9

7-

CURIOUS MYTHS OF THE MIDDLE AGES

nous MYTHS ( IHE xMIDDLE AGES

rnVfiLOI'ME.N i Ot HbLil

CURIOUS MYTHS OF THE MIDDLE AGES

s?'''baring-gould, m.a.

AUTHOR OF "ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT OF RELIGIOUS BELIEF," ETC.

RIVINGTONS

WATERLOO PLACE, LONDON

1877

\_New Edition.'\

ConteirtflJ

PAGE

I. THE WANDERING JEW I

II. PRESTER JOHN 32

III. THE DIVINING ROD 55

IV. THE SEVEN SLEEPERS OF EPHESUS . . 93

V. WILLIAM TELL II3

VI. THE DOG GELLERT 1 34

VII. TAILED MEN I45

VIII. ANTICHRIST AND POPE JOAN . . . . 161

t IX. THE MAN IN THE MOON . . . . IpO

X. THE MOUNTAIN OF VENUS . . . . 209

XI. S. PATRICK'S PURGATORY . . . .230

XII. THE TERRESTRIAL PARADISE . . . . 250

XIII. S. GEORGE 266

XIV. S. URSULA AND THE ELEVEN THOUSAND VIRGINS 317 XV. THE LEGEND OF THE CROSS . . . -341

XVI. SCHAMIR 385

XVII. THE PIPER OF HAMELN 417

XVIII. BISHOP HATTO 447

X Co7itents.

PAaE

XIX. MELUSINA . . 471

XX. THE FORTUNATE ISLES 524

XXI. SWAN-MAIDENS -.561

XXII. THE KNIGHT OF THE SWAN . . . -579

XXIII. THE SANGREAL 604

XXIV. THEOPHILUS 628

APPENDIX A. THE WANDERING JEW . . 637

B. MOUNTAIN OF VENUS . 64I

C. PRE-CHRISTIAN CROSSES . 643

D. SHIPPING THE DEAD . . 645

E. FATALITY OF NUMBERS . . 647

4

MEDIEVAL MYTHS

'XT 7" HO that has looked on Gustave Dores * marvellous illustrations to this wild legend, can forget the impression they made upon his imagination ?

I do not refer to the first illustration as striking, where the Jewish shoemaker is refusing to suffer the cross-laden Saviour to rest a moment on his door- step, and is receiving with scornful lip the judg- ment to wander restless till the Second Coming of that same Redeemer. But I refer rather to the second, which represents the Jew, after the lapse of ages, bowed beneath the burden of the curse, worn with unrelieved toil, wearied with ceaseless travel- ling, trudging onward at the last lights of evening, when a rayless night of unabating rain is creeping

B

The Wandering yew

on, along a sloppy path between dripping bushes ; and suddenly he comes over against a way-side crucifix, on which the white glare of departing day- light falls, to throw it into ghastly relief against t pitch-black rain clouds. For a moment we see i working of the miserable shoemaker's mind, feel that he is recalling the tragedy of the fir Good Friday, and his head hangs heavier on h breast, as he recalls the part he had taken in th awful catastrophe.

Or, is that other illustration more remarkable? where the wanderer is amongst the Alps, at th brink of a hideous chasm ; and seeing in the co: torted pine-branches the ever-haunting scene the Via dolorosa, he is lured to cast himself into' that black gulf in quest of rest,— when an angel flashes out of the gloom with the sword of flame turning every way, keeping him back from wh would be to him a Paradise indeed, the repose Death }

Or that last scene, when the trumpet sounds and earth is shivering to its foundations, the fire is bubbling forth through the rents in its surface, and the dead are coming together flesh to flesh, and bone to bone, and muscle to muscle — then the weary man sits down and casts off his shoes !

7

h^^

1

to

;el ne

I

The Wandering Jeiv d

Strange sights are around him, he sees them not ; strange sounds assail his ears, he hears but one — the trumpet-note which gives the signal for him to stay his wanderings and rest his weary feet.

It is possible to linger over those noble woodcuts, and learn from them something new each time that we study them ; they are picture-poems full of latent depths of thought. And now let us to the history of this most thrilling of all Mediaeval myths.

The words of the Gospel contain the germs out of which the story has developed. " Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death till they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom V' are our Lord's words, which I can hardly think apply to the destruction of Jerusalem, as commentators explain it to escape the difficulty. That some should live to see Jeru- salem destroyed was not very surprising, and hardly needed the emphatic Verily which Christ only used when speaking something of peculiarly solemn or mysterious import.

Besides, S. Luke's account manifestly refers the coming in the kingdom to the Judgment, for the

* Matt. xvi. 28. Mark i::. i. B 1

4 The Wandering Jew

saying stands as follows : " Whosoever shall bi ashamed of Me, and of My words, of him shall th^ Son of Man be ashamed, when He shall come ii His own glory, and in His Father's, and of the hoi] angels. But I tell you of a truth, there be some standing here, which shall not taste of death til| they see the kingdom of God \"

There can, I think, be no doubt in the mind of an unprejudiced person, that the words of our Lord do imply that some one or more of those then living should not die till He came again. I do not mean to insist ''on the literal signification, but I plead that it is compatible with our Lord's power to have fulfilled His words to the letter. That the circumstance is unrecorded in the Gospels is no evidence that it did not take place, for we are expressly told, " Many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book^;" and again, "There are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written ^"

We may remember also that mysterious wit-

' Luke ix. 26, 27.

2 John XX. 30. ■• John xxi. 25.

The Wandering Jew 5

nesses are to appear in the last eventful days of the world's history, and bear testimony to the Gospel truth before the antichristian world. One of these has been often conjectured to be S. John the Evangelist, of whom Christ said to Peter, " If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee?" and the other has been variously conjectured to be Elias, or Enoch, or our Jew.

The historical evidence on which the tale rests is, however, too slender, for us to admit for it more than the barest claim to be more than myth. The names and the circumstances connected with the Jew and his doom vary in every account, and the only point upon which all coincide is that such an individual exists in an undying condition, wander- ing over the face of the earth, seeking rest and finding none.

The earliest extant mention of the Wandering Jew, is to be found in the book of the chronicles of the Abbey of S. Albans, which was copied and continued by Matthew Paris. He records that in the year 1228, "a certain Archbishop of Armenia Major came on a pilgrimage to England to see the relics of the saints, and visit the sacred places in the kingdom, as he had done in others ; he also produced letters of recommendation from

6 The Wanderi7tg Jew

his Holiness the Pope, to the religious men and prelates of the churches, in which they were en- joined to receive and entertain him with due rever- ence and honour. On his arrival, he went to S. Albans, where he was received with all respect by the abbot and monks; at this place, being fatigued with his journey, he remained some days to rest himself and his followers, and a conversation was commenced between him and the inhabitants of the convent, by means of their interpreters, during which he made many inquiries concerning the religion and religious observances of this country, and related many strange things concerning Eastern countries. In the course of conversation he was asked whether he had ever seen or heard any thing of Joseph, a man of whom there was much talk in the world, who, when our Lord suffered, was piesent and spoke to Him, and who is still alive, in evidence of the Christian faith ; in reply to which, a knight in his retinue, who was his interpreter, replied, speaking in French, * My lord well knows that man, and a little before he took his way to the western countries, the said Joseph ate at the table of my lord the Archbishop in Armenia, and he had often seen and held converse with him.' He was then asked about what had

The Wandering Jew 7

passed between Christ and the same Joseph, to which he replied, *At the time of the suffering of Jesus Christ, He was seized by the Jews, and led into the hall of judgment before Pilate, the gover- nor, that He might be judged by him on the accusation of the Jews ; and Pilate, finding no cause for adjudging Him to death, said to them, 'Take Him and judge Him according to your law;* the shouts of the Jews, however, increasing, he, at their request, released unto them Barabbas, and delivered Jesus to them to be crucified. When, therefore, the Jews were dragging Jesus forth, and had reached the door, Cartaphilus, a porter of the hall, in Pilate's service, as Jesus was going out of the door, impiously struck Him on the back with his hand, and said in mockery, * Go quicker, Jesus, go quicker; why do you loiter?' and Jesus, looking back on him with a severe countenance, said to him, * I am going, and you will wait till I return.' And according as our Lord said, this Cartaphilus is still awaiting His return. At the time of our Lord's suffering he was thirty years old, and when he attains the age of a hundred years, he always returns to the same age as he was when our Lord suffered. After Christ's death, when the Catholic faith gained ground, this Cartaphilus was baptized

8 The Wandering Jew

by Ananias (who also baptized the Apostle Paul), and was called Joseph. He often dwells in both divisions of Armenia, and other Eastern coun- tries, passing his time amidst the bishops and other prelates of the Church ; he is a man of holy conversation, and religious ; a man of few words, and circumspect in his behaviour ; for he does not speak at all unless when questioned by th( bishops and religious men ; and then he tells of tl events of old times, and of the events which occurred at the suffering and resurrection of our Lord, ai of the witnesses of the resurrection, namely, thoj who rose with Christ, and went into the holy cit] and appeared unto men. He also tells of the cree of the Apostles, and of their separation ai preaching. And all this he relates without smilii or levity of conversation, as one who is well pra^ tised in sorrow and the fear of God, always lookii forward with fear to the coming of Jesus Chrij lest at the Last Judgment he should find Him anger whom, when on His way to death, he h* provoked to just vengeance. Numbers came him from different parts of the world, enjoying society and conversation ; and to them, if they ai men of authority, he explains all doubts on tl matters on which he is questioned. He refuses

The Wandering Jeiv 9

gifts that are offered to him, being content with slight food and clothing. He places his hope of salvation on the fact that he sinned through igno- rance, for the Lord when suffering prayed for His enemies in these words, * Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.' "

Much about the same date Philip Mouskes, afterwards Bishop of Tournay, wrote his rhymed chronicle (i 242)' which contains a similar account of the Jew, derived from the same Armenian prelate : —

" Adonques vint un arceveskes De 9a mer, plains de bonnes teques Par samblant, et fut d'Armenie,"

and this man having visited the shrine of " St. Tumas de Kantorbire," and then having paid his devotions at " Monsigour St. Jake," he went on to Cologne to see the heads of the three kings. The version told in the Netherlands much resembled that related at S. Albans, only that the Jew, seeing the people dragging Christ to His death, exclaims :

" Atendes moi ! ^\ vois, S'iert mis le faus profete en crois."

Then

" Le vrais Uieux se regarda, Et li a dit qu'e n'i tarda, Icist ne t'atenderont pas, Mais saces, tu m'atenderao.'

10 The Wandering Jew

We hear no more of the Wandering Jew till the sixteenth century, when we hear first of him in a casual manner, as assisting a weaver, Kokot, at the royal palace in Bohemia (1505), to find a treasure which had been secreted by the great-grandfather cf Kokot, sixty years before, at which time the Jew was present. He then had the appearance of being a man of seventy years ^

Curiously enough, we next hear of him in the East, where he is confounded with the prophet Elijah. Early in the century he appeared to Fadhilah, under peculiar circumstances.

After the Arabs had captured the city of Elvan, Fadhilah, at the head of three hundred horsemen, pitched his tents, late in the evening, between two mountains. Fadhilah having begun his evening prayer with a loud voice, heard the words " Allah akbar " (God is great) repeated distinctly, and each word of his prayer was followed in a similar manner. Fadhilah not believing this to be the result of an echo, was much astonished, and cried out, " O thou ! whether thou art of the angel ranks, or whether thou art of some other order of spirits, it is well, the power of God be with thee ; but if thou

* Gubitz, Gesellsch. 1845, No. 18

The Wandering Jew 11

art a man, then let mine eyes light upon thee, that I may rejoice in thy presence and society." Scarcely had he spoken these words, before an aged man with bald head stood before him, hold- ing a staff in his hand, and much resembling a dervish in appearance. After having courteously saluted him, Fadhilah asked the old man who he was. Thereupon the stranger answered, "Bassi Hadhret Issa, I am here by command of the Lord Jesus, who has left me in this world, that I may live therein until He comes a second time to earth. I wait for this Lord who is the Fountain of Happiness, and in obedience to His command I dwell behind yon mountain." When Fadhilah heard these words, he asked when the Lord Jesus would appear, and the old man replied that His appearing would be at the end of the world, at the Last Judgment. But this only increased Fadhilah's curiosity, so that he inquired the signs of the approach of the end of all things, whereupon Zerib Bar Elia gave him an account of general, social, and moral dissolution, which would be the climax of this world's history ^

In 1547 he was seen in Europe, if we are to believe the following narration : —

* Herbelot, Bibl. Orient, iii. p. 607.

12 The Wandering Jew

" Paul von Eitzen, doctor of the Holy Scriptures, and Bishop of Schleswig ', related as true for some years past, that when he was young, having studied at Wittemberg, he returned home to his parents in Hamburg in the winter of the year 1547, and that on the following Sunday, in church, he observed a tall man with his hair hanging over his shoulders, standing barefoot during the sermon, over against the pulpit, listening with deepest attention to the discourse, and, whenever the name of Jesus was mentioned, bowing himself profoundly and humbly^j with sighs and beating of the breast. He had n( other clothing in the bitter cold of the winterj except a pair of hose which were in tatters about his feet, and a coat with a girdle which reached t( his feet ; and his general appearance was that of a man of fifty years. And many people, some of high degree and title, have seen this same man in England, France, Italy, Hungary, Persia, Spain, Poland, Moscow, Lapland, Sweden, Denmark, Scotland, and other places.

" Every one wondered over the man. Now after

7 Paul V. Eitzen was bom Jan. 25th, 1522, at Hamburg ; in 1562 he was appointed chief preacher for Schleswig, and died Feb. 25th, 1598. (Greve, Memor. P. ab. Eitzen. Hamb. 1744.)

The Wanderiftg Jew 13

the sermon, the said Doctor inquired diligently where the stranger was to be found, and when he had sought him out, he inquired of him privately whence he came, and how long that winter he had been in the place. Thereupon he replied modestly, that he was a Jew by birth, a native of Jerusalem, by name Ahasverus, by trade a shoemaker ; he had been present at the crucifixion of Christ, and had lived ever since, travelling through various lands and cities, the which he substantiated by accounts he gave ; he related also the circumstances of Christ's transference from Pilate to Herod, and the final crucifixion, together with other details not recorded in the Evangelists and historians ; he gave accounts of the changes of government in many countries, especially of the East, through several centuries, and moreover he detailed the labours and deaths of the holy Apostles of Christ most cir- cumstantially.

" Now when Doctor Paul v. Eitzen heard this with profound astonishment, on account of its incredible novelty, he inquired further, in order that he might obtain more accurate information. Then the man answered, that he had lived in Jerusalem at the time of the crucifixion of Christ, whom he had regarded as a deceiver of the people

14 The Wandering Jew

and a heretic ; he had seen Him with his own eyes, and had done his best, along with others, to bring this deceiver, as he regarded Him, to justice, and to have Him put out of the way. When the sentence had been pronounced by Pilate, Christ was about to be dragged past his house ; then he ran home, and called together his household to have a look at Christ, and see what sort of a person He was.

" This having been done, he had his little child on his arm, and was standing in his doorway t have a sight of the Lord Jesus Christ.

" As, then, Christ was led by, bowed under the weight of the heavy cross. He tried to rest a little, and stood still a moment ; but the shoemaker, in zeal and rage, and for the sake of obtaining credit; among the other Jews, drove the Lord Christ for- ward, and told Him to hasten on His way. Jesus obeying, looked at him, and said, * I shall stan and rest, but thou shalt go till the last day.' At, these words the man set down the child ; and unable to remain where he was, he followed Christ, and saw how cruelly He was crucified, how H suffered, how He died. As soon as this had taken place, it came upon him suddenly that hi could no more return to Jerusalem, nor see again his wife and child, but must go forth into foreign

I

The Wandering Jew ] 5

lands, one after another, like a mournful pilgrim. Now, when, years after, he returned to Jerusalem, he found it ruined and utterly razed, so that not one stone was left standing on another ; and he could not recognize former localities.

" He believes that it is God's purpose in thus driving him about in miserable life, and preserving him undying, to present him before the Jews at the end, as a living token, so that the godless and un- believing may remember the death of Christ, and be turned to repentance. For his part he would well rejoice were God in heaven to release him from this vale of tears. After this conversation. Doctor Paul V. Eitzen, along with the rector of the school of Hamburg, who was well read in history, and a traveller, questioned him about events which had taken place in the East since the death of Christ, and he was able to give them much information on many ancient matters; so that it was impossible not to be convinced of the truth of his story, and to see that what seems impossible with men is, after all, possible with God.

" Since the Jew has had his life extended, he has become silent and reserved, and only answers direct questions. When invited to become any one's guest, he eats little, and drinks in great moderation;

16 The Wandering Jew

then hurries on, never remaining long in one place. When at Hamburg, Dantzig, and elsewhere money has been offered him, he never took more than two skillings (45^.), and at once distributed it to the poor, as token that he needed no money, for God would provide for him, as he rued the sins he had committed in ignorance.

" During the period of his stay in Hamburg and Dantzig he was never seen to laugh. In whatever land he travelled he spoke its language, and when he spoke Saxon, it was like a native Saxon. Many people came from different places to Hamburg and Dantzig in order to see and hear this man, and were convinced that the providence of God was exercised in this individual in a very remarkable manner. He gladly listened to God's word, or heard it spoken of always with great gravity and compunction, and he ever reverenced with sighs the pronunciation of the name of God, or of Jesus Christ, and could not endure to hear curses, but whenever he heard any one swear by God's death or pains, he waxed indignant, and exclaimed, with vehemence and with sighs, — 'Wretched man and miserable creature, thus to misuse the name of thy Lord and God, and His bitter sufferings and passion. Hadst thou seen, as I have, how heavy

Ike Wandering Jew 17

and bitter were the pangs and wounds of thy Lord, endured for thee and for me, thou wouldest rather undergo great pain thyself than thus take His sacred name in vain !'

" Such is the account given to me by Doctor Paul von Eitzen, with many circumstantial proofs, and corroborated by certain of my own old acquaint- ances who saw this same individual with their own eyes in Hamburg.

"In the year 1575, the Secretary Christopher Krause, and Master Jacob von Holstein, legates to the Court of Spain, and afterwards sent into the Netherlands to pay the soldiers serving his Majesty in that country, related on their return home to Schleswig, and confirmed with solemn oaths, that they had come across the same mysterious indi- vidual at Madrid in Spain, in appearance, manner of life, habits, clothing, just the same as he had appeared in Hamburg. They said that they had spoken with him, and that many people of all classes had conversed with him, and found him to speak good Spanish. In the year 1599, in Decem- ber, a reliable person wrote from Brunswick to Strasburg that the same mentioned strange person had been seen alive at Vienna in Austria, and that he had started for Poland and Dantzig; and that he

C

18 The Wandering Jew

purposed going on to Moscow. This Ahasve was at Lubeck in 1601, also about the same date Revel in Livonia, and in Cracow in Poland. Moscow he was seen of many and spoken to many.

"What thoughtful God-fearing persons are think of the said person, is at their option. God's works are wondrous and past finding out, and are manifested day by day, only to be revealed in full at the last great day of account.

"Dated, Revel, August ist, 161 3 " D. W. "D.

*• Chrysostomus Duduloeus, "Westphalus."

The statement that the Wandering Jew appeared in Lubeck in 1601, does not tally with the more precise chronicle of Henricus Bangert, which gives : — " Die 14 Januarii Anno MDCIIL, adnotatum reli- quit Lubecae fuisse Judaeum ilium immortalem, qui se Christi crucifixioni interfuisse affirmavit ^"

In 1604, he seems to have appeared in Paris. Rudolph Botoreus says under this date: "I fear

* Henr. Bangert, Comment, de Ortu, Vita, et Excessu Coleri.

I

dT^I

I

.re I

I

The Wandering Jew 19

lest I be accused of giving ear to old wives* fables, if I insert in these pages what is reported all over Europe of the Jew, coeval with the Saviour Christ ; however, nothing is more common, and our popular histories have not scrupled to assert it. Following the lead of those who wrote our annals, I may say- that he who appeared not in one century only, in Spain, Italy, and Germany, was also in this year seen and recognized as the same individual who had appeared in Hamburg, anno MDLXVI. The common people, bold in spreading reports, relate many things of him ; and this I allude to, lest any thing should be left unsaid '."

