As the frenzy rose toward its height, and the Regent took advantage of

it to issue stock enough to pay the whole national debt, namely, three

hundred thousand new shares, at $1,000 each, or a thousand per cent. in

the par value. They were instantly taken. Three times as many would have

been instantly taken. So violent were the changes of the market, that

shares rose or fell twenty per cent. within a few hours. A servant was

sent to sell two hundred and fifty shares of stock; found on reaching

the gardens of the Hotel de Soissons, that since he left his master's

house the price had risen from $1,600 (par value $100 remember) to

$2,000. The servant sold, gave his master the proceeds at $1,600 a

share, put the remaining $100,000 in his own pocket, and left France

that evening. Law's coachman became so rich that he left service, and

set up his own coach; and when his master asked him to find a successor,

he brought two candidates, and told Law to choose, and he would take the

other himself. There were many absurd cases of vulgarians made rich.

There were also many robberies and murders. That committed by the Count

de Horn, one of the higher nobility and two accomplices, is a famous

case. The Count, a dissipated rascal, poniarded a broker in a tavern for

the money the broker carried with him. But he was taken, and, in spite

of the utmost and most determined exertions of the nobility, the Regent

had him broken on the wheel in public, like any other murderer.

The stock of the Company of the Indies, though it dashed up and down ten

and twenty per cent. from day to day, was from the first immensely

inflated. In August 1719, it sold at 610 per cent.; in a few weeks more

it arose to 1,200 per cent. All winter it still went up until, in April

1720, it stood at 2,050 per cent. That is, one one-hundred dollar share

would sell for two thousand and fifty dollars.

At this extreme point of inflation, the bubble stood a little, shining

splendidly as bubbles do when they are nearest bursting, and then it

received two or three quiet pricks. The Prince de Conti, enraged because

Law would not send him some shares on his own terms, sent three

wagon-loads of bills to Law's bank, demanding specie. Law paid it, and

complained to the Regent, who made him put two-thirds of it back again.

A shrewd stock-gambler drew specie by small sums until he had about

$200,000 in coin, and lest he should be forced to return it, he packed

it in a cart, covered it with manure, put on a peasant's disguise, and

carted his fortune over the frontiers into Belgium. Some others quietly

realized their means in like manner by driblets and funded them abroad.

By such means coin gradually grew very scarce, and signs of a panic

appeared. The Regent tried to adjust matters by a decree that coin

should be five per cent. less than paper; as much as to say, It is

hereby enacted that there is a great deal more coin than there is!

This did not serve, and the Regent decreed again, that coin should be

worth ten per cent. less than paper. Then he decreed that the bank must

not pay more than $22 at once in specie; and, finally, by a bold stretch

of his authority, he issued an edict that no person should have over

$100 in coin, on pain of fine and confiscation. These odious laws made a

great deal of trouble, spying, and distress, and rapidly aggravated the

difficulty they were meant to cure. The price of shares in the great

company began to fall steadily and rapidly. Law and the Regent began to

be universally hated, cursed, and threatened. Various foolish and vain

attempts were made to stay the coming ruin, by renewing the stories

about Louisiana sending out a lot of conscripted laborers, ordering that

all payments must be made in paper, and printing a new batch of notes,

to the amount of another $300,000,000. Law's two corporations were also

doctored in several ways. The distress and fright grew worse. An edict

was issued that Law's notes and shares should depreciate gradually by

law for a year, and then be worth but half their face. This made such a

tumult and outcry that the Regent had to retract it in seven days. On

this seventh day, Law's bank stopped paying specie. Law was turned out

of his public employments, but still well treated by the Regent in

private. He was, however, mobbed and stoned in his coach in the street,

had to have a company of Swiss Guards in his house, and at last had to

flee to the Regent's own palace.

I have not space to describe in detail the ruin, misery, tumults, loss

and confusion which attended the speedy descent of Law's paper and

shares to entire worthlessness. Thousands of families were made paupers,

and trade and commerce destroyed by the painful process. Law himself

escaped out of France poor; and, after another obscure and disreputable

career of gambling, died in poverty at Venice, in 1729.

Thus this enormous business-humbug first raised a whole nation into a

fool's paradise of imaginary wealth, and then exploded, leaving its

projector and many thousands of victims ruined, the country disturbed

and distressed, long-enduring consequences, in vicious and lawless and

unsteady habits, contracted while the delusion lasted, and no single

benefit except one more most dearly-bought lesson of the wicked folly of

mere speculation without a real business basis and a real business

method. Let not this lesson be lost on the rampant and half-crazed

speculators of the present day. Those who buy gold or flour, leather,

butter, dry goods, groceries, hardware, or anything else on speculation,

when prices are inflated far beyond the ordinary standard, are taking

upon themselves great risks, for the bubble must eventually be pricked;

and whoever is the "holder" when that time comes, must necessarily be

the loser.

V. MEDICINE AND QUACKS.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

DOCTORS AND IMAGINATION.--FIRING A JOKE OUT OF A CANNON.--THE PARIS EYE

WATER.--MAJENDIE ON MEDICAL KNOWLEDGE.--OLD SANDS OF LIFE.

Medical humbugs constitute a very critical subject indeed, because I

shall be almost certain to offend some of three parties concerned,

namely; physicians, quacks, and patients. But it will never do to

neglect so important a division of my whole theme as this.

To begin with, it is necessary to suggest, in the most delicate manner

in the world, that there is a small infusion of humbug among the very

best of the regular practitioners. These gentlemen, for whose learning,

kind-heartedness, self-devotion, and skill I entertain a profound

respect, make use of what I may call the gaseous element of their

practice, not for the lucre of gain, but in order to enlist the

imaginations of their patients in aid of nature and great remedies.

The stories are infinite in number, which illustrate the force of

imagination, ranging through all the grades of mental action, from the

lofty visions of good men who dream of seeing heaven opened to them, and

all its ineffable glories and delights, down to the low comedy conceit

of the fellow who put a smoked herring into the tail of his coat and

imagined himself a mermaid.

Probably, however, imagination displays its real power more wonderfully

in the operations of the mind on the body that holds it, than anywhere

else. It is true that there are some people even so utterly without

imagination that they cannot take a joke; such as that grave man of

Scotland who was at last plainly told by a funny friend quite out of

patience, "Why, you wouldn't take a joke if it were fired at you out of

a cannon!"

"Sir," replied the Scot, with sound reasoning and grave thought, "Sir,

you are absurd. You cannot fire a joke out of a cannon!"

But to return: It is certainly the case that frequently "the doctor"

takes great care not to let the patient know what is the matter, and

even not to let him know what he is swallowing. This is because a good

many people, if at a critical point of disease, may be made to turn

toward health if made to believe that they are doing so, but would be

frightened, in the literal sense of the words, to death, if told what a

dangerous state they are in.

One sort of regular practice humbug is rendered necessary by the demands

of the patients. This is giving good big doses of something with a

horrid smell and taste. There are plenty of people who don't believe the

doctor does anything to earn his money, if he does not pour down some

dirty brown or black stuff very nasty in flavor. Some, still more

exacting, wish for that sort of testimony which depends on internal

convulsions, and will not be satisfied unless they suffer torments and

expel stuff enough to quiet the inside of Mount Vesuvius or

Popocatepetl.

"He's a good doctor," was the verdict of one of this class of

leather-boweled fellows--"he'll work your innards for you!"

It is a milder form of this same method to give what the learned faculty

term a placebo. This is a thing in the outward form of medicine, but

quite harmless in itself. Such is a bread-pill, for instance; or a

draught of colored water, with a little disagreeable taste in it. These

will often keep the patient's imagination headed in the right direction,

while good old Dame Nature is quietly mending up the damages in "the

soul's dark cottage."

One might almost fancy that, in proportion as the physician is more

skillful, by so much he gives less medicine, and relies more on

imagination, nature, and, above all, regimen and nursing. Here is a

story in point. There was an old gentleman in Paris, who sold a famous

eye-water, and made much gain thereby. He died, however, one fine day,

and unfortunately forgot to leave the recipe on record. "His

disconsolate widow continued the business at the old stand," however--to

quote another characteristic French anecdote--and being a woman of ready

and decisive mind, she very quietly filled the vials with water from the

river Seine, and lived respectably on the proceeds, finding, to her

great relief, that the eye-water was just as good as ever. At last

however, she found herself about to die, and under the stings of an

accusing conscience she confessed her trick to her physician, an eminent

member of the profession. "Be entirely easy, Madam," said the wise man;

"don't be troubled at all. You are the most innocent physician in the

world; you have done nobody any harm."

It is an old and illiberal joke to compare medicine to war, on the

ground that the votaries of both seek to destroy life. It is, however,

not far from the truth to say that they are alike in this; that they are

both preeminently liable to mistakes, and that in both he is most

successful who makes the fewest.

How can it be otherwise, until we know more than we do at present, of

the great mysteries of life and death? It seems risky enough to permit

the wisest and most experienced physician to touch those springs of life

which God only understands. And it is enough to make the most stupid

stare, to see how people will let the most disgusting quack jangle their

very heartstrings with his poisonous messes, about as soon as if he were

the best doctor in the world. A true physician, indeed, does not hasten

to drug. The great French surgeon, Majendie, is even said to have

commenced his official course of lectures on one occasion by coolly

saying to his students: "Gentlemen, the curing of disease is a subject

that physicians know nothing about." This was doubtless an extreme way

of putting the case. Yet it was in a certain sense exactly true. There

is one of the geysers in Iceland, into which visitors throw pebbles or

turfs, with the invariable result of causing the disgusted geyser in a

few minutes to vomit the dose out again, along with a great quantity of

hot water, steam, and stuff. Now the doctor does know that some of his

doses are pretty sure to work, as the traveler knows that his dose will

work on the geyser. It is only the exact how and why that is not

understood.

But however mysterious is nature, however ignorant the doctor, however

imperfect the present state of physical science, the patronage and the

success of quacks and quackeries are infinitely more wonderful than

those of honest and laborious men of science and their careful

experiments.

I have come about to the end of my tether for this time; and quackery is

something too monstrous in dimensions as well as character to be dealt

with in a paragraph. But I may with propriety put one quack at the tail

of this letter; it is but just that he should let decent people go

before him. I mean "Old Sands of Life." Everybody has seen his

advertisement, beginning "A retired Physician whose sands of life have

nearly run out," etc. And everybody--almost--knows how kind the fellow

is in sending gratis his recipe. All that is necessary is (as you find

out when you get the recipe) to buy at a high price from him one

ingredient which (he says) you can get nowhere else. This swindling

scamp is in fact a smart brisk fellow of about thirty-five years of age,

notwithstanding the length of time during which--to use a funny phrase

which somebody got up for him--he has been "afflicted with a loose

tail-board to his mortal sand-cart." Some benevolent friend was so much

distressed about the feebleness of "Old Sands of Life" as to send him

one day a large parcel by express, marked "C. O. D.," and costing quite

a figure. "Old Sands" paid, and opening the parcel, found half a bushel

of excellent sand.

CHAPTER XXIX.

THE CONSUMPTIVE REMEDY.--E. ANDREWS, M. D.--BORN WITHOUT

BIRTHRIGHTS.--HASHEESH CANDY.--ROBACK THE GREAT.--A CONJURER OPPOSED TO

LYING.

