MOORE’S LAST VICTORY.
In an instant Sir John Moore half raised himself, gazing still with
concentrated earnestness, as if nothing had happened, towards the
Highland regiment now hotly engaged. Not a sigh was heard. Not a muscle
in his face quivered.
Hardinge had sprung down, and Moore’s right hand grasped his firmly.
When Hardinge, seeing his anxiety as to the 42nd, exclaimed, “They are
advancing!” a flash of joy lighted up Moore’s features.
Then Colonel Graham hurried to the spot. So placid and unchanged was
the General’s look that for a moment he hoped it might be no more than
an accidental fall from the horse. The next moment he saw—and he rode
off at full speed for a surgeon.
It was an awful wound. Almost the whole left shoulder was carried
away; the arm was all but separated from the body; the ribs over that
intrepid heart were broken; the flesh and muscles were fearfully torn
and mangled. Hardinge made an attempt with his sash to check the rush
of blood; but with so extensive an injury little could be done.
Sir John was then gently lifted upon a blanket, and all the while he
still intently watched the struggle, as if his own state were a matter
of very secondary importance.
For a moment his attention was recalled from the front. His sword
became entangled, as the soldiers moved him, and the hilt went into
the wound. Captain Hardinge began to unbuckle it, but he was at once
checked, Moore saying in his usual voice, with calm distinctness—
“It is as well as it is. I had rather it should go out of the field
with me.”
So extraordinary was his composure that Hardinge began to hope, even
against hope, that the wound might after all prove not to be mortal,
that the General might even yet be spared to his country. He faltered
something of the kind, and Moore turned from gazing at the battle, to
inspect gravely his own injuries.
“No, Hardinge, I feel that to be impossible,” he replied. “You need not
go with me. Report to General Hope that I am wounded and carried to the
rear.”
He was slowly borne towards Coruña, a sergeant and ten soldiers of the
Guards and the 42nd being told off for this service. Hardinge’s sash
was arranged so as to give him support.
Two surgeons came hastening to meet him. They had been engaged with the
arm of his next in command, Sir David Baird, which was badly shattered,
but on hearing what had happened to his Chief, Baird hurried them
off, and they left his arm half-dressed. Moore, who was losing blood
rapidly, observed—
“You can be of no service to me. Go to the wounded soldiers. You may be
of use to them.” But this unselfish order could not be obeyed.
Again and again in their sad progress he desired a halt, that he might
watch what was going on, and might listen to the fainter sound of the
enemy’s musketry, as the French were driven back.
Presently they were overtaken by a spring waggon containing a wounded
officer, Colonel Wynch, who asked, “Who was in the blanket?” On hearing
that it was General Moore, he suggested his removal to the waggon.
Moore did not refuse, but he looked at one of the Highlanders and asked
his opinion—would the waggon or the blanket be best? The man advised
the latter.
“It will not shake you so much, sir,” he said; “and we can keep step,
and carry you more easy.”
“I think so, too,” Sir John quietly said, and they went on their way as
before. By this time the hardy Highlanders and Guardsmen who carried
him were one and all in tears.
It was nearly dark when they reached his lodgings in Coruña. Colonel
Anderson, his devoted friend and comrade during twenty-one years past,
met the mournful cavalcade, and was speechless with distress. This was
the third time that he had seen Moore carried wounded from a field of
battle; and it was the last.
Moore pressed his hand tightly.
“Anderson, don’t leave me!” he murmured.
Then, as his faithful French servant, François, appeared, in blank
horror, with falling tears, he smiled.
“_Mon ami_, this is nothing,” he said.
The surgeons examined the wound, only to find that no hope of recovery
existed. By this time the agony had become so overwhelming that Moore
could hardly speak, and his face was deathly pale. Yet, after a while,
he so far mastered the torture as to utter one sentence and then
another at intervals.
“Anderson, you know that I have always wished to die in this way,” came
first. And, as the officers of his staff appeared, one by one, he put
the same question to each—“Are the French beaten?”
Next, with unconscious pathos, read now in the light of
after-misrepresentations—
“_I hope the people of England will be satisfied. I hope my country
will do me justice!_”
Now there was the thought of his own relatives.
“Anderson—you will see my friends as soon as you can. Tell
them—everything. Say to my mother——”
For the first time self-control failed. His voice broke, and his
features were strongly agitated. The love between that son and that
mother had been of no common kind. He was utterly unable to speak what
he wished, and he turned to another subject.
“Hope—Hope—I have much to say to him—but—cannot get it out? Are Colonel
Graham[2] and all my Aides-de-camp safe?”
Anderson hastily signed to others not to tell him that one of the
latter had been dangerously wounded, knowing well the strong affection
which existed between Moore and his whole staff. The question was
evaded.
