 Chapter 4 Part XI of Memoise of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds Volume I. Memoise of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds Volume I. Charles Mackay. The Alchemist. Part XI. Jean de Lille. In the year 1705 there was much talk in France of a blacksmith named de Lille, who had discovered the philosopher's stone, and who went about the country, turning lead, into gold. He was a native of Provence, from which his fame soon spread to the capital. His early life is involved in obscurity, but Lenglet du Fresnoi has industriously collected some particulars of his later career, which possess considerable interest. He was a man without any education, and had been servant, and his youth, to an alchemist, from whom he learned many of the tricks of the fraternity. The name of his master has never been discovered, but it is pretended that he rendered himself, in some manner, obnoxious to the government of Louis XIV, and was obliged, in consequence, to take refuge in Switzerland. De Lille accompanied him as far as Savoy, and there it is said, set upon him in a solitary mountain pass, and murdered and robbed him. He then disguised himself as a pilgrim, and returned to France, at a lonely inn, by the roadside, where he stopped for the night. He became acquainted with a woman, named Alois, and so sudden a passion was incandled betwixt them, that she consented to leave all, follow him, and share his good or evil fortune, wherever he went. They lived together for five or six years, in Provence. Without exciting any attention, apparently possessed of a decent independence, at last in 1706 it was given out, that he was the possessor of the Philosopher's Stone, and people, from far and near, came flocking to his residence, at the Château de la Pellue, at Cilenez, near Bar-Jean-Mont. To witness the wealth he could make, out of pumps and fire shovels. The following account of his operations, is given in a letter, addressed to M. de Serresy, the prior of Château de la Pellue, in the Diocese of Ries, in Provence, to the vicar of Saint-Jacques-du-Hut-Pas, at Paris, and dated the 18th of November 1706. I have something to relate to you, my dear cousin, which will be interesting to you and your friends. The Philosopher's Stone, which so many persons have looked upon as a chimera, is at last found. It is a man, named de Lille, of the parish of Cilenez, and residing within a quarter of a league of me, that has discovered this great secret. He turns lead into gold and iron into silver, by merely heating these metals red-hot, and pouring upon them, in that state, some oil and powder he is possessed of, so that it would not be impossible for any man to make a million a day, if he had sufficient of this wondrous mixture. Some of the pale gold, which he had made in this manner, he sent to the jewelers of Lyon, to have their opinion of its quality. He also sold twenty pounds weight of it, to a merchant of Dignia, named Texas. All the jewelers say they never saw such fine gold in their lives. He makes nails, part gold, part iron, and part silver. He promised to give me one of them, in a long conversation which I had with him the other day, by order of the Bishop of Cilenez, who saw his operations, with his own eyes, and detailed all the circumstances to me. The Baron and the Baroness de Rinewald showed me a linguit of gold made out of pewter, before their eyes by Monsieur de Lille. My brother-in-law, Sevour, who has wasted fifty years of his life in this great study, brought me the other day a nail which he had seen changed into gold by de Lille, and fully convinced me that all his previous experiments were founded on an erroneous principle. This excellent workman received, a short time ago, a very kind letter from the Superintendent of the Royal Household, which I read. He offered to use all his influence with the ministers to prevent any attempts upon his liberty, which has twice been attacked by the agents of government. It is believed that the oil he makes use of is gold or silver reduced to that state. He leaves it for a long time, exposed to the rays of the sun. He told me that it generally took him six months to make all his preparations. I told him that, apparently, the King wanted to see him. He replied that he could not exercise his art in every place, as a certain climate and temperature were absolutely necessary to his success. The truth is that this man appears to have no ambition. He only keeps two horses and two men-servants. Besides, he loves us liberty, has no politeness, and speaks very bad French, but his judgment seems to be solid. He was formerly no more than a blacksmith, but excelled in that trade, without having been taught it. All the great lords and seniors from far and near come to visit him, and pay such court to him that it seems more like idolatry than anything else. Happy would France be if this man would discover a secret to the King, to whom the superintendent has already sent some lingots, but the happiness is too great to be hoped for. For I fear that the workman and his secret will expire together. There is no doubt that this discovery will make a great noise in the kingdom, unless the character of the man, which I have just depicted to you, prevent it. At all events, posterity will hear of him. In another letter to the same person, dated the 27th of January, 1707, M. de Serresy says, My dear cousin, I spoke to you in my last letter of the famous alchemist of province, M. de Lille. A good deal of that was only hearsay, but now I am enabled to speak from my own experience. I have in my possession a nail, half iron and half silver, which I made myself. That great and admirable workman also bestowed a still greater privilege upon me. He allowed me to turn a piece of lead which I had brought with me into pure gold, by means of his wonderful oil and powder, all the country have their eyes upon this gentleman. Some deny loudly, others are incredulous, but those who have seen acknowledge the truth. I have read the passport that has been sent to him, from court, with orders that he should present himself at Paris early in the spring. He told me that he would go willingly, and that it was himself who fixed the spring for his departure, as he wanted to collect his materials and order that immediately on his introduction to the king, he might make an experiment worthy of his majesty by converting a large quantity of lead into the finest gold. I sincerely hope that he will not allow a secret to die with him, but that he will communicate it to the king. As I had the honour to dine with him on Thursday last, the twentieth of this month, being seated at his side, I told him in a whisper, that he could, if he liked, humble all the enemies of France. He did not deny it, but began to smile. In fact, this man is the miracle of art. Sometimes he employs the oil and powder mixed, sometimes the powder only, but in so small a quantity, that when the lingot which I made was rubbed all over it, it did not show at all. This soft-headed priest was by no means the only person in the neighbourhood who lost his wits in hopes of the boundless wealth held out by this clever imposter. Another priest named de Leon, a chanter in the Cathedral of Grenoble, writing on the thirtieth January 1707, says, quote, Monsieur Messinard, the curate of Montchere, has written to me, stating that there is a man, about thirty-five years of age, named de Leon, who turns lead and iron into gold and silver, and that this transmutation is so veritable and so true, that the golds misaffirmed that his gold and silver are the purest and finest they ever saw. For five years this man was looked upon as a madman or a cheat, but the public mind is now disabused with respect to him. He now resides with Monsieur de la Pellue at the château of the same name. Monsieur de la Pellue is not very easy in his circumstances, and wants money to portion his daughters, who have remained single till middle age, no man, being willing to take them without a dowry. Monsieur de Lille has promised to make them the richest girls in the province before he goes to court, having been sent for by the king. He is asked for a little time before his departure, in order that he may collect powder enough to make several quintals of gold, before the eyes of his majesty, to whom he intends to present them. The principal matter of his wonderful powder is composed of symbols, principally the herbs, Lunaria major, and minor. There is a good deal of the first planted by him in the gardens of La Pellue, and he gets the other from the mountains that stretch about two leagues from Montchere. What I tell you now is not a mere story invented for your diversion. Monsieur Messinard can bring forward many witnesses to its truth. Among others, the Bishop of Sénès, who saw these surprising operations, performed, and Monsieur de Seresie, whom you know well, de Lille transmutes his medals in public. He rubs the lead or iron with his powder, and puts it over burning charcoal. In a short time it changes color. The lead becomes yellow, and is found to be converted into excellent gold. The iron becomes white, and is found to be pure silver. De Lille is altogether an illiterate person. Monsieur de Saint-Auban endeavored to teach him to read and write, but he profited very little by his lessons. He is unpolite, fantastic, and dreamer, and acts by fits and starts. De Lille, it would appear, was afraid of venturing to Paris. He knew that his sleight of hand would be too narrowly watched in the royal presence, and upon some pretense or other he delayed the journey for more than two years. Desmarets, the Minister of Finance de Lille XIV, thinking the philosopher, dreaded for foul play, twice sent him a safe conduct under the King's seal, but de Lille still refused. Upon this Desmarets wrote to the Bishop of Sénès, for his real opinion, as to these famous transmutations. The following was the answer of that prelate. Copy of a report addressed to Monsieur Desmarets, Comptroller General of the Finances to His Majesty Louis XIV, by the Bishop of Sénès, dated March 1709. Sir, a twelve month ago, or a little more, I expressed you my joy at hearing of your elevation to the ministry. I have now the honour to write you my opinion of the Sia de Lille, who has been working at the transmutation of medals in my diocese. I have, during the last two years, spoken of him, several times, to the Count de Pontchartrain, because he asked me. But I have not written to you, sir, or to Monsieur Deschamiards, because you neither of you requested my opinion upon the