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The Freemasons' Monthly Magazine, Aug. 17, 1861: Page 14

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    Article NOTES ON LITERATURE SCIENCE AND ART. ← Page 2 of 3 →
Page 14

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Notes On Literature Science And Art.

civilisation and art—to claim admiration for much that they despised , and a broader , more tolerant , and more genial interpretation of nature ancl life than they would have allowed . " Mr . Thomas Hutchinson , in his Ten Years' Wanderings among the Ethiopians , ivith Sketches of the Manners and Customs of the Civilized aud Uncivilized Tribes , from Senegal to Gaboon , gives the

following account of " a reprisal execution" which he witnessed at Bonny , by getting ashore soon in the morning , and secreting himself about the place where he heard it was about to take place . We quote this horrid tale to show what work there is for us in the

world if ( as every true Mason must ) we wish to leave the world better than we found it . Even supposing , for charity ' s sake , that Mr . Hutchinson was mistaken with regard to the cannibalism of the poor degraded people ( though we are afraid he was not ) , there yet remains proofs of bloodthirstiness more becoming tigers than the human race . But to our tale : — "As I looked through the slit in the Avail on tho space between my place of concealment and the

ju-ju house , I observed no change from its appearance the evening before . No gibbet , nor axe , nor gallows , nor rope—no kind of preparation , nothing significant of death , save the skulls in the pillars of ju-ju house , that seemed leering at me with an expression at once strange and vacant . It would have been a relief in the awful stillness of the place to have heard something of what I had read of the preparations for an execution in Liverpool or London—of the hammering

suggestive of driving nails into scaffold , drop , or coffin—of a crowd gathering round the place before early dawn—and of the solemn tolling of the boll that chimed another soul into eternity . Everything seemed as if nothing beyond the routine of daily like Avere to take place . Could it be that I had been misinformed—that the ceremony was adjourned to another time , or was to he carried out elsewhere ? No . A distant murmur of gabbling voices was heard

approaching nearer and nearer , till , passing the corner house on my left , I saw a group of negroes . An indiscriminate crowd of all ages ancl both sexes , so huddled together that no person whom I could particularly distinguish as either executioner or culprit was visible amongst them . But above their clattering talk came the sound of a clanking chain that made me shudder . They stopped in the middle of the square opposite the ju-ju houseancl ceased

, talking . One commanding voice uttered a single word , and clown they sat upon the grass , forming a circle round two figures , standing upright in the centre— -the executioner and the man about to be killed . The former was remarkable only by the black skull-cup which he had on him , ancl by a common cutlass ivhich he held in hand . Tho latter had chains round his neck , his wrists , and his ankles . There was no sign of fear or cowardice about him—no

¦ seeming consciousness of the dreadful fate before him—no evidence , even upon his face , of that dogged stubbornness which is said to be exhibited hy some persons about to undergo an ignominious death . Save that he stood upright , one would scarcely have known that he was alive . Amongst the spectators , too , there was a silent impassiveness which was appalling . Not a word , nor gesture , nor glance of sympathy , that could make me believe I looked at beings who liad a vestige of humanity amongst them . As the ju-ju butcher

stepped backed and measured his distance to make an effectual swoop at his victim ' s neck the man moved not a muscle , but stood as if he were unconscious—till—chop ! the first blow felled him to the ground . The noise of a chopper falling on meat is familiar to most people . No other sound was here—none from the man , not a whisper nor a murmur from thoso who were seated about ! I was nearly crying out in mental agony , and the sound of that first stroke will haunt my ears to my ding day . How I wished

y some one to talk or scream , to destroy the impression of that fearful hough , and the still more awful silence that followed it . Again the weapon was raised to continue the decapitation—another blow as she man lay prostrate , ancl then a sound broke the silence ! But , oh , Father of Mercy ! of what a kind was that noise—a gurgle ancl gasp accompanying the dying sjiasvn of the struck-down man . Once more the weapon was lifted— I saw the blood flow in gory horror down the blade to the butcher ' s hand , and there it was