J. C. Bulenger puts the date of the Hamburg visit earlier. " It was reported at this time that a Jew of the time of Christ was wandering without food and drink, having for a thousand and odd years been a vagabond and outcast, condemned by God to rove, because he, of that generation of vipers, was the first to cry out for the crucifixion of Christ and the release of Barabbas ; and also because soon after, when Christ, panting under the burden of the rood, sought to rest before his workshop (he was a cobbler), the fellow ordered Him off with

» R". Botoreus, Comm. Histor. lii. p. 305. C 2

20 The Wander mg Jew

acerbity. Thereupon Christ replied : * Becai thou grudgest Me such a moment of rest, I shj enter into My rest, but thou shalt wander restles At once frantic and agitated he fled through whole earth, and on the same account to this daj he journeys through the world. It was this perse who was seen in Hamburg in MDLXIV. Credj Judseus Apella ! / did not see him or hear ai thing authentic concerning him at that time whe I was in Paris \"

A curious little book' written against the quackery of Paracelsus, by Leonard Doldius, a Niirnberg physician, and translated into Latin and augmented by Andreas Libavius, doctor and physician of Rotenburg, alludes to the same story, and gives the Jew a new name nowhere else met with. After having referred to a report that Paracelsus was not dead, but was seated alive, asleep or napping, in his sepulchre at Strasburg, preserved from death by some of his specifics, Libavius declares that he would sooner believe in the old man the Jew, Ahasverus, wandering over the world, called by some Buttadaeus, and otherwise, again, by others.

^ J. C. Bulenger, Historia sui Temporis, p. 357. ' Praxis Alchymias. Francfurti, MDCIV. 8vo.

The Wandering Jew 21

He is said to have appeared in Naumburg, but the date is not given ; he was noticed in church, listening to the sermon. After the service he was questioned, and he related his story. On this occasion he received presents from the burghers ^. In 1633 he was again in Hamburg*. Tn the year 1640, two citizens, living in the Gerberstrasse, in Brussels, were walking in the Sonian wood, when they encountered an aged man, whose clothes were in tatters and of an antiquated appearance. They invited him to go with them to a house of refresh- ment, and he went with them, but would not seat himself, remaining on foot to drink. When he came before the doors with the two burghers, he told them a great deal, but they were mostly stories of events which had happened many hundred years before. Hence the burghers gathered that their companion was Isaac Laquedem, the Jew who had refused to permit our Blessed Lord to rest for a moment at his doorstep, and they left him full of terror. In 1641^, he is reported to have visited Leipzig. According to Peck's " History of Stam- ford," Upon Whitsunday, in the year of our Lord 1658, "about six of the clock, just after evensong."

^ Mitternacht, Diss, in Johann. xxi. 19. ^ Mitternacht, ut supra.

22 The Wandering Jew

one ■ Samuel Wallis, of Stamford, who had been long wasted with a lingering consumption, was sitting by the fire, reading in that delectable boo! called "Abraham's Suit for Sodom." He heard knock at the door ; and, as his nurse was abse he crawled to open it himself. What he saw then Samuel shall say in his own style : — " I beheld proper, tall, grave old man. Thus he said : ' Frien^ I pray thee, give an old pilgrim a cup of sm beere !' And I said, *Sir, I pray you, come in a welcome.' And he said, * I am no Sir, therefor call me not Sir ; but come in I must, for I canni pass by thy doore.'

" After finishing the beer : * Friend,' he sai * thou art not well.' I said, * No, truly Sir, I have not been well this many yeares.' He said, * What is thy disease.?' I said, *A deep consumption. Sir ; our doctors say, past cure : for, truly, I am a very poor man, and not able to follow doctors' councell.' ' Then,' said he, * I will tell thee what thou shalt do ; and, by the help and power of Almighty God above, thou shalt be well. To- morrow, when thou risest up, go into thy garden, and get there two leaves of red sage, and one of bloodworte, and put them into a cup of thy small beere. Drink as often as need require, and when

re «

The Wandering Jew 23

the cup is empty fill it again, and put in fresh leaves every fourth day, and thou shalt see, through our Lord's great goodness and mercy, before twelve days shall be past, thy disease shall be cured and thy body altered.'"

After this simple prescription, Wallis pressed him to eat : " But he said, * No, friend, I will not eat ; the Lord Jesus is sufficient for me. Very seldom doe I drinke any beere neither, but that which comes from the rocke. ' So, friend, the Lord God be with thee.'"

So saying, he departed, and was never more heard of; but the patient got well within the given time, and for many a long day there was war hot and fierce among the divines of Stamford, as to whether the stranger was an angel or a devil. His dress has been minutely described by honest Sam. His coat was purple, and buttoned down to the waist ; " his britches of the same couler, all new^ to see to ;" his stockings were very white, but whether linen or jersey, deponent knoweth not ; his beard and head were white, and he had a white stick in his hand. The day was rainy from morning to night, "but he had not one spot of dirt upon his cloathes."

Aubrey gives an almost exactly similar relation.

24 The Wa7tdering Jew

the scene of which he places in the Staffordshii Moorlands. He there appears in a " purple shj gown," and prescribes balm-leaves ^

On the 22nd July, 1721, he appeared at the gat( of the city of Munich ^ About the end of tl seventeenth century, or the beginning of th^ eighteenth, an impostor calling himself tm Wandering Jew, attracted attention in England' and was listened to by the ignorant, and despisec by the educated. H^ however managed to thruj himself into the notice of the nobility, who, half ii jest, half in curiosity, questioned him, and paid hii as they might a juggler. He declared that he ha( been an officer of the Sanhedrim, and that he had struck Christ as He left the judgment-hall of Pilate. He remembered all the Apostles, and described their personal appearance, their clothes, and their peculiarities. He spoke many languages, claimed the power of healing the sick, and asserted that he had travelled nearly all over the world. Those who heard him were perplexed by his familiarity with foreign tongues and places. Oxford and Cambridge sent professors to question him, and to discover the

* Notes and Queries, vol. xii. No. 322. " Hormayr, Taschenbuch, 1834, p. 216.

The Wandering Jew 25

imposition, if any. An English nooleman con- versed with him in Arabic. The mysterious stranger told his questioner in that language that historical works were not to be relied upon. And on being asked his opinion of Mahomet, he replied that he had been acquainted with the father of the prophet, and that he dwelt at Ormuz. As for Mahomet, he believed him to have been a man of intelligence ; once when he -heard the prophet deny that Christ was crucified, he answered abruptly by telling him he was a witness to the truth of that event. He related also that he was in Rome when Nero set it on fire ; he had known Saladin, Tamerlane, Bajazeth, Eterlane, and could give minute details of the history of the Crusades ^

Whether this Wandering Jew was found out in London or not, we cannot tell, but he shortly after appeared in Denmark, thence travelled into Sweden, and vanished.

Some impostors assuming to be the mysterious Jew, or lunatics actually believing themselves to be him, appeared in England in 1818, 1824,

1830'.

7 Calmet, Dictionn. de la Bible, t. ii. p. 473. ^ Athenaeum, Nov. 3, 1866, p. 561.

26 The Wandering Jew

Such are the principal notices of the Wandering Jew which have appeared. It will be seen at once how wanting they are in all substantial evidence which could make us regard the story in any other light than myth.

But no myth is wholly without foundation, and there must be some substantial verity upon which this vast superstructure of legend has been raised. What that is I am unable to discover.

It has been suggested by some that the Jew Ahasverus is an impersonification of that race which wanders, Cain-like, over the earth with the brand of a brother's blood upon it, and one which is not to pass away till all be fulfilled, not to be reconciled to its angered God, till the times of the Gentiles are accomplished. And yet, probable as this supposition may seem at first sight, it is not to be harmonized with some of the leading features of the story. The shoemaker becomes a penitent, and earnest Christian, whilst the Jewish nation has still the veil upon its heart ; the wretched wanderer eschews money, and the avarice of the Israelite is proverbial.^

According to local legend, he is identified with the Gipsies, or rather that strange people are sup- posed to be living under a curse somewhat similar

The Wandering Jew 27

to that inflicted on Ahasverus, because they refused shelter to the Virgin and Child on their flight into Egypt ^ Another tradition connects the Jew with the wild huntsman, and there is a forest at Bretten in Swabia, which he is said to haunt. Popular superstition attributes to him there a purse con- taining a groschen, which, as often as it is expended, returns to the spender'.

In the Harz one form of the Wild Huntsman myth is to this effect, — that he was a Jew who had refused to suffer our Blessed Lord to drink out of a river, or out of a horse-trough, but had contemp- tuously pointed out to Him the hoof-print of a horse, in which a little water had collected, and had bid Him quench His thirst thence ^

As the Wild Huntsman is the impersonification of the storm, it is curious to find in parts of France that the sudden roar of a gale at night is attributed by the vulgar to the passing of the Everlasting Jew.

A Swiss story is, that he was seen one day stand- ing upon the Matterberg, which is below the Matterhorn, contemplating the scene with mingled

' Aventinus, Bayr. Chronik, viii.

* Meier, Schwabischen Sagen, i. ii6.

^ Kuhn u. Schwarz, Nordd. Sagen, p. 4Q9.

28 The Wandering Jezv

sorrow and wonder. Once before he stood on that spot, and then it was the site of a flourishing city, now it is covered with gentian and wild pinks. Once again will he revisit the hill, and that will be on the eve of Judgment.

Perhaps, of all the myths which originated in the Middle Ages, none is more striking than that we have been considering ; indeed there is something so calculated to arrest the attention and to excite the imagination in the outline of the story, that it is remarkable that we should find an interval of three centuries elapse between its first introduction into Europe by Matthew Paris and Philip Mouskes, and its general acceptance in the sixteenth century. As a myth, its roots lie in that great mystery of human life which is an enigma never solved, and ever originating speculation.

What was life.'* was it of necessity limited to fourscore years, or could it be extended indefinitely t were questions curious minds never wearied of asking. And so the mythology of the past teemed with legends of favoured or accursed mortals, who had reached beyond the term of days set to most men. Some had discovered the water of life, the fountain of perpetual youth, and were ever renew- ing their strength. Others had dared the power of

d

The Wandering Jew 29

God, and were therefore sentenced to feel the weight of His displeasure, without tasting the repose of death.

John the Divine slept at Ephesus, untouched by- corruption, with the ground heaving over his breast as he breathed, waiting the summons to come forth and witness against Antichrist. The seven sleepers reposed in a cave, and centuries ghded by like a watch in the night. The monk of Hildesheim, doubting how with God a thousand years could be as yesterday, listened to the melody of a bird in the green wood during three minutes, and found that in three minutes three hundred years had flown. Joseph of Arimathaea, in the blessed city of Sarras, draws perpetual life from the Saint Graal ; Merlin sleeps and sighs in an old tree, spell- bound of Vivien. Charlemagne and Barbarossa wait, crowned and armed, in the heart of the mountain, till the time comes for the release of Fatherland from despotism. And, on the other hand, the curse of a deathless life has passed on the Wild Hunts- man, because he desired to chase the red-deer for evermore ; on the Captain of the Phantom Ship, because he vowed he would double the Cape whether God willed it or not ; on the Man in the Moon, because he gathered sticks during the

i

80 The Wandering Jew

Sabbath rest ; on the dancers of Kolbeck, because they desired to spend eternity in their mad gam-| bols.

I began this article intending to conclude it with a bibliographical account of the tracts, letters, ^j essays, and books, written upon the Wandering ^H Jew ; but I relinquish my intention at the sight of the multitude of works which have issued from the press upon the subject; and this I do with less compunction as the bibliographer may at little trouble and expense satisfy himself, by perusing the lists given by Grasse in his essay on the myth, and those to be found in "Notice historique et bibliographique sur les Juifs-errants : par G. B." (Gustave Brunet), Paris, Techener, 1845 ; also in the article by M. Mangin, in " Causeries et Medita- tions historiques et litteraires," Paris, Duprat, 1843 ; and, lastly, in the essay by Jacob le Bibliophile (M. Lacroix) in his "Curiosites de I'Histoire des Croyances populaires," Paris, Delahays, 1859.

Of the romances of Eugene Sue and Dr. Croly, founded upon the legend, the less said the better. The original legend is so noble in its severe sim- plicity, that none but a master mind could develope it with any chance of success. Nor have the poetical attempts upon the story fared better.

Tfie Wandering Jew 31

It was reserved for the pencil of Gustave Dore to treat it with the originality it merited, and in a series of woodcuts to produce at once a poem, a romance, and a chef-d'ceuvre of art.

iPrcster 3ol)n

Arms of ths See of Chichester

ABOUT the middle of the twelfth century, rumour circulated through Europe that there reigned in Asia a powerful Christian Emperor, Pres- byter Johannes. In a bloody fight he had broken the power of the Mussulmans, and was ready to come to the assistance of the Crusaders. Great was the exultation in Europe, for of late the news from the East had been gloomy and depressing, the power of the infidel had increased, overwhelming masses of men had been brought into the field against the chivalry of Christendom, and it was felt that the cross must yield before the odious crescent.

Prester John 83

The news of the success of the Priest-King opened a door of hope to the desponding Christian world. Pope Alexander III. determined at once to effect a union with this mysterious personage, and on the 37th of September, 11 77, wrote him a letter, which he entrusted to his physician, Philip, to deliver in person.

Phihp started on his embassy, but never returned. The conquests of Tschengis-Khan again attracted the eyes of Christian Europe to the East. The Mongol hordes were rushing in upon the West with devastating ferocity ; Russia, Poland, Hungary, and the Eastern provinces of Germany, had succumbed, or suffered grievously ; and the fears of other nations were roused lest they too should taste the misery of a Mongolian invasion. It was Gog and Magog come to slaughter, and the times of Anti- christ were dawning. But the battle of Liegnitz stayed them in their onward career, and Europe was saved.

Pope Innocent IV. determined to convert these wild hordes of barbarians, and subject them to the cross of Christ ; he therefore sent among them a number of Dominican and Franciscan missioners, and embassies of peace passed between the Pope, the King of France, and the Mogul Khan.

D

34 Prester John

The result of these communications with the East was that the travellers learned how false were the prevalent notions of a mighty Christian empire existing in central Asia. Vulgar superstition or conviction is not, however, to be upset by evidence, and the locality of the monarchy was merely trans- ferred by the people to Africa, and they fixed upon Abyssinia, with a show of truth, as the seat of the famous Priest-King. However, still some doubted. John de Plano-Carpini and Marco Polo, though they acknowledged the existence of a Christian monarch in Abyssinia, yet stoutly maintained as well that the Prester John of popular belief reigned in splendour somewhere in the dim Orient.

But before proceeding with the history of this strange fable, it will be well to extract the different accounts given of the Priest-King and his realm by early writers ; and we shall then be better able to judge of the influence the myth obtained in Europe.

Otto of Freisingen is the first author to mention the monarchy of Prester John, with whom we are acquainted. Otto wrote a chronicle up to the date 1156, and he relates that in 1 145 the Catholic Bishop of Cabala visited Europe to lay certain complaints before the Pope. He mentioned the fall

Prester John 85

of Edessa, and also "he stated that a few years ago a certain King and Priest called John, who lives on the further side of Persia and Armenia in the remote East, and who, with all his people, were Christians, though belonging to the Nestorian Church, had overcome the royal brothers Samiardi, kings of the Medes and Persians, and had captured Ecbatana, their capital and residence. The said kings had met with their Persian, Median, and Assyrian troops, and had fought for three consecu- tive days, each side having determined to die rather than take to flight. Prester John, for so they are wont to call him, at length routed the Persians, and after a bloody battle, remained victorious. After which victory the said John was hastening to the assistance of the Church at Jerusalem, but his host, on reaching the Tigris, was hindered from passing through a deficiency in boats, and he directed his march North, since he had heard that the river was there covered with ice. In that place he had waited many years, expecting severe cold, but the winters having proved unpro- pitious, and the severity of the climate having carried off many soldiers, he had been forced to retreat to his own land. This king belongs to the family of the Magi, mentioned in the Gospel, and D 2

36 Prestcr John

he rules over the very people formerly governed by the Magi ; moreover, his fame and his wealth is so great, that he uses an emerald sceptre only.

"Excited by the example of his ancestors, who came to worship Christ in His cradle, he had pro- posed to go to Jerusalem, but had been impeded by the above-mentioned causes \"

At the same time the story crops up in otl quarters, so that we cannot look upon Otto as tl inventor of the myth. The celebrated Maimonidj alludes to it in a passage quoted by Joshua Lor^ a Jewish physician to Benedict XIII. Maimonic lived from 1135 to 1204. The passage is as follow — " It is evident both from the letters of Rambai (Maimonides), whose memory be blessed, and from the narration of merchants who have visited the ends of the earth, that at this time the root of our faith is to be found in the lands of Babel and Teman, where long ago Jerusalem was an exile ; not reckoning those who live in the land of Paras ' and Madai ^ of the exiles of Schomrom, the number of which people is as the sand : of these some are still under the yoke of Paras, who is called the Great-Chief Sultan by the Arabs ; others live in a

* Otto, Ep. Frising., lib. vii. c. 33. » Persia. » Media.

Pr ester John 37

place under the yoke of a strange people

governed by a Christian chief, Preste-Cuan by name. With him they have made a compact, and he with them ; and this is a matter concerning which there can be no manner of doubt."

Benjamin of Tudela, another Jew, travelled in the East between the years 1159 — 1173, the last being the date of his death. He wrote an account of his travels, and gives in it some information with regard to a mythical Jew king, who reigned in the utmost splendour over a realm inhabited by Jews alone, situate somewhere in the midst of a desert of vast extent. About this period there appeared a document which produced intense excitement throughout Europe — a letter, yes ! a letter from the mysterious personage himself to Manuel Comnenus, Emperor of Constantinople (1143 — -ti8o). The exact date of this extra- ordinary epistle cannot be fixed with any certainty, but it certainly appeared before 1241, the date of the conclusion of the chronicle of Albericus Trium Fontium. This Albericus relates that in the year 1 165 "Presbyter Joannes, the Indian king, sent his wonderful letter to various Christian princes, and especially to Manuel of Constantinople, and Frederic the Roman Emperor." Similar letters were

38 P Tester JoJm

sent to Alexander III., to Louis VII. of France, and to the King of Portugal, which are alluded to in chronicles and romances, and which were indee turned into rhyme and sung all over Europe minstrels and trouveres. The letter is as follows : —

"John, Priest by the Almighty power of God and the Might of our Lord Jesus Christ, King of Kings, and Lord of Lords, to his friend Emanuel, Prince of Constantinople, greeting, wishing him health, prosperity, and the continuance of Divine favour.

" Our Majesty has been informed that you hold our Excellency in love, and that the report of our greatness has reached you. Moreover we have heard through our treasurer that you have been pleased to send to us some objects of art and interest, that our Exaltedness might be gratified thereby.

" Being human, I receive it in good part, and we have ordered our treasurer to send you some of our articles in return.

"Now we desire to be made certain that you hold the right faith, and in all things cleave to Jesus Christ, our Lord, for we have heard that your ,. court regard you as a god, though we know that you are mortal, and subject to human infirmities.

Prester John 39

Should you desire to learn the greatness

and excellency of our Exaltedness and of the land subject to our sceptre, then hear and believe : — I, Presbyter Johannes, the Lord of Lords, surpass all under heaven in virtue, in riches, and in power ; seventy-two kings pay us tribute. ... In the three Indies our Magnificence rules, and our land extends beyond India, where rests the body of the holy Apostle Thomas ; it reaches towards the sunrise over the wastes, and it trends towards deserted Babylon near the tower of Babel. Seventy-two provinces, of which only a few are Christian, serve us. Each has its own king, but all are tributary to us.

