The cockles and oysters, too (the possession of which the Bishops

maintained as their right), had disappeared with all other denizens of

the salt sea, and in place of the brown, tangled seaweeds, fresh-water

plants had sprung up. The old historian specially noted the abundant

growth of _swangirs_, whatever they may be, on the seeds of which the

wild swans love to feed, and large flocks of these beautiful birds

floated in stately pride in the calm blue loch, while multitudes of

wild-duck and all manner of water-fowl found refuge among the tall

bullrushes and sedges.

[Illustration:

_C. F. Gordon Cumming._

THE PALACE AT SPYNIE, 1860.

]

“In this region,” says he, “is a lake named Spiney, wherein is

exceedingly plentie of swans. The cause of their increase in this place

is ascribed to a certeine herbe, which groweth there in great abundance,

and whose seed is verie pleasant unto the said fowle in the eating,

wherefore they call it swangirs; and hereunto such is the nature of the

same, that where it is once sowne or planted it will never be destroyed,

as may be proved by experience. For albeit that this lake be five miles

in length, and was some time within the rememberance of man verie

well-stocked with salmon and other fish, yet after that this herbe began

to multiplie upon the same, it became so shallow that one may now wade

through the greatest part thereof, by means whereof all the great fishes

there be utterlie consumed.”

Very lovely in those days must have been the view from “Bishop Davie’s

Great Tower,” overlooking the wide expanse of quiet lake, fringed with

willows and rustling reeds and dark green alders (precious to the

fishers as yielding a valuable dye for their nets), while beyond the

recently created ridge of shingle lay the great stormy ocean, and the

watchers on the tower might mark the incoming of the fleet of

brown-sailed fishing-smacks, or catch the first glimpse on the horizon

of the approach of some gallant merchantman (or perchance a smuggler’s

craft) bringing stores of claret and brandy, and other foreign goods.

The lake extended from Aikenhead in the east, far to the west of the

ancient salt-works at Salterhill, etc., close to Gordonstoun, and

ferry-boats took passengers across from point to point.

About the centre of the loch rose the island of Fowl Inch, where

multitudes of water-fowl found a quiet breeding-place, while the west

end of the loch was dotted with green islets called holmes, which were

covered with coarse, rank pasture, called star grass. In days when no

foreign grasses had yet been imported, this natural growth was precious,

so in the summer-time the cattle were carried by boat and turned loose

on the isles to graze. Of these isles, the principal were those known as

Wester Holme, Easter Holme, Tappie’s Holme, Skene’s Holme, Picture

Holme, Long Holme, Little Holme, and Lint Holme. This precious star

grass also grew luxuriantly on some parts of the shore at the west end

of the loch, and gave its name to those favoured spots—such were the

Star Bush of Balornie, the Star Bush of Salterhill, and the Star Bush of

Spynie.

Now, he who has a steady head and sufficient nerve to venture on

climbing the ruined and broken spiral stairs (through the gaps of which

he looks down into the empty space left by the total disappearance of

the rafters and flooring which once divided the great tower into four

stories) may still stand on Bishop Davie’s battlement, but in place of

the broad lake, he will see only one little corner of blue water,

sparkling like a sapphire in a setting of yellow gold—the withered reeds

of autumn.

This small lakelet, covering about a hundred and ten acres, of which

eighty are open water, lies on the edge of the dark fir-woods of

Pitgaveny, and is carefully preserved by means of strong embankments

separating it from the broad main ditch, which has so effectually

carried off most of the water. Small as it is, it suffices to attract a

considerable number of wild-duck, and a number of black-headed gulls

breed on its margin, notwithstanding that their nests are freely

pillaged, as their beautiful green, russet, or brown eggs are in great

request for the table. About eighty dozen are thus taken each week

during the breeding-season.

A neighbouring tract of rush-land still shows that art has not yet

wholly triumphed over nature, but to all intents and purposes Loch

Spynie has vanished “like as a dream when one awaketh.” Gone are the

quiet pools, well sheltered by tall reeds, where wild geese and ducks,

herons and coots, were wont to rear their young; no longer does the

otter haunt the shore, or the booming note of the bittern echo from the

swamp whence the white mists rose so eerily, and where the fowlers

devised cunning snares for the capture of wild-fowl.

The thick mud, once tenanted by multitudinous eels, and which afforded

such excellent sport to the spearers, was turned to good account by

large tile-works, and the waters are everywhere replaced by rich green

pasture, dotted over with sheep and cattle or comfortable homesteads

with well-filled stack-yards; while straight, dull roads take the place

of the old ferries; the boatmen have vanished, the wayfarer trudges on

mile after mile across a monotonous expanse of ploughed land or

harvest-fields, and the wild cries of the water-fowl are replaced by the

shrill steam-whistles that tell of railway-trains, steam-ploughs, or

reaping-machines. In short, the days of romance and of ague are a dream

of the past, and unpoetic wealth and health reign in their place.

The means by which in the course of many generations this transformation

has been effected, form a curious chain of incidents in the history of

reclaimed lands. For many years after the separation of the sea from the

loch, the River Lossie continued to flow in its ancient channel, passing

right through the loch, draining the surrounding land, and carrying

superfluous water to the sea. There is reason to believe that the

Bishops, who were then almost sole proprietors, assisted this natural

drainage by the cutting of deep lateral ditches, by which means some

land was reclaimed, and the loch became so shallow that a road of

stepping-stones was constructed right across it, so that the Bishop’s

Vicar, after preaching to his congregation at Kinnedar (or “The head of

the water”) might thereon cross to hold another preaching in Oguestown

(the ancient name for the parish church at Gordonstoun).

This road across the water was carefully constructed, and was known as

“The Bishop’s Stepping-Stones.” These were three feet apart, and on them

was laid a causeway of broad, flat stones, along which the great Church

dignitaries might walk in safety. There was also an artificial island

near the Palace of Spynie—measuring about sixty paces by sixteen. For

what purpose it had been constructed no one can guess, but it was built

of stone, bound together by crooked branches of oak—a strange survival

of those oak-forests which flourished in this district at the time when

the Danes occupied Burghead, and came to repair old galleys and build

new ones at Rose Isle, compelling the inhabitants to cut timber for this

purpose in the oak-forests.

Now only bleak, bent-clothed sandhills stretch along the shore, and from

time to time an old root or log is upturned as if to prove that the

tradition was not wholly a delusion.

Not only have the oak-forests disappeared, but the inlet of the sea

where the galleys were constructed has been so wholly blocked up with

sand, that not a trace of it is to be found, nor is there any mark to

suggest at what period this portion of the coast can have been an

island, as its name indicates.

Strange to say, however, the fisher-folk in the neighbouring village of

Hopeman tell us that about forty years ago a foreign vessel (“we call

them all foreigners unless they’re British,” say the fishers), bound for

Burghead, being caught in a storm, ran right ashore near Lossiemouth, as

the captain understood by his very old chart that he could run into

Spynie harbour, and thence sail round under shelter by the back of Rose

Isle.

A similar change, though in a smaller matter, is suggested by the name

of Brae-mou, which was formerly Burn-mouth, at Hopeman, and also by the

neighbouring farm of Burnside, which lies on rising ground near the

sea-board of crags, but where now not the tiniest trickling brooklet is

to be found, nor the faintest indication of any fresh-water stream

having ever flowed.

There is, however, a tradition that two hundred years ago this and

several other burns flowed westward into the lochs of Rose Isle and

Outlet, both of which were filled up, and their very sites obliterated

in the awful sand-storms which, in the autumn of 1694 and spring of

1695, overwhelmed so many miles of the most fertile land along the

shores of Moray.

These streams, thus diverted from their natural channel, turned

eastward, and thenceforward flowed into the Loch of Spynie, thus adding

to its water-supply at the same time as the drifting sand had partly

filled up its basin. Consequently the loch overflowed its bounds, and

did vast damage to the surrounding lands. The Bishop’s causeway and

other artificial roads, the Spynie islet and various homesteads, were

lost to sight, and well-nigh to tradition.

After the Reformation, when Church and lands were divorced, the

Protestant Bishops, shorn of all temporal power, might indeed inhabit

the Palace of Spynie, but were compelled to be passive witnesses of the

decay of the ancient drain-works, and the enlargement of the lake. The

newly-created Lord Spynie never lived in the country, and suffered

everything to go to ruin, so the accumulating waters encroached on the

arable land to such an extent as to necessitate some very energetic

measures—nothing less than turning the course of the river Lossie and

providing it with a new seaward channel.

So in the year 1599 two of the proprietors, Sutherland of Duffus and

Archibald Douglas of Pittendreich, whose lands chiefly suffered, agreed

on this action.

How these “twa lairds” set about their work does not appear, but they

evidently failed, for early in the seventeenth century most of the

neighbouring proprietors combined, and having taken counsel with

Anderson of Finzeach of Aberdeen, a skilful engineer, they succeeded in

turning the Lossie into a new channel, separating it from the loch by a

great embankment. A map of the province of Moray, published in 1640 by

Sir Robert Gordon of Straloch, shows that this great work had been

successfully accomplished.

After this the waters were fairly kept within bounds for half a century,

during which men were too much occupied with stormy politics to give

much heed to the care of their lands. But in 1694 their attention was

rudely reawakened by the terrible calamity to which I have already

referred. The drifting sands which desolated so wide a belt of the most

fertile lands of Moray did similar damage, though in a less degree, in

this district, and so effectually filled the channels of all streams and

a great part of the bed of Loch Spynie, that its waters, now greatly

enlarged, again overflowed their bounds, covering the cultivated lands,

and presenting a wide but very shallow surface.

There was danger, too, lest the river Lossie should break its artificial

banks, and return to its original channel. So in 1706 the neighbouring

lairds bound themselves “to maintain and support the banks of the said

river with earth, feal (_i.e._ turf), stone, creels, etc., ... in order

to keep her in the channel where she now runs, and _where she had been

put by art and force_.”

Dunbar of Duffus next attempted to reclaim his own swamped lands, which

bore the appropriate name of Waterymains. He made great dykes and

embankments, set up a windmill with pumping machinery, and all went well

till a great tempest overthrew the mill and destroyed the machinery,

whereupon the waters once more overswept the arable lands, of which they

retained possession for many years, during which the neighbouring

proprietors endeavoured to decide on some system of concerted action.

This, however, was effectually prevented by the counter interests of the

family of Gordonstoun. It appears that when, in A.D. 1636, Sir Robert

Gordon purchased these estates, he had obtained a charter from John

Guthrie, Bishop of Moray, bestowing on him various lands, including

those of Salterhill, otherwise called Little Drainie, “with all singular

parts, pendicles, and pertinents, _together with the passage or

ferry-boat in the Loch of Spynie, with the privileges, liberties,

profits, and duties of the same_.”

In consequence of this charter, the family of Gordonstoun claimed the

sole right, not only to the possession of boats on the loch, but also to

the fishing and fowling and the use of the natural pastures on the

shores, and the determination to preserve these rights was a fruitful

source of litigation. It was therefore evident that whatever means were

adopted to diminish the lake would infringe on the “profits and

privileges” of the Gordons.

Thus matters were left until the year 1778, when we find local

chroniclers bewailing the neglect which had suffered “the ancient ditch”

to be so filled up that the loch was daily increasing westward, forming

a level sheet of water upwards of four miles in length, and covering a

space of 2500 acres, besides the broad margin of marshy land which,

owing to occasional overflows, was rendered worthless.

In the following year Mr. Brander of Pitgaveny (whose low-lying lands

near the loch suffered more severely than those of his neighbours),

resolutely set to work at his own expense, aided by his brother, to

restore the old drain, and enlarge it so as to form a canal of some

importance. He succeeded in lowering the surface of the lake upwards of

three feet, and recovered 1162 acres of land, of which eight hundred

fell to his own share, and the remainder to Gordonstoun and other

adjacent estates, which touched the shores of the loch.

Then it was that the stone causeway (which was dimly remembered in local

tradition) reappeared, as did also the artificial islet aforesaid, and

an isle at the west end of the loch, on which were the ruins of a turf

cottage. On excavating these, there were found a quantity of peat-ashes

and a number of coins, which had apparently been here buried on some

sudden alarm. Little did their possessor dream what changes would pass

over his humble home ere his hidden treasure was again brought to light!

For a while Sir William Gordon (the last of the strong-minded, energetic

race of the Gordonstoun family) looked on with comparative indifference,

supposing that this effort to drain the loch would prove as unsuccessful

as those of the past. But when he found that the waters had actually

fallen so low as to stop his ferry-boat, he deemed it necessary to take

active steps for the protection of his rights; and by application to the

Crown he obtained a new charter, bearing date 22nd July 1780, giving him

a right to “_the whole lake or loch of Spynie, and fishings of the

same_, with all the privileges and pertinents thereof, together with the

ferry-boat upon the said loch, with the privileges, liberties, profits,

and duties of the same.” The granting of this charter was vehemently

opposed by the neighbours, and the Messrs. Brander raised a

counter-action and counter-claims, which kept all the lawyers busy for

many years.

Meanwhile, nature and art continued in conflict. Three years after Mr.

