Part 16

For the details of the measure, see "Irregular Marriages," Knowledge for the Time, 1864, pp. 120-123.

The Agapemone, or Abode of Love.

This strange place, Agapemone (Gr. αγαπη love, and μονη an abode), was the general residence of a peculiar sect of religionists, established in 1845 at Charlinch, near Taunton, in Somersetshire. They were originally a branch of the sect called Lampeters, and their peculiar tenets are, that the day of grace and prayer is passed, and the time of judgment arrived. They carry out their belief by perpetual praises to God, but do not adopt the use of prayer. The members enter into a community of property, and profess to live in a state of constant joyousness and mutual love. In 1849 a singular trial, connected with this institution, occupied the Court of Exchequer for three days. It was an action brought by Miss Louisa Nottidge, a maiden lady of large property, against her brother and brother-in-law, for forcibly abducting her from the Agapemone, and confining her in a lunatic asylum. It appeared that the plaintiff and her three sisters, all ladies of considerable property, had become converts to the opinions of this sect, and taken up their abode in the Agapemone, where the sisters were married to three of the clerical rulers of the establishment; but Miss Louisa Nottidge, who had remained single, was forcibly taken away by the two defendants, and sent to a lunatic asylum; for which alleged wrong she obtained 50l. damages; thus showing that she was not insane, and that the law, as the Chief Baron observed, tolerated every sect, however absurd, that did not inflict a social wrong, or openly violate the laws of morality.

Since that period the sect has been sending its missionaries to different parts of the country, in order to gain converts. On the 26th of September, 1856, two of these missionaries called a meeting at the Hanover Square Rooms, in London, when one of them addressed the assembled visitors in an unintelligible jargon relative to the mission of a certain "Brother Prince," the head of the Agapemone, who had, he said, been made a "vessel of mercy" for the human race, and who was to supersede the Gospel by some new religious dispensation which he had been specially commissioned to teach. The other missionary then stated that he would explain who Brother Prince was. He was by nature, he said, a child of wrath, but by grace a vessel of mercy. The testimony of Brother Prince was concerning what Jesus Christ had done by his own person. Some eleven years ago, he said, the Holy Ghost fulfilled in Brother Prince all that he came to be and to do. The speaker proceeded to allude to a second spiritual manifestation which, he said, occurred at the Agapemone about five years ago, in which case the phenomenon was exhibited in the person of a woman--a prophetess--"not privately, but in the presence of all." These sentiments were uttered in the midst of general execration; and a resolution was unanimously passed, "That the statements which had been made that evening were contrary to common sense, degrading to humanity, and blasphemous towards God."--English Cyclopædia.

Singular Scotch Ladies.

Lord Cockburn, in his Memorials of his Time, speaks of "a singular race of Scotch old ladies," who were a delightful set; warm-hearted, very resolute, indifferent about the modes and habits of the modern world, and adhering to their own ways, who dressed, spoke, and did exactly as they chose. Among these examples of perfect naturalness was a Miss Menie Trotter, of whom Miss Grahame, in her Mystifications, relates:--"She was penurious in small things, but her generosity could rise to circumstances. Her dower was an annuity from the estate of Mortonhall. She had contempt for securities, and would trust no bank with her money, but kept all her bills and bank-notes in a green silk bag that hung on her toilette-glass. On each side of the table stood a large white bowl, one of which contained her silver, the other her copper money, the latter always full to the brim, accessible to Peggy, her handmaid, or any other servant in the house, for the idea of any one stealing money never entered her brain. Indeed, she once sent a present to her niece, Mrs. Cuninghame, of a fifty-pound note wrapped up in a cabbage-leaf, and entrusted it to the care of a woman who was going with a basket of butter to the Edinburgh market. My friend Mrs. Cuninghame related to me this and the following histories of her aunt:--One day, in the course of conversation, she said to her niece, 'Do you ken, Margaret, that Mrs. Thomas R---- is dead. I was gaun by the door this morning, and thought I wad just look in and speer for her. She was very near her end, but quite sensible, and expressed her gratitude to God for what He had done for her and her fatherless bairns. She said "she was leaving a large young family with very small means, but she had that trust in Him that they would not be forsaken, and that He would provide for them." Now, Margaret, ye'll tell Peggy to bring down the green silk bag that hangs on the corner of my looking-glass, and ye'll tak' twa thousand pounds out o' it, and gi'e it Walter Ferrier for behoof of thae orphan bairns; it will fit out the laddies, and be something to the lassies. I want to make good the words, "that God wad provide for them," for what else was I sent that way this morning, but as a humble instrument in his hands?'"