subject. Now, however, that you have given me to understand that you wish to know my sentiments on the matter, I will unfold myself to you in all sincerity, for the interests of the King and the glory of your ministry. There are two things about the Sia de Lille which, in my opinion, should be examined without prejudice. The one relates to his secret, the other to his person. That is to say, whether his transmutations are real, and whether his conduct has been regular. In regards to the secret of the Philosopher's Stone, I deemed it impossible for a long time, and for more than three years I was more mistrustful of the pretensions of Sia de Lille than any other person. During this period, I have fronted him no countenance. I even aided a person who was highly recommended to me by an influential family of this province to prosecute de Lille. For some offense, or other, which it was alleged, he had committed, but this person, in his anger against him, having told me that he had himself been several times the bearer of gold and silver to the goldsmiths of Nice, Axe, and Avignon, which had been transmuted by de Lille from lead and iron, I began to waver a little in my opinions respecting him. I afterwards met de Lille at the house of one of his friends, to please me, the family asked de Lille to operate before me, to which he immediately consented. I offered him some iron nails, which he changed into silver in the chimney-place, before six or seven credible witnesses. I took the nails thus transmuted, and sent them, by my all-owner, to Imbert, the jeweler of Axe, who, having subjected them to the necessary trial, returned them to me, saying that they were very good silver. Still, however, I was not quite satisfied. Monsieur de Pontchartre, having hinted to me, two years previously, that I should do a thing agreeable to his majesty, if I examined into this business of de Lille, I resolved to do so now. I therefore summoned the alchemist to come to me at Castellan. He came, and I had him escorted by eight or ten vigilant men, to whom I had given notice to watch his hand strictly. Before all of us he changed two pieces of lead into gold and silver. I sent them both to Monsieur de Pontchartre, and he afterwards informed me, by a letter, now lying before me, that he has shown them to the most experienced goldsmiths of Paris, who unanimously pronounced them to be gold and silver of the very purest quality, and without alloy. My former bad opinion of de Lille was now indeed shaken. It was much more so when he performed transmutation five or six times before me at Sénès, and made me perform it myself, before him, without his putting his hand to any thing. You have seen, sir, the letter of my nephew, the parade-brard, of the oratoire at Paris, on the experiment that he performed at Castellan, and the truth of which I hereby attest. Another nephew of mine, the Sier-Borgé, who was here three weeks ago, performed the same experiment in my presence, and will detail all the circumstances to you, personally, at Paris. A hundred persons in my diocese have been witnesses of these things. I confess to you, sir, that, after the testimony of so many spectators and so many goldsmiths, and after the repeatedly successful experiments that I saw performed, all my prejudices vanished. My reason was convinced by my eyes, and the phantoms of impossibility which I had conjured up were dissipated by the work of my own hands. It now only remains for me to speak to you on the subject of his person and conduct. Three suspicions have been excited against him, the first that he was implicated in some criminal proceedings at Cisteron, and that he falsified the coin of the realm, the second that the king sent him two safe conducts without effect, and the third that he still delays going to court to operate before the king. You may see, sir, that I do not hide or avoid anything, as regards to business at Cisteron, the Sir de Lille, has repeatedly assured me that there was nothing against him which could reasonably draw him within the pale of justice, and that he had never carried on any calling injurious to the king's service. It was true that, six or seven years ago, he had been to Cisteron to gather herbs necessary for his powder, and that he had lodged at the house of one Poulouse, whom he thought an honest man. Poulouse was accused of clipping Louis Dior's, and, as he had lodged with him, he was suspected of being his accomplice. This mere suspicion, without any proof whatever, had caused him to be condemned for contumacy, a common case enough with judges who always proceed with much rigor against those who are absent. During my own sojourn at Aix, it was well known that a man named André Elias had spread about reports injurious to the character of de Lille, because he hoped thereby to avoid paying him a sum of forty Louis that he owed him. But permit me, sir, to go further, and to add that, even if there were well-founded suspicions against de Lille, we should look with some little indulgence on the fault of a man who possesses a secret so useful to the state. As regards to two safe conducts sent him by the king, I think I can answer certainly that it was through no fault of his that he paid so little attention to them. His year, strictly speaking, consists only of the four summer months, and when, by any means, he is prevented from making the proper use of them, he loses a whole year. Thus the first safe conduct became useless by the eruption of the Duke of Savoy in 1707, and the second had hardly been obtained at the end of June 1708, when the said de Lille was insulted by a party of armed men, pretending to act under the authority of the Count de Gringon, to whom he wrote several letters of complaint without receiving any answer or promise that his safety would be attended to. What I have now told you, sir, removes the third objection, and is the reason why, at the present time, he cannot go to Paris to the king, in fulfilment of his promises made two years ago. Two or even three summers have been lost to him, owing to the continual inequity he has laboured under. He has, in consequence, been unable to work, and has not collected a sufficient quantity of his oil and powder, or brought what he has got to the necessary degree of perfection. For this reason, also, he could not give the sir de Bourget the portion he promised him for your inspection. If the other day he changed some lead into gold, with a few grains of his powder, they were assuredly all he had, for he told me that such was the fact long before he knew my nephew was coming. Even if he had preserved the small quantity to operate before the king, I am sure that, on second thoughts, he would never have adventured with so little, because the slightest obstacles in the metal, there being too hard or too soft, which is only discovered in operating, would have caused him to be looked upon as an imposter. If in case his first powder had proved ineffectual, he had not been possessed of more to renew the experiment and surmount the difficulty. Permit me, sir, in conclusion, to repeat that such an artist as this should not be driven to the last extremity, nor force to seek an asylum offered to him in other countries, but which he has despised as much from his own inclinations, as from the advice I have given him. You risk nothing in giving him a little time, and in hurrying him you may lose a great deal. The genuineness of his gold can no longer be doubted, after the testimony of so many jewelers of aches, Lyon and Paris, in its favour. As it is not his fault that the previous safe conduct sent to him have been of no service, it will be necessary to send him another, for the success of which I will be answerable. If you will confide the matter to me, and trust to my zeal for the service of his majesty, to whom I pray you to communicate this letter, that I may be spared the just reproaches he might one day heap upon me, if he remained ignorant of the facts I have now written to you. Assure him, if you please, that if you send me such a safe conduct, I will oblige the Sir de Lille to depose me with such precious pledges of his fidelity, as shall enable me to be responsible myself to the king. These are my sentiments, and I submit them to you with your superior knowledge, and have the honour to remain, with much respect, etc. John Bishop of Sénès To Monsieur de Maritz, Minister of State, and Comptroller-General of the Finances at Paris, that de Lille was no ordinary impostor, but a man of consummate cunning and address, is very evident from this letter. The bishop was fairly taken in by his clever, ledger domain, and when once his first distrust was conquered, appeared as anxious to deceive himself, as even de Lille could have wished. His faith was so abundant, that he made the case of his protégé his own, and would not suffer the breath of suspicion to be directed against him. Both Louis and his Minister appear to have been dazzled by the brilliant hopes he had excited. And a third pass, or safe conduct, was immediately sent to the alchemist, with a command from the king that he should forthwith present himself at Versailles, and make public trial of his oil and powder. But this did not suit the plans of de Lille. In the provinces he was regarded as a man of no small importance. The servile flattery that awaited him wherever he went was so grateful to his mind that he could not willingly relinquish it, and run upon certain detection at the court of the monarch. Upon one pretext or another he delayed his journey, not withstanding the earnest solicitations of his good friend the bishop. The latter had given his word to the Minister, and pledged his honor that he would induce de Lille to go, and he began to be alarmed when he found, and he could not subdue the obstinacy of that individual. For more than two years he continued to remonstrate with him, and was always met by some excuse that there was not sufficient powder, or that it had not been long enough, exposed to the rays of the sun. At last his patience was exhausted, and fearful that he might suffer in the royal estimation by longer delay, he wrote the king for a de Cachet, in virtue of which the alchemist was seized at the castle of La Palou, in the month of June 1711, and carried off to be imprisoned in the Bastille. The gendarmes were aware that their prisoner was supposed to be the lucky possessor of the philosopher Stone, and on the road they conspired to rob and murder him. One of them pretended to be touched with pity for the misfortunes of the philosopher, and offered to give him an opportunity