Brander’s canal was finished, a great flood occurred which did it

considerable damage; the loch regained much of its lost ground, and the

ferry-boat continued to ply even to Salterhill until the beginning of

the nineteenth century.

By this time Sir William Gordon was dead, and the neighbouring

proprietors awoke to a conviction that it would prove remunerative to

unite their efforts in making a great new canal so as to reclaim more

land. Telford, the most eminent engineer of his day, was consulted. (He

was then engaged in the construction of the great Caledonian Canal.) His

suggestion was that a canal should be cut through the high ramparts of

shingle so as to give the loch a direct outlet to the sea, with mighty

sluices at the mouth to keep back the tide.

It was determined to carry out this scheme, but a considerable time

elapsed ere the neighbouring proprietors could come to an agreement

respecting their several shares in the expenditure, and in the division

of land to be reclaimed. This matter involved so much discussion, so

many surveys and reports, such examination of witnesses, and other legal

forms, that it dragged on, at an enormous expense, from 1807 to 1822!

when the dispute was finally submitted to arbitration by the Dean of

Faculty.

The work was, however, not allowed to suffer by these long legal

proceedings, and by 1812 it was completed, at a cost of £12,740, a sum

in which law-expenses formed a heavy item. The lowering of the waters

put a stop to ferry-boats, so it became necessary to construct a

turnpike road right across the loch. The workmen stood in some places

breast-deep in the water: thus the Bishop’s stepping-stones, ere many

years passed, were succeeded by a substantial turnpike road; and the

eels and pike, which still found a home in the shallow water, were

further disturbed by the construction of a pathway for “the iron horse.”

For about seventeen years all went well, and although the sluices at

Lossiemouth were of wood and not self-acting, involving constant

watchfulness on the part of the men in charge, the surface of the loch

was maintained at an almost permanent level. Some expensive alterations

were made in 1827 to avert a threatened danger of inundation in the

fishing town of Lossiemouth; but all such minor fears were swallowed up

in the reality of the great calamity which befell the whole land of

Moray in the memorable floods of 1829, when very heavy rains on the high

lands caused all the rivers to overflow their natural bounds and ravage

the land. Even the little Lossie, usually so peaceful, was transformed

into a raging torrent, and, bursting the barriers which had grown up

between her and the loch, overflowed the canal, leaving it choked with

great stones and earth; and rushing seaward, carried away the sluices.

Thus in a few brief hours did the mocking waters destroy the labour of

years.

In that widespread desolation, men had neither money nor inclination to

return at once to the battle; but ere long the canal was partially

cleared, the Lossie turned back into her accustomed channel, and high

banks were raised to keep her therein. The sluices, however, had

vanished, consequently the canal was simply a great tidal ditch, so that

the loch itself rose and fell about three feet with every tide. The said

ditch was, however, so far effectual that although the loch did overflow

a considerable amount of cultivated ground, its limits were well

defined, and the raised turnpike road continued perfectly dry.

As years passed by, however, the bottom of the canal gradually filled

up, and the loch thereupon commenced to spread further and further, so

that the neighbouring farms suffered severely, as field after field was

inundated. Finally, in 1860 all the tenant-farmers united in a petition

to the proprietors to set about a thorough drainage of the loch. This

was agreed upon, and after many consultations, the landowners resolved

to send a deputation to the fen-country of England, there to study the

various methods successfully adopted for marsh drainage. Three reliable

men were accordingly selected to represent the proprietors, the factors,

the tenants, while a fourth was added to the number as professional

adviser. These made a careful examination of the principal waterworks in

England, and of all the various kinds of sluices in use, together with

the methods of working them.

On their return they drew up a report, recommending, in the first

instance, a partial drainage by means of self-acting sluices, which they

calculated would, at a cost of £2430, so reduce the waters as to leave

only a pool covering about a hundred acres near the old Palace of

Spynie. Steam power, they considered, might, if requisite, be applied

later to a final drainage.

As there were at that time two thousand acres of land either under water

or so moist as to be worthless, there appeared a fair prospect of a good

return for the outlay. The works were accordingly commenced. Sluices

were put on at the sea, but months of toil and grievous expense were

incurred ere they were in working order. In the first instance, a

foundation of solid masonry had to be raised on what proved to be a

quicksand, and an artificial foundation of heavy piles had to be

prepared. Then the water poured into the cutting made through the

shingly beach on the one hand, and through the sand on the other—so that

the works were inundated both by sea and loch. The unhappy contractor,

who had never calculated on such a contingency, pumped and pumped with

might and main for months, till at length in despair, “out of heart and

out of pocket,” he quietly disappeared from the country.

It was necessary, however, that the work, once begun, should be

finished. It was accordingly undertaken by two local tradesmen, who in

due time accomplished it satisfactorily, but at a very heavy loss on

their contract. Four sluices of cast iron, each weighing eighteen

hundredweight, were so finely poised as to be opened or closed by the

rise or fall of a quarter of an inch in the surface of the water; and

when shut not one drop of water could ooze through from the sea into the

canal. Then followed the great labour of again digging and deepening the

canal, and ere the works were finally accomplished, the expenditure was

found to have been about £8000—rather an increase on the estimate!

Nevertheless, the work is considered to have been remunerative, as the

greater part of the two thousand acres thus reclaimed has proved

first-class soil, and even the poorer portions are capable of

considerable improvement.

Of course there is a necessity for some annual expenditure, as repairs

are needed to keep the whole in working order; but so far the drainage

of what was once the beautiful Loch of Spynie may be deemed a complete

success from an agricultural point of view, though to the naturalist and

the sportsman the farmer’s gain is an irreparable loss.

Much of the low-lying land thus reclaimed proved to be heavy clay, which

produced rich wheat-crops, and till about thirty years ago a large

proportion of this, and indeed of all the lowlands of Moray, was devoted

to this grain. Now, however, since Russia and California furnish such

abundant supplies, home-grown wheat is no longer a remunerative crop, so

the wheat-fields have vanished, and are replaced by barley and oats, and

especially by turnips, for Moray is now emphatically a stock-rearing

district, and the farmer’s energies are concentrated on care of his

beasts.

As concerns the fine old palace with “regality,” its glory rapidly waned

after the date of the Reformation. The last Roman Catholic Bishop,

Patrick Hepburn, was a man who fully understood the art of making

friends with the unrighteous mammon, and, foreseeing the storm of 1560,

he made provision in due season, and sought to secure a powerful ally

against the day of need. He therefore presented a large part of the most

valuable land of the diocese to the Earl of Moray, Regent of Scotland,

with fishing and other privileges. He also handsomely endowed many of

his own kinsfolks and friends, including his own sons, which was indeed

adding injury to insult, so far as his relation to the church was

concerned! Having thus disposed of her property for his own benefit,

forestalling other robbers of church lands, he settled down to a less

harassing life in the old palace, and there died at an advanced age.

At his death the remaining lands of the diocese were confiscated by the

Crown, and in 1590 were granted to Sir Alexander Lindsay, son of the

Earl of Crawford, who had found favour with King James VI. by advancing

ten thousand gold crowns to help to defray his majesty’s travelling

expenses when journeying to Denmark to wed the Princess Anne. Sir

Alexander accompanied his sovereign as far as Germany, when he was

attacked by severe illness, and had to remain behind. King James wrote

from the castle of Croneburg, in Denmark, promising to bestow on him the

lordship of Spynie, with all lands and honours pertaining thereto. “Let

this,” said he, “serve for cure to your present disease.” Sir Alexander

was accordingly created Lord Spynie, but not caring to live in the

north, he appointed a neighbouring laird to act as constable of the

Fortalice and Castle of Spynie. He himself afterwards lost favour with

the king, and in 1607 had the misfortune to get mixed up in a family

fight in the streets of Edinburgh, which resulted in his death.

This method of settling a family difficulty was curiously illustrative

of the times. The Earl of Crawford had assassinated his kinsman, Sir

Walter Lindsay, whereupon Sir David Lindsay of Edzell, nephew of the

murdered man, assembled his armed retainers to avenge the death of his

uncle. The two armed forces met at Edinburgh, whereupon Lord Spynie

interposed and strove to bring about a reconciliation. Hot words soon

resulted in a fray, and the mediator was accidentally slain, and fell

pierced with eleven wounds. Altogether this is a very pretty picture of

the mediæval method of settling such questions.

The title died out in the third generation, when the lands reverted to

the Crown, and have since passed from one family to another, till both

lands and ruined palace reached the hands of the present owner—Captain

Brander Dunbar.

Three centuries have passed by since the death of Bishop Hepburn, for

the first hundred of which the old palace was the seat of the Protestant

Bishops, to whom it was transferred after the Reformation. One of these,

John Guthrie of that Ilk (which means that he was the proprietor of

Guthrie in Angus), held it in the year 1640, when the Covenanters took

arms, whereupon he garrisoned the palace and prepared for a siege. But

when General Munro arrived with a force of three hundred men, the Bishop

was persuaded to surrender, so only his arms and riding-horses were

carried off.

Again, in 1645, when Montrose laid waste the lands of Moray with fire

and sword, the inhabitants of the neighbouring town of Elgin (the

cathedral town of the diocese) fled at his approach, to seek shelter for

themselves, their wives, and their treasure, in the Palace of Spynie,

which continued to be the episcopal residence till the time of Bishop

Colin Falconer, who died there in 1686.

Two years later, in the Revolution of 1688, the palace was annexed to

the Crown, as the lands had already been, and since that date it has

remained uninhabited. As a natural consequence, its timber and iron-work

have gradually been removed by the neighbouring farmers—the doors and

flooring, the oaken rafters, the iron gate, the iron chain of the

portcullis, have all disappeared, and only a portion of the massive

stone walls now remains to tell of the glory of this ancient palace.

Even the best of the hewn stones, and the steps of the old stairs, have

been thus appropriated. Never was transformation more complete than that

which has changed this once mighty ecclesiastical fortress and palace of

the sea-board into a peaceful inland ruin, whose grey walls, now

tottering to their fall, re-echo only the scream of the night-owl, or

the bleating of the sheep which crop the sweet grass within its courts.

Nevertheless, the position of those who occupy the reclaimed lands is by

no means one of absolute security. Not only might another year of

unwonted rainfall on the hills repeat the story of the floods of 1829,

and restore the Lossie to its self-chosen channel through Loch Spynie,

to the total destruction of all sea-sluices—but there exists the ever

present and far more serious danger on the west, where only a narrow

belt of low sandhills protects the cultivated lands from the sea, which

in the eighteenth century made such serious encroachments on the

neighbouring bay of Burghead.

When we note its ceaseless activity all along this coast (one year

building up huge barriers of great boulders to a height of perhaps

thirty feet or more, and in the following year carrying them all away,

to leave only a gravelly shore), we cannot ignore the possibility that a

day may very possibly come when, after a night of unwonted storm, the

morning light may reveal a gap in the sandhills, and the fertile lands,

which at eventide appeared so safe and so peaceful, may lie deep beneath

the salt sea, which, reclaiming its rights, has once more resumed its

original channel, passing round the back of Rose-isle, to restore to the

ancient harbour of Spynie its long-lost character.

NOTE D

_Elgin Cathedral and the Church of St. Giles._

There are some points of special interest connected with these ancient

buildings, apart from the ruthless destruction by “the Wolf of Badenoch”

of all that was beautiful in the town of Forres and the cathedral city

of Elgin. (It is a moot-point whether the possession of a picturesque

ruin still entitles the burgh of Elgin to this honorary title—a doubt

carefully expressed by a conscientious young revivalist in his prayer

for a special blessing on “this city of Elgin, _if it be a city_!” By

the way, it is interesting to note that in the Chartulary of Moray,

about A.D. 1190, the name Elgin was spelt as at present, although in

various later writings it is called Elgyn, Helgun, and Aigin.)

The first bishop of the Roman Church in the diocese of Moray (dating

about A.D. 1115) by some means obtained possession of the Culdee Church,

which had long been established at Birnie, near Elgin—a simple building

of wood and clay. The present church was built about A.D. 1150. Here the

first four bishops lived and died in all simplicity; but Richard, the

fifth bishop, removed the seat of the diocese to Spynie, and there a

stately palace was erected overlooking the lake, and in 1215 a site was

chosen for a cathedral. But Andrew de Moravia, the seventh bishop (a son

of the powerful family of Duffus[82]), deeming this site too isolated,

and otherwise inconvenient of access for the people, obtained the

sanction of Pope Honorius (about 1224) to build the cathedral at Elgin

on the fertile banks of the river Lossie. This was accordingly done, and

the noble building was completed ere the middle of the century, as were

also twenty-two manses as residences for the canons, all enclosed within

the great precinct wall. The canons were the clergy of parishes in all

parts of the diocese.

But misfortunes soon began, for the cathedral and the manses were

partially burnt in 1270, and in 1390 the ruthless Wolf of Badenoch

(Alexander Stewart, Earl of Buchan) raided the town and set fire to the

cathedral, destroying the nave and roof and all woodwork. The great

steeple, which is said to have been a hundred and ninety-eight feet in

height, was cracked by the heat, but the western steeples and beautiful

stone arches resisted the fire. All the manses were totally destroyed.

