The "Treasury" at Petra, via Wikipedia

Once there was a boy in Norfolk, England, who boasted the quintessentially English name of “James Arthur Flowerdew.”  His was a perfectly normal early 20th century childhood, until he reached the age of 12, when some odd and unsettling things began happening to him.  He began having unusually vivid dreams where he saw a large desert city.  These visions left him greatly agitated, although he could not understand why.  As his dreams of this mysterious city went on, they became increasingly detailed.  He saw a temple, a large volcano-shaped rock, streets, lanes, and various military and civilian structures.  So clear were Flowerdew’s tours of the city, he became convinced he was actually there.

One day when he was visiting the seashore, Flowerdew idly picked up some pink and orange pebbles.  As he toyed with them, the image of his desert city suddenly came into his mind.  From then on, whenever he would go to the beach and play with the orange and pink pebbles, he was instantly mentally transported to the city.  He realized that the pebbles were similar in color to the stones of the ancient metropolis.  Such visions were so common, he accepted them as a normal part of his life.  As time went on, flashes of his life in the city began to come to him.  Flowerdew believed that he had been a soldier, who was killed with a spear in or near the temple.

Aside from these strange visions--which he appears to have largely kept to himself--Flowerdew’s life went on in a modest, unremarkable way.  One day, the now-elderly retired Army officer casually happened to watch a BBC documentary about the ancient Jordan city of Petra.  As soon as he saw the ruins, he was stunned.  He immediately recognized it as the place that had haunted his dreams for so many years.

Flowerdew was so thrilled to finally be able to identify the city he had come to know so well, he contacted the BBC.  Perhaps surprisingly, he was taken seriously.  The BBC filmed a short segment about him, after which he was questioned by an archaeologist who was an expert on Petra.  The archaeologist came away perplexed by the depth of Flowerdew’s knowledge of the city--knowledge that Flowerdew could not have gotten without serious archaeological research.  And there was nothing to indicate that this relatively uneducated old man was lying when he insisted that he had never even seen a book about Petra.

Word of Flowerdew’s strange story reached the ears of the Jordanian government, who invited him to see Petra in person for the first time.  (Or for the first time in a very long while, depending on your views of such matters.)  Flowerdew appeared to be right at home, easily navigating the city unaided.  He commented in detail on the various landmarks, and even identified sites that had yet to be excavated.  When shown certain items and structures that were puzzling archaeologists, Flowerdew immediately gave plausible explanations for what they were.  When he went into a military barrack, he pointed out the location of the guardroom, and explained how the check-in system for the guards had worked--something that was unknown even to the experts.  He even showed the place where an enemy had murdered him in the first century B.C.

Throughout his visit, Flowerdew displayed such an intimate knowledge of Petra that the archaeologists, unable to catch him in the slightest error, were baffled.  He even politely corrected the experts when he believed they had wrong information.  One archaeologist commented, “He’s filled in details and a lot of it is very consistent with known archaeological and historical facts, and it would require a mind very different from his to be able to sustain a fabric of deception on the scale of his memories--at least those he’s reported to me.  I don’t think he’s a fraud.  I don’t think he has the capacity to be a fraud on this scale.”

Flowerdew died at the age of 95 in 2002, leaving everyone to wonder if this unassuming old man had somehow pulled off an incredibly challenging hoax, or if he had, as he insisted, once been a soldier in ancient Petra.

Via Newspapers.com

In this week’s news item from the past, meet Mr. and Mrs. Ralph Chesley Ott, a couple who provided definitive proof that no love lasts forever.  “Hull Daily Mail,” August 28, 1912:

A courtship which, according to the principals, began 5,000 years ago on the banks of the Nile, culminated yesterday in the St. Louis Divorce Court, U.S.A., when Mrs. R. C. Ott brought a suit for a divorce from her husband and the custody of their two children. 

Mr. and Mrs. Ott both believe in reincarnation, and they declare that their shattered romance had its inception in a former existence once when both were Egyptians. Mr Ott is an artist, and his wife was an artist's model when he married her in 1910, after his return from Egypt, where he went for local colour, to reproduce Egyptian architecture, for a wealthy patron. 

Mr. Ott declares that he had strange dreams in Egypt, and that when after his return he met his future wife, he knew her immediately as Princess Amneris, Pharaoh's daughter, who was his love 5,000 years ago. 

"We first met," he says, “during our previous incarnation in the Queen's Chamber of the great pyramid. Then we used to meet in the palace gardens, and wend our way to the Nile, where she loved to throw sweetmeats to the sacred crocodiles. I recall the great tragic night when Pharaoh discovered us. There were torches and guards, and I was seized." 

Mrs. Ott said: "I remember how we went to the river together and fed the crocodiles.  I remember our first meeting in the pyramid. I had accompanied my father on a tour of inspection, and looking into the Queen's Chamber, I saw the handsomest man in the world. 

"We fell in love at once. That evening he came into the royal gardens, and our love, which has lasted through centuries, began.

“I have beautiful recollections of nights in the royal barge, and I vividly recall my father's anger when we were discovered together. It must have been Isis. Egypt's great goddess, who watched over us all these centuries, and finally brought us together." 

Mrs. Ott now alleges that her reincarnated husband, soon after their twentieth-century wedding, began to throw crockery at her, and became insanely jealous, often insulting her in the presence of guests. She wants the 5,000-year-old romance terminated.

Trying to revive old love affairs is usually a bad idea.

Via Newspapers.com

A mystical cat who loves beer, enjoys fine dramatic works, and hates the news media.  You bet I’m inviting him into the hallowed halls of Strange Company HQ.  The “San Francisco Chronicle,” October 13, 1899:

The Baldwin Theater possesses a very peculiar black cat who has probably received more attentions from dramatic celebrities male and female than any member of the feline tribe in the country.  Selim is the name of the highly cultivated mouser, the title having been bestowed on him by some discriminating actor who was doubtless impressed by the rather Oriental tastes of the sable pet. Exactly how or when Selim became one of the properties of the theater no one can tell. All at once he sprang into notice and favor as a habitue of the greenroom and the stage and soon made himself as much a feature of the establishment as anything with four legs and a mercurial disposition can possibly be.  When the Fanny Davenport combination occupied the theater recently, Selim attracted unusual attention in the greenroom, as there were several confirmed spiritualists in the company who hold the Pythagorean doctrine of the transmigration of souls. 

John Thompson, who can Impose spiritual activity into any inanimate object from a doughnut to a chunk of coal, and bring a fusillade of raps out of an ordinary piece of furniture, pronounced Selim at first sight a reanimated actor. 

Property Master Marcus, who was listening to Thespian Thompson’s diagnosis, suggested that possibly Selim was the shadow of some snide song and dance man.

“In sooth thou speakest well, good Marcus,” quoth the Thespian, “but we shall soon test the temper of his former dramatic ability,” and forthwith Mr. Thompson hurled at the defenseless cat a chunk of Shakesperian blank verse that would have staggered Joe McAullife if it hit him anywhere within the scope of his intellectuality. Instead of rolling over and dying instantly, the wonderful cat faced the poetic avalanche as calmly as a duck would an April shower, and when Mr. Thompson, at the end of his declamation, fell exhausted and perspiring over the prompter’s table, Selim was as calm as Eve.

