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sources, for he had been admitted into the fraternity of Freemasons, which procured him a ready welcome among the brethren wherever he went; and on this basis he reared the edifice of his Egyptian masonry, by whose mystic agency he promised not only to restore youth to the aged, but also to confer perfection on the guilty. Of this order, whose original founders were, he averred, Enoch and Elias, he declared himself the Grand Cophta or high-priest, and constituted Seraphina the high-priestess, as masons of both sexes were to be admitted into it. By the aid of a pupil, or "Colomb," (for so was named the child selected as their interpreter,) he pretended to unfold futurity to his dupes; and perhaps we need scarcely be surprised at the multitude of inquirers who beset his doors; for in every human breast there dwells a lingering desire to anticipate the designs of fate, and penetrate the darkness of futurity; therefore, on no other subject is it so easy to deceive the world as this.

The most prosperous moment of Cagliostro's life was in 1783, at Strasbourg, where he reckoned among his victims Louis de Rohan, Prince and Bishop of Strasbourg, whose wealth and favor were lavishly bestowed on the adventurer. At this time he played the role of a lofty benefactor of the human race. The Prince de Rohan having desired to see him: "If Monseigneur the Cardinal is sick, let him come, and I will cure him," was the reply; "if he is well, he has no need of me, I none of him." The cardinal was subdued by such high-minded independence. He visited the quack, who affected to be captivated by his noble visitor, saying: "Your soul is worthy of mine; you deserve to be made a participator of all my secrets.' From that moment, the prince, who was an earnest investigator of alchemy, became his willing slave, and placed his palace, his wealth, his credit at Cagliostro's disposal. On being informed one day that the Grand Cophta and his high-priestess were reveling so disgracefully in his palace that the "Tokay wine ran like water," his answer was, "Let it be so; I have authorized him even to commit abuses, if he think fit to do so." So strong are the bonds forged by an opportune flattery on a vain, speculative mind!

Other French gentlemen of credit (MM. de Ségur, de Vergennes, and de la Borde) write in the following terms concerning this impostor to the Prætor of Strasbourg :"We have seen the Count Alessandro di

Cagliostro, whose whose countenance bespeaks

genius, and whose eloquence convinces and captivates the hearer. We have beheld him going round a vast hall, from one afflicted being to another, dressing their wounds, softening their miseries, imparting hope to all; and in these acts of humanity he is aided by his countess, a modest and beautiful person, who is worthy of her admirable husband."

Let us hear a very different opinion expressed by a solid professor from Göttingen, Meiners by name :-* 'My conviction is that Count Cagliostro from of old has been more of a cheat than an enthusiast, and also, that he continues a cheat to this day. As to his country, I have ascertained nothing. Some make him a Jew, some an Arab, who, having persuaded a certain Asiatic prince to send his son to travel in Europe, murdered the youth, and took possession of his treasures. He himself pretends to claim the Cherif of Mecca for his father. As the self-styled count speaks badly all the languages one hears from him, and has spent the greater part of his life under feigned names, it is probable that no sure trace of his origin may ever be discovered. On his first appearance in Strasbourg, he connected himself with the Freemasons, but only till he felt strong enough to stand on his own feet. He soon gained the favor of the prætor and cardinal, and, through these, the favor of the court, to such a degree that his adversaries cannot so much as think of overthrowing him. With the prætor and cardinal he demeans himself as with persons who are under boundless obligations to him, and uses the cardinal's equipage as freely as if it were his own. He pretends to recognize atheists and blasphemers by the smell, and that the vapor from such throws him into epileptic fits; into which sacred disorder he, like a true juggler, has the art of falling when he pleases. He pretends to evoke spirits, and to bear rule over them. He takes nothing from his patients, and even lodges. many of them at his house without recompense. With all this conspicuous disinterestedness, he lives in an expensive way, plays deep, and loses almost continually to ladies; so that he must require at least 29,000 livres a year. The darkness which Cagliostro has spread over the sources of his income and outlay, contributes even more than his cures and his munificence to the notion that he is a divine sort of man, who has watched Nature in her deepest operations, and, among other secrets, stolen that of gold-making from her. With a mixture

A CONTRAST IN BIOGRAPHY.

of sorrow and indignation over our age, I
have to record that not only the great, who
from of old have been the easiest bewitched
by such pretenders, but also with many of
the learned, and even physicians and natu-
ralists, he has received a cordial reception.'

