Eustace Budgel was a man of much literary fame at the beginning of the last century, the relation and friend of Addison, and a distinguished writer in the periodical publications of that day. He was born to a good fortune, and held a considerable place under government whilst Addison lived, who kept him in some order as to his political character. But having lost all court favour after Addison’s decease, and being a man of great expense and vanity, having also sunk a large sum of money in the South Sea scheme, and having involved himself in a number of fruitless litigations, he became highly distressed in his circumstances. This, added to the chagrin of disappointed ambition and to other matters, determined him to make away with himself. He had always thought but lightly of revelation, and after Addison’s death became an avowed free-thinker, which laxity of principle strongly concurred in disposing him to adopt this fatal resolution. Accordingly, after having been visibly agitated and almost distracted for several days, he took a boat, and ordered the waterman to go through London bridge. While the boat was under the bridge, Budgel threw himself overboard, having had the previous caution to fill his pockets with stones. This happened in the year 1737. It was said to have been Budgel’s opinion, “that when life becomes uneasy to support, and is overwhelmed with clouds and sorrows, man has a natural right to deprive himself of it, as it is better not to live than to live in pain.” A man of unsettled principles easily persuades himself into the notion of suicide when he is actually suffering from some violence of his passions, even though he had not imbibed it before. For whenever the passions attempt to reason, it is only on the delusive suggestions of their own perturbed feelings. The morning before Budgel carried his deadly intentions into execution, he endeavoured to persuade his daughter to accompany him in his death. His only argument to her was, that her life was not worth holding; but she thought otherwise, and refused to concur in the sacrifice. A slip of paper was left on his writing-table, containing these few words, as an apology for his rash act:—
“What Cato did and Addison approved
Cannot be wrong.”
Monsieur de Boissy, a French dramatic writer and satirist, being reduced to great indigence, resolved to commit suicide. As he considered this action in no other light than as a friendly relief from further misery, he not only persuaded his wife to bear him company, but prevailed on her not to leave their child of five years old behind them, to the mercy of that world in which they had experienced so little sympathy and happiness. Nothing now remained but to fix on the mode of their death. They at length agreed to starve themselves. This not only seemed to them the most natural consequence of their condition, but also saved them from committing a violence either on their child, themselves, or each other, of which perhaps neither Boissy nor his wife found themselves capable. They determined therefore to wait with unshaken constancy the arrival of death under the meagre form of famine; and accordingly they shut themselves up in the solitude of their apartment, where, on account of their distresses, they had little reason to dread the interruption of company. They began, and resolutely persisted in their plan of starving themselves to death with their child. If any one called by chance at their apartment, they found it locked, and receiving no answer, it was concluded that nobody was at home. A friend, however, from that kind of instinct perhaps with which the spirit of friendship abounds, began to apprehend that something must be much amiss with Boissy, as he could neither find him at home, nor get intelligence concerning him. Under much anxiety he returned once more to his apartment; and, whether from hearing any groans from within, or suspecting something was wrong, he ventured to break open the door. Boissy and his wife had been so much in earnest, that it was now three days since they had taken any sustenance, and they were so far on their way to their intended home, that they were in sight, as it were, of the gates of death. The friend, entering into the room where this scene of death was going forward, found the miserable pair in such a situation as to be insensible of his intrusion. Boissy and his wife had no eyes but for each other, and were not sitting in, but rather supported from falling on the ground by two chairs set opposite to each other. Their hands were locked together, and in their ghastly looks was painted a kind of rueful compassion for their child, which hung at the mother’s knee, and seemed as if looking up to her for nourishment, in its natural tenaciousness of life. This group of wretchedness did not less shock than afflict his friend. But soon collecting from circumstances what it must mean, his first care was not to expostulate with Boissy or his wife, but to engage them to receive his succours, in which he found no small difficulty. Their resolution had been taken in earnest. They had got over the worst, and were in sight of their port. Their friend, however, took the right way of reconciling them to live by making the child join in the intercession. The child, who could have none of the prejudices or reasons they might have for not retracting, held up his little hands, and in concert with him entreated his parents to consent to live. Nature did not plead in vain. They were gradually restored to life, and provided with everything that could make them in good humour with its return.
Euphrosine Lemoine was the daughter of a bourgeoise of the Faubourg St. Antoine. She loved, and had admitted to secret interviews, a young cabinetmaker of the neighbourhood. Her parents, however, had long intended her to marry Mr. B——, a man of some property. She reluctantly consented—pronounced the “fatal yes;” and the young man prudently left Paris for some years. In 1836 he yielded to the desire of once more seeing her he had loved. They met, and the husband was dishonoured. This was followed by an elopement; but the husband, who still loved his wife in spite of her crimes, discovered their retreat, and by the intervention of friends and of the police a reconciliation was effected—in vain. They again eloped, but only to perish together; and they were found dead, eight days after, locked in each other’s arms, in a miserable apartment they had hired for the purpose. Before the suicide, one of them had sketched with coal on the wall of their retreat two flaming hearts, and beneath, this inscription—“We have sworn eternal love, and death, terrible death, shall find us united.”
A boatman discovered in the Seine a mass which the stream seemed to roll along with difficulty; he found it was two bodies, a young woman about twenty, tastefully dressed, and a young man in the uniform of the eighth hussars. The left hand and foot of one victim were laid to the right hand and foot of the other. A bit of paper, carefully wrapped up in parchment to preserve it from the water, told their names and motives:—
“O you, whoever you may be, compassionate souls, who shall find these two bodies united, know that we loved each other with the most ardent affection, and that we have perished together, that we may be eternally united. Know, compassionate souls, that our last desire is, that you should place us, united as we are, in the same grave. Man should not separate those whom death has joined.
(Signed), “Florine. Goyon.”
Some years ago, a light was observed in the church of Rueil. This singular appearance occasioned a search; on the approach of the authorities the light was extinguished, but a woman’s stays were found on the pavement. The beadle of the church was met, apparently much agitated. On a further search, the proprietress of the stays was found concealed in a press under the draps mortuaires, (the parish pall.) The unhappy man, on the detection of this profanation, drowned himself.
M. Malglaive, a half-pay officer, lately employed in a public office, had suffered some unexpected pecuniary losses. One of his friends received a note from him by the twopenny post, requesting him to call at his lodgings, where he would find a packet addressed to him. On proceeding there, and opening the packet, he found a letter in these words:—