There is a fellow in Williamsburg who calls himself a clergyman, and

sells a "consumptive remedy," by which I suppose he means a remedy for

consumption. It is a mere slop corked in a vial; but there are a good

many people who are silly enough to buy it of him. A certain gentleman,

during last November, earnestly sought an interview with this reverend

brother in the interests of humanity, but he was as inaccessible as a

chipmunk in a stone fence. The gentleman wrote a polite note to the

knave asking about prices, and received a printed circular in return,

stating in an affecting manner the good man's grief at having to raise

his price in consequence of the cost of gold "with which I am obliged to

buy my medicines" saith he, "in Paris." This was both sad and

unsatisfactory; and the gentleman went over to Williamsburg to seek an

interview and find out all about the prices. He reached the abode of the

man of piety, but, strange to relate, he wasn't at home.

Gentleman waited.

Reverend brother kept on not being at home. When gentleman had waited to

his entire satisfaction he came back.

It is understood it is practically out of the question to see the

reverend brother. Perhaps he is so modest and shy that he will not

encounter the clamorous gratitude which would obstruct his progress

through the streets, from the millions saved by his consumptive remedy.

It is a pity that the reverend man cannot enjoy the still more complete

seclusion by which the state of New York testifies its appreciation of

unobtrusive and retiring virtues like his, in the salubrious and quiet

town of Sing Sing.

A quack in an inland city, who calls himself E. Andrews, M. D., prints a

"semi-occasional" document in the form of a periodical, of which a copy

is lying before me. It is an awful hodgepodge of perfect nonsense and

vulgar rascality. He calls it "The Good Samaritan and Domestic

Physician," and this number is called "volume twenty." Only think what a

great man we have among us--unless the Doctor himself is mistaken. He

says: "I will here state that I have been favored by nature and

Providence in gaining access to stores of information that has _fell_ to

the lot of but very few persons heretofore, during the past history of

mankind." Evidently these "stores" were so vast that the great doctor's

brain was stuffed too full to have room left for English Grammar.

Shortly, the Doctor thus bursts forth again with some views having their

own merits, but not such as concern the healing art very directly: "The

automaton powers of machinery"--there's a new style of machinery, you

observe--"must be made to WORK FOR, _instead_ of _as now_, against

mankind; the Land of _all nations_ must be made FREE to Actual Settlers

in LIMITED quantities. No one must be born without _his birthright_

being born with him." The italics, etc., are the Doctor's. What an awful

thought is this of being born without any birthright, or, as the Doctor

leaves us to suppose possible, having one's birthright born first, and

dodging about the world like a stray canary-bird, while the unhappy and

belated owner tries in vain to put salt on its tail and catch it!

Well, this wiseacre, after his portentous introduction, fills the rest

of his sixteen loosely printed double-columned octavo pages with a

farrago of the most indescribable character, made up of brags, lies,

promises, forged recommendations and letters, boasts of systematic

charity, funny scraps of stuff in the form of little disquisitions,

advertisements of remedies, hair-oils, cosmetics, liquors, groceries,

thistle-killers, anti-bug mixtures, recipes for soap, ink, honey, and

the Old Harry only knows what. The fellow gives a list of seventy-one

specific diseases for which his Hasheesh Candy is a sure cure, and he

adds that it is also a sure cure for all diseases of the liver, brain,

throat, stomach, ear, and other internal disorders; also for "all long

standing diseases"--whatever that means!--and for insanity! In this

monstrous list are jumbled together the most incongruous troubles.

"Bleeding at the nose, and abortions;" "worms, fits, poisons and

cramps." And the impudent liar quotes General Grant, General Mitchell,

the Rebel General Lee, General McClellan, and Doctor Mott of this city,

all shouting in chorus the praises of the Hasheesh Candy! Next comes the

"Secret of Beauty," a "preparation of Turkish Roses;" then a lot of

forged references, and an assertion that the Doctor gives to the poor

five thousand pounds of bread every winter; then some fearful

denunciations of the regular doctors.

But--as the auctioneers say--"I can't dwell." I will only add that the

real villainy of this fellow only appears here and there, where he

advertises the means of ruining innocence, or of indulging with impunity

in the foulest vices. He will sell for $3.30, the "Mystic Weird Ring."

In a chapter of infamous blatherumskite about this ring he says: "The

wearer can drive from, or draw to him, any one, and for any purpose

whatever." I need not explain what this scoundrel means. He also will

sell the professed means of robbery and swindling; saying that he is

prepared to show how to remove papers, wills, titles, notes, etc., from

one place to another "by invisible means." It is a wonder that the Bank

of Commerce can keep any securities in its vaults--of course!

But enough of this degraded panderer to crime and folly. He is beneath

notice, so far as he himself concerned; I devote the space to him,

because it is well worth while to understand how base an imposture can

draw a steady revenue from a nation boasting so much culture and

intelligence as ours. It is also worth considering whether the

authorities must not be remiss, who permit such odious deceptions to be

constantly perpetrated upon the public.

I ought here to give a paragraph to the great C. W. Roback, one of whose

Astrological Almanacs is before me. This erudite production is

embellished in front with a picture of the doctor and his six

brothers--for he is the seventh son of a seventh son. The six elder

brethren--nice enough boys--stand submissively around their gigantic and

bearded junior, reaching only to his waist, and gazing up at him with

reverence, as the sheaves of Joseph's brethren worshipped his sheaf in

his dream. At the end is a picture of Magnus Roback, the grandfather of

C. W., a bull-headed, ugly old Dutchman, with a globe and compasses.

This picture, by the way, is in fact a cheap likeness of the old

discoverers or geographers. Within the book we find Gustavus Roback, the

father of C. W., for whom is used a cut of Jupiter--or some other

heathen god--half-naked, a-straddle of an eagle, with a hook in one hand

and a quadrant in the other; which is very much like the picture by one

of the "Old Masters" of Abraham about to offer up Isaac, and taking a

long aim at the poor boy with a flint-lock horse-pistol. Doctor Roback

is good enough to tell us where his brothers are: "One, a high officer

in the Empire of China, another a Catholic Bishop in the city of Rome,"

and so on. There is also a cut of his sister, whom he cured of

consumption. She is represented "talking to her bird, after the fashion

of her country, when a maiden is unexpectedly rescued from the jaws of

death!"

Roback cures all sorts of diseases, discovers stolen property, insures

children a marriage, and so on, all by means of "conjurations." He also

casts nativities and foretells future events; and he shows in full how

Bernadotte, Louis Philippe, and Napoleon Bonaparte either did well or

would have done well by following his advice. The chief peculiarity of

this impostor is, that he really avoids direct pandering to vice and

crime, and even makes it a specialty to cure drunkenness and--of all

things in the world--lying! On this point Roback gives in full the

certificate of Mrs. Abigail Morgan, whose daughter Amanda "was sorely

given to fibbing, in so much that she would rather lie than speak the

truth." And the delighted mother certifies that our friend and wizard

"so changed the nature of the girl that, to the best of our knowledge

and belief, she has never spoken anything but the truth since."

There is a conjurer "as is a conjurer."

What an uproar the incantation of the great Roback would make, if set

fairly to work among the politicians, for instance! But after all, on

second thoughts, what a horrible mass of abominations would they lay

bare in telling the truth about each other all round! No, no--it won't

do to have the truth coming out, in politics at any rate! Away with

Roback! I will not give him another word--not a single chance--not even

to explain his great power over what he calls "Fits! Fits! Fits! Fits!

Fits!"

CHAPTER XXX.

MONSIGNORE CRISTOFORO RISCHIO; OR, IL CRESO, THE NOSTRUM-VENDER OF

FLORENCE.--A MODEL FOR OUR QUACK DOCTORS.

Every visitor to Florence during the last twenty years must have noticed

on the grand piazza before the Ducal Palace, the strange genius known

as Monsignore Creso, or, in plain English, Mr. Croesus. He is so called

because of his reputed great wealth; but his real name is Christoforo

Rischio, which I may again translate, as Christopher Risk. Mrs. Browning

refers to him in one of her poems--the "Casa Guidi Windows," I

think--and he has also been the staple of a tale by one of the Trollope

brothers.

Twice every week, he comes into the city in a strange vehicle, drawn by

two fine Lombardy ponies, and unharnesses them in the very centre of the

square. His assistant, a capital vocalist, begins to sing immediately,

and a crowd soon collects around the wagon. Then Monsignore takes from

the box beneath his seat a splendidly jointed human skeleton, which he

suspends from a tall rod and hook, and also a number of human skulls.

The latter are carefully arranged on an adjustable shelf, and Creso

takes his place behind them, while in his rear a perfect chemist's shop

of flasks, bottles, and pillboxes is disclosed. Very soon his singer

ceases, and in the purest Tuscan dialect--the very utterance of which is

music--the Florentine quack-doctor proceeds to address the assemblage.

Not being conversant with the Italian, I am only able to give the

substance of his harangue, and pronounce indifferently upon the merit of

his elocution. I am assured, however, that not only the common people,

who are his chief patrons, but numbers of the most intelligent citizens,

are always entertained by what he has to say; and certainly his gestures

and style of expressions seem to betray great excellence of oratory.

Having turned the skeleton round and round on its pivot, and minutely

explained the various anatomical parts, in order to show his proficiency

in the basis of medical science, he next lifts the skulls, one by one,

and descants upon their relative perfection, throwing in a shrewd

anecdote now and then, as to the life of the original owner of each

cranium.

One skull, for example, he asserts to have belonged to a lunatic, who

wandered for half a lifetime in the Val d'Ema, subsisting precariously

upon entirely vegetable food--roots, herbs, and the like; another is the

superior part of a convict, hung in Arezzo for numerous offences; a

third is that of a very old man who lived a celibate from his youth up,

and by his abstinence and goodness exercised an almost priestly

influence upon the borghesa. When, by this miscellaneous lecture, he has

both amused and edified his hearers, he ingeniously turns the discourse

upon his own life, and finally introduces the subject of the marvellous

cures he has effected. The story of his medical preparations alone,

their components and method of distillation, is a fine piece of

popularized art, and he gives a practical exemplification of his skill

and their virtues by calling from the crowd successively, a number of

invalid people, whom he examines and prescribes for on the spot. Whether

these subjects are provided by himself or not, I am unable to decide;

but it is very possible that by long experience, Christoforo--who has no

regular diploma--has mastered the simpler elements of Materia Medica,

and does in reality effect cures. I class him among what are popularly

known as humbugs, however, for he is a pretender to more wisdom than he

possesses. It was to me a strange and suggestive scene--the bald,

beak-nosed, coal-eyed charlatan, standing in the market-place, so

celebrated in history, peering through his gold spectacles at the

upturned faces below him, while the bony skeleton at his side swayed in

the wind, and the grinning skulls below, made grotesque faces, as if

laughing at the gullibility of the people. Behind him loomed up the

massive Palazzo Vecchio, with its high tower, sharply cut, and set with

deep machicolations; to the left, the splendid Loggia of Orgagna, filled

with rare marbles, and the long picture-gallery of the Uffizi, heaped

with the rarest art-treasures of the world; to his right, the Giant

Fountain of Ammanato, throwing jets of pure water--one drop of which

outvalues all the nostrums in the world; and in front, the Post Office,

built centuries before, by Pisan captives. If any of these things moved

the imperturbable Creso, he showed no feeling of the sort; but for three

long hours, two days in the week, held his hideous clinic in the open

daylight.

Seeing the man so often, and interested always in his manner--as much

so, indeed, as the peasants or contadini, who bought his vials and

pillboxes without stint--I became interested to know the main features

of his life; and, by the aid of a friend, got some clues which I think

reliable enough to publish. I do so the more willingly, because his

career is illustrative, after an odd fashion, of contemporary Italian

life.

