of Worcester, and a carpenter, who had lodged at the house of her
brother-in-law, joined the regiment, when Hannah becoming apprehensive
of the discovery of her sex resolved to desert. Her female friend
endeavoured to dissuade her from such a dangerous enterprise; but
finding her resolution fixed, she furnished her with money, and Hannah
commenced her journey on foot for Portsmouth. About a mile from
Carlisle, perceiving some men employed in picking peas, and their
clothes lying at some distance, she exchanged her regimental coat for
one of the old coats belonging to one of the men, and proceeded on her
journey. At Liverpool and Chester, Hannah contrived, by her attentions
to a landlady and a young mantua-maker, to obtain some money; but in an
intrigue with a widow at Winchester our gallant was less successful,
the widow rifling her pockets, and leaving her with but a few shillings
to finish her journey on foot. Arrived at Portsmouth, she soon enlisted
as a marine in Colonel Fraser's regiment which in three weeks was
drafted for the East Indies, and Hannah, among the rest, was ordered
to repair on board the _Swallow_ sloop, in Admiral Boscawen's fleet.
She soon distinguished herself on board by her dexterity in washing,
mending, and cooking for her messmates, and she thus became a great
favourite with the crew of the sloop. She was regarded as a boy, and in
case of an engagement her station was on the quarter-deck, to fight at
small arms, and she was one of the afterguard; she was also obliged to
keep watch every four hours night and day, and frequently to go aloft.
We read likewise of the _Swallow_ being in a violent tempest, and
almost reduced to a wreck: Hannah took her turn at the pump, which was
kept constantly going, and she declined no office, however dangerous,
but established her character for courage, skill, and intrepidity.
The ship then made the best of her way to the Cape of Good Hope, during
their voyage from which they were reduced to short allowance, and but
a pint of water a day. The admiral next bore away for Fort St. David,
on the coast of Coromandel, where the fleet soon afterwards arrived.
Hannah, with the rest of the marines, being disembarked, after a march
of three weeks, joined the English army encamped before Aria-Coupon,
which place was to have been stormed; but a shell having burst and
blown up their magazine, the besieged were obliged to abandon it. This
adventure gave Hannah fresh spirits, and her intrepid conduct acquired
the commendation of all the officers.
The army then proceeded to the attack of Pondicherry, and after lying
before that place eleven weeks, and suffering very great hardships,
they were obliged by the rainy season to abandon the siege. Hannah
was the first in the party of English foot who forded the river,
breast-high, under an incessant fire from a French battery. She was
likewise on the picket-guard, continued on that duty seven nights
successively, and laboured very hard about fourteen days at throwing up
the trenches. In one of the attacks, however, her career was well-nigh
terminated. She fired thirty-seven rounds during the engagement, and
received, according to her account, six shots in her right leg, five in
the left, and, what was still more painful, a dangerous wound in the
lower part of her body, which she feared might lead to the discovery
of her disguise to the surgeons. She, however, intrusted her secret
to a negress who attended her, and brought her lint and salve; after
most acute suffering she extracted the ball with her finger and thumb,
and made a perfect cure. Meanwhile the greater part of the fleet had
sailed. She was then sent on board the _Tartar_ pink, and continued
to do the duty of a sailor till the return of the fleet from Madras.
She was soon afterwards turned over to the _Eltham_ man-of-war, and
sailed with that ship to Bombay. Here the vessel, which had sprung a
leak on the passage, was heaved down for repair, which lasted five
weeks. The captain remained on shore, while Hannah, in common with the
rest of the crew, had her turn on the watch. On one of these occasions,
Mr. Allen, the lieutenant who commanded in the captain's absence,
desired her to sing a song, but she excused herself, saying she was
unwell; the officer, however, insisted that she should sing, which
she as resolutely refused to do. She soon had occasion to regret her
non-compliance, for being suspected of stealing a shirt belonging to
one of her comrades, though no proof could be adduced, the lieutenant
ordered her to be put in irons. After remaining there five days, she
was ordered to the gangway, and received twelve lashes, and she was
then sent to the topmast-head for four hours. The missing shirt was
afterwards found in the chest of the man who complained that he had
lost it.
About this time the sailors began to rally Hannah because she had no
beard, and they soon afterwards jocosely christened her Miss Molly
Gray; this alarmed her, lest some of the crew might suspect that she
was a female; but she took part in their scenes of dissipation with
such glee, that she was soon called Hearty Jemmy.