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So speaks the sober German professor, more largely gifted with common sense and less endued with the organ of wonder than the superficial gentlemen already quoted.

We have yet one more witness to cite before our readers as to the real character of this Charlatan: one of a different stamp from any of those whose testimony we have already given. It is a French lady of the highest rank and talents,-a shrewd, sensible, and witty woman, cousin to the aforenamed dupe of Cagliostro's, the Cardinal de Rohan. But, before recording the Marquise de Créqui's opinion of Cagliostro, we must premise that it was a part of his plan never to make too long a stay at any place, but, as soon as the first flow of popularity was past, and distrust became awakened, he would try some new ground Accordingly, after a while we no longer hear of him at Strasbourg, but find him at Bordeaux, where his magnificent hotel was crowded night and day to such an excess by applicants from far and near, that the municipal authorities granted him a military guard to keep order.

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Marquise de Créqui, from whose memoirs we extract the following particulars:-" About this time there came to Paris Joseph Balsamo, who, after having called himself at different times Count Tischio, Count de MePellegrini, Count Fenice, was now definitely lissa, Commander of Belmonte, Chevalier known as Count de Cagliostro. He was a man of clumsy figure, and his dress was in singularly bad taste. ver lace, and his hair was dressed after the blue taffetas slashed with a profusion of silIt was composed of strangest fashion, with long powdered plaits confined in pig-tails. stockings with gold clocks, and velvet shoes He wore openwork As many diamonds were displayed about his whose buckles were sparkling with jewels. person as he possibly could find room for. His costume was completed by a hat with waving white plumes, which he invariably speak with peculiar emphasis and energy. drew over his brow whenever he wished to During eight months of the year, all that renard; and when I say all that, I use the was covered with a large pelisse of blue word advisedly, for attached to this loose upper garment was a large fur hood with three long points depending from it, which he pulled over his hat in cold weather; and whenever our children saw him approach they always strove who should get the most with this horned head-gear of renard-skin, quickly out of his way.

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The fair countess played her part by opening her salon to the affluent and noble, who were enchanted by her grace and loveliness; nor were the ladies of this southern city colored, and his teeth white and perfect. I His features were regular, his skin freshslow in purchasing the costly elixir, which will not attempt to describe his physiognowas supposed to have preserved the countess's charms in such unimpaired perfection; command. Never have I seen two eyes like my, because he had at least a dozen at his for although, in fact, a young woman, she his! He had a quick perception of what was professed to have already attained a very graceful or in good taste either in the manadvanced age. This bewilderment did not, however, last long, and being deserted by he had to do. Indeed, he was gifted with ners or external aspect of those with whom the rich, and hooted by the populace, who extraordinary finesse in detecting any shade nicknamed him "the wandering Jew," and of vulgarity in the thoughts, habits, or conthreatened him with personal violence, Cag-versation of others, and with this delicate liostro and his wife escaped from Bordeaux, appreciation of what was refined, I could and bent their steps toward Paris. as usual, he appeared in the complex char- this grotesque costume, merely to gain a more Here, not but suspect that he disguised himself in acter of magician and Grand Cophta, and decided influence over the multitude by asthe volatile Parisians, always eager in their suming an air of originality. The moral pursuit of novelty, were enchanted to have physiognomy of this charlatan was as changamong them a being who professed to ing as his physical one, and it was partly be endued with such marvelous powers. through this contemptible instability of proThrough the friendly zeal of his patron the fession that he contrived for a while to deCardinal de Rohan, Cagliostro gained im- ceive such opposite classes of persons. With mediate access into the highest Parisian circles; and among the grandes dames to fessed himself an infidel, and during his inour philosophers and beaux-esprits he prowhom he bore a particular introduction, was cantations, profanely parodied the most saone to whom we have already alluded, the cred rites of religion. On such occasions, he

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would with the profoundest expressions of reverence evoke Satan to the presence of his guests, for the purpose of unfolding the dread secrets of futurity, and I lament to say that not only our giddy courtiers, but also some of our princes of the blood, countenanced these orgies by their presence.

