_In the Chancel._

Upon an alabaster tomb, repaired, and the inscription cut, and filled up with black in 1774, (by Mr. Watson.)

Here lies John Vernon, son and heir of Henry Vernon, who died the 12th of August 1477, whose soule God pardon.

_August, 1827._

E. J. H.

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_For the Table Book._

ERASMUS.

Quæritur, unde tibi sit nomen Erasmus? _Eras-mus._

_Resp._

Si sum _Mus_ ego, te judice _Summus_ ero.

_Joannis Audoeni_, lib. vii. epig. 34.

* * * * *

That thou wast great _Erasmus_ none dispute; Yet, by the import of thy name, wast small: For none its truth can readily refute Thou wast--_a Mouse_,--ERAS-MUS after all.

THE REPLY OF ERASMUS.

Hence, if _a Mouse_, thy wit must this confess:-- I will be SUM-MUS:--Can’st thou make me less?

J. R. P.

* * * * *

~Garrick Plays.~

No. XXX.

[From a “Woman’s a Weathercock,” a Comedy, by Nathaniel Field, 1612.]

_False Mistress._

_Scudmore alone; having a letter in his hand from Bellafront, assuring him of her faith._