“My life upon it,” exclaimed Mr. Thompson as soon as he could collect the remnants of his breath, “Selim was a legitimate actor.”

Selim, who was listening gravely, was plainly seen by Mr. Bouvier to nod his head approvingly, and in the general discussion that followed in the greenroom the conclusions were reached that Selim was certainly the spirit of some eminent actor who once strode the Baldwin stage.

Morris Peyser thought that Selim’s appreciation of tragedy indicated that he might be the ghost of the talented William E. Sheridan, but Master Mechanic Abrahams was ready to make affidavits that the weird feline was none other than Frank Evan Rae, the Beau Brummel of the melodramatic stage.

“Why, one day when Margaret Mather put a pink ribbon round her neck, I saw him go up to the mirror and tie it into an elaborate bow with his forepaws,” said Mr. Abrahams.

Whatever the former status of Selim may have been, his future in cat life at least is assured, for his position in the theater is as well defined as that of Manager Hayman himself.  Selim is the stock pet and any spare affection which the actresses have to bestow goes to him.  Fanny Davenport during her recent engagement never tired of caressing Selim and the cat’s gallantry toward her was tireless.  He met the actress every evening at the stage entrance and greeted her with a cordial purr and after receiving the expected caress, trotted after her to the door of her dressing-room where he left her with a respectful “meaow.”  While the star was on the stage Selim stood on the first entrance watching her with evident interest and wagging his tail cheerfully whenever the auditorium echoed with appreciative applause.

The fourth act of “La Tosca,” where Scarpia presses his unwelcome attentions on the heroine, affected Selim in an unusual manner, but his emotions have so far overcome his regard for stage etiquette as to lead him to dash from the wings on the stage and aid the actress in her struggles with the athletic Scarpia.

That Selim is a cat of the most extraordinary kind was shown by his conquest of Frank Willard, Miss Davenport’s stage manager.  When the Davenport combination occupied the theater Assistant Treasurer Peyster called Willard’s attention to the fact that Selim was regarded as something supernatural.  Mr. Willard, who is quite a connoisseur in cats and a skeptic of the strongest type, smiled at the story, but before two days he was a firmer believer than anybody in the superstition about Selim.  The phenomenal intelligence of the stage pet so impressed Mr. Willard that Selim got more privileges than were granted to the most favored bipeds of the company.  The unheard of liberty of sitting on the prompt table during rehearsals was allowed Selim, and in the fourth act he was permitted to occupy the first entrance without drawing forth the vigorous reprimand that such a crime calls forth when a human biped is the offender.

Miss Davenport at the close of her recent engagement presented Selim with an expensive jeweled collar in presence of the full company.

The only person around the Baldwin Theater who discredits the superstition that Selim is the reincarnation of some actor’s spirit is Forrest Seabury, who will have it that the wonderful cat is some departed scene-painter.  Whenever Selim is not engaged downstairs he wanders up to the paint frame and sits for hours at a time watching the pictorial work with an interest that is altogether unfeline.

Selim’s almost insane antipathy to the attaches of snide dramatic sheets shows, however, that artist Seabury is wrong and that the wonderful cat is imbued with the soul of a true actor.

Selim knows every offensive scribbler by sight, and when he catches a glimpse of them behind the scenes flies into an ungovernable rage.  His form swells to gigantic proportions, his sleek back becomes corrugated, and the bristles on his inflamed tail stand out like spikes on a telegraph pole.  His eyes blaze with fury and his whole aspect denotes the progress of a regular whirlwind of passion.  If the intruders ask for an interview with the star who may be playing, Selim’s rage finds expression in whines and howls which Charley, the doorkeeper, interprets into such words as “blackmail,” “scurrility,” etc.  It is evident that whatever branch of the dramatic art Selim followed in his former life, he learned to hate the newspaper scribes cordially, and when he displays his feelings toward them most of them are inclined to beat a hasty retreat.

Though apparently well advanced in years Selim has all the true Thespian’s admiration of the opposite sex, and his four-footed female admirers are numerous; whenever he wants to show his partiality toward some sleek dame of his tribe he introduces her behind the scenes, and during the Davenport engagement appeared to be so beset with applications for free passes that Doorkeeper Charley had to repress the crowd with a club.  In every other respect but his blind infatuation for the other sex Selim is a most exemplary cat, and though he can chew tobacco like a forty-niner and drink beer he never carries these habits to excess.  His gallantry, however, occasionally scandalizes the staid members of the company, but Manager Haymond overlooks all Selim’s moral obliquities, believing that he is a mascot of the most pronounced type.  Doorkeeper Charley has orders to keep Selim supplied with delicate cutlets of liver when the ordinary forage of the theater, such as rats, mice, and cockroaches runs low.  Another of the doorkeeper’s duties is to groom Selim once a week, but the post of tonsorial manipulator of the cat’s whiskers is a sinecure, as the ladies of the ballet are constantly titivating Selim and bestowing their affections on him in a way that would drive the bald-headed holders of front seats wild with envy.

The latest rumor round the Baldwin Theater about Selim is that Mr. Bouvier, who is quite a playwright, is constructing a drama with Selim as one of the leading characters.  Selim is the pet of the heroine, who is restrained by hard-hearted parents from visiting her unfortunate lover, who is incarcerated in the fourth story of a Bush street boarding-house for non-payment of dues.  Selim, to please his fond mistress, defies a ferocious bull-terrier in the backyard of the hashery, and scaling to the bedroom of the imprisoned lover with a clothesline wound round his tail, sets the captive free.  In the last scene the happily wedded pair are shown by the domestic hearth, surrounded by thirteen beautiful children, while Selim grown old and gray, but still as joyous and talented as ever, sits on the window-sill and sings “Auld Lang Syne.”

It is thought that this will cap the climax in the way of pure and emotional domestic dramas.

Arthur Guirdham

The Cathars (or "pure ones") were one of the most intriguing religious sects of the medieval era. Put very simply, they believed that our world was Hell, created and managed by Satan himself. Human beings are the souls of angels who had angered God, and as punishment, were sent to Earth, imprisoned in the physical body. Our only hope of redemption is to spend this life purifying ourselves and becoming joined with Christ.

The Catholic church condemned this gloomy doctrine as dangerous heresy, but the Cathars were left more-or-less alone until 1174, when St. Bernard went to the Cathar stronghold of Toulouse and vigorously preached against the sect. In 1205, a monk named Dominic Guzman took it upon himself to preach the Cathars out of existence. Around this time, Pope Innocent III excommunicated Count Raymond of Toulouse (a Cathar) and ordered the king of France to replace him with a reliable Catholic. In 1208, one of Raymond's henchmen fought back by assassinating the papal legate Pierre de Castlenau.