He was the son of a small farmer, not far from Sienna, and grew up in

daily contact with vine-dressers and olive-gatherers, living upon the

hard Tuscan fare of macaroni and maroon-nuts, with a cutlet of lean

mutton once a day, and a pint of sour Tuscan wine. Being tolerably well

educated for a peasant-boy, he imbibed a desire for the profession of an

actor, and studied Alfieri closely.

Some little notoriety that he gained by recitations led him, in an evil

hour, to venture an appearance _en grand role_, in Florence, at a

third-rate theatre. His father had meanwhile deceased and left him the

property; but to make the debut referred to, he sold almost his entire

inheritance. As may be supposed, his failure was signal. However easy he

had found it to amuse the rough, untutored peasantry of his

neighborhood, the test of a large and polished city was beyond his

merit.

So, poor and abashed, he sank to the lower walks of dramatic art,

singing in choruses at the opera, playing minor parts in show-pieces,

and all the while feeling the sting of disappointed ambition and

half-deserved penury.

One day found him, at the beginning of winter, without work, and without

a soldo in his pocket. Passing a druggist's shop, he saw a placard

asking for men to sell a certain new preparation. The druggist advanced

him a small sum for travelling expenses, and he took to peripatetic

lectures at once, going into the country and haranguing at all the

villages.

Here he found his dramatic education available. Though not good enough

for an actor, he was sufficiently clever for a nomadic eulogizer of a

patent-medicine. His vocal abilities were also of service to him in

gathering the people together. The great secret of success in anything

is to get a hearing. Half the object is gained when the audience is

assembled.

Well! poor, vagabond, peddling Christopher Risk, selling so much for

another party, conceived the idea of becoming his own capitalist. He

resolved to prepare a medicine of his own; and, profiting by the

assistance of a young medical student, obtained bona fide prescriptions

for the commonest maladies. These he had made up in gross, originated

labels for them, and concealing the real essences thereof by certain

harmless adulterations, began to advertise himself as the discoverer of

a panacea.

To gain no ill-will among the priests, whose influence is paramount with

the peasantry, he dexterously threw in a reverent word for them in his

nomadic harangues, and now and then made a sounding present to the

Church.

He profited also by the superstitions abroad, and to the skill of

Hippocrates added the roguery of Simon Magus. By report, he was both a

magician and physician, and a knack that he had of slight-of-hand was

not the least influential of his virtues.

His bodily prowess was as great as his suppleness. One day, at Fiesole,

a foreign doctor presumed to challenge Monsignore to a debate, and the

offer was accepted. While the two stood together in Cristoforo's wagon,

and the intruder was haranguing the people, the quack, without a

movement of his face or a twitch of his body, jerked his foot against

his rival's leg and threw him to the ground. He had the effrontery to

proclaim the feat as magnetic entirely, accomplished without bodily

means, and by virtue of his black-art acquirements.

An awe fell upon the listeners, and they refused to hear the checkmated

disputant further.

As soon as Cristoforo began to thrive, he indulged his dramatic taste by

purchasing a superb wagon, team, and equipments, and hired a servant.

Such a turnout had never been seen in Tuscany since the Medician days.

It gained for him the name of Creso straightway, and, enabling him to

travel more rapidly, enlarged his business sphere, and so vastly

increased his profits.

He arranged regular days and hours for each place in Tuscany, and soon

became as widely known as the Grand Duke himself. When it was known that

he had bought an old castle at Pontassieve on the banks of the Arno, his

reputation still further increased. He was now so prosperous that he set

the faculty at defiance. He proclaimed that they were jealous of his

profounder learning, and threatened to expose the banefulness of their

systems.

At the same time, his talk to the common people began to savor of

patronage, and this also enhanced his reputation. It is much better, as

a rule, to call attention up to you rather than charity down to you. The

shrewd impostor became also more absolute now. It was known that the

Grand Duke had once asked him to dine, and that Monsignore had the

hardihood to refuse. Indeed, he sympathized too greatly with the aroused

Italian spirit of unity and progress to compromise himself with the

house of Austria. When at last the revolution came, Cristoforo was one

of its best champions in Tuscany. His cantante sang only the march of

Garibaldi and the victories of Savoy. His own speeches teemed with the

gospel of Italy regenerated; and for a whole month he wasted no time in

the sale of his bottighias and pillolas, but threw all his vehement,

persuasive, and dramatic eloquence into the popular cause.

The end we know. Tuscany is a dukedom no longer, but a component part of

a great peninsular kingdom with "Florence the Beautiful" for its

capital.

And still before the ducal palace, where the deputies of Italy are to

assemble, poor, vain Cristoforo Rischio makes his harangue every Tuesday

and Saturday. He is now--or was four years ago--upward of sixty years of

age, but spirited and athletic as ever, and so rich that it would be

superfluous for him to continue his peripatetic career.

His life is to me noteworthy, as showing what may be gained by

concentrating even humble energies upon a paltry thing. Had Creso

persevered as well upon the stage, I do not doubt that he would have

made a splendid actor. If he did so well with a mere nostrum, why should

he not have gained riches and a less grotesque fame by the sale of a

better article? He understood human nature, its credulities and

incredulities, its superstitions, tastes, changefulness, and love of

display and excitement. He has done no harm, and given as much amusement

as he has been paid for. Indeed, I consider him more an ornamental and

useful character than otherwise. He has brightened many a traveler's

recollections, relieved the tedium of many a weary hour in a foreign

city, and, with all his deception, has never severed himself from the

popular faith, nor sold out the popular cause. I dare say his death,

when it occurs, will cause more sensation and evoke more tears, than

that of any better physician in Tuscany.

VI. HOAXES.

CHAPTER XXXI.

THE TWENTY-SEVENTH STREET GHOST.--SPIRITS ON THE RAMPAGE.

In classing the ghost excitement that agitated our good people to such

an extent some two years ago among the "humbugs" of the age, I must, at

the outset, remind my readers that there was no little accumulation of

what is termed "respectable" testimony, as to the reality of his

ghostship in Twenty-seventh street.

One fine Sunday morning, in the early part of 1863, my friends of the

"Sunday Mercury" astonished their many thousands of patrons with an

account that had been brought to them of a fearful spectre that had made

its appearance in one of the best houses in Twenty-seventh Street. The

narrative was detailed with circumstantial accuracy, and yet with an

apparent discreet reserve, that gave the finishing touch of delightful

mystery to the story.

The circumstances, as set forth in the opening letter (for many others

followed) were briefly these:--A highly respectable family residing on

Twenty-seventh Street, one of our handsome up-town thoroughfares, became

aware, toward the close of the year 1862, that something extraordinary

was taking place in their house, then one of the best in the

neighborhood. Sundry mutterings and whisperings began to be heard among

the servants employed about the domicile, and, after a little while it

became almost impossible to induce them to remain there for love or

money. The visitors of the family soon began to notice that their calls,

which formerly were so welcome, particularly among the young people of

the establishment, seemed to give embarrassment, and that the smiles

that greeted them, as early as seven in the evening gradually gave place

to uneasy gestures, and, finally to positive hints at the lateness of

the hour, or the fatigue of their host by nine o'clock.

The head of the family was a plain, matter-of-fact old gentleman, by no

means likely to give way to any superstitious terrors--one of your

hard-headed business men who pooh-poohed demons, hobgoblins, and all

other kinds of spirits, except the purest Santa Cruz and genuine old

Otard; and he fell into a great rage, when upon his repeated gruff

demands for an explanation, he was delicately informed that his parlor

was "haunted." He vowed that somebody wanted to drive him from the

house; that there was a conspiracy afoot among the women to get him

still higher up town, and into a bigger brown-stone front, and refused

to believe one word of the ghost-story. At length, one day, while

sitting in his "growlery," as the ladies called it, in the lower story,

his attention was aroused by a clatter on the stairs, and looking out

into the entry he saw a party of carpenters and painters who had been

employed upon the parlor-floor, beating a precipitate retreat toward the

front door.

"Stop!--stop! you infernal fools! What's all this hullabaloo about?"

shouted the old gentleman.

No reply--no halt upon the part of the mechanics, but away they went

down the steps and along the street, as though Satan himself, or Moseby

the guerrilla, was at their heels. They were pursued and ordered back,

but absolutely refused to come, swearing that they had seen the Evil

One, in _propria persona_; and threats, persuasions, and bribes alike

proved vain to induce them to return. This made the matter look serious,

and a family-council was held forthwith. It wouldn't do to let matters

go on in this way, and something must be thought of as a remedy. It was

in this half-solemn and half-tragic conclave that the pater-familias was

at last put in possession of the mysterious occurrences that had been

disturbing the peace of his domestic hearth.

A ghost had been repeatedly seen in his best drawing-room!--a genuine,

undeniable, unmitigated ghost!

The spectre was described by the female members of the family as making

his appearance at all hours, chiefly, however in the evening, of course.

Now the good old orthodox idea of a ghost is, of a very long,

cadaverous, ghastly personage, of either sex, appearing in white

draperies, with uplifted finger, and attended or preceded by sepulchral

sounds--whist! hush! and sometimes the rattling of casements and the

jingling of chains. A bluish glare and a strong smell of brimstone

seldom failed to enhance the horror of the scene. This ghost, however,

came it seems, in more ordinary guise, but none the less terrible for

his natural style of approach and costume. He was usually seen in the

front parlor, which was on the second story and faced the street. There

he would be found seated in a chair near the fire place, his attire the

garb of a carman or "carter" and hence the name "Carter's Ghost"

afterward frequently applied to him. There he would sit entirely unmoved

by the approach of living denizens of the house, who, at first, would

suppose that he was some drunken or insane intruder, and only discover

their mistake as they drew near, and saw the fire-light shining through

him, and notice the glare of his frightful eyes, which threatened all

comers in a most unearthly way. Such was the purport of the first sketch

that appeared in the "Sunday Mercury," stated so distinctly and

impressively that the effect could not fail to be tremendous among our

sensational public. To help the matter, another brief notice, to the

same effect, appeared in the Sunday issue of a leading journal on the

same morning. The news dealers and street-carriers caught up the novelty

instanter, and before noon not a copy of the "Sunday Mercury" could be

bought in any direction. The country issue of the "Sunday Mercury" had

still a larger sale.

On Sunday morning, every sheet in town made some allusion to the Ghost,

and many even went so far as to give the very (supposed) number of the

house favored with his visitations. The result of this enterprising

guess was ludicrous enough, bordering a little, too, upon the serious.

Indignant house-holders rushed down to the "Sunday Mercury" office with

the most amusing wrath, threatening and denouncing the astonished

publishers with all sorts of legal action for their presumed trespass,

when in reality, their paper had designated no place or person at all.

But the grandest demonstration of popular excitement was revealed in

Twenty-seventh street itself. Before noon a considerable portion of the

thoroughfare below Sixth Avenue was blocked up with a dense mass of

people of all ages, sizes, sexes, and nationalities, who had come "to

see the Ghost." A liquor store or two, near by, drove a splendid

"spiritual" business; and by evening "the fun" grew so "fast and

furious" that a whole squad of police had to be employed to keep the

side-walks and even the carriage-way clear. The "Ghost" was shouted for

to make a speech, like any other new celebrity, and old ladies and

gentlemen peering out of upper-story windows were saluted with playful

tokens of regard, such as turnips, eggs of ancient date, and other

things too numerous to mention, from the crowd. Nor was the throng

composed entirely of Gothamites. The surrounding country sent in its

contingent. They came on foot, on horseback, in wagons, and arrayed in

all the costumes known about these parts, since the days of Rip Van

Winkle. Cruikshanks would have made a fortune from his easy sketches of

only a few figures in the scene. And thus the concourse continued for

days together, arriving at early morn and staying there in the street

until "dewy eve."

