ALBERTUS MAGNUS AND NOSTRADAMUS.
In the year 1248, the Emperor William of Holland arrived at Cologne on the anniversary of the festival of the Epiphany; when Albertus the Great, invited him and his whole Court to a banquet in a garden near the Convent of the Preaching Friars. The Emperor accepted the offer: but on the appointed day, there was a great fall of snow; and the Emperor and his Court were much disconcerted by the invitation.
But though inclined to avoid exposure to such inclemency of weather, they adhered to their engagement and proceeded to the scene of the entertainment, where they found the tables spread, but the trees and turf covered with snow. The guests were of course indignant at so absurd an arrangement; but Albertus had contrived that no one could go out of the garden, by placing at every entrance guards of imposing stature. The Emperor and Princes having seatedthemselves, the dishes were placed on the table; when the day became gradually fine, and the snow disappearing as if by enchantment, the shrubs and flowers recovered their verdure and perfume; while the trees suddenly presented fruits in luscious maturity, with innumerable birds perched upon their branches warbling heart-stirring music.
The heat increasing, the guests were forced to throw off their outward garb; but no one could conjecture whence or by whom the dishes of the feast were produced; the menials who served them being strangers, richly attired, and of the most courteous deportment. The feast being at an end, servitors and birds vanished; the turf lost its verdure, the flowers their odour; and the snow re-appeared as if in the gloom of winter. The outward garments of the guests were, of course, resumed; and all persons repaired to a vast hall, where a good fire was blazing.
The Emperor, gratified with this wonderful entertainment, endowed the convent of which Albertus was a member with a valuable estate; expressing great esteem for the skill and dexterity of his entertainer.
Such is the monkish legend; nor is it worth while to contest such absurdities, no one being weak enough to believe seriously in tales of enchantment worthy only to figure in the pages of a romance.
Many such marvels are recorded of Albertus,entitling us to believe him a sorcerer, and the ally of Satan. But he is known to have been, like Friar Bacon, one of the most enlightened men of the thirteenth century; and it often happens, that in order to enhance the fame of illustrious persons, their biographers have resource to exaggerations that deteriorate their well-won fame. Such was the case with Nostradamus; who, in spite of himself, was made a prophet. The real name of Nostradamus, was Michael of Notre-Dame, but a custom prevailed in his time of latinizing names; and Nostradamus was one of the high-sounding titles likely to ensure popularity. Among the French, it enjoyed equal fame with that of Matthew Länsberg among the Germans.
The family of Nostradamus was of Jewish extraction, and proclaimed itself descended from Issachar; a personage reputed to have been profoundly versed in chronological science. Michael was born, December 14, 1503, at twelve precisely, in the village of St. Remi, in Provence. He studied at Avignon, where he distinguished himself in rhetoric; then proceeded to Montpellier for the study of medicine. Having attained the degree of Doctor at twenty-six, an unusual occurrence, he was considered the successor of Hippocrates and Galen; but disdaining all earthly vocations, he devoted himself to astrology, and mysterious speculations upon the future.
Nostradamus first published his Ephemeris, proclaiming agricultural epochs, eclipses, phases of the moon, the returns of the season, and the variations of atmosphere; and predicted the approach of epidemics, the progress of governments, the births and marriages of the great; peace, war, land, and sea fights, and many other things, which, as a matter of course, must be realized in some part or other of the world. His predictions were so fortunate, that he was soon acknowledged to be a prophet; every one seeking to benefit by his vast enlightenment. The wily man, aware that speculation upon popular prejudices is a sure road to fortune, and seeing the love of the marvellous predominate, soon laid aside his almanack, and gave full play to his fecund imagination as a soothsayer.
Had Nostradamus been only a man of profound science, he would have pined in obscurity; but as affording diversion for the Court of France, his fame soon prevailed throughout Europe. When his predictions first appeared, in 1555, they had such success, that Henry II. and Catherine de Medicis invited him to Paris.
Enriched by their munificence, he returned to his vocation in Provence; and four years later, the Duke of Savoy and Marguerite of France, on their way to Nice, visited Nostradamus at Salon. The Duchess beingenceinte, the Duke desired to know theprobable sex of the issue; a tolerable safe order of prediction as the chances of verification are even. In this case, he foretold a son who afterwards became the greatest Captain in Europe—Charles Emanuel, Duke of Savoy.
The system of Nostradamus was partly original; but grafted upon several others. He not only consulted the stars to cast a nativity, but the form and features of the party. The Governor of Henry IV. wishing to have the horoscope of his youthful master, applied to him, when he demanded to see the royal youth naked. Henry at first resisted, thinking it a trick, and that they perhaps meant to castigate him unjustly; but finally consented, and after the examination, it was predicted that he would become King of France, and enjoy a long reign.
These facts are avouched by the biographers of Nostradamus; who, though he predicted the future to others, was unable to foresee his approaching end. He died in July 1566, aged sixty-two; but his fame survived him, and his tomb became a kind of shrine, being inscribed with testimonials to his profound science and miraculous qualities. Louis XIII. visited it in 1622, and Louis XIV. in 1660.
Like most men possessed of high renown, who profit by the credulity of their contemporaries, he had a host of fanatical adulators. Among them, none more enthusiastically devoted than a man namedChavigny, who abandoned every thing to follow the fortune of the prophet, and received his last sigh. Chavigny became the interpreter and eulogist of his great master, as he had been the depository of his secrets. He even ventured upon some posthumous predictions.
Inconsolable for the loss of his illustrious master, Chavigny abandoned Provence, and settled at Lyons; where he solaced his regrets by reflecting upon the predictions and discoveries of the great astrologer. He commented upon three hundred stanzas of the great work of Nostradamus, the result of thirty years’ study; and published the first part of the “French Janus,” or rather, a partial explanation of his prophecies. In this curious work, Chavigny collated, compared and approximated the stanzas bearing reference to the events of his own century; and composed a chronological table, so remarkable for order and method, as to impose upon superficial minds. So singularly happy are some of the stanzas of Nostradamus, and their associations with history are so striking, that the renowned Doctor might almost pass for having been inspired. Such, at least, is the opinion of many who have strictly examined the work.
In 1695, one Guinaud, one of the royal pages and a zealous supporter of Nostradamus, proposed to reconcile the prophecies of Nostradamus withhistory, from the time of Henry II. till that of Louis XIV. Presuming upon his genius for exposition, he undertook to prove that nothing could be clearer and less mysterious than the predictions of his favourite astrologer.
In support of this opinion, he applies the following lines to the massacre of St. Bartholomew:
Le gros airain qui les heures ordonne;Sur le trépas du tyran cassera;Fleurs plainte et cris, eau glace, pain ne donne,V.S.C. Paix, l’armée passera.