of escape, whenever he could divert the attention of his companions. De Lille was profuse in his thanks, little dreaming of the snare that was laid for him. His treacherous friend gave notice of the success of the stratagem so far, and it was agreed that De Lille should be allowed to struggle with and overthrow one of them while the rest were at some distance. They were then to pursue him and shoot him through the heart, and after robbing the corpse of the philosopher Stone, conveyed to Paris on a cart, and tell Monsieur Des Marets that the prisoner had attempted to escape, and would have succeeded if they had not fired after him, and shot him through the body. At a convenient place the scheme was executed on a given signal from the friendly gendarme, De Lille fled, while another gendarme took aim and shot him through the thigh. Some peasants arriving at the instant, they were prevented from killing him as they intended, and he was transported to Paris, maimed and bleeding. He was thrown into a dungeon in the Bastille, and obstinately tore away the bandages which the surgeons applied to his wound. He never afterwards rose from his bed. The bishop of Sénès visited him in prison, and promised him his liberty if he would transmute a certain quantity of lead into gold before the king. The unhappy man had no longer the means of carrying on the deception. He had no gold, and no double-bottom crucible, or hollow wand to conceal it in, even if he had. He would not, however, confess that he was an imposter, but merely said that he did not know how to make the powder of projection, but had received a quantity of it from an Italian philosopher, and had used it all in his various transmutations in province. He lingered for seven or eight months in the Bastille, and died from the effects of his wound in the forty-first year of his age. Albert Alois This pretender to the philosopher's stone was the son, by a former husband, of the woman Alois, with whom Délil became acquainted at the commencement of his career, in the cabaret by the roadside, and whom he afterwards married. Délil performed the part of a father towards him, and thought he could show no stronger proof of his regard than by giving him the necessary instructions to carry on the deception which had raised himself to such a pitch of greatness. The young Elias was an apse scholar, and soon mastered all the jargon of the alchemist. He discoursed learnedly upon projections, cementations, sublimations, the elixir of life, and the universal alchohest. And on the death of Délil gave out that the secret of that great adept had been communicated to him, and to him only his mother aided in the fraud, with the hope that they might both fasten themselves in true alchemic old-fashioned, upon some rich dupe who had entertained them magnificently, while the operation was in progress. The fate of Délil was no inducement for them to stop in France. The Provençals, it is true, entertained as high an opinion as ever of his skill, and were well inclined to believe the tales of the young adept on whom his mantle had fallen, but the dungeons of the Bastille were yawning for their prey, and Alois and his mother de-camped with all convenient expedition. They traveled about the continent for several years, sponging upon credulous rich men, and now and then performing successful transmutations by the aid of double-bottomed crucibles and the like. In the year 1726, Alois, without his mother, who appears to have died in the interval, was at Vienna, where he introduced himself to the dupe de Richelieu. At that time, Ambassador from the Court of France, he completely deceived this nobleman, and turned lead into gold, apparently, on several occasions, and even made the Ambassador himself turn an iron nail into a silver one. The dupe afterwards boasted to Lenglet du Fresnoi of his achievement as an alchemist, and regretted that he had not been able to discover the secret of the precious powder by which he performed them. Alois soon found that, although he might make a dupe of the dupe de Richelieu, he could not get any money from him. On the contrary, the dupe expected all his pokers and fire shovels to be made of silver, and all his pewter utensils gold, and thought the honour of his acquaintance was reward sufficient for a roturier who could not want wealth since he possessed so invaluable a secret. Alois, seeing that so much was expected of him, bade a do to his Excellency, and proceeded to Bohemia, accompanied by a pupil, and by a young girl who had fallen in love with him in Vienna. Some noblemen in Bohemia received him kindly, and entertained him at their houses for months at a time. It was his usual practice to pretend that he possessed only a few grains of his powder, with which he would operate in any house re-intended to fix his quarters for the season. He would make the proprietor the present of a piece of gold thus transmuted, and promise him millions, if he could only be provided with the leisure to gather his Lunaria major and minor on their mountaintops, and board lodging and loose cash for himself, his wife, and his pupil, in the interval. He exhausted in this manner the patience of some dozen people, when thinking that there was less danger for him in France, after the young king Louis XV, then under his old and morose predecessor, he returned to province. On his arrival at Aix, he presented himself before Monsieur Le Bret, the president of the province, a gentleman who was much attached to the pursuits of alchemy, and had great hopes of being himself able to find the philosopher's stone. Le Bret, contrary to his expectation, received him very coolly in consequence of some rumours that were spread abroad, respecting him, and told him to call upon him on the morrow. Alois did not like the tone of his voice, or the expression of the eye of the learned president, as that functionary looked down upon him, suspecting that all was not right. He left Aix, secretly the same evening, and proceeded to Marseille, but the police were on the watch for him, and he had not been out there four and twenty hours before he was arrested on a charge of coining and thrown into prison. As the proofs against him were too convincing, to leave him much hope of an acquittal, he planned an escape from Durant's. It so happened that the goaller, had a pretty daughter, and Alois soon discovered that she was under-hearted. He endeavored to gain her in his favour. Anne succeeded. The damsel, unaware that he was a married man, conceived and encouraged a passion for him, and generously provided him with the means of escape. After he had been nearly a year in prison, he succeeded in getting free, leaving the poor girl behind to learn that he was already married. And to lament in solitude, that she had given her heart to an ungrateful vagabond. When he left Marseille, he had not a shoe to his foot, or a decent garment to his back, but was provided with some money and clothes by his wife in a neighbouring town. They then found their way to Brussels, and by dint of excessive impudence brought themselves into notice. He took a house, fitted up a splendid laboratory, and gave out that he knew the secret of transmutation. And vain did Messieurs Purcell, the brother-in-law of Lenglett de Fresnois, who resided in that city, expose his pretensions, and hold him up to contempt as an ignorant imposter. The world believed him not. They took the alchemist at his word, and besieged his doors to see and wonder, at the clever ledger domain by which he turned iron nails into gold and silver. A rich greffier paid him a large sum of money that he might be instructed in the art. And Alois gave him several lessons on the most common principles of chemistry. The greffier studied hard for a twelve-month, and then discovered that his master was a quack. He demanded his money back again. But Alois was not inclined to give it to him. And the affair was brought before the civil tribunal of the province. In the meantime, however, the greffier died suddenly, poisoned according to popular rumour, by his debtor, to avoid repayment. So great an outcry arose in the city that Alois, who may have been innocent of the crime, was nevertheless afraid to remain and brave it. He withdrew secretly in the night, and retired to Paris. Here all trace of him is lost. He was never heard of again. But Lenglet du Fresnoi conjectures that he ended his days in some obscured dungeon, into which he was cast for coining or other malpractices. CHAPTER XIV POPULAR DELUSIONS AND THE MADNESS OF CROWDS VOLUME I by Charles McKay, the Alchemist Part XII THE COUNT DE Sainte Germain This adventurer was of a higher grade than the last, and played a distinguished part at the court of Louis XV. He pretended to have discovered the elixir of life, by means of which he could make anyone live for centuries, and allowed it to be believed that his own age was upwards of two thousand years. He entertained many of the opinions of the Rosicrucians, boasted of his intercourse with sylphs and salamanders, and of his power of drawing diamonds from the earth, and pearls from the sea, by the force of his incantations. He did not lay claim to the merit of having discovered the philosopher's stone, but devoted so much of his time to the operations of alchemy, that it was very generally believed that if such a thing as the philosopher's stone had ever existed, or could be called into existence, he was the man to succeed in finding it. It has never been discovered what was his real name, or in what country he was born. Some believe, from the Jewish cast of his handsome countenance, that he was the quote wandering Jew. Others asserted that he was the issue of an Arabian princess, and that his father was a salamander, while others more reasonable, affirmed him to be the son of a Portuguese Jew, established at Bordeaux. He first carried on his imposture in Germany, where he made considerable sums by selling an elixir to arrest the progress of old age. The Marichel de Belisle purchased a dose of it, and was so captivated with the wit, learning, and good manners of the charlatan, and so convinced of the justice of his most preposterous pretensions, that he induced him to fix his residence in Paris. Under the Marshal's patronage he first appeared in the gay circles of that capital. One was delighted with the mysterious stranger, who, at this period of his life, appears to have been about seventy years of age, but did not look more than forty-five. His easy assurance imposed upon most people. His reading was extensive, and his memory extraordinarily tenacious