Various - The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 20, No. 566, September 15, 1832

As your journal is open to the elucidation of any facts or traditions connected with history, perhaps you will not consider the following attempt at the elucidation of a singular subject, unworthy of your pages. There is something pleasing in every successful attempt at tracing tradition to a rational and philosophical cause, an origin to which many of the most absurd and incredible may be referred.

It was well known that to witchcraft was ascribed only the power of effecting the destruction of certain parts of the human body, and that some of the members could be protected against the effects of incantation. The spells of contra-incantation were often successfully exerted in the destruction of the human body, except in those parts previously rendered invulnerable. Jezebel was destroyed except her hands and feet, and the same fate is recorded of many other witches, or of those who suffered under the influence of malevolent spells.

Might not the vulgar, in search of a cause for so singular a phenomenon, which has often occurred, as spontaneous combustion of the human body, find in the powers of witchcraft an easy solution? Grace Pitt who was burnt in this manner in Suffolk (recorded in the Philosophical Transactions, ) was a reputed witch, and her death was assigned by the country people to the effects of contra-incantation; that her hands and feet (generally left untouched by this phenomenon) were not consumed, was attributed to the influence of her spell. Indeed, we may suppose that these old ladies, who were distinguished by the respectable appellation of witches, gained that title by their excessive devotion to spirituous liquors, which, in every case that has occurred, have been found to predispose to spontaneous combustion, of the human body.

Colchester.

Mad. de Pomp. —Who may this lady be with acquiline nose and large black eyes; with such height and noble bearing; with mien so proud, yet so coquettish, who enters my chamber without being announced, and makes her obeisance in a religious fashion?

Tullia. —I am Tullia, born at Rome, about eighteen hundred years ago; I make the Roman obeisance, not the French, and have come, I scarce know from whence, to see your country, yourself, and your toilette.

Mad. de. P. —Ah, madam, do me the honour of seating yourself. An arm-chair for the Lady Tullia.

Tullia. —For whom? me, madam? and am I to sit on that little incommodious sort of throne, so that my legs must hang down and become quite red?

Mad. de P. —Upon what then would you sit?

Tullia. —Madam, upon a couch.

Mad. de P. —Ay, I understand—you would say upon a sofa; there stands one, upon which you may recline at your ease.

Tullia. —I am charmed to see that the French have furniture as convenient as ours.

Mad. de P. —Hah, hah, madam, you've no stockings! your legs are naked, but ornamented, however, with a very pretty ribbon, after the fashion of a sandal.

Tullia. —We knew nothing about stockings, which, as a useful and agreeable invention, I certainly prefer to our sandals.

Mad. da P. —Good heavens, madam, I believe you've no chemise!

Tullia. —No, madam, in my time nobody wore one.

Mad. de P. —And in what time did you live?

Tullia. —In the time of Sylla, Pompey, Caesar, Cato, Cataline; and Cicero, to whom I have the honour of being daughter: of that Cicero, of whom one of your protegés has made mention in barbarous verse. 3 3 Crébillon, author of Catalina. I went yesterday to the theatre, where Cataline was represented with all the celebrated people of my time, but I did not recognise one of them; and when my father exhorted me to make advances to Cataline, I was astonished! But, madam, you seem to have some beautiful mirrors; your chamber is full of them; our mirrors were not a sixteenth part so large as yours; are they of steel?

Mad. de P. —No, madam, they are made with sand, and nothing is more common amongst us.

Tullia. —What an admirable art! I confess we had none such! And oh! what a beautiful painting too you have there!

Mad. de P. —It is not a painting, but a print, done merely with lamp-black; a hundred copies of the same design may be struck off in a day, and this secret immortalizes pictures, which time would otherwise destroy.

Tullia. —It is indeed an astonishing secret! we Romans had nothing like it!

Un Savant. —(A literary man there present, taking up the discourse, and producing a book from his pocket, says to Tullia:) You will be astonished, madam, to learn, that this book is not written by hand, but that it is printed almost in a manner similar to engravings; and that this invention also immortalizes works of the mind.

(The Savant presents his book, a collection of verses dedicated to the Marchioness, to Tullia, who reads a page, admires the type, and says to the author:)

Tullia. —Truly, sir, printing is a fine thing; and if it can immortalize such verses as these, it appears to me to be the noblest effort of art. But do you not at least employ this invention in printing the works of my father?

The Savant. —Yes, madam, but nobody reads them; I am truly concerned for your father, but in these days, little is known of him save his name.

(Here are brought in chocolate, tea, coffee, and ices. Tullia is astonished to see, in summer, cream and strawberries 4 4 Groseilles, literally; gooseberries or currents; but we have taken the liberty here, and elsewhere, slightly to deviate from the original text, in compliment to English customs, tastes, idioms, &c. iced. She is informed that such congealed beverages are obtained in five minutes, by means of the salt-petre with which they are surrounded, and that by continual motion, is produced their firmness and icy coldness. She is speechless with astonishment. The dark colour of the chocolate and coffee, somewhat disgust her, and she asks whether these liquids are extracted from the plants of the country?—A duke who is present, replies:)

Duke. —The fruits of which these beverages are composed, come from another world, and from the Gulf of Arabia.

Tullia. —Arabia I remember; but never heard mention made of what you call coffee; and as for another world, I know only of that from whence I came, and do assure you, we have no chocolate there.

Duke. —The world of which we tell you, madam, is a continent, called America, almost as large as Europe, Asia, and Africa, put together; and of which we have a knowledge less vague, than of the world from whence you came.

Tullia. —What! Did we then, who styled ourselves masters of the world, possess only half of it? The reflection is truly humiliating!

The Savant. —(piqued that Tullia had pronounced his verses bad, replies dryly:) Yes, your countrymen who boasted of having made themselves masters of the world, had scarce conquered the twentieth part of it. We have at this moment, at the further end of Europe, an empire larger in itself than the Roman: 5 5 Russia: whose Empress, Catherine II, is intended by the succeeding sentence. it is governed, too, by a woman, who excels you in intellect and beauty, and who wears chemises; had she read my verses, I am certain she would have thought them good.