the club Crœsus, attended the meetings of the Royal Society Club with
only money enough in his pocket to pay for his dinner; that he declined
taking tavern soup, picked his teeth with a fork, invariably hung his
hat upon the same peg, and always stuck his cane in his right boot.
More apocryphal is the anecdote that one evening Cavendish observed a
pretty girl looking out from an upper window on the opposite side of
the street, watching the philosophers at dinner. She attracted notice,
and one by one they got up, and mustered round the window to admire
the fair one. Cavendish, who thought they were looking at the moon,
bustled up to them in his odd way, and when he saw the real object of
attraction, turned away with intense disgust, and grunted out "Pshaw!"
the more amorous conduct of his brother philosophers having horrified
the woman-hating Cavendish.
If men were a trouble to him, women were an abhorrence. With his
housekeeper he generally communicated with notes deposited on the
hall-table. He would never see a female servant; and if an unlucky
maid showed herself she was instantly dismissed. To prevent inevitable
encounters he had a second staircase erected in his villa at Clapham.
In all his habits he was punctiliously regular, even to his hanging his
hat upon the same peg. From an unvarying walk he was, however, driven
by being gazed at. Two ladies led a gentleman on his track, in order
that he might obtain a sight of the philosopher. As he was getting over
a stile he saw, to his horror, that he was being watched, and he never
appeared in that path again. That he was not quite merciless to the sex
was proved by his saving a lady from the pursuit of a mad cow.
Cavendish's town house was near the British Museum, at the corner
of Gower Street and Montague Place. Few visitors were admitted, and
those who crossed the threshold reported that books and apparatus
were its chief furniture. He collected a large library of scientific
books, hired a house for its reception in Dean Street, Soho, and kept
a librarian. When he wanted one of his own books, he went there as
to a circulating library, and left a formal receipt for whatever he
took away. Nearly the whole of his villa at Clapham was occupied as
workshops; the upper rooms were an observatory, the drawing-room was
a laboratory. On the lawn was a wooden stage, from which access could
be had to a large tree, to the top of which Cavendish, in the course
of his astronomical and meteorological observations, and electrical
experiments, occasionally ascended. His apparatus was roughly
constructed, but was always exact and accurate.
His household was strangely managed. He received but little company,
and the few guests were treated on all occasions to the same fare--a
leg of mutton. One day, four scientific friends were to dine with him;
when his housekeeper asked him what was to be got for dinner, Cavendish
replied, "A leg of mutton."
"Sir," said she, "that will not be enough for five."
"Well, then, get two," was the reply.
Cavendish extended his eccentric reception to his own family. His
heir, Lord George Cavendish, visited him once a-year, and was allowed
an audience of but half-an-hour. His great income was allowed to
accumulate without attention. The bankers where he kept his account,
finding they had in hand a balance of 80,000_l._, apprised him of the
same. The messenger was announced, and Cavendish, in great agitation,
desired him to be sent up; and, as he entered the room, the ruffled
philosopher cried, "What do you come here for! what do you want with
me?"
"Sir, I thought it proper to wait upon you, as we have a very large
balance in hand of yours, and we wish your orders respecting it."
"If it is any trouble to you, I will take it out of your hands. Do not
come here to plague me!"
"Not the least trouble to us, sir, not the least; but we thought you
might like some of it to be invested."
"Well, well, what do you want to do?"
"Perhaps you would like 40,000_l._ invested."
"Do so, do so! and don't come here to trouble me, or I'll remove it,"
was the churlish finale of the interview.
Cavendish died in 1810, at the age of seventy-eight. He was then the
largest holder of Bank-stock in England. He owned 1,157,000_l._ in
different public funds; he had besides, freehold property of 8,000_l._
a-year, and a balance of 50,000_l._ at his bankers. He was long a
member of the Royal Society Club, and it was reported at his death
that he had left a thumping legacy to Lord Bessborough, in gratitude
for his Lordship's piquant conversation at the club meetings; but
no such reason can be found in the will lodged at Doctors' Commons.