Miss Trotter had a strong friendship for a certain Mrs. B----, who had an only son, and he was looked on as a simpleton, but his relatives had interest to get him a situation as clerk in a bank, where he contrived to steal money to the extent of five hundred pounds. His peculations were discovered, and in those days he would have been hanged, but Miss Trotter hearing the report started instantly for Edinburgh, went to the bank, and ascertained the truth. She at once laid down five hundred pounds, telling them, "Ye maun not only stop proceedings, but ye maun keep him in the bank in some capacity, however mean, till I find some other employment for him." Then she fitted the lad out, and sent him to London, where she had a friend to whom she wrote, offering another five hundred pounds to any one who would procure him a situation abroad, in which he might gain an honest living, and never be trusted with money. After all this was settled, she went herself and communicated the facts to his mother.

Mrs. Bond, of Hackney.

About the year 1771 there died one of the four children of Bond, a jeweller, residing in an alley leading from Wellclose Square to Ratcliffe Highway. She left property, to be divided between Mrs. S. Bond, of Hackney, and a sister. The latter died in the year 1801, and left her property, amounting to about 6,000l., to her surviving sister, Sarah, who bought an annuity of 700l. By living in a most parsimonious manner she contrived to scrape together about 13,000l. three per cent., 1,000l. four percent., and 150l. per year Long Annuities.

In 1821 Mrs. Bond, who was of most eccentric habits, died at her residence, Cambridge Heath, Hackney, leaving, it was said, great wealth, which was to be paid to King George the Fourth, if no relative could be found to claim it. After her death, vestry and parish clerks, beadles, sextons, country schoolmasters, and persons holding any official situations about cathedral churches, &c.--in short, innumerable persons who had leisure or opportunity for such inquiry, set about searching for Mrs. Bond's pedigree; but all to no effect. Some ludicrous incidents, however, occurred in the neighbourhood of Mrs. Bond's residence, where persons arrived from various parts of the country to claim a relationship. Among the number a man and his son arrived from Sunderland, whence they had walked. He stated that his name was Bond; he was sure the deceased was his sister, and he would not quit London without the money. Upon investigation he could produce no other authority than being of the same name, and was, therefore, compelled to retrace his steps, almost penniless.

About a week afterwards, a decently-dressed elderly woman, named Bond, made her appearance. She had just arrived outside the coach from the environs of Carmarthen. Her story was that about fifty years previously (1771), her sister left her and proceeded to London to seek her fortune. They had never corresponded, but from the name and description of the deceased, she had no doubt she was her sister, and the money accordingly belonged to her. It had cost her nearly all the money she could raise to come from Wales, fully satisfied of being amply repaid for her trouble, but she met with the same fate as the preceding applicant.

The next claimant was a sailor, who had just returned from the West Indies, where he had been moored, he said, thirty-five years. He had left in England two sisters named Bond: one was of very eccentric manners, particularly for her love of money; the sailor declared that he had frequently seen her make a meal off cat's meat. The above he considered sufficient proof of his relationship. He insisted upon entering a caveat against the claim of his Majesty, but acknowledging that the King appeared to be the legal claimant, he swore he would go and see his royal master, and ask him if he had any objection to share the money with him!

It would be tedious to enumerate the persons who put in their claims from various parts of the world; but the King's proctor stood first in the Prerogative Court, and nothing had transpired to affect his right in behalf of his Majesty.

The hut on Cambridge Heath wherein Mrs. Bond died was closed for some time; at length it was announced to be let; but such was the anxiety to get possession of it that the notice was removed. The number of applications were, doubtless, made under the impression that hoards of money were yet undiscovered in the hut.

The claimant most likely entitled to the property was a Mr. Bond, a butcher, in Shoreditch, who traced out that he was second cousin to the wealthy spinster, his grandfather having been the only brother of the father of Mrs. Bond; and the only bar to his administering was that he had not been able to ascertain the church where Mrs. Bond's father and mother were married, a most essential point to prove the legitimacy of Mrs. Sarah Bond. There were no fewer than eight caveats against the administrator.

John Ward, the Hackney Miser.

In Church Street, Hackney, one of the most interesting of our suburban parishes for its antiquarian history, stands a mansion, which, though plain in itself, has long been traditionally conspicuous, from the infamous character of its founder. This was John Ward, a man who was so notorious for his readiness to take advantage of the foibles, the wants, and vices of his fellow-men, that it attracted the satirical acrimony of Pope, who, in his epistle to Allen, Lord Bathurst, On the Use of Riches, has placed him in a niche in the Temple of Obloquy, in company with a trio, who seem fit to descend with him to posterity, or rather to accompany him in the descent alluded to in the following lines:--

Like doctors thus, when much dispute has pass'd, We find our tenets just the same at last; Both fairly owning riches, in effect, No grace of Heaven or token of the elect: Given to the fool, the mad, the vain, the evil, To Ward, to Waters, Chartres, and the Devil.