As a matter of course, there were various explanations of the story

propounded by various people--all wondrously wise in their own conceit.

Some would have it that "the Ghost" was got up by some of the neighbors,

who wished, in this manner, to drive away disreputable occupants; others

insisted that it was the revenge of an ousted tenant, etc., etc.

Everybody offered his own theory, and, as is usual, in such cases,

nobody was exactly right.

Meanwhile, the "Sunday Mercury" continued its publications of the

further progress of the "mystery," from week to week, for a space of

nearly two months, until the whole country seemed to have gone

ghost-mad. Apparitions and goblins dire were seen in Washington,

Rochester, Albany, Montreal, and other cities.

The spiritualists took it up and began to discuss "the Carter Ghost"

with the utmost zeal. One startling individual--a physician and a

philosopher--emerged from his professional shell into full-fledged

glory, as the greatest canard of all, and published revelations of his

own intermediate intercourse with the terrific "Carter." In every nook

and corner of the land, tremendous posters, in white and yellow, broke

out upon the walls and windows of news-depots, with capitals a foot

long, and exclamation-points like drumsticks, announcing fresh

installments of the "Ghost" story, and it was a regular fight between

go-ahead vendors who should get the next batch of horrors in advance of

his rivals.

Nor was the effect abroad the least feature of this stupendous "sell."

The English, French, and German press translated some of the articles in

epitome, and wrote grave commentaries thereon. The stage soon caught the

blaze; and Professor Pepper, at the Royal Polytechnic Institute, in

London, invented a most ingenious device for producing ghosts which

should walk about upon the stage in such a perfectly-astounding manner

as to throw poor Hamlet's father and the evil genius of Brutus quite

into the "shade." "Pepper's Ghost" soon crossed the Atlantic, and all

our theatres were speedily alive with nocturnal apparitions. The only

real ghosts, however--four in number--came out at the Museum, in an

appropriate drama, which had an immense run--"all for twenty-five

cents," or only six and a quarter cents per ghost!

But I must not forget to say that, really, the details given in the

"Sunday Mercury" were well calculated to lead captive a large class of

minds prone to luxuriate in the marvelous when well mixed with plausible

reasoning. The most circumstantial accounts were given of sundry "gifted

young ladies," "grave and learned professors," "reliable

gentlemen"--where are those not found?--"lonely watchers," and others,

who had sought interviews with the "ghost," to their own great

enlightenment, indeed, but, likewise, complete discomfiture. Pistols

were fired at him, pianos played and songs sung for him, and, finally,

his daguerreotype taken on prepared metallic plates set upright in the

haunted room. One shrewd artist brought out an "exact photographic

likeness" of the distinguished stranger on cartes de visite, and made

immense sales. The apparitions, too, multiplied. An old man, a woman,

and a child made their appearance in the house of wonders, and, at last,

a gory head with distended eyeballs, swimming in a sea of blood, upon a

platter--like that of Holofernes--capped the climax.

Certain wiseacres here began to see political allusions in the Ghost,

and many actually took the whole affair to be a cunningly devised

political satire upon this or that party, according as their sympathies

swayed them.

It would have been a remarkable portion of "this strange, eventful

history," of course, if "Barnum" could have escaped the accusation of

being its progenitor.

I was continually beset, and frequently, when more than usually busy,

thoroughly annoyed by the innuendoes of my visitors, that I was the

father of "the Ghost."

"Come, now, Mr. Barnum--this is going a little too far!" some good old

dame or grandfather would say to me. "You oughtn't to scare people in

this way. These ghosts are ugly customers!"

"My dear Sir," or "Madam," I would say, as the case might be, "I do

assure you I know nothing whatever about the Ghost"--and as for

"spirits," you know I never touch them, and have been preaching against

them nearly all my life."

"Well! well! you will have the last turn," they'd retort, as they edged

away; "but you needn't tell us. We guess we've found the ghost."

Now, all I can add about this strange hallucination is, that those who

came to me to see the original "Carter," really saw the "Elephant."

The wonderful apparition disappeared, at length, as suddenly as he had

come. The "Bull's-Eye Brigade," as the squad of police put on duty to

watch the neighborhood, for various reasons, was termed, hung to their

work, and flashed the light of their lanterns into the faces of lonely

couples, for some time afterward; but quiet, at length, settled down

over all: and it has been it seems, reserved for my pen to record

briefly the history of "The Twenty-seventh street Ghost."

CHAPTER XXXII.

THE MOON-HOAX.

The most stupendous scientific imposition upon the public that the

generation with which we are numbered has known, was the so-called

"Moon-Hoax," published in the columns of the "New York Sun," in the

months of August and September, 1835. The sensation created by this

immense imposture, not only throughout the United States, but in every

part of the civilized world, and the consummate ability with which it

was written, will render it interesting so long as our language shall

endure; and, indeed, astronomical science has actually been indebted to

it for many most valuable hints--a circumstance that gives the

production a still higher claim to immortality.

At the period when the wonderful "yarn" to which I allude first

appeared, the science of astronomy was engaging particular attention,

and all works on the subject were eagerly bought up and studied by

immense masses of people. The real discoveries of the younger Herschel,

whose fame seemed destined to eclipse that of the elder sage of the same

name, and the eloquent startling works of Dr. Dick, which the Harpers

were republishing, in popular form, from the English edition, did much

to increase and keep up this peculiar mania of the time, until the whole

community at last were literally occupied with but little else than

"star-gazing." Dick's works on "The Sidereal Heavens," "Celestial

Scenery," "The improvement of Society," etc., were read with the utmost

avidity by rich and poor, old and young, in season and out of season.

They were quoted in the parlor, at the table, on the promenade, at

church, and even in the bedroom, until it absolutely seemed as though

the whole community had "Dick" upon the brain. To the highly educated

and imaginative portion of our good Gothamite population, the Doctor's

glowing periods, full of the grandest speculations as to the starry

worlds around us, their wondrous magnificence and ever-varying aspects

of beauty and happiness were inexpressibly fascinating. The author's

well-reasoned conjectures as to the majesty and beauty of their

landscapes, the fertility and diversity of their soil, and the exalted

intelligence and comeliness of their inhabitants, found hosts of

believers; and nothing else formed the staple of conversation, until the

beaux and belles, and dealers in small talk generally, began to grumble,

and openly express their wishes that the Dickens had Doctor Dick and all

his works.

It was at the very height of the furor above mentioned, that one morning

the readers of the "Sun"--at that time only twenty-five hundred in

number--were thrilled with the announcement in its columns of certain

"Great Astronomical Discoveries Lately Made by Sir John Herschel, LL.D.,

F.R.S. etc., at the Cape of Good Hope," purporting to be a republication

from a Supplement to the Edinburgh Journal of Science. The heading of

the article was striking enough, yet was far from conveying any adequate

idea of its contents. When the latter became known, the excitement went

beyond all bounds, and grew until the "Sun" office was positively

besieged with crowds of people of the very first class, vehemently

applying for copies of the issue containing the wonderful details.

As the pamphlet form in which the narrative was subsequently published

is now out of print, and a copy can hardly be had in the country, I will

recall a few passages from a rare edition, for the gratification of my

friends who have never seen the original. Indeed, the whole story is

altogether too good to be lost; and it is a great pity that we can not

have a handsome reprint of it given to the world from time to time. It

is constantly in demand; and, during the year 1859, a single copy of

sixty pages, sold at the auction of Mr. Haswell's library, brought the

sum of $3,75. In that same year, a correspondent, in Wisconsin, writing

to the "Sunday Times" of this city, inquired where the book could be

procured, and was answered that he could find it at the old bookstore,

No. 85 Centre Street, if anywhere. Thus, after a search of many weeks,

the Western bibliopole succeeded in obtaining a well-thumbed specimen of

the precious work. Acting upon this chance suggestion, Mr. William

Gowans, of this city, during the same year, brought out a very neat

edition, in paper covers, illustrated with a view of the moon, as seen

through Lord Rosse's grand telescope, in 1856. But this, too, has all

been sold; and the most indefatigable book-collector might find it

difficult to purchase a single copy at the present time. I, therefore,

render the inquiring reader no slight service in culling for him some

of the flowers from this curious astronomical garden.

The opening of the narrative was in the highest Review style; and the

majestic, yet subdued, dignity of its periods, at once claimed

respectful attention; while its perfect candor, and its wealth of

accurate scientific detail exacted the homage of belief from all but

cross-grained and inexorable skeptics.

It commences thus:

"In this unusual addition to our Journal, we have the happiness to

make known to the British public, and thence to the whole civilized

world, recent discoveries in Astronomy, which will build an

imperishable monument to the age in which we live, and confer upon

the present generation of the human race a proud distinction

through all future time. It has been poetically said, that the

stars of heaven are the hereditary regalia of man, as the

intellectual sovereign of the animal creation. He may now fold the

Zodiac around him with a loftier consciousness of his mental

superiority," etc., etc.

The writer then eloquently descanted upon the sublime achievement by

which man pierced the bounds that hemmed him in, and with sensations of

awe approached the revelations of his own genius in the far-off heavens,

and with intense dramatic effect described the younger Herschel

surpassing all that his father had ever attained; and by some stupendous

apparatus about to unvail the remotest mysteries of the sidereal space,

pausing for many hours ere the excess of his emotions would allow him to

lift the vail from his own overwhelming success.

I must quote a line or two of this passage, for it capped the climax of

public curiosity:

"Well might he pause! He was about to become the sole depository of

wondrous secrets which had been hid from the eyes of all men that

had lived since the birth of time. He was about to crown himself

with a diadem of knowledge which would give him a conscious

preeminence above every individual of his species who then lived or

who had lived in the generations that are passed away. He paused

ere he broke the seal of the casket that contained it."

Was not this introduction enough to stimulate the wonder bump of all the

star-gazers, until

"Each particular hair did stand on end,

Like quills upon the fretful porcupine?"

At all events, such was the effect, and it was impossible at first to

supply the frantic demand, even of the city, not to mention the country

readers.

I may very briefly sum up the outline of the discoveries alleged to have

been made, in a few paragraphs, so as not to protract the suspense of my

readers too long.

It was claimed that the "Edinburgh Journal" was indebted for its

information to Doctor Andrew Grant--a savant of celebrity, who had, for

very many years, been the scientific companion, first of the elder and

subsequently of the younger Herschel, and had gone with the latter in

September, 1834, to the Cape of Good Hope, whither he had been sent by

the British Government, acting in conjunction with the Governments of

France and Austria, to observe the transit of Mercury over the disc of

the sun--an astronomical point of great importance to the lunar

observations of longitude, and consequently to the navigation of the

world. This transit was not calculated to occur before the 7th of

November, 1835 (the year in which the hoax was printed;) but Sir John

Herschel set out nearly a year in advance, for the purpose of thoroughly

testing a new and stupendous telescope devised by himself under this

peculiar inspiration, and infinitely surpassing anything of the kind

ever before attempted by mortal man. It has been discovered by previous

astronomers and among others, by Herschel's illustrious father, that the

sidereal object becomes dim in proportion as it is magnified, and that,

beyond a certain limit, the magnifying power is consequently rendered

almost useless. Thus, an impassable barrier seemed to lie in the way of

future close observation, unless some means could be devised to

illuminate the object to the eye. By intense research and the

application of all recent improvements in optics, Sir John had succeeded

in securing a beautiful and perfectly lighted image of the moon with a

magnifying power that increased its apparent size in the heavens six

thousand times. Dividing the distance of the moon from the earth, viz.:

240,000 miles, by six thousand, we we have forty miles as the distance

at which she would then seem to be seen; and as the elder Herschel, with

a magnifying power, only one thousand, had calculated that he could

distinguish an object on the moon's surface not more than 122 yards in

diameter, it was clear that his son, with six times the power, could see

an object there only twenty-two yards in diameter. But, for any further

advance in power and light, the way seemed insuperably closed until a

profound conversation with the great savant and optician, Sir David

Brewster, led Herschel to suggest to the latter the idea of the

readoption of the old fashioned telescopes, without tubes, which threw

their images upon reflectors in a dark apartment, and then the

illumination of these images by the intense hydro-oxygen light used in

the ordinary illuminated microscope. At this suggestion, Brewster is

represented by the veracious chronicler as leaping with enthusiasm from

his chair, exclaiming in rapture to Herschel:

"Thou art the man!"