While the vessel remained at Lisbon, on her passage home, she met with
an English sailor who had been at Genoa in a Dutch vessel. She took the
opportunity of inquiring after her long-lost husband, and was informed
that he had been confined at Genoa for murdering a native gentleman of
that city, a person of some distinction; and that to expiate his crime,
he was put into a sack with a quantity of stones, and thus thrown into
the sea. Distressing as this information must have been, Hannah had
sufficient command over herself to conceal her emotions.
Leaving Lisbon, Hannah arrived safely at Spithead. At Portsmouth she
met her female friend, for whose sake she had been whipped at Carlisle.
This girl was still single, and would have married Hannah, had she
chosen to discover herself. She, however, proceeded to London, where
she was heartily received by her sister. She soon afterwards met with
some of her shipmates; and, after receiving her pay, she was about to
part with them, when she revealed her sex, and one of them immediately
offered to marry her, but she declined.
Hannah's strange career had now acquired her popularity, and as she
possessed a good voice, she obtained an engagement at the Royalty
Theatre, in Wellclose Square, where she appeared in the character of
Bill Bobstay, a sailor; she also represented Firelock, a military
character, and in a masterly and correct manner went through the manual
and platoon exercises. She, however, quitted the stage in a few months;
and as she preferred male attire, she resolved to continue to wear it
during the remainder of her life; she usually wore a laced hat and
cockade, and a sword and ruffles. There were good portraits of her
published in 1750.
Hannah now became an out-pensioner of Chelsea Hospital on account
of the wounds she received at the siege of Pondicherry, her pension
being 30_l._ She next took a public-house at Wapping; on one side of
the signboard was painted the figure of a jolly British tar, and on
the other the valiant marine; underneath was inscribed, "The Widow
in Masquerade, or the Female Warrior." She continued to keep this
house for many years; and afterwards married one Eyles, a carpenter,
at Newbury, in Berkshire. A lady of fortune, who admired Hannah's
heroism and eccentricity of conduct, took special notice of her, became
godmother to her son, and contributed towards his education. Mrs. Eyles
continued to receive her pension to the day of her death. She lived for
some time with her son in Church Street, Stoke Newington; but, about
three years before her death, she showed symptoms of insanity, and was
admitted as patient at Bethlem Hospital, Moorfields, where she died
February 8, 1792, aged sixty-nine years.
[Illustration: Lady Archer enamelling at her Toilet.]
Lady Archer.
This lady, formerly Miss West, lived to a good age--a proof that
cosmetics are not so fatal as some would have us suppose. Nature had
given her a fine aquiline nose, like the princesses of the House
of Austria, and she did not fail to give herself a complexion. She
resembled a fine old wainscoted painting, with the face and features
shining through a thick incrustation of copal varnish.
Her ladyship was for many years the wonder of the fashionable world,
envied by all the ladies of the Court of George the Third. She had a
well-appointed house in Portland Place. Her equipage was, with her, a
sort of scenery. She gloried in milk-white horses to her carriage, the
coachmen and footmen wore very showy liveries, and the carriage was
lined with silk of a tint to exhibit the complexion to advantage.
Alexander Stephens, amongst whose papers was found this account of
Lady Archer, tells us that he recollected to have seen Mrs. Robinson
(the _Perdita_ of the Prince of Wales's love) go far beyond all this
in the exuberance of her genius, in a yellow lining to her landau,
with a black footman, to contrast with her beautiful complexion and
fascinating figure, and thus render both more lovely. Lady Archer lived
at Barn Elms Terrace, and her house had the most elegant ornaments
and draperies to strike the senses, and yet powerfully address the
imagination. Her kitchen-garden and pleasure-ground, of five acres--the
Thames, flowing in front, as if a portion of the estate--the apartments
decorated in the Chinese style, and opening into hothouses stored
with fruits of the richest growth, and greenhouses with plants of
great rarity and beauty, and superb couches and draperies, effectively
placed, rendered her home a sort of elysium of luxury.
Barn Elms will be remembered as the scene of an older
eccentricity--Heydegger's instantaneous light reception of George II.,
a device worthy of the master of the revels.
_DELUSIONS, IMPOSTURES, and FANATIC MISSIONS._
[Illustration: The Alchemist.]