Only twelve years elapsed ere the town was again raided by another

“noble savage,” namely, Alexander Macdonald, son of the Lord of the

Isles, who plundered whatever had escaped the covetous Wolf. After this

the work of rebuilding the cathedral progressed slowly, the most

energetic worker being Bishop John Innes, who was consecrated in 1407

and died in 1414—a brief seven years, in the course of which he also

erected the Bishop’s House in Elgin, and carried out important works at

Spynie.

At the time of the Reformation no damage was done to the noble pile, but

eight years later, in 1568, the Privy Council ordered that all lead

should be stripped from the cathedral churches of Elgin and Aberdeen and

sold for the maintenance of soldiers, the sheriffs and bishops being

commanded to assist the spoilers. It seems certain that the nave and

side aisles were covered with slates and the chapterhouse with freestone

slabs, and that the lead only covered wooden spires crowning the three

steeples to protect them from rain and frost. Every trace of spires and

steeples has disappeared, doubtless from that cause.

This mean and sacrilegious theft was the first step towards the

destruction of the grand old cathedral, and met its just reward, in that

the vessel on which the lead was shipped at Aberdeen for sale in Holland

foundered on its voyage.

In 1637 a terrible gale unroofed the choir and blew down the rafters. On

28th December 1640 Gilbert Ross, the iconoclastic Presbyterian minister

of Elgin, in company with the lairds of Brodie, of Innes, and others,

took upon him to destroy the beautiful carved woodwork, their special

spite being directed against the Rood screen, separating the nave from

the choir, on one side of which was depicted the Day of Judgment, and on

the other the Crucifixion—all in colours and gold so rich that neither

had faded or tarnished, although for well-nigh eighty years they had

been exposed to rain and snow, sun and frost, which had free access to

the unroofed temple.

Mr. Ross, being of a utilitarian spirit, had the woodwork cut up and

brought to his own house as fuel. In those days, ere lucifer matches

were invented, it was very desirable to keep sufficient fire smouldering

all night to secure a kindling for the following morning, but it was

found that the wood so sacrilegiously hewn down would not keep alight,

so that it was necessary each morning to kindle fresh fire by means of

the cumbersome flint and steel, which required such patience ere light

could be obtained.

When, ten or twelve years later, a party of Cromwell’s soldiers were

quartered here, they could find nothing left for them to destroy save

the beautiful stone tracery of the great windows, and this they did most

effectually, especially in the western window over the grand porch.

In 1711 the great steeple fell, crushing the whole body of the building,

and for the next hundred years this mass of finely-hewn stone served as

a convenient quarry for the builders of modern houses in the town, while

the cathedral precincts became the receptacle for all the dirt and

rubbish of the town.

Not till the beginning of the present century was there a trace of even

antiquarian reverence for this sacred spot. Then, happily, an

enlightened provost was elected (Mr. King of New-mill) who commenced the

work of protection, and in course of time the Board of Public Works was

induced to take the matter in hand and undertake such repairs as have

prevented further decay, and preserve at least a memorial of how nobly

our ancestors could once build.

Though all the bishops were buried here, few of their tombs bear any

inscriptions. Among those of most special interest are a large, bluish

slab on the south side of the choir, beneath which lies the quiet dust

of Bishop Andrew de Moravia, the founder, under whose energetic

supervision it is probable that the stately building was completed. Once

it was covered with fine brass, but that, of course, was soon pillaged.

Another grave of interest, which can still be recognised by a sculptured

stone showing a recumbent figure in episcopal robes, is that of Columba

Dunbar, who was Bishop in A.D. 1430. He was a son of the Earl of March,

and nephew of John Dunbar, Earl of Moray, and was himself a powerful

noble who, on his journeys to Rome and to the Council of Basle,

travelled with a retinue of thirty servants. He died in his palace at

Spynie, and was buried in the cathedral, in the north transept, in the

aisle of St. Thomas the Martyr, now known as “Dunbar’s Aisle.”

Near his dust lies that of Sir Alexander Dunbar of Westfield, son of the

fifth Earl of Moray. He died in 1498, and is represented as a recumbent

figure in armour, having his armorial bearings on his breast-plate. Both

these monuments were much injured by the fall of the great steeple,

which totally destroyed so much that was interesting and beautiful.

Among the modern memorials is a slab of red granite in the chancel,

above the high altar. It was placed there in 1868 to the memory of the

Rev. Lachlan Shaw, who died in 1777, aged ninety-one, and was buried

here. He was the author of a very valuable _History of the Province of

Moray_, up to his own times.

Two burials of interest in the last century were those of the very

latest Duke of Gordon and his wife. He died in London, 28th May 1836.

His body was brought by sea, and landed near Gordon Castle, whence it

was conveyed to Elgin. On 31st January 1864 Elizabeth, his widow, died

at Huntly Lodge, and she was buried beside the Duke in the last

available space in the family vault beneath the ruins of the cathedral.

Lastly, I must not fail to claim reverent notice for the humble grave of

a truly devout lover of the cathedral, namely, John Shanks, one of the

earliest keepers appointed to protect the ruins, when the whole place

was still a wilderness of dirt and rubbish overgrown with tall grass,

brambles, and rank nettles. By his own exertions, without any one to

help him, this frail old man gradually cleared away the rubbish, laying

bare the original outlines of the building, and collecting such

sculptured stones as had escaped the spoilers. On his tomb is the

epitaph written by Lord Cockburn:—

“Here lyes

JOHN SHANKS, SHOEMAKER IN ELGIN,

Who died 14th April 1841, aged 83 years.

“For seventeen years he was the keeper and the shower of this

Cathedral, and while not even the Crown was doing anything for its

preservation, he, with his own hands, cleared it of many thousand

cubic yards of rubbish, disclosing the bases of the pillars,

collecting the carved fragments, and introducing some order and

propriety.

“Whoso reverences the Cathedral will respect the memory of this man.”

The fine parish church of St. Giles, which likewise was destroyed by the

malignant “Wolf,” was ere long rebuilt, and held its position as “The

Muckle Kirk” till the year 1826, an ugly but venerable building, which

for six hundred years had been the centre of worship in its successive

phases—Roman Catholic, Reformed, Episcopal, and Presbyterian. The two

latter prevailed alternately from A.D. 1560 to the present day, changing

seven times, and the internal fittings of the church having to be

altered accordingly, with very quaint effect.

Of course the chief changes were effected after the Reformation, when

all the altars were removed, and the side aisles, formerly left free for

private worship, were filled with hideous pews, as were also the

galleries erected in every available corner, and apportioned to all the

trades. There was the shoemakers’ loft (always well filled), the

glovers’ loft (these were once a numerous body, but they dwindled away

till only two remained, and when they died that craft disappeared from

the town). The blacksmiths had their loft, as had also the tailors and

weavers, who sat in a corner so dark that they could see nothing. For

the carpenters a special loft was erected, A.D. 1751, perched so very

high as to seem extremely insecure. The merchants of the town occupied a

gallery, which was hence called “the guildry loft,” and the magistrates

sat in state in a great pew of carved oak, beneath a canopy of the same.

There was a considerable amount of old carved oak about the church, and

the emblems of the various crafts were carved on all the trades’ lofts.

The north galleries were apportioned to the chief heritors of the

parish, namely, the Earls of Fife, Seafield, and Moray, and their

tenants and friends.

Prior to 1753 the roof of the church was of open woodwork, showing the

strong rafters, from which hung antique brass chandeliers, suspended by

chains of twisted iron. Though picturesque, the open roof was voted

draughty, so it was then plastered, and altogether the appearance of the

building was as unlike our reawakened views of seemly church

architecture as could well be imagined, notwithstanding five massive

pillars and arches on either side. Four of these on each side were

square, and the central one circular. They and the walls were supposed

to date from the twelfth century, having withstood the flames which

destroyed the roof and all woodwork when, in 1390, the church was burnt

by the ruthless Wolf of Badenoch.

Accustomed as we are to fine churches, brilliantly lighted for all

evening services, it is strange to think that till a quarter of the

nineteenth century had elapsed, this, the principal church of the

county, was only lighted once a year,[83] on the evening of the first

Sunday of November, when the half-yearly celebration of the Holy

Communion involved extra services. Then only were candles placed in the

four old chandeliers, twelve in each. The pulpit and the precentor’s

seat were likewise illuminated. The magistrates and all master tradesmen

had their own candlesticks, as had also each family and many private

individuals, so that the gloom was in a measure dispelled by about five

hundred flickering candles, most of which must have been tallow, with

long wicks constantly requiring snuffing, while the poorer folk could

only afford rush-lights, so the light could not have been very

brilliant; and as doubtless many candles were snuffed with fingers, the

result, combined with the then prevalent habit of spitting on the floor,

is not suggestive of cleanliness!

Now that lightning has become man’s ministering servant, and one magic

touch floods home, church, or street with vivid electric light, it is

really very difficult to realise how different all this was even in the

last century. I myself can recollect the housemaid’s box containing

flint and steel and tinder, with which to kindle a spark should the

smouldering kitchen fire have died out in the night. Just imagine how

wearisome was such a process on a cold winter morning, and how great was

the advance when the first large, coarse, lucifer matches were invented.

Well do I remember their strong sulphurous smell, and that of the

servants’ tallow candles, flaring and guttering. And in all the cottages

the only lamp was that small iron cruisie, specimens of which are now

treasured as antiquarian curios.

The old church narrowly escaped being the scene of a dire tragedy, for

on a certain Sunday in 1669, just after the congregation had “scaled”

(_i.e._ dispersed), the roof of the nave fell in with an awful crash.

The timber (which for three hundred years had supported the heavy slabs

of freestone which were used instead of slates) had decayed, and at last

suddenly gave way. The annals of the burgh record a meeting, “in the

South Yle of Saint Geilles Church,” for considering the rebuilding of

the said church, “laittlie fallen.”

Five years elapsed ere the necessary repairs were effected, after which

all was secure till 1826, when symptoms of decay were again detected in

the roof, and though the walls, pillars, and arches were so strong that

they would doubtless have stood for centuries, and the old church could

have been preserved at comparatively small expense, the town authorities

decided, to the dismay of the people, that the whole must be pulled

down, and a modern church of Grecian design be erected in its stead. The

Holy Communion was celebrated for the last time in the venerated

building of such varied memories, on the 1st October 1826, and the

following day our good old friend Dr. Rose, minister of Drainie (near

Gordonstoun), preached the thanksgiving sermon, and few of his hearers

failed to share in the regret he expressed at the doom of the

time-hallowed building. But no time was allowed for reconsideration, and

no sooner had the congregation dispersed than the contractor commenced

his work of demolition by unslating the roof, and two months later the

destruction was complete, and included the carting away of a vast

quantity of human bones from beneath the church and the surrounding

street, which for five hundred years had been the hallowed “God’s-acre”

of the burgh.

Just two years later, October 1828, the first service was held in the

new church, the congregation being summoned by the self-same bells which

had called their forefathers for so many generations to worship. The

account of them, culled by Mr. Robert Young from the annals of the

burgh, is so interesting that I venture to quote it:—

“The larger one, for sweetness and clearness of tone, is equal to any

in Scotland. It is said to have been recast in 1589 or 1593. The

little bell, called ‘the minister’s bell,’ bears the following

inscription—‘Thomas de Dunbar, me fecit. 1402.’ It therefore was the

gift of the Earl of Moray, and is a venerable relic of Roman Catholic

times.

“The big bell was rent in 1713 by a woman striking it violently with a

large key, for the purpose of rousing the inhabitants to quench a fire

which had broken out in the town during the night. It was recast 17th

August 1713, at the head of Forsyth’s Close, by Albert Gelly, founder,

from Aberdeen, the expense being defrayed by the magistrates; and it

is stated that upon this occasion many of the rich inhabitants of

Elgin repaired to the founding-place, and cast in guineas, crowns, and

half-crowns, and the poorer people smaller silver coins during the

time the metal was smelting, which contributed to enrich the sound as

well as the substance.

“On the king’s birthday, 4th June 1784, it was over-rung and rent by

the boys of the town, when it was taken down and recast at London on

the 17th October the following year, having the names of the

magistrates cast upon it. The expense was again paid by the town.

Since that time no further accident has occurred. It has continued to

pour out its sweet sounds daily, morning and evening, and to summon on

Sundays the congregations of the various churches in the burgh to

public worship, and may continue to do so for ages to come.”

It must be confessed that from a picturesque point of view Old Elgin in

the first half of the seventeenth century must have been a very much

more interesting town than it is now. Besides the fine old houses of the

cathedral dignitaries—the dean and canons—all the principal county

families had their “house in town,” occupying both sides of the High

Street, and foot-passengers walked beneath low arcades formed under the

projecting houses. All these were pulled down by degrees.

Curiously enough, though there is nothing to suggest that Elgin was ever

enclosed by walls, it had four gateways, which were all standing till

about a hundred years ago—namely, the East Port, the West Port, the

Lossie Wynd Port, and the School Wynd Port. It is supposed that each had

a portcullis, which was pulled down at night, but if so, they had been

removed at some earlier period. These gateways being narrow, and a

hindrance to modern traffic, their removal was decreed towards the end

of last century.