Pedro Berruguete, "Saint Dominic and the Albigensians"

After this murder, all holy hell broke loose. Dominic Guzman's followers (the "Dominicans,") were given the task of destroying the Cathars, a campaign that came to be called "the Inquisition." The enraged pope essentially declared war on Catharism, resulting in the horrors that gone down in history as the "Albigensian Crusade."

In this 20-year military onslaught, it is estimated that between 200,000 and a million Cathars or Cathar sympathizers were slaughtered. In 1242, two Inquisitors were murdered by Cathars, which just intensified the campaign against the sect. The following year, the Cathars made their "last stand" at Montsegur. The siege lasted for ten months, until they were finally forced to surrender. All the holdouts who refused to renounce their beliefs were burned alive. Catharism was, quite literally, now nothing but ashes.

Chateau de Montsegur, via Wikipedia

Ironically enough, the church's crusade did much to support the belief that this world was Hell.

Pedro Berruguete, "Saint Dominic Presiding Over an Auto-da-fe"

Were the Cathars truly dead and gone, however? Did they--in the most unorthodox fashion--live into the present day? Such was the belief of one 20th century Englishman.

Arthur Guirdham was a prominent and highly respected British psychiatrist. He was an intelligent and inquisitive man, not given to dishonesty or quackery. He was also an ardent believer in extra-sensory perception and reincarnation who believed the study of parapsychology should be a key element of his profession. He found validation for this belief through one particular patient who led him on a strange historical and spiritual odyssey.

In 1962, a woman whom Guirdham identified only as “Mrs. Smith” came to him for treatment. She had been suffering from nightmares involving a man entering her room. For reasons she couldn’t grasp, the mere sight of him filled her with a sickening fear. Guirdham was unnerved—and intrigued—by the fact that he had been having similar dreams. For much of his life, he had nightmares where, as he lay asleep, he was approached by a man. His dreams did not go any further, but they were enough to make him wake up screaming in terror.

Guirdham had long been fascinated—almost obsessed—with the area of France known as the Pyrenees, where the wholesale massacre of Cathars had taken place in 1244. After he met Mrs. Smith, he found himself regularly encountering references to that obscure religious sect. He wrote bemusedly, “To this day, only a few people in England know anything about the Cathars, but it seems that it is preordained that, sooner or later, I meet all of them.” In 1963, he casually mentioned Catharism to Mrs. Smith. She replied that just that day, she had accidentally come across a book on the subject, and immediately became deeply intrigued.

Before learning of Catharism, Mrs. Smith—who had definite, if untrained, psychic abilities—visited the Pyrenees, and immediately felt she had been there before. She regarded the area with a mixture of familiarity and inexplicable anguish.

Two years after becoming Guirdham’s patient, Smith began telling him of dreams she had had involving him. They contained glimpses of her past life in thirteenth-century Toulouse. She saw herself as a Catholic peasant girl named Puerilia, and Guirdham was “Roger-Isarn d’Arborens,” a traveling Cathar preacher. The two became lovers, which caused her to be abandoned by her family and excommunicated from her church.

Some of her dreams involved a cousin of Roger's named Pierre de Mazerolles, a cousin of Roger's. He had participated in the murder of two agents of the Inquisition. (Mazerolles was the man who had so horrified Smith in her dream.) These were the murders which caused the Catholic church to take the savage retaliation that virtually wiped out the local Cathar community. Roger/Arthur Guirdham was arrested, and died of disease in his dungeon. Puerilia/Smith faced an even worse fate—she was burned at the stake, a gruesome death Mrs. Smith recalled with appalling detail.

Fortunately for history, the persecution and annihilation of the Cathars was recorded by their Dominican tormentors with meticulous detail, leaving us with surprisingly extensive records of this ill-fated sect. Guirdham explored these records in an effort to find if any of Smith’s story could be verified. Even he was shocked to discover proof of virtually all of it. He was unable to find any mention of “Puerilia”—he believed this had been a nickname which would not have appeared in the records—but Roger and many of the other names Smith recollected, along with Pierre de Mazerolles’ murder plot, and the subsequent massacre, proved to be historical fact, rather than a troubled woman’s fancy. Her extensive descriptions of thirteenth-century life--which included details unknown to historians until years later--were, Guirdham learned, also astonishingly accurate. In 1970, Guirdham published his findings in "The Cathars and Reincarnation."

In a later book, "We Are One Another," Guirdham went even further, asserting that a large group of Cathars were reincarnated at around the same time in contemporary England, all of whom carried with them powerful, detailed, and historically accurate memories of their traumatic past lives. He described how all these people--who already had some degree of contact with each other--independently came to the conclusion that they had lived before as Montsegur Cathars. Assuming Guirdham was correct, this simultaneous mass reincarnation was likely done for some larger purpose--but what?

“The Cathars and Reincarnation” is fascinating reading, even if you do not accept it as proof that we have all lived before. (I admit to remaining an agnostic on the subject.) His painstaking historical research provides a vivid glimpse of a largely-forgotten but important period of history.

Eccentrics arise in any era, and from any walk of life. However, it could be argued that the most outstanding examples of personal peculiarities could be found in the pre-modern gentry. Their financial and social security, coupled with large amounts of leisure time, allowed those who were naturally inclined to have a few screws loose to achieve their full potential of weirdness. The results were often people who were gloriously uninhibited, delightfully original, and first-class menaces to all unlucky enough to cross their paths.

What would this blog be without them?

In today's post, we look at one of the finest flowers of upper-class derangement: Adolphus Cooke, the Pride of Westmeath, Ireland. In his book "Irish Eccentrics," Peter Somerville-Large wrote that Cooke managed to "skirt the boundary of true madness." However, when one contemplates the fact that Cooke was convinced that his father had been reincarnated as a turkey, leading him to instruct his servants to take off their hats and genuflect whenever they encountered the bird, it may be that Somerville-Large was being overly optimistic.

Cooke was born in 1792, on his family's estate of Cookesborough. Cookes had lived on the land since the late 17th century. Unfortunately, by our hero's time, this land was much smaller than it had originally been. The Cooke menfolk combined a passion for gambling with appallingly bad luck, with the result that much of their property wound up being frittered away on losing bets.

Adolphus was illegitimate, the product of a union between lord of the manor Robert Cooke and one of his servants, whose name is now lost to history. After his birth, Robert's wife left him. Adolphus' mother was sent away, and the baby was given to a woman named Mary Kelly. Adolphus and his foster-mother were exiled to a cottage on the edge of the estate, never being allowed near the mansion.

Robert looked after his son's welfare, albeit in the traditionally peculiar Cooke fashion. Each day, a basket of provisions was sent to the cottage. There was never more than one day's worth of supplies, and these were carefully itemized out, down to weighing the amount of salt and counting the number of sods for the fire. One day a year, Kelly was allowed to go into town to buy the child clothes and shoes. When Adolphus grew old enough, he was sent to school in England, and then the army, where he served under Wellington. He seemed destined for the drab, anonymous existence usually allotted to illegitimate sons of rich men.

