The Mysteries of All Nations Part 45

With the view of discovering the owner, she continued to wear the ring. Unexpectedly, Fred and Georgina Hopper, her cousins, while driving past, stopped to take dinner, and to them she showed the ring.

Fred, who was an inveterate joker, made it the subject of several jests, all of which Miss Bloomer bore with good humour; but when Miss Hopper suggested that the ring might belong to some mean person, and hinted that it was an act of impropriety to wear it, the blood rushed to Miss Bloomer's cheeks; and she clenched her little fist, but for what purpose did not transpire.

In the evening the cousins drove away, leaving Miss Bloomer in anything but a pleasant mood. Evidently the charm had commenced to take effect, or Miss Hopper's remarks had disturbed the young lady's equanimity.

Still wearing the ring, Miss Bloomer retired to rest, or rather to bed, for during the night she was restless, tossing from side to side like one in delirium. One, two, three struck on the old clock, and still sleep did not come to soothe her disturbed brain. Whether in a sleeping or waking state she could not tell, but a regiment of armed men, with the recruiting sergeant at their head, seemed to pa.s.s before her, while in the distance there appeared ships at anchor in a large commodious bay. At four o'clock the lady stood at her window admiring the beautiful scenery. Retiring again to rest, she fell asleep, and did not waken before her accustomed time of rising.

After breakfast Miss Bloomer went out, as usual, to follow the bent of her mind. She had not gone far, before Sergeant Campbell approached her in a most respectful manner, and inquired if she had found a ring the previous day. It was scarcely necessary for her to return an answer, because there before him, on her ungloved hand, the ring appeared. As she handed it to him, an indescribable sensation ran through her whole frame. They entered into conversation; and how long they walked and chatted together, and what were the subjects of their conversation, we shall not pause to mention: sufficient to say that, before they parted, an early meeting was arranged. In due time, and quickly after each other, other meetings took place.

In course of time, old dames hinted that if the lady continued to keep tryst in the romantic secluded spots of her father's domains with such a fine-looking soldier as Campbell, she would provoke the G.o.ddess supposed to preside over love affairs, and most likely ent.i.tle herself to a rush-ring only on her wedding-day, instead of the customary gold one. But the evil prophetesses were wrong for once. Seldom did a recruiting party forward more stalwart soldiers to headquarters than Sergeant Campbell and his subordinates did. Indeed he owed much of his success to Miss Bloomer's exertions. She proved a valuable a.s.sistant; for, through her persuasion, a large number of young men on her father's estate were induced to enlist, and leave the homes of their youth for ever.

Happy days of single bliss cannot last for ever. Before three short months had pa.s.sed, Sergeant Campbell and Miss Bloomer observed more than once the finger of scorn pointed at them. Threats were made by the parents of certain young men who had enlisted, to make known the conduct of the young lady and her lover to Captain Bloomer. What was to be done? Miss Bloomer's reputation was at stake, and the sergeant's life endangered, as will afterwards appear.

The betrothed pair (by this time Sergeant Campbell and Miss Bloomer were engaged to be married) perceived the necessity of acting promptly, and therefore they resolved to elope. An obstacle, however, stood in the way of their doing so immediately. If the sergeant abandoned his station, he would be pursued, arrested, and dealt with as a deserter. Miss Bloomer, equal to the occasion, resolved to "buy him off."

The discharge from the army being obtained, and the indispensable arrangements for a long journey completed, the sergeant and his true love secretly departed for Aberdeen, where they were united for better and worse--not by a clergyman, but by a magistrate, before whom they went and declared themselves to be husband and wife--a ceremony as binding by the law of Scotland as if there had been regular proclamation of banns, according to custom, in the parish church, and they had been married by an ordained minister. In place of a new marriage ring being placed on the bride's finger by the gallant sergeant, he, at her request, put on the charmed ring, the magical power of which she confessed could not be resisted.

Having shown the effect of Lucky Lightfoot's subtle art, we might take leave of the subject; but as the career of Mrs. Campbell (Mr. Campbell did not survive long) is peculiarly interesting, particularly in connection with a cla.s.s that has created no small stir on both sides of the Atlantic, we shall pursue our narrative a little further.