of the slightest circumstances. His pretension to have lived for so many centuries naturally exposed him to some puzzling questions as to the appearance, life, and conversation of the great men of former days. But he was never at a loss for an answer. Many who questioned him for this purpose of scoffing at him, refrained in perplexity, quite bewildered by his presence of mind, his ready replies, and his astonishing accuracy on every point mentioned in history. To increase the mystery by which he was surrounded, he permitted no person to know how he lived. He dressed in a style of the greatest magnificence, sported valuable diamonds at his hat, and on his fingers, in his shoe-buckles, and sometimes made the most costly presence to the ladies of the court. It was suspected by many that he was a spy in the pay of the English ministry. But there was never a tittle of evidence to support the charge. The king looked upon him with marked favour, was often closeted with him for hours together, and would not suffer anybody to speak disparagingly of him. Voltaire constantly turned him into ridicule, and in one of his letters to the king of Prussia, mentions him as that Un Comte Pour Hier, and states that he pretended to have dined with the holy fathers at the Council of Trent. In the memoirs of Madame du Husset, Chamberwoman, to Madame du Pompadour, there are some amusing anecdotes of this personage. Very soon after his arrival in Paris, he had the entree of her dressing room. A favour only granted to the most powerful lords at the court of her royal lover. Madame was fond of conversing with him, and in her presence he thought fit to lower his pretensions very considerably. But he often allowed her to believe that he had lived two or three hundred years at least. One day, says Madame du Husset, Madame said to him, In my presence, what was the personal appearance of Francis I? He was a king, I should have liked. He was indeed very captivating, replied Saint Germain, and he proceeded to describe his face in person as that of a man who he had accurately observed. It is a pity he was too ardent. I could have given him some good advice, which would have saved him from all his misfortunes. But he would not have followed it, for it seems as if a fatality attended princes, forcing them to shut their ears to the wisest council. Was his court very brilliant? inquired Madame du Pompadour. Very, replied the Count. But those of his grandsons surpassed it. In the time of Mary Stuart and Margaret of Valois, it was a kind of land of enchantment, a temple sacred to pleasures of every kind. Madame said, laughing, You seem to have seen all of this. I have an excellent memory, said he, and have read the history of France with great care. I sometimes amuse myself, not by making, but by letting it be believed that I lived in old times. But you do not tell us your aides, said Madame du Pompadour, to him on another occasion, and yet you pretend you are very old, the Countess de Gégis, who was, I believe, ambassador to Vienna some fifty years ago, says she saw you there exactly the same as you now appear. It is true, Madame, replied Saint Germain. I knew Madame de Gégis many years ago. But according to her account, you must be more than a hundred years old. That is not impossible, he said, laughing, but it is much more possible that the good lady is in her dotage. You gave her an elixir, surprising for the effects it produced, for she says that, during a length of time, she only appeared to be eighty-four, the age at which she took it. Why don't you give it to the King? Oh, Madame, he explained, the Physicians would have me broken on the wheel, were I to think of drugging his Majesty. When the world begins to believe extraordinary things of an individual, there is no telling where its extravagance will stop. People, when once they have taken the start, vie with each other, who shall believe most. At this period all Paris resounded with the wonderful adventures of Count de Saint Germain, and a company of waggish young men tried the following experiment upon its credulity. A clever mimic, who, on account of the amusement he afforded, was admitted into good society, was taken by them, dressed as the Countess de Saint Germain, into several houses, in the Rue du Malais. He imitated the Count's peculiarities admirably, and found his auditors open mouth to believe any absurdity he chose to utter. No fiction was too monstrous for their all-devouring credulity. He spoke of the saviour of the world in terms of the greatest familiarity. Said he had supped with him at the marriage, in Canaan of Galilee, where the water was miraculously turned into wine. In fact, he said, he was an intimate friend of his, and had often warned him to be less romantic and imprudent, or he would finish his career miserably. This infamous blasphemy, strange to say, found believers, and error, three days had elapsed. It was currently reported that Saint Germain was born soon after the Deluge, and that he would never die. Saint Germain himself was too much a man of the world to assert any thing so monstrous. But he took no pains to contradict the story. In all his conversations with persons of rank and education, he advanced his claims modestly, and as if by mere inadvertency, and seldom pretended to a longitivity beyond three hundred years, except when he found he was in company with persons who would believe anything. He often spoke of Henry VIII, as if he had known him intimately, and of Emperor Charles V, as if that monarch had delighted his society. He would describe conversations which took place with such an apparent truthfulness, and be so exceedingly minute, in particular as to the dress and appearance of the individuals, and even the weather at the time, and the furniture of the room, that three persons out of four were generally inclined to credit him. He had constant applications from rich old women for an elixir to make them young again. And it would appear gained large sums in this manner. To those whom he was pleased to call his friends, he said that his mode of living and plan of diet were far superior to any elixir, and that any body might obtain at patriarchal age by refraining from drinking at meals, and very sparingly at other times. The baron de Glycan followed the system, and took great quantities of senile leaves, expecting to live for two hundred years. He died, however, at seventy-three. The Duchess de Choisselle was desirous of following the same system, but the duke her husband, in much wrath, forbade her to follow any system prescribed by a man who had so equivocal a reputation as Monsieur de Saint-Germain. Madame du Hausset says she saw Saint-Germain and conversed with him several times. He appeared to her to be about fifty years of age. Was of middle size and had fine expressive features. His dress was always simple, but displayed much taste. He usually wore diamond rings of great value, and his watch and snuff-box were ornamented with a profusion of precious stones. One day at Madame de Pompadour's apartments, where the principal courtiers were assembled, Saint-Germain made his appearance in diamond knee and shoe-buckles of so fine a water that Madame said she did not think the king had any equal to them. He was entreated to pass into the anti-champer and undo them, which he did, and brought them to Madame for closer inspection. The Degontant, who was present, said their value could not be less than two hundred thousand livres, or upwards of eight thousand pounds sterling. The Baron de Glycan, in his memoirs, relates that the Count one day showed him so many diamonds that he thought he saw before him all the treasures of Aladdin's lamp, and adds that he had, by great experience and precious stones, and was convinced that all those possessed by the Count were genuine. On another occasion Saint-Germain showed Madame de Pompadour a small box containing topazes, emeralds, and diamonds, worth half a million livres. He affected to size all this wealth, to make the world more easily believed that he could, like the Rosa Crucians, draw precious stones out of the earth by the magic of his song. He gave away a great number of these jewels to the ladies of the court, and Madame de Pompadour was so charmed with his generosity, that she gave him a richly enameled snuff-box as a token of her regard. On the lid of which was beautifully painted a portrait of Socrates, or some other Greek sage, to whom she compared him. He was not only lavish to the mistresses, but to the maids. Madame du Hasat says, Quote, The Count came to see Madame de Pompadour, who is very ill and lay on the sofa. She showed her diamonds, enough to furnish a king's treasury. Madame sent for me to see all those beautiful things. I looked at them with an air of the utmost astonishment, but I made signs to her that I thought them all false. The Count felt for something in a pocket-book, and about twice as large as a spectacle case, and at length drew out three little paper packets, which he unfolded, and exhibited as a per ruby. He threw on the table, with contemptuous air, and a little cross of green and white stones. I looked at it, and said it was not to be despised. I then put it on, and admired it greatly. The Count begged me to accept it. I refuse. He urged me to take it, and at length he pressed so warmly that Madame, seeing it could not be worth more than a thousand libra, made me a sign to accept it. I took the cross, much pleased with the Count's politeness." How the adventurer obtained his wealth remains a secret. He could not have made it all by the sale of Elixir Vite in Germany, though no doubt some portion of it was derived from that source. Voltaire positively says he was in the pay of foreign governments, and in his letter to the King of Prussia, dated 5 April 1758, says that he was initiated in all the secrets of Troisel, Kaunitz, and Pitt. Of what use he could be to any of those ministers to Troisel, especially, is a mystery of mysteries. There appears no doubt that he possessed the secret of removing spots from diamonds, and in all probability he gained considerable sums by buying at inferior prices, such as had flaws in them, and afterward disposing of them at a profit of cent per cent. Some do haset relates the following anecdote of this particular. The King, she says she, ordered a middling-sized diamond, which had a flaw in it, to be brought to him. After having it weighed, His Majesty said to the Count, The value of this diamond, as it is, with the flaw in it, is six-thousand libra, without the flaw, it will be worth at least