Therein, Cavendish names three of his club-mates--namely, Alexander
Dalrymple to receive 5,000_l._, Dr. Hunter 5,000_l._, and Sir Charles
Blagden (coadjutor in the water question) 15,000_l._ After certain
other bequests, the will proceeds: "The remainder of the funds (nearly
100,000_l._) to be divided: one-sixth to the Earl of Bessborough,"
while Lord George Henry Cavendish had two-sixths instead of one. "It
is, therefore," says Admiral Smyth, in his _History of the Royal
Society Club_, "patent that the money thus passed over from uncle to
nephew was a mere consequence of relationship, and not at all owing to
any flowers or powers of conversation at the Royal Society Club."
Cavendish never changed the fashion or cut of his dress, so that his
appearance in 1810, in a costume of sixty years previously, was odd,
and drew upon him the notice which he so much disliked. His complexion
was fair, his temperament nervous, and his voice squeaking. The only
portrait that exists of him was sketched without his knowledge. Dr.
George Wilson, who has left a clever memoir of Cavendish, says:
"An intellectual head, thinking--a pair of wonderful acute eyes,
observing--a pair of very skilful hands, experimenting or recording,
are all that I realize in reading his memorials."
Modern Astrology.--"Witch Pickles."
It would be an acquisition to our knowledge if some one competent
to the task would collect materials for the history of the men who,
within the present century, have made a profession of _judicial
astrology_. Attention is occasionally drawn to the practices of
itinerant fortune-tellers, many of whom still procure a livelihood.
The astrologer, however, or, as he is denominated in some districts
of England--more particularly in Yorkshire--a "planet-ruler," and
sometimes "a wise man," is of a higher order. He does not itinerate,
is generally a man of some education, possessed of a good deal of
fragmentary knowledge and a smattering of science. He very often
conceals his real profession by practising as a "Water Doctor" or as a
"Bone-setter," and some possess a considerable amount of skill in the
treatment of ordinary diseases.
The more lucrative part of his business was that which they carried on
in a secret way. He was consulted in cases of difficulty by a class
of superstitious persons, and an implicit faith was placed in his
statements and predictions. The "wise man" was sought in all cases of
accident, disaster, or loss. He was consulted as to the probabilities
of the return and safety of the distant and the absent; of the chances
of the recovery of the sick, and of the destiny of some beloved friend
or relative. The consultation with such a man would often have a
sinister aim; to discover by the stars whether an obnoxious husband
would survive, or whether the affections of courted or inconstant lover
could be secured. Very often long-continued diseases and inveterate
maladies were ascribed to an "ill-wish;" and the planet-ruler was
sought to discover who was the ill-wisher, and what charm would
remove the spell. It is needless to say that the practices of these
astrologers were productive, in a large number of cases, of much
disturbance among neighbours and relatives, and great mischief to all
concerned, except the man who profited by the credulity of his dupes.
Some of these charlatans no doubt were believers in the imposture, but
the greater number were arrant cheats. In Leeds and its neighbourhood
there were, some five-and-thirty years ago, several "wise men." Among
the number was a man known by no other name than that of "Witch
Pickles." He was avowedly an Astrological Doctor, and _ruled the
planets_ for those who sought him for that purpose. He dwelt in a
retired house on the road from Leeds to York, about a mile from
the Shoulder of Mutton public-house, at the top of March Lane. His
celebrity extended for above fifty miles, and persons came from the
Yorkshire Wolds to consult him. The man and the house were held in awe
by boys and even older persons who had belief in his powers. Little was
known of his habits, and he had few visitors but those who sought his
professional assistance. He never committed anything to writing. He
was particular in inquiring into all the circumstances of any case on
which he was consulted before he pronounced. He then, as he termed it,
proceeded to _draw a figure_, in order to discover the conjunction of
the planets, and then entered upon the explanation of what the stars
predicted. Strange things were told of him, such as that he performed
incantations at midnight on certain days in the year when particular
planets were in the ascendant; and that on such occasions strange
sights and sounds would be seen and heard by persons passing the house.
These were the embellishments of vulgar rumour. The man was quiet and
inoffensive in his demeanour, and was fully sensible of the necessity
of a life of seclusion. He is believed to have practised a few tricks
to awe his visitors, such as lighting a candle or fire without
visible agency, and other tricks far more ingenious than the modern
table-rapping.
