GIPSIES—EGYPTIANS.
In most parts of the continent the gipsies are called Cingari, or Zingari; the Spaniards call them Gitanos, the French Bohemiens or Bohemiennes.
It is not certain when the Gipsies, as they are now termed, first appeared in Europe; but mention is made of them in Hungary and Germany, so early as the year 1417. Within 10 years afterwards we hear of them in France, Switzerland and Italy. The date of their arrival in England is more uncertain; it is most probable that it was not until near a century afterward. In the year 1530, they are spoken of in the following manner, in the penal statutes.
“Forasmuch as before this time, divers and many outlandish people calling themselves Egyptians, using no craft nor feat of merchandize, have come into this realm, and gone from shire to shire, and place to place, in great company, and used great subtil and crafty means to deceive the people; bearing them in mind that they, by palmistry, could tell men’s and women’s fortunes; and so many times, by craft and subtilty, have deceived the people of their money; and also have committed many heinous felonies and robberies, to the great hurt and deceit of the people they have come among,” &c.
This is the preamble to an act, by which the Gipsies were ordered to quit the realm under heavy penalties. Two subsequent acts, passed in 1555 and 1565, made it death for them to remain in the kingdom; and it is still on record, that thirteen were executed under these acts, in the county of Suffolk, a few years before the restoration. It was not till about the year 1783, that they were repealed.
The Gipsies were expelled France in 1560, and Spain in 1591: but it does not appear they have been extirpated in any country. Their collective numbers, in every quarter of the globe, have been calculated at 7 or 800,000[[66]]. They are most numerous in Asia, and in the northern parts of Europe. Various have been the opinion relative to their origin. That they came from Egypt, has been the most prevalent. This opinion (which has procured them here the name of Gipsies, and in Spain that of Gittanos) arose from some of the first who arrived in Europe, pretending that they came from that country; which they did, perhaps, to heighten their reputation for skill in palmistry and the occult sciences. It is now we believe pretty generally agreed, that they came originally from Hindostan; since their language so far coincides with the Hindostanic, that even now, after a lapse of nearly four centuries, during which they have been dispersed in various foreign countries, nearly one half of their words are precisely those of Hindostan[[67]]; and scarcely any variation is to be found in vocabularies procured from the Gipsies in Turkey, Hungary, Germany, and those in England[[68]]. Their manners, for the most part, coincide, as well as the language, in every quarter of the globe where they are found; being the same idle wandering set of beings, and seldom professing any mode of acquiring a livelihood, except that of fortune-telling[[69]]. Their religion is always that of the country in which they reside; and though they are no great frequenters either of mosques or churches, they generally conform to rites and ceremonies as they find them established.
Grellman says that, in Germany, they seldom think of any marriage ceremony; but their children are baptized and the mothers churched. In England their children are baptized, and their dead buried, according to the rites of the church; perhaps the marriage ceremony is not more regarded than in Germany; but it is certain they are sometimes married in churches. Upon the whole, as Grellman observes, we may certainly regard the Gipsies as a singular phenomenon in Europe. For the space of between three and four hundred years they have gone wandering about like pilgrims and strangers, yet neither time nor example has made in them any alteration: they remain ever and every where what their fathers were: Africa makes them no blacker, nor does Europe make them whiter.
Few of the descendants of the aboriginal Gipsies are to be found any where in Europe, and in England less than any where else. The severity of the police against this description of the degenerate vagabonds existing at the present day, have considerably thinned their phalanxes, and brought them to something like a due sense of the laws and expectations of civilized society. What remains of them, nevertheless, contrive one way or other to elude the vigilance of the laws by different masked callings, under which they ostensibly appear to carry on their usual traffic.
The modern Gipsies pretend that they derive their origin from the ancient Egyptians, who were famous for their knowledge in astronomy and other sciences; and, under the pretence of fortune-telling, find means to rob or defraud the ignorant and superstitious. To colour their impostures, they artificially discolour their faces, and speak a kind of gibberish or cant peculiar to themselves. They rove up and down the country in large companies, to the great terror of the farmers, from whose geese, turkeys, and fowls, they take considerable contributions.
When a fresh recruit is admitted into the fraternity, he is to take the following oath, administered by the principal marauder, after going through the annexed forms:—
First, a new name is given to him, by which he is ever after to be called; then standing up in the middle of the assembly, and directing his face to the dimber damber, or principal man of the gang, he repeats the following oath, which is dictated to him by some experienced member of the fraternity; namely, “I, Crank Cuffin, do swear to be a true brother, and that I will, in all things, obey the commands of the great tawny prince, and keep his counsel, and not divulge the secrets of my brethren.
“I will never leave nor forsake the company, but observe and keep all the times of appointment, either by day or by night, in every place whatever.
“I will not teach any one to cant, nor will I disclose any of our mysteries to them.
“I will take my prince’s part against all that shall oppose him, or any of us, according to the utmost of my ability; nor will I suffer him, or any one belonging to us, to be abused by any strange Abrams, Rufflers, Hookers, Paillards, Swaddlers, Irish Toyles, Swigmen, Whip Jacks, Jackmen, Bawdy Baskets, Dommerars, Clapper Dogeons, Patricoes, or Curtals; but will defend him, or them, as much as I can, against all other outliers whatever. I will not conceal aught I win out of Libkins[[70]], or pun the Ruffmans[[71]], but will preserve it for the use of the company. Lastly, I will cleave to my Doxy-wap[[72]], stifly, and will bring her Duds[[73]], Margery Prators[[74]], Goblers[[75]], Grunting Cheats[[76]], or Tibs of the Buttery[[77]], or any thing else I can come at, as winning[[78]] for her wappings.”
The canters, it would appear, have a tradition, that from the three first articles of this oath, the first founders of a certain boastful, worshipful fraternity, (who pretend to derive their origin from the earliest times) borrowed both the hint and the form of their establishment; and that their pretended derivation of the first word Adam is a forgery, it being only from the first Adam Tyler[[70]]. At the admission of a new brother, a general stock is raised for booze or drink, to make themselves merry on the occasion. As for peckage or eatables, this they can procure without money, for while some are sent to break the ruffmans, or woods and bushes, for firing, others are detached to filch geese, chickens, hens, ducks, or mallards, and pigs. Their morts, or women, are their butchers, who presently make bloody work with what living things are brought to them; and having made holes in the ground under some remote hedge, in an obscure place, they make a fire, and boil or broil their food; and when it is done enough, fall to work tooth and nail; and having eaten more like beasts than human beings, they drink more like swine than men, entertaining each other during the time with songs in the canting dialect. As they live, so they lie together, promiscuously, and know not how to claim a property either in their goods or children; and this general interest ties them more firmly together, than if all their rags were twisted into ropes, to bind them indissolubly from a separation, which detestable union is farther consolidated by the preceding oath.
