The Queer, the Quaint and the Quizzical: A Cabinet for the Curious

From Childwald church-yard, England—

From Nettlebed church-yard, Oxfordshire—

At Wolstanton—

In Norwich Cathedral—

At Torrington church-yard, Devon, England—

In the church-yard of Pewsey, Wiltshire—

Here lies the body of Lady O'Looney, great-niece of Burke, commonly called the Sublime. She was bland, passionate and deeply religious; also she painted in water-colors, and sent several pictures to the exhibition. She was first cousin to Lady Jones; and of such is the kingdom of heaven.

Shields (the Irish orator)—

In Doncaster church-yard, 1816—

On the monument of John of Doncaster—

In a New England grave-yard—

Sternhold Oakes—

On a tombstone in New Jersey—

In East Hartford, Connecticut—

In Newington church-yard—

In Bideford church-yard, Kent—

Rebecca Rogers, Folkestone, 1688—

At Augusta, Maine—

John Mound—

POETRY, PIETY AND POLITENESS.

The following epitaph was copied from a stone in a country church-yard—

At Loch Rausa—

On Mr. Bywater—

At Staverton, England—

At Penryn—

From St. Agnes', London—

In Linton church-yard, 1825—

Under this inscription some one wrote—

At Queenborough—

At Minster—

At Hadley church-yard, Suffolk—

The middle line furnishes the terminal letters or syllables of the words in the upper and lower lines, and when added they read thus—

In a Paris cemetery—

Shakespeare's tomb—

The inscription on Shakespeare's tomb forbids the removal of the body. Subjoined is the prohibition—

In consequence of this inscription, the people of Stratford-on-Avon are afraid to put their feet on the stones above the grave, and the body of the greatest English poet has not been placed with other geniuses in Westminster Abbey.

Stone tablet puzzle—

The following letters are inscribed on a stone tablet placed immediately over the Ten Commandments in a church in England, and are deciphered with only one letter—

Grimmingham church-yard, Norfolk, England—

To the memory of Thomas Jackson, Comedian, who was engaged, 21st of Dec, 1741, to play a comic cast of characters, in this great theatre—the World: for many of which he was prompted by nature to excel.

The season being ended, his benefit over, the charges all paid, and his account closed, he made his exit in the tragedy of Death, on the 17th of March, 1798, in full assurance of being called once more to rehearsal; where he hopes to find his forfeits all cleared, his cast of parts bettered, and his situation made agreeable by Him who paid the great stock-debt, for the love which he bore to performers in general.

An inculpatory epitaph—

The following epitaph at West Allington, Devon, England, is not only a memorial of the deceased, but reproves the parson of the parish—

At St. Benedict Fink—

"1673, April 23rd, was buried M^r. Thomas Sharrow, Cloth-worker, late Churchwarden of this parish, killed by an accidental fall into a vault, in London Wall, men Corner, by Paternoster Row, and was supposed had lain there eleven days and nights before any one could tell where he was. Let all that read this take heed of drink."

At Clophill, Bedfordshire—

DEATH DO NOT KICK AT MEE
FOR CHRIST HATH TAKEN
THY STING AWAY.
1623.

In the same—

A watchmaker's epitaph—

Among the curious epitaphs to be seen in the graveyards of England, this one in the old church-yard of Lidford, Devon, is worthy of insertion—

Here lies, in a horizontal position,
The outside case of
George Rougleigh, watchmaker,
Whose abilities in that line were an honor
To his profession.
Integrity was the mainspring
And prudence the regulator
Of all the actions of his life.
Humane, generous and liberal,
His hand never stopped
Till he had relieved distress;
So nicely were all his actions regulated
That he never went wrong
Except when set a-going
By people
Who did not know his key;
Even then he was easily set aright again.
He had the art of disposing his time so well
That his hours glided away
In one continual round
Of pleasure and delight,
Till an unlucky minute put a period to
his existence.
He departed this life November 14, 1802,
Aged 57;
Wound up
In hopes of being taken in hand
By his Maker,
And of being thoroughly cleaned and repaired
And set a-going
In the world to come.