"Witch Pickles" was only one among the number who derived a large
profit from this kind of occupation. He was one of the more respectable
of the class, as he never descended to the vile tricks of others of
the profession--tricks practised upon weak and credulous women and
girls--which will not bear description.[16]
[16] Abridged from _Notes and Queries_, 3rd Series, No. 25.
One of the most celebrated works on Astrology is that of Dr. Sibly,
twelfth edition, 1817, in two octavo volumes, containing more
than eleven hundred pages. The following will give an idea of the
pretensions of the book, which is a remarkable book, if it really went
through twelve editions. The owner of a privateer, which had not been
heard of, called to know her fate. Dr. Sibly gave judgment on a figure
"rectified to the precise time the question was propounded. The ship
itself appeared well formed and substantial, but not a swift sailer, as
is demonstrated by an earthy sign possessing the cusp of the ascendant,
and the situation of the Dragon's Head in five degrees of the same
sign." The ship itself was pronounced to have been captured.
"From the whole account it is clear that Dr. Sibly's system--how now
esteemed by astrologers the writer knows not--has but this alternative:
either one and the same figure will tell the fate of all the ships
which have not been heard of, including their sailing qualities, or
the stars will never send an owner to ask for news except just at
the moment when they are in a position to describe this particular
ship."[17]
[17] _Notes and Queries_, 3rd Series, No. 34.
Hannah Green; or, "Ling Bob."
This noted sibyl lived in a cottage on the edge of the moor on the left
of the old road from Otley to Bradford, between Carlton and Yeadon,
and eight miles from Leeds. She was popularly known as "The Ling-bob
Witch," a name given her, it is supposed, from her living among the
ling-bobs, or heather-tubs. She was resorted to on account of her
supposed knowledge of future events; but, like the rest of her class,
her principal forte was fortune-telling, from which it is said she for
herself realized a handsome fortune.
Many strange tales have been told of her; such as her power of
transforming herself, after nightfall, into the shape of any she list;
and of her odd pranks in her nightly rambles, her favourite character
being that of the _hare_, in which personation she was unluckily shot
by an unsuspecting poacher, who was almost terrified out of his senses
by the awful screams which followed the sudden death of the Ling-bob
witch.
In the year 1785, D----, of Sheffield, being at Leeds, had the
curiosity to pay a visit to the noted Hannah Green. He first questioned
her respecting the future fortunes of a near relative of his, who was
then in circumstances of distress, and indeed in prison. She told him
immediately that his friend's trouble would continue _full three times
three years_, and he would then experience _a great deliverance_,
which, in fact, was on the point of being literally verified, for he
was then in the Court of King's Bench.
He then asked her if she possessed any foreknowledge of what was about
to come to pass on the great stage of the world; to which she replied
in the affirmative. She said, war would be _threatened once, but
would not happen_; but the second time it would blaze out in all its
horrors, and extend to all the neighbouring countries; and that the two
countries [these appear to be France and Poland], at a great distance
one from the other, would in consequence obtain their freedom, although
after hard struggles. After the year 1790, she observed, many great
persons, even kings and queens, would lose their lives, and that _not
by fair means_. In 1794, a great warrior of high blood is to fall in
the field of battle; and in 1795, a distant nation [thought to be negro
slaves], who have been dragged from their own country, will rise as one
man, and deliver themselves from their oppressors.
Hannah appears to have been one of a somewhat numerous class, many
of whom were resident in Yorkshire. Very few of them went beyond the
attempt to foretell the future events in the lives of individuals; they
did not work with such high ambition as drawing the horoscopes of
nations. Their predictions were always vague, and so framed as to cover
a number of the most probable events in the life of every individual.
Hannah really died on the 12th of May, 1810, after having practised
her art about forty years; and Ling-bob became a haunted and dreaded
place. The house remained some years untenanted and ruinous, but was
afterwards repaired and occupied. Her daughter and successor, Hannah
Spence, laid claim to the same prescience, but it need hardly be added,
without the same success.[18]
[18] See a pamphlet of 1794; _Notes and Queries_, 3rd Series, Nos. 20
and 21.