Speaking of the separate “lofts” in the old church assigned to each

trade, the gradual changes in these, as recorded in the annals, are

interesting. In the thirteenth century we find mention of gardeners,

carpenters, builders, armourers, shoemakers (called sutors), tailors

(called cissors), and glaziers, whose rare art entitled them to a French

or Latin name—_vitrearii_. About the year 1650 seven crafts were

recognised in the burgh—_i.e._ saddlers, smiths, metallers, tailors,

shoemakers, weavers, and butchers. But by the end of the century only

six are named—namely, smiths, tailors, glovers, shoemakers, weavers, and

carpenters—and these held the “exclusive right of exercising their own

trade,” any outsider venturing to encroach on their privileges being

forthwith prosecuted—a tyranny which became intolerable, and was finally

swept away after the Reform Bill was passed.

While the Loch of Spynie was still an arm of the sea, bringing cargoes

from France, Holland, and Germany, there and to Lossiemouth, within two

miles of Elgin, there was a considerable foreign trade; but even

allowing for a large export, the amount of malt manufactured in the town

was startling. There were between thirty and forty kilns and barns, each

substantial stone buildings about a hundred feet in length, for malting

and drying the grain; and in A.D. 1697, out of a population of three

thousand persons, no less than eighty were professional brewers and

distillers. One of these showed that within three months he had brewed

four thousand gallons of ale and four hundred gallons of _aqua vitæ_,

_alias_ whisky. Considering the very large amount of foreign wines,

brandy, and gin, which were imported from abroad, either above-board or

by smugglers, we may infer that the home consumption of our ancestors

was considerably in excess of that of their degenerate descendants.

I record this with something of the feeling of the man who, when he

heard any very bad story, always said: “Now, I DO like to hear that. I

say to myself, ‘I know I am bad, but I am NOT so bad as that!’”

It is, however, satisfactory and interesting to learn that early in the

eighteenth century the malting-trade had so fallen off that the kilns

were given over to the weavers, and were filled with their looms, each a

centre of busy work, and this continued till well into the nineteenth

century, when hand-looms gradually disappeared before the steady advance

of spinning-jennies and other machinery.

It is really very difficult to realise how few of the modern comforts

which we deem necessities existed a hundred years ago. Even in so

important a burgh as Elgin there seems to have been no attempt at

lighting the streets, and the first reference thereto in the burgh

annals is in November 1775, when the Council considered the propriety of

so doing, and decided to lay the matter before the principal inhabitants

and the trades, in consequence of which, in the following February, “Mr.

William Robertson was authorised, when he went to London, to purchase

twenty lamps, and also to buy caps for these lamps.” This tentative

effort was, however, soon given up, and once again the streets were left

in total darkness through the long, long hours of winter nights.

Prior to eight o’clock, there was here and there a faint ray from a

solitary lamp or candle in some shop window, but after that hour all was

darkness, and if any convivial entertainment was prolonged till after

dark (remember that sixty years ago the dinner-hour was generally about

3 P.M., and tea and card-parties began at 6), each party of guests was

escorted home by a servant carrying a lantern; and very necessary was

this precaution, for not only were there no side pavements for

foot-passengers, and carts were left standing all night at the sides of

the streets, but filth of every description was there accumulated.

But in 1830 a giant step in advance was made, and the town was lighted

with gas. At that time almost every one who journeyed at all did so on

horseback; so there were scarcely any private carriages in the town—only

a few post-chaises for hire at the principal inn, and to hire one of

these for conveyance to an evening party would have been deemed

ostentatious extravagance. Even two sedan-chairs, which were imported

for this purpose about 1818, obtained small patronage.

As regards the state of the streets, the town annals contain various

suggestive entries. In September 1776 the magistrates resolved to stop

the practice of thrashing and winnowing corn upon the street, and there

depositing heaps of stones and manure. They therefore empowered “the

officer who keeps the keys to secure and detain _whatever corn and straw

may be found thrashing upon the street, and the dung or stones flung

thereon, until trial_.”

In the following year the barking of dogs at night on the High Street

was declared to be so annoying that their owners were required to keep

them indoors, under a penalty of five shillings fine, and that the

offending dog be shot.

In 1778 the Council took note of the spouts or scuttles projecting from

holes in the side-walls of many houses, through which all manner of

filth was constantly ejected into the street, endangering the clothes of

passers-by. It was therefore ordained that these holes should all be

filled up. Large dunghills or “middens” were, however, allowed to lie

undisturbed in all the narrow wynds, at the doors of the houses,

breeding frequent fevers.

In 1818 it was recorded that the streets were full of holes, dangerous

to carriages and horses; and even so late as 1822 there were no side

pavements, and the safest place to walk was the raised ridge in the

centre of the street known as the “kantle of the causey,” or crown of

the causeway, which was in fact a ridge of stepping-stones, which in wet

weather afforded the only means of picking one’s way dryshod. The road

sloping downward on either side ended in wide open gutters, which

carried streams of rain-water and sewage to open ditches and larger

gutters (which were often so flooded as to be impassable), whence they

flowed into the river Lossie.

Yet—we must hope it was from some higher point!—water was daily brought

from the Lossie in pails for cooking purposes, and clothes were carried

to the river-bank to be washed. There were comparatively few wells in

the town, either public or private, and it was not till 1850 that the

town was fully supplied with pure water.

As regards firing, our ancestors were wholly dependent on peat and wood.

It was not till the year 1754 that a ship loaded with coals came to

Lossiemouth, the first cargo of the kind known to have been received at

that port. The demand was so small that “the importer could not dispose

of 100 barrels, but the country soon found out the value of the fuel. On

11th July 1768 the magistrates purchased from Thomas Stephen, senior,

merchant in Elgin, 40 chalders of coals, deliverable at Lossiemouth, for

behoof of the inhabitants of Elgin, at the price of 21 shillings and

sixpence Scots (1s. 9½d. per barrel), a very considerable price for

those days. On the 10th September they purchased 22 chalders additional

from Alexander Davidson, shipmaster in Aberdeen, at 1s. 10d. per

barrel.”

To ensure early hours, it was the duty of the town drummer to rouse the

inhabitants at 4 A.M., and to go the round of the town a second time at

5 A.M., lest perchance they might have fallen asleep again; and in like

manner at 9 P.M. he and his drum went round to give notice to all wise

folk that it was time to sleep, because

“Early to bed and early to rise

Makes a man healthy, and wealthy, and wise,”

and that

“He who would thrive must rise at five,

Though he who has thriven may lie till seven.”

The town annals record that in 1769 George Edward, tailor, was appointed

to this office, and as regards the healthiness of the system, there

could not be a better example than himself, for he never knew ache or

sickness till disabled by old age, and his son, who succeeded him in

office, carried on the tradition of his father.

In those days few people ever left their homes. In the whole parish of

Elgin there were not more than four gigs in use, and it was a very rare

thing for any one to go so far as Edinburgh; few indeed had ever visited

London. There was no public conveyance north of Aberdeen. A mail-coach

was started about 1812 to run between Aberdeen and Inverness. This it

did very slowly, being run by only a pair, and those between Elgin and

Torres are said to have been very decrepit old horses.

About the year 1819 a four-horse coach was started, which, leaving

Inverness at 6 A.M., reached Aberdeen at 10 P.M. The original mail-coach

followed suit, and the competition improved matters. About 1826 “The

Star” was started, to leave Aberdeen at 8 A.M. and reach Elgin at 5 P.M.

Other local coaches were started, but were frequently half empty. In

1835 “The Defiance” was started. Well do I remember it with its

first-class team, and the scarlet coats of the cheery driver and guard,

whose brass horn was the signal that news from the south was arriving.

In those days postage was so costly that letters were few and far

between. So small was the correspondence even in the beginning of the

nineteenth century, that the mailbags containing a very few letters were

carried by a post-rider on horseback three times a week. And now our

half-a-dozen heavy posts each day are too few for the present

generation, who must needs telegraph about every trifle, often to the

exceeding disgust of the country recipients of totally unnecessary

messages, for which they have to pay large sums as porterage.

“The Defiance” continued to keep up its credit, till it was driven aside

by the arrival of the railway, which was somewhat late in the day, as

the idea that so gigantic an undertaking could ever pay, was considered

preposterous, more especially the Highland line between Forres and

Perth, crossing barren mountains. However, energetic men pushed the

matter, and bit by bit from the year 1846 onwards, local railways were

made, and finally in 1865 all were amalgamated under the name of The

Highland Railway Company, with branches in every direction, and crowds

of busy folk and tourists from every corner of the world—a change indeed

since 1800! with the solitary post-runner and an occasional gig or

post-chaise.

One very important reason against travelling on wheels was that till

quite recent times there were no bridges: small streams were crossed on

stepping-stones, and large ones by ferry-boats, and when rivers were in

flood, passengers had to wait till the waters subsided, sometimes being

detained for days in most uncomfortable quarters, while each year had a

record of persons drowned in rashly attempting to ford the rivers.

With the exception of an old wooden bridge which crossed the Spey at

Boat of Bridge, and which was ruined at the time of the Reformation, and

a few other slight wooden bridges, there were none north of Aberdeen

till the early part of the sixteenth century, when the first stone

bridge over the Lossie was erected—a single arch founded on each side on

the rock, and consequently so secure that it remains in use to this day.

Unmindful of the wisdom of the earlier builders, a two-arch stone bridge

across the Lossie was built in 1814, but being founded on gravel, it was

swept away in the flood of 1829. Now we have stone or metal bridges for

road or rail in every direction.

NOTE E

Anne Seymour Conway was the only child and heiress of Field-Marshal

Conway, second son of the first Lord Conway. In 1747 he married Lady

Caroline Campbell, daughter of John, Duke of Argyle, and widow of the

Earl of Aylesbury. By her previous marriage she had another daughter,

who married the third Duke of Richmond. The mother and daughters were

all beautiful.

Anne Seymour Conway married the Honourable John Damer, eldest son of

Lord Damer, afterwards Earl of Dorchester. He proved a worthless

spendthrift, and on his father refusing to pay £70,000 for his gambling

debts, he shot himself, after a riotous supper at the Bedford Arms in

Covent Garden. Thus his young widow was left free to devote her long

life to her loved art, and to the congenial society of the most

cultivated of her generation.

When quite a young girl she had been taught by Mrs. Samon to model

dainty statuettes in wax; but when only eighteen, being provoked by a

sneer from David Hume, the historian, she set herself to chisel his bust

in marble, and succeeded so admirably that she then studied anatomy

under the best masters available. Her uncle, Charles Fox, and her

cousin, Horace Walpole, encouraged her wish to excel, and the former was

wont to say that “he prided himself more upon her talent than upon his

ancient descent.”

She worked very rapidly, and produced spirited groups of horses and

deer. Among her best-known busts are those of Mrs. Siddons, Miss Berry,

Miss Farren, Horace Walpole, one of Charles Fox, which she gave to

Napoleon, three of Nelson, one of which she presented to William IV.,

and which is now at Windsor Castle; another is in the Council Chamber at

the Guildhall. She executed a statue of George III., a bust of Queen

Caroline, and many others.

The two heads of Thamesis and Isis on Henley Bridge are her handiwork,

the latter being a portrait of her friend, Miss Freeman of Fawley Court.

The Academy in Florence awarded high honour to her life-like dog; while

Horace Walpole gave her osprey eagle the place of honour in his gallery

at Strawberry Hill.

On his death he left to her that fascinating home with all its contents,

but on the death of her mother, who lived there with her, she made it

over to the next heir, Lord Waldegrave, together with £2000 per annum

assigned for its upkeep. She then bought York House, Twickenham.

In 1828, being eighty years of age, she died and was buried in the

church at Sundridge, Kent, where her mother was already laid, probably

because Coombe Bank in that parish had long been in the possession of

the Argyll family.

Her tablet in the chancel of the church describes her as

“Sculptrix et Statuaria Illustris Femina.”

By her desire, her working tools, apron, and the leash of her favourite

little dog, Fidele, were buried with her.

NOTE F

_Conditional Immortality_

Most Christians have been brought up to such implicit belief in our

being all necessarily immortal, that the mere suggestion that the plain

literal teaching of the Bible is that immortality is a conditional,

special gift, is generally received with grave disapproval. Yet if the

references to this subject are read without preconceived convictions,

all seem to prove that although GOD created man capable of Eternal Life,

man did not secure the gift, and I find nothing whatever to show that

immortality either of soul or body was then conferred on him.

The story of man’s first disobedience simply records the warning, “In

the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die,” followed by

the curse, “Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return.” There is

not a word that could possibly suggest that immortality was conferred on

him, to enable him to endure eternal punishment for temporal sin. On the

contrary, everything goes to show that the Gift of Immortality was

specially reserved. “Lest” (having now sinned) “he take also of the Tree

of Life, and eat, and live for ever,” man was driven out of Paradise,

and cherubim and a flaming sword were placed to guard the approach to

the Tree of Life.

Observe that before he sinned he was not debarred from eating of it. He

had the option of doing so, but did not.