The suggestion, thus happily approved, was immediately acted upon, and a

subscription, headed by that liberal patron of science, the Duke of

Sussex, with L10,000, was backed by the reigning King of England with

his royal word for any sum that might be needed to make up L70,000, the

amount required. No time was lost; and, after one or two failures, in

January 1833, the house of Hartley & Grant, at Dumbarton, succeeded in

casting the huge object-glass of the new apparatus, measuring

twenty-four feet (or six times that of the elder Herschel's glass) in

diameter; weighing 14,826 pounds, or nearly seven tons, after being

polished, and possessing a magnifying power of 42,000 times!--a

perfectly pure, spotless, achromatic lens, without a material bubble or

flaw!

Of course, after so elaborate a description of so astounding a result as

this, the "Edinburg Scientific Journal" (_i. e._, the writer in the "New

York Sun") could not avoid being equally precise in reference to

subsequent details, and he proceeded to explain that Sir John Herschel

and his amazing apparatus having been selected by the Board of Longitude

to observe the transit of Mercury, the Cape of Good Hope was chosen

because, upon the former expedition to Peru, acting in conjunction with

one to Lapland, which was sent out for the same purpose in the

eighteenth century, it had been noticed that the attraction of the

mountainous regions deflected the plumb-line of the large instruments

seven or eight seconds from the perpendicular, and, consequently,

greatly impaired the enterprise. At the Cape, on the contrary, there was

a magnificent table-land of vast expanse, where this difficulty could

not occur. Accordingly, on the 4th of September, 1834, with a design to

become perfectly familiar with the working of his new gigantic

apparatus, and with the Southern Constellations, before the period of

his observations of Mercury, Sir John Herschel sailed from London,

accompanied by Doctor Grant (the supposed informant,) Lieutenant

Drummond, of the Royal Engineers, F.R.A.S., and a large party of the

best English workmen. On their arrival at the Cape, the apparatus was

conveyed, in four days' time, to the great elevated plain, thirty-five

miles to the N.E. of Cape Town, on trains drawn by two relief-teams of

oxen, eighteen to a team, the ascent aided by gangs of Dutch boors. For

the details of the huge fabric in which the lens and its reflectors were

set up, I must refer the curious reader to the pamphlet itself--not that

the presence of the "Dutch boors" alarms me at all, since we have plenty

of boors at home, and one gets used to them in the course of time, but

because the elaborate scientific description of the structure would

make most readers see "stars" in broad daylight before they get through.

I shall only go on to say that, by the 10th of January, everything was

complete, even to the two pillars "one hundred and fifty feet high!"

that sustained the lens. Operations then commenced forthwith, and so,

too, did the "special wonder" of the readers. It is a matter of

congratulation to mankind that the writer of the hoax, with an apology

(Heaven save the mark!) spared us Herschel's notes of "the Moon's

tropical, sidereal, and synodic revolutions," and the "phenomena of the

syzygies," and proceeded at once to the pith of the subject. Here came

in his grand stroke, informing the world of complete success in

obtaining a distinct view of objects in the moon "fully equal to that

which the unaided eye commands of terrestrial objects at the distance of

a hundred yards, affirmatively settling the question whether the

satellite be inhabited, and by what order of beings," "firmly

establishing a new theory of cometary phenomena," etc., etc. This

announcement alone was enough to take one's breath away, but when the

green marble shores of the Mare Nubium; the mountains shaped like

pyramids, and of the purest and most dazzling crystalized, wine-colored

amethyst, dotting green valleys skirted by "round-breasted hills;"

summits of the purest vermilion fringed with arching cascades and

buttresses of white marble glistening in the sun--when these began to be

revealed, the delight of our Luna-tics knew no bounds--and the whole

town went moon-mad! But even these immense pictures were surpassed by

the "lunatic" animals discovered. First came the "herds of brown

quadrupeds" very like a--no! not a whale, but a bison, and "with a tail

resembling that of the bos grunniens"--the reader probably understands

what kind of a "bos" that is, if he's apprenticed to a theatre in

midsummer with musicians on a strike; then a creature, which the

hoax-man naively declared "would be classed on earth as a monster"--I

rather think it would!--"of a bluish lead color, about the size of a

goat, with a head and a beard like him, and a single horn, slightly

inclined forward from, the perpendicular"--it is clear that if this goat

was cut down to a single horn, other people were not! I could not but

fully appreciate the exquisite distinction accorded by the writer to the

female of this lunar animal--for she, while deprived of horn and beard,

he explicitly tells us, "had a much larger tail!" When the astronomers

put their fingers on the beard of this "beautiful" little creature (on

the reflector, mind you!) it would skip away in high dudgeon, which,

considering that 240,000 miles intervened, was something to show its

delicacy of feeling.

Next in the procession of discovery, among other animals of less note,

was presented "a quadruped with an amazingly long neck, head like a

sheep, bearing two long spiral horns, white as polished ivory, and

standing in perpendiculars parallel to each other. Its body was like

that of a deer, but its forelegs were most disproportionately long, and

its tail, which was very bushy and of a snowy whiteness, curled high

over its rump and hung two or three feet by its side. Its colors were

bright bay and white, brindled in patches, but of no regular form."

This is probably the animal known to us on earth, and particularly along

the Mississippi River, as the "guyascutus," to which I may particularly

refer in a future article.

But all these beings faded into insignificance compared with the first

sight of the genuine Lunatics, or men in the moon, "four feet high,

covered, except in the face, with short, glossy, copper-colored hair,"

and "with wings composed of a thin membrane, without hair, lying snugly

upon their backs from the top of their shoulders to the calves of their

legs," "with faces of a yellowish flesh-color--a slight improvement on

the large ourang-outang." Complimentary for the Lunatics! But, says the

chronicler, Lieutenant Drummond declared that "but for their long wings,

they would look as well on a parade-ground as some of the cockney

militia!" A little rough, my friend the reader will exclaim, for the

aforesaid militia.

Of course, it is impossible, in a sketch like the present, to do more

than give a glimpse of this rare combination of astronomical realities

and the vagaries of mere fancy, and I must omit the Golden-fringed

Mountains, the Vale of the Triads, with their splendid triangular

temples, etc., but I positively cannot pass by the glowing mention of

the inhabitants of this wonderful valley--a superior race of Lunatics,

as beautiful and as happy as angels, "spread like eagles" on the grass,

eating yellow gourds and red cucumbers, and played with by snow-white

stags, with jet-black horns! The description here is positively

delightful, and I even now remember my poignant sigh of regret when, at

the conclusion, I read that these innocent and happy beings, although

evidently "creatures of order and subordination," and "very polite,"

were seen indulging in amusements which would not be deemed "within the

bounds of strict propriety" on this degenerate ball. The story wound up

rather abruptly by referring the reader to an extended work on the

subject by Herschel, which has not yet appeared.

One can laugh very heartily, now, at all this; but nearly everybody, the

gravest and the wisest, too, was completely taken in at the time: and

the "Sun," then established at the corner of Spruce street, where the

"Tribune" office now stands, reaped an increase of more than fifty

thousand to its circulation--in fact, there gained the foundation of its

subsequent prolonged success. Its proprietors sold no less than $25,000

worth of the "Moon Hoax" over the counter, even exhausting an edition of

sixty thousand in pamphlet form. And who was the author? A literary

gentleman, who has devoted very many years of his life to mathematical

and astronomical studies, and was at the time connected as an editor

with the "Sun"--one whose name has since been widely known in literature

and politics--Richard Adams Locke, Esq., then in his youth, and now in

the decline of years. Mr. Locke, who still survives, is a native of the

British Isles, and, at the time of his first connection with the New

York press, was the only short-hand reporter in this city, where he laid

the basis of a competency he now enjoys. Mr. Locke declares that his

original object in writing the Moon story was to satirize some of the

extravagances of Doctor Dick, and to make some astronomical suggestions

which he felt diffident about offering seriously.

Whatever may have been his object, his hit was unrivaled; and for months

the press of Christendom, but far more in Europe than here, teemed with

it, until Sir John Herschel was actually compelled to come out with a

denial over his own signature. In the meantime, it was printed and

published in many languages, with superb illustrations. Mr. Endicott,

the celebrated lithographer, some years ago had in his possession a

splendid series of engravings, of extra folio size, got up in Italy, in

the highest style of art, and illustrating the "Moon Hoax."

Here, in New York, the public were, for a long time, divided on the

subject, the vast majority believing, and a few grumpy customers

rejecting the story. One day, Mr. Locke was introduced by a mutual

friend at the door of the "Sun" office to a very grave old orthodox

Quaker, who, in the calmest manner, went on to tell him all about the

embarkation of Herschel's apparatus at London, where he had seen it with

his own eyes. Of course, Locke's optics expanded somewhat while he

listened to this remarkable statement, but he wisely kept his own

counsel.

The discussions of the press were very rich; the "Sun," of course,

defending the affair as genuine, and others doubting it. The "Mercantile

Advertiser," the "Albany Daily Advertiser," the "New York Commercial

Advertiser," the "New York Times," the "New Yorker," the "New York

Spirit of '76," the "Sunday News," the "United States Gazette," the

"Philadelphia Inquirer," and hosts of other papers came out with the

most solemn acceptance and admiration of these "wonderful discoveries,"

and were eclipsed in their approval only by the scientific journals

abroad. The "Evening Post," however, was decidedly skeptical, and took

up the matter in this irreverent way:

"It is quite proper that the "Sun" should be the means of shedding

so much light on the Moon. That there should be winged people in

the moon does not strike us as more wonderful than the existence of

such a race of beings on the earth; and that there does still exist

such a race, rests on the evidence of that most veracious of

voyagers and circumstantial of chroniclers, Peter Wilkins, whose

celebrated work not only gives an account of the general appearance

and habits of a most interesting tribe of flying Indians; but,

also, of all those more delicate and engaging traits which the

author was enabled to discover by reason of the conjugal relations

he entered into with one of the females of the winged tribe."

The moon-hoax had its day, and some of its glory still survives. Mr.

Locke, its author, is now quietly residing in the beautiful little home

of a friend on the Clove Road, Staten Island, and no doubt, as he gazes

up at the evening luminary, often fancies that he sees a broad grin on

the countenance of its only well-authenticated tenant, "the hoary

solitary whom the criminal code of the nursery has banished thither for

collecting fuel on the Sabbath-day."

CHAPTER XXXIII.

THE MISCEGENATION HOAX.--A GREAT LITERARY SELL.--POLITICAL

HUMBUGGING.--TRICKS OF THE WIRE-PULLERS.--MACHINERY EMPLOYED TO RENDER

THE PAMPHLET NOTORIOUS.--WHO WERE SOLD AND HOW IT WAS DONE.