Fate, however, decided that Adolphus was destined for grander things. Robert Cooke's two legitimate sons predeceased him, without leaving children of their own. He had little choice but to leave Cookesborough and its seven hundred acres to his only surviving child, Adolphus. When Robert died in 1835, the 43-year-old heir left the army and returned to claim his estate.

It was clear right from the start that Cookesborough's new master had his own distinctive way of doing things. He hired two large, heavy men, gave them the titles of "Gentlemen of Nature's Stamp," and essentially gave them the run of the place. One of the new "Gentlemen," named (I kid you not) Tom Cruise, was interested in sport, and not much else. He was constantly leaving the estate to attend various sporting matches, and insisted that the local parish priest announce these events as part of his Sunday Mass. On one occasion, Cruise interrupted the sermon to chide, "Father, you are forgetting to tell them about the sports at Longfield today." Adolphus' other aide was Billy Dunne, whose most notable characteristic was his large, flat feet. Dunne spent much of his time drilling imaginary troops, when he wasn't playing policeman. He liked to march around in a cast-off police uniform, swinging a stick he called his "bayonet." He was a great figure of fun to the local children.

Cooke was, as you might expect, something of a mixed blessing to his tenants. He generously provided them with warm blankets and other furnishings, pensions, and funeral expenses. On the other hand, he expected everyone on his land to conform to his particular ideas of discipline. Each morning, Cooke would lead his men in a sort of army parade. He'd give the command, "Fall in! March in step!" and the workmen would obediently follow in a line, each pushing a wheelbarrow full of tools. If the men should lose any of those tools, they were instantly fired. At the end of the day, he would lead them home, all again marching in step.

On a more heartwarming note, Cooke loathed children. A couple who lived on his lands spent years hiding their offspring from him, out of fear of being evicted. On one occasion, a panhandler asked Cooke for some charity. When Adolphus learned the man was childless, the delighted seigneur rewarded him with five pounds. Conversely, when another vagrant pleaded for help on the grounds that he had twelve children to support, Cooke sternly called him a "naughty man," and sent him packing.

It was his dealings with animals that brought out Cooke's most peculiar side. He bred some of the finest horses in the country. However, he did not allow them to be broken until they were at least ten years old. Once, when he heard that a bullock had fallen into a river and was drowning, his reaction was to order that all the other cattle be driven to the riverbank to watch the edifying spectacle. "It will be a warning and a caution to each and everyone during their mortal tenure to shun water."

On another occasion, when a bull had the temerity to threaten Cooke, he challenged the animal to a duel. I am pleased to report that the bull got the better of the battle, and would have turned his adversary into a grease spot if a maidservant hadn't intervened. She set the dogs on the bull and opened the paddock gate wide enough to allow Cooke to escape. Adolphus showed his gratitude by firing her. Only the best, he explained, should be allowed to survive.

Cooke had a particular predilection for crows. During nesting season, he spent much of his time watching them, getting very anxious if they should fight, and expressing great relief when the squabbles were over. He forbade cutting any trees on the estate, simply because the crows made their homes in them. One year, he ordered his men to gather twigs and make the nests for his favorite birds. (The crows ignored them and built their own nests elsewhere.) Cooke boasted that Cookesborough had the best and strongest crows in all Ireland, able to make short work of any rivals. Anyone on the estate who shot or otherwise ill-treated any of his corvids was immediately sacked or evicted.

As I mentioned earlier, Cooke was a believer in reincarnation, which proved to be very fortunate for his dog, Gusty. Gusty was a playful, affectionate dog who was a great favorite on the estate. Unfortunately, Gusty liked to roam the countryside, a habit much condemned by his owner. After Gusty was brought back from one of these journeys, Cooke gave him a stern lecture about his wandering ways, and announced that if the dog left the estate again, he would be hanged like any common criminal. He even showed Gusty the rope and the tree that would serve as the gallows.

Like so many recidivists, Gusty failed to heed all warnings. Not long afterward, he was found in nearby Mullingar in the company of some common village mutts. Cooke's feudal soul was outraged by this blatant consorting with the peasantry. The next morning, Gusty stood trial in Cookesborough's Great Hall, with the staff serving as jury. Cooke, of course, was the judge. After hearing testimony about Gusty's escape and subsequent resisting arrest, the jurors returned a verdict of "Guilty of Misbehavior."

Cooke put on the black cap and delivered the ultimate penalty. After giving a long sermon on Gusty's ingratitude and disobedience, Cooke ruled that the dog must hang. After the execution was carried out, a tombstone would be erected over the setter's grave, reading:

Executed for high crimes and misdemeanors
Gusty
Once the favourite setter dog of
Adolphus Cooke, Esq.,
Cookesborough,
And it is earnestly hoped that his sad fate will be a
warning to other dogs against so offending.
Tuesday, 8th May, 1860.
Judge Cooke had spoken. But who was to serve as executioner? No one on the estate wanted to perform the appalling deed, but they were equally fearful of antagonizing their mercurial master. Finally, a man known as "The Bug Mee" volunteered to act as canine Jack Ketch, saying cheerfully, "To plaze your honour I'll hang him; and I'd hang the missus and childer too, if it came to that."

On the morning scheduled for execution, Bug Mee took the condemned dog off into the woods. A short while later, he returned to the mansion...accompanied by a very much alive Gusty. When Cooke demanded an explanation, Bug Mee replied, "Your honour, I was knotting the rope on his neck when he put the heart across me. He began speaking to me in some kind of foreign language. So, I said to myself, I'd bring him back to you because there is something in him...Who knows, but it's the ould gentleman himself that is living with?"

Cooke certainly did not want to be guilty of patricide. Gusty's sentence was commuted on the spot, and he lived happily for many years after.

As Adolphus grew older, he naturally began contemplating his own burial plans. At first, the idea of the simplest of burials--in a lonely spot, with no formal service and no stone marking his grave--had a poetic appeal. However, he soon changed his mind and went for the notion of putting on a jolly good show. He built himself a huge marble vault on the estate, forty feet square and forty feet deep. (He did not want his eternal rest spoiled by hearing the crows quarrel.) When it was completed, he installed a large fireplace, along with a marble chair and a table holding pens, ink, and paper. There were shelves filled with books. Cooke ordered that when the time came, he should be embalmed and placed in a sitting position before the fire, which was to be kept perpetually lit.

He obviously had big plans for his afterlife.

Sadly, this novel and entertaining burial never took place. After Cooke died in 1876, the rector (perhaps getting revenge for all those years of Sunday sermons turning into "Wide World of Sports,") ignored his wishes and had him buried in the stone vault that contained the bodies of Cooke's father and foster-mother. (Cooke had designed the mausoleum to resemble a beehive, as he thought it possible that Dad came back as a bee.) The grand marble vault was demolished.