The newly married couple, not considering themselves safe from pursuit in the Granite City, posted south, and reached the Clyde in less than twenty-four hours, where they secured a pa.s.sage on board a vessel bound for America.

As soon as Captain Bloomer heard of his daughter's elopement, his rage could not be restrained. Arming himself with a brace of pistols, and mounting his fleetest steed (and a valuable stud he had), he rode in pursuit, stopping not before he reached Aberdeen. Not finding the fugitives there, he hastened to Edinburgh, with the twofold object of bringing back his daughter and shooting her companion in flight. After diligent inquiry in the city, he obtained what he considered reliable information that they had proceeded in the direction of the Borders, to be married at Gretna Green, a village celebrated as a place where many distinguished and obscure persons have been married by a blacksmith. As the reader already knows, the offended father went in the wrong direction.

Months pa.s.sed before the captain's equanimity became restored; but time, the alleviator of sorrow and best soother of a turbulent spirit, brought a favourable change.

Mr. and Mrs. Campbell arrived safe in America, the land of their adoption, with little more means than sufficient to provide for their immediate wants. After love's first fever ended, calm reflection followed. Romance disappeared before the stern realities of life.

Friends they had few, relations none, in the wild wide expanse of America. Mrs. Campbell became home-sick: the scenes of her father's mansion, and everything pleasant connected with the estate, rose before her mind's eye. Above all, she constantly thought of her father with more than half regret at the rash act she had been guilty of.

Then she did what most young ladies would do under similar circ.u.mstances--wrote to her father asking forgiveness. Before Captain Bloomer received the letter, the last spark of anger in his breast had given place to paternal anxiety. Left alone without wife or child, gladly would he have welcomed her home, had not prudential reasons rendered it necessary to keep father and daughter separate. Her letter gave great satisfaction; and he resolved to a.s.sist her and her husband. Through an English friend, a sufficient amount was remitted to America, to enable Mr. Campbell to purchase an estate. The young couple settled down comfortably in an improving locality, with every prospect of comfort and happiness.

Before the fifth winter of Mr. and Mrs. Campbell's married life had pa.s.sed, Mr. Campbell died, leaving his wife alone (they had no issue) in a far distant country. Mrs. Campbell returned to Scotland, and took up her residence in Edinburgh for a few years. Again a brave defender of his country led the lady to the hymeneal altar. The union proved an unhappy one: Mrs Smith (this, though a common name, is the cognomen by which she will now be known) separated from her husband, and sailed once more for America. Preferring town life to solitude in the forest, Mrs. Smith settled down (if such could be said of one possessed of bustling active habits like hers) in the greatest city of the United States. To augment an income rendered small through the misfortune and death of her father, she became a journalist. Her papers were favourably received, being pointed and piquant. Her talents were chiefly directed to the support of women's rights; and she became a leader of the cla.s.s of strong-minded women, still seeking to a.s.sert their rights in politics, science, and art.

CHAPTER LXXI.

Superst.i.tion at Chelmsford--Woman Bewitched--Fortune-telling Quack--Old Zadkiel--Incantation in Somerset--Turning the Bible and Key--Woman a.s.suming the form of a Hare--Woman ruling the Stars--Young Women Deceived--Superst.i.tion in London--Generality of Superst.i.tion--A Prediction--How to preserve Children from Disease--Dreams Fulfilled--Virtue of Holly and Ivy in Worcestershire and Herefordshire--Legend concerning the Tichborne Family--Romantic Divorce Case.

A case tried at Chelmsford, on the Home Circuit, in 1864, affords a curious proof how much antique superst.i.tion still lingers amongst the English peasantry. For twenty years before 1863 there had been living in one of the Ess.e.x villages an old man, deaf and dumb, who enjoyed the reputation of a wizard or fortune-teller. He was eighty years of age, and the singularities of his manner and appearance contributed to the impression he made on the rustic mind. The better sort of people treated the old man with a kindness due rather to his calamities than to his profession, while the more sceptical of the rabble who did not fear him, seem to have amused themselves occasionally at his expense.

