III. passes at Harleston Fair, and introduces Lacy, Earl of Lincoln,

disguised as a rustic, and the comely Margaret. In Scene IV., at
Hampton Court, Henry III. receives Elinor of Castile, who is betrothed
to his son, Prince Edward, and arranges with her father, the Emperor,
a competition between the great German magician, Jaques Vandermast,
and Friar Bacon, 'England's only flower.' In Scene V. we pass on to
Oxford, where some comic incidents occur between Prince Edward (in
disguise) and his courtiers; and in Scene VI. to Friar Bacon's cell,
where the friar shows the Prince in his 'glass prospective,' or magic
mirror, the figures of Margaret, Friar Bungay, and Earl Lacy, and
reveals the progress of Lacy's suit to the rustic beauty. Bacon
summons Bungay to Oxford--straddling on a devil's back--and the scene
then changes to the Regent-house, and degenerates into the rudest
farce. At Fressingfield, in Scene VIII., we find Prince Edward
threatening to slay Earl Lacy unless he gives up to him the Fair Maid
of Fressingfield; but, after a struggle, his better nature prevails,
and he retires from his suit, leaving Margaret to become the Countess
of Lincoln. Scene IX. carries us back to Oxford, where Henry III., the
Emperor, and a goodly company have assembled to witness the trial of
skill between the English and the German magicians--the first
international competition on record!--in which, of course, Vandermast
is put to ridicule.

Passing over Scene X. as unimportant, we return, in Scene XI., to
Bacon's cell, where the great magician is lying on his bed, with a
white wand in one hand, a book in the other, and beside him a lighted
lamp. The Brazen Head is there, with Miles, armed, keeping watch over
it. Here the dramatist closely follows the old story. The friar falls
asleep; the head speaks once and twice, and Miles fails to wake his
master. It speaks the third time. 'A lightning flashes forth, and a
hand appears that breaks down the head with a hammer.' Bacon awakes to
lament over the ruin of his work, and load the careless Miles with
unavailing reproaches. But the whole scene is characteristic enough to
merit transcription:

Scene XI.--_Friar Bacon's Cell._

_FRIAR BACON is discovered lying on a bed, with a white stick
in one hand, a book in the other, and a lamp lighted beside
him; and the BRAZEN HEAD, and MILES with weapons by him._

BACON. Miles, where are you?

MILES. Here, sir.

BACON. How chance you tarry so long?

MILES. Think you that the watching of the Brazen Head craves
no furniture? I warrant you, sir, I have so armed myself
that if all your devils come, I will not fear them an inch.

BACON. Miles,
Thou know'st that I have divèd into hell,
And sought the darkest palaces of fiends;
That with my magic spells great Belcephon
Hath left his lodge and kneelèd at my cell;
The rafters of the earth rent from the poles,
And three-form'd Luna hid her silver looks,
Tumbling upon her concave continent,
When Bacon read upon his magic book.
With seven years' tossing necromantic charms,
Poring upon dark Hecat's principles,
I have framed out a monstrous head of brass,
That, by the enchanting forces of the devil,
Shall tell out strange and uncouth aphorisms,
And girt fair England with a wall of brass.
Bungay and I have watch'd these threescore days,
And now our vital spirits crave some rest:
If Argus lived and had his hundred eyes,
They could not over-watch Phobetor's[9] night.
Now, Miles, in thee rests Friar Bacon's weal:
The honour and renown of all his life
Hangs in the watching of this Brazen Head;
Therefore I charge thee by the immortal God
That holds the souls of men within his fist,
This night thou watch; for ere the morning star
Sends out his glorious glister on the north
The Head will speak. Then, Miles, upon thy life
Wake me; for then by magic art I'll work
To end my seven years' task with excellence.
If that a wink but shut thy watchful eye,
Then farewell Bacon's glory and his fame!
Draw close the curtains, Miles: now, for thy life,
Be watchful, and ... (_Falls asleep._)

MILES. So; I thought you would talk yourself asleep anon; and
'tis no marvel, for Bungay on the days, and he on the nights,
have watched just these ten and fifty days: now this is the
night, and 'tis my task, and no more. Now, Jesus bless me,
what a goodly head it is! and a nose! You talk of _Nos[10]
autem glorificare_; but here's a nose that I warrant may be
called _Nos autem populare_ for the people of the parish.
Well, I am furnished with weapons: now, sir, I will set me
down by a post, and make it as good as a watchman to wake me,
if I chance to slumber. I thought, Goodman Head, I would call
you out of your _memento_.[11] Passion o' God, I have almost
broke my pate! (_A great noise._) Up, Miles, to your task;
take your brown-bill in your hand; here's some of your
master's hobgoblins abroad.