No sooner had the Devil succeeded in inducing man to subject himself to

the penalty of death, than ONE stronger than he undertook to take man’s

nature upon HIM that by HIS perfect Sacrifice HE might “destroy death,

and him that had the power of death, that is, the Devil,” and obtain the

right to bestow on man the Gift of Immortality. “For GOD so loved the

world, that HE gave HIS only begotten SON, THAT WHOSOEVER BELIEVETH ON

HIM should not perish, but have EVERLASTING LIFE.” In Romans ii. 7 St.

Paul says that to those who by patient continuance in well-doing, _seek

for Immortality_, GOD gives ETERNAL LIFE.

Again, in the plainest and simplest words we are told that “The wages of

sin is death” (simple death—not miraculously preserved life in torture),

“but the Gift of GOD is Eternal Life, through JESUS CHRIST.” THIS GIFT

OF LIFE IS THE KEY OF THE WHOLE GOSPEL—the “good news” concerning HIM,

IN KNOWLEDGE OF WHOM STANDETH OUR ETERNAL LIFE. “WHOM TRULY TO KNOW, IS

LIFE EVERLASTING.”

Having thus “brought Life and Immortality to light through the Gospel,”

CHRIST is justly said to have abolished Death; and now HE proclaims to

all, “Whosoever will, let him take the Water of Life freely.” Now, for

the first time since the expulsion of man from Eden, do we hear again of

the Tree of Life, no longer guarded by a flaming sword, but as the gift

which CHRIST offers to HIS redeemed. “To him that overcometh will I give

to eat of the Tree of Life, which is in the midst of the Paradise of

GOD.” “Blessed are they that do HIS commandments, that they may have

right to the Tree of Life.”

The horrible doctrine of the eternity of evil has developed as the

natural sequence of a belief in inherent immortality. If once we fully

grasp the grand central truth that everlasting life is ours solely

through union with CHRIST, WHO IS OUR LIFE, the Pagan theories of a hell

as meaning everlasting life in torture, crumble away almost of their own

accord, yet by their lurid light men have for centuries distorted the

words of Scripture, forcing them to fit their preconceived ideas.

Look, for instance, at the general character of the illustrations used

by OUR LORD and HIS inspired servants, as symbols of the doom of the

unsaved. If they intended to suggest continuity of existence under most

adverse circumstances, they would certainly have made use of such

figures as are most enduring in a furnace—such as minerals or metals. So

far from this, every type seems purposely selected to denote utter

frailty and the most perishable nature, or the most evanescent, such as

“smoke,” “the early dew that passeth away,” “light clouds,” “a dream

when one awaketh.”

Of enduring materials, such as metals, we hear only when they are “to be

tried in the fire” for their own purification, to make them fit for the

MASTER’S use, as when “HE sits as a Refiner of Silver,” patiently

waiting till the purified metal reflects HIS own image.

But the swift destruction of those who will not accept HIS salvation is

invariably compared to that of the most fragile substances—“an

earthenware vessel broken to pieces” (frail, crumbling eastern pottery),

“a garment eaten by the moth,” “thorns cut up and burned in the fire,”

“bundles of tares tied up ready for burning, BEFORE the grain is

garnered” (Matt. xiii. 30), “as stubble devoured by fire,” “like

withered grass,” “as wax melteth before the fire,” “like burning tow,”

“like chaff in the furnace of unquenchable fire” (that is, a fire which

will burn till there is no more fuel to consume), like wood or hay—in

short, every image suggests the most total and absolute destruction of

whatsoever is cast into that furnace.

To those who refuse “HIM that speaketh from Heaven,” St. Paul has told

us that “Our GOD is a Consuming Fire”—not a Preserving Fire which shall

endow whatever is thrown into it with miraculous vitality in order to

enable it to endure torture for EVER, and EVER, and EVER, without being

consumed.

The same MASTER WHO told us that HE came to seek and to save lost men,

told us that HE will also say: “Those MINE enemies which would not that

I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before ME.” They

would not accept HIS gift of enduring life, so even the life which they

have is taken from them. That HE will utterly destroy HIS enemies is

most plainly revealed, but by swift destruction, not prolonged existence

in agony.

How can any one believe that HE WHOSE NAME IS LOVE would choose from HIS

realm of perfect bliss, to look for ever and ever upon the beings HE

once so dearly loved, enduring never-ending agony, which is only made

possible by HIS miraculously endowing each with the capability of

continued existence in ceaseless enmity to HIMSELF—or else uttering vain

agonised prayers, to which (still more incredible) HE can listen unmoved

throughout Eternity. Which of the creatures in whom HE has kindled one

spark of HIS love could endure to know that this mass of individual

misery was to continue day and night for ever and ever, while they

themselves were in perfect bliss?

Apart from the certainty that the divine flower of mercy CANNOT thus

wither and die in Heaven, the eternal suffering of human beings

necessarily implies the eternal continuance of evil, and therein an

everlasting triumph of the Devil, whereas we are expressly told by St.

John that the SON OF GOD was manifested that HE might destroy the works

of the Devil. And the same reason is given by St. Paul, “That through

Death, HE might destroy him that had the power of Death, that is the

Devil.” St. Paul has also told us that “The last enemy that shall be

destroyed is Death.”

Not till this is accomplished can Christ’s victory be completed. The

Lord of all Creation must reign alone in HIS universe, and THAT CANNOT

BE till every trace of the consequences of sin—the work of the

usurper—has been utterly effaced.

Then, only when all things that do offend have been totally and for ever

destroyed, can HIS perfect reign begin on that “new earth, wherein

dwelleth only Righteousness.”

Then, too late, it will be known how large a share of antagonism to GOD

has resulted from the false teaching about HIS revelation concerning

future life and death. I doubt whether in any other way has HIS love

been so persistently “wounded in the house of HIS Friends,” as by this

unjust misconstruction of HIS words.

The marvel is how Christians can have gone on from generation to

generation, blindly accepting such horrible tradition. It can only be

accounted for by the belief that the devil has persuaded them to hold

this dark, discoloured glass between themselves and GOD. Yet they do

hold it, and cling to it, quite as strongly as to any article of the

creed, and it is only too certain that a multitude of really earnest

Christians will buzz like angry hornets round any one who ventures to

suggest a future less appalling than the hell of their imagination—that

most subtle device of the adversary to misrepresent GOD, and estrange

men from HIS love.

Yet from the careless attitude of even earnest Christians it is

impossible to believe that they in the smallest degree realise the

meaning of the eternal duration of such a life in death, otherwise their

whole lives would of necessity be absorbed in one agonised effort to

rouse their fellows to repentance.

As an instance of the perverted meaning attributed to many passages,

take such an one as 1 John v. 11–13: “GOD HATH given to us Eternal Life,

and this Life is in HIS Son. He that hath the SON HATH LIFE; and he that

hath not the SON OF GOD, _hath not Life_.” This statement is in the

plainest words reiterated throughout the Gospel, yet so skilfully has

the enemy sown his tares amid the good seed, that men’s perverted

reading of this and all kindred verses is: “He that hath the SON _shall

have Life after Death_, and he that hath not the SON _shall live for

ever in torment_.”

Is not this precisely the meaning commonly attached to the same message

as spoken by St. Paul? “As sin hath reigned unto Death, so might grace

reign unto Eternal Life by JESUS CHRIST our LORD.” “The Wages of Sin is

Death, but the Gift of GOD is Eternal Life, through JESUS CHRIST our

LORD.” Surely these words are very clear; but the sower of tares has so

skilfully added his evil grain, that wherever in the Holy Scriptures we

find this contrast of death and eternal life, men mentally insert the

word “Eternal” before “Death,” and thus entirely pervert GOD’S message

of Love.

To me this view of CHRIST’S work, that THE ETERNAL LIFE NOW BEGUN IN ME

BY HIM IS THE SPECIAL GIFT WHICH HE DIED TO OBTAIN FOR ME, is infinitely

more precious and love-inspiring than was the belief that the primary

object of HIS dying for us was to save us from an immeasurable intensity

of punishment which in my secret heart I felt to be in excess of my own

deserts, or those of my fellow-creatures. Whereas now I can realise that

the life which I NOW live, I live by the faith of the SON OF GOD, WHO

loved me, and gave HIMSELF for me. Thus the dreaded hour of the

separation of body and soul which we call Death, becomes merely an

unpleasant incident in life nowise affecting its continuity.

I believe the choice of life to be entirely in our own option. If any

one prefers that death shall be to him the end of life and love, he has

only to glide along, and (always allowing for the last awful awakening

to judgment, and to realise what he has failed to secure) I believe that

he will eventually cease to exist in any form.

For my own part, I prefer the certainty of an eternity in light and

love, WHICH CAN ONLY BE SECURED BY ACCEPTING IT NOW, as the gift freely

offered to each one of us. And having accepted it, with my whole heart,

of course, I do most earnestly wish that all I care for here should do

likewise, that we MAY BE TOGETHER FOR EVER in that life of light and

gladness.

If any one cares to go deeper into this subject, I would refer them to

the volume which first awoke my own interest in it, _The Glory of Christ

in the Reconciliation of all things, with special reference to the

Doctrine of Eternal Evil_, by the Rev. Samuel Minton, M.A., of Worcester

College, Oxford, published in 1869 by Longmans, Green and Co. (Of course

the doctrine of the Eternity of Evil is a natural sequence of a belief

in Inherent Immortality.)

Amongst other authorities whom he quotes are MARTIN LUTHER and

ARCHBISHOP WHATELY. The former says, “I permit the Pope to make articles

of faith for himself and his faithful, such as, _that the soul is

Immortal_.” The latter says, “To the Christian all this doubt would be

instantly removed if he found that the Immortality of the Soul was

revealed in the Word of God. _In fact, no such doctrine is revealed to

us._”

_Life in Christ_, by the Rev. Edward White, published about thirty years

ago, came as a revelation of undoubted truth to many perplexed

Christians, who felt that their gravest difficulty crumbled to nothing

if the human soul was not created immortal. But so certain was the storm

of opposition which would encounter any Christian teacher or worker who

ventured to proclaim the new light which had dawned on his own soul,

that comparatively few had the courage to face it. (Just as men who love

the Episcopal Church too dearly to leave it, are compelled to make such

mental reservations as enable them to repeat that arrogant definition of

the Christian faith said to have been composed by a French Archbishop in

the fifth century, which is so unjustly attributed to poor St.

Athanasius, and which, I am told, was not adopted at Rome till the

middle of the tenth century, though it seems to have been accepted in

England about the eighth century.)

In his _Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans_, vol. ii. p. 212,

Bishop Gore says:—

“Careful attention to the origin of the doctrine of the necessary

immortality or indestructibility of each human soul ... will probably

convince us that it was no part of the original Christian message, or

of really Catholic doctrine. It was rather a speculation of Platonism

taking possession of the Church.”

In his book on Bishop Butler, the late W. E. Gladstone wrote:—

“_Another consideration of the highest importance is that the natural

immortality of the soul is a doctrine wholly unknown to the Holy

Scriptures_, and standing on no higher plane than that of an

ingeniously sustained, but gravely and formidably contested,

philosophical opinion.... We may perhaps find that we have ample

warrant for declining to accept the tenet of natural immortality as a

truth of Divine Revelation.”—_Studies on the Works of Bishop Butler_,

p. 197.

As regards the teaching of the Old Testament, or even of Jewish

tradition, it is certain that natural immortality could not possibly

have been understood, else how could the Sadducees, who denied any life

after death, have formed so strong a party?

The sect of the Sadducees seems to have originated about B.C. 250, and

that of the Pharisees about B.C. 150. Whereas the former denied that

there was any Resurrection, the Pharisees believed in an immortality

which doomed the wicked to endless torment, and the righteous to

transmigration. The latter doctrine is plainly implied in the question

which was asked by the disciples regarding the blind man to whom Jesus

gave sight, “DID THIS MAN SIN, or his parents, that he was born blind?”

It is mentioned as an article of faith by several Jewish writers,

including Josephus. (Quoted by Dr. Pusey, _Everlasting Punishment_, p.

69, 3rd edition.)

When Christ put the Sadducees to silence (Matt. xxii. 31–34), it was by

telling them of the CONTINUITY OF LIFE of those who, while yet on earth,

have attained to be the recognised servants of God.

In a volume of Biblical notes I find the following concerning the

Sadducees:—

“‘_They divided the hierarchy with the Pharisees_, and the _Chief

Council_ seems to have been equally balanced between the two’ (see

Acts xxiii. 6–8). When Paul, in presence of the High Priest Ananias,

perceived that the one part were Sadducees, and the other Pharisees,

he cried out in the Council, ‘Men and brethren, I am a Pharisee, the

son of a Pharisee. Of the hope and resurrection of the dead, I am

called in question.’ And when he had so said, there arose a dissension

between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the multitude was

divided. For the Sadducees say that there is _no_ resurrection,

neither angel nor spirit, but the Pharisees confess both. In our

Lord’s time _the family of Annas the High Priest_ belonged to this

faction (Acts v. 17): ‘Then the High Priest rose up, and all that were

with him (which is the sect of the Sadducees).’”

Mr. Minton points out the literal origin of many of the illustrations

used concerning the awful fate of all who refuse to accept Christ’s gift

of eternal life, and that His references to them were illustrations

which those to whom they were addressed would certainly understand

figuratively, such as those alluding to “unquenchable fires,” which all

present knew to have long since burnt themselves out, having finished

their work of destruction.

