Begone distrust!—I shall have clothes and bread,
While lilies flourish, or the birds are fed."
She resides at No. 5, Church-lane, Bloomsbury, and has been an inhabitant of London upwards of thirty-eight years. We particularly recommend her to the considerate attention of every little girl or young woman, and, when they are in want of any laces, to think of Ann Johnson.—Such great industry deserves encouragement.
SAMUEL HORSEY,
A REMARKABLE MAN WITHOUT LEGS,
Called the King of the Beggars.
Such as have seen this man in London (and there are very few that have not) will be instantly struck with the accuracy of the engraving.
He has literally rocked himself about London for upwards of nineteen years, with the help of a wooden seat, assisted by a short pair of crutches; and the facility with which he moves is the more singular, when we consider he is very corpulent; he appears to possess remarkably good health, and is about fifty-six years of age. In his life we have no great deal to notice, as wonderful or remarkable. His figure alone is what renders him a striking character; not striking for the height or bulk of his person, but for the mutilated singularity and diminutive size so conspicuously attracting when upon his move in the busiest parts of London streets; in places that require considerable care, even for persons well mounted upon legs, and possessing a good knowledge in the art of walking, to get along without accidents; but even here poor Samuel works his way, whilst buried, as it were, with the press of the crowd, in a manner very expeditious, and tolerably free from accidents, except being tumbled over now and then by people walking too much in haste.
Miss THEODORA DE VERDION,
commonly known by the name of
CHEVALIER JOHN THEODORA DE VERDION,
Who lived in London disguised as a man, a teacher of
languages and a walking bookseller.
This singular woman was born in the year 1744, at Leipsic, in Germany, and died at her lodgings in Upper Charles-street, Hatton-Garden, London, July 15, 1802. She was the only daughter of an architect, of the name of Grahn, who erected several edifices in the city of Berlin, particularly the church of St. Peter. She wrote an excellent hand, and had learned the mathematics, the French, Italian, and English languages, and possessed a complete knowledge of her native tongue. Upon her arrival in England, she commenced teacher of the German language, under the name of Dr. John de Verdion. In her exterior, she was extremely grotesque, wearing a bag wig, a large cocked hat, three or four folio books under one arm, and an umbrella under the other, her pockets completely filled with small volumes, and a stick in her right hand.