Modern Alchemists.
It may take some readers by surprise to learn that there have been true
believers in alchemy in our days. Dr. Price is commonly set down in
popular journals as _the last of the alchemists_. This is, however, a
mistake, as we shall proceed to show; before which, however, it will be
interesting to sketch the history of this reputed alchemist.
Towards the close of the last century, Dr. James Price, a medical
practitioner in the neighbourhood of Guildford, Surrey, acquired
some notoriety by an alleged discovery of methods of transmuting
mercury into gold or silver. He had been a student of Oriel College,
Oxford, where he obtained the degree of Bachelor of Physic. In 1782
he published an account of his experiments on mercury, silver, and
gold, performed at Guildford, in that year, before Lord King and
others, to whom he appealed as eye-witnesses of his wonder-working
power. It seems that mercury being put into a crucible, and heated in
the fire with other ingredients (which had been shown to contain no
gold), he added a red powder; the crucible was again heated, and being
suffered to cool, amongst its contents, on examination, was found a
globule of pure gold. By a similar process with a white powder, he
produced a globule of silver. The character of the witnesses of these
manifestations gave credit and celebrity for a time to Price, who was
honoured by the University with the degree of Doctor of Physic, and
he was also elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. Dr. Price had now
placed himself in a perilous position; for persons acquainted with the
history of alchemy must have conjectured how the gold and silver in his
experiments might have been procured with any transmutation of mercury
or any other substance. The Royal Society authoritatively required that
the pretensions of the new associate should be properly sifted, and
his claim as a discoverer be clearly established, or his character as
an impostor exposed. A repetition of the doctor's experiments before a
committee of the Royal Society was commanded on pain of expulsion; when
the unfortunate man, rather than submit to the ordeal, took a draught
of laurel-water, and died on July 31, 1783, in his twenty-fifth year.
At the beginning of the present century, some persons of eminence in
science thought favourably of alchemy. Professor Robinson, writing
to James Watt, February 11, 1800, says, "The analysis of alkalies
and alkaline earth will presently lead, I think, to a doctrine of _a
reciprocal convertibility of all things into all ... and I expect to
see alchemy revive_, and be as universally studied as ever."
Sir Walter Scott, in his well-known paper on Astrology and Alchemy, in
_The Quarterly Review_, tells us that about the year 1801, an adept
lived, or rather starved, in the metropolis, in the person of the
editor of an evening newspaper, who expected to compound the alkahat,
if he could only keep his materials digested in his lamp-furnace for
the space of seven years. Scott adds, in pleasant banter, "the lamp
burnt brightly during six years, eleven months, and some odd days, and
then unluckily it went out. Why it went out, the adept could never
guess; but he was certain that if the flame could only have burnt to
the end of the septenary cycle, the experiment must have succeeded."
The last true believer in alchemy was not Dr. Price, but Peter Woulfe,
the eminent chemist, and Fellow of the Royal Society, and who made
experiments to show the nature of mosaic gold. Mr. Brande says: "It
is to be regretted that no biographical memoir has been preserved
of Woulfe. I have picked up a few anecdotes respecting him from two
or three friends who were his acquaintance. He occupied chambers in
Barnard's Inn, Holborn (the older buildings), while residing in London,
and usually spent the summer in Paris. His rooms, which were extensive,
were so filled with furnaces and apparatus that it was difficult to
reach his fireside. A friend told me that he once put down his hat, and
never could find it again, such was the confusion of boxes, packages,
and parcels that lay about the chamber. His breakfast-hour was four in
the morning; a few of his select friends were occasionally invited to
this repast, to whom a secret signal was given by which they gained
entrance, knocking a certain number of times at the inner door of his
apartment. He had long vainly searched for the Elixir, and attributed
his repeated failures to the want of due preparation by pious and
charitable acts. I understand that some of his apparatus is still
extant, upon which are supplications for success and for the welfare
of the adepts. Whenever he wished to break an acquaintance, or felt
himself offended, he resented the supposed injury by sending a present
to the offender, and never seeing him afterwards. These presents were
sometimes of a curious description, and consisted usually of some
expensive chemical product or preparation. He had an heroic remedy for
illness; when he felt himself seriously indisposed, he took a place in
the Edinburgh mail, and having reached that city, immediately came back
in the returning coach to London."
