Incredible Liars.
The French papers, in the autumn of 1821, mention that a man named Desjardins was tried, on his own confession, as an accomplice with Louvel, the assassin of the Duke de Berri. But on his defense, Desjardins contended that his confession ought not to be believed because he was so notorious for falsehood that nobody would give credit to a word he said. In support of this, he produced a host of witnesses, his friend and relatives, who all swore that the excessively bad character which he had given of himself was true, and he was declared not guilty.
Before that a similar instance occurred in Ireland. A man was charged with highway robbery. In the course of the trial the prisoner roared out from the dock that he was guilty, but the jury, in their verdict, pronounced him "not guilty." "Good heavens, gentlemen!" exclaimed the astonished judge, "did you not hear the man himself declare that he was guilty?" The foreman answered: "We did, my lord, and that was the very reason we acquitted him, for we knew the fellow to be such a notorious liar that he never told a word of truth in his life."
Force of Imagination.
A peasant saw his dog attacked by a strange and ferocious mastiff. He tried to separate the animals, and received a bite from his own dog, which instantly ran off through the fields. The wound was healed in a few days, and the dog was not to be found, and the peasant after some time began to feel symptoms of nervous agitation. He conceived that the dog, from disappearing, was mad, and within a day or two after this idea had struck him, he began to feel symptoms of hydrophobia. They grew hourly more violent; he raved, and had all the evidence of a violent distemper.
As he was lying with the door open to let in the last air he was to breathe, he heard his dog bark. The animal ran up to the bedside and frolicked about the room; it was clear that he at least was in perfect health. The peasant's mind was relieved at the instant; he got up with renewed strength, dressed himself, plunged his head into a basin of water, and thus refreshed walked into the room to his astonished family.—Prof. Barrantini.
A Wife Returned.
The annexed story is gravely recorded in "Dodsley's Annual Register:" "The following extraordinary affair happened at Ferrybridge, in 1767. The wife of one Thomas Benson, being suddenly taken ill, she, to all appearances, expired, and continued without any symptoms of life the whole day, and every proper requisite was ordered for her burial; but the husband, hoping for consolation in his distress, by some money which he had reason to believe she had secreted from him in her lifetime, began a rummage for it, and found seven pounds ten shillings in crown pieces concealed in an old box; but, upon his attempting to take it away, he was surprised by his wife, who was just then recovered, and met him and terribly frightened him by appearing as if nothing had happened."
Life in Death.
The wife of the consul of Cologne, Retchmuth, apparently died of the plague, in 1571. A ring of great value, buried with her, tempted the cupidity of the grave-digger, and was the cause of many future years of happiness. At night the purloiner marched to his plunder, and she revived. She lived to be the mother of three children, and, when really dead, she was reburied in the same church, where a monument was erected, upon which the above particulars are recited in German verse.—Edmund Fillingham King.