Eccentrics often have great fun with wills, and Cooke was no exception. He made no less than three of them. The first left his estate to a nephew who lived in Scotland. However, when the nephew and his fiancee came to visit Cookesborough, the lady mortally offended Adolphus when she sat in the marble chair in his marble vault and asked, "Is this how you will look in it?" Such levity caused Cooke to banish the pair from the estate forthwith and disinherit the nephew.

Cooke's second will left everything to his cousin, Dr. Wellington Purdon. Unfortunately, Purdon went in for fox hunting. One day, Purdon's pack of hounds killed a fox in front of Cooke. As Cooke had become convinced that he would be reincarnated as a fox, this naturally disquieted him. He certainly did not want to leave his estate to a man who might well be responsible for having him murdered in the next life. So, Purdon got the boot as well. As an extra precaution, Cooke ordered that a number of deep foxholes and stone trenches be installed on the estate, so that if he indeed came back as a fox, he would have plenty of hiding places.

Cooke's final will left the estate to Edward Pakenham, a younger son of the Earl of Longford, on the condition that the impecunious young man change his name to Pakenham-Cooke. However, after Cooke's death, Dr. Purdon contested this will, on the highly unsurprising grounds that Cooke had been of unsound mind. This case yielded what is one of the greatest bits of dialogue ever heard in a court of law. It came when Cooke's doctor, William Williams, took the stand. Williams insisted that while Adolphus may have been a difficult man, he had been perfectly sane--he believed that Cooke enjoyed making himself look more lunatic than he really was. Purdon's lawyer questioned the doctor about the time when Cooke told him he was turning into a screech owl.

Williams: I told him that I admired screech owls very much.
Counsel: Do you admire screech owls?
Williams: Well, I said I liked places that had birds and crows and rooks...that they generally accompanied old demesnes and old families.
Counsel: Can you give me the exact words he used when he said his voice was becoming like that of a screech owl?
Williams: He said, "This is the first day I perceived my voice becoming like that of a screech owl." He was very hoarse at the time.
Judge: Did you ever hear a man saying he was as hoarse as a raven?
Williams: I did.
Judge: Now, when Mr. Cooke said his voice was becoming like that of a screech owl, do you think he supposed he was a screech owl?
Williams: I do not.

The court ruled in favor of the newly-christened Pakenham-Cooke, with the judge noting, "If a man believes he will turn into a successful screech owl after his death, that is no proof that he is incapable."

Dr. Purdon took his case to Dublin's High Court, which also ruled in favor of Pakenham-Cooke. Unfortunately, thanks to all this litigation, the only ones to profit from Cooke's will were the lawyers. The estate was declared bankrupt. The disgrunted Edward, feeling that it was scarcely worth his while to change his name for a denuded estate, dropped the "Cooke" and went back to being plain old Mr. Pakenham.

As for what became of Adolphus in the next life, I am very sorry to say that a few days after he died, a fox broke into Cookesborough's kitchen, where it was killed.

Of course, there is no proof that this was the former master visiting his old home, but the locals had few doubts. As a later history of the area quipped, "The kitchen was a fit and proper place to find a Cooke."

I'm not sure if this story is vaguely creepy, sweetly touching, or just sad. Possibly all three. From the "New York Journal," April 25, 1907:

This is a plain statement of the facts in a peculiar case--a case illustrating one of the strange beliefs of theosophy, exemplified in an everyday, well-ordered, happy American home, not in India, where miracles, viewed from this distance, seem natural. That the souls of human beings, for purposes which men can hardly pretend to understand, may enter the bodies of the lower animals and dwell there for years is a conviction familiar to all who have ever read a word of Oriental mysticism.

But no one would expect to find the belief in the transmigration of souls specialized in the everyday affairs of plain people in the State of New York. The strangest things happen, however, and not always in faraway places. Sometimes they are at our very doors, as in the present instance. No opinion is expressed or even hinted at. This is a question of fact. This is the way the doctrine of metempsychosis appears when it is viewed at close quarters.

If one should hunt the whole country over it would be impossible to find a more firm believer in theosophy in all its forms and phases, than Mrs. Henry K. Gilette, of Vestal Centre, N.Y., for she is certain that the soul of her sister has taken refuge in the body of a Maltese cat. It is also safe to make the statement that no cat in the entire world receives more attention and better care than this same Maltese cat. It has a bedroom, fully furnished, for its own exclusive use, has its place at the family table, eats with the family and is guarded with as much care as it would be if it were one of Mrs. Gilette's own children.

The Journal sent one of its representatives to Vestal Centre to get a story of the affair, and to describe the cat's mode of life, etc. The account which follows proves that oft-repeated axiom, "Truth is stranger than fiction."

To begin with, Vestal Centre is a typical country village, situated in Brome County, about fifteen miles from Binghamton. The only public conveyance that stops at this village is an old stage, once painted red.

The Gilettes for several generations have been farmers, and the homestead, with its eighty acres of more, is situated on a branch road, nearly a mile from the cluster of houses and the country store and post office combined that forms the village of Vestal Centre. The farm house is a fair-sized, comfortable looking dwelling, two stories high, with a small lawn and numerous trees in front, a garden with currant and berry bushes in the rear and a cluster of barns, sheds and outhouses near it.

Mrs. Gilette is a rosy matron of thirty-five, and well educated. She is the mother of three children, two boys and a girl. A conspicuous place in the sitting room, into which the Journal man was invited to enter, was occupied by a large old-fashioned rocking chair, which had in it a silk-covered cushion, and on this cushion was sleeping a large Maltese cat. The object of the call was made known, and what Mrs. Gilette said, in substance, follows:

"You see, Minnie and I," nodding her head at the cat, "were sent to a school near Hudson, N.Y., after we had attended for a number of years the village school in Greene, Chenango County. While at Hudson we first heard of theosophy. I think I can say we studied theosophy. For several months we inquired what theosophists believe; correspondd with several devout believers in its themes, and in the end were convinced of the merit of the faith, if I may so term it. I have always been called an infidel, since my return from school, by the country folk about my old home in Chenengo County, and where I lived until I married, and by my neighbors here as well. My maiden name was Paddock.

"Minnie, my sister, was never very strong. She was four years younger than I am, and ever since I can remember she had a peculiar cough; consumption caused her death almost three years ago. I can remember the day she died almost as though it was yesterday. Minnie had her bed in the large front room, where there was plenty of light and air. In the early Spring she seemed to rally some, but on July 26 she passed away. About three hours before her death she asked all to leave the roome except myself, and of course her request was complied with. She called me close to her side, and taking my hand, she pointed to that cat"--again Mrs. Gilette indicated the object of her remarks by a nod of her head--"and said: 'Edna, you have been such a good sister to me that I always want to be near you. I shall die today. Until I am called to inhabit another form my spirit will enter the body of your kitten.'

"Before my sister's death the kitten was a most troublesome creature, getting into all kinds of mischief, upsetting milk pans and was a general nuisance, so much of one in fact, that I had threatened to have it drowned a dozen times. Almost immediately after my sister died, the disposition of the kitten changed, and it has since that event, been the best kitten you ever saw. I firmly believe the spirit of my sister is in that cat. We call it Minnie. That was, as I have told you, the name of my sister. We have given this pretty little creature the best of care."