" Our land is the home of elephants, dromedaries, camels, crocodiles, meta-collinarum, cametennus, tensevetes, wild asses, white and red lions, white bears, white merles, crickets, griffins, tigers, lamias, hyaenas, wild horses, wild oxen and wild men, men with horns, one-eyed, men with eyes before and behind, centaurs, fauns, satyrs, pygmies, forty-ell high giants, Cyclopses, and similar women ; it is the home, too, of the phoenix, and of nearly all living animals. We have some people subject to us who feed on the flesh of men and of prematurely born animals, and who never fear death. When any of these people die, their friends and relations eat him

4-0 Pr ester ^oJin

ravenously, for they regard It as a main duty to munch human flesh. Their names are Gog and Magog, Anie, Agit, Azenach, Fommeperi, Befari, Conei-Samante, Agrimandri, Vintefolei, Casbei, Alanei. These and similar nations were shut in behind lofty mountains by Alexander the Great, towards the North. We lead them at our pleasure against our foes, and neither man nor beast is left undevoured, if our Majesty gives the requisite per- mission. And when all our foes are eaten, then we return with our hosts home again. These accursed fifteen nations will burst forth from the fotir quarters of the earth at the end of the world, in the times of Antichrist, and overrun all the abodes of the Saints as well as the great city Rome, which, by the way, we are prepared to give to our son who will be born, along with all Italy, Germany, the tw^ Gauls, Britain and Scotland. We shall also give hi Spain and all the land as far as the icy sea. Tb nations to which I have alluded, according to the words of the prophet, shall not stand in the judg- ment, on account of their offensive practices, but will be consumed to ashes by a fire which will fall on them from heaven.

" Our land streams with honey, and is overflow- ing with milk. In one region grows no poisonous

lO

I

Pr ester John 41

herb, nor does a querulous frog ever quack In it, no scorpion exists, nor does the serpent glide amongst the grass, nor can any poisonous animals exist in it, or injure any one.

"Among the heathen, flows through a certain province the river Indus ; encircling Paradise, it spreads its arms in manifold windings through the entire province. Here are found the emeralds, sapphires, carbuncles, topazes, chrysolites, onyxes, beryls, sardius, and other costly stones. Here grows the plant Assidos, which, when worn by any one, protects him from the evil spirit, forcing it to state its business and name ; consequently the foul spirits keep out of the way there. In a certain land subject to us, all kinds of pepper is gathered, and is exchanged for corn and bread, leather and cloth. ... At the foot of Mount Olympus bubbles up a spring which changes its flavour hour by hour, night and day, and the spring is scarcely three days' journey from Paradise, out of which Adam was driven. If any one has tasted thrice of the fountain, from that day he will feel no fatigue, but v/ill as long as he lives be as a man of thirty years. Here are found the small stones called Nudiosi, which, if borne about the body, prevent the sight from waxing feeble, and restore it where it is lost.

42 Prester John

The more the stone is looked at, the keener becomes the sight. In our territory is a certain waterless sea, consisting of tumbling billows of sand never at rest. None have crossed this sea ; it lacks water altogether, yet fish are cast up upon the beach of various kinds, very tasty, and the like are nowhere else to be seen. Three days' journey from this sea are mountains from which rolls down a 5tony, waterless river, which opens into the sandy sea. As soon as the stream reaches the sea, its stones vanish in it and are never seen again. As long as the river is in motion, it cannot be crossed ; only four days a week is it possible to traverse it. Between the sandy sea and the said mountains, in a certain plain is a fountain of singular virtue, which purges Christians and would-be Christians from all transgressions. The water stands four inches high in a hollow stone shaped like a mussel- shell. Two saintly old men watch by it, and ask the comers whether they are Christians, or are about to become Christians, then whether they desire healing with all their hearts. If they have answered well, they are bidden to lay aside their clothes, and to step into the mussel. If what they said be true, then the water begins to rise and gush over their heads ; thrice does the water thus lift

Prestcr John 43

itself, and every one who has entered the mussel leaves it cured of every complaint.

"Near the wilderness trickles between barren mountains a subterranean rill, which can only by chance be reached, for only occasionally the earth gapes, and he who would descend must do it with precipitation, ere the earth closes again. All that is gathered under the ground there is gem and precious stone. The brook pours into another river, and the inhabitants of the neighbourhood obtain thence abundance of precious stones. Yet they never venture to sell them without having first offered them to us for our private use : should we decHne them, they are at liberty to dispose of them to strangers. Boys there are trained to remain three or four days under water, diving after the stones.

" Beyond the stone river are the ten tribes of the Jews, which, though subject to their own kings, are, for all that, our slaves and tributary to our Majesty. In one of our lands, hight Zone, are worms called in our tongue Salamanders. These worms can only live in fire, and they build cocoons like silk- worms, which are unwound by the ladies of our palace, and spun into cloth and dresses, which are worn by our Exaltedness. These dresses in order

44 Prester John

to be cleaned and washed are cast into flames. . . . When we go to war, we have fourteen golden and bejewelled crosses borne before us instead of banners ; each of these crosses is followed by 1 0,000 horsemen, and 100,000 foot soldiers fully armed, without reckoning those in charge of the luggage and provision.

"When we ride abroad plainly, we have a wooden, unadorned cross, without gold or gem about it, borne before us, in order that we may m-editate on the sufferings of Our Lord Jesus Christ ; also a golden bowl filled with earth, to remind us of that whence we sprung, and that to which we must return ; but besides these there is borne a silver bowl full of gold, as a token to all that we are the Lord of Lords.

"All riches, such as are upon the world, our Magnificence possesses in superabundance. With us no one lies, for he who speaks a lie is thence- forth regarded as dead ; he is no more thought of, or honoured by us. No vice is tolerated by us. Every year we undertake a pilgrimage, with retinue of war, to the body of the holy prophet Daniel, which is near the desolated site of Babylon. In our realm fishes are caught, the blood of which dyes purple. The Amazons and the Brahmins are sub-

Prester John 45

ject to us. The palace in which our Supereminency resides, is built after the pattern of the castle built by the Apostle Thomas for the Indian king Gundo- forus. Ceilings, joists, and architrave are of Sethym wood, the roof of ebony, which can never catch fire. Over the gable of the palace are, at the extremities, two golden apples, in each of which are two carbuncles, so that the gold may shine by day, and the carbuncles by night. The greater gates of the palace are of sardius, with the horn of the horned snake inwrought, so that no one can bri^ig poison within.

" The other portals are of ebony. The windows are of crystal ; the tables are partly of gold, partly of amethyst, and the columns supporting the tables are partly of ivory, partly of amethyst. The court in which we watch the jousting is floored with onyx in order to increase the courage of the combatants. In the palace, at night, nothing is burned for light but wicks supplied with balsam. . . . Before our palace stands a mirror, the ascent to which consists of five and twenty steps of porphyry, and serpen- tine." After a description of the gems adorning this mirror, which is guarded night and day by three thousand armed men. he exolains its use : " We

46 Prester John

look therein and behold all that is taking place in every province and region subject to our sceptre.

" Seven kings wait upon us monthly, in turn, with sixty-two dukes, two hundred and fifty-six counts and marquises : and twelve archbishops sit at table with us on our right, and twenty bishops on the left, besides the patriarch of S. Thomas, the Sarmatian Protopope, and the Archpope of Susa. . . . Our lord high steward is a primate and king, our cup-bearer is an archbishop and king, our chamberlain a bishop and king, our marshal a king and abbot."

I may be spared further extracts from this extra- ordinary letter, which proceeds to describe the church in which Prester John worships, by enumerating the precious stones of which it is constructed, and their special virtues.

Whether this letter was in circulation before Pope Alexander wrote his, it is not easy to decide. Alexander does not allude to it, but speaks of the reports which have reached him of the piety and the magnificence of the Priest -King. At the same time, there runs a tone of bitterness through the letter, as though the Pope had been galled at the pretensions of this mysterious personage, and per-

Pr ester John 47

haps winced under the prospect of the man-eaters overrunning Italy, as suggested by John the Priest. The papal epistle is an assertion of the claims of the See of Rome to universal dominion, and it assures the Eastern Prince-Pope that his Christian professions are worthless, unless he submits to the successor of Peter. "Not every one that saith unto me. Lord, Lord," &c., quotes the Pope, and then explains that the will of God is that every monarch and prelate should eat humble pie to the Sovereign Pontiff.

Sir John Maundevil gives the origin of the priestly title of the Eastern despot, in his curious book of travels.

" So it befelle, that this emperour cam, with a Cristene knyght with him, into a chirche in Egypt : and it was Saterday in Wyttson woke. And the bishop made orders. And he beheld and listened the servyse fulle tentyfly ; and he asked the Cristene knyght, what men of degree thei scholden ben, that the prelate had before him. And the knyght an- swerede and seyde, that thei scholde ben prestes. And then the emperour seyde, that he wolde no longer ben clept kyng ne emperour, but preest : and that he wolde have the name of the first preest, that wente out of the chirche ; and his name was

48 Prestcr John

John. And so evere more sittlens, he is clept Prestre John."

It is probable that the foundation of the whole Prester-John myth lay in the report which reached Europe of the wonderful successes of Nestorianism in the East, and there seems reason to believe that the famous letter given above was a Nestorian fabrication. It certainly looks un- European ; the gorgeous imagery is thoroughly Eastern, and the disparaging tone in which Rome is spoken of could hardly have been the expression of Western feelings. The letter has the object in view of exalting the East in religion and arts to an undue eminence at the expense of the West, and it manifests some ignorance of European geography, when it speaks of the land extending from Spain to the Polar Sea. Moreover, the sites of the patri- archates, and the dignity conferred on that of S. Thomas are indications of a Nestorian bias. • A brief glance at the history of this heretical Church may be of value here, as showing that there really was a foundation for the wild legends con- cerning a Christian empire in the East, so prevalei in Europe. Nestorius, a priest of Antioch and disciple of S. Chrysostom, was elevated by tl emperor to the patriar-chate of Constantinople, ani

Prester John 49

in the year 428 began to propagate his heresy, denying the hypostatic union. The Council of Ephesus denounced him, and, in spite of the emperor and court, Nestorius was anathematized and driven into exile. His sect spread through the East, and became a flourishing Church. It reached to China, where the emperor was all but converted ; its missionaries traversed the frozen tundras of Siberia, preaching their maimed Gospel to the wild hordes which haunted those dreary wastes ; it faced Buddhism and wrestled with it for the religious supremacy in Thibet ; it established churches in Persia and in Bokhara ; it penetrated India ; it formed colonies in Ceylon, in Siam, and in Sumatra ; so that the Catholicos or Pope of Bagdad exercised sway more extensive than that ever obtained by the successor of S. Peter. The number of Christians belonging to that communion probably exceeded that of the members of the true Catholic Church in East and West. But the Nestorian Church was not founded on the Rock, it rested on Nestorius, and when the rain descended, and the winds blew, and the floods came, and beat upon that house, it fell, leaving scarce a fragment behind.

Rubruquis the Franciscan, who in 1253 was sent

E

50 Pr ester John

on a mission into Tartary, was the first to let in a little light on the fable. He writes, " The Catai dwelt beyond certain mountains across which I wandered, and in a plain in the midst of the moun- tains lived once an important Nestorian shepherd, who ruled over the Nestorian people, called Nay- man. When Coir-Khan died, the Nestorian people raised this man to be king, and called him King Johannes, and related of him ten times as much as the truth. The Nestorians thereabouts have this way with them, that about nothing they make a great fuss, and thus they have got it noised abroad that Sartach, Mangu-Khan, and Ken-Khan were Christians, simply because they treated Christians well, and showed them more honour than other people. Yet, in fact, they were not Christians at all. And in like manner the story got about that there was a great King John. However, I traversed his pastures, and no one knew any thing about him, except a few Nestorians. In his pastures lives Ken-Khan, at whose court was Brother Andrew, whom I met on my way back. This Johannes had d brother, a famous shepherd, named Unc, who lived three weeks' journey beyond the mountains of Caracatais."

This Unk-Khan was a real individual ; he lost

Presier John 51

his life in the year 1203. Kuschhik, prince of the Nayman, and follower of Kor-Khan, fell in 1218. »»

Marco Polo, the Venetian traveller (1254 — 1324), identifies Unk-Khan with Prester John ; he says, " I will now tell you of the deeds of the Tartars, how they gained the mastery, and spread over the whole earth. The Tartars dwelt between Georgia and Bargu, where there is a vast plain and level country, on which are neither cities nor forts, but capital pasturage and water. They had no chief of their own, but paid to Prester Johannes tribute. Of the greatness of this Prester Johannes, who was properly called Un-Khan, the whole world spake ; the Tartars gave him one of every ten head of cattle. When Prester John noticed that they were increasing, he feared them, and planned how he could injure them. He determined therefore to scatter them, and he sent barons to do this. But the Tartars guessed what Prester John purposed .... and they went away into the wide wastes of the North, where they might be beyond his reach." He then goes on to relate how Tschengis- (Jenghiz-)Khan became the head of the Tartars, and how he fought against Prester John, and, after a desperate fight, overcame and slew him. E 2

52 Prester John

The Syriac Chronicle of the Jacobite Primate, Gregory Bar-Hebraeus (born 1226, died 1286), also identifies Unk-Khan with Prester John. " In the year of the Greeks 1514, of the Arabs 599 (a.D. 1202), when Unk-Khan, who is the Christian King John, ruled over a stock of the barbarian Hunns, called Kergis, Tschengys-Khan served him with great zeal. When John observed the superiority and serviceableness of the other, he envied him, and plotted to seize and murder him. But two sons of Unk-Khan, having heard this, told it to Tschengys, whereupon he and his comrades fled by night and secreted themselves. Next morning Unk-Khan took possession of the Tartar tents, but found them empty. Then the party of Tschengys fell upon him, and they met by the spring called Balschunah, and the side of Tschengys won the day ; and the followers of Unk-Khan were compelled to yield. They met again several times, till Unk-Khan was utterly discomfited and was slain himself, and his wives, sons, and daughters carried into captivity. Yet we must consider that John, king of the Kergis, was not cast down for nought, nay rather, because he had turned his heart from the fear of Christ his Lord, who had exalted him, and had taken a

P Tester John 53

wife of the Zinlsh nation, called Quarakhata. Because he forsook the religion of his ancestors and followed strange gods, therefore God took the government from him, and gave it to one better than he, and whose heart was right before God."

Some of the early travellers, such as John de Plano-Carpini and Marco Polo, in disabusing the popular mind of the belief in Prester John as a mighty Asiatic Christian monarch, unintentionally turned the popular faith in that individual into a new direction. They spoke of the black people of Abascia in Ethiopia, which, by the way, they called Middle India, as a great people subject to a Christian monarch.

Marco Polo says that the true monarch of Abyssinia is Christ ; but that it is governed by six kings, three of whom are Christians and three Saracens, and that they are in league with the Soudan of Aden.

Bishop Jordanus, in his description of the world, accordingly sets down Abyssinia as the kingdom of Prester John ; and such was the popular im- pression, which was confirmed by the appearance at intervals of ambassadors at European courts from the King of Abyssinia. The discovery of the Cape of Good Hope was due partly to a desire

54 Prester John

manifested in Portugal to open communications with this monarch'', and King John II. sent two men learned in Oriental languages through Egypt to the court of Abyssinia. The might and domi- nion of this prince, who had replaced the Tartar chief in the popular creed as Prester John, was of course greatly exaggerated, and was supposed to extend across Arabia and Asia to the wall of China. The spread of geographical knowledge has contracted the area of his dominions, and a critical acquaintance with history has exploded the myth which invested Unk-Khan the nomad chief with all the attributes of a demigod, uniting in one the utmost pretensions of a Pope and the proudest claims of a monarch.

^ Ludolfi, Hist. yEthiopica, lib. ii. cap. i, 2. Petrus, Petri filius Lusitaniae princeps, M. Pauli Veneti librum (qui de Indorum rebus multa : speciatim vero de Presbytero Johanne aliqua magnifice scripsit) Venetiis secum in patriam detu- lerat, qui (Chronologicis Lusitanorum testantibus) pr^ecipuam Johanni Regi ansam dedit Indicae navigationis, quam Hen- ricus Johannis I. filius, patruus ejus, tentaverat, prose- quendae, &c.

I

CJe Btbining l^oTi

FROM the remotest period a rod has been regarded as the symbol of power and autho- rity, and Holy Scripture employs it in the popular sense. Thus David speaks of " Thy rod and Thy staff comforting me;" and Moses works his miracles before Pharaoh with the rod as emblem of Divine commission. It was his rod which became a serpent, which turned the water of Egypt into blood, which opened the waves of the Red Sea and restored them to their former level, which " smote the rock of stone so that the water gushed out abundantly." The rod of Aaron acted an oracular part in the contest with the princes ; laid up before the ark, it budded and brought forth almonds. In this in- stance we have it no longer as a symbol of autho- rity, but as a means of divining the will of God. And as such it became liable to abuse ; thus Hosea

56 The Divining Rod

rebukes the chosen people for practising similar divinations. "My people ask counsel at their stocks, and their staff declareth unto them'."

Long before this, Jacob had made a different use of rods, employing them as a charm to make his father-in-law's sheep bear pied and spotted lambs.

We find rabdomancy a popular form of divina- tion among the Greeks, and also among the Romans. Cicero in his "De Officiis" alludes to it. " If all that is needful for our nourishment and support arrives to us by means of some divine rod, as people say, then each of us, free from all care and trouble, may give himself up to the exclusive pursuit of study and science"."

Probably it is to this rod that Ennius alludes in the passage quoted in the first book of his " De Divinatione," wherein he laughs at those who for a drachma will teach the art of discovering treasures.

According to Vetranius Maurus, Varro left a satire on the " Virgula divina," which has not been preserved. Tacitus tells us that the Germans practised some sort of divination by means of rods.

* Hos. iv. 12. 2 £)£ Officiis. lib. i. cap. 44.

The D ivin ing Red 5 7

" For the purpose their method is simple. They cut a rod off some fruit-tree into bits, and after having distinguished them by various marks, they cast them into a white cloth. . . . Then the priest thrice draws each piece, and explains the oracle according to the marks ^." Ammianus Marcellinus says that the Alains employed an osier rod*.

The fourteenth law of the Prisons ordered that the discovery of murders should be made by means of divining rods used in Church. These rods should be laid before the altar, and on the sacred relics, after which God was to be supplicated to indicate the culprit. This was called the Lot of rods, or Tan-teen, the Rod of Rods.

But the middle ages was the date of the full development of the superstition, and the divining rod was believed to have efhcacy in discovering hidden treasures, veins of precious metal, springs of water, thefts, and murders. The first notice of its general use among late writers is in the " Testa- mentum Novum," hb. i. cap. 25, of Basil Valentine, a Benedictine monk of the fifteenth century. Basil speaks of the general faith in and adoption of this valuable instrument for the discovery of metals,

^ Tacitus, German., cap. x. ** Ammian. Marcel, xxxi. 2.

58 The Divining Rod

which is carried by workmen in mines, either in their belts or in their caps. He says that there are seven names by which this rod is known, and to its excellencies under each title he devotes a chapter of his book. The names are : — Divine Rod, Shining Rod, Leaping Rod, Transcendent Rod, Trembling Rod, Dipping Rod, Superior Rod. In his admirable treatise on metals, Agricola speaks of the rod in terms of disparagement ; he considers its use as a relic of ancient magical forms, and he says that it is only irreligious workmen who employ it in their search after metals. Goclenius, however, in his treatise on the virtue of plants, stoutly does battle for the properties of the hazel rod. Whereupon Roberti, a Flemish Jesuit, falls upon him tooth and nail, disputes his facts, overwhelms him with abuse, and gibbets him for popular ridicule. Andreas Libavius, a writer I have already quoted in my article on the Wandering Jew, undertook a series of experiments upon the hazel divining rod, and concluded that there was truth in the popular belief. The Jesuit Kircher also " experimentalized several times on wooden rods which were declared to be sympathetic with regard to certain metals, by placing them on delicate pivots in equilibrium, but they never turned on the approach of metal." (De

The Divining Rod 59

Arte Magnetica.) However, a similar course of experiments over water led him to attribute to the rod the power of indicating subterranean springs and watercourses ; " I would not affirm it," he says, *' unless I had established the fact by my own experience."

Dechales, another Jesuit, author of a treatise on natural springs, and of a huge tome entitled •'Mundus Mathematicus," declared in the latter work, that no means of discovering sources is equal to the divining rod ; and he quotes a friend of his who, with a hazel rod in his hand, could discover springs with the utmost precision and facility, and could trace on the surface of the ground the course of a subterranean conduit. Another writer, Saint- Romain, in his " Science degagee des Chimeres de I'Ecole," exclaims ; " Is it not astonishing to see a rod which is held firmly in the hands, bow itself and turn visibly in the direction of water or metal, with more or less promptitude, according as the metal or the water are near or remote from the surface!"