They stroll up and down all summer-time in droves, and dexterously pick pockets while they are telling fortunes; and the money, rings, silver thimbles, &c. which they get, are instantly conveyed from one hand to another, till the remotest person of the gang (who is not suspected, because they come not near the person robbed) gets possession of it; so that in the strictest search, it is impossible to recover it, while the wretches, with imprecations, oaths, and protestations, disclaim the thievery.
That by which they were said to get the most money, was, when young gentlewomen of good families and reputation, have happened to be with child before marriage, a round sum is often bestowed among Gipsies, for some mort to take the child; and, as in these cases it was never heard of more by the true mother and family, so the disgrace was kept concealed from the world; and, in the event of the child surviving, its parents are never known.
The following account of these wandering beings, is taken from Evelyn’s Journal, which throws some light on their degeneracy from the primitive tribes.
“In our statutes they are called Egyptians, which implies a counterfeit kind of rogues, who ‘being English or Welsh people,’ disguise themselves in uncouth habits, smearing their faces and bodies, and framing to themselves an unknown, canting language, wander up and down; and under pretence of telling fortunes, curing diseases, &c. abuse the common people, trick them of their money, and steal all that is not too hot or too heavy for them. See several statutes made against them, 28 Henry VIII. c. 10. 1 & 2. Philip and Mary, c. 4 & 5. Eliz. c. 20.
“The origin of this tribe of vagabonds called Egyptians, and popularly Gipsies, is somewhat obscure; at least the reason of the denomination is so. It is certain, the ancient Egyptians had the name of great cheats, and were famous for the subtilty of their impostures, whence the name might afterwards pass proverbially into other languages, as is pretty certain it did into the Greek and Latin, or else the ancient Egyptians, being much versed in astronomy, which in those days was little better than Astrology, the name was on that score assumed by these diseurs de bonne avanture, as the French call them, or tellers of good fortune. Be this as it may, there is scarce any country in Europe, even at the present day, but has its Egyptians, though not all of them under this denomination: the Latins called them Egyptii; the Italians, Cingani, and Cingari; the Germans, Zigeuna; the French, Bohemiens; others Saracens, and others Tartars, &c.
Munster, Geogr. L. III. c. 5. relates, that they made their first appearance in Germany, in 1417, exceedingly tawny and sun-burnt, and in pitiful array, though they affected quality, and travelled with a train of hunting dogs after them, like nobles. He adds, that they had passports from King Sigismund of Bohemia, and other princes. Ten years afterwards they came into France, and thence passed into England.
Pasquier, in his Recherches, L. IV. c. 19, relates the origin of the Gipsies thus: On the 17th of April, 1427, there came to Paris twelve penitents, or persons, as they said, adjudged to penance; viz. one duke, one count, and ten cavaliers, or persons on horseback; they took on themselves the characters of Christians of the Lower Egypt, expelled by the Saracens; who having made application to the Pope, and confessed their sins, received for penance, that they should travel through the world for seven years, without ever lying in a bed. Their train consisted of 120 persons, men, women, and children, which were all that were left of 1200, who came together out of Egypt. They had lodgings assigned them in the chapel, and people went in crowds to see them. Their ears were perforated, and silver buckles hung to them. Their hair was exceedingly black and frizzled; their women were ugly, thieves, and pretenders to telling of fortunes. The bishop soon after obliged them to retire, and excommunicated such as had shewn them their hands.
By an ordinance of the estates of Orleans, in the year 1560, it was enjoined, that all these impostors under the name of Bohemians and Egyptians, do quit the kingdom on the penalty of the gallies. Upon this they dispersed into lesser companies, and spread themselves over Europe. The first time we hear of them in England was three years afterwards, viz. anno 1563.
Ralph Volaterranus, making mention of them, affirms, that they first proceeded or strolled from among the Uxii, a people of Persis or Persia. (See Gipsies.)
The following characteristic sketch of one of the primitive gipsies, is ably delineated in the popular novel of Quentin Durward; with which we shall close this article:
Orleans, who could not love the match provided for him by the King, could love Isabelle, and follows her escort. Quentin, however, unhorses him, and sustains a noble combat with his companion the renowned Dunais; till a body of the archers ride up to his relief. The assailants are carried off prisoners, and our victorious Scot pursues his dangerous way, under uncertain guidance, as the following extract will shew:
“While he hesitated whether it would be better to send back one of his followers, he heard the blast of a horn, and looking in the direction from which the sound came, beheld a horseman riding very fast towards them. The low size, and wild, shaggy, untrained state of the animal, reminded Quentin of the mountain breed of horses in his own country; but this was much more finely limbed, and, with the same appearance of hardness, was more rapid in its movements. The head particularly, which, in the Scottish poney, is often lumpish and heavy, was small and well placed in the neck of this animal, with thin jaws, full sparkling eyes, and expanded nostrils.
“The rider was even more singular in his appearance than the horse which he rode, though that was extremely unlike the horses of France. Although he managed his palfrey with great dexterity, he sat with his feet in broad stirrups, something resembling a shovel, so short, that his knees were well nigh as high as the pommel of his saddle. His dress was a red turban of small size, in which he wore a sullied plume, secured by a clasp of silver; his tunic, which was shaped like those of the Estradiots, a sort of troops whom the Venetians at that time levied in the provinces, on the eastern side of their gulf, was green in colour, and tawdrily laced with gold; he wore very wide drawers or trowsers of white, though none of the cleanest, which gathered beneath the knee, and his swarthy legs were quite bare, unless for the complicated laces which bound a pair of sandals on his feet; he had no spurs, the edge of his large stirrups being so sharp as to serve to goad the horse in a very severe manner. In a crimson sash this singular horseman wore a dagger on the right side, and on the left a short crooked Moorish sword, and by a tarnished baldrick over the shoulder hung the horn which announced his approach. He had a swarthy and sun-burnt visage, with a thin beard, and piercing dark eyes, a well-formed mouth and nose, and other features which might have been pronounced handsome, but for the black elf-locks which hung around his face, and the air of wildness and emaciation, which rather seemed to indicate a savage than a civilized man.