Dummey had been at the village of Ridgewell, near Hedingham, in the summer of 1863, where there was a beer-house, the landlady of which was one Emma Smith. The old magician wanted to sleep in the beer-house instead of returning to his own hut, but Emma Smith refused to give him leave. He gesticulated menacingly in his own fashion with his stick, and went his way angrily. Soon after this Emma became ill. The image of Dummey rose before her mind, and she p.r.o.nounced herself "bewitched."

After long misery, she went forth to seek the old man, found him at the "Swan," a public-house near his own den, and tried to persuade him to return with her, that his presence might break the spell which hung over her. She repeatedly offered him three sovereigns as payment for this service; but neither money nor words could move him. Meanwhile the news spread that a woman who had been bewitched by old Dummey was at the "Swan," and a crowd a.s.sembled and pulled the unlucky wizard about, so that he fell once or twice on the ground. Smith took an active part in the a.s.sault; and after the "Swan" was closed, she was seen beating him and tearing his clothes. Fear for herself--fear of his supernatural gifts--were both merged in the stronger feeling of rage; and at last she, a.s.sisted by one Stammers, a carpenter, pushed the old man into a brook. He died at Halsted poorhouse from the effects of the ill-usage. Emma Smith and Stammers were sentenced to six months hard labour for their share in this outrage--the judge excusing the leniency of the punishment on the ground of the woman's state of mental excitement, and of the man's having pulled Dummey out of the water when the ducking seemed likely to produce death.

Only a few years ago an example of superst.i.tion in England came prominently before a public court of justice. It appears that in the neighbourhood of South Molton, North Devon, an old man aged eighty-six, living at Westdown, near Barnstaple, was charged with "using certain subtle craft, means, or device by palmistry and otherwise, to deceive and impose on certain of her Majesty's subjects." For some time a woman named Elizabeth Saunders, then residing in an adjacent hamlet, had been ill. Doctors' remedies failed, and her husband sent for the old man named Harper, generally called the "White Witch," but who called himself an herbalist. He went to the house of the woman, and gave her four or five iron rods in succession, with which she tapped a piece of iron held by her in the other hand while in bed. At the ends of the rods were the names of planets, such as Jupiter and Mercury. He asked the age of the woman and the hour she was born, saying he wanted to find out under what planet she came into the world. He gave her some bitters to take, but she died a few days afterwards. The defence was that the rods and piece of metal were a rude method of using electricity, by which means the defendant had effected many cures; but no explanation was given as to the meaning of the names of the planets. It was stated that the "White Witch" charged the woman 25s. for his services. Several witnesses, called for the defence, said they had been cured of complaints in the legs and arms by the defendant's magic rods when n.o.body else could cure them. The Bench sentenced him to a month's imprisonment.

A case of witchcraft came recently to our knowledge from Stonehouse.

Ann Bond, a professed herbalist, stood charged before a bench of justice with having obtained 1 by means of a subtle device. Mary Ann Pike said her sister, Mrs. Summers, having a bad leg, had been advised to let the prisoner see it. Bond, after looking at the limb, declared that it was not an affliction by G.o.d. She went away, and afterwards returned with some cards. These she arranged, and, after looking at them, said her sister was so ill-wished that her face would be drawn to her toes, and that she would die at the age of thirty-seven. Mrs.

Summers asked the prisoner if she could do her any good. Bond replied, "Yes; if you come at once under my demand; my usual price is 25s., but I'll do it for 1." Deponent lent her sister a sovereign to give to the woman. Bond turned up a bottle, and said to witness, "There is one dark woman, and a tall woman, doing your sister injury; the circle was not laid intentionally for her, but for her husband." The prisoner was convicted and punished. She had formerly been imprisoned for a similar offence.