Some persons say that "all is fair in politics." Without agreeing with

this doctrine, I nevertheless feel that the history of Ancient and

Modern Humbugs would not be complete without a record of the last and

one of the most successful of known literary hoaxes. This is the

pamphlet entitled "Miscegenation," which advocates the blending of the

white and black races upon this continent, as a result not only

inevitable from the freeing of the negro, but desirable as a means of

creating a more perfect race of men than any now existing. This pamphlet

is a clever political quiz; and was written by three young gentlemen of

the "World" newspaper, namely. D. G. Croly, George Wakeman, and E. C.

Howell.

The design of "Miscegenation" was exceedingly ambitious, and the

machinery employed was probably among the most ingenious and audacious

ever put into operation to procure the indorsement of absurd theories,

and give the subject the widest notoriety. The object was to so make use

of the prevailing ideas of the extremists of the Anti-Slavery party, as

to induce them to accept doctrines which would be obnoxious to the

great mass of the community, and which would, of course, be used in the

political canvass which was to ensue. It was equally important that the

"Democrats" should be made to believe that the pamphlet in question

emanated from a "Republican" source. The idea was suggested by a

discourse delivered by Mr. Theodore Tilton, at the Cooper Institute,

before the American Anti-Slavery Society, in May 1863, on the negro, in

which that distinguished orator argued, that in some future time the

blood of the negro would form one of the mingled bloods of the great

regenerated American nation. The scheme once conceived, it began

immediately to be put into execution. The first stumbling-block was the

name "amalgamation," by which this fraternizing of the races had been

always known. It was evident that a book advocating amalgamation would

fall still-born, and hence some new and novel word had to be discovered,

with the same meaning, but not so objectionable. Such a word was coined

by the combination of the Latin _miscere_, to mix, and _genus_, race:

from these, miscegenation--a mingling of the races. The word is as

euphonious as "amalgamation," and much more correct in meaning. It has

passed into the language, and no future dictionary will be complete

without it. Next, it was necessary to give the book an erudite

appearance, and arguments from ethnology must form no unimportant part

of this matter. Neither of the authors being versed in this science,

they were compelled to depend entirely on encyclopedias and books of

reference. This obstacle to a New York editor or reporter was not so

great as it might seem. The public are often favored in our journals

with dissertations upon various abstruse matters by men who are entirely

ignorant of what they are writing about. It was said of Cuvier that he

could restore the skeleton of an extinct animal if he were only given

one of its teeth, and so a competent editor or reporter of a city

journal can get up an article of any length on any given subject, if he

is only furnished one word or name to start with. There was but one

writer on ethnology distinctly known to the authors, which was Prichard;

but that being secured, all the rest came easily enough. The authors

went to the Astor Library and secured a volume of Prichard's works, the

perusal of which of course gave them the names of many other

authorities, which were also consulted; and thus a very respectable

array of scientific arguments in favor of Miscegenation were soon

compiled. The sentimental and argumentative portions were quickly

suggested from the knowledge of the authors of current politics, of the

vagaries of some of the more visionary reformers, and from their own

native wit.

The book was at first written in a most cursory manner the chapters got

up without any order or reference to each other, and afterward arranged.

As the impression sought to be conveyed was a serious one, it would

clearly not do to commence with the extravagant and absurd theories to

which it was intended that the reader should gradually be led. The

scientific portion of the work was therefore given first, and was made

as grave and terse and unobjectionable as possible; and merely urged,

by arguments drawn from science and history, that the blending of the

different races of men resulted in a better progeny. As the work

progressed, they continued to "pile on the agony," until, at the close,

the very fact that the statue of the Goddess of Liberty on the Capitol,

is of a bronze tint, is looked upon as an omen of the color of the

future American!

"When the traveler approaches the City of Magnificent Distances,"

it says, "the seat of what is destined to be the greatest and most

beneficent power on earth, the first object that will strike his

eye will be the figure of Liberty surmounting the Capitol; not

white, symbolizing but one race, nor black, typifying another, but

a statue representing the composite race, whose sway will extend

from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean, from the Equator to the

North Pole--the Miscegens of the Future."

The Book once written, plans were laid to obtain the indorsement of the

people who were to be humbugged. It was not only necessary to humbug the

members of the Reform and Progressive party, but to present--as I have

before said--such serious arguments that Democrats should be led to

believe it as a _bona fide_ revelation of the "infernal" designs of

their antagonists. In both respects there was complete success.

Although, of course, the mass of the Republican leaders entirely ignored

the book, yet a considerable number of Anti-Slavery men, with more

transcendental ideas, were decidedly "sold." The machinery employed was

exceedingly ingenious. Before the book was published, proof-copies were

furnished to every prominent abolitionist in the country, and also to

prominent spiritual mediums, to ladies known to wear Bloomers, and to

all that portion of our population who are supposed to be a little

"soft" on the subject of reform. A circular was also enclosed,

requesting them, before the publication of the book, to give the author

the benefit of their opinions as to the value of the arguments

presented, and the desirability of the immediate publication of the

work; to be inclosed to the American News Company, 121 Nassau street,

New York--the agents for the publishers. The bait took. Letters came

pouring in from all sides, and among the names of prominent persons who

gave their indorsements were Albert Brisbane, Parker Pillsbury, Lucretia

Mott, Sarah M. Grimke, Angelina G. Weld, Dr. J. McCune Smith, Wm. Wells

Brown. Mr. Pillsbury was quite excited over the book, saying; "Your work

has cheered and gladdened a winter-morning, which I began in cloud and

sorrow. You are on the right track. Pursue it, and the good God speed

you." Mr. Theodore Tilton, upon receiving the pamphlet, wrote a note

promising to read it, and to write the author a long and candid letter

as soon as he had time; and saying, that the subject was one to which he

had given much thought. The promised letter, I believe, however, was

never received; probably because, on a careful perusal of the book, Mr.

Tilton "smelt a rat." He might also have been influenced by an ironical

paragraph relating to himself, and arguing that, as he was a "pure

specimen of the blonde," and "when a young man was noted for his angelic

type of feature," his sympathy for the colored race was accounted for by

the natural love of opposites. Says the author with much gravity:

"The sympathy Mr. Greeley, Mr. Phillips and Mr. Tilton feel for the

negro is the love which the blonde bears for the black; it is the

love of race, a sympathy stronger to them than the love they bear

to woman. It is founded upon natural law. We love our opposites. It

is the nature of things that we should do so, and where Nature has

free course, men like those we have indicated, whether Anti-Slavery

or Pro-Slavery, Conservative or Radical, Democrat or Republican,

will marry and be given in marriage to the most perfect specimens

of the colored race."

So far, things worked favorably; and, having thus bagged a goodly number

of prominent reformers, the next effort was to get the ear of the

public. Here, new machinery was brought into play. A statement was

published in the "Philadelphia Inquirer" (a paper which, ever since the

war commenced, has been notorious for its "sensation" news,) that a

charming and accomplished young mulatto girl was about to publish a book

on the subject of the blending of the races, in which she took the

affirmative view. Of course, so piquant a paragraph was immediately

copied by almost every paper in the country. Various other stories,

equally ingenious and equally groundless, were set afloat, and public

expectation was riveted on the forthcoming work.

Some time in February last, the book was published. Copies, of course,

were sent to all the leading journals. The "Anglo-African," the organ of

the colored population of New York, warmly, and at great length,

indorsed the doctrine. The "Anti-Slavery Standard," edited by Mr. Oliver

Johnson, gave over a column of serious argument and endorsement to the

work. Mr. Tilton, of the "Independent," was not to be caught napping.

In that journal, under date of February 25, 1864, he devoted a

two-column leader to the subject of Miscegenation and the little

pamphlet in question. Mr. Tilton was the first to announce a belief that

the book was a hoax. I quote from his article:

"Remaining a while on our table unread, our attention was specially

called to it by noticing how savagely certain newspapers were

abusing it."

* * * * *

"The authorship of the pamphlet is a well-kept secret; at least it

is unknown to us. Nor, after a somewhat careful reading, are we

convinced that the writer is in earnest. Our first impression was,

and remains, that the work was meant as a piece of pleasantry--a

burlesque upon what are popularly called the extreme and fanatical

notions of certain radical men named therein. Certainly, the essay

is not such a one as any of these gentlemen would have written on

the subject, though some of their speeches are conspicuously quoted

and commended in it."

* * * * *

"If written in earnest, the work is not thorough enough to be

satisfactory; if in jest, we prefer Sydney Smith--or McClellan's

Report. Still, to be frank, we agree with a large portion of these

pages, but disagree heartily with another portion."

* * * * *

"The idea of scientifically undertaking to intermingle existing

populations according to a predetermined plan for reconstructing

the human race--for flattening out its present varieties into one

final unvarious dead-level of humanity--is so absurd, that we are

more than ever convinced such a statement was not written in

earnest!"

Mr. Tilton, however, hints that the colored race is finally in some

degree to form a component part of the future American; and that, in

time, "the negro of the South, growing paler with every generation, will

at last completely hide his face under the snow."

One of the editorial writers for the "Tribune" was so impressed with the

book that he wrote an article on the subject, arguing about it with

apparent seriousness, and in a manner with some readers supposed to be

rather favorable than otherwise to the doctrine. Mr. Greeley and the

publishers, it is understood, were displeased at the publication of the

article. The next morning nearly all the city journals had editorial

articles upon the subject.

The next point was, to get the miscegenation controversy into Congress.

The book, with its indorsements, was brought to the notice of Mr. Cox,

of Ohio (commonly called "Sunset Cox;") and he made an earnest speech on

the subject. Mr. Washburne replied wittily, reading and commenting on

extracts from a work by Cox, in which the latter deplored the existence

of the prejudice against the Africans. A few days after, Mr. Kelly, of

Pennsylvania, replied very elaborately to Mr. Cox, bringing all his

learning and historical research to bear on the topic. It was the

subject of a deal of talk in Washington afterward. Mr. Cox was charged

by some of the more shrewd members of Congress with writing it. It was

said that Mr. Sumner, on reading it, immediately pronounced it a hoax.

Through the influence of the authors, a person visited James Gordon

Bennett, of the "Herald," and spoke to him about "Miscegenation." Mr.

Bennett thought the idea too monstrous and absurd to waste an article

upon.

"But," said the gentleman, "the Democratic papers are all noticing it."

"The Democratic editors are asses," said Bennett.

"Senator Cox has just made a speech in Congress on it."

"Cox is an ass," responded Bennett.

"Greeley had an article about it the other day."

"Well, Greeley's a donkey."

"The 'Independent' yesterday had a leader of a column and a half about

it."

"Well, Beecher is no better," said Bennett. "They're all asses. But what

did he say about it?"

"Oh, he rather indorsed it."

"Well, I'll read the article," said Bennett. "And perhaps I'll have an

article written ridiculing Beecher."

"It will make a very good handle against the radicals," said the other.

"Oh, I don't know," said Bennett. "Let them marry together, if they want

to, with all my heart."

For some days, the "Herald" said nothing about it, but the occasion of

the departure of a colored regiment from New York City having called

forth a flattering address to them from the ladies of the "Loyal

League," the "Herald," saw a chance to make a point against Mr. Charles

King and others; and the next day it contained a terrific article,

introducing miscegenation in the most violent and offensive manner, and

saying that the ladies of the "Loyal League" had offered to marry the

colored soldiers on their return! After that, the "Herald" kept up a

regular fusillade against the supposed miscegenic proclivities of the

Republicans. And thus, after all, Bennett swallowed the "critter"

horns, hoofs, tail, and all.

The authors even had the impudence to attempt to entrap Mr. Lincoln into

an indorsement of the work, and asked permission to dedicate a new work,

on a kindred subject, "Melaleukation," to him. Honest Old Abe however,

who can see a joke, was not to be taken in so easily.

