It would be an excellent accomplishment if an abhorrence of moral evils
could be bred in men similar to the instinctive antipathies described
in this extract:
It seems absolutely incredible that Peter the Great, the father
of the Russian navy, should shudder at the sight of water,
whether running or still, yet so it was, especially when alone.
His palace gardens, beautiful as they were, he never entered,
because the river Mosera flowed through them. His coachman
had orders to avoid all roads which led past streams, and if
compelled to cross a brook or bridge, the great emperor would
sit with closed windows, in a cold perspiration. Another
monarch, James I, the English Solomon, as he liked to be called,
had many antipathies, chiefly tobacco, ling, and pork. He never
overcame his inability to look at a drawn sword, and it is said
that on one occasion when giving the accolade, the king turned
his face aside, nearly wounding the new-made knight. Henry III
of France had so great a dislike for cats that he fainted at
the sight of one. We suppose that in this case the cat had to
waive his proverbial prerogative, and could not look at a king.
This will seem as absurd, as extraordinary to lady lovers of
that much-petted animal, but what are we to say of the Countess
of Lamballe, of unhappy history, to whom a violet was a thing
of horror? Even this is not without its precedent, for it is on
record that Vincent, the painter, was seized with vertigo and
swooned at the smell of roses. Scaliger states that one of his
relations was made ill at the sight of a lily, and he himself
would turn pale at the sight of watercresses, and could never
drink milk. Charles Kingsley, naturalist as he was to the core,
had a great horror of spiders, and in “Glaucus,” after saying
that every one seems to have his antipathic animal, continues:
“I know one (himself), bred from his childhood to zoology by
land and sea, and bold in asserting and honest in feeling that
all, without exception, is beautiful, who yet can not after
handling and petting and examining all day long, every uncouth
and venomous beast, avoid a paroxysm of horror at the sight
of the common house-spider.” (Text.)--_Cassell’s Family
Magazine._
(107)
* * * * *
A well-known officer of Her Majesty’s army, who has proved
his strength and courage in more than one campaign, turns
pale at the sight of a cat. On one occasion, when asked out
to dinner, his host, who was rather skeptical as to the
reality of this feeling, concealed a cat in an ottoman in the
dining-room. Dinner was announced and commenced, but his guest
was evidently ill at ease; and at length declared his inability
to go on eating, as he was sure there was a cat in the room.
An apparently thorough but unavailing search was made; but
his visitor was so completely upset that the host, with many
apologies for his experiment, “let the cat out of the bag,”
and out of the ottoman at the same time.--_Cassell’s Family
Magazine._
(108)
=Antiques, Artificial=--See AGE.