“Quentin rode up to the Bohemian, and said to him, as he suddenly assumed his proper position on the horse, ‘Methinks, friend, you will prove but a blind guide, if you look at the tail of your horse rather than his ears.’
“‘And if I were actually blind,’ answered the Bohemian, ‘I could guide you through any county in this realm of France, or in those adjoining to it.’
“‘Yet you are no Frenchman born,’ said the Scot.
“‘I am not,’ answered the guide.
“‘What countryman, then, are you?’ demanded Quentin.
“‘I am of no country,’ answered the guide.
“‘How! of no country?’ repeated the Scot.
“‘No!’ answered the Bohemian, ‘of none. I am a Zingaro, a Bohemian, an Egyptian, or whatever the Europeans, in their different languages, may chuse to call our people; but I have no country.’
“‘Are you a Christian?’ asked the Scotchman.
“The Bohemian shook his head.
“‘Dog,’ said Quentin, (for there was little toleration in the spirit of Catholicism in those days,) ‘dost thou worship Mahoun?’
“‘No,’ was the indifferent and concise answer of the guide, who neither seemed offended nor surprised at the young man’s violence of manner.
“‘Are you a Pagan then, or what are you?’
“‘I have no religion,’ answered the Bohemian.
“Durward started back; for, though he had heard of Saracens and idolaters, it had never entered into his ideas or belief, that any body of men could exist who practised no mode of worship whatsoever. He recovered from his astonishment, to ask where his guide usually dwelt.
“‘Wherever I chance to be for the time,’ replied the Bohemian. ‘I have no home.’
“‘How do you guard your property?’
“‘Excepting the clothes which I wear, and the horse I ride on, I have no property.’
“‘Yet you dress gaily, and ride gallantly,’ said Durward. ‘What are your means of subsistence?’
“‘I eat when I am hungry, drink when I am thirsty, and have no other means of subsistence than chance throws in my way,’ replied the vagabond.
“‘Under whose laws do you live?’
“‘I acknowledge obedience to none, but as it suits my pleasure,’ said the Bohemian.
“‘Who is your leader, and commands you?’
“‘The father of our tribe—if I chuse to obey him,’ said the guide—‘otherwise I have no commander.’
“‘You are then,’ said the wondering querist, ‘destitute of all that other men are combined by—you have no law, no leader, no settled means of subsistence, no house, or home. You have, may Heaven compassionate you, no country—and, may Heaven enlighten and forgive you, you have no God! What is it that remains to you, deprived of government, domestic happiness, and religion?’
“‘I have liberty,’ said the Bohemian—‘I crouch to no one—obey no one—respect no one.—I go where I will—live as I can—and die when my day comes.’
“‘But you are subject to instant execution, at the pleasure of the Judge.’
“‘Be it so,’ returned the Bohemian; ‘I can but die so much the sooner.’
“‘And to imprisonment also,’ said the Scot; ‘and where, then, is your boasted freedom?’
“‘In my thoughts,’ said the Bohemian, ‘which no chains can bind; while yours, even when your limbs are free, remain fettered by your laws and your superstitions, your dreams of local attachment, and your fantastic visions of civil policy. Such as I are free in spirit when our limbs are chained—You are imprisoned in mind, even when your limbs are most at freedom.’
“‘Yet the freedom of your thoughts,’ said the Scot, ‘relieves not the pressure of the gyves on your limbs.’
“‘For a brief time that may be endured; and if within that period I cannot extricate myself, and fail of relief from my comrades, I can always die, and death is the most perfect freedom of all.’
There was a deep pause of some duration, which Quentin at length broke, by resuming his queries.
“‘Yours is a wandering race, unknown to the nations of Europe—Whence do they derive their origin?’
“‘I may not tell you,’ answered the Bohemian.
“‘When will they relieve this kingdom from their presence, and return to the land from whence they came?’ said the Scot.
“‘When the day of their pilgrimage shall be accomplished,’ replied his vagrant guide.
“‘Are you not sprung from those tribes of Israel which were carried into captivity beyond the great river Euphrates?’ said Quentin, who had not forgotten the lore which had been taught him at Aberbrothock.
“‘Had we been so,’ answered the Bohemian, ‘we had followed their faith, and practised their rites.’
“‘What is thine own name?’ said Durward.
“‘My proper name is only known to my brethren—The men beyond our tents call me Hayraddin Maugrabin, that is, Hayraddin the African Moor.’
“‘Thou speakest too well for one who hath lived always in thy filthy horde,’ said the Scot.
“‘I have learned some of the knowledge of this land,’ said Heyraddin.—‘When I was a little boy, our tribe was chased by the hunters after human flesh. An arrow went through my mother’s head, and she died. I was entangled in the blanket on her shoulders, and was taken by the pursuers. A priest begged me from the Provost’s archers, and trained me up in Frankish learning for two or three years.’
“‘How came you to part with him?’ demanded Durward.
“‘I stole money from him—even the God which he worshipped,’ answered Hayraddin, with perfect composure; ‘he detected me, and beat me—I stabbed him with my knife, fled to the woods, and was again united to my people.’
“‘Wretch!’ said Durward, ‘did you murder your benefactor?’
“‘What had he to do to burden me with his benefits?—The Zingaro boy was no house-bred cur to dog the heels of his master and crouch beneath his blows, for scraps of food—He was the imprisoned wolf-whelp, which at the first opportunity broke his chain, rended his master, and returned to his wilderness.’
“There was another pause, when the young Scot, with a view of still farther investigating the character and purpose of this suspicious guide, asked Hayraddin, ‘Whether it was not true that his people, amid their ignorance, pretended to a knowledge of futurity, which was not given to the sages, philosophers, and divines, of more polished society?’
“‘We pretend to it,’ said Hayraddin, ‘and it is with justice.’
“‘How can it be that so high a gift is bestowed on so abject a race?’ said Quentin.
“‘Can I tell you?’ answered Hayraddin—‘Yes, I may indeed; but it is when you shall explain to me why the dog can trace the footsteps of a man, while man, the noble animal, hath no power to trace those of the dog. These powers, which seem to you so wonderful, are instinctive in our race. From the lines on the face and on the hand, we can tell the future fate of those who consult us, even as surely as you know from the blossom of the tree in spring, what fruit it will bear in the harvest.’”
JUGGLERS, THEIR ORIGIN, EXPLOITS, &c.