Grave of Robin Hood—

At Kirklees, in Yorkshire, formerly a Benedictine nunnery, is a gravestone, near the park, under which it is said Robin Hood lies buried. Mr. Ralph Thoresby, in his "Ducatus Leodiensis," gives the following as the epitaph—

Great Tom of Lincoln.

The finest bell in England was the Great Tom of Lincoln, considerably older than St. Paul's. Its elevation gave it an horizon of fifty miles in every direction. Its note was like the chord of A upon a full organ. It fell from its support and was destroyed.

Mammoth Bell of Buddah.

Klaprath states that in an edifice before the great temple of Buddah, at Jeddo, is the largest bell in the world. It weighs 1,700,000 pounds, four times greater than the great bell of Moscow, and fifty-six times larger than the great bell of Westminister, England.

Great Bell of Rouen.

The grand entrance to the cathedral of Rouen is flanked by two towers; the one was erected by St. Romain; the expense of constructing the other, which bears the whimsical name of Tour-de-beurre, was raised by the sum received for granting the more wealthy and epicurean inhabitants of the city permission to eat butter during Lent. It was in this tower that the celebrated bell was erected; it was named George D'Amboise, after its founder, who died from joy upon seeing it completed. It weighed 40,000 pounds, and was melted into cannon in the year 1793.

St. Fillan's Bell.

In Sinclair's "Statistical Account of Scotland," the Rev. Mr. Patrick Stuart, minister of Killin parish, Perthshire, says: "There is a bell belonging to the chapel of St. Fillan that was in high reputation among the votaries of that saint in old times. It is a foot high, oblong in form, and made of mixed metal. It usually lay on a grave-stone in the church-yard. When mad people were brought to be dipped in the saint's pool, it was necessary to perform certain ceremonies in which there was a mixture of druidism and popery. After remaining all night in the chapel, bound with ropes, the bell was set upon their head with great solemnity. It was also the popular opinion that if the bell was ever stolen, it would extricate itself out of the thief's hands and return home, ringing all the way."

The Bells of Jersey.

The following is the bell-legend connected with Jersey: "Many years ago the twelve parish churches in that island possessed each a valuable peal of bells; but during a long civil war the government determined to sell the bells to defray the expenses of the troops. The bells were accordingly collected and sent to France for that purpose; but on the passage, the ship foundered, and everything was lost, to show the wrath of Heaven at such a sacrilege. Since then, during a storm, these bells always ring from the deep, and to this day the fishermen of St. Owen's Bay always go to the edge of the water before embarking, to listen if they can hear the bells upon the wind. If so, nothing will induce them to leave the shore; if all is quiet, they fearlessly set sail."

Subterranean Christmas Bells.

Near Raleigh, in Nottinghamshire, there is a valley, said to have been caused by an earthquake several hundred years ago, which swallowed up a whole village, together with the church. Formerly, it was a custom for people to assemble in this valley on Christmas morning, to listen to the ringing of the bells of the church beneath them. This it was positively asserted might be heard by putting the ear to the ground and harkening attentively. Even now, it is usual on Christmas morning for old men and women to tell the children to go to the valley, stoop down, and hear the bells ringing merrily.—Hone, 1827.

St. Sepulchre's Bell.

It has been a very ancient practice, on the night preceding the execution of condemned criminals, for the bellman of the parish of St. Sepulchre to go under Newgate, and, ringing his bell, to repeat the following, as a piece of friendly advice to the unhappy wretches under sentence of death:—

The Passing Bell.

The Passing Bell was so named from being tolled when any one was passing from life. Hence it was sometimes called the Soul Bell, and was rung that those who heard it might pray for the person dying, and who was not yet dead. We have a remarkable mention of the practice in the narrative of the last moments of the Lady Katherine Grey (sister of Lady Jane Grey), who died a prisoner in the Tower of London, in 1567. Sir Owen Hopton, constable of the tower, "perceiving her to draw toward her end, said to Mr. Bockeham, 'Were it not best to send to the church, that the bell may be rung?' and she herself, hearing him, said: 'Good Sir Owen, be it so;' and almost immediately died."—Ellis's Original Letters.

Bell-ringing in Holland.

The Hollanders exhibit the most enthusiastic fondness for bells. Every church and public building is hung round with them in endless variety. In Amsterdam not less than a thousand bells are kept constantly ringing, which creates a din that is almost intolerable to strangers.