THE BRAZEN HEAD (_speaks_). Time is.

MILES. Time is! Why, Master Brazen-Head, you have such a
capital nose, and answer you with syllables, 'Time is'? Is
this my master's cunning, to spend seven years' study about
'Time is'? Well, sir, it may be we shall have some better
orations of it anon: well, I'll watch you as narrowly as
ever you were watched, and I'll play with you as the
nightingale with the glow-worm; I'll set a prick against my
breast.[12] Now rest there, Miles. Lord have mercy upon me, I
have almost killed myself. (_A great noise._) Up, Miles; list
how they rumble.

THE BRAZEN HEAD (_loquitur_). Time was.

MILES. Well, Friar Bacon, you have spent your seven years'
study well, that can make your Head speak but two words at
once, 'Time was.' Yea, marry, time was when my master was a
wise man; but that was before he began to make the Brazen
Head. You shall lie while you ache, an your head speak no
better. Well, I will watch, and walk up and down, and be a
peripatetian[13] and a philosopher of Aristotle's stamp. (_A
great noise._) What, a fresh noise? Take thy pistols in hand,
Miles. (_A lightning flashes forth, and a Hand appears that
breaks down the HEAD with a hammer._) Master, master, up!
Hell's broken loose! Your Head speaks; and there's such a
thunder and lightning, that I warrant all Oxford is up in
arms. Out of your bed, and take a brownbill in your hand; the
latter day is come.

BACON. Miles, I come. (_Rises and comes forward._)

O, passing warily watched!
Bacon will make thee next himself in love.
When spake the Head?

MILES. When spake the Head? Did you not say that he should
tell strange principles of philosophy? Why, sir, it speaks
but two words at a time.

BACON. Why, villain, hath it spoken oft?

MILES. Oft! ay, marry hath it, thrice; but in all those three
times it hath uttered but seven words.

BACON. As how?

MILES. Marry, sir, the first time he said, 'Time is,' as if
Fabius Commentator[14] should have pronounced a sentence;
then he said, 'Time was;' and the third time, with thunder
and lightning, as in great choler, he said, 'Time is past.'

BACON. 'Tis past, indeed. Ah, villain! Time is past;
My life, my fame, my glory, are all past.
Bacon,
The turrets of thy hope are ruined down,
Thy seven years' study lieth in the dust:
Thy Brazen Head lies broken through a slave
That watched, and would not when the Head did will.
What said the Head first?

MILES. Even, sir, 'Time is.'

BACON. Villain, if thou hadst called to Bacon then,
If thou hadst watched, and waked the sleepy friar,
The Brazen Head had uttered aphorisms,
And England had been circled round with brass:
But proud Asmenoth,[15] ruler of the North,
And Demogorgon,[16] master of the Fates,
Grudge that a mortal man should work so much.
Hell trembled at my deep-commanding spells,
Fiends frowned to see a man their over-match;
Bacon might boast more than a man might boast;
But now the braves[17] of Bacon have an end,
Europe's conceit of Bacon hath an end,
His seven years' practice sorteth to ill end:
And, villain, sith my glory hath an end,
I will appoint thee to some fatal end.[18]
Villain, avoid! get thee from Bacon's sight!
Vagrant, go, roam and range about the world,
And perish as a vagabond on earth!

MILES. Why, then, sir, you forbid me your service?

BACON. My service, villain, with a fatal curse,
That direful plagues and mischief fall on thee.

MILES. 'Tis no matter, I am against you with the old proverb,
'The more the fox is cursed, the better he fares.' God be
with you, sir: I'll take but a book in my hand, a
wide-sleeved gown on my back, and a crowned cap[19] on my
head, and see if I can merit promotion.

BACON. Some fiend or ghost haunt on thy weary steps,
Until they do transport thee quick to Hell!
For Bacon shall have never any day,
To lose the fame and honour of his Head.

[_Exeunt._

Scene XII. passes in King Henry's Court, and the royal consent is
given to Earl Lacy's marriage with the Fair Maid, which is fixed to
take place on the same day as Prince Edward's marriage to the Princess
Elinor. In Scene XIII. we again go back to Bacon's cell. The friar is
bewailing the destruction of his Brazen Head to Friar Bungay, when two
young gentlemen, named Lambert and Sealsby, enter, in order to look
into the 'glass prospective,' and see how their fathers are faring.
Unhappily, at this very moment, the elder Lambert and Sealsby, having
quarrelled, are engaged 'in combat hard by Fressingfield,' and stab
each other to the death, whereupon their sons immediately come to
blows, with a like fatal result. Bacon, deeply affected, breaks the
magic crystal which has been the unwitting cause of so sad a
catastrophe, expresses his regret that he ever dabbled in the unholy
science, and announces his resolve to spend the remainder of his life
'in pure devotion.'

