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¦'¦ '" I have talent and knowledge enough to furnish a dwelling for friendship , but not enough to deck with golden gifts a Delphi for the world . Avan ^ "' Then a woman of tact and brilliancy like me , has an undtw advantage in conversion with men . They are astonished at our instincts . They do not see EewegotTur knowledge ; and , while they tramp on in their clumsywaywe wheel and fly , and dart hirer and thither , and seize with ^ ready eye all the weak 3 like Saladin in the desert . It is quite another thmg when we come to S , and , , without Buggestionfrom another mind ,, to declare the positive amount of thought that is in us . Because we seemed to know all , they think we can tell all and , finding we can tell so little , lose faith in their first opinion of us , whxch , nathless , was true . '" Again : —
"' I like to hear you express your sense of my defects . The word ' arrogance does not , indeed , appear to me to be just ; probably because I do not understand what you mean . But in due time I doubtless shall ; for so repeatedly have you used it , that it must stand for something real in my large and rich , yet irregular and unclarified nature . But though I like to hear you , as I say , and think somehow your reproof does me good , by myself I return to my native bias ; and feel as if there was plenty of room in the universe for my faults , and as if I could not spend time in thinking of them , when no many things interest me more . I have no defiance or coldness , however , as to these spiritual facts which I do not know ; but I must follow my . own law , and bide my time , even if , like CEdipus , I should return a criminal , blind and outcast , to ask aid from the gods . Such possibilities , I confess , give me great awe ; for I have more sense than most , of the tragic depths that may open suddenly in the life . '"
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BOOKS ON OUR TABLE . The Jew of Denmark . By M . Goldschmidt . George Rontledge Chambers * Pocket Miscellany . W . and B . Chambers The Rambler . Burns and Lambert The Portrait Gallery . W . S . Orr and Co The Half Century ; its XRstory , Political and Social . By"W . Wilks . C . Gilpin Plato Translated , by Surges . H . GL Bonn Geology and Scripture . By P . Smith . H . G . Bphn The battles of the Navy . ByJoseph Allen , Esq . H ; G . Bonn Crime and Insanity ; their Causes , Connexion * , and Consequences . By B . M . Burnett , Mvl > . . ' ,.: ¦• . ... - . Saniuel Highly The Riseand Progress ofNational Education in England . By Richard Church .
John Chapinan History of ike American " Revolution . By George Banoroft . Vol I . Bichard Bentley Rights and Duties qf Property . Bv John Sangster . . Whittaker and Co The Rambler . A Catholic Journal and Review . Borna and Lambert Mons . Guizot ; or , Democracy , Oligarchy , and'Monarch y * By C . Iiaelius . Chios . Eoi Discourses on Various Subjects .. By Samuel Bailey . Longman and Co The Upper Ten Thousand . Reprinted from Fraser ' s Magazine . John W . Parkef & Son IAfe of Constantine the Great-. By Joseph Fletcher . Albert CpekshaW The Works of Sir Joshm Reynolds . By H . TV . Beechey . H . G . Bphn Some Thoughts about the School of the j&uture . By the . Bev . Foster Barham Zincke . Lougman and Co A Treatise on ike Sugar and Sugar Apparatus of the Great Exhibition . By J . Scofijen . ¦ - Cooke and "WMtley
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MAGNETIC EVENINGS AT HOME . Letteb II . *— -To G . H . Lewes . The experiment to which I referred , at the close of my last letter , as being of a more extraordinary nature than any we had yet beheld , was this : — Our host proposed to make V— exhibit all the effects of having taken poison—any poison I chose to indicate- —by magnetizing a glass of water , with the will that she should believe , on drinking it , that she was really drinking a poisonous liquid . Before , however , the experiment began , he made two provisos . The first was , that I should select no poison , the
effects of which were immediately fatal when it was taken in ordinary doses ; the second , that instead of whispering the name of the poison chosen to him , or afterwards to my friends , I should write it down on a piece of paper , and only show that paper to him and to them . The Count insisted on this arrangement , as tending to prevent the possibility of any deception , in case we might still suspect that V could overhear what was said in the room , even when none of us were placed in communication with her . These preliminaries agreed on , a sheet of paper was placed before me , and a glass of water was procured from a jug standing on the sideboard , out of which some of the persons present had already been drinking .
The poison I chose , and wrote down , was Strychnine . In the first place , I knew that this poison was not immediately fatal ; and , in the second place , I was aware that " cases" exhibiting its effects were rare in medical practice , and that , consequently , those eff ects must be little , if at all , known to " the general public . " When the Count read what I had written , he shook his head , as a sign that he was unacquainted with the nature of Strychnine , and asked me whether I was quite sure that I had strictly complied with the terms of his first proviso : if I had any doubt on the subject , he said he would decline pursuing the experiment ; for he dared not assume a responsibility which , under those circumstances , might perhaps lead to a fatal result ., I reassured him on this point ; and he then magnetized the glass of water without further delay .
