41. What was the Diamond Necklace Affair?
This wonderful piece of jewelry, made by Boehmer, the court jeweller of Paris, was intended for Madame du Barry, the favorite of Louis XV. On the death of the monarch, however, she was excluded from court, and the bawble was left on the jeweller’s hands. Its immense value, 1,800,000 livres ($400,000), precluded any one from becoming its purchaser, but in 1785 Boehmer offered it to Marie Antoinette for $320,000, a considerable reduction. The queen much desired the necklace, but was deterred from its purchase by the great expense. Learning this, the Countess de la Motte forged the queen’s signature, and, by pretending that her Majesty had an attachment for the Cardinal de Rohan, the queen’s almoner, persuaded him to conclude a bargain with the jeweller for $280,000. De la Motte thus obtained possession of the necklace and made off with it. For this she was tried in 1786 and sentenced to be branded on both shoulders and imprisoned for life, but she subsequently escaped and fled to London. The cardinal was tried and acquitted the same year. The French public at that time believed that the queen was a party to the fraud, but no conclusive evidence was ever adduced to support the charge. Talleyrand wrote at the time, “I shall not be surprised if this miserable affair overturn the throne.” His prediction was, to a great extent, fulfilled.
42. Who was the “Patriot Preacher of the Revolution”?
The Rev. John Peter Gabriel Muhlenberg (1746–1807) has been so termed. He was educated at Halle, ordained to the ministry in England, and in 1772 became Lutheran minister of Woodstock, Va. He soon became a leading spirit among those opposed to British oppression. His last sermon was upon the duty men owe to their country. In concluding, he said: “There is a time for all things, a time to preach and (with a voice that echoed like a trumpet blast through the church) a time to fight, and now is the time to fight.” Then, laying aside his sacerdotal gown, he stood before his flock in the full regimental dress of a Virginia colonel. He ordered the drums to be beaten at the church door for recruits; and almost his entire male audience, capable of bearing arms, joined his standard. Nearly three hundred men enlisted under his banner on that day. The scene has been described in verse by Thomas Buchanan Read in the “Wagoner of the Alleghanies.” In February, 1777, Congress promoted Muhlenberg to the rank of brigadier-general; and at the close of the war he was made a major-general.
43. When does Easter come?
The Council of Nice (325 A. D.) authoritatively declared for the whole Church, Easter to be always the first Sunday after the full moon which occurs on or next after March 21; and if the full moon happen on a Sunday, Easter is to be the Sunday following.
44. Where are the highest tides found?
The high tides that rise in the Bay of Fundy are one of the wonders of the world. The funnel-shaped and rapidly narrowing entrance to the bay enables a disproportionally long tidal wave to enter, and as it becomes narrower and shallower the height necessarily increases. The tide, which at the entrance is eighteen feet, rushes with great fury up the bay, and swells to the enormous height of sixty feet, and even to seventy feet in the highest spring tides. With such velocity does it rush up the constantly narrowing bay, that hogs and other animals feeding along the shore are frequently overtaken by it.
45. In what country are nearly all of the clergymen blacksmiths?
The clergymen of Iceland are so miserably paid that they are generally obliged to do the hardest work of day laborers to preserve their families from starving. Besides making hay and tending cattle, they are all blacksmiths from necessity, and the best horse-shoers on the island. The feet of an Iceland horse would be cut to pieces over the sharp rocks and lava if not well shod. The church is the great resort of the peasantry; and should any of the numerous horses have lost a shoe, or be likely to do so, the clergyman dons his apron, lights his little charcoal fire in his smithy, one of which is attached to every parsonage, and sets the animal on its legs again. The task of getting the charcoal is not the least of his labors, for whatever the distance may be to the nearest thicket of dwarf birch, he must go thither to burn the wood, and bring it home when charred. His hut is scarcely better than that of the meanest fisherman; a bed, a rickety table, a few chairs, and a chest or two are all his furniture. This is, as long as he lives, the condition of the Icelandic clergyman, and learning, virtue, and even genius are but too frequently buried under this squalid poverty. In no Christian country, perhaps with the sole exception of Lapland, are the clergy so poor as in Iceland, but in none do they exert a more beneficial influence.