The explanation of Guinaud is, perhaps, more striking than the lines of Nostradamus. The “gros airain,” he declares to be the little bell of the palaces. In the “trépas du tyran,” he foresees the death of Coligny; and in the initials “V.S.C.,” he finds an unaccountable indication of Philip II. and Charles V.
The other analogies were equally far-fetched; and, as is not unusually the case, the absurdity of the annotation was visited upon the original work.
The prophesies of Nostradamus, like those of Merlin, are now nothing more than a literary curiosity.
LEECHES, SERPENTS, AND THE SONG OF THE DYING SWAN.
In the conclusions of naturalists there is much to respect. But we must beware of false inferences.
For instance, no one will deny that swallows skim the surface of the earth on the approach of a storm. But it is simply because insects then swarm in the lower regions of the atmosphere. The swallows seek their prey where instinct teaches them that it is most abundant; not because a peculiar sympathy warns them of the coming storm. Swans, ducks, goslings, also, indicate hot weather by plunging oftener than usual, because the temperature being oppressive, they seek a fresher one under the water.
In the list of meteorological animals, leeches hold a prominent place. An English physician pretends that they are lively when the sky is clear and serene, and raise their heads above water to breathe the pure air. But if the sky be gloomy and clouded,they conceal themselves in the mud, and are evidently agitated at the approach of storms. The following are the observations of Dr. Vitet, in his “Treaty on Medical Leeches.”
“Close up a quantity of leeches in jars of equal size containing the same water, and expose them together to the open air. Never will you see identity of action. In one jar, they are at the surface, in another at the bottom, while in another they will be completely out of the water sticking to the cover. Again, you will see all the leeches of the same jar in all these different positions; some adhering by their tails from the borders of the jar, others balancing themselves with the most perfect regularity. It follows, therefore, that leeches are devoid of meteorological susceptibility.”
Had not Dr. Vitet made his experiments on so large a scale, a single leech, well-watched, would always have been said to announce changes of weather and temperature. In the case of the Rana Arboria, or tree-frog, which is sometimes confined in a glass jar to form a sort of living weather-glass, it may be noticed that, when two frogs of the same species are kept in the same glass, one is sure to be found at the top of the ladder and one at the bottom, proving how little such indications are to be depended upon.
To leeches is attributed another peculiarity, equally groundless; the faculty, namely, of ridding us of our corrupt blood, while they respect the pure; a fact disproved by daily experience.
According to a popular prejudice in many countries, snakes and vipers will creep down the throats of persons imprudent enough to sleep in the open fields with their mouths open; and strange things are related on this subject, especially in Germany.
About fifty years ago, the German newspapers announced that in Styria a young girl being asleep with her mouth open, a viper made its way into her throat. She was not aware of the fact; but a few days afterwards began to experience an insupportable irritation. On a subsequent day, the viper reappeared by the channel it had penetrated, hissing and raising itself on its tail as if overjoyed at its emancipation; and immediately afterwards, the girl vomited a quantity of viper’s eggs. This anecdote so charmed the French journalists, that they republished it in various directions, neither suspecting that they were renewing a fable of the Greeks, nor inquiring whether vipers were oviparous.
The adventures of the Styrian girl was nearly forgotten, when a French surgeon gave a fresh version of it in the following shape:
“In the month of June, 1806, a child of four yearsold having fallen asleep on the bank of the Canal de L’Ourcq with her mouth open, a snake crept in and passed into her stomach, where it remained for nineteen days; at the expiration of which, the child accidentally drank a glass of white wine, when forth came the snake in the presence of her whole family!” Witnesses were found to attest the fact; and the medical man who attended the child, asserted the reptile to have been eighteen inches long! Dr. Masson, surgeon to the civil Hospitals of Paris, made a report upon the subject to the Faculty of Medicine, attributing the attraction of the snake to the child having fed upon bread and milk, the predilection of those reptiles for that sustenance being well known.
Before we return to the above subject, we may as well inquire whether the predilection of snakes for milk be really true. The French peasants agree in this opinion with Pliny, Aldovrandus and Gesner. Yet all are wrong. Snakes are furnished with numerous little teeth at the extremity of their mouths, that their prey may not escape; so that if they sucked the cows as asserted by the peasants, their teeth must become inextricably entangled in the udder. The diminution of the milk in the dairies of the French provinces, is nevertheless often most conveniently ascribed to the interposition of snakes, innocent at least of this species of mischief.
We must, therefore, conclude that Dr. Masson’s little patient was not the victim of the passion of the snake in question for milk. Is it credible, however, that a snake eighteen inches long could introduce itself into the mouth of a sleeping child without awaking it, or creep down the æsophagus and into the stomach without being perceived? The marvellous snake was probably nothing more than a worm such as is frequently ejected from the mouths of children.
Snakes, vipers, and serpents have always been leading features in fable, and, at times, in history. Without alluding to the serpent-tempter, we have the serpent of Aaron, which also serves as the attribute of Esculapius, and ornaments the Caduceus of Mercury. We have the serpent Python, and those which entwined themselves round the Laocoon and his sons; the serpent concealed under the flowers, whose sting caused the death of Eurydice; and finally, the asp of Cleopatra. But upon such matters, the moderns have gone far beyond the ancients. If, for instance, the asp which bit the bosom of Cleopatra had pertained to the species which Father Charleroix saw at Paraguay, it might have been the rival of Anthony; for the Padre expressly asserts that serpents are ever on the watch to carry off females in the forests of that province. These may be considered rivals to the Great Sea Serpent of the Americans.
Bertholin, the learned Swedish doctor, relates strange anecdotes of lizards, toads and frogs; stating that a woman, thirty years of age, being thirsty, drank plentifully of water at a pond. At the end of a few months, she experienced singular movements in her stomach, as if something were crawling up and down; and alarmed by the sensation, consulted a medical man, who prescribed a dose of orvietan in a decoction of fumitary. Shortly afterwards, the irritation of the stomach increasing, she vomited three toads and two young lizards, after which, she became more at ease. In the spring following, however, her irritation of the stomach was renewed; and aloes and bezoar being administered, she vomited three female frogs, followed the next day by their numerous progeny. In the month of January following, she vomited five more living frogs, and in the course of seven years, ejected as many as eighty. Dr. Bertholin protests that he heard them croak in her stomach! The utter incompatibility of the nature of these reptiles with the temperature of the human stomach, renders denial of the truth of this scientific anecdote almost superfluous.
The Journal des Débats, then called the Journal de l’Empire, published the following circumstances as having taken place at Joinville, in the Department of the Meuse.
“Marie Ragot, a widow, having complained fortwo years of a distaste for food, and suffered from internal cramps.