He then mentioned that he had made his will, and had in it remembered
his servants. “Colbourne has my will—and all my papers,” he said. And
when Major Colbourne[3] came in, Moore greeted him with exceeding
kindness, turning then to Sir John Hope, to say with difficulty, “Hope,
go to the Duke of York, and say he ought to give Colbourne a regiment.”
Upon Anderson too he urged the same.
He asked again, “Were the French beaten?” In every direction, he was
told. “It’s a great satisfaction for me to know we have beaten the
French,” he remarked. “Is Paget in the room?” Colonel Anderson, who
throughout remained close by his side, supporting him as he lay,
replied in the negative. “Remember me to him. It is General Paget I
mean. He is a fine fellow.”
A little later came the words, “I feel myself so strong—I fear I shall
be long dying. It is great uneasiness—it is great pain.”
This was the only approach to a complaint which passed those patient
lips. But the strength of which he spoke was that of the indomitable
will, not of the shattered body, for already life was ebbing fast, and
the shadows were closing around him.
Yet, surely for him, beyond the shadows, waited a Light Divine.
He met the last enemy as he had met his earthly foes, as indeed he
had ofttimes faced the former, with unshaken composure and without
dread, no more startled by the summons than if he had been called upon
to cross the English Channel. And, as always, his thoughts were for
others, not for himself.
“Everything François says—is right,” he told them. “I have the greatest
confidence in him.”
Some grateful words were addressed to the surgeons, thanking them for
their efforts to give him ease. He spoke kindly to two more of his
Aides-de-camp who came in. One of these was Captain James Stanhope,
brother to Charles Stanhope, killed that day, and to Lady Hester
Stanhope, Moore’s friend. Stanhope’s eyes met those of the dying
soldier, and Moore said distinctly—
“Stanhope—remember me to your sister.”
This was his last utterance. He sank into silence, pressing the hand of
Anderson closely to his side. A few minutes later, calmly and without a
struggle, the grand spirit triumphed over death, and passed away.
And in that still chamber might be heard the sound of smothered
convulsive sobbing. The younger officers present broke utterly down,
while the elder men looked on with bowed heads, scarcely better able
to restrain their anguish. Colonel Anderson still knelt, supporting
the lifeless head, gazing, with blanched and parted lips, into the
quiet face, which for twenty-one years had been the centre and the
illumination of his being, his look of woe being beyond the power of
words to describe. On the other side of the mattress, one in sorrow
with all these mourning Englishmen, was the faithful and devoted
François. French by birth, he cared for little in the world besides
this idolised master, over whom he despairingly hung, his hands wrung
together, his face matching in pallor those placid features.
For one of the noblest of men was gone from their midst that hour; and
a heavy shadow fell upon the victorious British Army.
Upon this sad scene came another Aide-de-camp, George Napier, too late
for any of those last words which would have been to him a lifelong
treasure. Twenty years afterwards, when describing what he had seen as
he entered, he wrote in still unconquered pain—
“That eye which was wont to penetrate the inmost soul was glazed in
death. That manly graceful form, the admiration of the Army, lay
stretched, a lifeless corpse. The great spirit had quitted its earthly
habitation. All around was sad and gloomy. Moore was dead!”
“Dark lay the field of slain; the battle’s strife was o’er,
That shook Coruña’s hills, and rent the Iberian shore;
Dim twilight veiled the scene of glory and of death,
Till o’er the blood-stained snow,
The moon, pale, trembling, slow,
Revealed each crimsoned wreath.
Low on the victor-field the Warrior Chief was laid;
His eye still sought the foe, his hand still grasped the blade;
Triumphant was his smile, though dim his closing eye,—
While bending o’er the slain,
His mournful gallant train
Learnt how the brave should die.
* * * * *
No sculptured trophy rose, to deck his honoured head,
Or monumental urn, to mark the Mighty Dead;
No lettered scroll to point the pilgrim soldier’s way,—
The musing foe to greet,
And guide his wandering feet
To where the Warrior lay.
But o’er his loved remains were choicest honours shed,
Tears such as Heroes weep bedewed his lowly bed;
A deep responsive sigh from Albion’s woe-struck Isle
Swelled o’er the Atlantic wave,
And decked his early grave—
Who for his Country fought, who for his Country fell.”[4]
(_To be continued._)
[2] Afterwards Lord Lynedoch.
[3] Afterwards Lord Seaton, one of the most prominent officers in the
British Army.
[4] Written in memory of Moore by William Stark of Edinburgh in 1813.
THE GIRL’S OWN QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS.
THE EXAMINERS REPORT ON THE THIRD AND LAST TWENTY-FOUR QUESTIONS.
Our useful and interesting competition is now at an end, and we give
here the answers to the third and last instalment of questions. In
this final march few competitors have fallen out of the ranks, and it
is gratifying to have to record that the quality of the papers has
steadily improved in almost every case, as, indeed, was to be expected
from the painstaking and enthusiasm displayed at the start. It only
remains now to say a few words about the competition as a whole, and
to intimate who are the prize-winners and certificate-holders, and for
that our diligent girls will not have long to wait.
