The Queer, the Quaint and the Quizzical: A Cabinet for the CuriousStauffer, Frank H.
History
The Queer, the Quaint and the Quizzical: A Cabinet for the Curious
Stauffer, Frank H.
Literary curiosa
"When she had been well washed and cleansed from the sea-moss which was
grown about her, she was like unto another woman. She was appareled, and
began to accustome herself to ordinary meats like unto any other, yet
she sought still means to escape and to get into the water, but she was
straightly guarded. They came from farre to see her. Those of Haarlem
made great sute to them of Edam to have this woman, by reason of the
strangenesse thereof. In the end they obtained her, where she did learn
to spin, and lived many years (some say fifteen), and for the reverance
which she bore unto the signe of the crosse whereunto she had been
accustomed, she was buried in the church-yarde. Many persons worthy of
credit have justified in their writings that they had seene her in the
said towne of Haarlem."
_Legends of Judas Iscariot._
It was believed in Pier della Valle's time that the descendants of Judas
Iscariot still existed at Corfu, though the persons who suffered under
the imputation stoutly denied it.
When the ceremony of washing the feet is performed in the Greek Church
at Smyrna, the bishop represents Christ, and the twelve apostles are
acted by as many priests. He who personates Judas must be paid for it,
and such is the feeling of the people, that whoever accepts this odious
part commonly retains the name of Judas for life.—_Hasselquiet_, p. 43.
Judas serves in Brazil for a Guy Faux to be carried about by the boys.
The Spanish sailors hang him at the yard-arm. The Armenians, who believe
hell and limbo to be the same place, say that Judas, after having
betrayed the Lord, resolved to hang himself, because he knew Christ was
to go to limbo and deliver all the souls which he found there, and
therefore he thought to get there in time. But the devil was more
cunning than he, and knowing his intention, held him over limbo till the
Lord had passed through, and then let him fall plum into
hell.—_Thevenot._
_Blue Beard._
Perrault, the author of "Blue Beard," founded the story, popular belief
assures us, on the history of a real person. The original was Giles de
Retz, Lord of Laval, who was made Marshal of France in 1429. He was born
in 1406, and fought under the command of Joan of Arc. He lived like a
king in his castle, with two hundred horsemen for his guard of honor,
besides fifty choristers, chaplains and musicians. He was wild and
profligate, lavish with his own money and of other people's, and lived
at the costliest rate.
When he had squandered his property, he took to the study of sorcery and
magic, having an especial fancy for murdering young children. From the
villages within a circuit of twenty miles, little boys and girls were
seduced into his castle and there immolated according to some wild Pagan
rites. Among his papers, history says, was found a list of two hundred
children whom he had thus sacrificed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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