Babes of Bethlehem.

It is an ancient custom at Norton, Worcestershire, England, on the 28th of December (Innocents' Day) to ring a muffled peal in token of sorrow for the slaughter of the hapless "babes of Bethlehem," and, immediately afterwards, an unmuffled peal, in manifestation of joy for the deliverance and escape of the infant Saviour.

Ringing the Changes.

It is curious to note the number of changes which may be rung on different peals. The changes on seven bells are 5040; on twelve, 479,001,600, which it would take ninety-one years to ring, at the rate of two strokes in a second. The changes on fourteen bells could not be rung through at the same rate in less than 16,575 years, and upon four-and-twenty they would require more than 117,000 billions of years.—E. F. King.

Bell Inscriptions.

Epigraphs or legends on bells were quite common in England. We subjoin specimens—

On the Six Bells of the Ancient Abbey of Hexham.

A not uncommon epigraph is—

At Aldbourne, on the first bell, we read: "The gift of Jos. Pizzie and Wm. Gwynn.

On the fourth bell is—

At Broadchalk—

At Coln, on the third bell—

At Devizes, St. Mary—

Amesbury, on the fifth bell—

Amesbury, on the tenor bell—

At Bath Abbey—

At Stowe, Northamptonshire—

At St. Michael's, Coventry—

On the seventh bell is—

At St. Peter-le-Bailey, Oxford, in expectation of other bells which were never purchased—

On the eighth bell is—

St. Helen's church, at Worcester, England, has a set of bells cast in the time of Queen Anne, with names and inscriptions recording victories gained in that reign—

1. Blenheim.

2. Barcelona.

3. Ramilies.

4. Menin.

5. Turin.

6. Eugene.

7. Marlborough.

8. Queen Anne.

On the famous alarm-bell called Roland, in a belfry-tower in the once powerful city of Ghent, is engraved the subjoined inscription, in the old Walloon or Flemish dialect—

The following inscription, remarkable for bad taste, is on one of eight bells in the church tower of Tilton, Devon—

Articles of Ringing.

The following "Articles of Ringing" are upon the walls of the belfry in Dunster, Somersetshire, England:—

Old Weather Rhymes.

Signs of Foul Weather.

First Meerschaum Pipe.

In 1723 there lived in Pesth, the capital of Hungary, Karol Kowates, a shoemaker, whose ingenuity in cutting and carving on wood, etc., brought him in contact with Count Andrassy, ancestor to the present prime minister of Austria, with whom he became a favorite. The count, on his return from a mission to Turkey, brought with him a large piece of whitish clay, which had been presented to him as a curiosity on account of its extraordinary light specific gravity. It struck the shoemaker that, being porous, it must naturally be well adapted for pipes, as it would absorb the nicotine. The experiment was tried, and Karol cut a pipe for the count and one for himself. But in the pursuit of his trade he could not keep his hands clean, and many a piece of wax became attached to the pipe. The clay, however, instead of assuming a dirty appearance, as was naturally to be expected, when Karol wiped it off, received, wherever the wax had touched, a clear brown polish, instead of the dull white it previously had. Attributing this change in the tint to the proper source, he waxed the whole surface, and, polishing the pipe, again smoked it, and noticed how admirably and beautifully it colored; also, how much more sweet the pipe smoked after being waxed. Karol had struck the smoking philosopher's stone; and other noblemen, hearing of the wonderful properties of this singular species of clay, imported it in considerable quantities for the manufacture of pipes. The natural scarcity of this much esteemed article, and the great cost of transportation in those days of limited facilities for transportation, rendered its use exclusively confined to the richest European noblemen until 1830, when it became a more general article of trade. The first meerschaum pipe made by Karol Kowates has been preserved in the museum at Pesth.

The First Oval Lathe.

William Murdock, the inventor of the oval lathe, was a poor millwright. He was a good workman, but rather shiftless, until he came into the employ of Boulton & Watt, the English manufacturers of steam-engines in the last century. The way in which the millwright first attracted the attention of these great machinists is thus told:—

Somewhere about the year 1780, a traveling millwright, weary and foot-sore, and with the broadest of Northern Doric accent, stopped at a factory in England and asked for work. His aspect indicated beggary, and the proprietor, Mr. Boulton, had bidden him seek some other workshop, when, as the man was turning sorrowfully away, he suddenly called him back, saying—

"What kind of hat 's yon ye have on your head, my man?"