In 1878, at a meeting of the guardians of the Coventry Union, an inmate named Arnold, _alias_ "Old Zadkiel," a professor of astrology, was the subject of inquiry. A letter had been addressed to him by a lady at Dorchester, anxious to learn "what planet she was born under, and the position of her future husband." She forwarded a number of postage stamps. There was another letter from a lady at Leamington, asking Arnold to keep an appointment with her, to "read her destiny."

The astrologer formerly lived in Coventry, and carried on an extensive trade until he was sent to Warwick gaol, which he left for the workhouse. He was cautioned by the Board. "Old Zadkiel," taking offence, left the workhouse, saying he "should resume his astrology"

and the "ruling of the planets."

Not long ago a well-to-do farmer near Ilchester, in Somerset, had the misfortune to have several of his cattle taken away by disease. A veterinary surgeon who was consulted, thought the remainder of the herd were in a fair way of recovery; the farmer, however, insisted that he and his cows had been "overlooked," and immediately sought out a "wise woman" residing in an adjacent town. Acting upon the advice of the old hag, the farmer returned home, and encircled with a f.a.ggot the last bullock that died, ignited the pile, and burnt the carcase, an incantation being p.r.o.nounced over the burning beast. The remainder of the herd became well, and their recovery was attributed by the farmer and his simple-minded neighbours, not to the skill of the veterinary surgeon, but to the success of the weird ceremonial prescribed by the fortune-teller.

A remarkable case of credulity came before Ludlow police court, in January of this year (1879). Mary A. Collier was summoned under the local bye-laws for using abusive language to Elizabeth Oliver. Both parties, it transpired, lived in Lower Gouldford; and a sheet having been lost off a garden line, with a view to discover the thief, the superst.i.tious practice of "turning the key and the Bible" was resorted to. Complainant said Collier met her in the street, and said the Bible had been turned down for Jones' yard, Martha Cad's yard, and Burnsnell's yard, and when Mrs. Oliver's name was mentioned, "the Bible fled out of their hands." The Bible was then turned to see if the sheet was stolen during the day or night, and Mrs. Collier then called her "a daring daylight thief." Mrs. Collier informed the Court that "the key turned for Mrs. Oliver and no one else, and the words in the Bible were for her." Mrs. Oliver said the sheet had been found under the snow. The Bench dismissed the case, and said such gross superst.i.tion was more like a relic of the past, and would not have believed that such a thing existed in this advanced age.

In the village of East Knighton, Dorsetshire, in the year above mentioned, a remarkable case reached the public ears. In a cottage dwelt a woman named Kerley and her daughter, a girl of about eighteen years, supposed to be bewitched. It was positively stated that they had been thrown out of the cottage into the street, although neither window nor door was open, and heavy articles of furniture were sent flying about in all directions.

An old woman called Burt was named as the cause of all the mischief, and she was declared to have a.s.sumed the form of a hare, to have been chased by the neighbours, and then to have sat up and looked defiantly at them. It is positively believed that until blood is drawn from the witch the manifestations will not cease.

We must confess that superst.i.tion is stripped of its romance by prosaic courts and stern judges. A case tried at Newbury quarter-sessions is fresh in the memory of many. Maria Giles, _alias_ "The Ranter," well known as the "Newbury Cunning Woman," was tried on the charge of having obtained sums of money from two women living at villages in a wild district in North Hants, by falsely pretending she had the power to recover some goods they had lost. The women travelled twelve miles to consult the prisoner. She went through some absurd proceedings, and pretended she saw in a gla.s.s the parties who had taken the goods. Prisoner had practised witchcraft for many years. She professed to rule the stars, and said that if the nights were clear and fine she would be able to recover the goods sooner. The jury returned a verdict of guilty, and sentenced her to five years penal servitude.