Oddities of Lady Hester Stanhope.
This eccentric lady, grand-daughter of the great Lord Chatham, held
implicit faith in the influence of the stars on the destiny of men, a
notion from which every crowned head in Europe is not, at this day,
exempt.
Lady Hester brought her theories into a striking though rather
ridiculous system. She had a remarkable talent for divining characters
by the conformation of men. This every traveller could testify who had
visited her in Syria; for it was after she went to live in solitude
that her penetration became so extraordinary. It was founded both
on the features of the face and on the shape of the head, body, and
limbs. Some indications she went by were taken from a resemblance to
animals; and wherever such indications existed, she inferred that the
dispositions peculiar to those animals were to be found in the person.
But, independent of all this, her doctrine was that every creature is
governed by the star under whose influence it was born.
"Animal magnetism," said Lady Hester, "is nothing but the sympathy of
our stars. Those fools who go about magnetizing indifferently one
person and another, why do they sometimes succeed and sometimes fail?
Because if they meet with those of the same star with themselves, their
results will be satisfactory; but with opposite stars they can do
nothing."
"What Lady Hester's _own star_ was," says her physician, "may be
gathered from what she said one day, when, having dwelt a long time on
this her favourite subject, she got up from the sofa, and approaching
the window, she called me. 'Look,' said she, 'at the pupil of my eyes;
there! my star is the sun--all sun--it is in my eyes: when the sun is
a person's star it attracts everything.' I looked, and I replied that
I saw a rim of yellow round the pupil. 'A rim!' cried she; 'it isn't a
rim--it's a sun; there's a disk, and from it go rays all around: 'tis
no more of a rim than you are. Nobody has got eyes like mine.'"
Lady Hester delighted in anecdotes that went to show how much and how
justly we may be biassed in our opinions by the shape of any particular
part of a person's body independent of the face. She used to tell a
story of ----, who fell in love with a lady on a glimpse of those
charms which gave such renown to the Onidian Venus. This lady, luckily
or unluckily, happened to tumble from her horse, and by that singular
accident fixed the gazer's affections irrevocably. Another gentleman,
whom she knew, saw a lady at Rome get out of a carriage, her head being
covered by an umbrella, which the servant held over her on account of
the rain; and seeing nothing but her foot and leg, swore he would marry
her--which he did.
Lady Hester delighted in prophecies some of which, with their
fulfilments and non-fulfilments, are very amusing. There is reason
to think, from what her ladyship let fall at different times, that
Brothers, the fortune-teller in England, and Metta, a village doctor on
Mount Lebanon, had considerable influence on her actions and, perhaps,
her destiny. When Brothers was taken up and thrown into prison (in Mr.
Pitt's time), he told those who arrested him to do the will of heaven,
but first to let him see Lady Hester Stanhope. This was repeated to her
ladyship, and curiosity induced her to comply with the man's request.
Brothers told her that "she would one day go to Jerusalem and lead back
the chosen people; that on her arrival in the Holy Land, mighty changes
would take place in the world, and that she would pass seven years in
the desert." Trivial circumstances will foster a foolish belief in a
mind disposed to encourage it. Mr. Frederick North, afterwards Lord
Guildford, in the course of his travels came to Brusa, where Lady
Hester had gone for the benefit of the hot baths. He, Mr. Fazakerley,
and Mr. Gally Knight would often banter her on her future greatness
among the Jews. "Well, madam, you must go to Jerusalem. Hester, Queen
of the Jews! Hester, Queen of the Jews!" was echoed from one to
another; and probably at last the coincidence of a name, a prophecy,
and the country towards which she found herself going, were thought,
even by herself, to be something extraordinary. Metta took up the book
of fate from that time and showed her the part she was to play in the
East. This man, Metta, for some years subsequent to 1815, was in her
service as a kind of steward. He was advanced in years, and, like the
rest of the Syrians, believed in astrology, spirits, and prophecy.
