meet the policeman's gaze. "Send this man away, and I'll tell you
the whole thing." He felt in his waistcoat pocket and drew out a
sovereign. "Here, take this and get out."
The policeman took the coin, and stood doubtfully with it between his
finger and thumb.
"Yes, please go," said Miss Winder, faintly.
"Shall I wait outside, mum?"
"Confound you, no," shouted Didcott. "Go right away."
"Right away," echoed Miss Winder.
The constable turned and left the room, not dissatisfied with the
results of his interview. When the door had closed on him, Didcott
turned to Miss Winder.
"What will you think of me? What can you think of me? Of course you
will never speak to me again."
"I--I don't understand. Why ever did you throw my story into the
water?"
Didcott groaned. "I would to heaven I had thrown myself. How I could
have done so monstrous a thing, I can't understand."
"But why? You must have had some kind of reason," persisted the young
lady.
"Your father insisted that it should be published in the _Didactic
Weekly_, and it seemed the only way to get rid of it," blurted out
Didcott.
Miss Winder drew back a pace. "But you liked it. You said it reminded
you of George Eliot at her best. You said it was a work of genius."
"It wasn't!" replied Didcott, briefly.
"What!" cried Miss Winder, her voice raised an octave.
"It was pure drivel," said Didcott, firmly.
Miss Winder sat down suddenly, and began to cry.
Didcott struck his forehead. "I am a brute!" he cried. "I am still a
brute." He went on his knees and implored her to smile.
"You pretended you liked it," sobbed the girl.
"I know I did. I was a hypocrite; and now I am being punished."
"You have been laughing at me, all this time," said Miss Winder,
wiping her eyes, and becoming dignified.
"No, no. Understand how I was situated. I have worked for years for
the _Didactic Weekly_. My life's work is in it. I have struggled for
it and brought it to success; it is part of my life. And then I was
told I must publish your story. It would have made me the laughing
stock of the journalistic world. It would have damaged if not ruined
my paper. I couldn't bear it. I----"
"You might have told me this," said Miss Winder, proudly. "I should
have accepted your opinion. I have sense enough not to insist on
publishing what is not fit for publication. Why could you not have
treated me like a reasonable being?"
"I wanted to," said Didcott, still on his knees. "I came here to
do so, but couldn't. I didn't like to disappoint you. I hadn't the
heart."
"It was your duty to do so."
"Ah, I am only a man, and you are a beautiful woman. I was weak."
"Oh," said the lady, and pondered. A pause intervened. "Get up, Mr.
Didcott," she said at length. "You do look rather ridiculous on the
carpet."
Didcott rose. "I will go away, and you need never see me again. I will
resign my editorship at once." He moved towards the door.
"Oh, no," she cried.
He turned.
She came towards him. "Don't you see, Mr. Didcott," she said, a little
petulantly, "I don't want to be made ridiculous. I have been conceited
and foolish, believing I was a great authoress, when really I have
been writing nonsense. I don't want it to get about."
"I will tell no one," he said, earnestly.
"Yes, but----" She was silent a moment. "What I want is that we should
mutually agree to forget the whole of this stupid business."
"It is a bargain," he answered, eagerly. "We will slam the door on the
past."
She looked away. "Not on all the past," she murmured, "only the past
that is concerned with my novel."
[Illustration: "'GET UP, MR. DIDCOTT,' SHE SAID, 'YOU DO LOOK
RIDICULOUS ON THE CARPET.'"]
"Shall we take up our history from the point where it intervened
to-day?" he queried.
She made no sign, save that the flush on her cheek deepened.
[Illustration: REMARKABLE SECRET CHAMBERS.]
STORIES OF QUEER HIDING PLACES [Linux Libertine Initials?]
_Written and Illustrated by Allan Fea._
The secret chamber is a favourite item in the properties of the
novelist, but few people are aware how many secret chambers really
exist. They are not quite so numerous as "ghosts," but many of our
country houses still possess these queer hiding places. The majority
of them owe their origin to the religious persecutions of Queen Bess.
In the mansions of the old Roman Catholic families we often find an
apartment in a secluded part of the house or garret in the roof, named
"the Chapel," where religious rites could be performed with the utmost
privacy; and close handy was usually an artfully contrived hiding
place, not only for the officiating priest to slip into in case of
emergency, but also where the vestments, sacred vessels, and altar
furniture could be put away at a moment's notice.