"It's just timmer, sir," replied the man.

"Timmer, my man!" ejaculated the manufacturer. "Just let me look at it. Where on earth did you get it?"

"I just turned it in the lathe," said the mechanic, with a flush of pride.

"But it's oval, not round, my man," said Mr. Boulton, in surprise; "and lathes turn things round."

"A-weel, I just gar'd the lathe gang anither gait to please me; and I'd a long journey before me, and I thocht I'd have a hat to keep out water; and I had na muckle to spare, so I just make ane."

The man was a born inventor, but he didn't know it. By his ingenuity he had invented the oval lathe, one of the most useful of machines. He had made his hat with it, and the hat made his fortune. Great events often result from seeming trifles. Mr. Boulton was a sharp man of business. He saw that the man who could turn out of a block of wood an oval hat, was too valuable a workman for the firm of Boulton & Watt to lose sight of. William Murdock was then and there employed. In 1784 he made the first wheeled vehicle impelled by steam in England,—made it with his own hands and brains. He gained fame and fortune, but the "timmer" hat, made for a long journey and to keep out water, was the corner-stone of both.

Porcelain.

An alchemist, while seeking to discover a mixture of earths that would make the most durable crucibles, one day found that he had made porcelain.

Origin of Blue-tinted Paper.

The origin of blue-tinted paper came about by a mere slip of the hand. The wife of William East, an English paper-maker, accidentally let a blue bag fall into one of the vats of pulp. The workmen were astonished when they saw the peculiar color of the paper, while Mr. East was highly incensed over what he considered a grave pecuniary loss. His wife was so much frightened that she would not confess her agency in the matter. After storing the damaged paper for four years, Mr. East sent it to his agent at London, with instructions to sell it for what it would bring. The paper was accepted as a "purposed novelty," and was disposed of at quite an advance over the market price. Mr. East was astonished at receiving an order from his agent for another large invoice of the paper. He was without the secret, and found himself in a dilemma. Upon mentioning it to his wife, she told him about the accident. He kept the secret, and the demand for the novel tint far exceeded his ability to supply it.

Following His Nose.

While Marshall Jewell was Minister to Russia, he found out, by the use of his nose, the secret of making Russia leather. Instead of using tallow and grease in the dressings of skins, the Russians employed birch-bark tar. By careful inquiry, and literally following his nose, during a visit to one of their large tanneries, he found the compound in a mammoth kettle, ready for use. He reported his discovery, and the result is that genuine Russian leather goods are now made in America.

Discovery of Composition for Printing-Rollers.

The composition of which printing-rollers are made was discovered by a Salopian printer. Not being able to find the pelt-ball, he inked the type with a piece of soft glue which had fallen out of a glue pot. It was such an excellent substitute that, after mixing molasses with the glue, to give the mass proper consistency, the old pelt-ball was entirely discarded.

Mezzotinting.

This art was suggested by the simple accident of the gun-barrel of a sentry becoming rusted with dew.

Whitening Sugar.

The process of whitening sugar was discovered in a curious way. A hen that had gone through a clay puddle went with her muddy feet into a sugar house, leaving her tracks on a pile of sugar. It was noticed that wherever her tracks were the sugar was whitened. Experiments were instituted, and the result was that wet clay came to be used in refining sugar.

Discovery of Glass.

Pliny informs us that the art of making glass was accidentally discovered by some merchants who were traveling with nitre, and stopped near a river issuing from Mount Carmel. Not readily finding stones to rest their kettles on, they employed some pieces of their nitre for that purpose. The nitre, gradually dissolving by the heat of the fire, mixed with the sand, and a transparent matter flowed, which was, in fact, glass.

Essence of Pearl.