Those occupations which were of the most absolute necessity to the support of existence, were, doubtless, the earliest, and, in the infancy of society, the sole employments that engaged attention. But when the art and industry of a few were found sufficient for the maintenance of many, property began to accumulate in the hands of individuals, and as all could no longer be engaged in the productions of the necessaries of life, those who were excluded applied their ingenuity to those arts which, by contributing to the convenience of the former, might enable them to participate in the fruits of their labour; and several of these have acquired a pre-eminence over the more useful avocations. A taste for the wonderful seems to be natural to man in every stage of society, and at almost every period of life; we, therefore, cannot wonder that, from the earliest ages, persons have been found, who, more idle or more ingenious than others, have availed themselves of this propensity, to obtain an easy livelihood by levying contributions on the curiosity of the public. Whether this taste is to be considered as a proof of the weakness of our judgment, or of innate inquisitiveness, which stimulates us to enlarge the sphere of our knowledge, must be left to the decision of metaphysicians; it is sufficient for our present purpose to know that it gave rise to a numerous class of persons, whom, whether performers of sleight of hand, rope-dancers, mountebanks, teachers of animals to perform extraordinary tricks, or, in short, who delude the senses, and practice harmless deception on spectators, we include under the common title of Jugglers.
If these arts served no other purpose than that of mere amusement, they yet merit a certain degree of encouragement, as affording at once a cheap and innocent diversion: but Jugglers frequently exhibit instructive experiments in natural philosophy, chemistry, and mechanics; thus, the solar microscope was invented from an instrument to reflect shadows, with which a Savoyard amused a German populace; and the celebrated Sir Richard Arkwright is said to have conceived the idea of the spinning machines, which have so largely contributed to the prosperity of the cotton manufacture in this country, from a toy which he purchased for his child of an itinerant showman. These deceptions have, besides, acted as an agreeable and most powerful antidote to superstition, and to that popular belief in miracles, conjuration, sorcery, and witchcraft, which preyed upon the minds of our ancestors; and the effects of shadows, electricity, mirrors, and the magnet, once formidable instruments in the hands of interested persons for keeping the vulgar in awe, have been stripped of their terrors, and are no longer frightful in their most terrific forms.
That this superstitious dread led to the persecution of many innocent beings, who were supposed to be guilty of witchcraft, is too well known to require illustration: our own statute books are loaded with penalties against sorcery; at no very distant period our courts of law have been disgraced by criminal trials of that nature; and judges who are still cited as models of legal knowledge and discernment, not only permitted such cases to go to a jury, but allowed sentences to be recorded which consigned reputed wizards to capital punishment. In Poland, even so late as the year 1739, a Juggler was exposed to the torture, until a confession was extracted from him that he was a sorcerer, upon which, without further proof, he was immediately hanged; and instances in other countries might be multiplied without end. But this, although it exceeds in atrocity, does not equal in absurdity, the infatuation of the tribunal of the inquisition in Portugal, which actually condemned to the flames, as being possessed with the devil, a horse belonging to an Englishman, who had taught it to perform some uncommon tricks; and the poor animal is confidently said to have been publicly burned at Lisbon, in conformity with his sentence, in the year 1601.
The only parts of Europe in which the arts of sorcery now obtain any credit, is Lapland; where, indeed, supposed wizards still practise incantations, by which they pretend to obtain the knowledge of future events, and in which the credulity of the people induces them to place the most implicit confidence. On such occasions a magic drum is usually employed. This instrument is formed of a piece of wood of a semi-oval form, hollow on the flat side, and there covered with a skin, in which various uncouth figures are depicted; among which, since the introduction of Christianity into that country, an attempt is usually made to represent the acts of our Saviour and the Apostles. On this covering several brass rings of different sizes are laid, while the attendants dispose themselves in many antic postures, in order to facilitate the charm; the drum is then beat with the horn of a rein-deer, which occasioning the skin to vibrate, puts the rings in motion round the figures, and, according to the positions which they occupy, the officiating seer pronounces his prediction.
It is unfortunate that of all the books (and there were several) which treated of the arts of conjuration, as they were practised among the ancients, not one is now extant, and all that we know upon the subject is collected from isolated facts which have been incidentally mentioned in other writings. From these it would, however, appear, that many of the deceptions which still continue to excite astonishment, were then common.
A century and a half before our æra, during the revolt of the slaves in Sicily, a Syrian of their number, named Eunus, a man of considerable talent, who after having witnessed many vicissitudes, was reduced to that state, became the leader of his companions by pretending to an inspiration from the gods; and in order to confirm the divinity of his mission by miracles, he used to breath flames from his mouth when addressing his followers. By this art the Rabbi Barchschebas also made the credulous Jews believe that he was the Messiah, during the sedition which he excited among them in the reign of Adrian; and, two centuries afterwards, the Emperor Constantius was impressed with great dread, when informed that one of the body-guards had been seen to breathe out fire. Historians tell us that these deceptions were performed by putting inflammable substances into a nut-shell pierced at both ends, which was then secretly conveyed into the mouth and breathed through. Our own fire-eaters content themselves with rolling a little flax, so as to form a small ball, which is suffered to burn until nearly consumed; more flax is then tightly rolled round it, and the fire will thus remain within for a long time, and sparks may be blown from it without injury, provided the air be inspired, not by the mouth but through the nostrils. The ancients also performed some curious experiments with that inflammable mineral oil called Naphtha, which kindles on merely exposing near a fire. Allusion is supposed to have been made to this in the story of the dress of Herculus, when it is said to have been dipped in the blood of Nessus. Many assert that it was with this substance Medea destroyed Creusa, by sending to her a dress impregnated with it, which burst into flames when she drew near the fire of the altar; and there can be no doubt that it was used by the priests on those occasions when the sacrificial offerings took fire imperceptibly.
The trial by Ordeal, in the middle ages, in which persons accused of certain crimes were forced to prove their innocence by walking blindfold among burning ploughshares, or by holding heated iron in their hands, was probably little else than a juggling trick, which the priests conducted as best suited their views. The accused was committed to their care during three entire days previous to the trial, and remained in their custody for the same space after it was over; the Ordeal took place in the church under their own immediate inspection; they not only consecrated, but heated, the iron themselves; mass was then said, and various ceremonies were performed, all calculated to divert the attention of the spectators; and when the operation was over, the part which had been exposed to the fire was carefully bound up and sealed, not to be opened until the end of the third day; doubtless, therefore, the time before the trial was occupied in preparing the skin to resist the effects of the heat, and that afterwards in obliterating the marks of any injury it might have sustained. That such was the fact has, indeed, been acknowledged in the works of Albertus Magnus, a Dominican friar, who, after the trial by Ordeal had been abolished, published the secret of the art, which, if his account be correct, consisted in nothing more than covering the hands and feet at repeated intervals with a paste made of the sap of certain herbs mixed together with the white of an egg.