The proceedings of a professional fortune-teller formed the subject of investigation by the mayor and other magistrates of Newbury in 1871. A widow named Maria Moss had been pretending to tell the fortune of divers persons, particularly young women, whom she had induced to go to her house. The princ.i.p.al witnesses called were Alice Prior and Maria Low, two young women, who proved that the prisoner had promised to tell their fortunes. Her practice had been to produce a pack of cards, which she placed upon the table, and told each girl to cut them into three parts. In one case she said she saw "London," and told Prior that she would get a good situation there, and be married to a widower. She represented to Low that she would also have an excellent situation in London, and be married to a gentleman with plenty of money. She induced the girls to obtain goods from tradesmen in the town and bring them to her house, and the girls also removed wearing apparel from their own homes and deposited the same with the prisoner, who promised to send the goods after the girls had arrived in the metropolis. However, the mother of Low discovered that clothes had been taken away from her house, and the intended journey of the girls was of course prevented. The Bench dealt with the case under the Vagrant Act, and sentenced the woman to fourteen days in Reading gaol.

In the beginning of 1879 a photographer named Henry, of Cooper's Road, Old Kent Road, London, was charged at the Southwark police court with obtaining money by false pretences. The prisoner issued an advertis.e.m.e.nt, offering for eighteen stamps to send to unmarried persons photographs of their future wives or husbands, and for twenty-four stamps a bottle of magnetic scent, or Spanish love scent, which were described, the first as "so fascinating in its effects as to make true love run smooth," and the other as "delicious, and captivating the senses," so that "no young lady or gentleman need pine in single blessedness." Several witnesses stated that they had answered these advertis.e.m.e.nts; and numbers of letters--some from Australia, China, and other places abroad, relating to them--were found at the defendant's house. It appeared that he had been carrying on a very successful fraud for some time. The magistrate sentenced the prisoner, under the Vagrant Act, to three months hard labour.

Four men were charged at the Marylebone police court, London, in 1871, with telling fortunes. They had a place in that district, in which the police found a magic mirror, cards, nativities, planetary schemes, and all the paraphernalia of fortune-telling imposition. On the police going to the house, they found no fewer than thirty or forty young women in a waiting-room, each having paid a fee. A book was found in which were entries of the dupes in each week, the numbers varying from 89 to 662. The prisoners were sentenced to three months hard labour.

Liverpool, Birmingham, Manchester, London, and nearly all the other cities, towns, and country districts of England continue to have their fortune-tellers and reputed witches and ghosts. There are still many believers in the prophecies of Mother Shipton, but none believe more implicitly in her sayings than the labouring cla.s.ses of Somerset.

Recently a report, put in circulation in the neighbourhood of Ham Hill, made them think a great catastrophe was about to occur in that particular locality. Mother Shipton had predicted that Ham Hill, one of the great stone quarries of Somerset and a prominent feature in the landscape for many miles, would be swallowed up on Good Friday. The collapse of this immense hill was to ensue from a terrible earthquake, the effect of which would be felt especially in that part of Somersetshire. One result of this belief was that persons left the neighbourhood temporarily in order to escape the disaster. Other people removed their household goods from shelves and cupboards, in order that they might not be thrown down by the upheaval of the earth; and in some cases, we are told, people delayed planting and cultivating their gardens. The residents who believed in the predicted event said that Yeovil would also be visited at the same time by a great and disastrous flood. One case was that of a man who delayed planting his garden with potatoes because he believed there would be a terrible frost, and that the River Thames would be covered with ice.

This he connected in some way with the Ham Hill affair. Amongst the labouring cla.s.ses considerable alarm existed, and Good Friday was looked forward to with no little amount of anxiety in that part of Somerset.

Good Friday came and pa.s.sed without any untoward event. Yet that is not enough to dispel the faith in Mother Shipton's prediction. She is not at fault. Some blundering calculator made a mistake as to time, and the people of Somerset are yet to have their great catastrophe.

A curious superst.i.tious custom is observed in the Isle of Man. Mothers believe their children may be preserved from disease by placing them in the hopper of a water flour-mill while the wheel makes three revolutions. On a Sunday not long since a number of children were taken to the Grenaby mill, in the parish of Malew, three miles from Castletown, in order to be subjected to the "charm" we have mentioned.