In 1659 the Jesuit Gaspard Schott writes that the rod is used in every town of Germany, and that he had frequent opportunity of seeing it used in the discovery of hidden treasures. "\ searched

60 The Divining Rod

with the greatest care," he adds, " into the question whether the hazel rod had any sympathy with gold and silver, and whether any natural property set it in motion. In like manner I tried whether a ring of metal, held suspended by a thread in the midst of a tumbler, and which strikes the hours, is moved by any similar force. I ascertained that these effects could only have arisen from the deception of those holding the rod or the pendulum, or, may be, from some diabolic impulsion, or, more likely still, because imagination sets the hand in motion."

The Sieur le Royer, a lawyer of Rouen, in 1674, published his " Traite du Baton universel," in which he gives an account of a trial made with the rod in the presence of Father Jean Frangois, who had ridiculed the operation in his treatise on the science of waters, published at Rennes in 1655, and which succeeded in convincing the blasphe- mer of the divine Rod. Le Royer denies to it the power of picking out criminals, which had been popularly attributed to it, and as had been un- hesitatingly claimed for it by Debrio in his " Dis- quisitio Magica."

And now I am brought to the extraordinary story of Jacques Aymar, which attracted the at- tention of Europe to the marvellous properties of

The Divitiing Rod 61

the divining rod. I shall give the history of .this man in full, as such an account is rendered neces- sary by the mutilated versions I have seen current in English magazine articles, which follow the lead of Mrs. Crowe, who narrates the earlier portion of this impostor's career, but says nothing of his expose and downfall.

On the 5th July, 1692, at about ten o'clock in the evenings a wine-seller of Lyons and his wife were assassinated in their cellar, and their money carried off. On the morrow, the officers of justice arrived, and examined the premises. Beside the corpses, lay a large bottle wrapped in straw, and a bloody hedging bill, which undoubtedly had been the instrument used to accomplish the murder. Not a trace of those who had committed the horrible deed was to be found, and the magis- trates were quite at fault as to the direction in which they should turn for a clue to the murderer or murderers.

At this juncture a neighbour reminded the magistrates of an incident which had taken place four years previous. It was this. In 1688 a theft of clothes had been made in Grenoble. In the parish of Crole lived a man named Jacques Aymar, supposed to be endowed with the faculty of using

62 The Divining Rod

the divining rod. This man was sent for. On reaching the spot where the theft had been com- mitted, his rod moved in his hand. He followed the track indicated by the rod, and it con- tinued to rotate between his fingers as long as he followed a certain direction, but ceased to turn if he diverged from it in the smallest degree. Guided by his rod, Aymar went from street to street, till he was brought to a standstill before the prison gates. These could not be opened without leave of the magistrate, who hastened to witness the experiment. The gates were unlocked, and Aymar, under the same guidance, directed his steps towards four prisoners lately incarcerated. He ordered the four to be stood in a line, and then he placed his foot on that of the first. The rod remained immovable. He passed to the second, and the rod turned at once. Before the third prisoner there were no signs, the fourth trembled, and begged to be heard. He owned himself the thief, along with the second, who also acknow- ledged the theft, and mentioned the name of the receiver of the stolen goods. This was a farmer in the neighbourhood of Grenoble. The magistrate and officers vjsited him and demanded the articles he had obtained. The farmer denied all know-

The Divinhig Rod 63

ledge of the theft and all participation in the booty. Aymar, however, by means of his rod, discovered the secreted property, and restored it to the persons from whom it had been stolen.

On another occasion Aymar had been in quest of a spring of water, when he felt his rod turn sharply in his hand. On digging at the spot, expecting to discover an abundant source, the body of a murdered woman was found in a barrel, with a rope twisted round her neck. The poor creature was recognized as a woman of the neigbourhood who had vanished four months before. Aymar went to the house which the victim had inhabited, and presented his rod to each member of the household. It turned upon the husband of the deceased, who at once took to flight.

The magistrates of Lyons, at their wits' end how to discover the perpetrators of the double murder in the wine-shop, urged the Procureur du Roi to make experiment of the powers of Jacques Aymar. The fellow was sent for, and he boldly asserted his capacity for detecting criminals, if he were first brought to the spot of the murder, so as to be put en rapport with the murderers.

He was at once conducted to the scene of the outrage, with the rod in his hand. This remained

64 The Diviiiinz Rod

^>

Stationary as he traversed the cellar, till he reached the spot where the body of the wine-seller had lain ; then the stick became violently agitated, and the man's pulse rose as though he were in an access of fever. The same motions and symptoms manifested themselves when he reached the place where the second victim had lain.

Having thus received his imp7'ession, Aymar left the cellar, and, guided by his rod, or rather by an internal instinct, he ascended into the shop, and then stepping into the street, he followed from one to another, like a hound upon the scent, the track of the murderers. It conducted him into the court of the archiepiscopal palace, across it, and down to the gate of the Rhone. It was now evening, and the city gates being all closed, the quest of blood was relinquished for the night.

Next morning Aymar returned to the scent. Accompanied by three officers, he left the gate and descended the right bank of the Rhone. The rod gave indications of there having been three involved in the murder, and he pursued the traces till two of them led to a gardener's cottage. Into this he entered, and there he asserted with warmth, against the asseverations of the proprietor to the contrary, that the fugitives had entered his room,

The Divininz Rod 65

"£:>

had seated themselves at his table, and had drunk wine out of one of the bottles which he indicated. Aymar tested each of the household with his rod, to see if they had been in contact with the mur- derers. The rod moved over the two children only, aged respectively ten and nine years. These little things on being questioned, answered with reluctance, that during their father's absence on Sunday miorning, against his express commands, they had left the door open, and that two men, whom they described, had come in suddenly upon them, and had seated themselves and made free with the wine in the bottle pointed out by the man with the rod. This first verification of the talents of Jacques Aymar convinced some of the sceptical, but the Procurator General forbad the prosecution of the experiment till the man had been further tested.

As already stated, a hedging bill had been dis- covered on the scene of the murder, smeared with blood, and unquestionably the weapon with which the crime had been committed. Three bills from the same maker, and of precisely the same descrip- tion, were obtained, and the four were taken into a garden, and secretly buried at intervals. Aymar was then brought, staff in hand, into the garden,

F

66 The Divininsr Rod

t,

and conducted over the spots where lay the bills. The rod began to vibrate as his feet stood upon the place where was concealed the bill which had been used by the assassins, but was motionless elsewhere. Still unsatisfied, the four bills were exhumed and concealed anew. The comptroller of the province himself bandaged the sorcerer's eyes and led him by the hand from place to place. The divining rod showed no signs of movement till it approached the blood-stained weapon, when it began to oscillate.

The magistrates were now so far satisfied as to agree that Jacques Aymar should be authorized to follow the trail of the murderers, and have a company of archers to follow him.

Guided by his rod, Aymar now recommenced his pursuit. He continued tracing down the right bank of the Rhone till he came to half a league from the bridge of Lyons. Here the footprints of three men were observed in the sand, as though engaged in entering a boat. A rowing boat was obtained, and Aymar with his escort descended the river; he found some difficulty in following the trail upon water, still he was able with a little care to detect it. It brought him under an arch of the bridge of Vienne, which boats rarely passed

The Divining Rod 67

'^>

beneath. This proved that the fugitives were without a guide. The way in which this curious journey was made was singular. At intervals Aymar was put ashore to test the banks with his rod, and ascertain whether the murderers had landed. He discovered the places where they had slept, and indicated the chairs or benches on which they had sat. In this manner, by slow degrees he arrived at the military camp of Sablon, between Vienne and Saint- Valier. There Aymar felt violent agitation, his cheeks flushed, and his pulse beat with rapidity. He penetrated the crowds of soldiers, but did not venture to use his rod, lest the men should take it ill, and fall upon him. He could not do more without special authority, and was constrained to return to Lyons. The magis- trates then provided him with the requisite powers, and he went back to the camp. Now he declared that the murderers were not there. He recom- menced his pursuit, and descended the Rhone again as far as Beaucaire.

On entering the town he ascertained by means of his rod that those whom he was pursuing had parted company. He traversed several streets, then crowded on account of the annual fair, and was brought to a standstill before the prison

F 2

G8 The Divining Rod

doors. One of the murderers was within, he declared, he would track the others afterwards. Having obtained permission to enter, he was brought into the presence of fourteen or fifteen prisoners. Amongst these was a hunchback who had only an hour previously been incarcerated on account of a theft he had committed at the fair. Aymar applied his rod to each of the prisoners in succession : it turned upon the hunchback. The sorcerer ascertained that the other two had left the town by a little path leading into the Nismes road. Instead of following this track, he returned to Lyons with the hunchback and the guard. At Lyons a triumph awaited him. The hunchback had hitherto protested his innocence, and declared that he had never set foot in Lyons. But as he was brought to that town by the way along which Aymar had ascertained that he had left it, the fellow was recognized at the different houses where he had lodged the night, or stopped for food. At the little town of Bagnols, he was confronted with the host and hostess of a tavern where he and his comrades had slept, and they swore to his identity, and accurately described his companions : their description tallied with that given by the children of the gardener. The wretched man was so con-

The Divining Rod 69

founded by this recognition, that he avowed having stayed there a few days before, along with two Proven9als. These men, he said, were the crimi- nals ; he had been their servant, and had only kept guard in the upper room whilst they committed the murders in the cellar.

On his arrival in Lyons he was committed to prison, and his trial was decided on. At his first interrogation he told his tale precisely as he had related it before, with these additions, — the mur- derers spoke patois, and had purchased two bills. At ten o'clock in the evening all three had entered the wine-shop. The Provengals had a large bottle wrapped in straw, and they persua'ded the publican and his wife to descend with them into the cellar to fill it, whilst he, the hunchback, acted as watch in the shop. The two men murdered the wine- seller and his wife with their bills, and then mounted to the shop, where they opened the coffer and stole from it 130 crowns, eight Louis d'ors, and a silver belt. The crime accomplished, they took refuge in the court of a large house, — this was the archbishop's palace, indicated by Aymar, — and passed the night in it. Next day, early, they left Lyons, and only stopped for a moment at a gar- dener's cottage. Some way down the river, they

70 The Divining Rod

found a boat moored to the bank. This they loosed from its mooring and entered. They came ashore at the spot pointed out by the man with the stick. They stayed some days in the camp at Sablon, and then went on to Beaucaire.

Aymar was now sent in quest of the other murderers. He resumed their trail at the gate of Beaucaire, and that of one of them, after consider- able detours, led him to the prison doors of Beaucaire, and he asked to be allowed to search among the prisoners for his man. This time he was mistaken. The second fugitive was not within ; but the gaoler affirmed that a man whom he de- scribed,— and his description tallied with the known appearance of one of the Provenpals, — had called at the gate shortly after the removal of the hunch- back, to inquire after him, and on learning of his removal to Lyons, had hurried off precipitately. Aymar now followed his track from the prison, and this brought him to that of the third criminal. He pursued the double scent for some days. But it became evident that the two culprits had been alarmed at what had transpired in Beaucaire, and were flying from France. Aymar traced them to the frontier, and then returned to Lyons.

On the 30th of August, 1692, the poor hunch-

TJie Divift mg Rod 71

back was, according to sentence, broken on the wheel, in the Place des Terreaux. On his way to execution he had to pass the wine-shop. There the recorder publicly read his sentence, which had been delivered by thirty judges. The criminal knelt and asked pardon of the poor wretches in whose murder he was involved, after which he continued his course to the place fixed for his execution.

It may be well here to give an account of the authorities for this extraordinary story. There are three circumstantial accounts, and numerous letters written by the magistrate who sat during the trial, and by an eye-witness of the whole transaction, men honourable and disinterested, upon whose veracity not a shadow of doubt was supposed to rest by their contemporaries.

M. Chauvin, Doctor of Medicine, published a Lettre a Mine, la Marquise de Senozan^ stir les inoyens dont on sest servi pour decouvrir les complices d'un assassinat commis a Lyon, le 5 Juillet, 1692, Lyons, 1692. The proces-verbal of the Procureur du Roi, M. de Vanini, is also extant, and published in the Physique occulte of the Abbe de Valle- mont.

Pierre Gamier, Doctor of Medicine of the

72 The Divining Rod

University of Montpelier, wrote a Dissertation physique en forme de lettre, a M. de Seve, seigneur de Flecheres, on Jacques Aymar, printed the same year at Lyons, and republished in the Histoire critique des pratiques super stitieuses, du Pere Lebrun.

Doctor Chauvin was witness of nearly all the circumstances related, as was also the Abbe Lagarde, who has written a careful account of the whole transaction as far as to the execution of the hunchback.

Another eye-witness writes to the Abbe Bignon a letter printed by Lebrun in his Histoire cri- tique cited above. "The following circumstance happened to me yesterday evening," he says ; " M. le Procureur du Roi here, who, by the way, is one of the wisest and cleverest men in the country, sent for me at six o'clock, and had me conducted to the scene of the murder. We found there M. Grimaut, director of the customs, whom I knew to be a very upright man, and a young attorney named Besson, with whom I am not acquainted, but who M. le Procureur du Roi told me had the power of using the rod as well as M. Grimaut. We descended into the cellar where the murder had been committed, and where there were still traces of blood. Each

The Divininz Rod 73

'i>

time that M. Grimaut and the attorney passed the spot where the murder had been perpetrated, the rods they held in their hands began to turn, but ceased when they stepped beyond the spot. We tried experiments for more than an hour, as also with the bill, which M. le Procureur had brought along with him, and they were satisfactory. I ob- served several curious facts in the attorney. The rod in his hands was more violently moved than in those of M. Grimaut, and when I placed one of my fingers in each of his hands, whilst the rod turned, I felt the most extraordinary throbbings of the arteries in his palms. His pulse was at fever- heat. He sweated profusely, and at intervals he was compelled to go into the court to obtain fresh air."

The Sieur Pauthot, Dean of the College of Medicine at Lyons, gave his observations to the public as well Some of them are as follows : " We began at the cellar in which the murder had been committed ; into this the man with the rod (Aymar) shrank from entering, because he felt violent agitations which overcame him when he used the stick over the place where the corpses of those who had been assassinated had lain. On entering the cellar, the rod was put in my hands,

74 The Divi7ii7tg Rod

and arranged by the master as most suitable fo? operation ; I passed and repassea over tne spot where the bodies had been found, but it remained immovable, and I felt no agitation. A lady of rank and merit, who was with us, took the rod after me : she felt it begin to move, and was internally agitated. Then the owner of the rod resumed it. and, passing over the same places, the stick rotated with such violence that it seemed easier to break than to stop it. The peasant then quitted our company to faint away, as was his wont after similar experiments. I followed him. He turned very pale and broke into a profuse perspiration, whilst for a quarter of an hour his pulse was violently troubled ; indeed the faintness was so considerable, that they were obliged to dash water in his face and give him water to drink in order to bring him round." He then describes experiments made over the bloody bill and others similar, which succeeded in the hands of Aymar and the lady, but failed when he attempted them himself Pierre Gamier, physician of the medical college of Mont- pelier, appointed to that of Lyons, has also written an account of what he saw, as mentioned above. He gives a curious proof of Aymar's powers.

The Divining Rod 75

" M. le Lieutenant-General having been robbed by one of his lackeys, seven or eight months ago, and having lost by him twenty-five crowns which had been taken out of one of the cabinets behind his library, sent for Aymar, and asked him to discover the circumstances. Aymar went several times round the chamber, rod in hand, placing one foot on the chairs, on the various articles of furni- ture, and on two bureaux which are in the apart- ment, each of which contains several drawers. He fixed on the very bureau and the identical drawer out of which the money had been stolen. M. le Lieutenant-General bade him follow the track of the robber. He did so. With his rod he went out on a new terrace, upon which the cabinet opens, thence back into the cabinet and up to the fire, then into the library, and from thence he went direct up- stairs to the lackeys' sleeping apartment, when the rod guided him to one of the beds, and turned over one side of the bed, remaining motionless over the other. The lackeys then present cried out that the thief had slept on the side indicated by the rod, the bed having been shared with another foot- man, who occupied the further side." Gamier gives a lengthy account of various experiments he made along with the Lieutenant-General, the uncle of the

76 The Divining Rod

same, the Abbe de S. Remain, and M. de Puget, to detect whether there was imposture in the man. But all their attempts failed to discover a trace of deception. He gives a report of verbal examina- tion of Aymar which is interesting. The man always replied with candour.

The report of the extraordinary discovery of murder made by the divining rod at Lyons at- tracted the attention of Paris, and Aymar was ordered up to the capital. There, however, his powers left him. The Prince de Conde submitted him to various tests, and he broke down under every one. Five holes were dug in the garden. In one was secreted gold, in another silver, in a third silver and gold, in the fourth copper, and in the fifth stones. The rod made no signs in presence of the metals, and at last actually began to move over the buried pebbles. He was sent to Chantilly to discover the perpetrators of a theft of trout made in the ponds of the park. He went round the water, rod in hand, and it turned at spots where he said the fish had been drawn out. Then, following the track of the thief, it led him to the cottage of one of the keepers, but did not move over any of the individuals then in the house. The keeper himself was absent, but arrived late at night, and

The Divijiing Rod 11

on hearing what was said, he roused Aymar from his bed, insisting on having his innocence vindi- cated. The divining rod, however, pronounced him guilty, and the poor fellow took to his heels, much upon the principle recommended by Montesquieu a while after. Said he, " If you are accused of having stolen the towers of Notre-Dame, bolt at once."

A peasant, taken at haphazard from the street, was brought to the sorcerer as one suspected. The rod turned slightly, and Aymar declared that the man did not steal the fish, but ate of them. A boy was then introduced, who was said to be the keeper's son. The rod rotated violently at once. This was the finishing stroke, and Aymar was sent away by the Prince in disgrace. It now transpired that the theft of fish had taken place seven years before, and the lad was no relation of the keeper, but a country boy who had only been in Chantilly eight or ten months. M. Goyonnot, Recorder of the King's Council, broke a window in his house, and sent for the diviner, to whom he related a story of his having been robbed of valuables during the night. Aymar indicated the broken window as the means whereby the thief had entered the house, and pointed out the window by which he had left

78 The Divining Rod

it with the booty. As no such robbery had been committed, Aymar was turned out of the house as an impostor. A few similar cases brought him into such disrepute that he was obliged to leave Paris, and return to Grenoble.

Some years after, he was made use of by the Marechal Montrevel, in his cruel pursuit of tl Camisards.

Was Aymar an impostor from first to last, did his powers fail him in Paris } and was it oi then that he had recourse to fraud }

Much may be said in favour of either supposi^ tion. His expose at Paris tells heavily against hii but need not be regarded as conclusive evidence imposture throughout his career. If he really di possess the powers he claimed, it is not to be suj posed that these existed in full vigour under conditions ; and Paris is a place most unsuitable fq testing them, built on artificial soil, and full of di turbing influences of every description. It hi been remarked with others who used the rod, that their powers languished under excitement, and that the faculties had to be in repose, the attention to be concentrated on the subject of inquiry, or the action — nervous, magnetic, or electrical, or what you will — was impeded.

The Divining Rod 79

•^

I

Now Paris, visited for the first time by a poor peasant, its saloons open to him, dazzling him with their splendour, and the novelty of finding himself in the midst of princes, dukes, marquises, and their families, not only may have agitated the country- man to such an extent as to deprive him of his peculiar faculty, but may have led him into simu- lating what he felt had departed from him, at the moment when he was under the eyes of the grandees of the Court. We have analogous cases in Bleton and Angelique Cottin. The former was a hydroscope, who fell into convulsions whenever he passed over running water. This peculiarity was no- ticed in him when a child of seven years old. When brought to Paris, he failed signally to detect the presence of water conveyed underground by pipes and conduits, but he pretended to feel the influence of water where there certainly was none. Angelique Cottin was a poor girl, highly charged with elec- tricity. Any one touching her received a violent shock ; one medical gentleman, having seated her on his knee, was knocked clean out of his chair by the electric fluid, which thus exhibited its sense of propriety. But the electric condition of Angelique became feebler as she approached Paris, and failed her altogether in the capital

80 The Divining Rod

I believe that the imagination is the principal motive force in those who use the divining' rod; but whether it is so solely, I am unable to decide. The powers of nature are so mysterious and in- scrutable that we must be cautious in limiting them, under abnormal conditions, to the ordinary laws of experience.