ten-thousand. Will you undertake to make me a gainer of four-thousand libra? Saint Germain examined it, very attentively, and said, It is possible, may be done, I will bring it you again in a month. At that time it was wrapped in a cloth of amyanthus, which he took off. The King had it weighed immediately and found it very little diminished. His Majesty then sent it to his jeweler, by Monsieur de Gontant, without telling him of anything that had passed. The jeweler gave nine-thousand six-hundred libra, or it, the King, however, sent for the diamond back again, and said that he would keep it as a curiosity. He could not overcome his surprise, and said that Monsieur de Saint Germain must be worth millions, especially if he possessed a secret of making large diamonds out of small ones. The Count neither said that he could or could not, but positively asserted that he knew how to make pearls grow, and to give them the finest water. The King paid him great attention, and so did Madame du Pompadour. Monsieur de Cuesnoy once said that Saint Germain was a quack, but the King reprimanded him. In fact, his Majesty appears infatuated by him, and sometimes talks of him as if his descendant were illustrious. Saint Germain had a most amusing vagabond for a servant, to whom he would often appeal for corroboration, when relating some wonderful event that had happened centuries before. The fellow, who was not without ability, generally corroborated him in a most satisfactory manner. Upon one occasion, his master was telling a party of ladies and gentlemen at dinner, some conversation he had had in Palestine, with Richard I of England, whom he described as a very particular friend of his. Signs of astonishment and incredulity were visible on the faces of the company, upon which Saint Germain very coolly turned to his servant, who stood behind his chair, and asked him if he had not spoken the truth. I really cannot say, replied the man, without moving a muscle, you forget, sir. I have only been five hundred years in your service. Ah! True! Said his master, I remember now. It was a little before your time. Occasionally, one with men whom he could not so easily dupe. He gave utterance to the contempt with which he could scarcely avoid regarding such gaping credulity. These fools of Parisians, said he to the Baron de Glycan, believe me to be more than five hundred years old, and, since they really will have it so, I confirm them in their idea, not but that I really am much older than I appear. Many other stories are related of this strange imposter. But enough have been quoted to show his character and pretensions. It appears that he endeavored to find the philosopher's stone, but never boasted of possessing it. The Prince of Hesse-Cassel, whom he had known years before in Germany, wrote urgent letters to him, and treating him to quit Paris, and to reside with him. Saint Germain, at last, consented. Nothing further is known of his career. There were no gossiping memoir-writers at the court of Hesse-Cassel to chronicle his sayings and doings. He died at Selzwig under the roof of his friend the Prince, in the year 1784. End of Chapter 4 Part 12 Read by Scott Beattie. Chapter 4 Part 13 of Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds Volume 1 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Reading by Morgan Scorpion. Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds Volume 1 by Charles Mackay. The Alchemists. Part 13. Calliostro. This famous charlatan, the friend and successor of Saint Germain, and a career still more extraordinary. He was the arch-quack of his age, the last of the great pretenders to the philosopher's stone and the water of life, and during his brief season of prosperity, one of the most conspicuous characters of Europe. His real name was Joseph Balsamo. He was born at Palermo, about the year 1743, of humble parentage. He had the misfortune to lose his father during his infancy, and his education was left in consequence to some relatives of his mother, the latter being too poor to afford him any instruction beyond mere reading and writing. He was sent in his fifteenth year, to a monastery, to be taught the elements of chemistry and physics, but his temper was so impetuous, his indolence so invincible, and his vicious habit so deeply rooted that he made no progress. After remaining some years he left it with the character of an uninformed and dissipated young man, with good natural talents but a bad disposition. When he became of age he abandoned himself to a life of riot and debauchery, and ended himself, in fact, into that celebrated fraternity known in France and Italy as the Knights of Industry, and in England as the Swellmob. He was far from being an idle or unwilling member of the corps. The first way in which he distinguished himself was by forging orders of admission to the theatres. He afterwards robbed his uncle and counterfeited a will. For acts like these he paid frequent compulsory visits to the prisons of Palermo. Somehow or other he acquired the character of a sorcerer, of a man who had failed in discovering the secrets of alchemy, and his soul to the devil for the gold which he was not able to make by means of transmutation. He took no pains to disabuse the popular mind on this particular, but rather encouraged the belief than otherwise. He at last made use of it to cheat a silversmith named Murano of about sixty ounces of gold, and was in consequence obliged to leave Palermo. He persuaded this man that he could show him a treasure hidden in a cave, for which service he was to receive the sixty ounces of gold, while the silversmith was to have all the treasure for the mere trouble of digging it up. They went together at midnight to an excavation in the vicinity of Palermo, where Balsamo drew a magic circle and invoked the devil to show his treasures. Suddenly there appeared half a dozen fellows, the accomplices of the swindler, dressed to represent devils with horns on their heads, close to their fingers, and vomiting, apparently, red and blue flame. They were armed with pitchforks with which they belaboured Palermo till he was almost dead, and robbed him of his sixty ounces of gold, and all the valuables he carried about his person. They then made off, accompanied by Balsamo, leaving the unlucky silversmith to recover or die at his leisure. Nature chose the former course, and soon after daylight he was restored to his senses, smarting in body from his blows, and in spirit for the deception of which he had been the victim. His first impulse was to denounce Balsamo to the magistrates of the town, but on further reflection he was afraid of the ridicule that a full exposure of all the circumstances would draw upon him. He therefore took the truly Italian resolution of being revenged on Balsamo by murdering him at the first convenient opportunity. Having given utterance to this threat in the hearing of a friend of Balsamo, it was reported to the latter, who immediately packed up his valuables and quitted Europe. He chose Medina in Arabia for his future dwelling-place, and there became acquainted with a Greek named Altotus, a man exceedingly well versed in all the languages of the East, and an indefatigable student of alchemy. He possessed an invaluable collection of Arabian manuscripts on his favourite science, and studied them with such unremitting industry that he found he had not sufficient time to attend to his crucibles and furnaces without neglecting his books. He was looking about when assistant, when Balsamo opportunally presented himself, and made so favourable an impression that he was at once engaged in that capacity. But the relation of master and servant did not long subsist between them. Balsamo was too ambitious and too clever to play a secondary part, and within fifteen days of their first acquaintance they were bound together as friends and partners. Altotus, in the course of a long life devoted to alchemy, had stumbled upon some valuable discoveries in chemistry, one of which was an ingredient for improving the manufacture of flax, and imparting to goods of that material a gloss and softness almost equal to silk. Balsamo gave him the good advice to leave the philosopher's stone for the present undiscovered and make gold out of their flax. The advice was taken, and they proceeded together to Alexandria to trade with a large stock of that article. They stayed forty days in Alexandria and gained considerable sum by their venture. They afterwards visited other cities in Egypt and were equally successful. They also visited Turkey, where they sold drugs and amulets. On their return to Europe they were driven by stress of weather into Malta, and were hospitably received by Pinto, the grandmaster of the knights, and a famous alchemist. They worked in his laboratory for some months, and tried hard to change a pewter platter into a silver one. Balsamo, having less faith in his companions, was soon wearied, and obtaining from his host many letters of introduction to Roman Naples. He left him in Altotas to find the philosopher's stone and transmute the pewter platter without him. He had long since dropped the name of Balsamo on account of the many ugly associations that clung to it, and during his travels he had assumed at least half a score others with titles annexed to them. He called himself sometimes the Chevalier d'Officio, the Marquis de Melissa, the Baron de Belmontet, de Pellegrini, de Anna, de Phoenix, de Hara, but most commonly the Count de Caliostro. Under the latter title he entered Rome, and never afterwards changed it. In this city he gave himself out as the restorer of the Rosicrucian philosophy, said he could transmute all metals into gold, that he could render himself invisible, cure all diseases, and administer an elixir against old age and decay. His letters from the grandmaster Pinto procured him an introduction into the best families. He made money rapidly by the sale of his elixir vitae, and like other quacks performed many remarkable cures by inspiring his patients with the most complete faith and reliance upon his powers, an advantage which the most impudent charlatans often possess over the regular practitioner. While thus in a fair way of making him his fortune he became acquainted with the beautiful Lorenza Feliciana, a young lady of noble birth, but without fortune. Caliostro soon discovered that she possessed accomplishments that were invaluable. Besides her ravishing beauty, she had the readiest wit, the most engaging manners, the most fertile imagination, and the least principle of any of the maidens of