While Mrs. Gilette was talking Minnie awoke from her nap, and after rubbing up against the Journal man's trousers, as sort of an introduction, jumped into his lap. After purring in acknowledgment of being stroked it settled itself down in his lap for another snooze. The cat was large, well fed. Later it did a number of tricks that showed its intelligence. Mrs. Gilette stated that Minnie was never taught to do those tricks, but did them when asked to from the very first.

The visitors asked questions regarding the cat's mode of life and was ushered into a large front room on the second story of the house. The furniture consisted of an old fashioned black walnut bedroom suite, with a marble topped dresser and a double bed. On the dresser lay combs and brushes and the windows were draped with chinz of a pretty pattern. The floor was carpeted and the room had the appearance of one that was used by some member of the household. It was, without doubt, the best located room in the house and appeared to be the best furnished.

"This is Minnie's room," announced Mrs. Gilette.

"What?" asked the Journal man, not thinking he understood aright.

"This is Minnie's room," she reaffirmed. "Every night about 8 o'clock Minnie comes to where I am, pulls on my dress, and then we come up here. She jumps on the bed and I cover her up with the bed clothes, leaving, of course, her head, which is on the pillow, exposed."

"You really mean what you are telling me?"

"Certainly I do. Why should not my sister have a bedroom of her own, I should like to know? When I put Minnie to bed we talk over old times for a while, and then I lock the door, for there is no telling what might happen during the night. Some crank of a scientist might try to steal Minnie. You should remember she is one of the family, and is entitled to all the care she receives. When I leave home to stay over night, I always take Minnie with me, and then she sleeps with me. When she goes out of the house some one is near her all the time to see that no harm comes to her. She has never shown any inclination to catch mice, but instead exhibits fear when my cat brings a dead mouse into the house."

At this time the hour for dinner had arrived, and Mr. Gilette and his farm hands were duly introduced. The Sunday Journal's representative accepted a cordial invitation to stay to dinner. He was not a little surprised when Minnie jumped into a high chair and sat down on her haunches. The plate had been placed in front of Minnie's chair. After serving the Journal man Mrs. Gilette next turned her attention to Minnie. Her meat was cut up and placed on a plate and milk was poured into a large open dish. The cat began eating and behaved itself very genteelly. It did not eat in a ravenous manner, as most animals do. When the meat was placed on the plate it formed an irregular pile. Minnie with her right front paw pulled each separate piece of meat to an unoccupied part of the plate and then ate it. The cat finished its meal before the rest of the family did, but remained in the chair until all left the table.

Mrs. Gilette is firmly convinced that the cat is possessed of her dead sister's spirit, and no power on earth could make her think otherwise.

I must confess that when I found this tale, my first thought was of Saki's short story "Laura." Let us hope Edna and Minnie had a happier ending than that ill-fated otter.

So, you assumed the epic conflict between Elizabeth Tudor and Mary Stuart ended after the two queens went to their graves?

HA!

The "Illustrated Police News" told all in their January 23, 1897 issue:

Two great historical rivals--Queen Elizabeth and Mary Queen of Scots--have lately reappeared in Paris, and Queen Elizabeth has been unfolding the story of her wrongs before a well-known police commissary.

It seems, says a correspondent to the Daily Graphic, that two Parisiennes--one a young and attractive widow, and another a single lady of riper years--went lately to a well-known medium living in one of the rich quarters of Paris. The wizard was unable to tell them much about their future--it would have been well for the elderly lady if she could have done so--but her revelations about their past were truly startling.

"You," she sail to the fair widow, "were once the hapless Queen of Scotland, and you "--she turned sternly to the alarmed spinster--"you are none other than the cruel Elizabeth of England."

Both ladies departed deeply impressed, and that same evening Mary Stuart borrowed a considerable sum from Elizabeth of England as damages due for imprisonment, ill-treatment, and beheading in another age and another body. This was not, however, the end. Mary Stuart next ran off with Elizabeth's nephew, in whom she professed to recognise the soul of Bothwell. Him she married, much to the distress of England's Queen, who objected strongly to receiving Mary Stuart into the bosom of her family, though the discovering of Bothwell's soul made matters historically correct.

The unfortunate Elizabeth was then exploited by both husband and wife, who claimed frequent sums of money on the ground of the ancient historic wrong. She could in no sense call her soul her own, and finally she appealed to the police. The result is that Mary, Bothwell and the medium have all disappeared, and the police much want to find them.

I have no love for any of the Tudors, including the Virgin Queen (there, I said it,) so this tale of Elizabeth's comeuppance--however belated--rather delighted me.  As the saying goes, Karma is a bitch.

Dorothy Eady began life as a pleasantly ordinary little girl, who gave no indication of becoming anything unusual. Then, when she was still a small child, Eady had a terrible fall. This accident sent her tumbling head-first into The Weird.

In 1907, the three-year-old girl fell down a flight of stairs in her London home, and a doctor pronounced her dead. Soon afterward, however, she had a miraculous revival. However, her relieved parents became increasingly disquieted to find that she had become a completely different, and very peculiar, child. Little Dorothy suddenly treated her surroundings with disdain, begging to be “brought home.” She could not express what “home” was until she was brought on a visit to the British Museum. When she saw an exhibit dealing with ancient Egypt, she immediately became very excited, crying, “These are my people.”  When she saw a photograph of the temple of Pharaoh Sety I (1290-1279 BC,) she insisted she had found her old “home.” After that, she haunted the Museum as often as she could, gazing at their Egyptian artifacts, and even reverently kissing the feet of the statues. During one of her visits, she met the great Egyptologist E. A. Wallis Budge, who encouraged her obsession with Egypt and helped her study hieroglyphs. (She later said that she had no need to “learn” hieroglyphs—she just required some help in “remembering” them.)

When she was fifteen, she announced that Sety I had begun visiting her at night. Not surprisingly, this development led her to be placed in sanatoriums several times, but nothing could shake her calm determination that her true life—the only one that mattered at all to her—had been in Sety’s Egypt.

When she was 27, Eady got a job writing for an Egyptian-oriented magazine based in London. During this period, she met an Egyptian student, Eman Abdel Meguid. She married him in 1931, largely, it seems, because he provided her with a way to “return home” to Egypt. Not long after the couple settled in Cairo, they had a son she named Sety. She continued to assert that she was visited by the old Egyptian gods. According to Eady, among these nightly visitors was the god Ho-Ra, who dictated to her the story of her previous existence. According to this account, she had been a girl named Bentreshyt who lived during the reign of Sety I. When she was three, her widowed father placed her in the temple of Kom e-Sultan, where she was raised to be a priestess. Despite the fact that she had taken vows of virginity, when she was still in her early teens she and Sety secretly became lovers. When Bentreshyt learned she was pregnant, she committed suicide rather than face the scandal and probable death sentence.

