LETTER VI.
Dear Charles,—I still insist, with all due deference,
that human nature can do any thing, however base, wicked
or deceptious, to excite wonder, attract admiration, or get
money. Of this there is no more doubt with me than that
fire burns. Careful observers can recall innumerable instances
to verify my remark. Not only every city and large
town, but every village and hamlet, and even every nook of our
retired settlements, has been repeatedly the theatre of the
grossest impositions. Indeed, one folly succeeds another,
just as fashions change; for men love variety in humbugs as
they do in dress: and humbugs have their artists as any
other pet of the public. Hence among us veteran doubters,
trick is believed in preference, not only to impossibility, but
even improbability; and where folly is evident, we cannot
be induced even to examine pretension, unless to expose it.
For my part, Charles, I must say that the phrenological
and mesmeric tricks are vastly inferior, in amusement and
adroitness, to those of legerdemain. These latter have, in reality,
more the semblance of a supernatural character than
the others; and certainly they are more amazing.
Does your mesmerist triumphantly ask, “Sir, will you
not believe your very senses? Did you not see that entranced
person stop at the order and stand like a statue? And
did you not see the other leap up and dance a hornpipe the
instant his organ of saltation was touched? And did you not
hear that fellow squeal out when his ear was pinched at one
time and not at another, because the mesmerist so willed it—
and could you or any other man have endured such a pull
without crying out?”
I answer, “Oh yes! I must believe my senses to be
sure. But, Doctor Rubmybump, what do you say to that
pancake affair the other night? Did we not see the conjurer
with our own identical eyes break two dozen fresh-laid eggs
into a bran new beaver—wave over said hat his wand—hear
with our own ears fat fry and splutter—smell with our own
noses the essence of pancake that came steaming out of the
hat—and then did we not see Mr. Sleightohand turn up the
said new beaver and empty out four dozen greasy, smoking,
savory slap-jacks? And did he not hand round the delicacies,
and did we not actually eat them? Yes, doctor, and
we saw him hatch from a goose-egg, a full grown ring-dove,
all formed and feathered like a Minerva from the brain of a
Jupiter—and then we saw that orphan dove fly around the
room! Yes, sir, and we also saw the magician lick a red-hot
iron poker with his own veritable tongue! Now, Doctor
Rubmybump, why shall I not believe that the conjurer's
tricks are as much animal magnetism as yours? The only
reason, perhaps, is, on your principles, that my friend Mr.
Sleightohand said his were tricks—but you call yours inexplicable
mysteries, or natural developments, and so forth.
Had he averred that his wonders were in obedience to the
laws of an invisible, intangible, subtle fluid, moved and directed
by his will and motions, and had he called in testimony
to his own character and added several affidavits, his disciples,
sir, would have been more numerous than your own;
and how would Sleightohand have been confuted?”
To argument like this, the doctor replies, “Oh! aye!
—hem! yes, but that is altogether another thing—every
body must see that is all trickery—our senses were deceived.”
“Doubtless,” we answer; “and in the other
case, where we must know all is trickery, may not the
senses be deceived?”
Above is a heavy kite, but we will fly it with an ample
bob-tail:—in other words, Charles, we shall illustrate with
a long tale.
In an obscure region of the adjoining county is a settlement
remote from the polish and intelligence of Kaleidaville.
Here are congregated some forty or fifty families, who,
among other primitive habits, retain a reverence and fear of
witches. Often, while riding through the district, may be
seen a cracked horse-shoe nailed to the lintel of the door,
forbidding all entrance to the venerable dame on a broom-stick.
Here doubtless was it, that folks used to sit on
Bibles to escape enchantments; although even that care did
not always prevent the evil, as in the case of a respectable
neighbor who, on rising to depart home, after a visit to a
suspected house, found to his unutterable horror a large
quarto Bible on which he had seated himself by stealth,
strangely adhesive to his inexpressibles—his host's unlucky
urchin of a son having unseen maliciously placed on the
Bible a large plaster of shoemaker's wax!
Here, too, must have lived the poor fellow who, night
after night, for months, was saddled and bridled by an old
witch, and ridden, as her hobby, to a meeting of some sort,
and there fastened by a halter to a worm fence; till once, in
outrageous anger and vengeance, he attempted to eat off the
halter and kick down the fence: at which he so entirely succeeded
as to discover in the morning that he had chewed off
a piece of his bed-cord, and kicked out the tail-piece of his
bedstead!
Farming and churning, and blacksmithing and carpentering
are, with many other matters, all done according to
the waning and waxing moon. Radishes there, if planted
at one time, go down deep; and manure, if spread at another,
rises up and rests on the top of the grass! Worm fence itself
refuses to rest, if laid in the ascent of the moon! And a
friend of mine, a carpenter there, by way of experiment,
shingled opposite sides of a roof at opposite times, and within
three months the shingles on one side were immovable,
whilst on the other, they were easily blown away—the nails
driven at the unpropitious time all coming out! And my
friend, a very worthy and an intelligent man, believed this
as firmly as Miss Martineau believes in clairvoyance—and
certainly on as good evidence.
In such a community, unusual diseases are very naturally
attributed to witchcraft, and cures sought from spell and
incantation; and hence deceit, whether in counterfeiting
sickness, or in pretending to miraculous healing, easily gains
credit. Indeed the success of any imposture indicates, not
only a people's ignorance, but their wishes and tastes; nor
could trickery exist if folks had not a relish for it.
But “don't forget” the story. Well, in a comfortable
frame house, at the foot of a lonely mountain, lived not long
since a respectable family called Herwig. A daughter was
the only child. She was very pretty, but very self-willed;
and often, when restrained by her parents, would become
frantic with passion, and sometimes fall into a fit. On one
occasion, being refused permission to attend some merry-making
in the neighborhood, she became affected with violent
spasms, which continued for several days, and in despite of
the physician's skill. One morning this gentleman was
hastily summoned to the patient; and, on his arrival at Mr.
Herwig's, he was told by the terrified parents that the fits
had indeed suddenly ceased, but that their poor daughter
was bewitched!
Dear Charles, I had designed to make this a very long
letter: but the sequel and conclusion must be reserved for
my next.