Rome. She was just the wife of Caliostro who proposed himself to her and was accepted. After their marriage he instructed his fellow Lorenza in all the secrets of his calling, taught her pretty lips to invoke angels and genii and sylphs, salamanders and undines, and, when required, devils and evil spirits. Lorenza was an apt scholar, and she soon learned all the jargon of the alchemists and all the spells of the enchanters, and thus accomplished the hopeful pair set out on their travels to levy contributions on the superstitious and the credulous. They first went to Sleswig on a visit to the Commdus Saint-Germain, their great predecessor in the art of making dupes, and were received by him in the most magnificent manner. They no doubt fortified their minds for the career they had chosen by the sage discourse of that worshipful gentleman, for immediately after they left him they began their operations. They travelled for three or four years in Russia, Poland, and Germany, transmuting metals, telling fortunes, raising spirits, and selling the elixir vitae wherever they went, but there is no record of their doings from whence to draw a more particular detail. It was not until they made their appearance in England in 1776 that the names of the Count and Countess de Caleostro began to acquire a European reputation. They arrived in London in the July of that year, possessed of property, in plate, jewels, and speci to the amount of about three thousand pounds. They hired apartments in Whitcomb Street, and lived for some months quietly. In the same house there lodged a Portuguese woman, named Blavari, who being in necessitous circumstances was engaged by the Countess' interpreter. She was constantly admitted into his laboratory, where he spent much of his time in search of the philosopher's stone. She spread aboard the fame of her entertainer in return for his hospitality, and laboured hard to impress everybody with as full a belief in his extraordinary powers as she felt herself. But as a female interpreter of the rank and appearance of Madame Blavari did not exactly correspond with the Count's notions either of dignity or decorum, he hired a person named Bitolini, a teacher of languages, to act in that capacity. Bitolini was a desperate gambler, a man who had tried almost every resource to repair his ruined fortunes, including among the rest the search for the philosopher's stone. Immediately that he saw the Count's operations, he was convinced that the great secret was his, and that the golden gates of the Palace of Fortune were open to let him in. With still more enthusiasm than Madame Blavari, he held forth to his acquaintances. And in all public places, that the Count was an extraordinary man, a true adept whose fortune was immense, and who could transmute into pure and solid gold as much lead, iron and copper, as he pleased. The consequence was that the House of Calliostro was besieged by crowds of the idol, the credulous, and the avaricious, all eager to obtain a sight of the philosopher, or to share in the boundless wealth which he could call into existence. Unfortunately for Calliostro he had fallen into evil hands. Instead of duping the people of England as he might have done, he became himself the victim of a gang of swindlers who, with the fullest reliance on his occult powers, only sought to make money of him. Vitalini introduced to him a ruined gambler, like himself, named Scott, whom he represented as a Scottish nobleman, attracted to London solely by his desire to see and converse with the extraordinary man whose fame had spread to the distant mountains of the North. Calliostro received him with great kindness and cordiality, and Lord Scott, thereupon introduced a woman named Frye as Lady Scott, who was to act as chaperone to the Countess de Calliostro, and make her acquainted with all the noble families of Britain. Thus things went swimmingly. His lordship, whose effects had not arrived from Scotland and who had no banker in London, borrowed two hundred pounds of the Count. They were lent without scruple. So flattered was Calliostro by the attentions paid him the respect they veneration they pretended to feel for him, and the complete deference with which they listened to every word that fell from his lips. Superstitious, like all desperate game-sters, Scott had often tried magical and cabalistic numbers in the hope of discovering lucky numbers in the lottery or at the roulette table. He had in his possession a cabalistic manuscript containing various arithmetical combinations of the kind which he submitted to Calliostro, with an urgent request that he would select a number. Calliostro took the manuscript and studied it, but as he himself informs us with no confidence in his truth. He however predicted twenty as the successful number for the sixth of November, following. Scott ventured a small sum upon this number out of the two hundred pounds he had borrowed, and won. Calliostro, incited by the success, prognosticated number twenty-five for the next drawing. Scott tried again and won a hundred guineas. The numbers fifty-five and fifty-seven were announced with equal success for the eighteenth of the same month, to the no-smallest donishment and delight of Calliostro, who thereupon resolved to try fortune for himself and not for others. To all the entreaties of Scott and his lady that he would predict more numbers for them, he turned a deaf ear, even while he still thought him a lord and a man of honor. But when he discovered that he was a mere swindler and the pretended lady, Scott, an artful woman of the town, he closed his door upon them and on all their gang. In complete faith in the supernatural powers of the count, they were in the deepest distress at having lost his countenance. They tried by every means their ingenuity could suggest to propitiate him again. They implored, they threatened, and endeavoured to bribe him, but all was vain. Calliostro would neither see nor correspond with them. In the meantime they lived extravagantly, and in the hope of future, exhausted all their present gains. They were reduced to the last extremity when Miss Fry obtained access to the countess and received a guinea from her on the representation that she was starving. Miss Fry, not contented with this, begged her to intercede with her husband, that for the last time he would point out a lucky number in the lottery. The countess promised to exert her influence, and Calliostro, thus entreated, named the number eight, at the same time reiterating his determination to have no more to do with any of them. By an extraordinary hazard which filled Calliostro with surprise and pleasure, number eight was the greatest prize in the lottery. Miss Fry and her associates cleared 1,500 guineas by the adventure, and became more than ever convinced of the occult powers of Calliostro, and strengthened in their determination never to quit him until they had made their fortunes. Out of the proceeds, Miss Fry bought a handsome necklace at a pawnbroker's for 90 guineas. She then ordered a richly chased gold box, having two compartments to be made out of jewellers, and putting the necklace in the one, filled the other with a fine aromatic snuff. She then sought another interview with Madame Calliostro, and urged her to accept the box as a small token of her esteem and gratitude, without mentioning the valuable necklace that was concealed in it. Madame Calliostro accepted the present, and was, from that hour, exposed to the most incessant persecution from all the Confederates, Lavary, Bicciolini, and the pretended Lord and Lady Scott. They flattered themselves, they had regained their lost footing in the house, and came day after day to know lucky numbers in the lottery, sometimes forcing themselves up the stairs and into the council laboratory in spite of the efforts of the servants to prevent them. Calliostro, exasperated by the person's pertinacity, threatened to call in the assistance of the magistrates, and taking Miss Fry by the shoulders pushed her into the streets. From that time may be dated the misfortunes of Calliostro, Miss Fry at the instigation of her paramour determined on vengeance. Her first act was to swear a debt of 200 pounds against Calliostro, and to cause him to be arrested for that sum. Whilst he was in custody in a sponging house, Scott, accompanied by a low attorney, broke into his laboratory, and carried off a small box containing, as they believed, the power of transmutation, and a number of cabalistic manuscripts and treaties upon alchemy. They also bought an action against him for the recovery of the necklace, and Miss Fry accused both him and his countess of sorcery and witchcraft, and of foretelling numbers in the lottery by the aid of the devil. This latter charge was actually heard before Mr. Justice Miller. The action of trove for the necklace was tried before the Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, who recommended the parties to submit to arbitration. In the meantime, Calliostro remained in prison for several weeks till having procured bail he was liberated. He was soon after waited upon by an attorney named Reynolds, also deep in the plot, who offered to compromise all the actions upon certain conditions. Scott, who had accompanied him, concealed himself behind the door, and suddenly, rushing out, presented a pistol at the heart of Calliostro, swearing he would shoot him instantly if he would not tell him truly the art of predicting lucky numbers under transmuting metals. Reynolds, presenting to be very angry, disarmed his accomplice and entreated the countess to satisfy them by fair means and disclose his secrets, promising that if he would do so they would discharge all the actions and offer him no further molestation. Calliostro replied that threats and entreaties were alike useless, that he knew no secrets and that the powder of transmutation of which they had robbed him was of no value to anybody but himself. He offered, however, if they would discharge the actions and return the powder and the manuscripts to forgive them all the money they had swindled him out of. These conditions were refused, and Scott and Reynolds departed, swearing vengeance against him. Calliostro appears to have been quite ignorant of the forms of law in England and to have been without a friend to advise him as to the best course he should pursue. Whilst he was conversing with his countess on the difficulties that beset them, one of his bail called and invited him to write in a hackney couch to the house of a person who would see him write it. Calliostro consented