=49. What epidemic in Italy in the sixteenth century was cured by means
of music?=
To illustrate the proverb that a bad beginning makes a good ending,
many failed to answer. But it was by no means out-of-the-way
information that this epidemic was what is known as tarantism, which
prevailed in South Italy to an extraordinary extent during the
fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries, being at its height
during the sixteenth century. It was a sort of hysteria, and the
different forms taken by the disease were cured by means of different
airs, to which the patients were forced to dance till they often
dropped down with exhaustion. Bands of players used to go through the
country to provide the medicinal music, the melodies they played being
spoken of as tarantellas.
=50. What is the mother-tongue of Queen Victoria?=
It depends, says a competitor, on what you mean by mother-tongue. If
you mean mother’s tongue, it is German; but if you mean the language
of her native land, it is English. This is a sensible reply. The Queen
was born at Kensington Palace on May 24th, 1819, her father being the
Duke of Kent, the fourth son of George III. Her mother was the daughter
of the Duke of Saxe-Coburg. When she came to England shortly before the
birth of her child, the Duchess could speak hardly any English, and
German was thus a language with which our Queen was familiar in her
earliest years. One girl suggests that we should settle this “puzzling
question by saying that ‘her Majesty has two mother-tongues.’”
=51. What is the best time at which to water indoor and outdoor plants?=
The best answers to this question pointed out that it depends on the
season of the year. In spring and autumn plants should be watered in
the morning, whilst in summer the proper time is the evening; and in
winter what little water is needed should be given in the middle of the
day. Mrs. Loudon’s _Plain Instructions in Gardening_ were quoted by
three or four to the effect that, though some people object to watering
plants when the sun is upon them, this is not at all injurious so long
as the water is not too cold, and is only given to the roots. To give
water over the leaves when the sun is on them makes the leaves blister
and become covered with pale brown spots.
=52. Is abundant hair an indication of bodily and mental strength?=
Here many girls showed their good sense by giving their own personal
observations, and in this way some odd facts were brought forward. The
general drift of the answers is pretty well summed up in the following
quotation—
“Abundant hair is neither an indication of bodily nor of mental
strength, whatever it may be supposed to be. The story of Samson has
given rise to the notion that hairy people are strong physically; but
the fact is that the Chinese, who are the most enduring of all races,
are nearly bald. And as to the supposition that long and thick hair is
a sign or token of intellectuality, all antiquity, all madhouses, and
all common observation are against it. The easily-wheedled Esau was
hairy; the mighty Cæsar was bald.”
One girl, in a spirit of fun, says, “If the brain is over-worked, the
hair comes out,” and draws very neatly two pictures of herself, one
with a fine head of hair as she was “before answering these questions”
and the other with the scantiest of scanty locks showing how she looked
“after they had been all replied to.”
=53. How many ways can be named of profitably using broken bread?=
“Some notable housewives,” says Miss Florence Stackpoole, “make the
ignominious confession that, in the manner of using up broken bread,
they are, in schoolboy slang, fairly ‘stumped.’ How to get rid of it
they do not know.” They may now be recommended to consult our numerous
band of competitors, who in their replies to this question showed much
practical housekeeping sense. “About forty-five ways,” says one girl,
and we are inclined to think that we could nearly make up that number
by taking all the different ways suggested, beginning with the various
uses to which broken bread can be put in cookery and ending with its
employment in cleaning pictures, wall-papers, and felt hats; feeding
the birds, “who are very glad of it, especially in cold weather”;
trapping birds, “for which, no doubt, they are not so thankful”;
furnishing bait for fishing, and feeding pigs, chickens and cats.
=54. Was public money ever raised in England by encouraging the spirit
of gambling?=
The right answer to this question is that public money was at one time
raised in this country by means of lotteries. The first public lottery
in England, so far as can be ascertained, was drawn in 1569, and had
for its object the repair of harbours and other useful public works.
“From that date in the reign of Queen Elizabeth,” says Dr. Robert
Chambers, “down to 1826 (except for a short time following upon an
Act of Queen Anne), lotteries continued to be adopted by the English
Government as a source of revenue. It seems strange that so glaringly
immoral a project should have been kept up with such a sanction so
long.” A good many girls did not answer this question at all, and
several, without referring to lotteries, ran off into particulars
regarding the famous South Sea Bubble.
=55. Who was the religious poet so beloved by the parish of which he
was rector, that many of his parishioners would stop their ploughs when
his bell rang for prayer, that they might offer their devotions to God
with him?=
This beautiful example of the influence that may be exerted by a godly
pastor appeared to be well known. The poet was the saintly George
Herbert, rector of Bemerton, in Wiltshire, who was born in 1593 and
died in 1632. And when he died, says Izaak Walton, who wrote his Life,
“he died like a saint, unspotted of the world, full of humility, and
all the examples of a virtuous life.”