It appears that most of the hiding places for priests, called
"Priests' Holes," were invented and constructed by the Jesuit,
Nicholas Owen, a servant of Father Garnet, who devoted the greater
part of his life to constructing these places in the principal
Catholic houses all over England.
"With incomparable skill," says Father Tanner, writing in the
seventeenth century, "he knew how to conduct priests to a place of
safety along subterranean passages, to hide them between walls and
bury them in impenetrable recesses, and to entangle them in labyrinths
of a thousand windings.
[Illustration:
CAPTAIN ARTHUR JONES WAS HARDLY CONCEALED IN THE SECRET
CHAMBER AT CHASTLETON, WHEN THE ENEMY ARRIVED TO SEARCH THE
HOUSE.
]
"He alone was both their architect and their builder, working at them
with inexhaustible industry and labour; for generally the thickest
walls had to be broken into, and large stones excavated, requiring
stronger arms than were attached to a body so diminutive as to give
him the nickname of 'Little John'; and by this his skill many priests
were preserved from becoming the prey of the persecutors."
[Illustration: SWINGING SHELVES IN A CUPBOARD AT ABBOTS SALFORD
OPENING INTO A SECRET RECESS.
The shelves closed.]
After the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot, "Little John" and his
master Father Garnet were arrested at Hindlip Hall, Worcestershire,
from information given to the Government by Catesby's servant, Bates.
[Illustration: PRIEST'S HOLE AT BOSCOBEL HOUSE USED BY CHARLES II.]
The grey old Jacobean mansion, Chastleton, preserves in its
oak-panelled hall the sword and portrait of the gallant Cavalier,
Captain Arthur Jones, who, narrowly escaping from the battlefield,
rode home with all speed with some of Cromwell's soldiers at his
heels, and his wife, a lady of great courage, had scarcely concealed
him in the secret chamber, when the enemy arrived to search the house.
[Illustration: The shelves open.]
Little daunted, the lady, with great presence of mind, made no
objection whatever--indeed, facilitated their operations by personally
conducting them over the mansion. Here, as in so many other instances,
the secret room was entered from the principal bedroom, and in
inspecting the latter the suspicion of the Roundheads was in some way
or other aroused. So here they determined to remain for the rest of
the night.
An ample supper and a good store of wine (which, by the way, had been
carefully drugged) was sent up to the unwelcome visitors, and in due
course the drink effected its purpose, and its victims dropped off one
by one until the whole party lay like logs upon the floor.
Mrs. Arthur Jones then crept in, having even to step over the bodies
of the inanimate Roundheads, released her husband, and, a fresh horse
being in readiness, by the time the effects of the wine had worn off,
the Royalist captain was far beyond their reach. The secret room is
situated in the front of the building, and has now been converted into
a very cosy little dressing-room, preserving its panelled wainscoting,
and but little altered, with the exception of the entry to it, which
is now by an ordinary door.
The above tradition has been provided by Miss Whitmore Jones, the
present representative of the family.
Abbots Salford, another fine old mansion, has its chapel and resident
priest for the services still held there.
In a dark passage up in the garrets is the priest's hole, as
ingeniously concealed and intact as it was three centuries ago.
By removing a wooden peg from a particular shelf in the most
innocent-looking of cupboards, the whole back of it, oak shelves and
all, swings backwards into a large and dismal recess four feet in
depth. This ingenious swing door may be fastened on the inside by a
stout wooden bolt provided for that purpose.
[Illustration: SECRET CHAMBER UNDER A ROOM IN MOSELEY HALL--ALSO USED
BY CHARLES II.]
When the Civil War was raging, many a defeated Royalist owed his
preservation to the priests' holes and secret chambers of the old
Catholic houses all over the country. Did not King Charles II. himself
owe his life to the artful hiding-places of Boscobel, Moseley, Trent,
and Heale?
After the defeat of Wigan the gallant Earl of Derby sought refuge
at Boscobel, and after a sojourn of two days proceeded to Gatacre
Park--now rebuilt, but also famous for its hiding holes--where he
was concealed by a Mr. Humphrey Elliot. When the day was lost on the
disastrous 3rd of September, the Earl suggesting his recent place
of concealment and the loyalty of the Penderels, Boscobel House was
decided upon as the safest place for the King in his dire extremity.
"I chose to trust them," says King Charles, "because I knew they had
hiding holes for priests that I thought I might make use of in case of
need."