and was driven to the King's Bench prison where his friend left him. He did not discover for several hours that he was a prisoner, or in fact understand the process of being surrendered by one's bail. He regained his liberty in a few weeks and the arbitrators between him and Ms. Fry made their award against him. He was ordered to pay the two hundred pounds she had sworn against him and to restore the necklace and gold box which had been presented to the countess. Calliostro was so disgusted that he determined to quit England. His pretensions, besides, had been unmercifully exposed by a Frenchman named Morande, the editor of the Courier de l'Europe, published in London. To add to his distress he was recognised in Westminster Hall as Joseph Balsamo, the swindler of Palermo. Such a convocation of disgrace was not to be borne. He and his countess packed up their small effects and left England with no more than fifty pounds out of the three thousand they had bought with them. They first proceeded to Brussels where fortune was more suspicious. They sold considerable quantities of the elixir of life, performed many chores and recruited their finances. They then took their course through Germany to Russia and always with the same success. Gold flowed into their coffers faster than they could count it. They quite forgot all the woes they had endured in England and learnt to be more circumspect in the choice of their acquaintance. In the year seventeen eighty they made their appearance in Strasbourg. Their fame had reached the city before them. They took a magnificent hotel and invited all the principal persons of the place to their table. Their wealth appeared to be boundless and the hospitality equal to it. Both the count and countess acted as physicians and gave money, advice and medicine to all the necessitous and suffering of the town. Many of the cures they performed astonished those regular practitioners who did not make sufficient allowance for the wonderful influence of imagination in certain cases. The countess, who at this time was not more than five and twenty, and all radiant with grace, beauty and cheerfulness, spoke openly of her eldest son as a fine young man of eight and twenty, who had been, for some years, a captain in the Dutch service. The trick succeeded to admiration. All the ugly old woman in Strasbourg, and for miles around, thronged the saloon of the countess to purchase the liquid which was to make them as blooming as their daughters. The young woman came in equal abundance that they might preserve their charms. And when twice as old as Ninonde Lanclos, be more captivating than she, while men who were not wanting who were fools enough to imagine that they might keep off the inevitable stroke of the grim foe by a few drops of the same incomparable elixir. The countess, soothed to say, looked like the incarnation of immortal loveliness, a very goddess of youth and beauty. And it is possible that the crowds of young men and old, who at all convenient seasons haunted the perfume chambers of the chanters, retracted less by their belief in her occult powers than from admiration of her languishing bright eyes and sparkling conversation. But amid all the incense that was offered out to her shrine, Madame de Caliostro was ever faithful to her sparse. She encouraged hopes it is true, but she never realised them. She excited admiration, yet kept it within bounds, and made men her slaves, without ever granting a favour of which the vainest might boast. In this city they made the acquaintance of many eminent persons and among others of the cardinal Prince de Rohan, who was destined afterwards to exercise so untold an influence over their fate. The cardinal, who seems to have had great faith in him as a philosopher, persuaded him to visit Paris in his company, which he did, but remained only thirteen days. He preferred the society of Strasbourg and returned thither with the intention of fixing his residence far from the capital. But he soon found that the first excitement of his arrival had passed away. People began to reason with themselves to be ashamed of their own admiration. The populace, among whom he had lavished his charity with a bountiful hand, accused him of being the Antichrist, the wandering Jew, the man of fourteen hundred years of age, a demon in human shape, sent to lure the ignorant to their destruction. While the more opulent and better informed called him a spy in the pay of foreign governments, an agent of the police, a swindler, and a man of evil life. The outcry grew at last so strong that he deemed it prudent to try his fortune elsewhere. He went first to Naples, but that city was too near Palermo. He dreaded recognition from some of his early friends, and after a short stay returned to France. He chose Bordeaux as his next dwelling place, and created as greater sensation there as he had done in Strasbourg. He announced himself as the founder of a new school of medicine and philosophy, boasted of his ability to cure all diseases, and invited the poor and suffering to visit him, and he would relieve the distress of the one class and cure the ailings of the other. All day long the street opposite his magnificent hotel was crowded by the populace, the halt and the blind, women with sick babes in their arms, and persons suffering under every species of human infirmity flocked to this wonderful doctor. The relief he afforded in money more than counterbalanced the failure of his nostrums, and the affluence of people from all the surrounding country became so great that the jurats of the city granted him a military guard to be stationed day and night before his door to keep open. The anticipations of Calliostra were realised. The rich were struck with admiration of his charity and benevolence, and impressed with the full conviction of his marvellous powers. The sale of the elixir went on admirably. His saloons were thronged with the wealthy dupes who came to purchase immortality. Beauty that would endure for centuries was the attraction for the fair sex. Health and strength for the same period were the bates held out to the other. There were no fortunes in casting nativities or granting attendant selves to any ladies who would pay sufficiently for their services. What was still better, as tended to keep up the credit of her husband, she gave the most magnificent parties in Bordeaux, but as at Strasbourg the popular delusion lasted for a few months only and burnt itself out. Calliostra forgot in the intoxication of success came in credulous. He was accused of being an enemy to religion of denying Christ and of being the wandering Jew. He despised these rumours as long as they were confined to a few, but when they spread over the town when he received no more fees when his parties were abandoned and his acquaintance turned away when they met him in the street he thought at high time to shift his quarters. He was by this time worried of the provinces and the founder of a new philosophy. He immediately made his way into the best society by means of his friend the Cardinal de Rohan. His success as a magician was quite extraordinary. The most considerable persons of the time visited him. He boasted of being able like the Rosicrucians to converse with the elementary spirits to invoke the mighty dead from the grave to transmute metals and to discover occult things by means of the special protection of God towards him. Like Dr. D. he summoned the angels to reveal the future and they appeared and converse with him in crystals and under glass bells open brackets forty-eight closed brackets. There was hardly says the biography d'es contemporaine a fine lady in Paris who would not suck with the shade of Lucretius in the apartments of Caliostro a military officer who would not discuss the art of war with Caesar Hannibal or Alexander or an advocate of the ghost of Cicero. These interviews with the departed were very expensive for as Caliostro said the dead would not rise for nothing. The Countess as usual exercised all her ingenuity to support her husband's credit. She was a great favourite with her own sex. To many a delighted and wandering auditorium she detailed the marvellous powers of Caliostro. She said he could render himself invisible, traverse the world with the rapidity of time. He had not been long at Paris before he became involved in the celebrated affair of the Queen's necklace. His friend the Cardinal de Rohan in Amouddou of the chums of Marie Antoinette was in sore distress at her coldness and the displeasure she had so often manifested against him. There was at that time a lady named Lémotte in the service of the Queen of whom the Cardinal was foolish enough to do well in her projects. In her capacity of chamberwoman or lady of honour to the Queen she was present at an interview between Her Majesty and Monsieur Burma a wealthy jeweler of Paris when the latter offered for sale a magnificent diamond necklace valued at 1,600,000 francs or about £64,000 sterling. The Queen admired it greatly but dismissed the jeweler with the expression that Lémotte formed a plan to get this costly ornament into her own possession and determined to make the Cardinal de Rohan the instrument by which to affect it. She therefore sought an interview with him and pretending to sympathise in his grief for the Queen's displeasure told him she knew a way by which he might be restored to favour. She then mentioned a necklace and the sorrow of the Queen was that Madame de Lémotte told him by no means to do so as he would thereby offend her Majesty. His plan would be to induce the jeweler to give her Majesty credit and accept her promissory note for the amount at a certain date to be here after agreed upon. The Cardinal readily agreed to the proposal and instructed the jeweler to draw up an agreement and he would procure the Queen's signature. He placed this in the hands of Madame de Lémotte who returned it to Marie Antoinette written in the margin. She told him at the same time that the Queen was highly pleased with his conduct in the matter and would appoint a meeting with him in the Garden of Versailles when she would present him with a flower as a token of her regard. The Cardinal shelled the forged document to the jeweler, obtained the necklace and delivered it into the hands of Madame de Lémotte. So far all was well. Her next object was to satisfy the Cardinal who waited impatiently for the meeting. There was at that time in Paris a young woman named de Lémotte noted for a resemblance to the Queen and Madame de Lémotte on the promise of a handsome reward found no