At Fressingfield, in Scene XIV., the opportune arrival of Lacy and his
friends prevents Margaret from carrying out her intention of retiring
to the nunnery at Framlingham, and with obliging readiness she
consents to marry the Earl. Scene XV. shifts to Bacon's cell, where a
devil complains that the friar hath raised him from the darkest deep
to search about the world for Miles, his man, and torment him in
punishment for his neglect of orders.

Miles makes his appearance, and after some comic dialogue, intended to
tickle the ears of the groundlings, mounts astride the demon's back,
and goes off to ----! In Scene XVI., and last, we return to the Court,
where royalty makes a splendid show, and the two brides--the Princess
Elinor and the Countess Margaret--display their rival charms. Of
course the redoubtable friar is present, and in his concluding speech
leaps over a couple of centuries to make a glowing compliment to Queen
Elizabeth, which seems worth quotation:

'I find by deep prescience of mine art,
Which once I tempered in my secret cell,
That here where Brute did build his Troynovant,[20]
From forth the royal garden of a King
Shall flourish out so rich and fair a bud,
Whose brightness shall deface proud Phoebus' flower,
And overshadow Albion with her leaves.
Till then Mars shall be master of the field,
But then the stormy threats of war shall cease:
The horse shall stamp as careless of the pike,
Drums shall be turned to timbrels of delight;
With wealthy favours Plenty shall enrich
The strand that gladded wandering Brute to see,
And peace from heaven shall harbour in these leaves
That gorgeous beautify this matchless flower:
Apollo's heliotropian[21] then shall stoop,
And Venus' hyacinth[22] shall vail her top;
Juno shall shut her gilliflowers up,
And Pallas' bay shall 'bash her brightest green;
Ceres' carnation, in consort with those,
Shall stoop and wonder at Diana's rose.'[23]

So much for Greene's comedy of 'Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay'--not, on
the whole, a bad piece of work.

* * * * *

Among the earlier English alchemists I may next name, in chronological
order, George Ripley, canon of Bridlington, who, in 1471, dedicated to
King Edward III. his once celebrated 'Compound of Alchemy; or, The
Twelve Gates leading to the Discovery of the Philosopher's Stone.'
These 'gates,' each of which he describes in detail, but with little
enlightenment to the uninitiated reader, are:--1. Calcination; 2.
Solution; 3. Separation; 4. Conjunction; 5. Putrefaction; 6.
Congelation; 7. Cibation; 8. Sublimation; 9. Fermentation; 10.
Exaltation; 11. Multiplication; and 12. Projection. In his old age
Ripley learned wisdom, and frankly acknowledged that he had wasted his
life upon an empty pursuit. He requested all men, if they met with any
of the five-and-twenty treatises of which he was the author, to
consign them to the flames as absolutely vain and worthless.

Yet there is a wild story that he actually discovered the
'magisterium,' and was thereby enabled to send a gift of £100,000 to
the Knights of St. John, to assist them in their defence of Rhodes
against the Turks.

* * * * *

Thomas Norton, of Bristol, was the author of 'The Ordinall of Alchemy'
(printed in London in 1652). He is said to have been a pupil of
Ripley, under whom (at the age of 28) he studied for forty days, and
in that short time acquired a thorough knowledge of 'the perfection of
chemistry.' Ripley, however, refused to instruct so young a man in the
master-secret of the great science, and the process from 'the white'
to 'the red powder,' so that Norton was compelled to rely on his own
skill and industry. Twice in his labours a sad disappointment overtook
him. On one occasion he had almost completed the tincture, when the
servant whom he employed to look after the furnace decamped with it,
supposing that it was fit for use. On another it was stolen by the
wife of William Canning, Mayor of Bristol, who immediately sprang into
immense wealth, and as some amends, I suppose, for his ill-gotten
gains, built the beautiful steeple of the church of St. Mary,
Redcliffe--the church afterwards connected with the sad story of
Chatterton. As for Norton, he seems to have lived in poverty and died
in poverty (1477).

The 'Ordinall of Alchemy' is a tedious panegyric of the science,
interspersed with a good deal of the vague talk about white and red
stones and the philosophical magnesia in which 'the adepts' delighted.