About the time the book was first published, Miss Anne E. Dickinson

happened to lecture in New York. The authors here exhibited a great

degree of acuteness and tact, as well as sublime impudence, in seizing

the opportunity to have some small hand bills, with the endorsement of

the book, printed and distributed by boys among the audience. Before

Miss Dickinson appeared, therefore, the audience were gravely reading

the miscegenation handbill; and the reporters, noticing it, coupled the

facts in their reports. From this, it went forth, and was widely

circulated, that Miss Dickinson was the author!

Dr. Mackay, the correspondent of the "London Times," in New York, was

very decidedly sold, and hurled all manner of big words against the

doctrine in his letters to "The Thunderer;" and thus "the leading paper

of Europe" was, for the hundredth time during the American Rebellion,

decidedly taken in and done for.

The "Saturday Review"--perhaps the cleverest and certainly the sauciest

of the English hebdomadals--also berated the book and its authors in the

most pompous language at its command. Indeed, the "Westminster Review"

seriously refers to the arguments of the book in connection with Dr.

Broca's pamphlet on Human Hybridity, a most profound work.

"Miscegenation" was republished in England by Truebner & Co.; and very

extensive translations from it are still passing the rounds of the

French and German papers.

Thus passes into history one of the most impudent as well as ingenious

literary hoaxes of the present day. There is probably not a newspaper in

the country but has printed much about it; and enough of extracts might

be collected from various journals upon the subject to fill my

whale-tank.

It is needless to say that the book passed through several editions. Of

course, the mass of the intelligent American people rejected the

doctrines of the work, and looked upon it either as a political dodge,

or as the ravings of some crazy man; but the authors have the

satisfaction of knowing that it achieved a notoriety which has hardly

been equalled by any mere pamphlet ever published in this country.

VII. GHOSTS AND WITCHCRAFTS.

CHAPTER. XXXIV.

HAUNTED HOUSES.--A NIGHT SPENT ALONE WITH A GHOST.--KIRBY, THE

ACTOR.--COLT'S PISTOLS VERSUS HOBGOBLINS.--THE MYSTERY EXPLAINED.

A great many persons believe more or less in haunted houses. In almost

every community there is some building that has had a mysterious

history. This is true in all countries, and among all races and nations.

Indeed it is to this very fact that the ingenious author of the

"Twenty-seventh-street Ghost" may attribute his success in creating such

an excitement. In fact, I will say, "under the rose," he predicted his

hopes of success entirely upon this weakness in human nature. Even in

"this day and age of the world" there are hundreds of deserted buildings

which are looked upon with awe, or terror, or superstitious interest.

They have frightened their former inhabitants away, and left the

buildings in the almost undisputed possession of real moles, bats, and

owls, and imaginary goblins and sprites.

In the course of my travels in both hemispheres I have been amazed at

the great number of such cases that have come under my personal

observation.

But for the present, I will give a brief account of a haunted house in

Yorkshire, England, in which some twenty years ago, Kirby, the actor,

who formerly played at the Chatham Theatre, passed a pretty strange

night. I met Mr. Kirby in London in 1844, and I will give, in nearly his

own language, a history of his lone night in this haunted house, as he

gave it to me within a week after its occurrence. I will add, that I saw

no reason to doubt Mr. Kirby's veracity, and he assured me upon his

honor that the statement was literally true to the letter. Having myself

been through several similar places in the daytime, I felt a peculiar

interest in the subject, and hence I have a vivid recollection of nearly

the exact words in which he related his singular nocturnal adventure.

One thing is certain: Kirby was not the man to be afraid of trying such

an experiment.

"I had heard wonderful stories about this house," said Mr. Kirby to me,

"and I was very glad to get a chance to enter it, although, I confess,

the next morning I was about as glad to get out of it."

"It was an old country-seat--a solid stone mansion which had long borne

the reputation of a haunted house. It was watched only by one man. He

was the old gardener,--an ancient servant of the family that once lived

there, and a person in whom the family reposed implicit confidence.

"Having had some inkling of this wonderful place, and having a few days

to spare before going to London to fulfil an engagement at the Surry

Theatre, I thought I would probe this haunted-house story to the bottom.

I therefore called on the old gardener who had charge of the place, and

introduced myself as an American traveller desirous of spending a night

with his ghosts. The old man seemed to be about seventy-five or eighty

years of age. I met him at the gate of the estate, where he kept guard.

He told me, when I applied, that it was a dangerous spot to enter, but I

could pass it if I pleased. I should, however, have to return by the

same door, if I ever came back again.

"Wishing to make sure of the job, I gave him a sovereign, and asked him

to give me all the privileges of the establishment; and if his bill

amounted to more, I would settle it when I returned. He looked at me

with an expression of doubt and apprehension, as much as to say that he

neither understood what I was going to do nor what was likely to happen.

He merely remarked:

"'You can go in.'

"'Will you go with me, and show me the road?'

"'I will.'

"'Go ahead.'

"We entered. The gate closed. I suddenly turned on my man, the old

gardener and custodian of the place, and said to him:

"'Now, my patriarchal friend, I am going to sift this humbug to the

bottom, even if I stay here forty nights in succession; and I am

prepared to lay all "spirits" that present themselves; but if you will

save me all trouble in the matter and frankly explain to me the whole

affair, I will never mention it to your injury, and I will present you

with ten golden sovereigns.'

"The old fellow looked astonished; but he smirked, and whimpered, and

trembled, and said:

"'I am afraid to do that; but I will warn you against going too far.'

"When we had crossed a courtyard, he rang a bell, and several strange

noises were distinctly heard. I was introduced to the establishment

through a well-constructed archway, which led to a large stairway, from

which we proceeded to a great door, which opened into a very large room.

It was a library. The old custodian had carried a torch (and I was

prepared with a box of matches.) He was acting evidently 'on the

square,' and I sat myself down in the library, where he told me that I

should soon see positive evidence that this was a haunted house.

"Not being a very firm believer in the doctrine of houses really

haunted, I proposed to keep a pretty good hold of my match-box, and lest

there should be any doubt about it, I had also provided myself with two

sperm candles, which I kept in my pocket, so I should not be left too

suddenly and too long in the dark.

"'Now Sir,' said he, 'I wish you to hold all your nerves steady and keep

your courage up, because I intend to stand by you as well as I can, but

I never come into this house alone.'

"'Well, what is the matter with the house?'

"'Oh! everything, Sir!'

"'What?'

"'Well, when I was much younger than I am now, the master of this estate

got frightened here by some mysterious appearances, noises, sounds,

etc., and he preferred to leave the place.'

"'Why?'

"'He had a tradition from his grandfather, and pretty well kept alive in

the family, that it was a haunted house; and he let out the estate to

the smaller farmers of the neighborhood, and quit the premises, and

never returned again, except one night, and after that one night he

left. We suppose he is dead. Now, Sir, if you wish to spend the night

here as you have requested, what may happen to you I don't know; but I

tell you it is a haunted house, and I would not sleep here to-night for

all the wealth of the Bank of England!'

"This did not deter me in the least, and having the means of

self-protection around me, and plenty of lucifer matches, etc., I

thought I would explore this mystery and see whether a humbug which had

terrified the proprietors of that magnificent house in the midst of a

magnificent estate, for upward of sixty years, could not be explored and

exploded. That it was a humbug, I had no doubt; that I would find it

out, I was not so certain.

"I sat down in the library, fully determined to spend the night in the

establishment. A door was opened into an adjoining room where there was

a dust-covered lounge, and every thing promised as much comfort as could

be expected under the circumstances.

"However, before the old keeper of the house left, I asked him to show

me over the building, and let me explore for myself the different rooms

and apartments. To all this he readily consented; and as he had some

prospect before him of making a good job out of it, he displayed a great

deal of alacrity, and moved along very quick and smart for a man

apparently eighty years of age.

"I went from room to room and story to story. Everything seemed to be

well arranged, but somewhat dusty and time-worn. I kept a pretty sharp

lookout, but I could see no sort of machinery for producing a grand

effect.

"We finally descended to the library, when I closed the door, and

bolting and locking it, took the key and put it in my pocket.

"'Now, Sir,' I said to the keeper, 'where is the humbug?'

"'There is no humbug here,' he answered.

"'Well, why don't you show me some evidence of the haunted house?'

"'You wait,' said he, 'till twelve o'clock to-night, and you will see

"haunting" enough for you. I will not stay till then.'

"He left; I staid. Everything was quiet for some time. Not a mouse was

heard, not a rat was visible, and I thought I would go to sleep.

"I lay down for this purpose, but I soon heard certain extraordinary

sounds that disturbed my repose. Chains were clanked, noises were made,

and shrieks and groans were heard from various parts of the mansion. All

of these I had expected. They did not frighten me much. A little while

after, just as I was going to sleep again, a curious string of light

burned around the room. It ran along on the walls in a zigzag line,

about six feet high, entirely through the apartment. I did not smell

anything bituminous or like sulphur. It flashed quicker than powder,

and it did not smell like it. Thinks I: 'This looks pretty well, we will

have some amusement now.' Then the jangling of bells, and clanking of

chains, and flashes of light; then thumpings and knockings of all sorts

came along, interspersed with shrieks and groans. I sat very quiet. I

had two of Colt's best pistols in my pocket, and I thought I could shoot

anything spiritual or material with these machines made in Connecticut.

I took them out and laid them on the table. One of them suddenly

disappeared! I did not like that, still my nerves were firm, for I knew

it was all gammon. I took the other pistol in my hand and surveyed the

room. Nobody was there; and, finally half suspicious that I had gone to

sleep and had a dream, I woke up with a grasp on my hand which was

holding the other pistol. This soon made me fully awake.

"I tried to recover my balance, and at this moment the candle went out.

I lit it with one of my lucifers. No person was visible, but the noises

began again, and they were infernal. I then took one of my sperm candles

out, and went to unlock the door. I attempted to take the key out of my

pocket. It was not there! Suddenly the door opened, I saw a man or a

somebody about the size of a man, standing straight in front of me. I

pointed one of Colt's revolvers at his head, for I thought I saw

something human about him; and I told him that whether he was ghost or

spirit, goblin or robber, he had better stand steady, or I would blow

his brains out, if he had any. And to make sure that he should not

escape I got hold of his arm, and told him that if he was a ghost he

would have a tolerably hard time of it, and that if he was a humbug I

would let him off if he would tell me the whole story about the trick.

"He saw that he was caught, and he earnestly begged me not to fire that

American pistol at him. I did not; but I did not let go of him. I

brought him into the library, and with pistol in hand I put him through

a pretty close examination. He was clad in mailed armor, with

breastplate and helmet, and a great sword, in the style of the

Crusaders. He promised, on condition of saving his life, to give me an

honest account of the facts.

"In substance they were, that he, an old family-servant, and ultimately

a gardener in charge of the place, had been employed by an enemy of the

gentleman who owned the property, to render it so uncomfortable that the

estate should be sold for much less than its value; and that he had got

an ingenious machinist and chemist to assist him in arranging such

contrivances as would make the house so intolerable that they could not

live there. A galvanic battery with wires were provided, and every

device of chemistry and mechanism was resorted to in order to effect

this purpose.

"One by one, the family left; and they had remained away for nearly two

generations under the terror of such forms, and appearances, and sights

and sounds, as frightened them almost to death. And furthermore, the old

gardener added, that he expected his own grand-daughter would become the

lady of that house, when the property should have been neglected so

long and the place became so fearful that no one in the neighborhood

would undertake to purchase it, or to even pass one moment after dark in

exploring its horrible mysteries.