difficulty in persuading her to personate Marie Antoinette and meet the Cardinal de Rohing in the evening twilight in the gardens of Versailles. The meeting took place accordingly. The Cardinal was deceived by the uncertain light, the great resemblance with a lighter heart than had been eaten his bosom for many a day. Note 50 The enemies of the unfortunate Queen of France from the progress of the revolution embittered the animosity against her, maintained that she was really a party in this transaction, that she and not Madame de Lémotte met the Cardinal and rewarded him with the flower and that the story above related was merely concocted between her and de Lémotte and others to cheat the jeweler of time the forgery of the Queen's signature was discovered. Burma the jeweler immediately named the Cardinal de Rohing and Madame de Lémotte as the persons with whom he had negotiated and they were both arrested and thrown into the Bastille. Lémotte was subjected to a vigorous examination and the disclosures she made implicating Cagliostro he was seized along with his wife and also sent to the Bastille. The thing was to be heard of in Paris but the Queen's necklace were the surmises of the guilt or innocence of the several parties implicated. The husband of Madame de Lémotte escaped England and in the opinion of many took the necklace with him and there disposed of it to different jewelers in small quantities at a time but Madame de Lémotte insisted alchemist a dream on the philosopher's stone a false prophet a profane of the true worship the self-dubbed Count Cagliostro. She further said that he originally conceived the project of ruining the Cardinal de Rohan that he persuaded her by the exercise of some magic influence over her mind to aid in a bet the scheme and that he was a robber, a swindler and a sorcerer. After all the accused parties had remained for upwards of six months in the absence of the witnesses having been heard Cagliostro as the principal culprit was first called upon for his defense. He was listened to with the most breathless attention. He put himself into a theatrical attitude and thus began I am oppressed I am accused I am columnated have I deserved this fate? I descend into my conscience and I there find the peace that men refuse me. I have given myself the friend of my fellow creatures my knowledge, my time my fortune have ever been employed in the relief of distress. I have studied and practiced medicine but I have never degraded that most noble and consoling arts of arts by mercenary speculations of any kind for always giving and never receiving I have deserved my independence I have even carried my delicacy so far as to refuse the favour of kings. I have given gratuitously my remedies and my advice the poor have received from me both remedies and money I have never contracted any debts and my manners are pure and uncorrupted after much more self-lawdation of the same kind he went on to complain of the great hardships he had endured and being separated for so many months from his innocent and loving wife who as he was given to understand had been detained in the Bastille and perhaps chained in an unwholesome dungeon he denied unequivocally turned to silence the rumors and accusations against him which his own secrecy with regard to the events of his life had perhaps originated expressed himself ready to satisfy the curiosity of the public and to give a plain and full account of his career he then told a romantic and incredible tale which imposed upon no one he said he neither knew the place of his birth nor the name of his parents but that he spent his infancy in Medina in Arabia and was brought up under the name he lived in the palace of the great Mufti in the city and always had three servants to wait upon him besides his preceptor named Altotus this Altotus was very fond of him and told him that his father and mother who were Christians and nobles died when he was three months old and left him in the care of the Mufti he could never he said ascertain their names for whenever he asked Altotus the question he was told Altotus at the age of 12 he began his travels and learned various languages of the east he remained three years in Mecca where the sheriff or governor showed him so much kindness and spoke to him so tenderly and affectionately that he sometimes thought this personage was his father he quitted this good man with tears in his eyes and never saw him afterwards but he was convinced that either of Europe or Asia he found an account open for him at the principal bank or merchants he could draw upon them to the amount of thousands and hundreds of thousands and no questions were ever asked beyond his name he had only to mention the word achorat and all his once were supplied he firmly believed that the sheriff of Mecca was the French to whom all was owing this was the secret of his wealth and he had no occasion to resort to swindling gifts when he had wealth enough to purchase as many as he pleased and more magnificent ones than had ever been worn by a queen of France as to the other charges brought against him by Madame de la Motte he had what a short answer to give she called him an empiric he was not unfamiliar with the word if it meant a man who without being a physician had some knowledge of medicine and took no fees who cured both rich and poor and took no money from either he confessed he had also called him a mean alchemist whether he were an alchemist or not the epithet mean could only be applied to those who begged and cringed and he had never done either as regards to his being a dreamer about the philosopher's stone whatever his opinions upon that subject might be he had been silent and had never travelled the public with his dreams then as to his intention and the result had verified the prediction he denied that he was a profaner of the true worship or that he had striven to bring religion into contempt on the contrary he respected every man's religion and never meddled with it he also denied that he was a rosa-crucian or that he had ever pretended to be 300 years of age or to have had one man in his service for 150 years in conclusion he said every statement that he had made which two words he begged her council to translate for her as it was not polite to tell her so in French such was the substance of his extraordinary answer to the charges against him an answer which convinced those who were before doubtful that he was one of the most impudent imposters that had ever run the career of deception council would then heard on behalf of the Cardinal de Rohan and Madame de Lamotte it appearing clearly that the Cardinal was himself Caliostro they were both acquitted Madame de Lamotte was found guilty and sentenced to be publicly whipped and branded with a hot iron on the back Caliostro and his wife were then discharged from custody on applying to the offices of the Bastille for the papers and effects which had been seized at his lodgings he found that many of them had been abstracted he thereupon brought an action against them for the recovery of his manuscripts and a small portion of the powder he received orders to quit Paris within four and twenty hours fearing that if he were once more enclosed in the dungeons of the Bastille he should never see daylight again he took his departure immediately and proceeded to England on his arrival in London he made the acquaintance of the notorious Lord George Gordon who espoused his cause warmly and inserted a letter in the public papers animadverting upon the conduct of the Queen of France in the affair of the necklace and asserting that she was really this letter Lord George was exposed to prosecution at the instance of the French ambassador found guilty of libel and sentenced to a fine and a long imprisonment Caliostro and the Countess afterwards traveled in Italy where they were arrested by the papal government in 1789 and condemned to death the charges against him were that he was a freemason, a heretic and a sorcerer this unjustifiable vessel of St. Angelo his wife was allowed to escape severe punishment by emuring herself in a nunnery Caliostro did not long survive the loss of liberty preyed upon his mind accumulated misfortunes had injured his health and broken his spirit and he died early in 1790 his fate may have been no better than he deserved but it is impossible not to feel that his sentence for the crime assigned was utterly disgraceful of alchemy we have now finished the list of the persons who have most distinguished themselves in this unprofitable pursuit among them are men of all ranks Countess and conditions the truth-seeking but erring philosopher the ambitious prince and the needy noble who have believed in it as well as the designing charlatan who has not believed in it but has merely made the pretension to it the means of cheating his fellows and living upon their credulity one or more of all these classes it will be seen from the record of their lives that the delusion was not altogether without its uses men in striving to gain too much do not always overreach themselves if they cannot arrive at the inaccessible mountaintop they may perhaps get halfway towards it and pick up some scraps of wisdom and knowledge on the road the useful science of chemistry is not a little indebted to its furious brother of alchemy many valuable discoveries have been made in that search for the impossible been hidden for centuries yet to come Roger Bacon in searching for the philosopher's stone discovered gunpowder a still more extraordinary substance Van Helmont in the same pursuit discovered the properties of gas gave her made discoveries in chemistry which were equally important and Paracelsus amidst his perpetual visions of the transmutation of metals found that mercury was a remedy for one of the most odious and excruciating of all the diseases that afflict humanity in our day little mention is made in Europe of any new devotees of the science though it is affirmed that one or two of our most illustrious men of science do not admit the pursuit to be so absurd and vain as it has been commonly considered in recent times the belief in witchcraft which is scarcely more absurd still lingers in the popular mind but few are so quagulous as to believe that any elixir could make man live for centuries or turn all our iron and pewter into gold alchemy in Europe may be said to be almost wholly exploded but in the east it still flourishes in as great repute as ever recent travellers make constant mention of it especially in China Hindustan Persia Tartary Egypt and Arabia End of Chapter 4 Part 13