"On the other hand, Cagliostro compounded with the scruples of Catholics, when he found that their religious convictions were not to be shaken; and so artful was his hypocrisy, that among his most ardent proselytes were to be found some of the convulsionnaire Jansenists, mystics of the cross, and illuminati. The most notable of these was a visionary Spaniard, named Don Luis de Lima-Vasconcellos, grand-prior of Lima, and brother to the Spanish ambassador, a man of ardent and enthusiastic mind, concerning whom Cagliostro has left a curious history as related by himself.

"To give you some idea of the enthusiasm which this man contrived to inspire, I will transcribe a letter of Prince Louis, Cardinal de Rohan, who recommended him to me in these terms: You have doubtless heard, madame and dear cousin, of the Count de Cagliostro; of the excellent qualities by which he is distinguished, of his admirable science and virtue, which have won for him the esteem and respect of all the most distinguished persons in Strasbourg, and my unbounded attachment and veneration. He is now in Paris, and I earnestly commend him to your good offices, feeling assured that through your kindness he will meet with a cordial reception in the most distinguished circles there. I pray you not to give heed to the calumnies uttered by his enemies against this admirable man. It is with a feeling of reverence that I have observed his unfailing tendency toward all that is great and good, and I feel assured that he will obtain your confidence and esteem, so that you may become his true friend and protector. Adieu, madame and dear cousin. You know how respectful and tender is my attachment

to you.

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+ Louis, Bishop and Prince of Strasbourg.' My answer was as follows:-'My cousin,—I have seen M. de Cagliostro, and have even received him several times at my house, in order that I might be the better able to form a correct opinion concerning him. All that I can say in favor of M. Cagliostro is, that he has much versatility of talent, and is a very clever man. God grant that you may never have cause to rue your confidence in him. You must not expect, my good

cousin, that I shall introduce or recommend him to any one, and as it is most probable he has perceived that I suspect him of charlatanism, it is not very likely that I shall often be fayored with his company.'

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Very soon after this period, began the perplexities of the cardinal concerning the issue of his negotiations with La Motte, the treacherous and worthless agent whom he had employed in the affair of the diamond necklace; an episode in history to which we can but briefly allude here. On this occasion, he consulted his oracle as to the event of this affair, and received for answer that his favor with royalty was secured, as well as his complete triumph over all political enemies. It need scarcely be told that Cagliostro's prediction proved utterly false; and in his patron's fall was likewise involved his ruin and disgrace. He was accused of being La Motte's accomplice, and after several months' imprisonment in the Bastille, and the loss of much ill-gotten wealth, he was permitted to leave the kingdom. Accordingly, he fled to England, where Lord George Gordon, from political motives, espoused his cause and wrote a pamphlet in his behalf against the French government. But the blaze of Cagliostro's deceptive fame was now burnt out. Being detected in some fraudulent attempt, he absconded to Turin,—was banished thence by an order of the King of Sardinia,-met a like fate at Trent, when he ventured again into the dominions of the Emperor of Germany,-and being thus driven from one country to another, his bold-facedness tempted him into the lion's den, and on a May-day of the year 1789 he entered Rome, whither his evil genius had beguiled him, for within the walls of the Eternal City that doom awaited him which had so long been his due. Toward the close of the same year he was detected forming an Egyptian lodge, was seized by the Inquisition, and safely lodged in the castle of St. Angelo.