A door now occupies the position of the sliding panel in the
wainscoting of "the squire's bedroom," behind which one of the hiding
places is situated. In the floor a trap-door can be raised, below
which is a recess some five feet square, and this communicated by a
narrow flight of steps in the great chimney to an outlet screened by
creepers, leading to the garden.
The other hiding place is entered from the floor above through a small
square hole at the top of a staircase leading to what is known as "the
gallery"--a large attic from the windows of which Charles II. could
get a good view of the surrounding country, and where he could take
some exercise and stretch his limbs after the narrow confinement of
his uncomfortable sleeping quarters. The hiding place in the garret is
five feet two inches in depth and 3-1/4 by 4-1/2 feet wide.
[Illustration: SECRET CHAMBER UNDER A WINDOW SEAT AT PARHAM HALL.]
The priest's hole at Moseley Hall, whither His Majesty removed when he
left Boscobel, is situated at the back of a large brewhouse chimney,
and is entered through a trap-door in the floor of a small room or
closet adjoining the apartment which was occupied by the fugitive
King. His narrow escape when the house was visited by Southall, the
notorious priest-catcher, has thus graphically been described by
Charles' host, Mr. Thomas Whitgreave:--
"In the afternoon, reposing himself on his bed in the parlour chamber,
and inclining to sleep, as I was watching at the window, one of the
neighbours I saw came running in, who told the maid soldiers were
coming to search, who therefore presentlie came running to the
staires' head and cried, 'Soldiers! Soldiers are coming!' which His
Majesty hearing, presentlie started out of his bedd, and ran to his
privacie, where I secured him the best I could, and then leaving him,
went forth into the street to meet the soldiers who were comeing to
search; as soon as they saw me and knew who I was, they were readie to
pull mee to pieces, and take me away with them, saying I was come
from the Worcester fight, but after much dispute with them, and by the
neighbours being informed of their false information that I was not
there, being very ill a great while, they let mee goe, but till I saw
them clearly all gone forth of the town, I returned not. But as soon
as they were I returned to release him."
In a corner of the priest's hole is a low brick seat. The walls are
of brick, and huge oak beams, in one of which we noticed a wooden
pin, about an inch in diameter, that could be easily pulled out by the
fingers. In all likelihood a straw or reed could be passed through
to supply an inmate with liquid food, as we shall see was the case at
Harvington.
Window seats often contained secret means of ingress to priests'
holes. In the long gallery of Parham Hall, Sussex, not far from "the
chapel," is an example wherein Charles Paget was concealed for some
days after the failure of the Babington Conspiracy.
[Illustration: THE MOVABLE STAIR AT HARVINGTON HALL, BENEATH WHICH IS
A ROOM FIVE FEET SQUARE.]
[Illustration: TRAP-DOOR IN ROCHESTER HOUSE, SAID TO HAVE BEEN USED BY
JAMES II.]
If we visit Harvington Hall in Worcestershire at twilight and ascend
the massive oak staircase, it will require no great stretch of the
imagination to people it with "pursuivants" hunting for their prey;
or if we climb to the top landing, to conjure up an indistinct form
stealthily removing the floorboard from one of the stairs and creeping
beneath it.
This particular step of a short flight running from the landing into
the garrets is upon closer inspection indeed movable, and beneath
gapes a dark cavity about five feet square, on the floor of which
still remains the piece of sedge matting whereon a certain Father Wall
reclined a few days prior to his capture and execution in August 1679.
A small concealed aperture in the wainscoting of the "banqueting-room"
would admit a straw being thrust from the hiding hole, through which
caudles and broths could be sucked up by the unfortunate inmate should
his friends be upon the alert.
The house of the loyal Sir Richard Head still exists at Rochester,
where King James II. went from Whitehall for the last few days ere
he quitted the country. He departed thence secretly. About twelve at
night he was rowed to a smack which was waiting without the fort at
Sheerness.
[Illustration: HIDING PLACE IN THE GARRET OF UFTON HALL.]
There is a secret passage in the upper story communicating with a
trap-door to the floor of one of the garrets; this leads by a private
staircase to the back of the house. Whether King James found it
necessary to make use of the secret passage and trap-door must remain
an open question.
The curious, many-gabled mansion Ufton Court, Berkshire, both from its
secluded situation and quaint internal construction, appears to have
been peculiarly suitable for the secretion of persecuted priests.