The manner in which the rod was used by certain persons renders self-deception possible. The rod is, generally of hazel, and is forked like a Y ; the fore- fingers are placed against the diverging arms of th( rod, and the elbows are brought back against the side ; thus the implement is held in front of th( operator, delicately balanced before the pit of th( stomach at a distance of about eight inches. Now, ii the pressure of the balls of the digits be in the least relaxed, the stalk of the rod will naturally fall. Itl has been assumed by some, that a restoration of the pressure will bring the stem up again, pointing towards the operator, and a little further pressure will elevate it into a perpendicular position. A relaxation of force will again lower it, and thus the rotation observed in the rod be maintained. I confess myself unable to accomplish this. The lowering of the leg of the rod is easy enough, but no efforts of mine to produce a revolution on its

The D iviii ins: Rod 81

'<!>

axis have as yet succeeded. The muscles which would contract the fingers upon the arms of the stick, pass over the shoulder ; and it is worthy of remark that one of the medical men who witnessed the experiments made on Bleton the hydroscope, expressly alludes to a slight rising of the shoulders during the rotation of the divining rod.

But the manner of using the rod was by no means identical in all cases. If, in all cases, it had simply been balanced between the fingers, some probability might be given to the suggestion above made, that the rotation was always effected by the involuntary action of the muscles.

The usual manner of holding the rod, however, precluded such a possibility. The most ordinary use consisted in taking a forked stick in such a manner that the palms were turned upwards, and the fingers closed upon the branching arms of t|^e rod. Some required the normal position of the rod to be horizontal, others elevated the point, others again depressed it.

G

82 The Divining Rod

If the implement were straight, it was held in a similar manner, but the hands were brought some- what together, so as to produce a slight arc in the rod. Some who practised rabdomancy sustains this species of rod between their thumbs a forefingers, or else the thumb and forefing were closed, and the rod rested on their points, again it reposed on the flat of the hand, or on t back, the hand being held vertically and the ro' held in equilibrium.

A third species of divining rod consisted in straight staff cut in two : one extremity of the on^ half was hollowed out, the other half was sharpened at the end, and this end was inserted in the hollow, and the pointed stick rotated in the cavity.

The way in which Bleton used his rod is th minutely described : " He does not grasp it, n warm it in his hands, and he does not regard wi preference a hazel branch lately cut and full of s He places horizontally between his forefingers rod of any kind given to him, or picked up in t' road, of any sort of wood except elder, fresh or d not always forked, but sometimes merely bent. If it is straight, it rises slightly at the extremities by little jerks, but does not turn. If bent, it revolves on its axis with more or less rapidity, in more or

POSITIONS OP THE HANDS.

From "Lettres qui decouvrent I'lllusion des Philosophes sur la Baguette. Paris, 1693.

G 2

The Divhmig Rod 85

less time, according to the quantity and current of the water. I counted from thirty to thirty-five revolutions in a minute, and afterwards as many as eighty. A curious phenomenon is, that Bleton is able to make the rod turn between another person's fingers, even without seeing it or touching it, by approaching his body* towards it when his feet stand over a subterranean watercourse. It is true, however, that the motion is much less strong and less continuous in other fingers than his own. If Bleton stood on his head, and placed the rod be- tween his feet, though he felt strongly the pecu- liar sensations produced in him by flowing water, yet the rod remained stationary. If he were insu- lated on glass, silk, or wax, the sensations were less vivid, and the rotation of the stick ceased."

But this experiment failed in Paris under cir- cumstances which either proved that Bleton's imagination produced the movement, or that his integrity was questionable. It is quite possible that in many instances the action of the muscles is purely involuntary, and is attributable to the imagination, so that the operator deceives himself as well as others.

This is probably the explanation of the story of Mdlle. OHvet, a young lady of tender conscience,

86 The Divining Rod

who was a skilful performer with the divining rod, but shrank from putting her powers in operation, lest she should be indulging in unlawful acts. She consulted the Pere Lebrun, author of a work already referred to in this paper, and he advised her to ask God to withdraw the power from her, if the exercise of it was harmful to her spiritual con- dition. She entered into retreat for two days, an^ prayed with fervour. Then she made her commt nion, asking God what had been recommended her, at the moment when she received the Hos In the afternoon of the same day she made expei ment with her rod, and found that it would nj longer operate. The girl had strong faith in before — a faith coupled with fear, and as long that faith was strong in her, the rod moved : noi she believed that the faculty was taken from hei and the power ceased with the loss of her faith.

If the divining rod is put in motion by any other force except the involuntary action of the muscles, we must confine its powers to the property of indi- cating the presence of flowing water. There are numerous instances of hydroscopes thus detecting the existence of a spring or of a subterranean watercourse ; the most remarkably-endowed indi- viduals of thi.«i description are Jean-Jacques Pa-

The Divhimg Rod f57

rangue, born near Marseilles in 1760, who expe- rienced a horror when near water which no one else perceived. He was endowed with the faculty of seeing water through the ground, says I'Abbe Sauri, who gives his history. Jenny Leslie, a Scotch girl, about the same date claimed similar powers. In 1790 Pennet, a native of Dauphine, attracted attention in Italy, but when carefully tested by scientific men in Padua, his attempts to discover buried m.etals failed ; at Florence he was detected in an endeavour to find out, by night, what had been secreted to test his powers on the morrow. Vincent Amoretti was an Italian, who underwent peculiar sensations when brought in proximity to water, coal, and salt ; he was skilful in the use of the rod, but made no public exhibi- tion of his powers.

The rod is still employed, I have heard it as- serted, by Cornish miners, but I have never been able to ascertain that such is really the case. The mining captains whom I have questioned, invari- ably repudiated all knowledge of its use.

In Wiltshire, however, it is still employed for the purpose of detecting water. In the 23nd volume of the Quarterly Review (p. 273, note) will be found a very strongly-attested case, commu-

88

The Divining Rod

fllcated to the writer of an article on " Populj Mythology," by a friend in Norfolk. A certi

Lady N is there stated to have convinced

Hutton of her possession of this mysterious gii and to have by means of it indicated to him tl existence of a spring of water in one of his fielc adjoining the Woolwich College, which, in col sequence of this discovery, he was enabled to s( to the College at a higher price. This power of hei

Lady N repeatedly exhibited before credibj

witnesses, and the Quarterly Reviewer of that d; (1820) held the fact incontrovertible. De Quincej in two passages ^ affirms that he has frequently seen the process applied with success, and declare that, whatever science or scepticism may say, moj of the tea-kettles in the Vale of Wrington, Noi Somersetshire, are filled by rabdomancy. In ill-watered province this would make its professoi an important class, though, as De Quincey allo^ the affinity of their local appellation "jowsers with the slang verb " to chouse," would argue soi suspicion of the soundness of their pretensions. the last number of the " Monthly Packet " (Marcl 1857), a curious story is told how the guests at at

De Quincey's Collected Works, i. p. 84 ; iii. p. 222.

The Divmiiig Rod 89

old Kentish house beset a fellow-guest, said to possess this power, with questions how they were to hold the two forks of the hazel wand. He pro- ceeded to show them with the double stalk of a couple of twin cherries, the party being at dessert, when, lo ! to the astonishment of himself and his questioners, the united portion curled quite over his hand. The master of the house alone knew that under his dining-room floor existed a strong spring of water ^

The following extract from a letter I have just received will show that it is still in vogue on the Continent : —

" I believe the use of the divining rod for dis- covering springs of water has by no means been confined to Mediaeval times, for I was personally acquainted with a lady, now deceased, who has successfully practised with it in this way. She was a very clever and accomplished woman ; Scotch by birth and education ; by no means credulous ; possibly a little imaginative, for she wrote not unsuccessfully ; and of a remarkably open and

straightforward disposition. Captain C y her

husband, had a large estate in Holstein, near

^ Quarterly Review, No. 244, p. 441.

30

The Divining Rod

Lubeck, supporting a considerable population, an^ whether for the wants of the people or for th improvement of the land, it now and then hai pened that an additional well was needed.

" On one of these occasions a man was sent fc who made a regular profession of finding water bj the divining rod ; there happened to be a lar^ party staying at the house, and the whole compani turned out to see the fun. The rod gave indicz tions in the usual way, and water was ultimately

found at the spot. Mrs. C , utterly sceptical,"

took the rod into her own hands to make experi^ ment, believing that she would prove the man a| impostor, and she said afterwards she was nevej more frightened in her life than when it began t^ move, on her walking over the spring. Seven other gentlemen and ladies tried it, but it was quit^ inactive in their hands. ' Well,' said the host t( his wife, ' we shall have no occasion to send for th4 man again, as you are such an adept'

" Some months after this, water was wanted another part of the estate, and it occurred to Mrs

C that she would use the rod again. Aft(

some trials, it again gave decided indicat'.ons, am a well was begun and carried down a verv con- siderable depth.

At last she began to shrink fro

I

Tlie Divining Rod 91

incurring more expense, but the labourers had implicit faith, and begged to be allowed to per- severe. Very soon the water burst up with such force that the men escaped with difficulty ; and this proved afterwards the most unfailing spring for miles round.

" You will take the above for what it is worth ; the facts I have given are undoubtedly true, what- ever conclusions may be drawn from them. I do not propose that you should print my narrative, but I think in these cases personal testimony, even indirect, is more useful in forming one's opinion than a hundred old volumes. I did not hear it

from Mrs. C 's own lips, but I was sufficiently

acquainted with her to form a very tolerable estimate of her character, and my wife, who has known her intimately from her own childhood, was in her younger days often staying with her for months together."

I remember having been much perplexed by reading a series of experiments made with a pen- dulous ring over metals, by a Mr. Mayo ; he ascer- tained that it oscillated in various directions under peculiar circumstances, when suspended by a thread over the ball of the thumb. I instituted a series of experiments, and was surprised to find the ring

92

The Divining- Rod

vibrate in an unaccountable manner in opposite directions over different metals. On consideratioi I closed my eyes whilst the ring was oscillating over gold, and on opening them I found that it had become stationary. I got a friend to change the metals whilst I was blindfolded — the ring n< longer vibrated. I was thus enabled to judge oi the involuntary action of muscles, quite sufficient to have deceived an eminent medical man lik< Mr. Mayo, and to have perplexed me till I suc- ceeded in solving the mystery'.

"^ A similar series of experiments was undertaken, as learned afterwards, by M. Chevreuil in Paris, with similar] results.

Cfie Seben Sleepers of Cl^pjegus

/^NE of the most picturesque myths of ancient ^-^ days, is that which forms the subject of this article. It is thus told by Jacques de Voragine in his " Legenda Aurea :" —

"The seven sleepers were natives of Ephesus. The Emperor Decius, who persecuted the Chris- tians, having come to Ephesus, ordered the erection of temples in the city, that all might come and sacrifice before him, and he commanded that the Christians should be sought out and given their choice, either to worship the idols, or to die. So great was the consternation in the city, that the friend denounced his friend, the father his son, and the son his father.

"Now there were in Ephesus seven Christians, Maximian, Malchus, Marcian, Dionysius, John, Serapion, and Constantine by name. These re-

94

The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus

fused to sacrifice to the idols, and remained their houses praying and fasting. They wei accused before Decius, and they confessed themj selves to be Christians. However, the empero^ gave them a little time to consider what line the] would adopt. They took advantage of this re prieve to dispense their goods among the poor, anc then they retired, all seven, to Mount Celion, whei they determined to conceal themselves.

" One of their number, Malchus, in the disguij of a physician, went to the town to obtain victuals Decius, who had been absent from Ephesus for little while, returned, and gave orders for the sev( to be sought. Malchus, having escaped from thj town, fled, full of fear, to his comraties, and tol^ them of the emperor's fury. They were mu( alarmed ; and Malchus handed them the loaves had bought, bidding them eat, that, fortified by tl food, they might have courage in the time of trij They ate, and then, as they sat weeping and spea] ing to one another, by the will of God they fe asleep.

"The Pagans sought every where, but could n< find them, and Decius was greatly irritated at thej escape. He had their parents brought before tiii and threatened them with death if they did not

The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus 95

reveal the place of concealment ; but they could only answer that the seven young men had distri- buted their goods to the poor, and that they were quite ignorant as to their whereabouts.

" Decius, thinking it possible that they might be hiding in a cavern, blocked up the mouth with stones, that they might perish of hunger.

" Three hundred and sixty years passed, and in the thirtieth year of the reign of Theodosius, there broke forth a heresy denying the resurrection of the dead

" Now, it happened that an Ephesian was building a stable on the side of Mount Celion, and finding a pile of stones handy, he took them for his edifice, and thus opened the mouth of the cave. Then the seven sleepers awoke, and it was to them as if they had slept but a single night. They began to ask Malchus what decision Decius had given concerning them.

" ' He is going to hunt us down, so as to force us to sacrifice to the idols,' was his reply. * God knows,' replied Maximian, 'we shall never do that' Then exhorting his companions, he urged Malchus to go back to the town to buy some more bread, and at the same time to obtain fresh infor- mation. Malchus took five coins and left the

96 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus

cavern. On seeing the stones, he was filled with astonishment ; however, he went on towards the city ; but what was his bewilderment, on approach- ing the gate, to see over it a cross ! He went to another gate, and there he beheld the same sacred sign ; and so he observed it over each gate of the city. He believed that he was suffering from the effects of a dream. Then he entered Ephes rubbing his eyes, and he walked to a baker's sho; He heard people using our Lord's name, and was the more perplexed. * Yesterday, no one dar pronounce the name of Jesus, and now it is every one's lips. Wonderful ! I can hardly believ myself to be in Ephesus.* He asked a passer-b the name of the city, and on being told it wi Ephesus, he was thunderstruck. Now he entered a baker's shop, and laid down his money. The baker, examining the coin, inquired whether he had found a treasure, and began to whisper to some others in the shop. The youth, thinking that he was discovered, and that they were about to con- duct him to the emperor, implored them to let him alone, offering to leave loaves and money if he might only be suffered to escape. But the shop- men, seizing him, said : * Whoever you are, you have found a treasure ; show us where it is, that we

«

The Seven Sleepers of Ephesiis 97

may share it with you, and then we will hide you.' Malchus was too frightened to answer. So they put a rope round his neck, and drew him through the streets into the market-place. The news soon spread that the young man had dis- covered a great treasure, and there was presently a vast crowd about him. He stoutly protested his innocence. No one recognized him, and his eyes ranging over the faces which surrounded him, could not see one which he had known, or which was in the slightest degree familiar to him.

" S. Martin, the bishop, and Antipater, the gover- nor, having heard of the excitement, ordered the young man to be brought before them, along with the bakers.

" The bishop and the governor asked him where he had found the treasure, and he replied that he had found none, but that the i^-^ coins were from his own purse. He was next asked whence he came. He replied that he was a native of Ephesus, * if this be Ephesus.'

" * Send for your relations — your parents, if they live here,' ordered the governor.

" ' They live here certainly,' replied the youth ; and he mentioned their names. No such names were known in the town. Then the governor

H

98 The Seven Sleepers of Epkesus

exclaimed : ' How dare you say that this money belonged to your parents when it dates back three hundred and seventy-seven years ^ and is as old as the beginning of the reign of Decius, and it is utterly unlike our modern coinage ? Do you think to impose on the old men and sages of Ephesus ? ]3elieve me, I shall make you suffer the severities of the law unless you show where you made discovery.'

"'I implore you,' cried Malchus, 'in the nai of God, answer me a few questions, and then I answer yours ! Where is the Emperor Decius go|| to?'

" The bishop answered, ' My son, there is emperor of that name ; he who was thus call died long ago.*

" Malchus replied, 'AH I hear perplexes me md! and more. Follow me, and I will show you m| comrades who fled with me into a cave of Mount Celion, only yesterday, to escape the cruelty of Decius. I will lead you to them.'

" The bishop turned to the governor. ' The hand

of God is here,' he said. Then they followed, and

a great crowd after them. And Malchus entered

first into the cavern to his companions, and the

* This calculation is sadly inaccurate.

The Sevejt Sleepers of Ephesus 9*J

bishop after him. . . . And there they saw the martyrs seated in the cave, with their faces fresh and blooming as roses ; so all fell down and glori- fied God. The bishop and the governor sent notice to Theodosius, and he hurried to Ephesus. All the inhabitants met him and conducted him to the cavern. As soon as the saints beheld the emperor, their faces shone like the sun, and the emperor gave thanks unto God, and embraced them, and said, * I see you, as though I saw the Saviour restoring Lazarus.' Maximian* repHed, * Believe us ! for the faith's sake, God has resusci- tated us before the great resurrection day, in order that you may believe firmly in the resurrection of the dead. For as the child is in its mother's womb living and not suffering, so have we lived without suffering, fast asleep.' And having thus spoken, they bowed their heads, and their souls returned to their Maker. The emperor, rising, bent over them and embraced them weeping. He gave orders for golden reliquaries to be made, but that night they appeared to him in a dream, and said that hitherto they had slept in the earth, and that in the earth they desired to sleep on till God should raise them again." Such is the beautiful story. It seems to have travelled to us from the East. Jacobus Sarugiensis H 1

100 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesiis

a Mesopotamian bishop, in the fifth or sixth cen- tury, is said to have been the first to commit it to writing. Gregory of Tours (De Glor. Mart. i. 9) was perhaps the first to introduce it to Europe. Dionysius of Antioch (ninth century) told the story in Syrian, and Photius of Constantinople repro- duced it, with the remark that Mahomet ha^H adopted it into the Koran. Metaphrastus alludes ' to it as well ; in the tenth century Eutychius iq^ serted it in his annals of Arabia ; it is found in Coptic and the Maronite books, and several eai historians, as Paulus Diaconus, Nicephorus, have inserted it in their works.

William of Malmesburj'- tells us a strange stoi concerning these sleepers. He says, that Kii Edward the Confessor sat, during the East festival, wearing his royal crown at dinner, in palace of Westminster, surrounded by his bishoj and nobles. During the banquet the king, instej of indulging in meat and drink, mused upon divine things, and sat long immersed in thought. Sud- denly, to the astonishment of all present, he burst out laughing. After dinner, when he retired to his bedchamber to divest himself of his robes, three of his nobles, Earl Harold, who was afterwards king, and an abbot and a bishop, followed him, and

The Seven Sleepers of EpJiesus 101

asked the reason of his rare mirth. " I saw," said the pious monarch, "things most wonderful to behold, and therefore did I not laugh without a reason." They entreated him to explain ; and after musing for a while, he informed them that the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus, who had been slumbering two hundred years in a cavern of Mount Celion, lying always on their right sides, had of a sudden, turned themselves over on their left sides ; that by heavenly favour he had seen them thus turn themselves, and at the sight he had been constrained to laugh. And as Harold and the abbot and bishop marvelled at his words, the king related to them the story of the Seven Sleepers, with the shape and proportion of their several bodies, which wonderful things no man had as yet committed to writing ; nay, he spake of the Ephesian sleepers, as though he had always dwelt with them. Earl Harold, on hearing this, got ready a knight, a clerk and a monk, who were forthwith sent to the emperor at Constantinople, with letters and presents from King Edward. By the emperor these . messengers were forwarded to Ephesus with letters to the Bishop, commanding him to admit the three Englishmen into the cavern of the sleepers. And, lo ! it fell out even as the

102 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesiis

king had seen in vision. For the Ephesians declared that they knew from their forefathers that the Seven had ever lain on their right sides ; but on the entry of the Englishmen into the cave, they were all found lying on their left sides. And this was a warning of the miseries which were to befall Christendom through the inroads of the Saracens, Turks and Tartars For whenever sorrow threatei the Sleepers turn on their sides.

A poem on the Seven Sleepers was compos by a trouvere named Chardri, and is mention* by M. Fr. Michel in his " Rapports au Ministre rinstruction Public ;" a German poem on the sai subject, of the thirteenth century, in 935 verses, been published by M. Karajan ; and the Spani^ poet, Augustin Morreto, composed a drama on entitled "Los Siete Durmientes," which is insert< in the 19th volume of the rare work, "Comedi^ Nuevas Escogidas de los Mejores Ingenios ;" laa and not least, it has formed the subject of a poem" by the late Dr. Neale.

Mahomet has somewhat improved on the story. He has made the Sleepers prophecy his coming, and he has given them a dog named Kratim, or Kratimer, which sleeps with them, and which is endowed with the gift of prophecy.

