Part 68

There is a story of a man who borrowed a volume of Chaucer from Charles Lamb, and scandalized the gentle Elia in returning it by the confidential remark, "I say, Charley, these old fellows spelt very badly." We do not know what this precision would have said of the lords and ladies of Morayshire 150 years ago, for, with few exceptions, they spelt abominably. Even Henrietta, Duchess of Gordon, daughter of the celebrated Earl of Peterborough, who writes most sensibly and affectionately to her "deare freind, Mistress Elizabeth Dunbar," is not immaculate in this respect. She talks of a "gownd," is "asured there will be an opportunity," and speaks of "sum wise and nesessary end." But it is a shame of us even to appear to disparage this excellent lady for what was then such a usual infirmity. Her letters are, perhaps, the most worth reading of any in Captain Dunbar's collection, and her literary criticisms on the books she wishes her "deare freind" to read are especially interesting. The gentlemen were, perhaps, still more careless than the ladies in their spelling. Here are a couple of notes, the latter of which is enough to make a modern salmon-fisher's mouth water:--

"Cloavs, Jnr 29, 1703.

"Affectionat Brother,--Cloavs and I shall met you the morou in the Spinle moore, betwixt 8 and nine in the morning, where ye canot miss good sporte twixt that and the sea. ffaile not to bring ane bottle of brandie along, ffor I asheure you ye will lose the wadger. In the mean time, we drink your health, and am your affectionat brother,"

"R. DUNBAR."

"To the Laird off Thunderton--Heast, heast."

"Innes, June 25, 5 at night.

"Sir,--You will not (I hope) be displeased when I tell you that Wat. Stronoch, this forenoon, killed eighteen hundred Salmon and Grilses. But it is my misfortune that the boat is not returned yet from Inverness, and I want salt. Therefore by all the tyes of friendship send me on your own horses eight barrels of salt or more. When my boat returns, none, particularly Coxton, shall want what I have. This in great heast from, dear Archie, yours,"

"HARRIE INNES."

"I know not but they may kill as many before 2 in the morning, for till then I have the Raick, and to-morrow the Pott. These twenty years past such a run was not as has been these two past days in so short a time, therefore heast, heast; spare not horse hyre. I would have sent my own horses, but they are all in the hill for peatts. Adieu, dear Archie."

From the Times' review of Captain Dunbar's Letters, 1865.

Our ancestors seem to have regarded spelling much as we regard the knowledge of French. It was disgraceful not to have a smattering of it, but exceptional to have mastered it thoroughly. When we compare the above notes, which would not confer much credit on a modern national schoolboy, with a letter written by Duncan Forbes in 1745, we find ourselves in quite a different atmosphere. The Lord President is terribly angry with the Elgin justices for winking at smugglers; but he writes like a scholar and a man of business. While on the subject of spelling, we must select from Captain Dunbar's collection two choice specimens of cacography, a "chereot," and "jelorfis." The reader will probably guess that the former stands for chariot, as cheroots were then unknown, but we defy him to unravel the latter without the context. "Jelorfis" is the phonetic utterance of an unlucky wight who had got into prison for giving a chop to another man's nose, and stands in his vocabulary for "jailer's fees." There are several characteristic letters from the celebrated Lord Lovat, in which his Scottish pawkiness and French courtliness, no unusual mixture early in the eighteenth century, are clearly displayed. This singular personage, who may be described as Nature's outline sketch of a character which she afterwards elaborated in the Bishop of Autun, but who, unlike Talleyrand, had the misfortune to die in his stocking-feet, wrote his letters on gilt-edged paper, enclosed in envelopes, and in these honied words addresses the Dunbar of that day:--

"I am exceeding glad to know that you and your lady are well, and having inquired at the bearer if you had children, he tells me that you have a son, which gives me great pleasure, and I wish you and your lady much joy of him, and that you may have many more, for they will be the nearest relatives I have of any Dunbars in the world, except your father's children; and my relation to you is not at a distance, as you are pleased to call it, it is very near, and I have not such a near relation betwixt Spey and Ness; and you may assure yourself that I will always behave to you and yours as a relation ought to do; and I beg leave to assure you and your lady of my most affectionate regards, and my Lady Lovat's, and my young ones, your little cousins."