A cold taken in one of these expeditions terminated in inflammation of
the lungs, of which Woulfe died in the year 1805. Of his last moments
we received the following account from his executor, then Treasurer of
Barnard's Inn. By Woulfe's desire, his laundress shut up his chambers,
and left him, but returned at midnight, when Woulfe was still alive.
Next morning, however, she _found him dead_! His countenance was calm
and serene, and apparently he had not moved from the position in his
chair in which she had last left him.
Twenty years after the death of Peter Woulfe, Sir Richard Phillips
visited "an alchemist" named Kellerman, at the village of Lilley,
between Luton and Hitchin. He was believed by some of his neighbours
to have discovered the Philosopher's Stone and the Universal Solvent.
His room was a realisation of the well-known picture of Tenier's
Alchemist. The floor was strewed with retorts, crucibles, alembics,
jars, and bottles of various shapes, intermingled with old books.
He gave Sir Richard a history of his studies, mentioned some men in
London who, he alleged, had assured him that they had made gold; that
having, in consequence, examined the works of the ancient alchemists,
and discovered the key which they had studiously concealed from the
multitude, he had pursued their system under the influence of new
lights; and, after suffering numerous disappointments, owing to the
ambiguity with which they described their processes, he had at length
happily succeeded; had made gold, and could make as much more as he
pleased, even to the extent of paying off the National Debt in the coin
of the realm!
Killerman then enlarged upon the merits of the ancient alchemists,
and on the blunders and assumptions of modern chemists. He quoted
Roger and Francis Bacon, Paracelsus, Boyle, Boerhaave, Woulfe, and
others to justify his pursuits. As to the term Philosopher's Stone, he
alleged that it was a mere figure to deceive the vulgar. He appeared
to give full credit to the silly story of Dee's finding the Elixir at
Glastonbury, by means of which, as he said, Kelly for a length of time
supported himself in princely splendour. Kellerman added, that he had
discovered the _blacker than black_ of Apollonius Tyanus: it was itself
"the powder of projection for producing gold."
It further appeared that Kellerman had lived in the premises at Lilley
for twenty-three years, during fourteen of which he had pursued his
alchemical studies with unremitting ardour, keeping eight assistants
for superintending his crucibles, two at a time, relieving each other
every six hours; that he had exposed some preparations to intense heat
for many months at a time; but that all except one crucible had burst,
and that, Kellerman said, contained the true "blacker than black."
One of his assistants, however, protested that no gold had ever been
found, and that no mercury had ever been fixed; for he was quite sure
Kellerman could not have concealed it from his assistants; while, on
the contrary, they witnessed his severe disappointment at the result of
his most elaborate experiments.
Of late years there have been some strange revivals of alchemical
pursuits. In 1850 there was printed in London a volume of considerable
extent, entitled, _A Suggestive Inquiry into the Hermetic Mystery_--the
work of a lady, by whom it has been suppressed; we have seen it
described as "a learned and valuable book."
By this circumstance we are reminded that some five-and-thirty years
since it came to our knowledge that a man of wealth and position in the
City of London, an _adept_ in alchemy, was held _in terrorem_ by an
unprincipled person, who extorted from him considerable sums of money
under threats of exposure, which would have affected his mercantile
interests.
Nevertheless, alchemy has, in the present day, its prophetic advocates,
who predict what may be considered a return to its strangest belief. A
Göttingen professor says, in the _Annales de Chimie_, No. 100, that in
the nineteenth century the transmutation of metals will be generally
known and practised. Every chemist and every artist will make gold;
kitchen utensils will be of silver and even gold, which will contribute
more than anything else to prolong life, poisoned at present by the
oxide of copper, lead, and iron which we daily swallow with our food.
More recently, MM. Dr. Henri Fabre and Franz have placed before the
French Academy their discovery of the means of transmuting silver,
copper, and quicksilver into gold.
[Illustration: Jack Adams, the Astrologer.
_Magnifico Smokentissimo Custardissimo Astrologissimo Cunningmanisso
Rabbinissimo Viro Jacko Adams de Clerkenwell Greeno hanc lovelissimam
Sui Picturam._
Hovbedeboody pinxit et scratchabat.]
Jack Adams, the Astrologer.