=56. How did the leek come to be the emblem of Wales?=
As was to be expected, for the answer is not to be looked for in
well-authenticated history, a good many different explanations were
given. According to some this national device of Wales, commonly worn
by Welshmen on St. David’s Day, March 1st, was selected for its high
position because it possesses the old Cymric colours, green and white.
Others had it that it was in memory of a great victory over the Saxons,
when the Welshmen, obeying the command of St. David, put leeks into
their hats, to distinguish between themselves and their foes. A good
many said that it was dated from the battle of Crecy, and backed up
their opinion by quoting Shakespeare. One girl we noticed said it was
because the Welsh think the leek a lucky plant, and grow it on their
cottage roofs to bring good fortune. And a few unromantic competitors
said it was all on account of the prominent place occupied by the leek
in Welsh cookery.
=57. What famous outlaw has a conspicuous place in ballad literature?=
Many outlaws have a place in ballad literature, but one stands head and
shoulders above all the rest, and that is Robin Hood. The numerous and
spirited ballads of which he and his companions, such as Maid Marian,
Friar Tuck and Little John, are the leading characters, are favourite
reading with all who love adventure and romance. Towards the close of
the Middle Ages, says a competitor, quoting a well-known authority,
Robin Hood was the people’s ideal as Arthur was that of the upper
classes. He was the ideal yeoman as Arthur was the ideal knight.
=58. Where can a married couple, after a twelvemonth of matrimony, lay
claim to a flitch of bacon after proving that, during the whole time,
they have never had a quarrel and never regretted the marriage?=
This whimsical custom, about which nearly everybody seemed to know, is
connected with the priory of Dunmow in Essex, and dates as far back
as the reign of King John. The earliest instances of the awarding of
the flitch have not been recorded: the first we have particulars of
is dated 1445. After 1763, the custom fell into the background, but
a revival of it was effected in 1855, by Mr. Harrison Ainsworth, the
novelist, and since then several have applied for and gained this
strange matrimonial prize.
=59. Has anyone ever tried to count the stars?=
“Look now towards Heaven,” we read in the Scriptures, “and tell the
stars if thou be able to number them.” Many observers, however,
including the two Herschels, have made the attempt. The stars visible
to the naked eye are only a fraction of the whole, but according to the
estimate of the distinguished German astronomer, Argeland, the number
seen by the unaided vision in the latitude of Berlin is 3,256, and for
the whole heavens may be put at about 5,000. Another German astronomer
makes out the naked-eye stars in the whole heavens to be about 6,800.
When the telescope is introduced the number is enormously increased.
The larger the telescope the more stars we see. The number has been
run up by authorities worthy of respect to as high as twenty million
stars, and more, within the grasp of an 18-inch reflector! Some girls,
in answering this question, mentioned that there was an International
Photographic Survey of the Heavens now going on which is sure to throw
light on this interesting problem.
=60. What English Earl once got a box on the ear from a great Queen?=
All competitors were right who said that the receiver of this royal
box was the Earl of Essex, and the giver Queen Elizabeth. It was on
an occasion when the two had begun to dispute on the subject of an
assistant in the affairs of Ireland, to which the earl was going
as Lord Deputy. The dispute ended in the earl’s receiving from her
majesty a box on the ear, with, we are told, the encouraging addition
of “Go and be hanged!” The fall of Essex is generally dated from this
circumstance, and it is thought that he never forgave it.
=61. Is what is known as the poisonous upas tree of Java a fact or a
hoax?=
It was right to say that it is partly the one and partly the other;
about an ounce of fact, however, to a pound of hoax. The name upas—a
Javanese word meaning poison—is given by the Malays and people of
Western Java to the poison obtained from the gum of a tree that used to
be employed in Celebes to envenom the bamboo shafts of the natives.
The famous description of the upas tree, with its effluvia killing all
things near it, is a pure fiction, the invention of George Stevens,
the Shakespearean commentator, who seems to have had a special turn
for mystifying and befooling the public. According to him the tree
destroyed all animal life within a radius of fifteen miles or more, and
when the poison was wanted it was fetched by condemned criminals, of
whom scarcely two out of twenty ever returned.
Several girls mentioned that the upas tree is to be met with in botanic
gardens in this country and, says one, “not doing a halfpennyworth of
harm to anybody.”
=62. What is the best way of treating a fainting fit?=
Almost all seemed to have an intelligent idea of what to do. They
had grasped the fact that the direct cause of fainting is diminished
circulation of blood through the brain, and that, therefore, in trying
to restore a person who has fainted, the first thing to be done is
to alter that condition. The patient, they said, should be laid down
quite flat, “so that the feebly-acting heart may not have to propel
the blood upward, but horizontally”; tight clothing should then be
loosened, cool fresh air admitted, cold water sprinkled down the face,
volatile salts, or other stimulant vapours, held at intervals to the
nostrils; and a little cold water, either by itself or having in it a
teaspoonful or two of sal volatile, or the same quantity of spirits,
being given as soon as the patient is able to swallow.