“These symptoms were at first attributed to an aneurism of the viscera; but were soon found to proceed from some strange substance in the stomach. After two months, Marie Ragot ejected from her mouth a living reptile in the presence of many; who, on seeing it creep away, in the hurry of the moment, inconsiderately crushed it. This reptile belonging to the lizard class, was thin and long, its colour light grey, brown on the back, and dark yellow under the belly. It had four small legs, each having nail-tipped feelers, a triangular head, rather obtuse at the nose, bent, a short tail and filiform at the extremity. This is all we have been able to learn, the witnesses having stupidly destroyed the reptile. Ragot died soon afterwards, and it remains undecided whether her death was caused by the reptile remaining so long in her stomach. The lizard we have described was doubtless the grey common wall lizard. It is supposed to have crept into her mouth when asleep.”
While occupied by consideration of the marvels of physiological history, we must not omit to mention the song of the Dying Swan; formerly applied as a standard of composition for the highest pitch which melody could attain, and as typical of the last strains emanating from the soul of the poet. Virgil, Fénélonand Shakspeare, are known as the Swan of Mantua, the Swan of Cambray, and Swan of Avon. Pliny, whose propensity for handing down popular fallacies we have already noticed, says, in treating of the gift of song conceded to swans by the poets: “The doleful strain attributed to the swan, at the moment of death, is a prejudice disproved by experience.” Modern observation confirms his opinion that the song of the swan is a mere metaphor. To urge this matter further would be equivalent to pleading after judgment; had not Dr. Bertholin, who attended the woman of the eighty frogs, endeavoured to revive the idea of the ancients; quoting the declaration of one of his friends, Grégoire Wilhelmi, that having seen one of a flight of swans expire, the others hastened to its aid, giving forth harmonious sounds, as if singing the funeral dirge of their departed companion.
This story is evidently a romantic fiction. But if the domestic swan be mute, it is not so with the wild one, which is guilty of the most discordant noises, instead of the fabulous harmony so long attributed to it. The Abbé Arnaud carefully observed two wild swans which sought refuge on the waters of Chantilly, more particularly, as regarded their cries. Buffon notices that they have ashrill, piercing shriek, far from agreeable, and are quite insensible to the sound of music.
The song of the swan, therefore, must be admitted to be as much a creation of the poets as the song of the syrens which, according to Homer, attracted the vessel of Ulysses.
NEGROES.
Two important questions present themselves with regard to negroes: first, the lawfulness or expediency of slavery; and secondly, the comparative equality of the whites and blacks. The History of the World teaches us that slavery is independent of colour, and existed every where of old, under every form of Government. But the abolition of slavery was the work of the Christian religion, of which it is one of the noblest mercies; and let us never forget the saying of Montesquieu, “that it is our business to prove the negroes less than men, lest they prove us to be less than Christians.”
The celebrated Abbé Grégoire was one of the most zealous and persevering advocates of the negroes. So enthusiastic was he in their cause, that he might have been supposed to have undertaken it as a reproach to their white brethren.
With regard to the question of innate equality between the two races, we cannot conceive a moreapt illustration than that made by a Creole child, on hearing at his father’s table, a discussion upon negroes, a subject on which most colonists differ entirely from the Abbé Grégoire.
In the course of dessert, a gentleman, who had been loudest in opprobriating the negroes, desired to be helped to grapes. The child pertinaciously insisted on giving him white grapes instead of the black, to which he had pointed. “One kind is as good as the other,” said the gentleman, “the only difference is in the colour of the skin.” “And why then,” cried the child, “do you persist in refusing the same concession to the poor negroes?”
The scholiasts have written much which has tended only to render more obscure the origin of the negro race; some deriving it from Cain, and attributing its blackness to Divine wrath after the murder of Abel; others from Shem, the son of Noah, which is the opinion of Dr. Hanneman, as is seen in his Latin Treatise upon the colour of “the Descendants of Shem.” The learned German quotes numerous proofs of the culpable conduct of Shem towards his father; adding that Shem had long practised the art of magic, and being unable to transport into the ark all his works of witchcraft and magic, had them engraved upon brass and stone, so as to find them after the deluge. Hanneman cites the authority of Luther, who formally assertsthat the skin of Shem was blackened as a punishment for his irreverence; and quotes a passage from the learned Ulricius, who in his treaty De Tacticis, established that the sons of Ham had white skins, those of Japhet a brownish complexion, while those of Shem were black as ebony.
The anatomist, Meiners, adopting the theory of the facial angle, excluded the negroes from the human race, and placed them in the family of apes and ourang-outangs.
According to the Abbé Grégoire, all black skinned races descend from the Ethiopian. He founds his opinion upon the works of Herodotus, Theophrastes, Pausanias, Athenœus, Eusebius, Heliodorus, Josephus, Pliny, and Terence; all of whom, in speaking of negroes, call them Ethiopians. As regards their origin, all we know is, that the Ethiopians are from the interior of Africa, and that their ancestors had short and woolly hair, black skins, and thick lips.
How are we to conciliate these pretensions with the assertions of Diodorus, the Sicilian, supported by those of the learned Hearne? Some affirm, on the other hand, that the Egyptians descend direct from the Ethiopians; the pure Egyptian race existing only in the Copts, who have woolly hair, round heads, flattened noses, and protruding cheek-bones. Similar signs certainly characterize both negroes and Ethiopians. Egypt was the cradle of civilization,and if inhabited by the Ethiopian race, with the negroes originated sciences, arts, and institutions. In that case, the problem of equality of intelligence becomes painfully solved; and if we now possess a vast superiority of intellect over the negroes, we owe it to their ancestors, who were our masters in almost every branch of polite knowledge.
With regard to colour, Virgil has said, “nimium ne crede colori.” Dr. Beddoes, moreover, completely overcame the difficulty; for by frequently immersing the hand of a negro in a solution of muriatic acid, he rendered it as white as ivory. In these speculative times, we should not be much surprised to see a company established for washing the black population white. This might furnish matter for reflection to Mr. Williams, of Vermont, who in his History of that State, requires four thousand years for effecting the transition from black to white, through the sole influence of climate.
Meiners, as we have seen, classes the negroes in the monkey tribe. How are we to reconcile this sacrilegious classification with the dogmas of the church, which canonize two blacks, viz. St. Elesbaan, patron of the Portuguese and Spaniards, and the Queen of Sheba, the wife of Solomon? Another great writer affirms, that black was the original colour of the human race; and that the white race is in a state of degeneration. Monsieur de Pauw shows the question of the negroes inanother light, refusing them an aptitude for civilization equal to the whites; but attributing their colour to the scorching heat of the sun, which, by wasting the brain, diminishes the faculties and organs of intelligence that distinguish Europeans. Dr. Gall goes further, and pronounces the negroes to be wholly deficient in the organs of music and mathematics.