A French bead-maker named Jaquin discovered the manner of preparing the glass pearls used at present, which approach as near to nature as possible, without being too expensive. He once noticed, at his estate near Passy, that when the small fish called ables or ablettes were washed, the water was filled with fine silver-colored particles. He suffered the water to stand for some time, and obtained from it a sediment which had the lustre of the most beautiful pearls, which suggested to him the idea of making pearls from it. He scraped off the scales of the fish, and called the soft shining powder which was diffused in the water essence of pearl, or essence d'orient. He succeeded in coating the interior of glass beads with the pearly liquid, and amassed a large fortune. This was during the reign of Henry IV. (according to some authors), and Jaquin's heirs continued the business down to a late period, and had a considerable manufactory at Rue de Petit Lion, at Paris. It required from eighteen to twenty thousand fish (which were not more than four inches in length) to make a pound of the essence of pearl. These pearls were frequently taken for genuine ones. Mercure Galant (1686), tells us in that year of a poor marquis, who, being in love with a lady, gained her affections by presenting her with a string of artificial pearls. They cost him not more than three louis, while she, believing them to be genuine pearls, valued them at 2,000 francs. Jewelers and pawnbrokers were frequently deceived by them.

Diminutive Note Paper.

A Brighton stationer took a fancy for dressing his show-window with piles of writing paper, rising gradually from the largest to the smallest size in use; and to finish his pyramids off nicely, he cut cards to bring them to a point. Taking these cards for diminutive note paper, lady customers were continually wanting some of "that lovely little paper," and the stationer found it advantageous to cut paper to the desired pattern. As there was no space for addressing the notelets after they were folded, he, after much thought, invented the envelope, which he cut by the aid of metal plates made for the purpose. The sale increased so rapidly that he was unable to produce the envelopes fast enough, so he commissioned a dozen houses to make them for him, and thus set going an important branch of the manufacturing stationery trade.

Etching upon Glass.

This process was discovered by accident about the year 1670, by an artist named Schwanhard. We are told that some aqua-fortis having fallen by accident upon his spectacles, the glass was corroded by it. He thence learned to make a liquid by which he could etch writing and figures upon glass.

Lundyfoot's Luck.

The shop of a Dublin tobacconist by the name of Lundyfoot was destroyed by fire. While he was gazing dolefully into the smouldering ruins, he noticed that his poorer neighbors were gathering the snuff from the canisters. He tested the snuff for himself, and discovered that the fire had largely improved its pungency and aroma. It was a hint worth profiting by. He secured another shop, built a lot of ovens, subjected the snuff to a heating process, gave the brand a particular name, and in a few years became rich through an accident which he at first thought had completely ruined him.

Citric Acid.

A London chemist was the inventor of citric acid, and, having his own prices as long as the way of making the acid was a secret, realized a large fortune.

This chemist trusted nobody, but worked entirely alone. He thought his secret very safe. It was necessary, however, to have a chimney to his laboratory, and chimneys sometimes want sweeping.

A rival, disguising himself as a chimney-sweep, got into the sanctum. He had all his eyes about him, as the saying is, and, when the chimney was swept, knew how to make citric acid, and thus a monopoly was ended.

A Half-Starved Tramp.

Mr. Huntsman, who had devised some important processes in the manufacture of cast steel, built his factory, to be out of observation, in the middle of a bleak moor, and "No Admission for Strangers" was painted on the outer gate.

One terribly snowy night, however, a poor, belated, half-frozen traveler, who said he had lost his way on the moor, craved shelter, was charitably admitted, and was placed near the furnace, to be thawed. He watched what was done, and, being an expert, took it all away in his mind. Next morning he walked away, and took the secret with him. So perished Huntsman's El Dorado.

Fiddling to some Purpose.

Stourbridge, a smoky town in Worcestershire, England, has long been famous for its iron, glass and fire-brick works, and also for its nails, as long as they were produced by hand-work. For the Crystal Palace, of 1851, a Stourbridge "hand" received an order to make a thousand gold and a thousand silver and a thousand iron tacks—the whole three thousand not to weigh more than three grains.

Nailmaking by machinery, which was accomplished in Sweden before it was perfected in New England, was drawing the trade away from England, and a Stourbridge man, one Richard Foley, resolved to get into the heart of the mystery. The case is curious, as showing the danger that has always beset successful inventors, and has often converted the golden hills into mere rocks of talc, and reduced many a secret El Dorado into commonplace little workshops.