=63. What public punishment was once in use in England for scolding
women?=
Women who made free use of their tongues were punished in an original
way in old England. They were submitted to the correction of the
ducking stool, a chair at the end of a plank which moved up and down
over a river or pond—it was a sort of see-saw arrangement. The scold
was fastened in the chair, the other end of the plank was lifted up,
and down she went into the water, the number of immersions being
in proportion to the vigour of her fiery tongue. It was an old
institution: we find it mentioned in the Doomsday Survey. In the
seventeenth century, the ducking stool was superseded, to a certain
extent, by what was known as the branks. This was a scold’s bridle,
the chief part of which entered the mouth and pressed upon the tongue,
thus forming an effectual gag. “Ducking stools and branks, however,”
one writer sadly remarks, “with all their terrors, seem to have been
insufficient to frighten the shrews of former days out of their bad
propensities.”
=64. What was the origin of the phrase, “The wise fools of Gotham?”=
A good number of competitors had been unable to discover how these
Nottinghamshire worthies obtained their unenviable notoriety. According
to tradition, King John once intended to pass through Gotham on his way
to Nottingham, but the inhabitants prevented him, for some reason or
other best known to themselves. The king, in a rage, sent some of his
servants to inquire why they had been so uncivil, and the Gothamites,
hearing of their approach, thought of an expedient to turn away the
monarch’s displeasure—they pretended more stupidity than really
belonged to them. When the messengers arrived they found some of the
inhabitants endeavouring to drown an eel in a pool of water; some were
employed in dragging carts into a large barn to shade the wood from the
sun, and lifting horses into lofts to eat hay; and others were engaged
in building a hedge round a cuckoo which had perched in a bush. In
short they were all employed in some ridiculous task or other, which
convinced the king’s servants that Gotham was a village of fools—a
reputation it has ever since maintained. Such is the story, but its
truth is another matter. In one paper we find a good word for Gotham
quoted from Fuller, to the effect that “Gotham doth breed as _wise_
people as any which causelessly laugh at their simplicity.”
=65. Is length of life greater now than it used to be?=
The best answer to this question will be to quote some interesting
statistics given by Mr. Holt Schooling, who takes for the basis of
his statements the three official English life-tables (for 1838-1854,
1871-1880, and 1881-1890). These tables show an increase in the second
period over the first of 1.44 years expectation of life at birth to
every male, and 2.77 to every female; and in the third period over the
first of 3.75 to every male, and 5.33 to every female. In other words,
3¾ years of life have been added on the average to every male child,
and 5¹⁄₃ years to every female child. Thus the children born in any one
year in England and Wales will in the mass live more than four million
years longer than at the beginning of the period dealt with in these
tables.
Girls who puzzled over such old examples as the Countess of Desmond,
who is said to have died at 145, Thomas Parr, credited with 152, and
Henry Jenkins, who is reported to have died at 169, should take note
that the ages of these persons are generally allowed to have been much
exaggerated, and that, even if the figures were authentic, it does not
do, from a few isolated instances, to infer a general conclusion.
=66. Of what literary work has it been said that it is “perhaps the
only book about which the educated minority has come over to the
opinion of the common people?”=
The book was the _Pilgrim’s Progress_, by John Bunyan, and he who said
it was Lord Macaulay. The general rule, Lord Macaulay points out, is
that when the educated minority and the common people differ about the
merit of a book, the opinion of the educated minority finally prevails.
The _Pilgrim’s Progress_, of which the numerous early editions were
evidently intended for the cottage and the servants’ hall, the paper,
the printing, and the plates being all of the meanest description,
furnishes a notable exception. A wonderful book! “One of the few
books,” says Coleridge, “which may be read repeatedly at different
times, and each time with a new and a different pleasure.”
=67. Who was the young Fellow of Oxford who, during the latter half of
last century, eloped with a banker’s daughter, and came in the end to
be Lord Chancellor of England?=
“When on a visit to Newcastle,” writes a competitor, “I was taken to
see the window through which Bessy Surtees came when on the 18th of
November, 1772, she eloped with Jack Scott, who afterwards became Lord
Eldon. He was the Lord Chancellor referred to in the question.” Yes,
that is so. By the aid of a ladder and an old friend, “this adventurous
young man,” as one girl calls him, carried off the lady from her
father’s house, and away they went across the Border to Blackshiels
in Scotland, where they were married. It proved a happy and fortunate
union, but the example, we need hardly say, is not recommended for
general imitation.
=68. What plant was introduced early in the seventeenth century into
this country as an ornamental plant, but is now a favourite vegetable?=
We had in view the scarlet-runner bean, which is a native of South
America, and was introduced into England in 1633, when “it was at
first only cultivated in the flower-garden as an ornamental plant, and
it is treated as such by all the early writers on flowers.” Several
other plants were named by competitors, and in some cases with a
considerable show of reason, but the one we have named is perhaps the
most striking example.