We cannot, however, expect to find the organ of music prominent in the organization of man in a state of nature. As to the organ of mathematics, were the negroes completely deficient in this, Meiners would be correct in his assimilation; for the higher order of mathematics is not here implied, but the simplest acts of calculation. No operation of the mind, however, is possible without the aid of a certain kind of calculation. Moreover, experience tends to confute the system of Dr. Gall. It is well known that in Africa, there are nations far advanced in civilization; a false kind of civilization, perhaps, and tainted with barbarism. They have no opera, for instance, nor a jockey club, nor the excitement of breaking their necks at steeple-chases. But they have cities, tribunals, laws, judges, institutions, and armies; they declare war and make peace; discuss the interests of the State, raise taxes, and regulate the public expenditure. Denyan, who resided thirteen years in the kingdom of Juida, was astonished by their wonderful policy; affirming that their diplomatists were capable of competing with the most wary European cabinets.
The Daccas, who occupy the fertile point of Cape Verd, are organized into a Republic, under directors, lieutenants, and a hierarchy, analagous to the different States existing in Europe. Bornou is governed by a monarchy; but the throne is both hereditary and elective at the death of the reigning Prince. His successors being selected from among his children without respect to primogeniture. The most worthy is nominated to reign. The funeral discourse is a panegyric or a censure, according to the tenor of the reign of the deceased.
This is stronger evidence of civilization than to possess a tenor equal to Rubini, or a dancer comparable with Taglioni.
The cities of Africa are not mere encampments. The capital of the Foulans has seven thousand inhabitants. Mungo Park mentions that they are fond of instruction, and read the books permitted by the Mahomedan religion with great assiduity. In his expedition to the interior of Africa, this celebrated traveller expresses his surprise at meeting with so much unexpected magnificence. The city of Sego had thirty thousand inhabitants; her population being less than those of Jenna, Timbuctoo, and Haussa.
Barrow extols the character and pleasing manners of the Boushouannas. Their capital, Litah, has from twelve to fifteen thousand souls; ruled by a patriarchal government. The chief executes the will of the people, emanating from a council composed ofelders. Is such a council characteristic of barbarism? Or a proof that the moral organization of the negroes is inferior to that of the whites?
Judging from the narratives of travellers, the maritime populations are generally inferior to those of the interior. If this opinion be well founded, there is every reason to infer that the circumstance arises from the access of Europeans being less frequent with the interior than the littoral. Often have we to deplore the demoralization we have conveyed to distant countries. Is it just, therefore, to speak of the brutal barbarity of the negroes, when all we see of it is partly our own work?
If we proceed from nations to individuals, a whole catalogue of eminent black men and mulattos presents itself. The name of Henry Diaz, demands a prominent place on the list. From a common slave, he became Colonel of a Portuguese regiment, which by his able tactics and daring courage often defeated experienced Generals. In an engagement, in which, overpowered by numbers, he perceived some troops on the point of giving way, he rushed among them exclaiming: “Are these the brave companions of Henry Diaz?” On hearing which, his men returned to the charge, and drove the enemy from the field. In 1645, in the heat of battle, a ball penetrated his left hand which he was about to have amputated, when he exclaimed: “Every finger of my right hand shall learn to grasp the sword!”
The famous St. George was a mulatto. His skill in fencing won him an European reputation, and no one could surpass him in the art of equitation. Moreover, Dr. Gall would have been forced to admit his prodigious talent for music. Fifty years ago, the compositions of St. George were eminently the fashion in the Parisian drawing-rooms.
The republican armies boasted among the bravest of the brave, General Alexander Dumas, who, though a mulatto, was surnamed by his companions in arms, the Horatius Cocles of the Tyrol. Before Lille, accompanied only by four of his men, he attacked a post of fifty Austrians, of whom he killed six, and made sixteen prisoners. With the Army of the Alps, he scaled Mount St. Bernard, stormed a redoubt, and turned the guns against the enemy. He was the father of the French dramatist, Alexander Dumas, who has immolated as many victims in his dramas, as his father destroyed in the enemies of his country.
Job-Ben-Solomon, son of the Mahomedan King of Banda, on the Gambia, was taken prisoner in 1750, conducted to America, and sold as a slave. He had a superior order of mind, understood Arabic, and was distinguished for his talents. He enjoyed the friendship of Sir Hans Sloane, for whom he translated several Arabic manuscripts; and was treated with distinction by the Court of London, till the African Company had him reconducted to his States. Atthe death of his father, he assumed the sceptre, and after being the slave of Europeans, became the idol of his subjects. The history of Job-Ben-Solomon presents a victorious argument against the prejudice concerning negroes, for in him there existed not only courage but intellect. A son of the King of Nimbana, who was educated in England, died soon after his return to his native land; but during his stay in England, he manifested great proofs of ability. He cultivated several sciences with success, learnt several languages, and read the Bible in the original.
Ramsay, who passed twenty years of his life among the negroes, mentions their impressive eloquence when excited, as well as their talent for mimicry and acting, in which they were not inferior to some of the best performers then known in England. In Africa, they have various national musical instruments, of which sixteen are stringed; without counting their famous balafon, resembling the once famed spinet. Vocal music is as familiar to them as instrumental; and their composers have been known to produce melodies replete with grace. We may here quote Gossec, whose opinion on the subject of music is preferable to that of Dr. Gall, as being one of the greatest musical composers of his time; and in his famous opera of the “Camp de Grand Pré,” he introduced a negro melody from St.Domingo, which met with immense success. The Abbé Grégoire also speaks of certain itinerant negro minstrels, who sang, played, and narrated like the minstrels of old.
The negro race, therefore, have produced both heroes and artists, as well as figured with distinction in the sciences. Derrham, once a slave at Philadelphia, was made over to a physician, who employed him in the compounding of his medicines. But soon ambition laid hold of the soul of the slave, he acquired French, English, Spanish, and Latin; and perfected himself in the hygienic and therapeutic sciences with such success, that, in 1788, he was esteemed the most eminent practitioner in New Orleans, and consulted from all parts of America.