Foley, who was a very good violinist, took his fiddle, fiddled his way to the Swedish splitting mills, and then fiddled his way into them. As often happens with musicians, he presently conceived the idea that there was "a great deal of brains outside of his head."

At any rate, he could look and speak foolishly, but his fiddling was wonderfully good. No one suspected that "soft" fellow, who lounged about with an idiotic want of expression in his face, but was ready to play whenever asked to do so.

He ingratiated himself so thoroughly with the workmen that they gave him a shakedown inside the mill or factory. He quietly exercised his faculty of observation, saw all the processes of manipulation, and one day was missing. He carried home their secrets of work, and fame and fortune became his own.

German Silver.

German silver derives its name from the fact that its first introduction in the arts, to any great extent, was made in Germany. It is, however, nothing more than the white copper long known in China. It does not contain a particle of real silver, but is an alloy of copper, nickel and zinc.

Isabella Color.

The Archduke Albert married the infanta Isabella, daughter of Philip II., King of Spain, with whom he had the Low Countries in dowry. In the year 1602 he laid siege to Ostend, then in the possession of the heretics, and his pious princess, who attended him in that expedition, made a vow that she would not change her clothes until the city was taken. Contrary to expectation, it was three years before the place was reduced, in which time the linen of her highness had acquired a hue which, from the superstition of the princess and the times, was much admired, and was adopted by the court fashionables under the name of the "Isabella color." It is a whitish yellow, or soiled buff—better imagined than described.

Parisian Scarlet.

The tincture of cochineal alone yields a purple color, which may be changed to a most beautiful scarlet by adding a solution of tin in aqua-regia, or muriatic acid, a discovery which was made by accident. Cornelius Drebbel, who died in London in 1634, having placed in his window an extract of cochineal, made with boiling water, for the purpose of filling a thermometer, some aqua-regia dropped into it from a phial, broken by accident, which stood above it, and converted the purple dye into a most beautiful scarlet. After some conjectures and experiments, he discovered that the tin by which the window frame was divided into squares had been dissolved by the aqua-regia, and was the cause of the change. Giles Gobelin, a dyer at Paris, used it for dyeing cloth. It became known as Parisian scarlet dye, and rose into such great repute that the populace declared that Gobelin had acquired his art from the devil.

Tyrian Purple.

The purple dye of Tyre was discovered about fifteen centuries before the Christian era, and the art of using it did not become lost until the eleventh century after Christ. It was obtained from two genera of one species of shell-fish, the smaller of which was called buccinum, the larger purpura, and to both the common name mure was applied. The dye-stuff was procured by puncturing a vessel in the throat of the larger genus, and by pounding the smaller entire. The tints capable of being imparted by this material were various—representing numerous shades between purple and crimson, but the imperial tint was that resembling coagulated blood. That it was known to the Egyptians, in the time of Moses, is sufficiently obvious from the testimony of more than one Scriptural passage. Ultimately, in later ages, a restrictive policy of the eastern emperors caused the art to be practised by only a few individuals, and at last, about the commencement of the twelfth century, when Byzantium was suffering from attacks without and dissensions within, the secret of imparting the purple dye of Tyre was lost.

The rediscovery of Tyrian purple, as it occurred in England, was made by Mr. Cole, of Bristol. About the latter end of the year 1683, this gentleman heard from two ladies residing at Minehead, that a person living somewhere on the coast of Ireland supported himself by marking with a delicate crimson color the fine linen of ladies and gentlemen sent him for that purpose, which color was the product of a shell-fish. This recital at once brought to the recollection of Mr. Cole the tradition of Tyrian purple. He, without delay, went in search of the shell-fish, and, after trying various kinds without success, his efforts were at length successful. He found considerable quantities of the buccinum on the sea-coast of Somersetshire and the opposite coast of South Wales. The fish being found, the next difficulty was to extract the dye, which in its natural state is not purple but white, the purple being the result of exposure to the air. At length our acute investigator found the dye-stuff in a white vein lying transversely in a little furrow or cleft next to the head of the fish.

Odor of Patchouli.

The odor of patchouli was known in Europe before the material itself was introduced, in consequence of its use in cashmere to scent the shawls with a view of keeping out moths, which are averse to it; hence the genuine cashmere shawls were known by their scent, until the French found out the secret and imported the herb for use in the same way.