This deception was, however, practised in times more remote than the period to which we have alluded. There was anciently an annual festival held on Mount Soracte, in Etruria, at which certain people called Hirpi, used to walk over live embers, for which performance they were allowed some peculiar privileges by the Roman senate; the same feat was achieved by women at the temple of Diana, at Castabala, in Cappadocia; and allusion is even made, in the Antigone of the Grecian poet Sophocles, who wrote nearly five centuries anterior to our æra, to the very species of Ordeal which has been just noticed.
In modern times, much notice has been excited by jugglers, who practised deceptions by fire. Towards the end of the seventeenth century, one Richardson, an Englishman, excited great astonishment at Paris, by pretending to chew burning coals and to swallow melted lead, with many other equally extraordinary feats; some of which are thus recorded in Evelyn’s diary:—“October the 8th, 1672, took leave of my Lady Sunderland, who was going to the Hague to my Lord, now ambassador there. She made me stay dinner at Leicester House, and afterwards sent for Richardson, the famous fire-eater. He, before us, devoured brimstone on glowing coals, chewing and swallowing them. He melted a beere glasse and eate it quite up; then taking a live coal on his tongue, he put on it a raw oyster; the coal was blowne on with bellows till it flamed and sparkled in his mouth, and so remained until the oyster was quite boiled; then he melted pitch and wax with sulphur, which he dranke down as it flamed.” Many of our readers must recollect Signora Girardelli; and Miss Rogers, the American fire-eater, who was announced as having entered a heated oven with a leg of mutton in her hand, and having remained there until it was baked! This young lady exhibited all the tricks usually performed by such persons; she washed her hands in boiling oil, and then suffered aquafortis to be poured over them; but below the oil, there, no doubt, was a quantity of water, the air from which, when heated, forcing itself through the supernatant oil, gave it the appearance of boiling, when in reality its temperature probably did not exceed a hundred degrees of Fahrenheit; and when the hands were once well coated with oil, there was no danger from the aquafortis. She had also a ladle of melted lead, out of which she appeared to take a little with a spoon and pour into her mouth, and then to return in the shape of a solid lump; but in pretending to take the lead into the spoon, it was, in fact, quicksilver that was received, through a dexterous contrivance in the ladle, and this she swallowed, the solid lead having been previously placed in her mouth. She, besides, repeatedly placed her foot on a bar of hot iron; but the rapidity with which she removed it scarcely allowed time to injure the most delicate skin, even had it not been previously prepared: the cuticle of the hands and of the soles of the feet may, however, be easily rendered sufficiently callous to support a longer experiment. This effect will be produced if it be frequently punctured, or injured by being in continual contact with hard substances; repeatedly moistening it with spirit of vitriol will also at length render it horny and insensible; and thus it is not uncommon to see the labourers at copper-works take the melted ore into their hands.
The exhibition of cups and balls is of great antiquity, and depends entirely on manual dexterity. It is mentioned in the works of various ancient authors, one of whom relates the astonishment of a countryman, who, on first witnessing the performance, exclaimed, “that it was well he had no such animal on his farm, for under such hands no doubt all his property would soon disappear.”
Feats of strength have been common to all countries in every age. More than fifteen hundred years ago, there were persons who excited astonishment by the since ordinary exhibition of supporting vast weights upon the breast, and of even suffering iron to be forged on an anvil placed upon it. But these were mere tricks: to support the former, it is only necessary to place the body in such a position, with the shoulders and feet resting against some support, as that it shall form an arch; and as for the latter, if the anvil be large and the hammer small, the stroke will scarcely be felt; for the action and reaction being equal and reciprocal, an anvil of two hundred pounds weight will resist the stroke of a hammer of two pounds, wielded with the force of one hundred pounds, or of four pounds with the impetus of fifty, without injury to the body.
In the beginning of the seventeenth century, there was a German, who travelled over Europe under the appropriate name of Sampson, and who rendered himself celebrated by the uncommon strength which he displayed: among many other extraordinary feats, it is said, that he could so fix himself between two posts, as that two or even more horses, could not draw him from his position. The same exploit was attempted not many years back, in this country, by a person who placed himself with his feet resting in a horizontal posture against a strong bar; only one horse was employed, and the man was enabled to resist the entire force of the animal, until both his thigh bones suddenly snapped asunder. Another had the temerity to try the same experiment, and, in like manner, broke both his legs. These instances clearly show, that apparent strength is often nothing more than a judicious application of the mechanical powers to the human frame; and from the catastrophe attending the two latter may be deduced the anatomical fact, that the sinews of the arms possess a greater power of resistance than the largest bones of the body.
Feats of tumbling, rope dancing, and horsemanship, were practised at very early periods. Xenophon mentions a female dancer at Athens, who wrote and read while standing on a wheel which revolved with the greatest velocity; but the manner in which this was performed is not explained. Juvenal seems also to have alluded to a similar performance at Rome, in that passage where he says:
“An magis oblectant animum jactata petauro,
Corpora quique solent rectum descendere funem,
Quam tu.” Sat. xiv. v. 265.
which, however, also wants explanation, although one of his most judicious translators has rendered it
——“The man who springs
Light through the hoop, and on the tight-rope swings.”
Gifford.
Addison tells us, that, in his travels through Italy, he witnessed an annual exhibition that is peculiar to the Venetians. “A set of artisans, by the help of poles, which they laid across each others’ shoulders, built themselves up in a kind of pyramid; so that you saw a pile of men in the air, of four or five rows, rising one above another. The weight was so equally distributed that every man was well able to bear his part of it; the stories, if they might be so called, growing less and less as they advanced higher and higher. A little boy presented the top of the pyramid, who, after a short space, leaped off, with a great deal of dexterity, into the arms of one who caught him at the bottom.” But this was only the revival of an ancient feat, which, as we learn from the following verses of the poet Claudian, was formerly practised among the Romans:—
“Vel qui mare arrum sese jaculantur in auras,
Corporaque adificant celeri cressentia nexu,
Queram compositam puer augmentatus in arcem
Emicat, et vinctas plantæ, vel eruribus hærens,
Pendulo librato figit vestigia sulta.”
De Pr. et Obyb. Cono.
“Men pil’d on men, with active leaps arise,
And build the breathing fabric to the skies;
A sprightly youth above the topmast row
Paints the tall pyramid, and crowns the show.”