Another negro, named Amo, claims attention as distinguished in the annals of science. A native of Guinea, he was brought to Amsterdam in 1707, and presented to the Duke Augustus of Wolfenbüttel, who sent him to study at Halle and Wittenberg. After distinguishing himself at both those Universities, he publicly sustained a thesis upon the rights of the negroes, “de Jure Manorum.” Amo was versed in astronomy; spoke Latin, Greek, Hebrew French, Dutch, and German, there were, indeed, few better linguists. Some years ago, a Swedish professor having addressed one of our academies in Latin, the different members, perplexed by their insufficientacquaintance with that tongue, sent in great haste for one of their absent members, the only one qualified to answer the learned foreigner. This was the late Andrieux; but had the negro, Amo, been in the way, he might have supplied his place. Amo was not only a man of universal information, but had the art of imparting it to others. Differing from his white colleagues, he preferred instructing his scholars to the ambition of acquiring personal renown. His lectures, from the able manner in which he combined the advantages of the ancient and modern systems, attracted numerous auditors. He was invested with a diploma in 1744; the first instance of a negro arriving at that distinction. Amo left a Dissertation upon Sensation considered as distinct from the Soul, and present to the body. Frederick the Great, who then reigned in Prussia, conferred the dignity of Councillor of State upon Amo. But these honours, unprecedented for a man of his colour, did not dazzle him so as to render him insensible to the land of his birth. Pining for his native air, he resolved, after the death of his patron, the Duke of Brunswick, to return, after thirty years’ absence, to his birth-place, Axim, on the Gold Coast; nor was anything further heard of him in Europe after his departure for that obscure place.
Buffon, who was the contemporary of Amo, did not distinguish himself by his definition of the negrorace. “Negroes,” said he, “are tall, fat, well-made, but devoid of mind and genius.” The great naturalist looked no deeper than the epidermis, and was greatly mistaken in asserting negroes to be tall and fat; as in general their stature scarcely equals our own.
Father Charleroy, goes farther than Buffon, by stating that, the negroes of Guinea have but limited capacities, some being quite imbecile, and few being able to count beyond three; that they possess no memory, the past being as unknown to them as the future. “On the other hand,” he observes, “they are docile, simple, humane, credulous, superstitious.” This definition of Father Charleroy may apply to a certain number of negroes; but it also applies to a certain number of whites. Buffon maintains that the negroes colonized at Sierra Leone had only the occupations of women, and a disgust for all useful employment. Their dwellings he states to be miserable hovels; declaring that they prefer sterile and wild spots to beautiful valleys clothed with trees, and watered by the clearest streams. Their roads, he adds, are twice as long as necessary; yet they always follow the beaten track, insensible to the waste of time, which they never calculate. M. Descourtils, who resided at St. Domingo, and closely observed the negroes, declares them to be ignorant, superstitious, and barbarous; their music being detestable and unmeaning. But though such asseverations may befounded to a certain degree on fact—after having shown the difference that exists between the maritime and fluvial tribes of Africa, and those settled in the interior—we are inclined to inquire whether the negroes of America, more particularly those of St. Domingo, ought to be selected as the standard of the negro race? Are not disabilities attributed to colour which are, in truth, caused by slavery? Had not the Spartan Helots the same skin as Agis and Epaminondas? Yet what could be more marked than their distinction of nature? Would it even be fair to judge the inhabitants of Paris and London by the swarms of footmen in those cities?
Nevertheless, we are bound to agree with the most experienced physiologists, that, independent of colour, independent of cerebral conformation, independent of facial angularity, the most perfect specimens of the human race are to be found in the temperate regions. The History of the World bears out the fact; and upon this point, the best intentions of philanthropy fall to the ground. Religion and humanity call aloud for the abolition of slavery; while the massacres of St. Domingo prove the necessity of its being prudent and progressive. At some still remote period, posterity will probably abjure the prejudice of the white race against the blacks. But this great revolution of popular feeling will not be effected withoutlong-established previous proof on the part of the negro population, that the blessings of freedom have brought forth all the fruits anticipated by the advocates of abolition. To decide upon their equality of nature, in their present unequal condition, would be rash and premature.
FASCINATION; OR, THE ART OF PLEASING.
No individual of the human race, but at the bottom of his heart is ambitious to please! But the charm is not more unequal in distribution than the means are various. So various, indeed, and so uncertain, that in our attempts to please we frequently produce the contrary effect.
This universal propensity has given rise to absurd prejudices and ridiculous efforts; and to a thousand arts, and trickeries, affording an amusing subject for consideration.
The desire of pleasing tended greatly to enhance, in the earlier stages of society, the reputation and influence of sorcerers, fairies, and supernatural beings; whose power was often invoked to increase the personal attractions of their votaries. The wild efforts of Medea to secure the affections of her faithless Jason are sufficiently known. Love potions and philtres were a favourite resource of the ancients,never weary of consulting sorcerers and enchantresses concerning their aptitude to please. Virgil, Ovid, Tibullus, Propertius, all allude to the love charms which could be procured at the hands of different magicians. Ovid, who has so poetically described the delicate mysteries of the art of love, laughs, it is true, at these incentives.
“Had magicians,” says he, “the power of inflaming lovers’ hearts, would Circe have allowed Ulysses to abandon her?”
Horace accuses Canidia of killing children for the purpose of composing love-potions; ignorant, apparently, that animal substances were inadmissible in their composition. Vervain and rue, with a few other mystic plants, gathered by the light of the moon, formed their chief ingredients. According to some, a sovereign charm consists ofenula campana, or St. John’s wort, plucked on the eve of that Saint, before sunrise, ambergris, and other substances, of which the virtue would be forfeited unless superscribed with the word “Scheva.”
One of the most ingenious authors of antiquity, Apuleius, has given, in his work of the Golden Ass, a recipe for a love-charm composed of different fishes; the claws of crayfish, crabs, and oyster shells. He was accused of having tried its influence in obtaining the affections of his wife to induce her to make a will in his favour. This recipe is theonly one of the kind not limited to the vegetable kingdom.
Pudentilla, a rich dowager, who had been a widow for fifteen years, chose for her future husband, the young, handsome, and clever Apuleius, who, according to the account of the “Golden Ass,” pleaded his cause as follows before the tribunal.
“I am accused,” said he, “of sorcery, because Pudentilla espoused me after fifteen years of widowhood. But would it not be better to inquire why she consented to remain a widow so long? In support of the accusation of magic, you say that I instructed fishermen to bring me fish for unlawful purposes. Ought I to have employed a lawyer, a blacksmith, or a bird-catcher? I am accused of collecting vermiculated oysters, striped cockle-shells, and sea crayfish. But when Aristotle, Democritus, Theophrastus, and other naturalists made collections of Natural History, did you infer that it was for the confection of love-charms? A child accidentally fell down, in my presence, on my return home, and I am accused of sorcery! For the future, then, I presume I shall be bound to hold in leading strings all the children that approach me; and to prevent all little girls from stumbling, I must pick up the stones in the street, and do away with the threshold of my door, lest any one make a false step in entering my house. Pudentilla, it seems, informed her neighboursthat I was a magician. She might have seen fit to call me a Consul; but would that have elevated me to the consular dignity?”