Lord Lovat wrote this letter when he was past seventy. Four years later, Dr. Carlyle, of Inveresk, then a mere youth, met him at Luckie Vint's tavern. He describes him as a tall, stately man, with a very flat nose, who, after imbibing a goodly quantity of claret, stood up to dance with Miss Kate Vint, the landlady's niece. Five years later still, his head fell on the scaffold at Tower Hill. Here we may pause to observe a curious instance of traditionary linkage. Dr. Carlyle died within the first decade of this century, so that many persons still living may have conversed with one who had been in company with a man born early in the reign of Charles II. Lovat was not only fond of flattering other people, but liked to be flattered himself also. This he accomplished by the simple expedient of sending self-laudatory puffs to the Edinburgh Courant and Mercury, for the insertion of which paragraphs he paid from half-a-crown to four shillings each.

For an account of Lord Lovat's execution, see Century of Anecdote, vol. i., p. 124.

A "Single" Conspirator.

About thirty years ago, when those atrocious crimes were committed which made the name of Burke a generic title for certain murders, an old woman entered the shop of a surgeon-apothecary in an Irish county-town and offered to sell him a "subject." He was quite ready to complete the contract, but he desired to learn some details for his guidance as to the value of the object in question, and put to her for this purpose certain queries. Imagine his horror to discover that "the subject" was at that very moment alive, being a boy of nine or ten years of age, but of whom, the bargain being made, the old woman was perfectly prepared to "dispose," she being so far provident as not to bring a perishable commodity to market till she had secured a purchaser. Determined that such atrocity should not go unpunished, he made an appointment with her for another day, on which she should return and more explicitly acquaint him with all she intended to do, and the means by which she meant to secure secrecy. At this meeting--that his testimony should be corroborated--he managed that a policeman should be present, and, concealed beneath the counter, listen to all that went forward. The interview, accordingly, took place; the old woman was true to her appointment, and most circumstantially entered into the details of the intended assassination, which she described as the easiest thing in life--a pitch-plaster over the mouth and a tub of water being the inexpensive requisites of the case. When her narrative, to which she imparted a terrible gusto, was finished, the policeman came forth from his lair and arrested her. She was thrown at once into prison, and sent for trial at the next assizes. Now, however, came the difficulty. For what should she be arraigned? It was not murder--it was still incomplete. It was, therefore, conspiracy to kill; but a single individual cannot "conspire;" and so, to fix her with the crime, it would be necessary to include the surgeon in the indictment. If they wanted to try the old woman, the doctor must share the dock. Now, all the ardour for justice could scarcely be supposed to carry a man so far; the doctor "demurred" to the arrangement, and the old hag was set at liberty.--Blackwood's Magazine.

A Miscalculation.

We have in England an old story of a luckless wight, who, having calculated he should live a certain number of years, parcelled out his income accordingly; but finding he lived to become penniless, he took to begging, and affixed on his breast a small box to receive contributions, with this brief but significant prayer: "Pray remember a poor man who has lived longer than he thought he should."

In 1843, the counterpart of this strange story really happened in Paris to a man named Jules André Gueret. When twenty-five years of age, he possessed a considerable fortune, and resolved never to marry. He converted his entire estate into hard cash, and, in order not to suffer any losses from failures, depreciation of property, &c., he kept his money in his own possession. He had made the following calculation:--"The life of a sober man extends over a period of seventy years; that of a man who denies himself no kind of amusement may attain fifty-five or sixty; thus the whole of my hopes cannot go beyond that period; at any rate, as a last resort, suicide is at my command." He divided his money into equal portions for each year's expenditure. This division was so nicely arranged, that, at the expiration of the sixtieth year, Gueret would have nothing left, and each year he scrupulously spent the sum set apart. But, alas! he had not reflected on the clinging attachment of man to life, for in 1843, having exceeded the prescribed period, he patiently submitted to his misfortune, and, being then old and infirm, he took his stand on the Quai des Célestins with a small box and a few lucifer-matches, living on the charity of the passers-by. He wore suspended round his neck a piece of pasteboard, on which were written the following lines of his own composing:--

"Ayez pitié, passants, du pauvre André Gueret, Dont la vie est plus longue, hélas! qu'il ne croyait."