Here is the wand of the magician broken. In vain does he plead that Egyptian masonry is a divine system accommodated to the spirit of the age, and the holy father's approbation and patronage. In vain does he offer to become the pope's spy. No favor is shown him, and on learning that the fair Seraphina (prisoner in a neighboring cell) has begun to confess, he too opens his lips, and tells out a marvelous story, in which, doubtless, truth and falsehood are singularly blended together, all of which is noted down carefully by one of the brethren of the Inquisition. After a delay of eighteen months,

the holy father gives sentence that all Joseph Balsamo's works on Egyptian masonry, magic, and other forbidden subjects are to be burnt by the common hangman, and his life forfeited as a heretic and sorcerer, but the sentence to be commuted into one of perpetual imprisonment.

This was in April, 1791. In vain did the wretched man appeal to the French Constituent Assembly. They troubled not themselves about him. In vain did he complain and struggle against his fate. That spirit which had feasted itself on lies and fraud was now left in lonely captivity, to brood over past crimes and present misery. After a lingering imprisonment, he pined away, and was found dead within the walls of St. Angelo toward the conclusion of the year 1795.

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erable meritoriousness, of whom probably few persons out of his immediate locality have ever heard, and with the spirit of whose endeavor the world cannot be the worse for being acquainted.

John Pounds was one of those good Samaritans of whom every generation apparently produces some examples. Seen in his week-day, or Sunday costume, or under any of the circumstantial appearances of his life, there was little or nothing about him to strike a casual observer with astonishment. A painstaking mender of shoes in the borough of Portsmouth, seeking by dint of industry to maintain a visible existence there-that is the outward figure of him. By combination of accident and forethought, he had there become stationed to repair the dilapidations incident to the wear and tear of leather. Sedentary occupations such as his, however, are known to promote activity of thought. George Fox, the most notable cordwainer upon record, took his earliest lessons in quietistic meditation whilst silently fabricating boots for the community; whereby straight-col

Thus perished one who had abilities for great and good things, but unhappily, through perversion of will, misapplied and corrupted those faculties which had been given for a far other and higher purpose. As for the Countess Seraphina, alias Lorenza Balsamo, she too was convicted of magic, sacrilege, &c., but was allowed to escape a severer pun-lared coats came to be perpetuated, and the ishment by immuring herself within the convent of St. Appoline, where she died early in 1794.

Cagliostro was the last pretender of any note in Europe to the science of alchemy. The pursuit of gold is not less eager in the nineteenth century than it was in preceding ages, but men are now less credulous as to the mode of its acquisition. Happy those who seek for it by honest and persevering industry, and with a higher aim in view than the mere indulgence of an avaricious temper, or the vain ambition of outshining their neighbors in wealth and luxury.

men.

JOHN POUNDS.

BY J. L.

L. H.

It is admitted that worth, in every degree, is deserving of honorable reco nition among The heroes and philanthropists, therefore, whose sphere of activity has been circumscribed by narrow and humble opportunities, ought not to be neglected or overlooked; but are justly entitled to a measure of the world's admiration. It is always well to remember that a man's intrinsic worthiness is not to be estimated by the extent or magnificence of his field of action, but rather by the qualities of persistency, disinterestedness, genuine ability, and depth of purpose, which his personal career exhibited. Here, for instance, is a man of no inconsid

respectable Society of Friends was visibly originated. Under the influence of similar conditions, John Pounds, feeling the need of some mental occupation, and inwardly moved by kindly dispositions, was induced to take charge of such human waifs and strays, as he here and there encountered in the streets, giving them house-room and shelter from day to day, and imparting to them such useful knowledge and serviceable advice as their capacities were adapted to take in, and he himself qualified to communicate. The number of children thus instructed, and who would not otherwise have received any manner of education, amounted in the course of years to several hundreds; some of whom, in all likelihood, turned out badly, as will happen under the best kinds of training; but by far the greater part grew up creditable and industrious men and women, reflecting much honor upon their teacher, and uniformly entertaining for him the profoundest respect.