Having pleaded his own cause in this vein of pleasantry, the judges acquitted Apuleius, seeing clearly that so amiable and graceful a man needed no love-charm for the conquest of the old widow.
In those times, sovereigns as well as subjects were in the habit of purchasing love-charms! According to Suetonius, Cesonia administered a potion to her husband, Caligula, which increased both his madness and his cruelty. The death of the poet Lucretius was caused by a similar potion administered by his mistress, Lucilia. Eusebius mentions a Governor of Egypt, who died from the same cause, and there are innumerable instances of these potent decoctions producing insanity, as well as fatal enfeeblement of body. Ovid furnishes the true recipe for love: “Ut ameris, amabilis esto!” “To be loved, be amiable!” But such a charm being out of the reach of many, it seems easier to purchase cosmetics at the perfumers, which are about as effective in the creation of the tender passion as the magic potions of darker ages.
A pretension to youthful habits and appearance at an advanced period of life, is perhaps one of the most effectual methods of becoming distasteful and ridiculous.
Still, however, a suitable attention to the care and variations of the toilet, proves a great enhancement to beauty in its civilized state; nor can there be a more vulgar error than the dictum of the poet, proclaiming:
“Beauty unadorned, adorned the most.”
In the female bosom, the love of dress is an instinctive passion. Look at two children of the same age, a girl and a boy; the one will be seen to delight in feats of strength and agility; the other, as if in evidence of the desire of pleasing instinctive in the opposite sex, is sure to prefer a doll, a ribbon, or a pretty frock, in place of the drum or gun chosen by the boy. Both have intuitively adopted their different vocations. Both are ambitious to conquer by means suitable to their several sexes.
What prodigies of art have been effected in France in consequence of the love of dress generated in the fair sex by a desire to please; from the period when the fair Gauls attired themselves in a sheep-skin fastened at the throat with a thorn; but were not the less coquettish for this enforced simplicity.
At that period, their notions of coquetry consisted in having fanciful designs tattooed upon their persons; and instead of pearls and diamonds, by way of adornment, cockle-shells were suspended from their ears. Their sole cosmetic consistedin unguents, which we now abhor as characteristic of the Hottentots.
Can the present inhabitants of Paris be really descended from these savages? At that time all the elegance and refinement of dress, arising from the desire to please, were concentrated in Rome; nor have modern times raised the fair Parisians to a similar state of refinement. Juvenal relates that it was thought indecent by the Roman ladies to spit or make use of a handkerchief in public; and at Athens, the fair sex never presumed to leave their chambers when suffering from a cold. What would they have thought of the disgusting habits of the Parisian belles, who contaminate their handkerchiefs by taking snuff, and yet ornament them with embroideries!—But the ladies of the antique world scrupulously avoided all that could provoke disgust—an essential preliminary in the art of pleasing.
In the early age of the Republic, the most refined cleanliness distinguished the habits of the fair Romans. Under the Cæsars, and after the conquest of the East, a taste for luxury, perfumes, and futilities of all kinds was first indulged; while the sumptuous prodigality of the table surpassed all precedent. The science of cosmetics then attained perfection; and there appeared no limit to their coquetry.
Pliny states that the Roman ladies, in order to make their skin white, made use of a juice expressedfrom the seeds of the wild grape;—while minium, white lead and chalk, filled up their wrinkles, and effaced unseemly spots.
“Tabula,” said Martial, “is afraid of the rain; and Sabilla of the sun; the one alarmed for the solution of her complexion, the other lest the heat should evaporate the roses of her cheeks.”
Ovid has transmitted to us a recipe for a paste to secure whiteness of skin, consisting of barley flour and lentils, eggs, hartshorn, narcissus bulbs, gum, and honey.
Poppæa invented a paste, which was moulded like a mask upon the face, to be worn in the house. This mask was called at Rome the husband’s face, because it was only taken off for the suitor. When Poppæa travelled, she was followed by a troop of donkeys, whose milk she used for her toilet; and in the baths of the Roman palaces, the most unlimited luxury prevailed. The ladies were served by numerous slaves, each having particular attributions. One superintended the hair; another the eye-brows; another the hands, which were dyed with pink; another, the face; while the rest were devoted to the care of the wardrobe and jewels.
These customs, handed down both by historians and poets, had solely for their object the desire to please; among women, the most ungovernable of all desires, and exceeding even the love of command. To please, however, is a preliminary to authority.
In modern times, the cosmetic art has become a branch of the sciences, and forms a considerable source of industry and revenue. The walls of our towns are covered with announcements of miraculous discoveries, pastes and capillary oils, odoriferous waters,—all and each being efficacious and infallible. Red hair may be transformed into beautiful black tresses;—baldness may be made to give place to flowing locks; and all these oils, pastes, and masks, which periodically change their name, are in fact the same villanous cosmetics which never yet restored elasticity to a withered skin, converted black to white, or bestowed curls upon a bald pate. Art is great, but Time far greater; nor are the ravages of years to be concealed. In divers of these preparations of lead, bismuth and tin, the sulphurated and phosphoric properties produce the most injurious effects. In others, the calcareous and aluminous substances obstruct the pores of the skin, and by hardening it, annihilate its elasticity. Minium, coral, and vegetable powders, are not less pernicious; their corroding action augmenting, instead of diminishing the ailments of the teeth and gums.
These salutary observations were made long before our time; and it has been as often observed that for the preservation of the complexion, innocuous substances should be employed such as milk, honey, cucumber, or melon-juice, mallow-water, and above all, that best of cosmetics, fresh water, which is withinthe reach of all, and wants no alluring aid of Chinese engravings on gilded bottles to recommend its miraculous properties.
The increased use of baths has fortunately rendered this cosmetic a matter of universal adoption; and nothing is more likely to confer softness of skin.
Anne of Austria, the mother of Louis XIV., had so fine a skin, that no linen could be found sufficiently delicate for her use, which caused Cardinal Mazarin to observe that in another world, her eternal punishment would consist in sleeping in coarse sheets. All the cold cream in the world would not have effected a change in the susceptible epidermis of Anne of Austria; and we repeat that cosmetics are both useless and dangerous.
Not even the consummate art of Jezebel availed to repair the irretrievable ravages of time. Young girls of redundant health have been known to swallow acids to counteract corpulency; after succeeding in which, they die prematurely of pulmonary affections. An equally fatal result of the desire to please is produced by over-lacing. Ladies desirous to conceal their obesity had far better rely upon a well-chosen dress than upon this injurious expedient. On the other hand, a tight shoe only exhibits more prominently a foot of large dimensions. Nothing is more erroneous thanthe proverb, “that people must suffer in order to look well.” To be graceful, the movements of the body should be unrestrained.