He quotes the Rev. H. Constable, who writes concerning the last

judgment:—

“That awful scene represents the final destruction of evil, and not

the eternal perpetuation of it in its most aggravated and malignant

forms. All evil, physical as well as moral, represented by Death and

Hades, has been cast into the Lake of Fire. All who have wilfully

continued to be evil have been consigned to one awful place of

punishment. According to their deserving is their chastisement—‘few

stripes or many stripes.’ Gradually life dies out in that fearful

prison. They who WOULD NOT find Life, have found Death, and the dead

know not anything. There is no eternal antagonism of good and evil, no

eternal jarring of the notes of praise and wailing. Evil has died out,

and with it sorrow. Throughout GOD’S world of Life, all is joy and

peace and love.”

“Then (after the accomplishment of the doom described in Rev. xx. 14,

15, and Rev. xxi. 8) there shall be no more curse, and no more death,

neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain. For

GOD HIMSELF shall dwell with men, and shall wipe away all tears from

their eyes. HE will swallow up Death in Victory.

“Is it not amazing that men should profess to believe these glorious

and most blessed promises and yet for one moment conceive such a

possibility as that their fulfilment should be co-existent with the

Eternity of Evil, and of the continued existence through endless ages

of countless myriads of GOD’S creatures, enduring the most appalling

torture, and (so far from HIS wiping all tears from off all faces)

that the weeping and gnashing of teeth (which our LORD has told us

will accompany the terrible moment when HE has finally shut the door

of mercy), shall continue through all eternity!

“Whereas HE has said that nothing shall then exist which is not

reconciled to HIM.

“LORD, open the eyes of THY servants to see the horror of horrors that

their imagination has substituted for the glorious future set before

us in THY WORD of a universe reconciled to THEE, and THYSELF ALL IN

ALL.”

“THY WILL BE DONE.”

While touching on such solemn subjects, I cannot refrain from referring

to another matter in this present life, in which the GOD of infinite

love and compassion is maligned. HE says of HIMSELF that, “Like as a

father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear HIM. HE

doth not willingly afflict the children of men.”

HE created everything in HIS world “very good” and very happy, and there

was no pain or suffering till HIS enemy had succeeded in bringing in sin

and consequent death. GOD’S will is the happiness of HIS children. And

yet it is chiefly when horrible accidents occur, and in every form of

sorrow and anguish, that we strive to say “THY WILL BE DONE,” ignoring

the context “as it is done in Heaven,” where HIS Will is done, and there

is no pain, nor any grief, because HIS enemy who causes the suffering

has no power there.

On this subject Mrs. Josephine Butler writes:

“Not until we recognise that there are two ruling powers in the world

can we ever be right in our estimate of or relation to the GOD of

Love—never till we recognise the dual government can we see straight.

It is a dual government which is at war now, but with a progressive

victory for the Benign and Blessed One, and defeat (with our help) for

the malign one....

“Have readers of the Gospel never fathomed the significance of the

words of Jesus: ‘Shall not this woman, whom Satan hath bound these

eighteen years, be healed?’ Again and again HE was angry with the evil

spirit which afflicted men and women. GOD is not the author of sin,

disease, pain, evil, death. These all come from another source. They

are maliciously inflicted evil” [as we read in the story of poor Job

and his trials—inflicted by Satan, though for some mysterious purpose

permitted by GOD up to a certain limit]. “Yet GOD is ever mending,

healing, bringing good out of Satan’s bad, making us heroic under

pains inflicted by the enemy, walking with us through the flames and

the floods of the Evil One’s creating, and making us HIS own

companions, working for the final victory.

“Was it GOD who tortured the demoniac boy, whose father brought him to

Christ? If it had been, would GOD’S Son have said: ‘Come out of him,

thou foul spirit, and enter no more into him?’ ‘GOD anointed Jesus of

Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power, who went about doing good

and healing all that were oppressed of the devil, for GOD was with

HIM.’”

On the other hand, of course we must not forget that some sufferings and

trials are for our education. According to His own Word, “As many as I

love, I rebuke and chasten.” And those marvellous sayings regarding our

LORD Himself in His human life—that “Though HE was the SON of GOD, yet

learned HE obedience by the things which HE suffered,” and that HE, the

Captain of our salvation, was made perfect through sufferings.”—Heb. v.

8; ii. 10.

But when in that awfully mysterious hour of HIS human agony HE cried,

“THY will be done,” that surely was, because HE was about to “taste

death for every man,” in order that “THROUGH DEATH HE MIGHT DESTROY HIM

THAT HAD THE POWER OF DEATH, THAT IS, THE DEVIL” (Heb. ii. 9–14), and so

by Himself enduring all, HE might conquer our enemy.

NOTE G

_Intercessory Prayer_

Well did Tennyson write—

“More things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of;

Wherefore let thy voice rise for me like a fountain day and night.”

Little does the world know how many a mighty change has been wrought in

answer to the unknown prayers of many a faithful heart. The guardian

angel who thus ceaselessly pleaded for Roualeyn was a saintly woman,

Davina M. ... who in her beautiful girlhood had been the one pure love

of his life, and who loved him with such devotion that she stedfastly

refused to link her life with his from a conviction that it would be to

his disadvantage to marry beneath his own social rank. She lived to know

that her life-long prayer had been granted, and soon after his death she

also passed to the brighter world.

Something of that romance of sixty years ago is suggested in the poem of

“Euphemia” by his niece Eisa (the Hon. Mrs. Willoughby, now Lady

Middleton) in her volume _On the North Wind, Thistledown_, published by

King and Co. In that volume and in _The Story of Alastair Bhan Comyn_,

published by Blackwood, are woven many traditions of Morayland.

When travelling in the Hawaiian Isles, I chanced to see in a local paper

some anonymous verses on intercessory prayer, which seemed to me so

touching, that I will venture to reproduce them here:—

“I PRAY FOR THEE.

“When thou art very weak and weary,

When it is dark and all seems dreary,

And suddenly a light almost divine

Upon thy doubting eyes and heart doth shine,

And thou the way to go dost plainly see,

Know, dearest heart, that then I pray for thee.

Far off, in little chamber, I am saying

These words, all softly, and GOD hears me praying:

‘Dear Lord, I do not know

If all is well with him whom I love so,

But Thou canst tell.

O give him Light to see!

O with him ever be

Till all is well!’

“When with a weight of sorrow and of fears,

Crushed to the earth, thou weepest bitter tears,

Lo! gently round thee arms of tenderest love

Raise thee from depths of woe, and far above

Thou hearest a sweet voice saying ‘Trust in ME,’

Know, dearest heart, that then I pray for thee!

Then, with full heart of love to GOD, I’m saying

These words, all softly, and HE hears me praying:

‘O Lord, perhaps to-day,

Down in the dust,

He thinks not Thou didst say—

“Heart, in ME trust.”

O save him, LORD, in love,

O lift him up above

Out of the dust.’

“When all the answering beauty of the soul

Is throbbing, thrilling with the rapturous whole

Of Nature, as on odorous summer night

The tremulous stars thy senses all delight;

Thou feelest higher joys than these can be,

Know, dearest heart, that then I pray for thee,

For at my twilight window I am saying

These words, all softly, and GOD hears me praying:

‘Dear Father, as to-night

He sees the sky

With glorious beauty light,

To THEE on high,

Who this rare radiance wrought,

Raise his adoring thought

Above the sky.’

“Thus always, with full heart of love to GOD, I’m saying

These words, all softly, and HE hears me praying:

‘Dear Lord, both he and I

Are far from strong;

To each of us be nigh,

The way is long.

Perhaps he heeds not me,

JESUS, we both need THEE;

Make us more strong.’”

As these pages are not intended for publication during my lifetime, but

are my last message to many friends personally unknown to me, I venture

here to quote two letters addressed to a very dear friend, in the hope

that they may possibly prove helpful to some one who finds the like

difficulty in coming into personal touch with the Master.

“DEAR...,—The few words we exchanged last night have made me wonder

whether the doubts you seemed to express were genuine, or just spoken

for the sake of argument. But because I know too how many minds such as

yours, intellectual difficulties do seem insuperable (their very wisdom

raising earth-born clouds, which hide the truth, that to ‘babes’ seems

so clear and simple), I feel that I am bound to say plainly that the

result of my own fifty years of thinking on the subject has been to bind

me more firmly than ever to the simplest child’s faith in the Old Story

of the Cross and in THE FRIEND whose love and presence are to me

infinitely more real and more precious than those of any human being.

“And I do feel that, knowing Him as I do, beyond all possibility of

doubt—and loving Him, however unworthily—realising, as I have done even

in the brightest years of life’s young morning, how utterly dark and

cheerless my own life would be but for this ‘fellowship’ (St. John’s own

word—1 John i. 3—so I may write it without presumption), it would be

unpardonable in me not to say so plainly to any friend who may not yet

have been able to realise this—the only Life-giving truth—the old, old

story which Saul, the cultivated Roman Jew, the persecutor of the

despised sect, was impelled to go and preach to the super-refined and

learned Corinthians, that the crucified peasant Jew was in truth

Incarnate GOD, Who saw fit ‘to humble Himself even to death on the Cross

that He might make us the children of GOD and exalt us to everlasting

life,’ and Who does care for each one of us individually.

“As concerns our intellectual difficulties, we can surely trust these to

HIM who made our minds, till HE sees fit to make us capable of

understanding all that now perplexes us. Our personal acquaintance with

Himself is FAR CLOSER than any outside difficulty of that sort, and so I

for one am content to believe that there are many things far beyond my

comprehension in its present undeveloped capacity—things which I know I

must accept on trust till I pass from the present caterpillar stage to

the full, free-winged life when we shall know all the mysteries.

“Only once in my life was there a time—a long, weary time of sad

darkness, when cold earth-born clouds closed round me, so as to shut out

all the light of His companionship. I do not mean that I doubted His

real presence any more than I doubt the shining of the sun beyond our

visible rain-clouds, but for me there were only leaden skies,

impenetrable and unresponsive, with only now and then a gleam of the

blessed light. But I knew it was the just punishment of wilful

wrong-doing—‘a needful time of trouble.’ (For of course in one who does

know the Master and His love, sins which the world would not recognise

as such, must rank very differently from the world’s standard, and

though HE has promised to be our defence, that we may not GREATLY fall,

we all know too well how continually we do stumble.) But at last the

earnest of forgiveness was granted in the restored consciousness of His

presence—a change quite as distinct as that from the darkness of a

November fog to the glad summer sunlight.

“And now with my whole soul I do thank Him for His gift of light, and I

do realise ever more and more, how closely HE does draw us to Himself

when we WILL come to Him, and what a real and blessed possession is the

Eternal Life, which is His gift to us NOW—the gift of Him ‘WHOM TRULY TO

KNOW, IS LIFE EVERLASTING.’

“This is the truth which myriads have believed, acknowledging how

unnecessary it is that they should understand how or why it should be,

but have simply taken Him at His word, surrendering themselves wholly to

Him, and have found in Him all-sufficient rest for their souls. And not

only rest, but perfect sympathy and companionship.

“I know you do not class me as quite an idiot in other matters; surely,

then, you can believe that it is no mere delusion which is to me so

intensely real that it fills and satisfies my heart and all my being,

and which makes what we call living or dying so entirely matters of

contentment, because I am perfectly certain that nothing except my own

wilful yielding to what I recognise as sin can possibly separate me from

Him, and from the Love wherein He enfolds all who do willingly give

themselves to Him to be His own.

“Though we all do instinctively shrink from revealing our inner lives to

one another, yet those who have once realised all that this means,

cannot but crave that all ‘who call them Friend’ should share the same

secret of inward peace....”

On one occasion I sent this friend a very beautifully illuminated card

with the words, “The Lord shall guide thee continually,” and “Underneath

are the Everlasting Arms.” Much to my surprise, it called forth a letter

so unlike her usual gentle courtesy, that I felt constrained to reply:—

“You and I are constituted so strangely alike in almost every respect,

that from you, beyond any other friend I possess, I feel entitled to the

sympathy of a true understanding all round. This is why I cannot bear

that words which are to me the expression of all that is most precious

and restful in life should seem to you merely ‘ridiculous charms.’ I

know you only mean that keeping such words before one’s eyes is so, but

when I look back over all the years of my past life, and recognise that

the consciousness of ‘continual guiding’ and the sense of perfect safety

in the enfolding of ‘the Everlasting Arms’ have been my own mainstay in

almost every hour of every day, I feel that simply to keep such words

where my outward eyes must often rest upon them does help me continually

to remember that the events of my life are not a mere matter of chance,

but are all being planned for me by One who loves me.

“Alas! dear, I know this does not come home to you as it does to me; and

I fear that when you see me fussing over the trivial cares of every day,

you must think that my daily outward life tells little of the inward

peace that passeth understanding—a just inference, I own, judging from

outward seeming—yet not really true, for though I so often forget for

awhile, I do most truly believe that every tiny detail of everyday life

IS over-ruled, and ordered for me in perfect wisdom, as I have proven

through long years.