=69. Who was the father of English cathedral music?=
Amongst the musicians named by girls as bearing this honourable title
were St. Ambrose, Palestrina, Orlando Gibbons, Henry Purcell, Handel,
Haydn and Bach. These were given in error. He who is justly called
“the father of English cathedral music” is Thomas Tallis, or Tallys,
as he himself spelt his name, who was born about 1515 and died about
1585. “His genius,” says Mr. W. S. Rockstro, “has left an indelible
impression upon the English school, which owes more to him than to any
other composer of the sixteenth century, and in the history of which
his name plays a very important part indeed.”
=70. What may justly claim to be the greatest work of imagination in
the world?=
This was a question giving an opportunity for considerable difference
of opinion. It drew forth many intelligent answers, and gave a
good deal of insight into individual taste. We give here the seven
principal works named by way of answer, placing them in the order of
frequency:—_The Arabian Night’s Entertainments_, _Don Quixote_ by
Cervantes, _Gulliver’s Travels_ by Dean Swift, the _Divine Comedy_
of Dante, Spencer’s _Faerie Queen_, _The Pilgrim’s Progress_ of John
Bunyan, and Milton’s _Paradise Lost_.
=71. What Scottish sovereign, looking out of the window of the prison
in which he was once confined, caught sight, for the first time, of the
lady whom he afterwards married?=
The captive monarch was James I. of Scotland. He had fallen into the
hands of the English when, a youth fourteen years old, he was on his
way by sea to France, and remained a prisoner for about eighteen years.
One day he happened to be looking out of his window in the great tower
of Windsor Castle, when Lady Jane Beaufort, the daughter of the Earl of
Somerset, was walking in the garden below. The charms of her person,
and the gentleness of her character won his heart, and they were
married with great splendour shortly before James set out for the north
to take up his crown. Lady Jane happened to be a cousin-german to Henry
IV. of England, “and thus,” remarks John Hill Burton, the historian
of Scotland, “romance found the very match which policy would have
dictated.”
=72. How many different kinds of clouds may be seen floating in the
sky?=
Few failed in this question, the answers going as a rule to show that
an observer of cloudland, about a hundred years ago, classified the
clouds, and proposed a series of names for them, since very generally
accepted. He divided them into seven kinds; three being simple, and
four intermediate or compound. The three simple forms are the Cirrus,
the Cumulus, and the Stratus. The intermediate or compound forms
derived from these three are the Cirro-cumulus, the Cirro-stratus, the
Cumulo-stratus, and the Cumulo-cirro-stratus, the last named most often
being called the Nimbus.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS.]
MEDICAL.
MISS PERT.—We think you are quite right in supposing that your throat
is really the cause of your trouble. Deafness is an exceedingly common
complication of catarrh of the throat. The ear communicates with the
back of the nose through the eustachian tube, and when the mucous
membrane of the nose or throat is inflamed, the end of the tube is
very apt to share in the condition, and so deafness results. Deafness
from this cause is often exceedingly intractable. The treatment of
the condition resolves itself into two parts—the treatment of the
throat, and the treatment of the ear. Of these, the former is by far
the more important. Perhaps it may be necessary to remove enlarged
tonsils or adenoids, or to destroy little growths in the nose or back
of the throat, or perhaps no such severe measure may be necessary,
and the throat condition may yield to medicated applications. We
advise you to wash out your throat and nose daily with a lotion made
by dissolving one teaspoonful of the following powder in a teacupful
of tepid water—of borax, bicarbonate of soda, and chlorate of potash,
finely powdered, one part each to three parts of finely powdered white
sugar. After having thoroughly washed your nose and throat with this
lotion, spray out your throat and nose with solution of menthol in
paraleine (1 in 8) used in an atomiser. Having well sprayed, close your
nostrils with your hand and blow up into your ears. This last little
manœuvre is of great value, for it helps to unstop the eustachian
tube, and it carries some of the menthol up into them. When you hear
a gurgling during this action, it is a sign that the tube is pervious
though not quite healthy. If the tube is quite normal, a single click
will be heard in both ears. You want our opinion upon the chloride of
ammonium inhaler. Here it is. We thoroughly and absolutely disapprove
of it. Theoretically it is all right, but in practice it has been
our experience that it does far more harm than good. It is true that
finely-divided chloride of ammonium is a very valuable application to
diseased mucous membranes. But the reason why the inhaler is harmful
is, that it is impossible to obtain chloride of ammonium vapours free
from either the vapour of ammonia or of hydrochloric acid. And these do
far greater harm than the ammonium chloride can do good.