The Seven Sleepers of Ephcsus 103

As a special favour this dog is to be one of the ten animals to be admitted into his paradise, the others being Jonah's whale, Solomon's ant, Ish- mael's ram, Abraham's calf, the Queen of Sheba's ass, the prophet Salech's camel, Moses' ox, Belkis' cuckoo, and Mahomet's ass.

It was perhaps too much for the Seven Sleepers to ask, that their bodies should be left to rest in earth. In ages when saintly relics were valued above gold and precious stones, their request was sure to be shelved ; and so we find that their remains were conveyed to Marseilles in a large stone sarcophagus, which is still exhibited in S. Victor's Church. In the Musaeum Victorium at Rome is a curious and ancient representation of them in a cement of sulphur and plaster. Their names are engraved beside them, together with certain attributes. Near Constantine and John are two clubs, near Maximian a knotty club, near Malchus and Martinian two axes, near Serapion a burning torch, and near Danesius or Dionysius a great nail, such as those spoken of by Horace (Lib. I, Od. 3) and S. Paulinus (Nat. 9, or Carm. 24) as having been used for torture.

In this group of figures, the seven are repre- sented as young, without beards, and indeed in

ed>

I

104 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus

ancient martyrologles they are frequently call boys.

It has been inferred from this curious plast representation, that the seven may have suffered under Decius, A.D. 250, and have been buried the afore-mentioned cave ; whilst the discovery a: translation of their relics under Theodosius, in 479^ may have given rise to the fable. And this I thi probable enough. The story of long sleepers a the number seven connected with it is anci^ enough, and dates from heathen mythology.

Like many another ancient myth, it was 1 hold of by Christian hands and baptized.

Pliny relates the story of Epimenides the e poet, who, when tending his sheep one hot d wearied and oppressed with slumber, retrea into a cave, where he fell asleep. After fifty- se years he awoke, and found every thing chang His brother, whom he had left a stripling, now a hoary man.

Epimenides was reckoned one of the seven sages by those who exclude Periander. He flourished in the time of Solon. After his death, at the age of two hundred and eighty-nine, he was reven as a God, and honoured especially by the At nians.

The Seven Sleepers of Ephesits 105

This story is a version of the older legend of the perpetual sleep of the shepherd Endymion, who was thus preserved in unfading youth and beauty by Jupiter.

According to an Arabic legend, S. George thrice rose from his grave, and was thrice slain.

In Scandinavian mythology we have Siegfrid or Sigurd thus resting, and awaiting his call to come forth and fight. Charlemagne sleeps in the Oden- berg in Hess, or in the Untersberg near Salzburg, seated on his throne, with his crown on his head and his sword at his side, waiting till the times of Antichrist are fulfilled, when he will wake and burst forth to avenge the blood of the saints. Ogier the Dane, or Olger Dansk, will in like manner shake off his slumber and come forth from the dream-land of Avallon to avenge the right — oh that he had shown himself in the Schleswig- Holstein war !

Well do I remember, as a child, contemplating with wondering awe the great Kyffhauserberg in Thuringia, for therein, I was told, slept Frederic Barbarossa and his six knights. A shepherd once penetrated into the heart of the mountain by a cave, and discovered therein a hall where sat the Emperor at a stone table, and his red beard had

106 The Seven Sleepers of Ephestis

grown through the slab. At the tread of the shepherd, Frederic awoke from his slumber, and asked, "Do the ravens still fly over the moun- tains ?"

"Sire! they do."

" Then we must sleep another hundred years."

But when his beard has wound itself thrice round the table, then will the Emperor awake wit his knights, and rush forth to release Germany froi its bondage, and exalt it to the first place amon| the kingdoms of Europe.

In Switzerland slumber three Tells at Riitlj near the Vierwaldstatter-see, waiting for the houi of their country's direst need. A shepherd crept into the cave where they rest. The third Tell rose and asked the time. " Noon," replied the shepherc lad. " The time is not yet come," said Tell, an< lay down again.

In Scotland, beneath the Eildon hills, sleeps Thomas of Erceldoune ; the murdered French whc fell in the Sicilian Vespers at Palermo, are alsc slumbering till the time is come when they maj wake to avenge themselves. When Constantinople fell into the hands of the Turks, a priest was celebrating the sacred mysteries at the great silver altar of S. Sophia. The celebrant cried to God to

The Seve7i Sleepers of Ephesus 107

protect the sacred host from profanation. Then the wall opened, and he entered, bearing the Blessed Sacrament. It closed on him, and there he is sleeping with his head bowed before the Body of Our Lord, waiting till the Turk is cast out of Constantinople, and S. Sophia is released from its profanation. God speed the time !

In Bohemia sleep three miners deep in the heart of the Kuttenberg. In North America, Ripp Van Winkle passed twenty years slumbering in the Katskill mountains. In Spain, Boabdil el Chico, the last Arab king of Granada, is said to lie spell- bound in the mountains close to the Alhambra. In Arabia, the prophet Elijah waits till he is called forth in the days of Antichrist. In Ireland, Brian Boroimhe slumbers, waiting till a Fenian insurrec- tion promising action and not talk summons him to his country's aid. In Wales, the legend of Arthur still dreaming through a long sleep in Avillon, has not died out. In Servia, Knez Lazar, who fell in battle against the Turks in the fight of Kossowa, in 1389, is expected to re-appear one day. A similar hope of the return of James IV. lasted for more than a hundred years after Flodden was fought. In Portugal it is believed that Sebas- tian, the chivalrous young monarch who did his

i

108 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus

best to ruin his country by his rash invasion ol Morocco, is sleeping somewhere, but he will wak again to be his country's deliverer in the hour o need. Olaf Tryggvason is waiting a similar occa- sion in Norway. Even Napoleon Bonaparte is believed among some of the French peasantry to be sleeping on in a like manner. j^H

S. Hippolytus relates that S. John the Divine i^" slumbering at Ephesus, and Sir John Mandeville relates the circumstances as follows : " Fro Pathmos men gone unto Ephesim, a fair citee an nyghe to the see. And there dyede Seynte John and was buryed behynde the highe Awtiere, in toumbe. And there is a faire chirche. F Christene mene weren wont to holden that pla alweyes. And in the tombe of Seynt John noughte but manna, that is clept Aungeles meti For his body was translated into Paradys. An Turkes holden now alle that place and tb citee and the Chirche. And all Asie the lesse yclept Turkye. And ye shalle undrestond, that Seynt Johne bid make his grave there in his Lyf, and leyd himself there-inne all quyk. And there- fore somme men seyn, that he dyed noughte, but that he resteth there till the Day of Doom. And forsoothe there is a gret marveule : For men may

i

The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus 109

see there the erthe of the tombe apertly many tymes steren and moven, as there weren quykke thinges undre." The connexion of this legend of S. John with Ephesus may have had something to do with turning the seven martyrs of that city into seven sleepers.

The annals of Iceland relate that in 1403, a Finn of the name of Fethmingr, living in Halogaland, in the North of Norway, happening to enter a cave, fell asleep, and woke not for three whole years, lying with his bow and arrows at his side, un- touched by bird or beast.

There certainly are authentic accounts of persons having slept for an extraordinary length of time, but I shall not mention any, as I believe the legend we are considering, not to have been an exaggera- tion of facts, but a Christianized myth of paganism. The fact of the number seven being so prominent in many of the tales, seems to lead to this con- clusion. Barbarossa changes his position every seven years. Charlemagne starts in his chair at similar intervals. Olger Dansk stamps his iron mace on the floor once every seven years. Olaf Redbeard in Sweden uncloses his eyes at precisely the same distances of time.

I believe that the mythological core of this

110 The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus

picturesque legend is the repose of the earth through the seven winter months. In the North Frederic and Charlemagne certainly replace Odin.

The German and Scandinavian still heathen legends represent the heroes as about to issue forth for the defence of Fatherland in the hour of direst need. The converted and Christianized tale brings the martyr youths forth in the hour when heresy is afflicting the Church, that they ma; destroy the heresy by their witness to the truth the Resurrection.

If there is something majestic in the heathei myth, there is singular grace and beauty in th Christian tale, teaching as it does such a gloriou doctrine ; but it is surpassed in delicacy by t modern form which the same myth has as- sumed— a form which is a real transformation, leaving the doctrine taught the same. It has been made into a romance by Hoffman, and is versified by Trinius. I may perhaps be allowed to translate with some freedom the poem of the latter :—

In an ancient shaft of Falum,

Year by year a body lay, God-preserved, as though a treasure,

Kept unto the waking day.

•^1

The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus 111

Not the turmoil, nor the passions,

Of the busy world o'erhead, Sounds of war, or peace rejoicings,

Could disturb the placid dead.

Once a youthful miner, whistling,

Hew'd the chamber, now his tomb, Crash ! the rocky fragments tumbled.

Closed him in abysmal gloom.

Sixty years pass'd by, ere miners

Toiling, hundred fathoms deep, Broke upon the shaft where rested

That poor miner in his sleep.

As the gold-grains lie untarnish'd

In the dingy soil and sand. Till they gleam and flicker, stainless,

In the digger's sifting hand ;

As the gem in virgin brilliance

Rests, till usher'd into day ; — So uninjured, uncorrupted.

Fresh and fair the body lay.

And the miners bore it upward,

Laid it in the yellow sun, Up, from out the neighb'ring houses.

Fast the curious peasants run.

"Who is he ?" with eyes they question .

"Who is he ?" they ask aloud : Hush ! a wizen'd hag comes hobbhng,

Panting through the wond'ring crowd

112 The Seven Sleepers of Ep /testis

Oh ! the cry — half joy, half sorrow — As she flings her at his side,

" John ! the sweetheart of my girlhood. Here am I, am I, thy bride.

" Time on thee has left no traces. Death from wear has shielded thee ;

I am aged, worn, and wasted. Oh ! what life has done to me ! "

Then, bis smooth unfurrow'd forehead Kiss'd that ancient wither'd crone ;

And the Death which had divided, Now united them in one.

51HiHiam Cell

T SUPPOSE that most people regard the story -"- of Tell and the apple as an historical event.; and with corresponding interest, when they under- take the regular Swiss round, visit the market- place of Altorf, where is pointed out the site of the lime-tree to which Tell's child v/as bound, and contemplate the plaster statue which is asserted to mark the spot where Tell stood to take aim. Once, moreover, there stood another monument erected near Lucerne in commemoration of this event, a wooden obelisk, painted to look like granite, surmounted by a rosy-cheeked apple transfixed by a golden arrow. This gingerbread memorial of bad taste has perished, struck by lightning. We shall in the following pages de- molish the very story which that erection was intended to commemorate.

I

114 William Tell

It is one of the painful duties of the antiquarian to dispel many a popular belief, and to probe the groundlessness of many a historical statement. The antiquarian is sometimes disposed to ask with Pilate, " What is truth ? " when he finds historical facts crumbling beneath his touch into mythological fables ; and he soon learns to doubt and question the most emphatic declarations of, and claims to, reliability.

Sir Walter Raleigh, in his prison, was composii the second volume of his history of the worl Leaning on the sill of his window, he meditated the duties of the historian to mankind, when su< denly his attention was attracted by a disturbance in the court-yard before his cell. He saw one man strike another whom he supposed by his dress to be an officer ; the latter at once drew his sword and ran the former through the body. The wounded man felled his adversary with a stick, and then sank upon the pavement. At this junc- ture the guard came up and carried off the officer insensible, and then the corpse of the man who had been run through.

Next day Raleigh was visited by an intimate friend, to whom he related the circumstances of the quarrel and its issue. To his astonishment,

William Tell 115

his friend unhesitatingly declared that the prisoner had mistaken the whole series of incidents which had passed before his eyes.

The supposed officer was not an officer at all, but the servant of a foreign ambassador ; it was he who had dealt the first blow ; he had not drawn his sword, but the other had snatched it from his side, and had run him through the body before any one could interfere ; whereupon a stranger from among the crowd knocked the murderer down with his stick, and some of the foreigners belonging to the ambassador's retinue carried off the corpse. The friend of Raleigh added that government haa ordered the arrest and immediate trial of the mur- derer, as the man assassinated was one of the principal servants of the Spanish ambassador.

" Excuse me," said Raleigh, " but I cannot have been deceived as you suppose, for I was eye-witness to the events which took place under my own window, and the man fell there on that spot where you see a paving-stone standing up above the rest."

" My dear Raleigh," replied his friend, " I was sitting on that stone when the fray took place, and I received this slight scratch on my cheek in snatching the sword from the murderer, and upon

I 2

116 William Tell

my word of honour, you have been deceived upon every particular."

Sir Walter, when alone, took up the second volume of his history, which was in MS., and con- templating it, thought — "If I cannot believe my own eyes, how can I be assured of the truth of a tithe of the events which happened ages before I was born 1 " and he flung the manuscript into the fire\

Now I think that I can show that the story William Tell and the apple is as fabulous as — wh^ shall I say } — many another historical event

It is almost too well known to need repetition.

In the year 1307, Gessler, Vogt of the Emperc Albert of Hapsburg, set a hat on a pole, as symbol of imperial power, and ordered every one who passed by to do obeisance towards it. A moun- taineer of the name of Tell boldly traversed the space before it without saluting the abhorred symbol. By Gessler's command he was at once seized and brought before him. As Tell was known to be an expert archer, he was ordered, by

* This anecdote is taken from the Journal de Paris, May, 1787; which derived it from "Letters on Literature, by Robert Heron" (i. e. John Pinkerton, F.A.S.), 1785. But whence did Pinkerton obtain it ?

William Tell 117

way of punishment, to shoot an apple off the head of his own son. Finding remonstrance vain, he submitted. The apple was placed on the child's head. Tell bent his bow, the arrow sped, and apple and arrow fell together to the ground. But the Vogt noticed that Tell, before shooting, had stuck another arrow into his belt, and he inquired the reason.

" It was for you," replied the sturdy archer. "Had I shot my child, know that it would not have missed your heart."

This event, observe, took place in the beginning of the fourteenth century. But Saxo Gramma- ticus, a Danish writer of the twelfth century, tells the story of a hero of his own country, who lived in the tenth century. He relates the incident in horrible style as follows : —

" Nor ought what follows to be enveloped in silence. Toki, who had for some time been in the king's service, had by his deeds, surpassing those of his comrades, made enemies of his virtues. One day, when he had drunk too much, he boasted to those who sat at table with him, that his 'skill in archery was such, that with the first shot of an arrow he could hit the smallest apple set on the top of a stick at a considerable distance. His

118 William Tell

detractors, hearing this, lost no time in conveying what he had said to the king (Harald Bluetooth). But the wickedness of this monarch soon trans- formed the confidence of the father to the jeopardy of the son, for he ordered the dearest pledge of his life to stand in place of the stick, from whom, if the utterer of the boast did not at his first shot strike down the apple, he should with his head pay the penalty of having made an idle boast. The command of the king urged the soldier to do this which was so much more than he had undertak the detracting artifices of the others having tab advantage of words spoken when he was hard sober. As soon as the boy was led forth, Toki carefully admonished him to receive the whir of the arrow as calmly as possible, with attentive ears, and without moving his head, lest by a slight motion of the body he should frustrate the expe- rience of his well-tried skill. He also made him stand with his back towards him, lest he should be frightened at the sight of the arrow. Then he drew three arrows from his quiver, and the very first he shot struck the proposed mark. Toki being asked by the king why he had taken so many more arrows out of his quiver, when he. was to make but one trial with his bow ; ' That I

his

I

William Tell 119

might avenge on thee,' he replied, 'the error of the first, by the points of the others, lest my inno- cence might happen to be afflicted, and thy in- justice go unpunished.'"

The same incident is told of Egil, brother of the mythical Velundr, in the Saga of Thidrik.

In Norwegian history also it appears with varia- tions again and again. It is told of King Olaf the Saint (d. 1030), that, desiring the conversion of a brave heathen named Eindridi, he competed with him in various athletic sports ; he swam with him, wrestled, and then shot with him. The king dared Eindridi to strike a writing-tablet from off his son's head with an arrow. Eindridi prepared to attempt the difficult shot The king bade two men bind the eyes of the child and hold the napkin, so that he might not move when he heard the whistle of the arrow. The king aimed first, and the arrow grazed the lad's head. Eindridi then prepared to shoot, but the mother of the boy interfered, and persuaded the king to abandon this dangerous test of skill. In this version also, Eindridi is prepared to revenge himself on the king, should the child be injured.

But a closer approximation still to the Tell myth is found in the life of Hemingr, another Norse

120 William Tell

archer who was challenged by King Harald, Sigurd's son (d. 1066). The story is thus told : —

" The island was densely overgrown with wood, and the people went into the forest. The king took a spear and set it with its point in the soil, then he laid an arrow on the string and shot up into the air. The arrow turned in the air and came down upon the spear-shaft and stood up in it. Hemingr took another arrow and shot up ; his w< lost to sight for some while, but it came back pierced the nick of the king's arrow. .... The the king took a knife and stuck it into an oak ; next drew his bow and planted an arrow in haft of the knife. Thereupon Hemingr took arrows. The king stood by him and said, ' They are all inlaid with gold, you are a capital workman.' Hemingr answered, * They are not my manufacture, but are presents.' He shot, and his arrow cleft the haft, and the point entered the socket of the blade.

" * We must have a keener contest,' said the king, taking an arrow and flushing with anger ; then he laid the arrow on the string and drew his bow to the farthest, so that the horns were nearly brought to meet. Away flashed the arrow, and pierced a tender twig. All said that this was a most asto-

William Tell 12]

nishing feat of dexterity. But Hemingr shot from a greater distance, and split a hazel nut All were astonished to see this. Then said the king, * Take a nut and set it on the head of your brother Bjorn, and aim at it from precisely the same distance. If you miss the mark, then your life goes.'

" Hemingr answered, * Sire, my life is at your disposal, but I will not adventure that shot' Then out spake Bjorn, * Shoot, brother, rather than die yourself Hemingr said, * Have you the pluck to stand quite still without shrinking.-*' *I will do my best,' said Bjorn. 'Then let the king stand by,' said Hemingr, 'and let him see whether I touch the nut.'

"The king agreed, and badeOddrUfeig's son stand by Bjorn, and see that the shot was fair. Hemingr then went to the spot fixed for him by the king, and signed himself with the cross, saying, * God be my witness that I had rather die myself than injure my brother Bjorn ; let all the blame rest on King Harald.'

"Then Hemingr flung his spear. The spear went straight to the mark, and passed between the nut and the crown of the lad, who was not in the least injured. It flew further, and stopped not till it fell.

122

William Tell

" Then the king came up and asked Oddr whal he thought about the shot."

Years after, this risk was revenged upon th( hard-hearted monarch. In the battle of Stamford- bridge an arrow from a skilled archer penetrated the windpipe of the king, and it is supposed to have spedj observes the Saga writer, from the bow of HemingrJ then in the service of the English monarch.

The story is related somewhat differently in th( Faroe Isles, and is told of Geyti, Aslak's son. Th< same Harald asks his men if they know who is his match in strength. " Yes," they reply, " there is peasant's son in the uplands, Geyti, son of AslakJ who is the strongest of men." Forth goes the kingj and at last rides up to the house of Aslak. " Anc where is your youngest son V

" Alas ! alas ! he lies under the green sod oi Kolrin kirkgarth." " Come, then, and show m( his corpse, old man, that I may judge whether h( was as stout of limb as men say."

The father puts the king off with the excuse that among so many dead it would be hard to find hi< boy. So the king rides away over the heath. H( meets a stately man returning from the chase, witl a bow over his shoulder. "And who art thoujj friend?" "Geyti, Aslak's son." The dead man,!

William Tell \16

in short, alive and well. The king tells him he has heard of his prowess, and is come to match his strength with him. So Geyti and the king try a swimming-match.

The king swims well, but Geyti swims better, and in the end gives the monarch such a ducking, that he is borne to his house devoid of sense and motion. Harald swallows his anger, as he had swallowed the water, and bids Geyti shoot a hazel nut from off his brother's head. Aslak's son con- sents, and invites the king into the forest to witness his dexterity.

" On the string the shaft he laid. And God hath heard his prayer ; He shot the Httle nut away, Nor hurt the lad a hair."

Next day the king sends for the skilful bowman :

" List thee, Geyti, Aslak's son, And truly tell to me, Wherefore hadst thou arrows twain In the wood yestreen with thee ?"

The bowman replies :

" Therefore had I arrows twain Yestreen in the wood with me, Had I but hurt my brother dear, The other had pierced thee^"

' Oxonian in Iceland, p. 15.