* * * * *

To Norton we owe our scanty knowledge of Thomas Dalton, who flourished
about the middle of the fifteenth century. He had the reputation of
being a devout Churchman until he was accused by a certain Debois of
possessing the powder of projection. Debois roundly asserted that
Norton had made him a thousand pounds of gold (lucky man!) in less
than twelve hours. Whereupon Dalton simply said, 'Sir, you are
forsworn.' His explanation was that he had received the powder from a
canon of Lichfield, on undertaking not to use it until after the
canon's death; and that since he had been so troubled by his
possession of it, that he had secretly destroyed it. One Thomas
Herbert, a squire of King Edward, waylaid the unfortunate man, and
shut him up in the castle of Gloucester, putting heavy pressure upon
him to make the coveted tincture. But this Dalton would not and could
not do; and after a captivity of four years, Herbert ordered him to be
brought out and executed in his presence. He obeyed the harsh summons
with great delight, exclaiming, 'Blessed art Thou, Lord Jesus! I have
been too long absent from Thee. The science Thou gavest me I have
kept without ever abusing it; I have found no one fit to be my heir;
wherefore, sweet Lord, I will restore Thy gift to Thee again.'

'Then, after some devout prayer, with a smiling countenance he desired
the executioner to proceed. Tears gushed from the eyes of Herbert when
he beheld him so willing to die, and saw that no ingenuity could wrest
his secret from him. He gave orders for his release. His imprisonment
and threatened execution were contrived without the King's knowledge
to intimidate him into compliance. The iniquitous devices having
failed, Herbert did not dare to take away his life. Dalton rose from
the block with a heavy countenance, and returned to his abbey, much
grieved at the further prolongation of his earthly sojourn. Herbert
died shortly after this atrocious act of tyranny, and Debois also came
to an untimely end. His father, Sir John Debois, was slain at the
battle of Tewkesbury, May 4, 1471; and two days after, as recorded in
Stow's "Annales," he himself (James Debois) was taken, with several
others of the Lancastrian party, from a church where they had fled for
sanctuary, and was beheaded on the spot.'

FOOTNOTES:

[6] That is, costard, or apple, mongers.

[7] See Appendix to the present chapter, p. 58.

[8] The pentageron, or pentagramma, is a mystic figure produced by
prolonging the sides of a regular pentagon till they intersect one
another. It can be drawn without a break in the drawing, and, viewed
from five sides, exhibits the form of the letter A (pent-alpha), or
the figure of the fifth proposition in Euclid's First Book.

[9] From the Greek +phobos+, fear; +phobêtra+, bugbears.

[10] Bad puns were evidently common on the stage before the days of
Victorian burlesque.

[11] So Shakespeare, '1 Hen. IV.,' iii. Falstaff says: 'I make as good
use of it as many a man doth of a death's head, or a memento house.'

[12] So in the 'Passionate Pilgrim':

'Save the nightingale alone:
She, poor bird, as all forlorn,
Leaned her breast uptill a thorn.'

[13] A _peripatetic_, or walking philosopher. Observe the
facetiousness in 'Aristotle's _stamp_.' Aristotle was the founder of
the Peripatetics.

[14] Fabius _Cunctator_, or the Delayer, so called from the policy of
delay which he opposed to the vigorous movements of Hannibal. One
would suppose that the humour here, such as it is, would hardly be
perceptible to a theatrical audience.

[15] In the old German 'Faustbuch,' the title of 'Prince of the North'
is given to Beelzebub.

[16] _Demogorgon_, or _Demiourgos_--the creative principle of
evil--figures largely in literature. He is first mentioned by
Lactantius, in the fourth century; then by Boccaccio, Boiardo, Tasso
('Gierusalemme Liberata'), and Ariosto ('Orlando Furioso'). Marlowe
speaks, in 'Tamburlaine,' of 'Gorgon, prince of Hell.' Spenser, in
'The Faery Queen,' refers to--

'Great Gorgon, prince of darkness and dead night,
At which Cocytus quakes, and Styx is put to flight.'

Milton, in 'Paradise Lost,' alludes to 'the dreaded name of
Demogorgon.' Dryden says: 'When the moon arises, and Demogorgon walks
his round.' And he is one of the _dramatis personæ_ of Shelley's
'Prometheus Unbound': 'Demogorgon, a tremendous gloom.... A mighty
Darkness, filling the seat of power.'

[17] Boasts. So in Peele's 'Edward I': 'As thou to England brought'st
thy Scottish braves.'

[18] This reiteration of the same final word, for the sake of
emphasis, is found in Shakespeare.

[19] A corner or college cap.

[20] An allusion to the old legend that Brut, or Brutus,
great-grandson of Æneas, founded New Troy (Troynovant), or London.

[21] Probably the reference is to the sunflower.