Eady made no secret of all this—if nothing else, she was always a woman with the courage of her convictions—with the result that her conventional, upper-class husband and in-laws became increasingly spooked by her. In 1935, she and Meguid separated, and she went off to work for the Department of Antiquities, where she impressed everyone with her passion and instinctive skill for Egyptian archaeology. Although she had no formal education on the topic, she wrote many highly-regarded articles and books that gave her a prominent place in contemporary Egyptology.

Eady lived the life of an ancient Egyptian woman to the fullest extent that the 20th-century world permitted. She prayed to the old gods, left offerings at the ruins of their temples, and frequently spent the night in the Great Pyramid, communing with who-knows-what. Unlike most obsessives, however, she maintained a respect for opposing views. She would fast with her Muslim neighbors during Ramadan, celebrate Christmas with the Christians, and cheerfully deflect comments on her eccentricity with the calm certitude of one who is sure she is in the right.

After all, priestesses who are hand-in-glove with the gods don’t need to take guff from anyone.

In 1956, the research project that employed her came to an end, leaving Eady without a job. She accepted—on Sety’s advice, she said—a position as a draftsperson in Abydos. While living there, she became known as “Omm Sety” (“Mother of Sety”) a designation she greatly preferred over her birth name. Although her new position paid poorly, she reveled in it, because she believed she had lived in Abydos’ Temple of Sety in her previous life. Even the many skeptics around her were amazed by her intimate knowledge of the site—often, knowledge that she could not have obtained by any conventional means. Although most were reluctant to believe that she had gained this knowledge from her incarnation as a priestess, they were at a loss to explain how she had gained it.

For the first time since her fateful tumble down the stairs those many years ago, Eady was happy and at peace. After all those centuries of waiting, she felt she had finally come home. She was also comforted by the belief that if she led a “chaste” life, that would atone for the “sin” she had committed in her previous incarnation.

Her deep knowledge of Egyptian folklore gained her something of a local reputation as a healer, or “white witch.” The locals would come to her with their illnesses or personal problems, and she would use rituals from the Pyramid Texts or folk medicine to cure them. She claimed a 100% success rate. “Magic in ancient Egypt was a science,” she once said. “It was really magic, and it worked.” She concentrated on using her powers for good, rather than evil, although there are some hints that if someone deliberately harmed her, she could and did dish out highly unusual forms of payback. She had a particular aptitude for documenting how many practices followed throughout the Middle East in the present day are directly related to ancient Egyptian customs.

Eady worked for the Antiquities Department until 1969. She translated and cataloged inscriptions found on the ruins, prepared drawings of the Temple of Sety’s architecture, and assisted archaeologists with their excavations. (She was considered “indispensable” for any serious archaeological mission in the Abydos area.) Her co-workers were awed by her “uncanny sixth sense” about the Temple and its surroundings. She claimed to often have “astral dreams” where she traveled back to Egypt as it had been in her former life—visions that always proved to be unsettlingly accurate. After her retirement, she remained a consultant for the Department, as well as a tour guide for the Temple. She stated that she still received visits from Sety, whom she saw as a source of advice and encouragement throughout her current existence.

As Eady grew older, she became an increasingly well-known and respected figure in Egyptologist circles. Although her spiritual beliefs were never fully accepted, they were at least tolerated. Her health became increasingly fragile, but for one who is convinced this life is just a progression to the next, death is nothing to dread. She only shrugged that when she came before Osiris for judgment, he “will probably give me a few dirty looks because I know I’ve committed some things I shouldn’t have.” Because both the Muslim and Christian cemeteries would not bury someone they considered “a heathen,” she built her own underground tomb, engraved with an ancient offering prayer.

Eady died on April 21, 1981. Unfortunately, the local health department refused to allow her to be buried in the tomb she had so carefully prepared, so she instead lies in an unmarked grave outside a Coptic graveyard.

Eady’s conviction that her knowledge of ancient Egypt stemmed from personal experience is, of course, far from universally accepted. However, there are no doubts about the quality of her scholarship. Scholar Kent Weeks wrote that as an ethnographer, she “has had few equals.” Conventional historians and archaeologists could not help but respect the depth and accuracy of her descriptions of Egypt’s ancient past. She was an intelligent, level-headed person who took her work very seriously, but approached life itself with a healthy dose of humor. In short, she was utterly unlike the stereotypical crackpot.

Perhaps the best answer for the mystery of Omm Sety came from writer William Golding, who met many Egyptologists who had known Eady. Golding reported that while they couldn’t quite bring themselves to believe she had truly been a reincarnated temple priestess, they all had to admit that “she had something.”

From the Illustrated Police News, October 8, 1892, via Newspapers.com

Meet Miss Vint, beloved Crazy Cat Lady Emeritus, and a woman with an admirably open-minded sense of family ties. From the "Royal Cornwall Gazette," October 6, 1892:

It is probably to no small extent due to the circumstance that she is not a rich woman that Miss Vint, of Eden-gardens, Walworth, is permitted to enjoy the sweets of liberty. If, instead of a modest income of but little more than a hundred per annum, she were possessed of thousands of pounds, and in place of having no relatives at all she were blessed with kith and kin that took as lively an interest in her affairs as in their own, it is not impossible that her present place of residence would be Hanwell or Colney Hatch, which would be a thousand pities, as well on the harmless lady's own account as on that of her feline friends and companions, who share with her the comforts of home.

Regarded as a cat case, that of Miss Vint differs widely from some lately brought under magisterial notice. The lady in question is not a person selfishly eccentric in the matter of tabbies and tortoiseshells, harbouring them indiscriminately, and in such a way that they become a nuisance, calling for the interference of the sanitary inspector. Although Miss Vint owns and houses several cats, male and female, the most fastidious next-door neighbours could establish no just ground of complaint against them. They are a highly respectable and cleanly family of pussies, eschewing low company, and having nothing to say to the loose-living, prowling vagabonds of their kind haunting the locality, and who, no doubt, would take delight in demoralising them.

I am not speaking from hearsay. I have been honoured with an interview with Miss Vint, who first questioning me as to my belief in the doctrines of Pythagoras, and satisfying herself that my faith in that ancient philosopher was unassailable, introduced me to her subjects. I have stated that Miss Vint has no relatives; but that, as she regards it, is scarcely correct. She has a mother and father, an aunt Deborah, a sister, and two brothers, all of whom have departed biped life, but live again in feline form, and are dependent on her, their only human relief, to provide for and make them comfortable. I may mention that Miss Vint is a maiden lady, prim and neat, tall, with silvery hair worn in old-fashioned French curls, with a mild and pleasing manner, and, barring cats, I verily believe, as sane as Solomon.