Addison.
In the thirteenth century, these performances were introduced at Constantinople, by a strolling company from Egypt, who afterwards travelled to Rome, and thence through great part of Europe. They could stand in various postures on horses while at full speed, and both mount and dismount without stopping them; and their rope-dancers sometimes extended the rope on which they poised themselves between the masts of ships.
It appears also that the ancients taught animals to perform many tricks that are still exhibited, and some even yet more extraordinary. In the year 543, a learned dog was shown at the Byzantine court, which not only selected, and returned to the several owners, the rings and ornaments of the spectators, which were thrown together before him, but on being asked his opinion respecting the character of some of the females who were present, he expressed it by signs at once so significant and correct, that the people were persuaded he possessed the spirit of divination. In the reign of Galba, an elephant was exhibited at Rome which walked upon a rope stretched across the theatre; and such was the confidence reposed in his dexterity, that a person was mounted on him while he performed the feat.
It must require the exercise not alone of vast patience, but also of extraordinary cruelty, mingled perhaps with much kindness, to train animals to exhibit a degree of intelligence approaching to that of human beings. It is said that bears are taught to dance by being placed in a den with a floor of heated iron: the animal, endeavouring to avoid the smart to which his paws are thus exposed, rears himself on his hind legs, and alternately raises them with the utmost rapidity, during all which time a flageolet is played to him; and after this lesson has been frequently repeated, he becomes so impressed with the associated recollection of the music and the pain, that, whenever he hears the same tune, he instinctively recurs to the same efforts, in order to escape the fancied danger.
In the middle of the last century, there was an Englishman, named Wildman, who excited great attention by the possession of a secret through the means of which he enticed bees to follow him, and to settle on his person without stinging him. A similar circumstance is related in Francis Bruce’s voyage to Africa in 1698, in which mention is made of a man who was constantly surrounded by a swarm of these insects, and who had thence obtained the title of “King of the bees.”
Only one instance is recorded in ancient history of the art of supplying the deficiency of hands by the use of toes; and that is of an Indian slave belonging to the emperor Augustus, who, being without arms, could, notwithstanding, wield a bow and arrows and put a trumpet to his mouth with his feet.
Of late years some persons have exhibited themselves in the character of stone-eaters; but although these are to be considered as mere jugglers, yet it would appear that there have been others who actually possessed the faculty of digesting similar substances. Of the instances on record we shall merely select one, from the “Dictionnaire Physique,” of father Paulian:—“The beginning of May 1760, there was brought to Avignon a true lithophagus, or stone-eater, who had been found, about three years before that time, in a northern island, by the crew of a Dutch ship. He not only swallowed flints of an inch and a half long, a full inch broad, and half an inch thick, but such stones as he could reduce to powder, such as marble, pebbles, &c., he made up into paste, which was to him a most agreeable and wholesome food. I examined this man with all the attention I possibly could; I found his gullet very large, his teeth exceedingly strong, his saliva very corrosive, and his stomach lower than ordinary, which I imputed to the vast quantity of flints he had swallowed, being about five and twenty, one day with another. His keeper made him eat raw flesh with the stones, but could never induce him to swallow bread; he would, however, drink water, wine, and brandy, which last liquor appeared to afford him infinite pleasure. He usually slept twelve hours a day, sitting on the ground, with one knee over the other, and his chin resting on it; and when not asleep he passed the greater part of his time in smoking.” In the year 1802, there was a Frenchman, who, indeed, did not profess to eat stones, but who publicly devoured at the amphitheatre, in the city of Lisbon, a side of raw mutton, with a rabbit and a fowl, both alive: he advertised a repetition of the experiment, with the addition of a live cat; but the magistrates, deeming the exhibition too brutal for the public eye, would not again allow its performance. Notwithstanding the public display of this man, and the extraordinary fact of his having appeared to swallow living animals, may rank him in the class of jugglers, it is still probable that he was no impostor; for instances of such uncommon powers of the stomach are by no means rare, and among others we read of another Frenchman who was in the constant habit, as an amateur, of eating cats alive, and was even strongly suspected of having devoured a child.
LEGENDS, &c. MIRACLES, &c.
A Legend[[79]] was originally a book used in the old Romish churches, containing the lessons that were to be read in divine service. Hence also the lives of saints and martyrs came to be called legends, because chapters were read out of them at matins, and in the refectories of the religious houses. The Golden Legend is a collection of the lives of the Saints, compiled by James De Varasse, better known by the Latin name of J. De Veragine, Vicar-General of the Dominicans, and afterwards Bishop of Genoa, who died in 1298. It was received into the church with the most enthusiastic applause, which it maintained for 200 years; but, in fact, it is so full of ridiculous and absurd romantic monstrosities, that the Romanists themselves are now generally ashamed of it. On this very account alone the word Legend got into general disrepute.
The following is stated to be the origin of those ecclesiastical histories entitled Legends:—The professors in rhetoric, before colleges were established in the monasteries where the schools were held, frequently gave their pupils the life of some saint for a trial of their talent at amplification. The students, being constantly at a loss to furnish out their pages, invented most of these wonderful adventures. Jortin observes, that the Christians used to collect out of Ovid, Livy, and other pagan poets and historians, the miracles and portents, so found there, and accommodated them to their own monks and saints. The good fathers of that age, whose simplicity was not inferior to their devotion, were so delighted with these flowers of rhetoric, that they were induced to make a collection of these miraculous compositions; not imagining that, at some distant period, they would become matters of faith. Yet when James De Veragine, Peter Nadal, and Peter Ribadeneira, wrote the Lives of the Saints, they sought for the materials in the libraries of these monasteries; and, awakening from the dust the manuscripts of amplification, imagined they made an invaluable present to the world, by laying before them these voluminous absurdities. The people received these pious fictions with all imaginable simplicity; and as the book is adorned with a number of cuts, these miracles were perfectly intelligible to their eyes. Fleury, Tillemont, Baillet, Launoi, and Ballendus, cleared away much of the rubbish. The enviable title of Golden Legend, by which James De Veragine called his work, has been disputed; iron or lead might more aptly express the character of this folio.
The monks, when the world became more critical in their reading, gave a graver turn to their narratives, and became more penurious of their absurdities. The faithful Catholic contends that the line of tradition has been preserved unbroken; notwithstanding that the originals were lost in the general wreck of literature from the barbarians, or came down in a most imperfect state. Baronius has given the lives of many apocryphal saints; for instance, of a Saint Xenoris, whom he calls a Martyr of Antioch; but it appears that Baronius having read this work in Chrysostom, which signifies a couple or pair, he mistook it for the name of a saint, and continued to give the most authentic biography of a saint who never existed! The Catholics confess this sort of blunder is not uncommon, but then it is only fools who laugh!