“When you told me how a very great botanist had asserted to you the

impossibility of your having found the night-blowing Cactus in a country

where you had actually sat up all night to paint it, I could not but

think how exactly his reasoning coincided with that of the intellectual

people who cannot believe what WE KNOW of the personal Love of our LORD.

YOU KNOW these flowers grow there, because you saw them. We know the

Love of our dear Lord because we are conscious that He is ALWAYS present

with us, and never fails or forsakes us, in sunshade or in shade.

“I quite sympathise with you as to formal ‘saying prayers,’ but if you

realise that you are always in the company of a dear Friend, whose

sympathy is so perfect that he understands every thought and wish of

your heart, so that all day long consciously, or even unconsciously, you

instinctively refer everything to Him, how can you think of a special

morning and evening talk with Him as ‘saying’ a form of words, no matter

how perfect?

“I do fully enter into your delight in your garden, though I have none

of your scientific knowledge of plants. But apart from joy in the

loveliness of flowers, I find a wondrous fascination in the perpetual

showing forth of ‘the resurrection of the body that shall be’ in the

ever-new miracles of glorious colour and fragrance evolved from

apparently dead sticks, ugly brown bulbs, and insignificant seeds.

“All such hints from the visible world become to me increasingly

precious, for the last few years have been marked by so very many

wrenches in parting from our nearest and dearest, that the whole

life-plant feels uprooted, at least all its fibres are loosened from

Mother Earth....”

NOTE H

Among the most noteworthy social changes within my memory, none is more

marked than the diminution in the use of alcoholic drinks of all sorts

in “respectable” society.

I cannot myself remember, what was a common occurrence up to a few years

before my birth, when the ladies frequently left the drawing-room before

the gentlemen left the dinner-table, knowing from their prolonged

absence that they would not be pleasant company. But up to thirty or

forty years ago the amount of wine which, as a matter of course, every

girl took at luncheon, dinner, and dessert, and often also at bed-time,

seems strange to remember, now that fashion has happily so greatly

changed. And if the girl was delicate, instead of recommending hockey or

tennis, the doctor’s prescription was generally an extra bumper of port

at 11 A.M.

It needed a Sir Andrew Clark to have the courage to proclaim that

“Alcohol is a poison, and as such must be classed with strychnine,

arsenic, and similar drugs.”

Here I must remark that although the old practice of hospitably

“pressing” guests to eat is happily an abomination of the past, this is

by no means the case as regards drink. If I refuse white bread at

dinner, no host expresses anxiety as to whether I would prefer brown

bread, or Hovis, or French roll. But in regard to wine, the variety of

offers is often wearisome, ending with, “Surely you are not a

teetotaller?”

And yet we know that there are a multitude of men and women to whom the

use of alcohol in any form is a really grave danger, and MANY WOULD

WILLINGLY ESCHEW IT BUT FOR THE DREAD OF BEING PECULIAR, AND OF HAVING

ATTENTION CALLED TO THEIR ABSTINENCE. It is partly with a view to

helping such as these that it is so desirable to multiply the number of

total abstainers, so that this fatal standard of good-fellowship may

soon become obsolete, and that it may be as much a matter of

indifference whether a guest drinks wine or not as whether he eats

bread.

But since we know that

“Evil is wrought by want of thought

As well as by want of heart,”

perhaps I may venture to point out to some hospitable ladies that the

practice of saturating many of the most attractive sweets with brandy,

rum, or liqueurs, is a most insidious source of danger to many who are

honestly trying to conquer the “drink crave,” and whose good resolution

has enabled them to resist the temptation when it comes undisguised, but

who are thrown quite off their guard by the innocent-looking cream, or

cake, or bon-bon, which contains quite enough of spirit to reawaken the

craving for more. Surely this thought, together with the danger of

temptation in our own kitchens, might avail to banish the use of alcohol

from our cookery.[84]

But quite apart from any desire to benefit our tempted brethren, the

strongest reasons for total abstinence are supplied by the plain

statements of the very highest medical authorities on the evil effects

on the human body of even the most moderate habitual use of alcohol, SIR

ANDREW CLARK says that more than three-fourths of the disorders in what

we call “fashionable life” arise from the use of alcohol, “a poison of

which even very small daily doses are injurious to perfect health, and

tend to gradually enfeeble various organs, whose breakdown some day is

really due to no other cause.” HE ASSERTS THAT IT IS THE GREATEST ENEMY

OF THE HUMAN RACE.

SIR WILLIAM GULL says: “I hardly know any more powerful source of

disease than alcoholic drink. I should say that alcohol is the most

destructive poison we are aware of.” DR. NORMAN KERR says he has been

able to trace three-fourths of his cases of heart-disease to its use.

SIR HENRY THOMPSON, in a letter to the late Archbishop of Canterbury

(Temple), states that A VERY LARGE PROPORTION OF SOME OF THE MOST

PAINFUL AND DANGEROUS DISEASES WHICH HAVE COME UNDER HIS NOTICE ARISE

FROM THE DAILY USE OF ALCOHOLIC DRINKS, TAKEN IN THE QUANTITY WHICH IS

ORDINARILY CONSIDERED MODERATE. “As to this fact,” he says, “I have a

right to speak with authority, and I do so solely because it appears to

me a duty not to be silent on a matter of such extreme importance.”

DR. MURCHISON ENUMERATES THE DISEASES OF VARIOUS ORGANS OF THE BODY

WHICH RENDER LIFE A BURDEN, AND WHICH MIGHT NEVER HAVE OCCURRED HAD IT

NOT BEEN FOR THE DAILY DOSE OF ALCOHOL. DR. ALFRED CARPENTER says:

“Alcohol is a virulent poison, and as such should be placed in the list

with arsenic, mercury and other dangerous drugs.”

May I advise all who are interested in the subject to invest one penny

in Sir Andrew Clark’s pamphlet, _An Enemy of the Human Race_, and

another in _Strong Drink and its Results_, by D. S. Govett, M.A.,

Archdeacon of Gibraltar, both published by the National Temperance

Depot, 33 Paternoster Row, London, E.C. The latter contains the evidence

of many leading medical men, and sums up thus: “Let no man think himself

or his family safe from drink’s deadly fascination. Remember how in

every generation men of the highest genius have become its slaves.

_Every one of these was once a moderate drinker, and intended so to

continue._ Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall.”

Most noteworthy is the change in the attitude of the clergy in this

matter. Fifty years ago it would have been considered _infra dig._ for a

clergyman to be a total abstainer. Now a very large proportion of all

denominations are so, and many of our Bishops and Archbishops throw the

whole weight not only of their teaching, but of their very practical

example into this effort to check the moral and physical ravages wrought

in our own land, as well as in those other countries to which we so

largely export the cruel fire-water.

This question in all its bearings formed the subject of many of

Archbishop Temple’s most powerful appeals to his countrymen. But I

cannot refrain from here quoting one passage from Dean Farrar, partly

because of the one Scriptural quotation which is so frequently waged

against total abstinence, namely concerning our Lord Himself having

provided wine at the marriage-feast—wine which was probably the

non-fermented juice of the vine. But few people seem ever to notice the

Scriptural references to THE TEETOTALERS OF JUDEA.

Dean Farrar writes:—

“You sneer at Total Abstainers from the altitude of your worldly

superiority, but the Scripture gives them its heartiest approbation.

GOD commanded His prophets to pronounce ON THE RECHABITES a

conspicuous blessing because they abstained from wine. Jeremiah speaks

of the health and happiness of the NAZARITES as the flower of the

youth of Jerusalem, for their strength and their beauty. SAMSON was a

Total Abstainer, whose drink was only from the living brook, and he

was the strongest man time records. JOHN THE BAPTIST, whom CHRIST

calls ‘the greatest of those born of woman,’ was a Total Abstainer.

The angel of the LORD in announcing his birth said, ‘He shall be great

in the sight of the LORD, _and shall drink neither wine nor strong

drink, and he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost_.’”

NOTE I

_Use of the Rosary_

This widespread tendency to the telling of beads is certainly one of the

strangest developments of devotion. We are apt to consider such vain

repetitions as peculiar to the Church of Rome, whereas we find that not

only do some four hundred and fifty million Buddhists find solace

therein, but also a vast multitude of Brahmins and Mohammedans.

Now, that Brahmins and Buddhists should thus keep a numerical tally of

their devotions is strange enough, but the adoption of this spiritual

treadmill by Mohammedans is more remarkable (though whoever has heard

the frenzied shouts of “_Allah el Allah! Allah el Allah!_” can never

doubt their faith in the efficacy of much speaking.) But that a

practice so little in accordance with the spirit of Christianity could

have been a spontaneous growth appears quite impossible, so it is only

natural to assume that it was imported from some heathen land, just as

the veneration for relics, the canonization of saints, the use of

rosaries, the divers orders of monastic life, the rigid vows of

poverty and asceticism, celibacy of the clergy, priestly robes and

shaven crowns, processions carrying banners, chanted litanies, use of

incense and holy water, and very many other ecclesiastical details—can

only be accounted for on the supposition, which, indeed, is well-nigh

a certainty, that they were adopted by the Christians of Egypt from

the practice of the Buddhists, by whom all these things were as

religiously observed long before the Christian era, as they continue

to be at this day.

Concerning the origin of the use of the rosary in Christendom (not its

Pagan origin, however!) Dr. Rock tells us that in early days the truly

devout were in the habit of reciting the whole Psalter daily. But as a

hundred and fifty psalms were certainly rather a lengthy recitation,

it became customary to substitute short prayers, which might be

uttered rapidly amid the stir and business of life, without requiring

undivided attention. Hence a hundred and fifty short “Aves” varied by

ten intervening Paternosters, and five Doxologies (thus dividing the

whole into ten decades, came to be accounted as meritorious an act of

devotion as the repetition of the whole Psalter.)

But as the omission of any of the number would have been esteemed

sinful, and the calculation was apt to be inexact, some mechanical aid

was desirable, and various expedients were devised. Thus Palladius has

recorded how the Abbot Paul, who made a point of repeating the

Paternoster three hundred times daily, that he kept count of his

prayers by the aid of a number of small pebbles, which he dropped into

his lap one by one till the tale was told. Then the simpler method of

counting on a string of beads worn round the neck was suggested, and

soon found favour with the devout.

The division of the Rosary into the fifteen decades of small beads for

the _Ave Maria_, with the large intervening beads for the Paternoster,

is generally ascribed to St. Dominic (born in Old Castille A.D. 1170);

but there is little doubt that this use of beads was common in Spain

before his time, and that it had been borrowed by the Spanish

Catholics from the Mohammedan dervishes who accompanied the Moors on

their invasion of Spain in A.D. 711, and who, in common with their

Syrian brethren, had adopted it from nations further east.

The ordinary Mohammedan rosary or _tasbih_ numbers ninety-nine beads,

often made of sacred earth brought from Mecca, but frequently only of

date-stones. Instead of a large bead to mark each tenth, a silken

tassel does this duty, and assists the pious Islamite in his

repetition of the ninety-nine names of God.

The Mohammedan rosary figures in a very curious ceremony practised on

the night immediately following a burial, commonly called “the night

of desolation” while the soul is believed still to abide with the

body, ere winging its flight to the place of spirits. About fifty

devout men assemble to perform an act of merit on behalf of the dead.

After reciting certain chapters of the Khoran, they repeat “_Allah el

Allah_” three thousand times, while one of the party keeps count on a

rosary of a thousand beads, each as large as a pigeon’s egg. Between

each thousand the exhausted worshippers pause to rest and drink

coffee. Afterwards several short prayers are uttered, each being

repeated a hundred times. The whole merit of this very severe bodily

exercise is formally assigned to the deceased; and on behalf of

wealthy men it is sometimes repeated for three nights running—a fact

rather suggestive of the pecuniary cost of such services!

How far Christianity has improved on this original may be somewhat a

nice question, for in such means of acquiring merit for the dead

neither Christians nor Buddhists are lacking, and in all Catholic

countries oft-told rosaries number Christian prayers for the deceased

by ten thousand times ten thousand.

It is believed that this celestial _abacus_—this method of reckoning

with heaven—originated with the Hindoos, who certainly are known to

have kept count of their oft-told prayers by means of bead-strings

from very early ages; but whether the invention was due to Hindoo

Buddhists or Hindoo Brahmins is not known. Probably, however, the

former may claim this merit, as they were so long the dominant

religion of India, and indeed three centuries before the Christian era

they had overspread all Asia, so that traces of their influence and

teaching are discernible even where successive waves of differing

faith have overswept the land.

To this day, the Brahmins of Guzerat and some other parts of India

carry chaplets of one hundred small and eight large beads, made of

sacred wood; and a truly devout man recites the _gāyatri_ one hundred

and eight times at the rising of the sun ere he proceeds to wash and

dress his idols. This mystic sentence is a short extract from the _Rig

Veda_—a meditation on the divine glory of the sun-god, and a prayer

that the Divine Giver of Life and Light may enlighten his

understanding.