visible in God ' s bright sunshine to the whole host of heaven . Not a word had yet been uttered by the crowd . More chopping and cleaving , and the head , severed from . tho body , was put , by the ju-ju executioner , into a calabash , which was carried off by one of his women to he cooked . He then repeated another calabastic word , perhaps the same as at first , and directly all who were seated rose up , whilst he walked away . A yell , such as reminded me of a company of tigers , arose from the multitude—cutlasses were

flourished as they crowded round the body ofthe dead man—sounds of cutting and chopping arose amidst tiie clamour of the voices , and I began to question myself whether , if I were on the other side of the river Styx , I should see what I was looking at here through

the little slit in the wall of my hiding place ?—A crowd of human vultures gloating over the headless corse of a murdered brother negro—boys and girls walking away from the crowd , holding- pi ' sces of bleeding flesh in their hands , while the dripping life-fluid -narked their road as they went along ; and one women snapping from the hands of another—both of them raising their voices in clamoura part of the body of that poor man , in whom the breath of life was vi not a quarter of an hour ago ! The whole of the

gourous body was at last divided , ancl nothing left behind hut the blood . The intestines were taken away to be given to an iguana—the Bonnyman ' s tutelary guardian . But the blood was still here , in glistening pools , though no more notice was taken of it by the gradually dispersing crowd , than if it- were a thing as common in that town as Heaven ' s bright dew is elsewhere .

Dr . Karl Scherger , in the first volume of his Narrative of the Circumnavigation of the Globe by the Austrian Frigate " Novara , " gives an account of the vine disease in Maderia , ivhich will be interesting to those of our readers who like a glass of good wine , wi * h ripe grapes for dessert , as who does not ? The doctor says : — " Though the ield of the vine had been decreasingyear after

y , year , for a considerable time , yet the actual vine disease only made its appearance in 1852 , when the leaves ancl fruit ivere covered with a kind of fungus ( O'idium Tuclceri ) like a white dust . The Portuguese Government sent a commission for the purpose of investigating the causes of the calamity . The report is not decisive on the point , whether the fungus is the real cause or only a symptom of the diseasenor does it offer advice as to how it he checked .

, any may Dr . Hermann Schacht , who resided during a period of eighteen months in the island , and has published a valuable treatise , states that the vine-disease appears there in the same form as in Germany , even as regards the season , which is soon after the blossom disappears . At first the young leaf is covered with a whitish matter , chiefly on its lower side ; it then assumes a crumpled appearance , becomes spotted , and at last decays . The young diseased grape

likewise becomes covered with a white dust , at first partially , ancl then entirely , the green skin by degrees assuming a brown colour , the grape increasing at the same time in size , until it is as large as a currant , or a small cherry , when it becomes black , ancl perishes together with its diseased - . stock . In this decayed condition the grapes remain on the vine till late in the Autumn . Dr . Schacht was successful in arresting the progress of the disease in its earlier stagesby washing all parts of the plant with a solution ; consisting

, of one part of glue to sixteen parts of water ; an operation which had heen likewise performed with good effect in the Royal hothouses of Sans-souci in Prussia . He rubbed the leaves ancl grape infected by the fungus with this solution , and , where possible , clipped the grapes in it . The solution very soon dried , and gave grapes ancl leaves a glossy appearance . All that had once been

operated upon in this way remained in a healthy condition , and even those affected by tho fungus recovered beneath the crust , the operation thus seeming to afford protection against the fungus . The practice of strewing the plant over with powdered sulphur , which was so much lauded , seems to be of little use . At Tenerifi ' e , Dr . Schacht found the fungus widely spread , notwithstanding the application of sulphur . Keeping the grape close upon the ground is also recommended as a protection against the disease , having