As a specimen of the happier inventions, one is given, embellished by the diction of Gibbon the historian.
“Among the insipid legends of ecclesiastical history, I am tempted to distinguish the memorable fable of the Seven Sleepers, whose imaginary date corresponds with the reign of the younger Theodosius, and the conquest of Africa by the Vandals. When the emperor Decius persecuted the Christians, seven noble youths of Ephesus concealed themselves in a spacious cavern on the side of an adjacent mountain, where they were doomed to perish by the tyrant, who gave orders that the entrance should be firmly secured by a pile of stones. They immediately fell into a deep slumber, which was miraculously prolonged without injuring the powers of life, during a period of one hundred and eighty-seven years. At the end of that time the slaves of Adolius, to whom the inheritance of the mountain had descended, removed the stones, to supply materials for some rustic edifice. The light of the sun darted into the cavern, and the Seven Sleepers were permitted to awake: after a slumber, as they thought, of a few hours, they were pressed by the calls of hunger; and resolved that Jamblichus, one of their number, should secretly return to the city to purchase bread for the use of his companions. The youth, if we may still employ that appellation, could no longer recognise the once familiar aspect of his native country; and his surprise was increased by the appearance of a large cross, triumphantly erected over the principal gate of Ephesus. His singular dress, and obsolete language, confounded the baker, to whom he offered an ancient medal of Decius as the current coin of the empire; and Jamblichus, on suspicion of a secret treasure, was dragged before the judge. Their mutual inquiries produced the amazing discovery that two centuries were almost elapsed since Jamblichus and his friends had escaped from the rage of a pagan tyrant. The bishop of Ephesus, the clergy, the magistrates, the people, and, it is said, the emperor Theodosius himself, hastened to visit the cavern of the Seven Sleepers; who bestowed their benediction, related their story, and at the same instant peaceably expired.
“This popular tale Mahomet learned when he drove his camels to the fairs of Syria; and he has introduced it, as a divine revelation, into the Koran.” The same story has been adopted and adorned, by the natives from Bengal to Africa, who profess the Mahometan religion.
These monks imagined that holiness was often proportioned to a saint’s filthiness. St. Ignatius delighted, say they, to appear abroad with old dirty shoes; he never used a comb, but suffered his hair to run into clots, and religiously abstained from paring his nails. One saint attained to such a pitch of piety as to have near three hundred patches on his breeches; which, after his death, were exhibited in public as a stimulus to imitate such a holy life. St. Francis discovered, by certain experience, that the devil was frightened away by similar kinds of unmentionables; but was animated by clean clothing to tempt and seduce the wearers; and one of their heroes declares that the purest souls are in the dirtiest bodies. On this subject a story is told by them which may not be very agreeable to fastidious delicacy. Brother Juniper was a gentleman perfectly pious in this principle; indeed so great was his merit in this species of mortification, that a brother declared he could always nose Brother Juniper when within a mile of the monastery, provided he was at the due point. Once, when the blessed Juniper, for he was no saint, was a guest, his host, proud of the honour of entertaining so pious a personage, the intimate friend of St. Francis, provided an excellent bed and the finest sheets. Brother abhorred such luxury; and this too evidently appeared after his sudden departure in the morning, unknown to his kind host. The great Juniper did this, says his biographer, (having told us what he did) not so much from his habitual inclinations for which he was so justly celebrated, as from his excessive piety, and as much as he could to mortify worldly pride, and to shew how a true saint despised clean sheets.
Among other grotesque miracles we find, in the life of St. Francis, that he preached a sermon in a desert, but he soon collected an immense audience. The birds shrilly warbled to every sentence, and stretched out their necks, opened their beaks, and when he finished, dispersed with a holy rapture into four companies, to report his sermon to all the birds of the universe. A grasshopper remained a week with St. Francis during the absence of the Virgin Mary, and fastened on his head. He grew so companionable with a nightingale, that when a nest of swallows began to twitter, he hushed them, by desiring them not to tittle tattle of his sister the nightingale. Attacked by a wolf, with only the sign manual of the cross, he held a long dialogue with his rabid assailant, till the wolf, meek as a lap-dog, stretched his paws in the hands of the saint, followed him through towns, and became half a Christian. This same St. Francis had such a detestation of the good things of this world, that he would never suffer his followers to touch money. A friar having placed some money in a window collected at the altar, he observed him to take it in his mouth and throw it on the dung of an ass! St. Phillip Nerius was such an admirer of poverty that he frequently prayed God would bring him to that state as to stand in need of a penny, and find none that would give him one! But St. Macaire was so shocked at having killed a louse that he endured seven years of penitence among the thorns and briars of a forest.
The following miraculous incident is given respecting two pious maidens. The night of the Nativity of Christ, after the first mass, they both retired into a solitary spot of their nunnery till the second mass was rung. One asked the other, “why do you want two cushions, when I have only one?” The other replied, “I would place it between us, for the child Jesus; as the Evangelist says, “Where there are two or three persons assembled I am in the midst of them.”—This being done, they sat down, feeling a most lively pleasure at their fancy; and there they remained from the nativity of Christ to that of John the Baptist; but this great interval of time passed with these saintly maidens, as two hours would appear to others. The abbess and her nuns were alarmed at their absence, for no one could give any account of them. On the eve of St. John, a cowherd passing by them, beheld a beautiful child seated on a cushion between this pair of run-away nuns. He hastened to the abbess with news of this stray sheep, who saw this lovely child playfully seated between these nymphs, who, with blushing countenances, enquired if the second bell had already rung? Both parties were equally astonished to find our young devotees had been there since the birth of Christ to that of John the Baptist. The abbess inquired after the child who sat between them: they solemnly declared they saw no child between them, and persisted in their story.”
“Such,” observes a late writer on this subject, “is one of the miracles of the ‘Golden Legend,’ which a wicked wit might comment on, and see nothing extraordinary in the whole story. The two nuns might be missing between the nativities, and be found at last with a child seated between them. They might not choose to account either for their absence or their child: the only touch of miracle is, that they asseverated they saw no child, that I confess is a little (child) too much.
Ribadeneira’s Lives of the Saints exhibit more of the legendary spirit than Alban Butler’s work on the same subject, (which, by the bye, is the most sensible history of these legends;) for wanting judgment and not faith, the former is more voluminous in his details, and more ridiculous in his narratives.