A remarkable hole is to be seen in one of the gables close to the
ceiling, of which a sketch is given in the heading to this article.
It is triangular in shape, and is opened by a spring bolt that can be
unlatched by pulling a string which runs through a tiny hole pierced
in the framework of the door of the adjoining room. The door of the
hiding place swings upon a pivot, and externally is thickly coated
with plaster, so as to resemble the rest of the wall, and is so solid
that when sounded there is no hollow sound from the cavity behind,
where it is supposed the crucifix and sacred vessels were secreted.
Not far off, in an upper garret, is a hiding place in the thickness
of the wall large enough to contain a man standing upright. Like
the other, the door or entrance forms part of the plaster wall,
intersected by thick oak beams, into which it exactly fits, disguising
any appearance of an opening.
Sawston Hall, Cambridgeshire, the fine old mansion of the Huddlestons,
has a remarkable hiding place on the top landing of a quaint spiral
staircase. When one of the floor-boards is raised, a round hole or
tunnel is discovered in the stone masonry slanting into the wall,
where is a space ten or twelve feet deep, and of sufficient breadth to
contain any sized priest, should he succeed in squeezing through
the aforesaid circular entrance, which would not admit a very bulky
person.
Blocks of oak fixed upon the inside of the floor-board fit exactly
into sockets scooped out of the beams which run at right angles and
support the landing, and unless the movable board be pointed out it is
impossible to detect it, so ingenious is its construction.
These are but a few of the stories that might be told of these quaint
hiding-places which abound in England and Scotland. Unfortunately the
buildings in which they exist are gradually disappearing. The pictures
and facts here given, however, will bring vividly to mind the romantic
and exciting conditions under which some of our forefathers lived.
[Illustration: ENTRANCE TO TUNNEL UNDER FLOOR-BOARDS AT SAWSTON HALL.]
DEAD MEN'S STRANGE WISHES.
SOME QUEER BURIAL PLACES.
BY H. G. ARCHER.
[Illustration: THIS TOWER ON LEITH HILL CONTAINS ITS BUILDER'S BODY.]
Strange requests are often made by men when they are dying or in their
wills. And few are stranger than those made concerning their mode of
burial.
The most extraordinary of all was that made by the celebrated Jeremy
Bentham. The great philanthropist and exponent of the doctrine of
utilitarianism, dying in 1832, left directions that his body should
be dissected, and that the skeleton should be put together, and after
being clothed in his old vestments, should be seated in a sort of
glasshouse on wheels. The first part of the programme was performed
by his faithful disciple, Dr. Southwood Smith, who, in endeavouring
to preserve the head, deprived the face of all expression. Seeing this
would not do for exhibition purposes, Dr. Smith had a model made in
wax by a distinguished French artist, who succeeded in producing a
most admirable likeness.
The skeleton was then stuffed out to fit Bentham's own clothes, and
the wax likeness fitted to the trunk. This figure was placed seated
on the chair in which he usually sat, with one hand holding the
walking-stick which was his constant companion in life, called by him
(like a dog) "Dapple." The whole was enclosed in a mahogany case with
a glass front, covered by folding doors, and presented to University
College, Gower Street, where it can be seen in the south gallery of
the college museum. Our sketch was made on the spot specially for this
article.
To those knowing the story the spectacle is certainly a startling
one--to all appearances a living man is seated within the case; while
to those ignorant of the facts the figure seems to be nothing more
than a wax effigy. Mr. Bentham has a whole host of visitors, nearly
all Americans though, many of whom want to take photographs.
[Illustration: THE STUFFED BODY OF JEREMY BENTHAM IN UNIVERSITY
COLLEGE.]
Next in point of interest comes the strange request of Anthony
Ettericke, who was an eminent lawyer, and once Recorder of Poole.
Having some cause of offence against the people of Wimborne, in which
town he lived, he declared that he was to be buried in a consecrated
spot, but not above nor below the ground, not in the church nor out of
it.
To make certain that this was done he got permission to build a coffin
into the wall of Wimborne Minster, so that it is half in the church
and half out, half above the ground and half below it. To do this a
special arch had to be made, and for the repair of this arch and the
coffin Anthony Ettericke gave to the church a sum of 20_s._ from a
farm. To bury him the wall of the church level with the pavement was
opened and the body deposited in the coffin as described. It is of
slate, and is emblazoned with many coats-of-arms.
