“It is experiences such as these that keep a man modest,” said Sir Ernest. The ladies had forgotten his name and the object of his expedition, which was in the Antarctic and not the Arctic region--a distinction of minor importance to the general public perhaps. In the days of the Boer War the children of an illustrious couple who were touring the world fell, childlike, to discussing the presents their parents would bring home for them. “I know what I want,” said the youngest of them. “I want old Kruger’s hat and whiskers, and I believe papa will bring them to me, because I want to send them to Madame Tussaud’s.” Mr. Cyril Maude, the actor, was taken to the Exhibition when a small boy, and it is recorded of him that the visit inspired him with the determination to become an actor. If that were so, then we may congratulate ourselves. Some years ago a lady wrote to say that when scolding her child for being naughty, and impressing upon her that bad little girls would not go to heaven, the child naïvely replied, “Well, mother, I can’t expect to go everywhere, but I’ve been to Madame Tussaud’s.” CHAPTER XLII The lure of horrors--Beginnings of the “Dead Room”--Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A., sketches a suicide--Burke and Hare--Fieschi’s infernal machine--Greenacre--Executions in Public--“Free at last!” _Crime may be secret, but never secure._--OLD PROVERB. In citing the old aphorism that society itself creates the crimes that most beset it, we shall in no way be tempted to regard the popularity of the Chamber of Horrors as due to any desire on the part of the people to visit the place with the object of gazing upon the result of their own handiwork. An inquiry into the motives that induce the public to visit this gloomy chamber scarcely comes within the scope of this work. But that a very large number _do_ visit the place in the course of each year, and that they cannot be deemed to belong to any particular class, but represent, without distinction, _all_ classes of society, we may, of our own certain knowledge, aver without the slightest hesitation. Were we, however, if only from an abstract point of view, to venture an opinion on the vexed question as to why so many have a leaning towards the seamy and sinister side of life, we should be disposed to consider that, apart from the allurement of the abnormal and the inclination to indulge a morbid curiosity, perhaps the chief influence serving to stimulate the mind of the public when a great crime has been perpetrated in a genuine concern that a serious outrage has been made on society, constituting a veritable menace to its security.