When it was given to V s . he smelt it ; an expression of disgust came over her face ; and she refused to drink . It was only after the Count had made several . passes over her , and had insisted on her obeying him , that she could be induced to tnste the water . Then , in obedience to the irresistible influence of his will on hers , she drank a very small quantity , with extreme reluctance , and with a visible contraction of the throat after each
sip . When the water was taken away ; I put myself in cptamunicitio with her , and asked what was the taste of the liquid she hacl ; just bee imbibing . She answered , rather faintly : "An intensely bitter taste . " a + the same moment , I looked carefully at her complexion , and touched h hand and cheek : as yet , there was rip appearance whatever of unusual paleness , and the temperature of : her skin was at it ' s natural degree of warmth ; ¦ ' ••¦ . ¦ ¦ ¦ ' ' ¦ : ¦¦ \' /; /¦ ' ; ' ¦ ' ¦ ' " ' " ' : '' . ' ¦¦ ¦' . '" " " ' ' : '' '¦ ¦' " ¦ ¦ ' ' ¦ '' ¦/¦ ' ' r Soon , while we watched heri we saw that she began to move uneasily from side to side in her chair . Th 0 n ' she . took- ' b ^ liftu ^^ GdW , ; : «] id ^ p ^ her lips with it ; repeating this action incessantly , though was not the slightest moisture about her mouth . fiefr complexion got paler and paler , until at last it grew perfectly livid—livid to her very lips . I touched
her face now : her skin had become cold and clarrimy . I took her handit felt like the hand of a corpse . Ere longf—while she still wiped her mouth from time to time , and Still moved painfully frorii side to side in her chair— -spasmodiecontractionsappeared about hei brow arid lips , and sprea d to her chest , her shoulders , and her arms . Her legs , too , began to stretch out rigidly before her ; and she complained , in a faint , gasping whisper , of violent pains in the abdomen , and of a disposition to vomit . We lifted her eyelids , and found that her eyeballs wer dilaited ; the pupils being in . sensible , arid turned far Upward . The dullj , glassy glare of the distorted eye was positively fearful to behold . What further symptoms might have soon appeared , it is impossible to say ; for , at this point , we all agreed that the expeririient must stop . It was theri about ten minutes fjfojn the time when she had first tasted the magnetizedwater . the her
She was relieved—but very slowly- ^ of pain m stomach , by passes ; and after that , complained of / a sensation of coldness arid numbness in her legs . When this also had been removed , she begged for something to quench a great thirst that she felt ; and being asked what drink she wished for , answered ; " Lukewarm-milk . " The Cottnt poured out a fresh glass of water , magnetized it , and gave it to he ** She eagerly -drank it off at a draught ; and , in answer to a question from me , said tfyat she vras drinking lukewarm riiilk . After this , she sank back in the chair ; and , desiring to be left to repose , appeared to fall ittimediately' into a deep sleep . Before she was restored to this state of tranquillity she had engaged the magnetizer ' s unremitting attention for double the time lie had ever occupied before * in recovering her froin experiments of a similar nature .
The next morning , I consulted Taylor ' s Medical Jurisprudence ( Ed . 3 , 184 ft , pp . 181—183 ) , to ascertain exactly what were the sj ^ nptottis of poisoning by Strychnine . For 4 ; he information of persons , unacquainted with chemistry , it must be premised , that Strychnin * is nothing ' but a concentration of the poisonous properties of Nux Vomica , wm ' cli Taylor states to have " an intensely bitter taste' *— -the very taste , observe , that V- ¦" - complained of to me . The first case related 6 fptoistiriing by Strychnine , is that of a young man , aged seventeen , who took forty grains (!); and died in an hour and a half after swallowing this tremendous dose of poison , the first symptoms having appeared in a quarter of an hour . The second case is the case of Dr . Warner , who died in fourteen minutes from the
effect of the smallest dose on record—half-a-grain .. A thitd instance us then cited of a person who recovered from a dose of seven grains . Thus it appears , from medical evidence , that the quantity of Strychnine ' required to destroy life , the time when symptoms of having taken it first appear , and the period that elapses before a dose becomes fatal , vary so much ill different persons , as to defy any previous computation whatever . Among the symptoms exhibited by the young man who'took the dose ol . forty grains , Taylor describes ^—lividness of the' skltij prontiriericeof the eyeballs , dilatation arid insensibility of the pupils , and spasms of the chest . Among the symptoms of poisoning by Nux Vomica ( which the author of Medical Jurisprudence informs us " closely resemble" those of poisoning by Strychnine ) are mentioned—vomiting , pain in the abdomen , and a stretching out of the limbs . We have here , then , no less than seven symptoms ,
detailed on medical authority , as symptoms produced by taking the poison that I wrote down for our magnetic experience ' , every bne of which we saw exhibited by V . Others of a more aggravated nature might have appeared , had we not stopped the experiment when we did . I , for one , never desire to witness its repetition , under any circumstances whatever . Now , how are we to account for such a phenomenon as I have just described ? People who keep a large stock of ready-made assertions always on hand to answer any emergency , would solve the mystery at once , by saying that V was acting . Setting aside , for mere argument sake , the weight of evidence ' which the character of the young lady lierscif , an ^ ° * the friends under whose care she was living , would bring to bear against
the possibility of any . deception being practised by her , —what am I obliged to believe , if I believe that she was acting ? First , I must believe that ( she is the most consummate acjtress in Europe ; for I have , never seen , on the stage , any simulation of the physical effects of poison-taking comparable for a moment to her simulation . Rachel ' s performance in the last act ol " Adrienne Lccouvreur" was , in regard to those parts of it which were confined to the simple representation of the outward effect of poison on t » ° human frame , tricky > nd artificial by comparison with V * - '*> Secondly , remembering that I saw with my own eyes the livid pftleiiess come ovet V—' s face , and felt with my own hands the clammy coldness of her » , * must believe that , at little more than a minute ' s notice , she could act aw » y all colour from her cheeks , and act away the natural vital warmth froin htit handj »~~» perfection of histrionic art to which no Other actress , from " '
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We should do our utmost to encourage the Beautiful , for the Useful encourages itself . —Goethe .
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* Seo Leader , No . 05 . '
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160 THE IiEA 3 E > EB > : ^ C ^^
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Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 14, 1852, page 160, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1922/page/20/
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