Among the celebrities of Clerkenwell Green was Jack Adams, whose
nativity was calculated by Partridge, who affirmed that he was born
on the 3rd of December, 1625, and that he was so great a _natural_, or
simpleton, as to be obliged to wear long coats, besides other marks of
stupidity; and that the parish not only maintained him, but allowed a
nurse to attend him to preserve him from harm. Allusion is made to him
in a satirical ballad of 1655:--
Jack Adams, sure, was pamet (poet) by the vein.
And in the _Wits, or Sport upon Sport_, 1682, we read of his visit
to the Red Bull playhouse, where Simpleton, the smith, appearing on
the stage with a large piece of bread-and-butter, Jack Adams, knowing
him, cried out, "Cuz, Cuz, give me some," to the great pleasure of the
audience. Ward thus mentions his celebrity:--
What mortal that has sense or thought
Would strip Jack Adams of his coat;
Or who would be by friends decoyed
To wear a badge he would avoid?
Jack Adams was a conjurer and professor of the celestial sciences; he
was (says Granger's Supplement) "a blind buzzard, who pretended to have
the eyes of an eagle. He was chiefly employed in horary questions,
relative to love and marriage, and knew, upon proper occasions, how to
soothe and flatter the expectations of those who consulted him, as a
man might have much better fortune from him for five guineas than for
the same number of shillings. He affected a singular dress, and cast
horoscopes with great solemnity. When he failed in his predictions,
he declared that the stars did not absolutely force, but powerfully
incline, and threw the blame upon wayward and perverse fate. He assumed
the character of a learned and cunning man; but was no otherwise
cunning than as he knew how to overreach those credulous mortals who
were as willing to be cheated as he was to cheat them, and who relied
implicitly upon his art." Mr. Warner says: "A short time after we
removed into the house (No. 7, Clerkenwell Green), two young women
applied to have their fortunes told; upon being informed they were
under some mistake, one expressed great surprise, and stated that was
the place she always came to, and she thought some of Mr. Adams's
family always resided there. This was the first time I ever heard
anything of Jack Adams. Several similar applications were made by other
persons, and we afterwards learnt that it had been occupied by persons
of that profession for many years, and they generally went by the name
of Adams."[15]
[15] Pinks's _History of Clerkenwell_, 1865, p. 110.
In an old print we have Jack Adams in a fantastic dress, with a
tobacco-pipe in his girdle, standing at a table on which lies a
horn-book and _Poor Robin's Almanack_. On one shelf is a row of books,
and on another several boys' playthings, particularly tops, marbles,
and a small drum. Before him is a man genteelly dressed, presenting
five pieces; from his mouth proceeds a label, inscribed, "Is she a
princess?" This is meant for Carleton, who married the pretended German
princess. Behind him is a ragged, slatternly woman, who has also a
label in her mouth, with these words: "Sir, can you tell my fortune?"
In _Poor Robin's Almanack_ for 1785 are these lines:
Now should I choose t'invoke a Muse--
Muses are fickle madams;
Else I could go my poem through
Ere you could say _Jack Adams_.
In the City of London Library is an original print of Jack Adams, and a
copy by Caulfield.
The Woman-hating Cavendish.
Eccentricity in men of science is not rare. The Hon. Henry Cavendish,
who demonstrated, in 1781, the composition of water, was a remarkable
instance. He was an excellent mathematician, electrician, astronomer,
and geologist; and as alchemist shot far ahead of his contemporaries.
But he was a sort of methodical recluse, and an enormous fortune left
him by his uncle did little to change his habits. His shyness and
aversion to society bordered on disease. To be looked at or addressed
by a stranger seemed to give him positive pain, when he would dart
away as if hurt. At Sir Joseph Banks's _soirées_ he would stand for
a long time on the landing, afraid to face the company. At one of
these parties the titles and qualifications of Cavendish were formally
recited when he was introduced to an Austrian gentleman. The Austrian
became complimentary, saying his chief reason for coming to London
was to see and converse with Cavendish, one of the greatest ornaments
of the age, and one of the most illustrious philosophers that ever
existed. Cavendish answered not a word, but stood with his eyes cast
down, abashed, and in misery. At last, seeing an opening in the crowd,
he flew to the door, nor did he stop till he reached his carriage and
drove directly home. Any attempt to draw him into conversation was
almost certain to fail, and Dr. Wollaston's recipe for treating with
him usually answered best: "The way to talk to Cavendish is, never to
look at him, but to talk as if it were into a vacancy, and then it is
not unlikely you may set him going."