[22] The classic writers usually identify the hyacinth with Apollo.

[23] The rose, that is, of the Virgin Queen--an English
Diana--Elizabeth. In Shakespeare's 'Midsummer Night's Dream'
(Act iv., scene 1) we read of 'Diana's bud.'


APPENDIX TO CHAPTER I.

The ancient magic included various kinds of divination, of which the
principal may here be catalogued:

_Aeromancy_, or divination from the air. If the wind blew from the
east, it signified good fortune (which is certainly not the general
opinion!); from the west, evil; from the south, calamity; from the
north, disclosure of what was secret; from all quarters simultaneously
(!), hail and rain.

_Axinomancy_, practised by the Greeks, more particularly for the
purpose of discovering criminals. An axe poised upon a stake, or an
agate on a red-hot axe, was supposed by its movement to indicate the
offender. Or the names of suspected persons were called out, and the
movement of the axe at a particular name was understood to certify
guilt.

_Belomancy_, in use among the Arabs, was practised by means of arrows,
which were shot off, with written labels attached to them; and the
inscription on the arrow first picked up was accepted as prophetic.

_Bibliomancy_, divining by means of the Bible, survived to a
comparatively recent period. The passage which first caught the eye,
on a Bible being opened haphazard, was supposed to indicate the
future. This was identical with the _Sortes Virgilianæ_, the only
difference being that in the latter, Virgil took the place of the
Bible. Everybody knows in connection with the Sortes the story of
Charles I. and Lord Falkland.

_Botanomancy_, divining by means of plants and flowers, can hardly be
said to be extinct even now. In Goethe's 'Faust,' Gretchen seeks to
discover whether Faust returns her affection by plucking, one after
another, the petals of a star-flower (_sternblume_, perhaps the
china-aster), while she utters the alternate refrains, 'He loves me!'
'He loves me not!' as she plucks the last petal, exclaiming
rapturously, 'He loves me!' According to Theocritus, the Greeks used
the poppy-flower for this purpose.

_Capnomancy_, divination by smoke, the ancients practised in two ways:
they threw seeds of jasmine or poppy in the fire, watching the motion
and density of the smoke they emitted, or they observed the
sacrificial smoke. If the smoke was thin, and shot up in a straight
line, it was a good omen.

_Cheiromancy_ (or Palmistry), divination by the hand, was worked up
into an elaborate system by Paracelsus, Cardan, and others. It has
long been practised by the gipsies, by itinerant fortune-tellers, and
other cheats; and recently an attempt has been made to give it a
fashionable character.

_Coscinomancy_ was practised by means of a sieve and a pair of shears
or forceps. The forceps or shears were used to suspend a sieve, which
moved (like the axe in axinomancy) when the name of a guilty person
was mentioned.

_Crystallomancy_, divining by means of a crystal globe, mirror, or
beryl. Of this science of prediction, Dr. Dee was the great English
professor; but the reader will doubtless remember the story of the
Earl of Surrey and his fair 'Geraldine.'

_Geomancy_, divination by casting pebbles on the ground.

_Hydromancy_, divination by water, in which the diviner showed the
figure of an absent person. 'In this you conjure the spirits into
water; there they are constrained to show themselves, as Marcus Varro
testifieth, when he writeth how he had seen a boy in the water, who
announced to him in a hundred and fifty verses the end of the
Mithridatic war.'

_Oneiromancy_, divination by dreams, is still credited by old women of
both sexes. Absurdly baseless as it is, it found believers in the old
time among men of culture and intellectual force. Archbishop Laud
attached so much importance to his dreams that he frequently recorded
them in his diary; and even Lord Bacon seems to have thought that a
prophetic meaning was occasionally concealed in them.

_Onychomancy_, or _Onymancy_, divination by means of the nails of an
unpolluted boy.

_Pyromancy_, divination by fire. 'The wife of Cicero is said, when,
after performing sacrifice, she saw a flame suddenly leap forth from
the ashes, to have prophesied the consulship to her husband for the
same year.' Others resorted to the blaze of a torch of pitch, which
was painted with certain colours. It was a good omen if the flame ran
into a point; bad when it divided. A thin-tongued flame announced
glory; if it went out, it signified danger; if it hissed, misfortune.

_Rabdomancy_, divination by the rod or wand, is mentioned by Ezekiel.
The use of a hazel-rod to trace the existence of water or of a seam of
coal seems a survival of this practice. But enough of these follies:

'Necro-, pyro-, geo-, hydro-, cheiro-, coscinomancy,
With other vain and superstitious sciences.'
Tomkis, 'Albumazar,' ii. 3.