There are two dates on it, 1691 and 1703, one over the other, so as to
render both almost unreadable. He was fully convinced that he should
die in 1691, and had his coffin made and that date placed upon it.
But he did not die till 1703, and so the second date was cut over the
first.
An art gallery seems a queer place in which to bury bodies, and
probably few of the inhabitants of Dulwich are aware that Dulwich
College Picture Gallery contains three bodies--the bodies of the three
people to whom that collection of pictures owes its existence.
Noll Joseph Desenfans was a native of Douai in France, but settled
in London, first as a teacher of languages. He became possessed of
a valuable picture by Claude, which he sold to George III. for 1,000
guineas, and so became a picture dealer.
[Illustration: THE SLATE COFFIN OF A MAN WHO WOULD NOT BE BURIED IN
THE CHURCH NOR OUT OF IT, NOT ABOVE THE GROUND NOR BELOW IT.]
Then Stanislaus, King of Poland, commissioned him to purchase pictures
to form a National Gallery for Poland, and in this work Desenfans was
helped by his friend Sir Francis Bourgeois, R.A.
When the Polish King was overthrown, the collection of pictures
came back to Desenfans, and was housed in Sir F. Bourgeois' house in
Charlotte Street, Portland Place, where Desenfans lived.
On his death Desenfans left his pictures to Bourgeois, and he decided
to hand them over to some public body for the benefit of the public.
Accident directed his attention to Dulwich College, to which he
bequeathed his pictures.
The bequest was conditional. He wished a mausoleum to be erected in
the gallery where his own remains and those of his friends Mons.
and Mme. Desenfans might repose. The condition was accepted, and our
photograph shows the burial place of these three patrons of the fine
arts. The mausoleum can be entered from the Art Gallery.
Students of De Quincey will remember his tale of the "clock-case
mummy." This was none other than the embalmed corpse of a Miss
Beswick, which for many years posed as an exhibit in the Manchester
Natural History Museum. When in the flesh, during the middle of the
last century, this lady had been attended medically by a Dr. White,
to whose skill she had owed much alleviation of her sufferings from
chronic neuralgia. Accordingly, she left him a bequest of £25,000, but
with the condition annexed to it that she should be embalmed, and that
once a year Mr. White, accompanied by two witnesses of credit, should
withdraw the veil from her face. To render this easy, Mr. White placed
his benefactor in an ordinary grandfather's clock case, with the usual
glass face. The doctor died in the year 1813, and the greater part of
his museum was divided among the Manchester hospitals and museums,
the mummy finding its way to the old Natural History Museum. When,
however, the contents of this museum were transferred to Owens
College, the authorities had the mummy buried.
[Illustration: EXTERIOR OF THE TRIPLE GRAVE IN THE DULWICH COLLEGE
PICTURE GALLERY.]
In 1783, the remains of Margaret, widow of Richard Coosins, of
Parrock, Gravesend, were deposited in Cuxton church, near Rochester.
Under a pyramidal mural monument is a vault with a glass door, covered
with a green silk curtain, with a lock having a key standing inside.
Here, resting upon tressels, is a mahogany coffin with gilt furniture,
the lid of which is not screwed down. This coffin contains the body of
the above lady, attired, so it is said, in a costly dress of scarlet
satin, according to her wish.
In 1766, Richard Hull, a native of Bristol, bencher of the Inner
Temple, and an ex-member of the Irish Parliament, resided at Leith
Hill Place, Dorking. In that year, having obtained permission of the
lord of the manor, Sir John Evelyn, of Wotton, he erected a tower on
the summit of Leith Hill, both for the benefit of the public and
to form his own cenotaph. Dying on January 18, 1772, his body was
deposited within the east wall of the building, where a tablet of
Portland stone marks the spot.
The subsequent history of this tower is rather curious. For many years
it remained open to the public, but as this privilege was abused and
the tower became a harbour for smugglers, gypsies, and other lawless
characters, a subscription was raised in 1795 among the gentry in the
locality to make it uninhabitable. The whole of the interior was then
filled up with stones and cement, and remained in this state until a
dozen years ago, when the present holder of the property announced his
intention of reopening it to the public.
So solid was the cement, however, that it was found impossible
to reopen the old entrance and interior staircase. Accordingly, a
staircase tower was built by the side in order to make it available
for the original purpose. A splendid view is to be obtained from its
commanding situation--on a clear day the sea is even visible--but
few of the holiday folk frequenting it are acquainted with its real
history.