Of Ward's private history little is known. He is said to have been early in life employed in a floorcloth manufactory. The exact period when he built the house at Hackney is uncertain. He resided in it in the year 1727, at which time he sat in Parliament for Melcombe Regis. But having made a mistake with respect to a name in a deed in which the interest of the Duchess of Buckingham was implicated, he was prosecuted by her and convicted of forgery, was first expelled the House of Commons, and then stood in the pillory, on the 17th of March, 1727. As misfortune seldom comes alone, about this time Ward was suspected of joining in a conveyance with Sir John Blunt to secrete 50,000l. of that director's estate forfeited to the South Sea Company by Act of Parliament. The Company recovered the 50,000l. against Ward, and by execution swept away the whole of the furniture and other effects in the mansion at Hackney. These being insufficient to cover even the costs, Ward sought to protect his other property, set up prior conveyances of his real estate to his brother and son, and concealing all his personal, which was computed to be 150,000l. Against these paper fortifications, a bill in Chancery, ten times as voluminous, and twenty times more zig-zag, was erected; a countermine of immense depth was sprung, and however ably his works were defended, they were at length carried. The conveyances were set aside, Ward was imprisoned, and hazarded the forfeiture of his life by not giving in his effects till the last day, which was that of his examination. During his confinement his amusement was to give poison to dogs and cats, and see them expire by slower or quicker torments!

In the Post-boy newspaper of the period we find these records of Ward's career:--In June, 1719, he recovered 300l. damages from one Thomas Dyche, a schoolmaster of Bow, for printing and publishing a libel upon Ward, reflecting upon the discharge of his trust about repairing Dagenham Breach. In May, 1726, he fled to France or Flanders. In June, 1731, he was indicted, with certain others, for wounding several officers of the Commissioners of Bankruptcy; and in September, 1732, he surrendered to the Commissioners, and was kept under examination at Guildhall from three o'clock that afternoon till three the next morning, when he was committed to the Fleet for further examination.

To sum up the wealth of Ward at the several eras of his life: at his standing in the pillory he was worth above 200,000l.; at his commitment to prison he was worth 150,000l., but became so far diminished in his reputation as to be thought a worse man by fifty or sixty thousand.

Among a variety of curious papers of Mr. Ward was found the following extraordinary document, in his own handwriting, which may very appropriately be called The Miser's Prayer:--

"O Lord, Thou knowest that I have nine estates in the City of London, and likewise that I have lately purchased one estate in fee simple in the county of Essex; I beseech Thee to preserve the two counties of Middlesex and Essex from fire and earthquakes; and as I have a mortgage in Hertfordshire, I beg of Thee likewise to have an eye of compassion on that county; and for the rest of the counties Thou mayst deal with them as Thou art pleased. O Lord, enable the Bank to answer their bills, and make all my debtors good men. Give a prosperous voyage and return to the 'Mermaid' sloop, because I have insured it; and as Thou hast said the days of the wicked are but short, I trust in Thee that Thou wilt not forget Thy promise, as I have purchased an estate in reversion, which will be mine on the death of that profligate young man, Sir J. L. Keep my friends from sinking, and preserve me from thieves and housebreakers, and make all my servants so honest and faithful that they may attend to my interests, and never cheat me out of my property, night or day."

"Poor Man of Mutton."

This is a term applied to the remains of a shoulder of mutton, which, after it has done its regular duty as a roast at dinner, makes its appearance as a broiled bone at supper or upon the next day.

The late Earl of B., popularly known by the name of Old Rag, being indisposed at an hotel in London, the landlord came to enumerate the good things he had in his larder, hoping to prevail on his guest to eat something. The Earl, at length, starting suddenly from his couch, and throwing back a tartan nightgown, which had covered his singularly grim and ghastly face, replied to his host's courtesy:--"Landlord, I think I could eat a morsel of a poor man." Boniface, surprised alike at the extreme ugliness of Lord B.'s countenance and the nature of the proposal, retreated from the room, and tumbled down-stairs precipitately, having no doubt that this barbaric chief when at home was in the habit of eating a joint of a tenant or vassal when his appetite was dainty.--Jamieson's Etymological Dictionary.

Lord Kenyon's Parsimony.

Lord Kenyon studied economy even in the hatchment put up over his house in Lincoln's Inn Fields after his death. The motto was certainly found to be "Mors janua vita"--this being at first supposed to be the mistake of the painter. But when it was mentioned to Lord Ellenborough, "Mistake!" exclaimed his lordship, "it is no mistake. The considerate testator left particular directions in his will that the estate should not be burdened with the expense of a diphthong!" Accordingly, he had the glory of dying very rich. After the loss of his eldest son, he said with great emotion to Mr. Justice Allan Park, who repeated the words soon after to the narrator:--"How delighted George would be to take his poor brother from the earth, and restore him to life, although he receives 250,000l. by his decease!"