proved very successful in the south . The pecuniary loss sustained since the first appearance of the malady amounted in the autumn of 1853 to 1 , 137 , 990 Spanish piastres ( £ 190 , 000 ) , and after having waited in vain a period of five years , for a better state of things , the impoverished landowners entirely gave up cultivating the vine . A traveller who chances now to visit Madeira can scarcely believe that but a few years ago the greater portion of tho island was covered with the plant . The cause of its disappearance must ,

however , not be ascribed entirely to the disease , but partly also to the utter neglect of its culture in favour of that of other products , so much so , that of late is was scarcely possible to procure a sufficient quantity of grapes for invalids to whom they were medicinally prescribed . Moreover , the sugar plantations , ivhich annual ! y increase in extent , have contributed to the destruction of the vines as the former require irrigation , which causes the roots of the latter to rot in the humid ground . " >

Mr . James Hannay , in his recently-collected Fssays from the Quarterly Review , says : —" For a long time it was an established tradition in literature that the 'life' of a man of letters must necessarily he a dull hook . How the theory originated—in what hour of dejection some melancholy writer broached it—we have not been able to learn . But nothing is more certain than its success , ancl , what is more , that it had practical effects on biography . The

dearth of ' incidents' was supposed to be the fatal element in the history of the class , ancl had become a 'trite' remark among biographers when Mason undertook his Memoirs of Gray . Mason himself ( who was no common man ) evidently felt the benumbing

“The Freemasons' Monthly Magazine: 1861-08-17, Page 14” Masonic Periodicals Online, Library and Museum of Freemasonry, 9 June 2025, django:8000/periodicals/mmr/issues/mmr_17081861/page/14/.
  • List
  • Grid
Title Category Page
CLASSICAL THEOLOGY.—XLTV. Article 1
MEMOIRS OF THE FREEMASONS OF NAPLES. Article 2
MASONIC ADVENTURE. Article 3
ARCHITECTURE AND ARCHAÆOLOGY. Article 4
ARTISTIC LABOUR AT THE BUILDING OF ST. PAUL'S CATHEDRAL. Article 6
GENERAL ARCHITECTURAL INTELLIGENCE. Article 6
MEMORIAL TO BRO. SIR CHARLES BARRY. Article 8
CAVOUR AN ENGINEER. Article 10
THE GEORGE STREET "MODEL." * Article 10
MASONIC NOTES AND QUERIES. Article 12
NOTES ON LITERATURE SCIENCE AND ART. Article 13
CORRESPONDENCE. Article 15
THE MASONIC BANQUET AT NORWICH. Article 15
THE MASONIC MIRROR. Article 16
GRAND LODGE. Article 16
PROVINCIAL. Article 16
SCOTLAND. Article 17
PUBLIC AMUSEMENTS. Article 18
THE WEEK. Article 18
TO CORRESPONDENTS. Article 20
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.

Notes On Literature Science And Art.

civilisation and art—to claim admiration for much that they despised , and a broader , more tolerant , and more genial interpretation of nature ancl life than they would have allowed . " Mr . Thomas Hutchinson , in his Ten Years' Wanderings among the Ethiopians , ivith Sketches of the Manners and Customs of the Civilized aud Uncivilized Tribes , from Senegal to Gaboon , gives the

following account of " a reprisal execution" which he witnessed at Bonny , by getting ashore soon in the morning , and secreting himself about the place where he heard it was about to take place . We quote this horrid tale to show what work there is for us in the

world if ( as every true Mason must ) we wish to leave the world better than we found it . Even supposing , for charity ' s sake , that Mr . Hutchinson was mistaken with regard to the cannibalism of the poor degraded people ( though we are afraid he was not ) , there yet remains proofs of bloodthirstiness more becoming tigers than the human race . But to our tale : — "As I looked through the slit in the Avail on tho space between my place of concealment and the