MOLLY.—We do not advise the biscuits you mention. Of course they
are indigestible since they cannot be digested at all! They are
occasionally given for wind and tainted breath arising from
indigestion, etc., but they are open to grave objections, and we really
cannot see their value.
A. G.—We have so frequently detailed the treatment of anæmia that it
is not fair to other correspondents to occupy our space, which is very
much limited, by going over the same ground again. Look up the back
correspondence, and you will find all about anæmia. Do not take quinine
and iron, for this mixture is exceedingly indigestible, and anæmic
girls must be very careful of their digestions. The best preparations
of iron to begin with are dialysed iron, syrup of hæmaglobin, or
Robin’s peptonate of iron; the two last drugs are French preparations,
and are rather expensive.
DIANA D.—The pain in the left side of your chest may be due to many
causes, by far the most likely of which is indigestion. Possibly the
illness you had last year was pleurisy.
POPPY.—1. A pale and sallow complexion may either be a natural
condition, or else, as is more probable, a symptom of some abnormal
state. In anæmia, severe indigestion, constipation, and some more
serious affections, a sallow complexion is a common feature. You
say you are quite healthy; this excludes most abnormal conditions.
But the third mentioned trouble is not excluded by that remark, and
as constipation is the commonest cause of a sallow complexion, we
think that that is what is troubling you. Just lately we discussed
the treatment of this complaint at full length.—2. Do not use any
cosmetics. We do not know the preparation you mention, but we strongly
dissuade you from using it all the same. The less you have to do with
patent proprietary articles the better you will be.
GIRLS’ EMPLOYMENTS.
MARION (_Stewardess_).—You should apply at the offices of some of the
principal steamship companies, and inquire whether there is likely to
be a vacancy which you might fill. Preference is usually given to women
who are related to men in the companies’ employ. Nursing experience is
also a strong recommendation to an applicant. Salaries vary from £1
10s. to £3 10s. a month with board, and the gratuities of passengers on
first-class lines make an important addition to the fixed payment.
VERITAS (_Addressing Envelopes_).—This kind of work is occasionally
given out by the law stationers in London, but it tends to become
superseded by typewriting. You must forgive us for saying that your
handwriting is not very well adapted for the purpose. It is almost
essential to write a neat clerkly hand.
DAISY IN THE FIELD (_Nursing_).—See our reply to “Louise” (April 15).
It is rather a jump from the kitchen to the Army Nursing Service, is it
not? Still, if you feel that you would make a better nurse than cook,
you are right in trying to realise your ambition. We advise you to take
the full three years’ training at some large general hospital, and at
the end of that time you will be in a position to decide what to do
next. District and rural nursing we would commend to your notice, for
the poor in our large towns and villages want skilled attendance almost
as sorely as wounded soldiers, and have very few chances of getting it.
A SCOTCH READER (_Teaching Cookery_).—Since you cannot hear of a
vacancy in Scotland, it might be wise to apply to some of the English
educational bodies. We would suggest your writing to the Clerk of the
London School Board, Victoria Embankment, and the Secretary, Technical
Education Board, London County Council, St. Martin’s Lane, London.
Study also the advertisements in such papers as the _Schoolmaster_,
_Schoolmistress_, _Church Times_, and the _Guardian_. You might see
an advertisement for a cookery teacher in one of those journals.
Be careful in applying for a post to make a full statement of your
qualifications and previous experience (if any) as a teacher. There
is a tendency at the present time to prefer teachers who can give
instruction in all housewifery subjects to those who can teach cookery
only.
LUCY HOOD, Germany (_Club for Teacher of Singing_).—1. We do not know
of any residential club in London for teachers only; but there are
many excellent homes and clubs for women who are earning a living in
various ways. Among these we may mention the Ilchester Club, Ilchester
Gardens, Hyde Park, W. (not intended, however, for professional women
exclusively), the Beechwood Club, 6, Oakley Street, Chelsea, and the Y.
W. C. A. Home for Working Ladies, 91, Great Portland Street, W.—2. We
do not advise you to pay fees to an agent in order to obtain pupils.
You should not establish yourself in London unless you have the promise
of a pupil or two already. In the musical profession social interest
is a great advantage. Then the mothers of your pupils could help you
by speaking of you to their friends, and still more by giving an “At
Home” occasionally, at which you might sing. London teachers very often
give concerts at which their musical colleagues and pupils perform.
These concerts usually entail expense, but they are regarded in the
profession as valuable advertisements.
MYRTLE (_Writing_).—If by writing you mean copying, you would certainly
not earn a living by such means; and if, on the other hand, you mean
literary work, you will need to obtain a better education than most
girls have at your age of 16½. You can hardly be expected to earn
a living without being taught any special kind of work. But many
occupations can be learnt without great expense. You could learn, for
instance, cookery or dairy-work at some of the County Council classes;
or you could be trained as an elementary school teacher, after passing
the Queen’s Scholarship Examination. The Post Office branch of the
Civil Service is also worth considering, especially as you write a good
clear hand, and are fond of any occupation that entails writing. In any
case it would be worth while to try to pass the examination. Probably
some Board School teacher in your neighbourhood would coach you for it
out of school hours, if there is no institution in your neighbourhood
that you could attend for the purpose.