We have already pointed out the distinction between the art of pleasing, and the desire of pleasing. The desire is common to all, the art limited to a few; and they who charm most are those who please naturally and without effort.
THE PHILOSOPHER’S STONE.
How was the world ever brought to believe that students, in rags, possessed the power of producing gold, when the misery of their personal condition was so apparent? How could individuals, in the enjoyment of competence, ever be tempted to own themselves in the pursuit of chimerical opulence? How could an enlightened century give birth to so monstrous a delusion?
The alchemists, though not comprised among sorcerers, and requiring a separate notice, rivalled them in the pretence to magic; for their volumes abound in recipes for raising the dead, universal elixirs, the regeneration of old people, the transformation of the ugly into the beautiful, and even the creation of men and animals, without other aid than that of a few cinders and herbs!
Such miracles, however, were insignificant compared with the science of producing gold; which,according to some was known to Job. The philosopher’s stone is said, by certain legends, to have been the origin of his fortune; and his poverty to have been occasioned by its loss. These alchemists do not explain how he came to forfeit the scientific powers which had originally produced the stone; such details being beneath the notice of the grand science.
The philosopher’s stone was, on the contrary, a creation of the fourteenth century, and much accredited among the scientific men of that day. Raymond Lully, Nicholas Flamel, Arnaud de Villeneuve, Paracelsus, and several others, were initiated into the secret. Nicholas Flamel was a celebrated alchemist, and having acquired an immense fortune, it was attributed to the philosopher’s stone, which of course stimulated the cupidity of the proselytes of alchemy. Eager was their pursuit of a study which was to endow them with boundless wealth; and these lunatics found coadjutors in persons of weak and credulous mind, while wiser men diverted themselves by sustaining their hopes, and affecting conviction of their success. Such was Van Helmont, who published his belief in the existence of the philosopher’s stone, protesting that he had seen it, and tasted it; that with a grain, he had produced several marks of pure gold.
The ardour with which conjectural sciences areadopted, proves a serious injury to positive science. Many learned men asserted the possibility of the transmutation of metals; among others, the famous Pica of Mirandola. Alchemists, however, were not unanimous concerning the principles of the art. Some placed its origin in Heaven, and looked upon the rays of the sun as its primitive source; the quintessence of which was called, in their gibberish, the powder of projection. Others maintained that its elements existed throughout every department of nature, constituting the active principle of the universe. Some ascribed the principle to the metals themselves. Mercury presented itself to them as the agent for producing silver, according to the properties we have already described with reference to miraculous showers. According to them, mercury had only to be condensed, its mobility fixed, and its different parts coagulated, to create silver. But by far the greater number indulged in still wider speculations. Most of those who attempted the pursuit were brought to want and wretchedness; and one of them observed, in his last moments, that he could not imagine a bitterer curse to bequeath than the love of alchemy!
All, however, were not martyrs to the art. Many of its advocates perambulated the world, finding dupes in Princes, Kings and Emperors, who paiddearly for their imaginary discoveries. These mountebanks were the only real possessors of the philosopher’s stone. After the treaty of Westphalia, in 1648, the Emperor Ferdinand was convinced that he had converted half a pound of mercury into gold by means of a philosophical tincture; and in commemoration of the event, had a medal struck, bearing the effigy of a youth with a face like a sun, shooting forth rays. On the reverse was inscribed, “Glory to God for deigning to impart to his humble creatures a portion of his infinite power.”
The mountebank to whom this transmutation was attributed, by name Richthausen, was created a Baron; and repeated his experiments before the Elector of Mayence and many other Sovereigns. His name was long celebrated in Germany; but his end is unknown. It is well known that Cardinal de Richelieu witnessed several experiments in pursuit of the philosopher’s stone, generously rewarding the operator. This may have been an expedient of his Eminence in order to secure the services of these adroit individuals; who, admitted into the bosom of illustrious families, became a source of useful information. Voltaire relates that he saw one, Damusi, Marquis of Conventiglio, handsomely remunerated by certain rich noblemen, after producing, in their presence, two or three crowns of gold.
No one has written more to the purpose on the subject of alchemists, than Fontenelle. “Nothing but the blindness induced by avidity,” says he, “could induce the belief that a man, possessing the power of making gold, must receive gold from another, before he can exhibit his art. How can such a person stand in need of money? Nevertheless, these mountebanks, by their fanatical conduct, mysterious language, and exorbitant promises, far from rendering themselves objects of suspicion, acquire the utmost influence. Without deciding upon the impractibility of making gold, experience teaches us that the extreme difficulty of the operation must render it unavailable in practice, if not in theory. But supposing that by the means of a sulphur of gold, completely separated from other principles, the point were gained by applying it to silver, so as to produce a mass of gold of the same weight and volume, what would be the result beyond a curious experiment effected at an enormous cost?”
In this appreciation of alchemy, Fontenelle expresses himself with the scrupulousness worthy the philosopher who said that he would not have opened his hand had it been full of truth. In this instance he opens it partially, admitting an experimental possibility which he knew did not exist.
Not only Kings and Emperors, but even the populace, delighting in the marvellous, believed in the existence of the philosopher’s stone; choosing toattribute several sudden accumulations of wealth to this mysterious source. Raymond Lullé had become rich by farming the duty imposed by Edward III. upon the exportation of wool from England to Flanders. Arnaud de Villeneuve, an eminent physician and chemist, effected cures by specifics only known to himself, which were highly requited. Nicholas Flamel enriched himself by seizing the ledgers of the Jews when expelled from France; their creditors preferring a settlement with him, to paying their liabilities into the exchequer; in return for which, he effaced their names from the registers.
These mountebanks are now known to have made use of a hollow cane, the extremity being plugged with wax, by introducing which into the crucible, on pretext of stirring up the different matters, as the wax melted the gold fell out, and the miracle appeared to be accomplished.
Others had their crucibles lined with a substance which yielded to the action of the fire, when the gold concealed behind it appeared. These clumsy tricks of legerdemain succeeded for several centuries; but credulity flits round error, as the moth is attracted by the flame of the taper, and is at length annihilated.
In the beginning of the last century, a well-known Princess was the victim of an absurd fraud. Being famed for her humanity, a wounded soldier knocked at the door of her palace, and solicitedhospitality. Having been nobly received, on recovering from his wounds, he desired to offer some acknowledgment of gratitude previous to his departure. This man pretended to be possessed of three reeds, which, being placed in a crucible, converted mercury into gold. These reeds he pretended to have discovered in a ruined Abbey in Wurzbourg; a fact which he disinterestedly communicated to the Princess; who, in return, loaded him with marks of munificence. When, however, her Highness proceeded to apprize the Bishop of Wurzbourg of the treasure concealed in his diocese, no such Abbey as the one described by the crafty soldier was found to be in existence. This kind of philosophers’ stone is not a new invention, and there is little chance of the secret being lost.