No doubt he perceived in Lady Hester Stanhope a tincture of the same
belief; and on some occasion in conversation he said he knew of a
book on prophecy which he thought had passages in it that related to
her. This book, he persuaded her, could only be had by a fortunate
conjunction connected with himself; and he said if she would only
lend him a good horse to take him to the place where it was, he would
procure her a sight of it, but she was never to ask where he fetched it
from. All this exactly suited Lady Hester's love of mystery. A horse
was granted to him; he went off and returned with a prophetic volume
which he said he could only keep a certain number of hours. It was
written in Arabic, and he was to read and explain the text. The part
which he propounded was, "That a European female would come and live on
Mount Lebanon at a certain epoch, would build a house there, and would
obtain power and influence greater than a sultan's; that a boy without
a father would join her; that the coming of the Mahedi would follow,
but be preceded by war, pestilence, famine, and other calamities; that
the Mahedi would ride a horse born saddled, and that a woman would come
from a far country to partake in the mission." There were many other
incidents besides which were told.
"The boy without a father" was thought by Lady Hester to be the Duke
of Reichstadt; but when he died, not at all discountenanced, she
fixed on some one else. Another portion of the prophecy was not so
disappointing, for in 1835 the Baroness de Feriat, an English lady
residing in the United States, wrote of her own accord, asking to
come and live with her, "When," remarks the discriminating doctor,
"the prophecy was fulfilled." For the fulfilment of the remainder of
the prophecy, Lady Hester was resolved at least not to be unprepared.
She kept with the greatest care two mares, called Laïla and Lulu;
the latter for Lady Hester herself, and the former, which was "born
saddled," or in other words of a peculiar hollow-backed breed, was for
the Murdah or Mahedi, the coming of whom she had brought herself to
expect, by the words of St. John, "There is one shall come after me who
is greater than I." These mares she cherished with care equal to that
paid by the ancient Egyptians to cats; and she would not allow them
to be seen by strangers, except by those whose _stars_ would not be
baneful to cattle.
[Illustration: A Hermit of the Sixteenth Century.]
Hermits and Eremitical Life.
Men have, in most times, withdrawn themselves from the world and taken
up their abode in caverns or ruins, or whatever shelter they could
find, and lived on herbs, roots, coarse bread and water. In many cases,
such persons have deemed these austerities as acceptable to God, and
this has become one of the rudest forms of monastic life. It is not
from this class of persons that we propose to introduce a few portraits
of hermit life, but rather to those whose peculiarities have taken a
more eccentric turn, almost in our own time.
The Hon. Charles Hamilton, in the reign of George II., proprietor
of Pain's Hill, near Cobham, Surrey, built a hermitage upon a steep
brow in the grounds of that beautiful seat. Of this hermitage Horace
Walpole remarks that it is a sort of ornament whose merit soonest
fades, it being almost comic to set aside a quarter of one's garden
to be melancholy in. There is an upper apartment supported in part
by contorted logs and roots of trees, which form the entrance to the
cell, but the unfurnished and neglected state of the whole proves the
justness of Walpole's observation. Mr. Hamilton advertised for a person
who was willing to become a hermit in that beautiful retreat of his.
The conditions were that he was to continue in the hermitage seven
years, where he should be provided with a Bible, optical glasses, a mat
for his bed, a hassock for his pillow, an hour-glass for his timepiece,
water for his beverage, food from the house, but never to exchange a
syllable with the servant. He was to wear a camlet robe, never to cut
his beard or nails, nor ever to stray beyond the limits of the grounds.
If he lived there, under all these restrictions, till the end of the
term, he was to receive seven hundred guineas. But on breach of any of
them, or if he quitted the place any time previous to that term, the
whole was to be forfeited. One person attempted it, but a three weeks'
trial cured him.
A Correspondent of _Notes and Queries_ describes a gentleman near
Preston, Lancashire, as more successful in the above eccentricity. He
advertised a reward of 50_l._ a year for life to any man who would
undertake to live seven years underground, without seeing anything
human; and to let his toe and finger nails grow, with his hair and
beard, during the whole time. Apartments were prepared underground,
very commodious, with a cold bath, a chamber organ, as many books
as the occupier pleased, and provisions served from his own table.
Whenever the recluse wanted any convenience he was to ring a bell,
and it was provided for him. Singular as this residence may appear,
an occupier offered himself, and actually stayed in it, observing the
required conditions, for four years.