MISCELLANEOUS.
SUNDAY SCHOOL TEACHER.—The passage to which you refer is easily
explained (“Put Thou my tears into Thy bottle,” Psalm lvi. 8). The
practice of preserving tears in bottles is of very ancient Eastern
origin. It was done in Egypt as elsewhere, and it exists down to the
present day in Persia. In that country it constitutes an important
item of funeral ceremonials, when every mourner is presented with a
sponge with which to mop the eyes and cheeks; and after the burial
is over, these are taken by a priest, who squeezes the tears into a
bottle. These sacred tears of mourners are supposed to possess healing
properties, and to be more efficacious than any means of cure for
several forms of Persian diseases.
MINKA.—There have been such terrible and fatal accidents from using
preparations of petroleum for the hair that it is illegal to employ it
in this country. “Koko” is a patent, and of it we have had no personal
experience.
A. POODRIDGE.—As we have often told inquirers, “pouring oil on troubled
waters” is not a quotation—it is an existing fact; and the use of
oil for this purpose obtains at sea. Only a week or two ago oil was
employed on the Channel to enable passengers to land.
THRIFTLESS.—We think that the United Sisters Friendly Society would
suit you. It was founded some years ago in order to enable women
dependent on their earnings to make provision for sickness and old age,
and to secure at death a sum of money for burial expenses. All women of
good health and character between the ages of sixteen and forty-five
are eligible for membership; also the Work and Leisure Court, No. 15.
For both of these, address Miss Edith M. Maskell, 7c, Lower Belgrave
Street, London, S.W. The names of the Trustees of these two Societies
are a sufficient guarantee for their stability and honesty.
KAROLEEN.—If you cannot find the card-game you require at one of the
large bazaars, we do not know where else you could look for them.
Perhaps the bazaar at which you inquire would endeavour to procure them
for you in London.
SLOGGER.—You may find illustrations from photographs of some of the
most distinguished men amongst cricketers in some of the recent
magazines; but you have only to order any you require at a photograph
shop, and they will send you a collection from which you may make a
selection.
FLORA.—We could not take the responsibility of recommending any
security for the investment of money. We do not think a ground rent
could be purchased for so small a sum. The Post Office Savings Bank
appears to us the most suitable.
FLUFF.—Do you mean the famous and beautiful Duchess, or her successor?
In any case, you can only inquire at one of the photograph shops where
the windows are full of notables of every description.
BECKY SHARP.—Fine soft hair can easily be made to lie as you wish; but
the coarse, stiff, pigs’-bristle sort can only be forced into place by
the use of some sort of bandoline, formerly much in use, especially at
a windy seaside place. You had better consult a hairdresser.
TOMUEL, MAB, and others, are very anxious to get rid of the rats which
infest their houses, but that their death should be painless. We fear
any death by poison would be painful, and so it would be by traps; but
then the rats are peculiarly obnoxious, so we have to make a choice
of two evils. We are told of an old recipe, viz., half a pint of
plaster of Paris, mixed with a pint of oatmeal, is an excellent means
of killing them. The best plan, however, is to try to stop up all
the holes by which they enter with broken glass and tin, and to keep
them stopped. To do this may be more expensive, but it will be more
satisfactory, if you have scruples about the cruelty of killing them.
AN IGNORANT ONE.—John Smith. Esq., Mayor of Blackford, would be the
proper address. In speaking to him, we believe he is addressed as “Mr.
Mayor.” You would write to him as “Dear Sir,” or “My dear Sir,” and
after signing yourself, would add below his name and address, “John
Smith, Esq., Mayor of Blackford.”
DAISY.—Leave two of your husband’s cards where you call, if the lady be
at home; in case of an afternoon party, leave your own and his on the
hall table as you go out. White is generally worn for confirmation.
A TROUBLED MIND.—Tell the person who wishes to be engaged to you that
you would like to see more of him personally, and so have opportunity
for a fuller interchange of thought, and that you think he also should
have a better acquaintance with you, before entering into any definite
engagement, for fear of disappointment; in the meantime that (with your
mother’s sanction) you and he might correspond with a view to render
that prospective engagement a wise and happy one. Try some “Berlin
black” on your grate.
NEW HOUSEKEEPER.—1. In a general way, house-linen of the best kind
is now marked in cross-stitch. It may in the case of table-linen be
embroidered in satin-stitch. Marking-ink is used for the commoner
articles only.—2. _The Girls’ Own Cookery Book_, price 1s., was issued
some years ago, and is an excellent manual.
* * * * *
[Transcriber’s note—the following changes have been made to this text:
Page 523: Arther to Arthur—“Arthur S. Way”.]