Alban Butler affirms that St. Genevieve, the patron of Paris, was born in 422, at Nanterre, four miles from Paris, near the present Calvary there, and that she died a virgin on this day in 512, and was buried in 545, near the steps of the high altar, in a magnificent church, dedicated to St. Peter and St. Paul, began by Clovis, where he also was interred. Her relics were afterwards taken up and put into a costly shrine about 630. Of course they worked miracles. Her shrine of gold and silver, covered with precious stones, the presents of kings and queens, and with a cluster of diamonds on the top, presented by the intriguing Mary de Medicis, is, on calamitous occasions, carried about Paris in procession, accompanied by shrines equally miraculous, and by the canons of St. Genevieve walking barefoot.
The miracles of St. Genevieve, as related in the Golden Legend, were equally numerous and equally credible. It relates that when she was a child, St. Germaine said to her mother, “Know ye for certain that on the day of Genevieve’s nativity the angels sung with joy and gladness,” and looking on the ground he saw a penny signed with the cross, which came there by the will of God; he took it up, and gave it to Genevieve, requiring her to bear in mind that she was the spouse of Christ. She promised him accordingly, and often went to the minister, that she might be worthy of her espousals. “Then,” says the Legend, “the mother was angry, and smote her on the cheek—God avenged the child, so that the mother became blind,” and so remained for one and twenty months, when Genevieve fetched her some holy water, signed her with the sign of the cross, washed her eyes, and she recovered her sight. It further relates, that by the Holy Ghost she showed many people their secret thoughts, and that from fifteen years to fifty, she fasted every day except Sunday and Thursday, when she ate beans, and barley bread of three weeks old. Desiring to build a church, and dedicate it to St. Denis and other martyrs, she required materials of the priests for that purpose. “Dame,” answered the priests, “we would; but we can get no chalk nor lime.” She desired them to go to the bridge of Paris, and bring what they found there. They did so till two swineherds came by, one of whom said to the other, ‘I went yesterday after one of my sows and found a bed of lime;’ the other replied that he had also found one under the root of a tree that the wind had blown down. St. Genevieve’s priests of course inquired where these discoveries were made, and bearing the tidings to Genevieve, the church of St. Denis was began. During its progress the workmen wanted drink, whereupon Genevieve called for a vessel, prayed over it, signed it with the cross, and the vessel was immediately filled; “so,” says the Legend, “the workmen drank their belly full,” and the vessel continued to be supplied in the same way with “drink” for the workmen till the church was finished. At another time a woman stole St. Genevieve’s shoes, but as soon as she got home lost her sight for the theft, and remained blind, till, having restored the shoes, St. Genevieve restored the woman’s sight. Desiring the liberation of certain prisoners condemned to death at Paris, she went thither and found the city gates were shut against her, but they opened without any other key than her own presence. She prayed over twelve men in that city possessed with devils, till the men were suspended in the air, and the devils were expelled. A child of four years old fell into a pit, and was killed; St. Genevieve only covered her with her mantle and prayed over her, and the child came to life, and was baptised at Easter. On a voyage to Spain she arrived at a port “where, as of custom, ships were wont to perish.” Her own vessel was likely to strike on a tree in the water, which seems to have caused the wrecks; she commanded the tree to be cut down, and began to pray; when lo, just as the tree began to fall, “two wild heads, grey and horrible, issued thereout, which stank so sore, that the people there were envenomed by the space of two hours, and never after perished ship there; thanks be to God and this holy saint.”
At Meaux, a master not forgiving his servant his faults, though St. Genevieve prayed him, she prayed against him. He was immediately seized with a hot ague: “on the morrow he came to the holy virgin, running with open mouth like a German bear, his tongue hanging out like a boar, and requiring pardon.” She then blessed him, the fever left him, and the servant was pardoned. A girl going out with a bottle, St. Genevieve called to her, and asked what she carried: she answered oil, which she had bought; but St. Genevieve seeing the devil sitting on the bottle, blew upon it, and the bottle broke, but the saint blessed the oil, and caused her to bear it home safely notwithstanding. The Golden Legend says, that the people who saw this, marvelled that the saint could see the devil, and were greatly edified.
It was to be expected that a saint of such miraculous powers in her lifetime should possess them after her death, and accordingly the reputation of her relics is very high.
Several stories of St. Genevieve’s miraculous faculties, represent them as very convenient in vexatious cases of ordinary occurrence; one of these will serve as a specimen. On a dark wet night she was going to church with her maidens, with a candle borne before her, which the wind and rain put out; the saint merely called for the candle, and as soon as she took it in her hand it was lighted again, “without any fire of this world.”
Other stories of her lighting candles in this way, call to mind a candle, greatly venerated by E. Worsley, in a “Discourse of Miracles wrought in the Roman Catholic Church, or, a full refutation of Dr. Stillingfleet’s unjust Exceptions against Miracles,” octavo, 1676. At p. 64, he says, “that the miraculous wax candle, yet seen at Arras, the chief city of Artois, may give the reader entertainment, being most certain, and never doubted of by any. In 1105, that is, much above 720 years ago, (of so great antiquity the candle is,) a merciless plague reigned in Arras. The whole city, ever devout to the Mother of God, experienced her, in this their necessity, to be a true mother of mercy; the manner was thus: The Virgin Mary appeared to two men, and enjoined them to tell the bishop of Arras, that on the next Saturday towards morning she would appear in the great church, and put into his hands a wax candle burning; from whence drops of wax should fall into a vessel of water prepared by the bishop. She said, moreover, that all the diseased that drank of this water, should forthwith be cured. This truly promised, truly happened. Our blessed Lady appeared all beautiful, having in her hands a wax candle burning, which diffused light over the whole church; this she presented to the bishop; he blessing it with the sign of the cross, set it in the urn of water; when drops of wax plentifully fell down into the vessel. The diseased drank of it; all were cured; the contagion ceased; and the candle to this day, preserved with great veneration, spends itself, yet loses nothing; and therefore remains still of the same length and greatness it did 720 years ago. A vast quantity of wax, made up of the many drops which fall into the water upon those festival days, when the candle burns, may be justly called a standing indeficient miracle.”
This candle story, though gravely related by a catholic writer, as “not doubted of by any,” and as therefore not to be doubted, miraculously failed in convincing the protestant Stillingfleet, that “miracles wrought in the Roman catholic church,” ought to be believed.