ju-ju house , I observed no change from its appearance the evening before . No gibbet , nor axe , nor gallows , nor rope—no kind of preparation , nothing significant of death , save the skulls in the pillars of ju-ju house , that seemed leering at me with an expression at once strange and vacant . It would have been a relief in the awful stillness of the place to have heard something of what I had read of the preparations for an execution in Liverpool or London—of the hammering

suggestive of driving nails into scaffold , drop , or coffin—of a crowd gathering round the place before early dawn—and of the solemn tolling of the boll that chimed another soul into eternity . Everything seemed as if nothing beyond the routine of daily like Avere to take place . Could it be that I had been misinformed—that the ceremony was adjourned to another time , or was to he carried out elsewhere ? No . A distant murmur of gabbling voices was heard

approaching nearer and nearer , till , passing the corner house on my left , I saw a group of negroes . An indiscriminate crowd of all ages ancl both sexes , so huddled together that no person whom I could particularly distinguish as either executioner or culprit was visible amongst them . But above their clattering talk came the sound of a clanking chain that made me shudder . They stopped in the middle of the square opposite the ju-ju houseancl ceased

, talking . One commanding voice uttered a single word , and clown they sat upon the grass , forming a circle round two figures , standing upright in the centre— -the executioner and the man about to be killed . The former was remarkable only by the black skull-cup which he had on him , ancl by a common cutlass ivhich he held in hand . Tho latter had chains round his neck , his wrists , and his ankles . There was no sign of fear or cowardice about him—no

¦ seeming consciousness of the dreadful fate before him—no evidence , even upon his face , of that dogged stubbornness which is said to be exhibited hy some persons about to undergo an ignominious death . Save that he stood upright , one would scarcely have known that he was alive . Amongst the spectators , too , there was a silent impassiveness which was appalling . Not a word , nor gesture , nor glance of sympathy , that could make me believe I looked at beings who liad a vestige of humanity amongst them . As the ju-ju butcher

stepped backed and measured his distance to make an effectual swoop at his victim ' s neck the man moved not a muscle , but stood as if he were unconscious—till—chop ! the first blow felled him to the ground . The noise of a chopper falling on meat is familiar to most people . No other sound was here—none from the man , not a whisper nor a murmur from thoso who were seated about ! I was nearly crying out in mental agony , and the sound of that first stroke will haunt my ears to my ding day . How I wished

y some one to talk or scream , to destroy the impression of that fearful hough , and the still more awful silence that followed it . Again the weapon was raised to continue the decapitation—another blow as she man lay prostrate , ancl then a sound broke the silence ! But , oh , Father of Mercy ! of what a kind was that noise—a gurgle ancl gasp accompanying the dying sjiasvn of the struck-down man . Once more the weapon was lifted— I saw the blood flow in gory horror down the blade to the butcher ' s hand , and there it was

visible in God ' s bright sunshine to the whole host of heaven . Not a word had yet been uttered by the crowd . More chopping and cleaving , and the head , severed from . tho body , was put , by the ju-ju executioner , into a calabash , which was carried off by one of his women to he cooked . He then repeated another calabastic word , perhaps the same as at first , and directly all who were seated rose up , whilst he walked away . A yell , such as reminded me of a company of tigers , arose from the multitude—cutlasses were

flourished as they crowded round the body ofthe dead man—sounds of cutting and chopping arose amidst tiie clamour of the voices , and I began to question myself whether , if I were on the other side of the river Styx , I should see what I was looking at here through

the little slit in the wall of my hiding place ?—A crowd of human vultures gloating over the headless corse of a murdered brother negro—boys and girls walking away from the crowd , holding- pi ' sces of bleeding flesh in their hands , while the dripping life-fluid -narked their road as they went along ; and one women snapping from the hands of another—both of them raising their voices in clamoura part of the body of that poor man , in whom the breath of life was vi not a quarter of an hour ago ! The whole of the

gourous body was at last divided , ancl nothing left behind hut the blood . The intestines were taken away to be given to an iguana—the Bonnyman ' s tutelary guardian . But the blood was still here , in glistening pools , though no more notice was taken of it by the gradually dispersing crowd , than if it- were a thing as common in that town as Heaven ' s bright dew is elsewhere .

