The Emperor Napoleon III., when Prince Louis Napoleon, was stated to be in possession of the talisman of Charlemagne to which allusion is frequently made in traditional history. This curious object of vertu is mentioned in the Parisian journals as la plus belle relique de l'Europe, and it certainly has excited considerable interest in the archæological and religious circles on the continent. The talisman is of fine gold, of a round form, set with gems, and in the centre are two rough sapphires and a portion of the Holy Cross, besides other relics brought from the Holy Land. This was found round the neck of Charlemagne on the opening of his tomb, and given by the town of Aachen (Aix-la-Chapelle) to Bonaparte, and by him to his favorite Hortense, ci-devant Queen of Holland, at whose death it descended to her son Prince Louis, the late Emperor of the French.
The Black Stone at Mecca.
Near the entrance of the Kaaba, at Mecca, is the famous Black Stone, called by the Moslems Hajra el Assouad, or Heavenly Stone. It forms a part of the sharp angle of the building, and is inserted four or five feet above the ground. It is an irregular oval, and is about seven inches in diameter. Its color is now a deep reddish brown, approaching to black, and it is surrounded by a border of nearly the same color, resembling a cement of pitch and gravel, and from two to three inches in breadth. Both the border and the stone itself are encircled by a silver band, swelling to a considerable breadth below, where it is studded with nails of the same metal. The surface is undulated, and seems composed of about a dozen smaller stones, of different sizes and shapes, but perfectly smooth, and well joined with a small quantity of cement. It looks as if the whole had been dashed into many pieces by a severe concussion, and then re-united—an appearance that may perhaps be explained by the various disasters to which it has been exposed. During the fire that occurred in the time of Yezzid I. (A. D. 682), the violent heat split it into three pieces; and when the fragments were replaced, it was necessary to surround them with a rim of silver, which is said to have been renewed by Haroun-al-Raschid. It was in two pieces when the Karmathians carried it away, it having been broken by a blow from a soldier during the plunder of Mecca. Hakem, a mad Sultan of Egypt, in the eleventh century, attempted, while on a pilgrimage, to destroy it with an iron club which he had concealed under his clothes, but was prevented and slain by the populace. After that accident it remained unmolested until 1674, when it was found one morning besmeared with dirt, so that every one who kissed it returned with a sullied face. As for the quality of the stone, it does not seem to be accurately determined. Burckhardt says it appeared to him like a lava containing several small extraneous particles of a whitish and yellowish substance. Ali Bey calls it a fragment of volcanic basalt, sprinkled with small-pointed colored crystals, and varied with red feldspar. The millions of kisses and touches impressed by the faithful have worn the surface uneven, and to a considerable depth. This miraculous block all orthodox Mussulmans believe to have been originally a transparent hyacinth brought from heaven to Abraham by the angel Gabriel; but that its substance, as well as its color, have long been changed by coming in contact with the impurities of the human race.
The Portland Vase.
This was the name of a beautiful cinerary urn, of transparent dark blue glass, found about the middle of the sixteenth century in a marble sarcophagus near Rome. It was at first deposited in the Barberini Palace at Rome, and hence is often called the Barberini Vase. Next it became (in 1770) the property, by purchase, of Sir William Hamilton, from whose possession it passed into that of the Duchess of Portland. In 1810 the Duke of Portland, one of the trustees of the British Museum, allowed it to be placed in that institution, retaining his right over it as his own property. In 1845 a miscreant named William Lloyd, apparently from an insane love of mischief, or a diseased ambition for notoriety, dashed the valuable relic to pieces with a stone. Owing to the defective state of the law, only a slight punishment could be inflicted; but an act was immediately passed making such an offence punishable with imprisonment for two years. The pieces of the fractured vase were afterwards united in a very complete manner; and, thus repaired, it still exists in the Museum, but is not exhibited to the public.
Martin Luther's Tankard.
This interesting relic of the great reformer is of ivory, very richly carved, and mounted in silver-gilt. There are six medallions on its surface, which consist, however, of a repetition of two subjects. The upper one represents the agony in the garden and the Saviour praying that the cup might pass from Him; the base represents the Lord's Supper, the centre dish being the incarnation of the bread. This tankard, now in the possession of Lord Londesborough, was formerly in the collection of Elkington, of Birmingham, who had some copies made of it. On the lid, in old characters, is the following: "C. M. L., MDXXIIII."
Brass Medal of the Saviour.
In 1702 Rev. H. Rowlands, author of Mona Antiqua, while superintending the removal of some stones near Aberfraw, Wales, for the purpose of making an antiquarian research, found a beautiful brass medal of the Saviour in a fine state of preservation, which he forwarded to his friend and country-man, the Rev. E. Lloyd, author of the Archeologiæ Britannica, and at that time, keeper of the Ashmolean Library at Oxford.
This medal has on one side the figure of a head exactly answering the description given by Publius Lentulus of our Saviour, in a letter sent by him to the Emperor Tiberius and the Senate of Rome. On the reverse side it has the following legend or inscription in Hebrew characters; "This is Jesus Christ, the Mediator or Reconciler;" or, "Jesus the Great Messias, or Man Mediator." Being found among the ruins of the chief Druid's residence in Anglesea, it is not improbable that the curious relic belonged to some Christian connected with Brân the Blessed, who was one of Caractacus's hostages at Rome from A. D. 52 to 59, at which time the Apostle Paul was preaching the gospel at Rome. In two years afterwards, A. D. 61, the Roman General Suetonius extirpated all the Druids in the island. The following is a translation of the letter alluded to, a very antique copy of which is in the possession of the family of Lord Kellie, now represented by the Earl of Mar, a very ancient Scotch family, taken from the original at Rome:—