Two hoppers of the mill were crammed full of children, and, as soon as they were settled, the miller caused the wheel to revolve three times, the parents of the children being present at the time. In order to be efficacious, the ceremony must be gone through at a time when the ministers of the district are preaching in their pulpits. For this reason, about noon on Sundays is generally the time chosen for the performance of this curious rite.

At an inquest lately held in London on the body of a woman aged eighty-two years, the evidence showed that the woman's death resulted from injury to the head, caused by a fall from her chair. One of the witnesses told the coroner that he believed the time had come for the woman to die. His reason for that opinion was, that she had dreamed, a fortnight before her death, that she had a fall, and cut open her head, and was likely to die in consequence.

An awful fulfilment of a dream took place at a calico-printing establishment at Sunnyside. A clerk in the work remarked to one of the machine printers that he was glad to see him at his employment; the printer asked his reason for his congratulations, when the clerk observed that during the previous night he (the clerk) had dreamed that he (the printer) had, while at his work, dropped down dead. The printer replied, in a jocular way, "You see you were mistaken, for I am alive yet." The printer being in his usual health and spirits, no further notice was taken of the matter; but singularly, at three o'clock in the afternoon of the same day, while attending to his duties at his machine, he dropped down dead without the least warning.

This year (1879) the Deal magistrates sentenced a man named George Wylds to two months imprisonment for refusing to proceed to sea in the barque "Umzinto," on a voyage from London to Port Natal. The man told the magistrate that he was satisfied with the ship, officers, and food, but he had had a dream that the ship would be lost, and would not go to sea in her for any amount of money. Once before he had a dream that a vessel in which he was sailing would be lost, and it was lost.

It is worth recording that in many parishes of Worcestershire and Herefordshire the holly and ivy that have adorned churches at Christmas-time are much esteemed and cherished.

If a small branch of holly, with the berries upon it, is taken home and hung up in the house, it is considered sure to bring a lucky year.

A little of this church ivy given to sheep is considered likely to make them bring forth two lambs a-piece. The evergreens that were hung up in the house must, however, all be burned, except the mistletoe bough, which should be kept throughout the year; and it generally is in farmhouses, as, according to old people, it prevented any bad effect from the evil eye, and fiends and hobgoblins were scared away by it, as stated in this verse of an old sagacious adviser:

"On Candlemas eve kindle the fire, and then Before sunset let every leaf it bren; But the mistletoe must hang agen Till Christmas next return; This must be kept, wherewith to tend The Christmas bough, and house defend, For where it's safely kept, the fiend Can do no mischief there."

Some country churches in Worcestershire and Herefordshire are still usually decked with sprigs of yew at Easter, and boughs of fragrant fresh-leaved birch at Whitsuntide; and a sprig of yew thus consecrated, when taken and kept in the house, is deemed a preservative from the influence or entrance of any malignant spirits.

In like manner, a branch of the birch is honoured by being placed on or over the kneading-trough; for, thus placed, it is considered to be a sure antidote against heavy bread.

A celebrated case, in which the pursuer, newly returned from Australia, sought to establish, in the Court of Common Pleas (we think in 1871 or 1872), his claim to the ancient baronetcy of Tichborne, recalls to mind a legend current in the Tichborne family for many generations relative to the "Tichborne Dole." The house of Tichborne dates the possession of its right to the manor of Tichborne, near Winchester, as far back as two centuries before the Norman Conquest.

About the middle of the twelfth century the then head of the family married Mabel, only daughter and heiress of Sir Ralph de Lamerston, of Lamerston, in the Isle of Wight, by which he acquired considerable estates in that part of England, in addition to his own possessions in Hampshire. After many years of wedded happiness, during which the Lady Mabel became celebrated for her kindness and care of the poor, and death approaching, she besought her husband to grant her the means of leaving behind her a charitable bequest, in the shape of a _dole_, or measure of bread, to be distributed annually, on the 25th of March (the Feast of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary), to all needy and indigent people who should apply for it at the hall door.

The said bread was to be the produce of a certain piece of ground containing an area of fifteen acres, and of known value; but should the applicants be greater in number than the measures produced, twopence in money was to be given as the _dole_.