"He begged on his knees that I would spare him with his gray hairs,

since he had so short a time to live. He declared that he had been

actuated by no other motive than pride and ambition for his child.

"I told the poor old fellow that his secret should be safe with me, and

should not be made public so long as he lived. The old man grasped my

hand eagerly and expressed his gratitude in the strongest terms. Thus,

Mr. Barnum, I have given you the pure and honest facts in regard to my

adventure in a so called haunted house. Don't make it public until you

are convinced that the old gardener has shuffled off this mortal coil."

So much for Kirby's story of the haunted house. No doubt, the old

gardener has before this become in reality a disembodied spirit, but

that his grand-daughter became legally possessed of the estate is not at

all probable. Real estate does not change hands so easily in England. So

powerful, however is the superstitious belief in haunted houses, that it

is doubtful whether that property will for many years sustain half so

great a cash value in the market as it would have done had it not been

considered a "haunted house."

It is to be hoped that, as schools multiply and education increases, the

follies and superstitions which underlie a belief in ghosts and

hobgoblins will pass away.

CHAPTER XXXV.

HAUNTED HOUSES.--GHOSTS.--GHOULS.--PHANTOMS.--VAMPIRES.--CONJURORS.--

DIVINING.--GOBLINS.--FORTUNE-TELLING.--MAGIC.--WITCHES.--SORCERY.--

OBI.--DREAMS.--SIGNS.--SPIRITUAL MEDIUMS.--FALSE PROPHETS.--

DEMONOLOGY.--DEVILTRY GENERALLY.

Whether superstition is the father of humbug, or humbug the mother of

superstition (as well as its nurse,) I do not pretend to say; for the

biggest fools and the greatest philosophers can be numbered among the

believers in and victims of the worst humbugs that ever prevailed on the

earth.

As we grow up from childhood and begin to think we are free from all

superstitions, absurdities, follies, a belief in dreams, signs, omens,

and other similar stuff, we afterward learn that experience does not

cure the complaint. Doubtless much depends upon our "bringing up." If

children are permitted to feast their ears night after night (as I was)

with stories of ghosts, hobgoblins, ghouls, witches, apparitions,

bugaboos, it is more difficult in after-life for them to rid their minds

of impressions thus made.

But whatever may have been our early education, I am convinced that

there is an inherent love of the marvelous in every breast, and that

everybody is more or less superstitious; and every superstition I

denominate a humbug, for it lays the human mind open to any amount of

belief, in any amount of deception that may be practised.

One object of these chapters consists in showing how open everybody is

to deception, that nearly everybody "hankers" after it, that solid and

solemn realities are frequently set aside for silly impositions and

delusions, and that people, as a too general thing, like to be led into

the region of mystery. As Hudibras has it:

"Doubtless the pleasure is as great

Of being cheated as to cheat;

As lookers-on feel most delight

That least perceive a juggler's sleight;

And still the less they understand,

The more they admire his sleight of hand."

The amount or strength of man's brains have little to do with the amount

of their superstitions. The most learned and the greatest men have been

the deepest believers in ingeniously-contrived machines for running

human reason off the track. If any expositions I can make on this

subject will serve to put people on their guard against impositions of

all sorts, as well as foolish superstitions, I shall feel a pleasure in

reflecting that I have not written in vain. The heading of this chapter

enumerates the principal kinds of supernatural humbugs. These, it must

be remembered, are quite different from religious impostures.

It is astonishing to reflect how ancient is the date of this class of

superstitions (as well as of most others, in fact,) and how universally

they have prevailed. Nearly thirty-six hundred years ago, it was thought

a matter of course that Joseph, the Hebrew Prime Minister of Pharaoh,

should have a silver cup that he commonly used to do his divining with:

so that the practice must already have been an established one.

In Homer's time, about twenty-eight hundred years ago, ghosts were

believed to appear. The Witch of Endor pretended to raise the ghost of

Samuel, at about the same time.

To-day, here in the City of New York, dream books are sold by the

edition; a dozen fortune-tellers regularly advertise in the papers; a

haunted house can gather excited crowds for weeks; abundance of people

are uneasy if they spill salt, dislike to see the new moon over the

wrong shoulder, and are delighted if they can find an old horse-shoe to

nail to their door-post.

I have already told about one or two haunted houses, but must devote

part of this chapter to that division of the subject. There are hundreds

of such--that is, of those reputed to be such; and have been for

hundreds of years. In almost every city, and in many towns and country

places, they are to be found. I know of one, for instance, in New

Jersey, one or two in New York, and have heard of several in

Connecticut. There are great numbers in Europe; for as white men have

lived there so much longer than in America, ghosts naturally

accumulated. In this country there are houses and places haunted by

ghosts of Hessians, and Yankee ghosts, not to mention the headless Dutch

phantom of Tarrytown, that turned out to be Brom Bones; but who ever

heard of the ghost of an Indian? And as for the ghost of a black man,

evidently it would have to appear by daylight. You couldn't see it in

the dark!

I have no room to even enumerate the cases of haunted houses. One in

Aix-la-Chapelle, a fine large house, stood empty five years on account

of the knockings in it, until it was sold for almost nothing, and the

new owner (lucky man!) discovered that the ghost was a draft through a

broken window that banged a loose door. An English gentleman once died,

and his heir, in a day or two, heard of mysterious knockings which the

frightened servants attributed to the defunct. He, however, investigated

a little, and found that a rat in an old store room, was trying to get

out of an old-fashioned box trap, and being able to lift the door only

partly, it dropped again, constituting the ghost. Better pleased to find

the rat than his father, the young man exterminated rat and phantom

together.

A very ancient and impressive specimen of a haunted house was the palace

of Vauvert, belonging to King Louis IX, of France, who was so pious that

he was called Saint Louis. This fine building was so situated as to

become very desirable, in the year 1259, to some monks. So there was

forthwith horrid shriekings at night-times, red and green lights shone

through the windows, and, finally, a large green ghost, with a white

beard and a serpent's tail, came every midnight to a front window, and

shook his fist, and howled at those who passed by. Everybody was

frightened--King Louis, good simple soul! as well as the rest. Then the

bold monks appearing at the nick of time, intimated that if the King

would give them the palace, they would do up the ghost in short order.

He did it, and was very thankful to them besides. They moved in, and

sure enough, the ghost appeared no more. Why should he?

The ghosts of Woodstock are well known. How they tormented the Puritan

Commissioners who came thither in 1649, to break up the place, and

dispose of it for the benefit of the Commonwealth! The poor Puritans had

a horrid time. A disembodied dog growled under their bed, and bit the

bed-clothes; something invisible walked all about; the chairs and tables

danced; something threw the dishes about (like the Davenport "spirits;")

put logs for the pillows; flung brickbats up and down, without regard to

heads; smashed the windows; threw pebbles in at the frightened

commissioners; stuck a lot of pewter platters into their beds; ran away

with their breeches; threw dirty water over them in bed; banged them

over the head--until, after several weeks, the poor fellows gave it up,

and ran away back to London. Many years afterward, it came out that all

this was done by their clerk, who was secretly a royalist, though they

thought him a furious Puritan, and who knew all the numerous secret

passages and contrivances in the old palace. Most people have read Sir

Walter Scott's capital novel of "Woodstock," founded on this very story.

The well known "Demon of Tedworth," that drummed, and scratched, and

pounded, and threw things about, in 1661, in Mr. Mompesson's house

turned out to be a gipsy drummer and confederates.

The still more famous "Ghost in Cock Lane," in London in 1762,

consisted of a Mrs. Parsons and her daughter, a little girl, trained by

Mr. Parsons to knock and scratch very much after the fashion of the

alphabet talking of the "spirits" of to-day. Parsons got up the whole

affair, to revenge himself on a Mr. Kent. The ghost pretended to be that

of a deceased sister-in-law of Kent, and to have been poisoned by him.

But Parsons and his assistants were found out, and had to smart for

their fun, being heavily fined, imprisoned, etc.

A very able ghost indeed, a Methodist ghost--the spectral property,

consequently, of my good friends the Methodists--used to rattle, and

clatter, and bang, and communicate, in the house of the Rev. Mr. Wesley,

the father of John Wesley, at Epworth, in England. This ghost was very

troublesome, and utterly useless. In fact, none of the ghosts that haunt

houses are of the least possible use. They plague people, but do no

good. They act like the spirits of departed monkeys.

I must add two or three short anecdotes about ghosts, got up in the

devil-manner. They are not new, but illustrate very handsomely the state

of mind in which a ghost should be met. One is, that somebody undertook

to scare Cuvier, the great naturalist, with a ghost having an ox's head.

Cuvier woke, and found the fearful thing glaring and grinning at his

bedside.

"What do you want?"

"To devour you!" growled the ghost.

"Devour me?" quoth the great Frenchman--"Hoofs, horns, _graminivorous_!

You can't do it--clear out!"

And he did clear out.

A pious maiden lady, in one of our New-England villages, was known to

possess three peculiarities. First, she was a very religious, honest,

matter-of-fact woman. Second, she supposed everybody else was equally

honest; hence she was very credulous, always believing everything she

heard. And third, having "a conscience void of offense," she saw no

reason to be afraid of anything; consequently, she feared nothing.

On a dark night, some boys, knowing that she would be returning home

alone from prayer-meeting, through an unfrequented street, determined to

test two of her peculiarities, viz., her credulity and her courage. One

of the boys was sewed up in a huge shaggy bear-skin, and as the old

lady's feet were heard pattering down the street, he threw himself

directly in her path and commenced making a terrible noise.

"Mercy!" exclaimed the old lady. "Who are you?"

"I am the devil!" was the reply.

"Well, you are a poor creature!" responded the antiquated virgin, as she

stepped aside and passed by the strange animal, probably not for a

moment doubting it was his Satanic Majesty, but certainly not dreaming

of being afraid of him.

It is said that a Yankee tin peddler, who had frequently cheated most of

the people in the vicinity of a New England village through which he was

passing, was induced by some of the acute ones to join them in a

drinking bout. He finally became stone drunk; and in that condition

these wags carried him to a dark rocky cave near the village, then,

dressing themselves in raw-head-and-bloody-bones' style, awaited his

return to consciousness.

As he began rousing himself, they lighted some huge torches, and also

set fire to some bundles of straw, and three or four rolls of brimstone,

which they had placed in different parts of the cavern. The peddler

rubbed his eyes, and seeing and smelling all these evidences of

pandemonium, concluded he had died, and was now partaking of his final

doom. But he took it very philosophically, for he complacently remarked

to himself.

"In hell--just as I expected!"

A story is told of a cool old sea captain, with a virago of a wife, who

met one of these artificial devils in a lonely place. As the ghost

obstructed his path, the old fellow remarked:

"If you are not the devil, get out! If you are, come along with me and

get supper. I married your sister!"

CHAPTER XXXVI.

MAGICAL HUMBUGS.--VIRGIL.--A PICKLED SORCERER.--CORNELIUS AGRIPPA.--HIS

STUDENTS AND HIS BLACK DOG.--DOCTOR FAUSTUS.--HUMBUGGING

HORSE-JOCKEYS.--ZIITO AND HIS LARGE SWALLOW.--SALAMANCA.--DEVIL TAKE THE

HINDMOST.

Magic, sorcery, witchcraft, enchantment, necromancy, conjuring,

incantation, soothsaying, divining, the black art, are all one and the

same humbug. They show how prone men are to believe in _some_

supernatural power, in _some_ beings wiser and stronger than

themselves, but at the same time how they stop short, and find

satisfaction in some debasing humbug, instead of looking above and

beyond it all to God, the only being that it is really worth while for

man to look up to or beseech.