Of the way in which she first became imbued with a belief in transmigration, Miss Vint is reluctant to speak. She admitted, however, that it came to her through her grandmother, of whom she was particularly fond. The old lady, it seemed, when in the flesh had, amongst many more, three peculiarities: grey eyes, that were of not exactly the same colour, a wart on her nose, and a terror of lucifer matches. Up to the last she stuck to the old flint-and-steel method of obtaining a light, the sharp crackling sound caused by striking a lucifer match causing her a nervous shock from which she did not recover for hours afterwards. Her grandmother lived in Devonshire, and on the very day, before Miss Vint was made aware of the demise of her aged relative, there mysteriously appeared to her a kitten. The chamber door being shut and locked, and Miss Vint not having as yet risen from her couch, there suddenly leapt upon it the animal mentioned. It purred at the pillow, and commenced to mew plaintively, whereon Miss Vint opened her eyes, and the kitten at the same moment expanding hers, the lady was instantly struck by the discovery that it had eyes of the grey of her grandmother, and that one of them was a shade lighter in hue than the other, From Kitty's optics, Miss Vint glanced at its pink little nose, and lo! there was a wart? It was winter-time, and scarcely daylight, and with a strange sensation creeping over bar, she leant out of bed to strike a light and as she did so the kitten uttered a cry of affright, and leaping down from the counterpane ran to hide in a distant corner.

Such evidences were, to an unbiased mind, irresistible, and Miss Vint waited only to hear that her grandmother had ceased to exist within a few minutes of the appearance of the kitten on the bed, when she literally took the creature to her bosom, regarding it as a sacred duty to adopt it. Her own mother and father being dead, it was but natural that she should wonder whether they too existed in similar bodily tenements. Bearing in mind those of their characteristics that would most "likely reappear" in animal shape--her father was lame in his left foot--only a short time elapsed before she recovered both her parents, and within a very few months her Aunt Deborah as well. If anything was needed to convince Miss Vint that it was really her own mother in catskin she was cherishing, it was provided when the animal in question put in an uninvited appearance. Aunt Deborah, it seemed, and old Mrs. Vint could never agree in human life. The former was a cross-grained, red-haired woman, and afflicted with a squint, and so was the cat that, forcing its way into the premises and refusing to be "hished" away, pertinaciously picked a quarrel with its whilom sister and fought and scratched her. Had it been a simple question of preserving peace and quietness, Miss Vint, as she herself assured me, would have got rid of the carroty creature by some means or other; but the feelings of a niece prevailed with her, and she permitted it to remain.

Miss Vint's feline relatives had each for its domicile one of a range of boxes, comfortable and capacious, fixed pigeon-hole fashion against the further wall of her large kitchen. A soft bed of hay was provided, and above every doorway appeared the name of the occupier. "Aunt Deborah's" name so appeared, and she was at home. A strong, wrong-headed, sulky-looking cat, she arched her back and spat at me when I attempted to stroke her. "I am sadly afraid," Miss Vint remarked in an undertone and with a sigh, as we turned away from the boxes and returned to the fireplace, "that I shall always have trouble with her." "Is she, then, in the habit of misbehaving herself?" "She is a wicked, wicked creature," whispered the poor lady. "A thief perhaps?" She glanced round, expecting, I believe, that the carrotty cat was listening, and then, screening her mouth with her hand, replied, "Worse, far worse than that. She is a murderess. She killed her own mother--the kind old soul I told you of, and who originally died in Devonshire. She ought, no doubt, to have been long ago dealt with according to law, but the puzzle is, to what law is she answerable? Anyhow, it would be a hard thing for a niece to denounce her aunt, whatever her shape, for such a terrible crime." "But then, again, it might have been an accident." "You are very kind," returned Miss Vint gratefully, "to make such a suggestion, but unfortunately I myself witnessed it, and a more cruel or cold-blooded deed was never committed. She was, as usual, wrangling with her sister when dear old granny interfered, and she at once flew at her, and, seizing her by the throat, strangled her before I could separate them. It has weighed heavily on my mind ever since. It is two years ago, but I feel that I can never forgive her."

"And what as to the other members of your interesting family?--your transmigrated sister, and your three brothers--are they tolerably tractable?" " Well, thank goodness," said Miss Vint, "they give me scarcely any trouble at all. As for my ' Sister Minnie,' no creature, human or otherwise, could be more faithful or affectionate." She called "Minnie, Minnie," and quite a handsome large white cat jumped down from its box, and gracefully leaping first up its mistress's extended arm, and then on her shoulder, putting its cheek against hers. "And by what sign or taken were you able to identify Minnie as your 'departed sister?'" 'Well, that I am scarcely able to explain," she made answer, as she caressed her feline relative. "It was more the prompting of nature than anything else. My dear sister had blue eyes--she was seventeen when she died--a pretty, mincing way of walking, and this darling had the same. There was nothing else, that just drew us together, except that Minnie, my sister, used to take pride in a pink sash worn over her white frock, and Minnie, when she first came here and scratched at the parlour window, had a pink ribbon tied round her throat. She returned her "sister Minnie "' to her box and called "Micah," and gravely introduced the speckled animal to me as her elder brother. The feline Micah was excessively fat and whiskerless, and, as Miss Vint declared, such a living likeness of the firstborn of her respected parents that she recognised him at first sight. It was fortunate that she was able to do so. It was more than a mile distant from Eden-gardens; and the wretched cat was being stoned to death by ragamuffin boys when the identification took place; and the boys were instantly routed and "Micah" rescued.

Observing another box labelled "Job," I inquired for the animal hearing that name, and Miss Vint's face at once assumed an anxious expression. "Conscientiously," she remarked, "I have some doubts respecting Master Job. "As to his being deserving of your confidence and protection, do you mean ?" "Oh, he would be quite welcome to both, of course, if I could feel quite certain as to his previous life, but I must own that at times I am troubled with doubts. The points of resemblance are more in character than in features. Job, my own brother, was not a steady lad. He got into trouble with a young woman before he was twenty-three and ran away and went to sea, and the only letter ever received from him was one that bore the Persian post-mark. That is many years ago, and, as I need not tell you, it made me very anxious, he being my only remaining relative. My belief is, however," and the lady placed her hand on my arm and looked wondrous wise, "that Job Vint died at sea, probably in the Persian Gulf, on the night of February 7th, 1887." "And what is it that enables you to fix the date so exactly?" "Because, sir, that night I was awoke by cries of distress, as of a creature struggling for its life, and, opening the staircase window, near which is this cistern, the lid of which my maid had accidentally left open the day before, there saw, gasping for breath and in the act of sinking, a Persian cat and as it opened its month I observed that it was deficient of some of its front teeth, which was the case with my brother Job, who had lost them in fighting when a boy. I saved its life and took it in, and from that moment called it Job, and treated it as such. But I don't know!" and she shook her grey curls dubiously. "His propensity for roaming is certainly like that of my younger brother, but he was always fond of me, and the cat is not. The only person he shows any regard for is the cat's-meat man, and he would sooner sleep of nights in the dustbin than in his comfortable bed here. I may have made a mistake, but if 1 have," and Miss Vint brightened up, "thank goodness, it is the only one." I did not have the heart to contradict her.

I, myself, would never dream of contradicting Miss Vint. I hope she and her resurrected relatives had a long and happy life together.  (Well, maybe except for Aunt Deborah.)

And that putting her family tree together later gave genealogists fits.