There are still many persons engaged in the decomposition and transmutation of metals;—viz: the coiners of base money. Even the Academy of Sciences of Paris has still one member devoted to the miracles of the crucible—Baron Cagnard de la Tour; who has made many wonderful experiments on the nature and reproduction of diamonds.
GIANTS AND DWARFS.
“Have dwarfs and giants ever really existed?”
“Only so long as no traveller penetrated the countries they were supposed to inhabit,” would be the reasonable reply. For since the globe has been explored in all directions, and tourists are compelled to be more measured in their narratives, travellers’ wonders are greatly diminished.
A belief in the existence of nations of giants and dwarfs was, however, long entertained; one of the many errors bequeathed to us by antiquity, and adopted by modern credulity.
The ancients had their Titans and Cyclops; of whom Polyphemus, the most towering, was three hundred feet high; while we moderns, more moderate, allow only ten feet to the Patagonian. From the period the Magellan regions became better known, their proportions were still further reduced; and we now allow only an average of seven feet.Credulity, distance, and the love of the marvellous, tend greatly to the exaggeration of such allotments.
The Bible, like mythology, has its giants; but in most cases, they are exceptional; and it is undeniable that nature often digresses, and produces individuals differing in stature from the ordinary standard of mankind.
Most people have heard of Bébé, the famous dwarf of the King of Poland, who came to Paris in the early part of the Consulate; and of Friand, the giant, whose height exceeded seven feet two inches. But these two were exceptions, not the types of a race. Excepting the Greenlanders, Laplanders, and Samoyedes, there is little variation of stature among the different populations of the globe, certainly not more than a tenth. As regards the inhabitants of the arctic regions, we must bear in mind that their stunted proportions are in harmony with the rigid, and unkindly nature of their climates; in proof of which may be cited the similarity of climate between Lapland and certain vallies of the frozen regions of Switzerland. A similar influence is manifest in the inhabitants of the two localities; the peasants of the Valais, afflicted with the goitre, having more analogy with the Laplanders than with the fine population of Switzerland.
There are few phenomenal races, though manyindividuals; just as the monstrous fruits grown for horticultural prizes cannot be regarded as fair samples of a species. It would be as rational to cite, by way of example, the fabulous creations of Rabelais and Swift, the giant Gargantua, and the nation of Lilliputians.
Polyphemus and his Cyclops are real, as they exist in the pages of Homer and Virgil; but ideal the moment Flasellus asserts that the remains of Polyphemus were found in Sicily, near Mount Eripana, of which he gives the following account.
“The giant was seated with his left hand resting on the mast of a ship terminated like a club, and carrying fifteen hundred weight of lead. It crumbled into dust upon being touched, except part of his skull; which would have contained several bushels of corn. Three teeth of which the least weighed one hundred ounces, and a thigh bone, one hundred and twenty feet long, were still perfect.” Between Homer, and Virgil, and Thomas Flasellus there is all the difference of ingenious fiction and the grossest imposture produceable in prose.
In former days, the head of Adam was believed to have out-topped the atmosphere, and that he touched the Arctic Pole with one hand, and the Antarctic with the other; one of the hyperbolical exaggerations of the rabbinical Scriptures. After Adam, the rabbins rank Og, the King of Basan, to whom Holy Writassigns thirteen or fourteen feet, while the rabbinical writings declare that the stature of Og was such that the waters of the deluge only came up to his knee. In the war against the Israelites, he hurled a mountain against the enemy; but as he held it above his head, God decreed that the ants should excavate it, so that it fell about his neck like a collar. Moses, who was six ells high, profiting by the circumstance, grasped a formidable axe, and making a spring of his own height, could only strike the giant on the instep. The King, however, fell, and encumbered by the mountain, was put to death.
Polyphemus, and all other giants might have danced upon the palm of King Og; and the thigh of the Cyclops would scarcely have furnished him a toothpick. The Jewish rabbins affirm that the thigh bone of Og, the King of Basan, was about twelve leagues long. They do not, however, give the precise measure.
Pomponius Mela, the most incredible of the authors of antiquity, states that certain of the Indian tribes were of such exceeding stature, that they mounted their elephants as we do our horses. Father Rhetel, a Capuchin friar, saw at Thessalonica the bones of a giant ninety-six feet long; the skull of which could contain twenty-four bushels of corn. Herodotus states that the shoe of Perseus measured three feet. The wise Plutarch, himself adopted the historyof the giant Antæus, related by that illustrious liar Gabirius. According to some historians, King Tentradus was twenty-five feet high; Goliath was nine feet four inches; the Emperor Maximin was more than eight; and the Elector of Brandenbourg, Joachim, had at his Court a man named Michael, who was about eight feet high. The height of Goliath, Maximin and Michael were mere instances of the caprices of nature.
The early legends of stupendous giants arose from the fact, that the fossil remains of antediluvial animals were originally ascribed to the human race; whereas, geologists have never found, either in calcareous or granitical formations, any bones of the human species which could have preceded the deluge.
Having dismissed the giants, let us consider the dwarfs, concerning whom our conclusions are the same:—that they are exceptions to the general rule. Nay, the impossibility of establishing a race has been proved by a German Princess, who having married and settled several couples of dwarfs, failed in securing a diminutive progeny.
The existence of pygmies is the sole question concerning the dwarfish species requiring attention; but though so long credited by the ancients, it is now looked upon as fabulous. Aristotle, the evangelist of science, affirms that pygmies were not fabulous; and placed them near the source of theNile, in a country created purposely for them, in which the nature of every thing was proportionate. Some authors have pronounced the pygmies to have been twenty-eight inches high; but Juvenal only allows them a foot. These ideal dwarfs must have been about the size of the young American, popularly known under the name of General Tom Thumb.
The pygmies are said to have been courageous and enterprising; dexterous with the bow, and, according to Pliny, hewed down with an axe the corn, which to them was in about the proportions of the oaks of Dodona.
The most valorous exploit attempted by the pygmies was the siege of Hercules. Pliny relates, that one day the son of Alcmena having fallen asleep in the country of the pygmies, their King assembling his troops, led a division against his right arm, surrounded his left, then at the head of his troops charged the head, leaving the remainder of the army to capture the feet. On awaking, Hercules spread out his cloak, and made the whole army of pygmies prisoners. This is a pretty fable, and may have originated the Lilliputians of the Dean of St. Patrick’s. But we have no hesitation in affirming, that though the words giants and pygmies may serve as terms of comparison, they have no prototypes among the nations of the earth.