Pounds was born on the 17th of July, in the year 1766. His father followed the trade of a sawyer, in the Portsmouth dockyards, and when the boy had grown to be a strong athletic lad of twelve years of age, he was regularly apprenticed to a shipwright. He served three years of his term with satisfaction to his master, when a serious accident befell him, which altered his subsequent course of life. Falling one day from a con

siderable height into one of the dry docks, he dislocated his thigh, and was in other respects very grievously injured. Time and surgical ingenuity sufficed to restore him to a tolerable state of health, but he was so completely crippled, as to be thenceforth unfitted to resume his trade. It accordingly became necessary for him to try some other calling; and, after a little consideration, he was led to place himself under the instruction of an old shoemaker, in the High Street of Portsmouth, to learn as much of the mystery of his art as he might be competent to acquire.

A respectable proverb, which affirms that by aiming at a silk-gown, one may chance to get a sleeve of it, appears to have been verified in the case of John Pounds. His apprenticeship to shoemaking was so far successful as to qualify him for mending shoes. Whether his insufficiency in this respect was owing to the imperfections of his teacher, want of adequate practice, or to personal inaptitude, is not distinctly ascertainable, and is indeed of little consequence. As soon as he was able to provide for his own wants, by means of his new employment, he hired a room in the house of one of his relations, and there set up an authentic cobbler's stall. Work gradually flowed toward him; slowly at first, but, after a time, in sufficient abundance to keep him busy. When a few years had elapsed, he was so far established as to feel justified in entering upon a house on his own account, a small weather-beaten tenement in St. Mary's Street, where he ever afterward resided.

He lived a lonely kind of life. Like the Pope, who is known to be a bachelor on compulsion, he had no married cares or consolations ;-on him, a poor distorted cripple, what woman would be likely to look with loving eyes? A meek, contented nature, he resigned himself to perpetual celibacy, without the encumberance of taking vows for his observance. Having no household society, and being little disposed to go abroad in quest of entertainment, he relieved his involuntary solitude by rearing and domesticating all kinds of singing birds and harmless animals; teaching some of them a variety of amusing tricks, and accustoming those of opposite propensities to live together in unanimity and peacefulness. He would sit with a cat upon one shoulder, and a canary bird upon the other, dividing his attentions, and dispensing suitable benefactions between the two: charming away fear in the one case, and curbing destructive inclinations in another,

and thus instituting a sort of "happy family," consisting, like that in Trafalgar Square, of the most incongruous and naturally discordant members. Such birds as could be inspired with any gift of speech, as starlings and the like, he trained to a skillful articulation, and held dialogues with them in the south of England dialect. The last of this stock, a very intelligent starling, he presented in the latter years of his life to the lady of Port-admiral Sir Philip Durham, in consideration for certain kindnesses which her ladyship and the admiral had rendered him, in the way of providing for several of the unfriended boys whom he instructed.

The notion of undertaking the gratuitous education of poor children seems to have been first suggested to him accidentally. A brother of his, who was a seafaring man, with a large family, had amongst the rest a feeble little boy, with deformed feet; and, with a view to effect some partial cure of the imperfection, John benevolently took charge of him at his own house, and, in all respects, carefully attended to him. Having succeeded, by ingenious contrivances with the soles of old shoes, in making a tolerable imitation of a pair of pattens, suitable to the child's infirmity, an effectual cure was in time completed. The boy, however, continued with his uncle, and thenceforth became the chief object of his attachment. When he was about five years old the worthy shoemaker began to teach him to read, and in other ways to perform toward him the office of a schoolmaster. After a time, he conceived that he would probably learn better if he had at companion, and he accordingly obtained one, and taught them both together. By and by he added another, and went on gradually increasing his numbers until it became at length an understood thing amongst the youngsters of his neighborhood, that all were at liberty to go to him who felt disposed to benefit by the opportunity. Homeless and neglected children went to him on cold-weather days for the sake of a little warmth and shelter; mothers, whose duties called them frequently from home, would solicit him to take care of their little ones in their absence; some he enticed by trifling presents; others went out of childish curiosity, and even a considerable number from a pure desire to learn what he could teach them. Thus he became, finally, a sort of Ragged Schoolmaster-general to all the poorer population; and, in a spirit of noble disinterestedness, performed a most serviceable work in his generation.

His workshop was his school-room-a

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