The rosary commonly used by the worshippers of Vishnu numbers 108

smooth beads, made of the wood of the sacred Tulasi shrub.[85] These

represent the 108 most sacred titles of Krishna. In the course of the

elaborate daily morning ritual, certain formulas of worship are

repeated 108 times, count being kept by the aid of the rosary, which,

together with the counting-hand, is concealed under a cloth or in a

bag (which is called a Go-mukhi). Why this concealment is necessary

does not appear, unless there is some idea of not letting the left

hand know what the right is doing!

But it is equally incumbent on the worshippers of Siva, who, while

reciting his 1008 names and sacred attributes, keep count of their

task on rosaries of 32 or 64 rough berries of the Rudrāska tree,[86]

which are said to have originally been formed from the tears shed by

Siva in passionate anger. These berries have five sides, which are

considered symbolic of Siva’s five faces.

The hideous Saiva Yogis occasionally use grim rosaries of human teeth

collected from funeral-pyres, a more agreeable variety allowed by the

Vishnuvites being the use of lotus-seeds. The various sects have

slight differences in this respect. One at least, (that of Vallabha)

bestows the rosary of 108 Tulasi beads on each child as a token of

church membership, when it attains the age of from three to four

years, and is capable of repeating the eight-syllabled charm,

“_Sri-Krishnah saranam mama_,” which is, being interpreted, “Great

Krishna is the refuge of my soul.” Another Vishnuvite sect invests

each member with two rosaries—one in honour of Krishna, and the other

for the worship of Radhā.

The votaries of Ganesa, the elephant-headed god, use the seeds of the

kumala, or lotus, for this purpose, while the worshippers of Surya,

the Sun, prefer a string of small balls of crystal—miniatures of the

great crystals which symbolize the sun on the Shinto altars of Japan.

NOTE J

_Hair Offerings_

It is always interesting to note the same superstitions in divers

countries. In my book on _The Hebrides_, page 39, I related the

Gaelic-Danish legend of the “Whirlpool of Corrie Vreckan,” in which

the young Danish prince might have anchored in safety had he been

provided with a cable woven entirely of the long fair tresses of

Danish maidens of faultless purity. But, alas! one lock had been shorn

from the head of one whose fair fame was no longer spotless, so the

cable parted, and the prince and his vessel were sucked down, down, in

the raging waters.

I am told that in Malabar a cure for some diseases, and also a

recognised penance, is being tied up to a tree and undergoing a severe

flogging, after which a piece of growing hair is securely pegged into

the bark, and by a sudden wrench it is torn from the head and left

hanging on the tree as a votive offering.

Strange to say, this identical ceremony (minus the flogging) was long

practised at the village of Berkhampstead in Hertfordshire. The object

to be gained was the cure of ague, and a group of fine old oaks was

the scene of action.

I am told that in Sunderland a popular cure for whooping-cough is to

shave the crown of the head and hang the hair on a bush, in full faith

that as the birds carry away the hair, so will the cough vanish. In

Lincolnshire, a girl suffering from ague cuts a lock of her hair and

binds it round an aspen tree, praying it to shake in her stead. In

Ross-shire, where within the last fifty years living cocks were

occasionally buried as a sacrificial remedy for epilepsy, some of the

hair of the patient was generally added to the buried offering.

In Ireland, at Tubber Quan, near Carrick-on-Suir, there is a holy tree

beside a holy well, which are held in the deepest veneration. Thither,

chiefly on the last three Sundays in June, Roman Catholic peasants

make pilgrimage to worship St. Quan (whoever he may be); and having

gone thrice round the holy tree on their bare knees, each cuts off a

lock of his own hair and ties it to a branch as a charm against

headache. By the end of June the tree is fringed with countless locks

of human hair of all shades.

A recent visitor to some of these Irish holy wells enumerated amongst

many other votive offerings, thirty-nine crutches, six hand-sticks,

and a pair of boots!

NOTE K

_On the Medicinal Use of Animals in China and Britain_

These quaint druggists’ shops were indeed a strangely vivid

illustration of what must have been the general appearance of the

laboratory of the learned leeches of Britain from olden times until

really quite recent days—literally until the eighteenth century—as we

know from the official pharmacopœia of the College of Surgeons of

London, published in A.D. 1724, that unicorn’s horn, human fat, human

skulls, dog’s dung, toads, vipers, worms, and all manner of animal

substances, either dried, seethed, or calcined, were accounted

valuable medical stores. In the same medical directory for A.D. 1724,

centipedes, vipers, and lizards are especially enumerated as

possessing valued properties!

It will be interesting to glance at a few of these old prescriptions

as compared with those still in favour in China. Here is a letter from

a French Catholic Missionary in Mongolia. “May Heaven preserve us from

falling ill here! It is impossible to conceive who can have devised

remedies so horrible as those in use in the Chinese pharmacopœia, such

as drugs compounded of toads’ paws, wolves’ eyes, vultures’ claws,

human skin and fat, and other medicaments still more horrible, of

which I spare you the recital. Never did witches’ den contain a

collection of similar horrors!”

Mr. Mitford has told us how at Peking he saw a Chinese physician

prescribe a decoction of three scorpions for a child struck down with

fever; and W. Gill, in his _River of Golden Sand_, mentions having met a

number of coolies laden with red-deers’ horns, some of them very fine

twelve-tyne antlers. They are only hunted when in velvet, and from the

horns in this state a medicine is made which is one of the most highly

prized in the Chinese pharmacopœia.

With regard to the singular virtues supposed to attach to the medicinal

use of tiger, my cousin, General Robert Warden, told me that on one

occasion when, in India, he was exhibiting some trophies of the chase,

some Chinamen who were present became much excited at the sight of an

unusually fine tiger-skin. They eagerly inquired whether it would be

possible to find the place where the carcase had been buried, because

from the bones of tigers dug up three months after burial, a decoction

may be prepared which gives immense muscular power to the fortunate man

who swallows it.

I was indebted to the same informant for an interesting note on the

medicine folklore of India, namely, that while camping in the jungle,

one of his men came to entreat him to shoot a night-jar for his benefit,

because from the bright, prominent eyes of this bird of night an

ointment is prepared which gives great clearness of vision, and is

therefore highly prized.

Miss Bird, when travelling in the Malay Peninsula, was eyewitness of a

very remarkable scene when, a tiger having been killed, a number of

Chinamen flew upon the body, cut out the liver, heart, and spleen, and

carefully drained every drop of its blood. Those who failed to secure

these, cut out the cartilage from the joints. She learnt that the blood,

dried at a temperature of 110°, is esteemed the strongest of all tonics

and gives strength and courage. The powdered liver and spleen are good

for many diseases, but the centre of the tiger’s eyeball is supposed to

possess well-nigh miraculous virtues. So all these treasured fragments

were sold at high prices to Chinese doctors, who doubtless knew they

would not lose on the retail price!

From the qualities here attributed to tigers’ blood, we can better

understand how it came to pass that in the Tai-ping rebellion the

Imperial troops, having captured a rebel leader at Shanghai, roasted

him, and ate his heart and other vital organs in order to make them

brave! The case is not unique, as in that same terrible civil war the

Tai-pings were guilty of similar atrocities during the siege of Nanking,

though cannibalism _per se_ is a crime as deeply abhorred in China as in

Britain.

In Perak Miss Bird saw rhinoceros’ horn selling at a high price in the

drug-market, a single horn being priced at fifty dollars; and in Japan a

native doctor showed her a small box of unicorn’s horn which, he said,

was worth its weight in gold. He also expressed his faith in the value

of rhinoceros’ horn. One of the said rhinoceros’ horns was, as we have

seen, among the most valued treasures of the old druggist of Osaka. This

horn, and that of the unicorn, which seems generally to mean the

narwhal,[87] have ever been held in high repute throughout the East as

an antidote to poison, and cups carved from these horns were used as a

safeguard, because they possessed the property of neutralising poison,

or at least of revealing its presence.

And indeed the same virtue was attributed to them by the learned leeches

of Europe. At the close of the sixteenth century, the doctors of

medicine in Augsberg met in solemn conclave to examine a specimen of

unicorn’s horn, which they found to be true _monoceros_ and not a

forgery, the proof thereof being that they administered some of it to a

dog which had been poisoned with arsenic, and which recovered after

swallowing the antidote. They further administered _nux vomica_ to two

dogs; and to one they gave twelve grains of unicorn horn, which

effectually counteracted the poison; but the other poor dog got none, so

he died. Similar statements concerning this antidote, and also

concerning the value of elk’s and deer’s horns powdered, as a cure for

epilepsy, appear in various old English medical works of the highest

authority.

Not less remarkable is the efficacy supposed to attach to antediluvian

ivory, more especially the tusks of the mammoths which have been so well

preserved in Siberian ice that their very flesh has been found

untainted. There they have lain hermetically sealed for many a long

century, and now, when the rivers from time to time wash away fragments

of the great ice-cliffs, they reveal the strange treasures of that

wondrous storehouse. It may be a great woolly elephant with a mane like

a lion, and curly tusks, or a huge unwieldy hippopotamus, or a

rhinoceros, and the hungry Siberian bears and wolves fight and snarl

over these dainty morsels.

Here, then, in these marvellous ice-fields lie inexhaustible stores of

finest ivory, and this it is which the learned professors of the

Celestial Medical Hall value so highly. So these precious tusks are

dragged forth after thousands of years to be ground down and boiled to a

jelly, for the cure of vulgar Chinese diseases of the twentieth century.

Alas! poor mammoth!

Nor are these the only antediluvian relics which are thus turned to

account. Professor H. N. Moseley tells us of the “Dragon’s teeth and

bones” which he bought from the druggists of Canton, where they are sold

by weight as a regular medicine, and are highly prized in the _materia

medica_ both of China and Japan as specifics in certain diseases.

They proved, on examination, to be the fossil teeth and bones of various

extinct mammalia of the tertiary period, including those of the

rhinoceros, elephant, horse, mastodon, stag, hippotherium, and the teeth

of another carnivorous animal unknown. He obtained a translation of the

passage in the medical works of Li-She-Chan, which specially refers to

the use of this medicine. It states that “Dragon’s bones come from the

southern parts of Shansi, and are found in the mountains.” Dr.

To-Wang-King says that if they are genuine, they will adhere to the

tongue. This medicine must not come in contact with fish or iron. “It

cures heart-ache, stomach-ache, drives away ghosts, cures colds and

dysentery, irregularities of the digestive organs, paralysis, etc., and

increases the general health.”

Another medical authority, _The Chinese Repository_, published in Canton

A.D. 1832, states that the bones of dragons are found on banks of

rivers, and in caves of the earth—places where the dragon died. Those of

the back and brain are highly prized, being variegated with different

streaks on a white ground. The best are known by slipping the tongue

lightly over them. The horns are hard and strong, but if these are taken

from damp places, or by women, they are worthless.

From his examination of these so-called relics of the dragon (which

prove to belong to so many different animals which, in successive ages,

have crept to the same cave to die), Mr. Moseley points out how some

imaginative person probably first devised a fanciful picture of the

mythical animal combining the body of the vast lizard with the wings of

a bat, the head of a stag, and carnivorous teeth, which has become the

stereotyped idea of the dragon in all lands.

Even in Europe, fossil bones thus found together in caves were long

known as dragon’s bones, and accounted useful in medicine. Indeed, so

great was the demand for these and similar relics, that our museums and

scientific men have good cause to rejoice that their ancestors failed to

discover what stores of old bones lay hidden in our own sea-board

caves—as, for instance, in that wonderful Kirkdale cavern where the

mortal remains of several hundred hyenas were found guarding the teeth

of a baby mammoth, a patriarchal tiger, a rhinoceros, and a

hippopotamus. Or the caves along the Norfolk coast where Hugh Miller

tells us that within thirteen years the oyster-dredgers dragged up the

tusks and grinders of five hundred mammoths! Or those wonderful

zoological cemeteries where the fossil bones of cave-lions, cave-hyenas,

elephants, mammoths, hippopotami, woolly rhinoceros, red deer and fallow

deer, oxen, sheep, and horses, lay so securely stored for untold ages

beneath Charing Cross and Trafalgar Square!

Of the firm belief of the Chinese in the efficacy of medicines

compounded of the eyes and vitals of a human body we have had too

terrible proof, for it is well known that one cause which led to the

appalling Teintsin massacre in 1870 was the widespread rumour that the

foreign doctors (whose skill all were forced to admit) obtained their

medicines by kidnapping and murdering Chinese children and tearing out

their hearts and eyes. As this nice prescription is actually described

in their own books as a potent medicine, the story obtained ready

credence, and we all remember the result. Moreover, the same accusation

has repeatedly been spread on other occasions of popular excitement

against foreign teachers, and we need scarcely wonder that it should

obtain credence, when we find that one of the most esteemed acts of

filial devotion is for a son or a daughter to bestow a good slice of his

or her own flesh, to be administered, with other ingredients, to parents

suffering from certain forms of disease, which are otherwise deemed

incurable. Archdeacon Grey of Canton was personally acquainted with

various persons who had endured this voluntary mutilation![88]

I am not aware whether the Lamas of Peking have there introduced the

fashion of administering medicine from a drinking-cup fashioned from the

upper part of a wise man’s skull, but such medicine-cups are greatly

esteemed in Thibet and Mongolia, where they are mounted in gold, silver,

or copper.