Dr . Karl Scherger , in the first volume of his Narrative of the Circumnavigation of the Globe by the Austrian Frigate " Novara , " gives an account of the vine disease in Maderia , ivhich will be interesting to those of our readers who like a glass of good wine , wi * h ripe grapes for dessert , as who does not ? The doctor says : — " Though the ield of the vine had been decreasingyear after

y , year , for a considerable time , yet the actual vine disease only made its appearance in 1852 , when the leaves ancl fruit ivere covered with a kind of fungus ( O'idium Tuclceri ) like a white dust . The Portuguese Government sent a commission for the purpose of investigating the causes of the calamity . The report is not decisive on the point , whether the fungus is the real cause or only a symptom of the diseasenor does it offer advice as to how it he checked .

, any may Dr . Hermann Schacht , who resided during a period of eighteen months in the island , and has published a valuable treatise , states that the vine-disease appears there in the same form as in Germany , even as regards the season , which is soon after the blossom disappears . At first the young leaf is covered with a whitish matter , chiefly on its lower side ; it then assumes a crumpled appearance , becomes spotted , and at last decays . The young diseased grape

likewise becomes covered with a white dust , at first partially , ancl then entirely , the green skin by degrees assuming a brown colour , the grape increasing at the same time in size , until it is as large as a currant , or a small cherry , when it becomes black , ancl perishes together with its diseased - . stock . In this decayed condition the grapes remain on the vine till late in the Autumn . Dr . Schacht was successful in arresting the progress of the disease in its earlier stagesby washing all parts of the plant with a solution ; consisting

, of one part of glue to sixteen parts of water ; an operation which had heen likewise performed with good effect in the Royal hothouses of Sans-souci in Prussia . He rubbed the leaves ancl grape infected by the fungus with this solution , and , where possible , clipped the grapes in it . The solution very soon dried , and gave grapes ancl leaves a glossy appearance . All that had once been

operated upon in this way remained in a healthy condition , and even those affected by tho fungus recovered beneath the crust , the operation thus seeming to afford protection against the fungus . The practice of strewing the plant over with powdered sulphur , which was so much lauded , seems to be of little use . At Tenerifi ' e , Dr . Schacht found the fungus widely spread , notwithstanding the application of sulphur . Keeping the grape close upon the ground is also recommended as a protection against the disease , having

proved very successful in the south . The pecuniary loss sustained since the first appearance of the malady amounted in the autumn of 1853 to 1 , 137 , 990 Spanish piastres ( £ 190 , 000 ) , and after having waited in vain a period of five years , for a better state of things , the impoverished landowners entirely gave up cultivating the vine . A traveller who chances now to visit Madeira can scarcely believe that but a few years ago the greater portion of tho island was covered with the plant . The cause of its disappearance must ,

however , not be ascribed entirely to the disease , but partly also to the utter neglect of its culture in favour of that of other products , so much so , that of late is was scarcely possible to procure a sufficient quantity of grapes for invalids to whom they were medicinally prescribed . Moreover , the sugar plantations , ivhich annual ! y increase in extent , have contributed to the destruction of the vines as the former require irrigation , which causes the roots of the latter to rot in the humid ground . " >

Mr . James Hannay , in his recently-collected Fssays from the Quarterly Review , says : —" For a long time it was an established tradition in literature that the 'life' of a man of letters must necessarily he a dull hook . How the theory originated—in what hour of dejection some melancholy writer broached it—we have not been able to learn . But nothing is more certain than its success , ancl , what is more , that it had practical effects on biography . The

dearth of ' incidents' was supposed to be the fatal element in the history of the class , ancl had become a 'trite' remark among biographers when Mason undertook his Memoirs of Gray . Mason himself ( who was no common man ) evidently felt the benumbing

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