124 William Tell

A very similar tale is told also in the celebrated Malleus Maleficarum of a man named Puncher, with this difference, that a coin is placed on the lad's head instead of an apple or a nut. The person who had dared Puncher to the test of skill, inquires the use of the second arrow in his belt, and receives the usual answer, that if the first arrow had missed the coin, the second would have trans- fixed a certain heart which was destitute of natural feeling.

We have, moreover, our English version of the same story in the venerable ballad of William of Cloudsley.

The Finn ethnologist Castren obtained the fol- lowing tale in the Finnish village of Uhtuwa : — j

A fight took place between some freebooters and the inhabitants of the village of Alajarwi. The robbers plundered every house, and carried off amongst their captives an old man. As they pro- ceeded with their spoils along the strand of the lake, a lad of twelve years old appeared from among the reeds on the opposite bank, armed with a bow, and amply provided with arrows ; he threatened to shoot down the captors unless the old man, his father, were restored to him. The robbers mockingly replied, that the aged man

William Tell 125

would be given to him, if he could shoot an apple off his head. The boy accepted the challenge, and on successfully accomplishing it the surrender of the venerable captive was made.

Farid-Uddin Attar was a Persian dealer in perfumes, born in the year 1119. He one day was so impressed with the sight of a dervish, that he sold his possessions and followed righteousness. He composed the poem Mantic Utta'ir, or the language of birds. Observe, the Persian Attar lived at the same time as the Danish Saxo, and long before the birth of Tell. Curiously enough we find a trace of the Tell myth in the pages of his poem. According to him, however, the king shoots the apple from the head of a beloved page, and the lad dies from sheer fright, though the arrow does not even graze his skin.

The coincidence of finding so many versions of the same story scattered through countries as remote as Persia and Iceland, Switzerland and Denmark, proves I think that it can in no way be regarded as history, but is rather one of the numerous household myths common to the whole stock of Aryan nations. Probably, some one more acquainted with Sanskrit literature than myself, and with better access to its unpublished stores of

120 William Tell

fable and legend, will some day light on an early Indian tale corresponding to that so prevalent among other branches of the same family. The coincidence of the Tell myth being discovered among the Finns is attributable to Russian or Swedish influence. I do not regard it as a primeval Turanian, but as an Aryan story, which, like an erratic block, is found deposited on foreign soil far from the mountain whence it was torn.

Mythologists will, I suppose, consider the mythl to represent the manifestation of some natural phenomena, and the individuals of the story to be impersonifications of natural forces. Most primeval stories were thus constructed, and their origin is traceable enough. In Thorn-rose, for instance, who can fail to see the earth goddess re- presented by the sleeping beauty in her long winter- slumber, only returning to life when kissed by the golden-haired sun-god Phoebus or Baldur .? But the Tell myth has not its signification thus painted on the surface, and though it is possible that Gessler or Harald may be the power of evil and darkness, and the bold archer the storm-cloud with his arrow of lightning and his iris bow, bent against the sun, which is resting like a coin or a golden apple on the edge of the horizon, yet we have no

William Tell 127

guarantee that such an interpretation is not an overstraining of a theory.

In these pages and elsewhere I have shown how some of the ancient myths related by the whole Aryan family of nations are reducible to allegori- cal explanations of certain well-known natural phenomena ; but I must protest against the manner in which our German friends fasten rapaciously upon every atom of history, sacred and profane, and demonstrate all heroes to represent the sun, all villains to be the demons of night or winter ; all sticks and spears and arrows to be the lightning, all cows and sheep and dragons and swans to be clouds.

In a work on the superstition of Werewolves, I have entered into this subject with some fulness, and am quite prepared to admit the premises upon which mythologists construct their theories ; at the same time I am not disposed to run to the ex- travagant lengths reached by some of the most enthusiastic German scholars. A wholesome warning to these gentlemen was given some years ago by an ingenious French ecclesiastic, who wrote the following argument to prove that Napoleon Bonaparte was a mythological character. Arch- bishop Whately's " Historic Doubts " was grounded

128 William Tell

on a totally different line of argument ; I subjoin the other, as a curiosity and as a caution.

Napoleon is, says the writer, an impersonifica- tion of the sun.

1. Between the name Napoleon and Apollo, or Apoleon, the god of the sun, there is but a trifling difference ; indeed the seeming difference^ is lessened, if we take the spelling of his nami from the column of the Place Vendome, where it stands Neapoleo. But this syllable Ne prefixec to the name of the sun-god is of importance ; lik( the rest of the name it is of Greek origin, and ij vf] or vai^ a particle of affirmation, as though in- dicating Napoleon as the very true Apollo, or| sun.

His other name, Bonaparte, makes this apparent connexion between the French hero and the luminary of ^the firmament conclusively certain. The day has its two parts, the good and luminous portion, and that which is bad and dark. To the sun belongs the good part, to the moon and stars belongs the bad portion. It is therefore natural that Apollo or Ne-Apoleon should receive the surname of Bonaparte.

2. Apollo was born in Delos, a Mediterranean island ; Napoleon in Corsica, an island in the same

William Tell 121»

sea. According to Pausanias, Apollo was an Egyptian deity ; and in the mythological history of the fabulous Napoleon we find the hero in Egypt, regarded by the inhabitants with venera- tion, and receiving their homage.

3. The mother of Napoleon was said to be Letitia, which signifies joy, and is an impersonifi- cation of the dawn of light dispensing joy and gladness to all creation. Letitia is no other than the break of day, which in a manner brings the sun into the world, and " with rosy fingers opes the gates of Day." It is significant that the Greek name for the mother of Apollo was Leto. From this the Romans made the name Latona which they gave to his mother. But LcEto is the unused form of the verb Icetor, and signified to inspire joy ; it is from this unused form that the substantive Letitia is derived. The identity, then, of the mother of Napoleon with the Greek Leto and the Latin Latona, is established conclusively.

4. According to the popular story, this son of Letitia had three sisters, and was it not the same with the Greek deity, who had the three Graces t

5. The modern Gallic Apollo had four brothers. It is impossible not to discern here the anthropo- morphosis of the four seasons. But, it will be

K

130 William Tell

objected, the seasons should be females. Here the French language interposes ; for in French the seasons are masculine, with the exception of autumn, upon the gender of which grammarians are un- decided, whilst Autumnus in Latin is not more feminine than the other seasons. This difficulty is therefore trifling, and what follows removes all shadow of doubt.

Of the four brothers of Napoleon, three are Sc to have been kings, and these of course are, Sprii reigning over the flowers. Summer reigning o^ the harvest, Autumn holding sway over the fruil And as these three seasons owe all to the powerf influence of the Sun, we are told in the popuk myth that the three brothers of Napoleon drei their authority from him, and received from him their kingdoms. But if it be added that, of the four brothers of Napoleon, one was not a king, that was because he is the impersonification of Winter, which has no reign over any thing. If however it be asserted, in contradiction, that the winter has an empire, he will be given the principality over snows and frosts, which, in the dreary season of the year, whiten the face of the earth. Well ! the fourth brother of Napoleon is thus invested by popular tradition, commonly called history, with a vain prin^

William Tell 131

cipality accorded to him iji the decline of the power of Napoleon. The principality was that of Canino, a name derived from cani, or the whitened hairs of a frozen old age, — true emblem of winter. To the eyes of poets, the forests covering the hills are their hair, and when winter frosts them, they represent the snowy locks of a decrepit nature in the old age of the year :

" Cum gelidus crescit canis in montibus humor."

Consequently the Prince of Canino is an impersoni- fication of winter ; — winter whose reign begins when the kingdoms of the three fine seasons are passed from them, and when the sun is driven from his power by the children of the North, as the poets call the boreal winds. This is the origin of the fabulous invasion of France by the allied armies of the North. The story relates that these invaders — the northern gales — banished the many- coloured flag, and replaced it by a white standard. This too is a graceful, but, at the same time, purely fabulous account of the Northern winds driving all the brilliant colours from the face of the soil, to replace them by the snowy sheet.

6. Napoleon is said to have had two wives. It is well known that the classic fable gave two also to K 2

5th

132 Williavi Tell

Apollo. These two were the moon and the earth. Plutarch asserts that the Greeks gave the moon to Apollo for wife, whilst the Egyptians attributed to him the earth. By the moon he had no posterity, but by the other he had one son only, the little Horus. This is an Egyptian allegory representing the fruits of agriculture produced by the earth ferti- lized by the Sun. The pretended son of the fabu- lous Napoleon is said to have been born on the 20th of March, the season of the spring equinox, wh agriculture is assuming its greatest period of activi

7. Napoleon is said to have released France from the devastating scourge which terrorized over the country, the hydra of the revolution, as it was popularly called. Who cannot see in this a Gallic version of the Greek legend of Apollo releasing Hellas from the terrible Python } The very name revolution, derived from the Latin verb revolvo, is indicative of the coils of a serpent hke the Python.

8. The famous hero of the 19th century had, it is asserted, twelve Marshals at the head of his armies, and four who were stationary and inactive. The twelve first, as may be seen at once, are the- signs of the zodiac, marching under the orders of the sun Napoleon, and each comm.anding a division of

Williafn Tell 133

the innumerable host of stars, which are parted into twelve portions, corresponding to the twelve signs. As for the four stationary officers, im- movable in the midst of general motion, they are the cardinal points.

9. It is currently reported that the chief of these brilliant armies, after having gloriously traversed the Southern kingdoms, penetrated the North, and was there unable to maintain his sway. This too represents the course of the Sun, which assumes its greatest power in the South, but after the spring equinox seeks to reach the North, and after a three months' march towards the boreal regions, is driven back upon his traces, following the sign of Cancer, a sign given to represent the retrogression of the sun in that portion of the sphere. It is on this that the story of the march of Napoleon towards Moscow, and his humbling retreat, is founded.

10. Finally, the sun rises in the East and sets in the Western sea. The poets picture him rising out of the waters in the East, and setting in the ocean after his twelve hours' reign in the sky. Such is the history of Napoleon coming from his Mediterranean isle, holding the reins of government for twelve years, and finally disappearing in the mysterious regions of the great Atlantic.

HAVING demolished the story of the famoi shot of William Tell, I proceed to tl destruction of another article of popular belief

Who that has visited Snowdon has not seen tl grave of Llewellyn's faithful hound Gellert, ai been told by the guide the touching story of tl death of the noble animal ? How can we doubt the facts, seeing that the place, Beth-Gellert, is named after the dog, and that the grave is still visible? But unfortunately for the truth of the legend, its pedigree can be traced with the utmost precision.

The story is as follows : —

The Welsh Prince Llewellyn had a noble deer- hound, Gellert, whom he trusted to watch the cradle of his baby son whilst he himself was absent.

One day, on his return, to his intense horror, he beheld the cradle empty and upset, the clothes

The Dog Gellert 135

dabbled with blood, and Gellert's mouth dripping with gore. Concluding hastily that the hound had proved unfaithful, had fallen on the child and devoured it, — in a paroxysm of rage the prince drew his sword and slew the dog. Next instant the cry of the babe from behind the cradle showed him that the child was uninjured, and, on looking further, Llewellyn discovered the body of a huge wolf, which had entered the house to seize and devour the child, but which had been kept off and killed by the brave dog Gellert.

In his self-reproach and grief, the prince erected a stately monument to Gellert, and called the place where he was buried after the poor hound's name.

Now, I find in Russia precisely the same story told, with just the same appearance of truth, of a Czar Piras. In Germany it appears with consider- able variations. A man determines on slaying his old dog Sultan, and consults with his wife how this is to be effected. Sultan overhears the conversa- tion, and complains bitterly to the wolf, who suggests an ingenious plan by which the master may be induced to spare his dog. Next day, when the man is going to his work, the wolf undertakes to carry off the child from its cradle

136 The Dog Gellert

Sultan is to attack him and rescue the infant. The plan succeeds admirably, and the dog spends his remaining years in comfort. (Grimm, K. M. 48.)

But there is a story in closer conformity to that of Gellert among the French collections of fabliaux made by Le Grand d'Aussy and Edelestand du Meril. It became popular through the " Gest Romanorum," a collection of tales made by th^ monks for harmless reading, in the fourteen! century.

In the " Gesta " the tale is told as follows : — " Folliculus, a knight, was fond of hunting ani tournaments. He had an only son, for whoi three nurses were provided. Next to this child, loved his falcon and his greyhound. It happen( one day that he was called to a tournament, whithe his wife and domestics went also, leaving the chil^ in the cradle, the greyhound lying by him, and the falcon on his perch. A serpent that inhabited a hole near the castle, taking advantage of the pro- found silence that reigned, crept from his habita- tion, and advanced towards the cradle to devour the child. The falcon perceiving the danger, flut- tered with his wings till he awoke the dog, who instantly attacked the invader, and after a fierce conflict, in which he was sorely wounded, killed

The Doo; Gellert 137

"^^5

him. He then lay down on the ground to lick and heal his wounds. When the nurses returned, they found the cradle overturned, the child thrown out, and the ground covered with blood, as was also the dog, who they immediately concluded had killed the child.

" Terrified at the idea of meeting the anger of the parents, they determined to escape ; but in their flight fell in with their mistress, to whom they were compelled to relate the supposed murder of the child by the greyhound. The knight soon arrived to hear the sad story, and, maddened with fury, rushed forward to the spot. The poor wounded and faithful animal made an effort to rise and wel- come his master with his accustomed fondness, but the enraged knight received him on the point of his sword, and he fell lifeless to the ground. On examination of the cradle, the infant was found alive, and unhurt, with the dead serpent lying by him. The knight now perceived what had happened, lamented bitterly over his faithful dog, and blamed himself for having too hastily depended on the ■^ words of his wife. Abandoning the profession ^■pf arms, he broke his lance in pieces, and vowed a ^«)ilgrimage to the Holy Land, where he spent the

138 The Dog Gellert

The monkish hit at the wife is amusing, and might have been supposed to have originated with those determined misogynists, as the gallant Welsh- men lay all the blame on the man. But the good compilers of the "Gesta" wrote little of their own, ex- cept moral applications of the tales they relate, and the story of Folliculus and his dog, like many others, in their collection, is drawn from a foreign source.

It occurs in the Seven Wise Masters, and in the "Calumnia Novercalis" as well, so that it must| have been popular throughout Mediaeval EuropCii Now the tales of the Seven Wise Masters an translations from a Hebrew work, the Kalilah and' Dimnah of Rabbi Joel, composed about A.D. 1^50, or from Symeon Seth's Greek Kylile and Dimne, written in 1080. These Greek and Hebrew works were derived from kindred sources. That of Rabbi Joel was a translation from an Arabic version made by Nasr- Allah in the twelfth century, whilst Simeon Seth's was a translation of the Persian Kalilah and Dimnah. But the Persian Kahlah and Dimnah was not either an original work, it was in turn a translation from the Sanskrit Pantschatantra, made about A.D. 540.

In this ancient Indian book the story runs as follows —

The Dog Gellert 139

A Brahmin named Devasaman had a wife, who gave birth to a son, and also to an ichneumon. She loved both her children dearly, giving them alike the breast, and anointing them alike with salves. But she feared the ichneumon might not love his brother.

One day, having laid her boy in bed, she took up the water jar, and said to her husband, " Hear me, master ! I am going to the tank to fetch water. Whilst I am absent watch the boy, lest he gets injured by the ichneumon." After she had left the house, the Brahmin went forth begging, leaving the house empty. In crept a black snake, and at- tempted to bite the child ; but the ichneumon rushed at it, and tore it in pieces. Then proud of its achievement, it sallied forth, all bloody, to meet its mother. She, seeing the creature stained with blood, concluded, with feminine precipitance, that it had fallen on the baby and killed it, and she flung her water jar at it and slew it. Only on her return home did she ascertain her mistake.

The same story is also told in the Hitopadesa (iv. 13), but the animal is an otter, not an ich- neumon. In the Arabic version a weasel takes the place of the ichneumon.

The Buddist missionaries carried the story into

140

The Dog Gellert

Mongolia, and In the Mongolian Uligerun, whicl is a translation of the Tibetian Dsanglun, th^ story reappears with the pole-cat as the brave an< suffering defender of the child.

Stanislaus Julien, the great Chinese scholar, ha^ discovered the same tale in the Chinese worl entitled, "The Forest of Pearls from the Gardei of the Law." This work dates from 668 ; and it the creature is an ichneumon.

In the Persian Sindibad-nameh, is the same tah but the faithful animal is a cat. In Sandabar an( Syntipas it has become a dog. Through th( influence of Sandabar on the Hebrew translatioi of the Kalilah and Dimnah, the ichneumon is als^ replaced by a dog.

Such is the history of the Gellert legend ; it an introduction into Europe from India, every ste| of its transmission being clearly demonstrable From the Gesta Romanorum it passed into popular tale throughout Europe, and in differei countries it was, like the Tell myth, localized an< individualized. Many a Welsh story, such as thos< contained in the Mabinogion, are as easily tracec to an Eastern origin.

But every story has its root. The root of th^ Gellert tale is this : A man forms an alliance ol

The Dog Gellert 141

friendship with a beast or bird. The dumb animal renders him a signal service. He misunderstands the act, and kills his preserver.

We have tracked this myth under the Gellert form from India to Wales ; but under another form it is the property of the whole Aryan family, and forms a portion of the traditional lore of all nations sprung from that stock.

Thence arose the classic fable of the peasant, who, as he slept, was bitten by a fly. He awoke, and in a rage killed the insect. When too late he observed that the little creature had aroused him that he might avoid a snake which lay coiled up near his pillow.

In the Anvar-i-Suhaili is the following kindred tale. A king had a falcon. One day, whilst hunting, he filled a goblet with water dropping from a rock. As he put the vessel to his lips, his falcon dashed upon it, and upset it with its wings. The king, in a fury, slew the bird, and then dis- covered that the -water dripped from the jaws of a serpent of the most poisonous description.

This story, with some variations, occurs in -^sop, ^lian, and Apthonius. In the Greek fable, a peasant liberates an eagle from the clutches of a dragon. The dragon spirts poison into the water

142 The Doz Gellert

i>

which the peasant is about to drink, without observing what the monster had done. The grateful eagle upsets the goblet with his wings.

The story appears in Egypt under a whimsical form. A Wali once smashed a pot full of herbs which a cook had prepared. The exasperated cook thrashed the well-intentioned but unfortunat Wali within an inch of his life, and when returned, exhausted with his efforts at belabouring the man, to examine the broken pot, he discoven amongst the herbs a poisonous snake.

How many brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, an^ cousins of all degrees a little story has ! And hoi few of the tales we listen to can lay any claim originality } There is scarcely a story which hear, which I cannot connect with some family of myths, and whose pedigree I cannot ascertain with more or less precision. Shakespeare drew the plots of his plays from Boccaccio or Straparola ; but these Italians did not invent the tales they lent to the English dramatist. King Lear does not originate with Geoffry of Monmouth, but comes from early Indian stores of fable, whence also are derived the Merchant of Venice and the pound of flesh, aye ! and the very incident of the three caskets.

But who would credit it, were it not proved by

The Dog Gellert 143

conclusive facts, that Johnny Sands is the inhe- ritance of the whole Aryan family of nations, and that Peeping Tom of Coventry peeped in India and on the Tartar steppes ages before Lady Godiva was born ?

If you listen to Traviata at the opera, you have set before you a tale which has lasted for centuries, and which was perhaps born in India.

If you read in classic fable of Orpheus charm- ing woods and meadows, beasts and birds, with his magic lyre, you remember to have seen the same fable related in the Kalewala of the Finnish Wai- nomainen, and in the Kaieopoeg of the Esthonian Kalewa.

If you take up English history and read of William the Conqueror slipping as he landed on British soil, and kissing the earth, saying he had come to greet and claim his own, you remember that the same story is told of Napoleon in Egypt, of King Olaf Harald's son in Norway, and in classic history of Junius Brutus on his return from the oracle.

A little while ago I cut out of a Sussex news- paper, a story purporting to be the relation of a fact which had taken place at a fixed date in Lewes. This was the story. A tyrannical husband locked the door against his wife, who was out

144 The Dog Gellert

having tea with a neighbour, gossiping and scandal- mongering ; when she appHed for admittance, he pretended not to know her. She threatened to jump into the well unless he opened the door.