The cholera carried him off at last, to the great regret of the artistes of the Ile St. Louis, whose leisure hours he whiled away by the relation of his youthful recollections. He died in one of the hospitals of Paris.

An Indiscriminate Collector.

In the Scotsman, May, 1866, we find the following curious case of eccentricity related as having occurred in the city of Edinburgh: it is strongly tinged with oddity, and would be fairly laughed at did it not present a lamentable instance of waste of means. The details are as follows:--A good many years ago, a gentleman who filled a prominent situation in one of the Edinburgh banks, at a good old age, married his servant. The pair lived happily together for several years, when the gentleman died, leaving by his will 1,000l. to his widow, in addition to an annuity of 300l. and a mansion, which he had built and elegantly furnished; it is situated in the midst of a garden, surrounded by a high stone wall. Shortly after her husband's death, the widow became notorious for two peculiarities: first, the rigid exclusion of all visitors from her house, the invariable answer to all entreaties to see her being that she was not at home, or could not be seen; the second was her constant attendance at book and most other sales which took place in Edinburgh, where during the season she might daily be seen carrying a large blue bag, in which she deposited and carried home her purchases, which were of the most miscellaneous description. Matters went on thus for some twenty years. On Sunday, May 6, 1866, the old lady, in her usual health, went into her garden to take the air, and, as she did not return so speedily as was her wont, her servant looked out at the main door, when she found her mistress sitting on the stone steps dead. This unexpected event speedily cleared up the mystery which enveloped her domestic relations.

On the house being entered by warrant from the sheriff, it was found converted into a vast magazine for the conservation of the purchases of the last twenty years. The lobby had been decorated with statuary figures, standing, with the pedestals, some eight feet high; but these were totally hidden by piles of books, intermixed with rubbish of every description, heaped up on every side--a narrow passage being left in the centre. Every room in the house was filled with piles of books, rotten mattresses, stuffed dogs, female dresses, made and unmade, cheap jewelry, old bonnets, pictures, and prints, with a great variety of other articles, intermixed with straw, hair, shavings, &c., which covered all the floors to the depth of several feet; and similar piles filled the beds, and lay heaped on every article of furniture in the house. The smell from the mass of festering rubbish was intolerable. Upwards of five tons weight of books had to be removed before the rooms could be inspected. Most of the smaller articles were found tied up in bags or parcels, in the state in which they had been brought home. The deceased, it seems, cleared a hole which she had scooped out amid a vast quantity of rubbish in one of the rooms, and there, on the floor, with only a hair mattress beneath her, the tick of which had rotted away on one side, she took her rest in the dress she daily wore, without blankets or covering of any kind.

The deceased, though a purchaser of books to so large an extent, never read any, nor knew anything of their value; and when asked what were their uses, her answer was that she brought them to present to ministers or the children of her friends. The tenacity with which she preserved the secrets of her prison-house may also be judged of by the fact that her servant, a young Highland girl, had never, though she had been six months in her service, been beyond the walls of the garden. The girl was carefully locked up every time the deceased left the house until her return, and she never was allowed to go out of her mistress' sight.

The Bishops' Saturday Night.

The Reverend Sydney Smith, on the bare suggestion that Lord John Russell's Church Commission should collect the Church revenues, and pay the hierarchy out of them, imagined and described the scene of payment in the following irresistible words:--"I should like to see this subject in the hands of H. B. I would entitle the print,--

"The Bishops' Saturday Night; or, Lord John Russell at the Pay-Table."