The man, not supposing that she would carry her threat into execution, declined, alleging that he was in bed, and the night was chilly ; besides which he entirely disclaimed all acquaintance with^ the lady who besought admittance.

The wife then flung a log into a well, am secreted herself behind the door. The man hearing] the splash, fancied that his good lady was really in the deeps, and forth he darted in his nocturnal costume, which was of the lightest, to ascertain whether his deliverance was complete. At once the lady darted into the house, locked the door, and on the husband pleading for admittance, she declared most solemnly from the window that she did not know him.

Now this story, I can positively assert, unless the events of this world move in a circle, did not happen in Lewes, or any other Sussex town.

It was told in the Gesta Romanorum six hundred years ago, and it was told, may be, as many hundred years before in India, for it is still to be found in Sanskrit collections of tales.

Cadetr Mtn

T WELL remember having it impressed upon -*- me by a Devonshire nurse, as a Httle child, that all Cornishmen were born with tails ; and it was long before I could overcome the prejudice thus early implanted in my breast against my Cornubian neighbours. I looked upon those who dwelt across the Tamar as "uncanny," as being scarcely to be classed with Christian people, and certainly not to be freely associated with by tail- less Devonians. I think my eyes were first opened to the fact that I had been deceived, by a worthy

bookseller of L , with whom I had contracted

a warm friendship, he having at sundry times con- tributed pictures to my scrap-book. I remember one day resolving to broach the delicate subject

L

146 Tailed Men

with my tailed friend, whom I Hked, notwith- standing his caudal appendage.

*' Mr. X , is it true that you are a Cornish- man } "

" Yes, my little man ; born and bred in the West country."

" I like you very much ; — but — have you rea got a tail?"

When the bookseller had recovered from

astonishment which I had produced by my qu

tion, he stoutly repudiated the charge.

" But you are a Cornishman ?"

** To be sure I am."

*' And all Cornishmen have tails."

I believe I satisfied my own mind that the g

man had sat his off, and my nurse assured me t

such was the case with those of sedentary habits.

It is curious that Devonshire superstition shou

attribute the tail to Cornishmen, for it was asse

of certain men of Kent in olden times, and

referred to Divine vengeance upon them for havin

insulted S. Thomas a Becket, if we may believe

Polydore Vergil. " There were some," he says,

"to whom it seemed that the king's secret wish

was, that Thomas should be got rid of He,

indeed, as one accounted to be an enemy of the

I

vin^

Tailed Men 147

king's person, was already regarded with so little respect, nay, was treated with so much contempt, that when he came to Strood, which village ii situated on the Medway, the river that washes Rochester, the inhabitants of the place, being eager to show some mark of contumely to the prelate in his disgrace, did not scruple to cut off the tail of the horse on which he was riding ; but by this profane and inhospitable act they covered them- selves with eternal reproach, for it so happened after this, by the will of God, that all the offspring born from the men who had done this thing, were born with tails like brute animals. But this mark of infaniy, which formerly was every where noto- rious, has disappeared with the extinction of the race whose fathers perpetrated this deed."

John Bale, the zealous reformer, and Bishop of

Ossory in Edward VI.'s time, refers to this story,

and also mentions a variation of the sc^ne and

\ 'cause of this ignoble punishment. He writes

I quoting his authorities, " John Capgrave and Alex-

|1 ander of Esseby sayth, that for castynge of fyshe

jl tayles at thys Augustyne, Dorsettshyre men had

\ tayles ever after. But Polydorus applieth it unto

Kentish men at Stroud, by Rochester, for cuttinge

of Thomas Becket's horse's tail. Thus hath

L 1

148 Tailed Men

England in all other land a perpetual infamy of tayles by theye wrytten legendes of lyes, yet can they not well tell where to bestowe them truely." Bale, a fierce and unsparing reformer, and one who stinted not hard words, applying to the inventors of these legends an epithet more strong than elegant, says, " In the legends of their sanctified sorcerers they have dififamed the English posterity with tails, as has been showed afore. That an Englyshman now cannot travayle in another land by way of marchandyse or any other honest oc pyinge, but it is most contumeliously thrown his tethe that all Englyshmen have tails. Th" uncomely note and report have the nation gotten, without recover, by these laisy and idle lubbers, the monkes and the priestes, which could find no matters to advance their canonized gains by, or their saintes, as they call them, but manifest lies and knaveries \"

Andrew Marvel also makes mention of this' strange judgment in his Loyal Scot: —

" But who considers right will find indeed, 'Tis Holy Island parts us, not the Tweed. Nothing but clergy could us two seclude, No Scotch was ever like a bishop's feud.

in^- hW

Actes of English Votaries."

Tailed Men 149

All Litanys in this have wanted faith,

There's no — Deliver us from a BisJiofs wrath.

Never shall Calvin pardon'd be for sales,

Never for Burnet's sake, the Lauderdales ;

For Beckef s sake, Kent always shall have tails."

Bailey in his Dictionary, under the head of " Kentish longtails," endeavours to shift the charge to Dorsetshire ; and Lambarde, in his " Perambula- tion of Kent," is equally sensitive on the subject. Vieyra, the famous Portuguese preacher, says that Satan was tail-less till his fall, when that appendage grew to him " as an outward and visible token that he had lost the rank of an angel, and was fallen to the level of a brute I"

It may be remembered that Lord Monboddo, a Scotch judge of last century, and a philosopher of some repute, though of great eccentricity, stoutly maintained the theory that man ought to have a tail, that the tail is a desideratum, and that the abrupt termination of the spine without caudal elongation is a sad blemish in the organization of man. The tail, the point in which man is inferior to the brute, what a delicate index of the mind it is ! how it expresses the passions of love and hate, how nicely it gives token of the feelings of joy or

" Quarterly Review, No. 244, p. 446.

150 Tailed Men

fear which animate the soul ! But Lord Mon- boddo did not consider that what the tail is to the brute, that the eye is to man ; the lack of one member is supplied by the other. I can tell a proud man by his eye just as truly as if he stalked past one with erect tail, and anger is as plainly depicted in the human eye as in the bottle-brush tail of a cat. I know a sneak by his cowering glance, though he has not a tail between his le^ and pleasure is evident in the laughing eye, witho^ there being any necessity for a wagging brush express it.

Dr. Johnson paid a visit to the judge, an( knocked on the head his theory, that men ought to have tails, and actually were born with them occasionally, for, said he, " Of a standing fact, sir, there ought to be no controversy ; if there are mer. with tails, catch a homo caudatus!' And, " It is a pity to see Lord Monboddo publish such notions as he has done ; a man of sense, and of so much elegant learning. There would be little in a fool doing it ; we should only laugh ; but, when a wise man does it, we are sorry. Other people have strange notions, but they conceal them. If they have tails, they hide them ; but Monboddo is as jealous of his tail as a squirrel." And yet Johnson

Tailed Men 151

seems to have been tickled with the idea, and to have been amused with the notion of an appendage like a tail being regarded as the complement of human perfection. It may be remembered how Johnson made the acquaintance of the young Laird of Col, during his Highland tour, and how pleased he was with him. " Col," says he, " is a noble animal. He is as complete an islander as the mind can figure. He is a farmer, a sailor, a hunter, a fisher : he will run you down a dog ; if any man has a tail, it is Col. " And notwithstanding all his aversion to puns, the great Doctor was fain to yield to human weakness on one occasion, under the influence of the mirth which Monboddo's name seems to have excited. Johnson writes to Mrs. Thrale of a party he had met one night, which he thus enumerates ; " There were Smelt, and the Bishop of S. Asaph, who comes to every place ; and Sir Joshua, and Lord Monboddo, and ladies out of tale"

There is a Polish story of a witch who made a girdle of human skin and laid it across the threshold of a door where a marriage-feast was being held. On the bridal pair stepping across the girdle they were transformed into wolves. Three years after the witch sought them out, and cast over

152 Tailed Men

them dresses of fur with the hair turned outward, whereupon they recovered their human forms, but, unfortunately, the dress cast over the bridegroom was too scanty, and did not extend over his tail, so that, when he was restored to his former condition, he retained his lupine caudal appendage, and this became hereditary in his family ; so that all Poles with tails are lineal descendants of the ancestor to whom this little mJsfortune happened. John Struys, a Dutch traveller, who visited the isle of Formosa in 1677, gives a curious story which is worth tran- scribing.

" Before I visited this island," he writes, " I had often heard tell that there were men who had long tails like brute beasts ; but I had never been able to believe it, and I regarded it as a thing so alien to our nature, that I should now have difficulty in accepting it, if my own senses had not removed from me every pretence for doubting the fact, by the following strange adventure : — The inhabitants of Formosa being used to see us, were in the habit of receiving us on terms which left nothing to apprehend on either side ; so that, although mere foreigners, we always believed ourselves in safety, and had grown familiar enough to ramble at large without an escort, when grave experience taught us

Tailed Men 153

that, in so doing, we were hazarding too much. As some of our party were one day taking a stroll, one of them had occasion to withdraw about a stone's throw from the rest, who being at the moment engaged in an eager conversation, proceeded without heeding the disappearance of their com- panion. After a while, however, his absence was observed, and the party paused, thinking he would rejoin them. They waited some time, but at last, tired of the delay, they returned in the direction of the spot where they remembered to have seen him last. Arriving there, they were horrified to find his mangled body lying on the ground, though the nature of the lacerations showed that he had not had to suffer long ere death released him. Whilst some remained to watch the dead body, others went off in search of the murderer, and these had not gone far, when they came upon a man of peculiar appearance, who, finding himself enclosed by the exploring party, so as to make escape from them impossible, began to foam with rage, and by cries and wild gesticulations to intimate that he would make any one repent the attempt who should venture to meddle with him. The fierceness of his despera- tion for a time kept our people at bay, but as his fury gradually subsided, they gathered more closely

154 Tailed Men

round him, and at length seized him. He then soon made them understand that it was he who had killed their comrade, but they could not learn from him any cause for this conduct. As the crime was so atrocious, and, if allowed to pass with impunity, might entail even more serious consequences, it was determined to burn the man. He was tied up to a stake, where he was kept for some hours before the time of execution arrived. It was then that I beheld what I had never thought to see. He had a tail more than a foot long, covered with red hair, and very like that of a cow. When he saw the surprise that this discovery created among the European spectators, he informed us that his tail was the effect of climate, for that all the inhabitants of the southern side of the island, where they then were, were provided with like appendages'."

After Struys, Hornemann reported that, between the Gulf of Benin and Abyssinia, were tailed an- thropophagi, named by the natives Niam-niams ; and in 1849, ^' Descouret, on his return from Mecca, affirmed that such was a common report, and added that they had long arms, low and narrow foreheads, long and erect ears, and slim legs.

' " Voyages de Jean Struys," An. 1650.

Tailed Men 165

Mr. Harrison, in his " Highlands of Ethiopia," alludes to the common belief among the Abys- sinians, in a pigmy race of this nature.

MM. Arnault and Vayssiere, travellers in the same country, in 1850, brought the subject before the Academy of Sciences.

In 1851 M. de Castelnau gave additional details relative to an expedition against these tailed men. "The Niam-niams," he says, "were sleeping in the sun : the Haoussas approached, and, falling on them, massacred them to the last man. They had all of them tails forty centimetres long, and from two to three in diameter. This organ is smooth. Among the corpses were those of several women, who were deformed in the same manner. In all other particulars, the men were precisely like all other negroes. They are of a deep black, their teeth are polished, their bodies not tattooed. They are armed with clubs and javelins ; in war they utter piercing cries. They cultivate rice, maize, and other grain. They are fine-looking men, and their hair is not frizzled."

M. d'Abbadie, another Abyssinian traveller, writing in 1852, gives the following account from the lips of an Abyssinian priest. " At the distance of fifteen days' journey south of Herrar, is a place

156 Tailed Men

where all the men have tails, the length of a palm, covered with hair, and situated at the extremity of the spine. The females of that country are very beautiful and are tailless. I have seen some fifteen of these people at Besberah, and I am positive that the tail is natural."

It will be observed that there is a discrepancy between the accounts of M. de Castelnau and M. d'Abbadie. The former accords tails to the ladies, whilst the latter denies them. According to j the former the tail is smooth, according to the latter it is covered with hair.

Dr. Wolf has improved on this in his "Travels and Adventures," Vol. II. 1861. "There are men and women in Abyssinia with tails like dogs and horses." — "Wolf heard also from a great many Abyssinians and Armenians (and Wolf is convinced of the truth of it), that there are near Narea in Abyssinia, people — men and women — with large tails, with which they are able to knock down a horse, and there are also such people near China." And in a note, " In the College of Surgeons at Dublin may still be seen a human skeleton, with a tail seven inches long ! There are many known instances of this elongation of the caudal vertebra, as in the Poonangs in Borneo."

Tailed Men 157

But the most interesting and circumstantial account of the Niam-niams is that given by Dr. Hubsch, physician to the hospitals of Con- stantinople. "It was in 1852," says he, "that I saw for the first time a tailed negress. I was struck with this phenomenon, and I questioned her master, a slave dealer. I learned from him that there exists a tribe called Niam-niam, occupying the interior of Africa. All the members of this tribe bear the caudal appendage, and, as Oriental imagination is given to exaggeration, I was assured that the tails sometimes attained the length of two feet. That which I observed was smooth and hairless. It was about two inches long, and ter- minated in a point. This woman was as black as ebony, her hair was frizzled, her teeth white, large, and planted in sockets which incHned considerably outward ; her four canine teeth were filed, her eyes bloodshot. She ate meat raw, her clothes fidgeted her, her intellect was on a par with that of others of her condition.

" Her master had been unable, during six months, to sell her, notwithstanding the low figure at which he would have disposed of her ; the abhorrence with which she was regarded was not attributed to her tail, but to the partiality, which she was unable

158 Tailed Men

to conceal, for human flesh. Her tribe fed on the flesh of the prisoners taken from the neigh- bouring tribes, with whom they were constantly at war.

" As soon as one of the tribe dies, his relations, instead of burying him, cut him up and regale themselves upon his remains ; consequently there are no cemeteries in this land. They do not all of them lead a wandering life, but many of them con- struct hovels of the branches of trees. They make for themselves weapons of war and of agriculture ; they cultivate maize and wheat, and keep cattle. The Niam-niams have a language of their own, of an entirely primitive character, though containing an infusion of Arabic words.

" They live in a state of complete nudity, and seek only to satisfy their brute appetites. There is among them an utter disregard for morality, incest and adultery being common. The strongest among them becomes the chief of the tribe ; and it is he who apportions the shares of the booty obtained in war. It is hard to say whether they have any religion ; but in 'all probability they have none, as they readily adopt any one which they are taught.

"It is difficult to tame them altogether; their

Tailed Men 159

instinct impelling them constantly to seek for human flesh ; and instances are related of slave, who have massacred and eaten the children con fided to their charge.

" I have seen a man of the same race, who had a tail an inch and a half long, covered with a few hairs. He appeared to be thirty- five years old ; he was robust, well built, of an ebon blackness, and had the same peculiar forma- tion of jaw noticed above, that is to say, the tooth sockets were inclined outwards. Their four canine teeth are filed down, to diminish their power of mastication.

" I know also, at Constantinople, the son of a physician, aged two years, who was born with a tail an inch long ; he belonged to the white Cau- casian race. One of his grandfathers possessed the same appendage. This phenomenon is regarded generally in the East as a sign of great brute force."

About ten years ago, a newspaper paragraph recorded the birth of a boy at Newcastle-on-Tyne, provided with a tail about an inch and a quarter long. It was asserted that the child when sucking wagged this stump as token of pleasure.

According to a North-American Indian tradition

160 Tailed Men

all men were created originally with tails, tails long-haired, sleek, and comely. These tails were their delight, and they adorned them with paint, beads and wampum. Then the world was at peace, discord and wars were unknown. Men became proud and forgot their Maker, and He found it necessary to disturb their serenity by sending them a scourge which might teach them humility, and make them realize their dependence on the Great Spirit. Then He amputated their tails, and' out of these dejecta membra fashioned women — • who, say the Kikapoos, retain traces of their origin, for we find them ever trailing after the men, frisky and impulsive ".

Yet, notwithstanding all this testimony in favour of tailed men and women, I profess myself dubious ; and shall yield only when a homo caudatiis has been caught and shown to me.

■* Atherne Jones, Trad. N. American Indians, ill. 175.

FROM the earliest ages of the Church, the advent of the Man of Sm has been looked forward to with terror, and the passages of Scrip- ture relating to him have been studied with solemn awe, lest that day of wrath should come upon the Church unawares. As events in the world's history- took place which seemed to be indications of the approach of Antichrist, a great horror fell upon men's minds, and their imaginations conjured up myths which flew from mouth to mouth, and which were implicitly believed.

Before speaking of these strange tales which pro- duced such an effect on the minds of men in the Middle Ages, it will be well briefly to examine the opinions of divines of the early ages on the pas- sages of Scripture connected with the coming of the last great persecutor of the Church. Antichrist

M

162 Antichrist and Pope Joan

was believed by most ancient writers to be destined to arise out of the tribe of Dan, a belief founded on the prediction of Jacob, " Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path " (conf Jeremiah vili. 1 5), and on the exclamation of the dying patriarch, when looking on his son Dan, " I have waited for Thy Salvation, O Lord," as though the long-suffering of God had borne long with thj tribe, but in vain, and it was to be extingulsh( without hope. This, indeed, is implied in tl sealing of the servants of God in their foreheac (Revelation vil.), when twelve thousand out every tribe, except Dan, were seen by S. Johl to receive the seal of adoption, whilst of the tribe of Dan not 07ie was sealed, as though it, to a man, had apostatized.

Opinions as to the nature of Antichrist were divided. Some held that he was to be a devil in phantom body, and of this number was Hippolytus. Others again believed that he would be an incarnate demon, true man and true devil ; in fearful and diabolical parody of the Incarnation of our Lord. A third view was that he would be merely a des- perately wicked man, acting upon diabolic Inspira- tions, just as the saints act upon divine inspirations. S. John Damascene expressly asserts that he will

AnticJirist and Pope Joan 163

not be an incarnate demon, but a devilish man, for he says, " Not as Christ assumed humanity, so will the devil become human, but the Man will receive all the inspiration of Satan, and will suffer the devil to take up his abode within him." In this manner, Antichrist could have many forerunners, and so S. Jerome and S. Augustine saw an Antichrist in Nero, not the Antichrist, but one of those of whom the Apostle speaks — " Even now are there many Antichrists." Thus also every enemy of the faith, such as Diocletian, Julian, and Mahomet, has been regarded as a precursor of the Arch- persecutor, who was expected to sum up in him- self the cruelty of a Nero or Diocletian, the show of virtue of a Julian, and the spiritual pride of a Mahomet.

From infancy the evil one is to take possession of Antichrist, and to train him for his office, instil- ling into him cunning, cruelty, and pride. His doctrine will be — not downright infidelity, but a " show of godliness," whilst " denying the power thereof," i.e. the miraculous origin and divine authority of Christianity. He will sow doubts of our Lord's manifestation "in the flesh," he will allow Christ to be an excellent Man, capable of teaching the most exalted truths, and inculcating M 1

164 Antichrist mid Pope Joan

the purest morality, yet Himself fallible and carried away by fanaticism.

In the end, however, Antichrist will " exalt himself to sit as God in the temple of God," and become "the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place." At the same time there is to be an awful alliance struck l^etween himself, the impersonification of the world-power, and th< Church of God ; some high pontiff of which, or th^ episcopacy in general, will enter into league wil the unbelieving State to oppress the very elect. Ij is a strange instance of religionary virulence whic makes some detect the Pope of Rome in th^ Man of Sin, the Harlot, the Beast, and tht Priest going before it. The Man of Sin and th« Beast are unmistakably identical, and refer t^ an Antichristian world-power ; whilst the Harlot and the Priest are symbols of an apostasy in the Church. There is nothing Roman in this, but something very much the opposite.

How the Abomination of Desolation can be con- sidered as set up in a Church where every sanc- tuary is adorned with all that can draw the heart to the Crucified, and raise the thoughts to the imposing ritual of heaven, is a puzzle to me. To the man uninitiated in the law that Revelation is

Antichrist ajid Pope Joan 165

to be interpreted by contraries, it would seem more like the Abomination of Desolation in the Holy- Place if he entered a Scotch Presbyterian, or a Dutch Calvinist, place of worship. Rome does not fight against the Daily Sacrific