THE DEATHLESS ONE

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 208, 3 September 1938, Page 12 (Supplement)

THE DEATHLESS ONE

golden rule of the chronicler is to begin at the beginning, and the only excuse that can be offered for making an exception in this case is simply that historians have failed to find a beginning. Stranger still, they have also failed to find an end. Let me explain. Throughout recorded history is to be found, here and there, mention of a, mysterious being who passes across the stage of human affairs, rich, powerful, working out a hidden purpose behind the scenes, coming no man knows whence—always, it seems, arranging to die in obscurity although authentic evidence of hie decease can never be foun.l. And the man to whom this queer description applies in every way is the Comte de Saint-Germain, the historical

enigma. ByW. J. Passingham

Of this reality there can be no shadow of doubt. The facts about Saint-Ger-main are recorded and vouolicd for by reliable French, German, and English writers who knew hiin personally,, without ever uncovering the deep mystery surrounding him. He stands out, a sombre, impressive figure against a brilliant background of life at the court of that supreme egoist, King Louis XV. of France, while a crowd of idlers were busy sowing seed for a terrible harvest —the French Revolution. Voltaire, Horace Walpole, the exiled Prince Charles Edward Stuart, and many other famous men of that period, mention Saint-Germain in their memoirs. Even more significant, this man's name is allotted considerable space in the State Papers of France, in -long and detailed reports from secret service agents to the French police. All describe him after the same fashion—as a stately, middle-aged man speaking French with a Jewish accent. Nothing was discovered against his character. Like the question of his birth, the source of his great wealth remained a complete mystery. He never played cards or gambled; nor did he practise as a charlatan. Scandal was never attached to his name. Always dressed in black silk, this strange figure mingles in an incongruous setting—like a furtive silhouette gliding among the gay throng which paid homage to a Royal mistress, the Marquise de Pompadour, and gradually, unobtrusively, he establishes himself among the greatest men of art and literature she gathered about her at Versailles. The aristocracy of France seems to have awakened too late to prevent the advancement of a queer stranger in their exclusive circle about the ravishing Pom- : padour. At a time when intense jealousy was instantly aroused by the bestowal of ft Royal favour, however slight, Saint-Germainjrained ait intimate position with the r aqd Queen —even so far a* to flhare and be trusted with their jCfctofej'J: Through a maze of , intrigue he went his cUtely .way, unperturbed, after the fashion of the grand seigneur, claiming social equality with the best in all France. Moreover, few dared to dispute hie place, for there was good reason to fear this stranger who called himself Comte do v. /• 7*^%*,' „<s'|jßroug!»t from Germany by the Marecba] de Belle-Isle, in which country he to known as der Wundermann, or :'l&pgician, Saint-Germain quickly revealed himself to the French court as a genius of many parts. Germany admired him as a master of science, but in France he was first noticed ae a wonderful musician. and then as a man of great wealth. On State occasions SaintGermain blazed wi£h precious stones. His fingers, watch, snuff box, shoe buckles, and even his garter, studs flashed with' geiM.' On one occasion a court jeweller who, happened to be present made a rough estimate of the jewellery Saint-Germain wore upon his person, and the estimate totalled 200,000 francs. Saint-Germain openly claimed to have the secret of removing'flaws from diamonds, and this information was quickly conveyed to the King. It was also whispered in the Royal ear that the man must be made because he talked of famous people dead for centuries whom he had known personally. Louis at once put Saint-Germain to the test. He showed him a yellow diamond valued at.

6000 francs—which, without a flaw, would be worth 10,000 francs at least. Saint-Germain examined the stone, and smiled gently. "I thank you for the opportunity, Sire," he said. "This diamond will be returned to you in less than a month and it will be flawless." Courtiers overbearing the statement chuckled among themselves. They knew there was no chance of deception on Saint-Germain's part. Louis had arranged for the stone to be marked. So they could see the mysterious Comte de Saint-Germain leaving Versailles within the month. It was beyond the power of any man to alter the substance of a diamond. However, the silk-clad stranger remained anions them, calm before the j fate that threatened him, and in less I

than a month he placed a flawless diamond in the King's hands. Louis made no comment on this miracle, but sent the diamond to his own jeweller for Valuation. The Jeweller oflered his Royal patron 9600 francs for the stone, and his offer was promptly refined. Thus, an incident which promised to discredit Saint-Germain, served to forge a closer bond of friendship between him and the King. Soon Saint-Germain was suspected of being able to make precious stones by a chemical secret. Everything pointed to his ability in this direction. The established _ facts about this amazing man are without logical explanation. Even to-day, jthe Encyclopaedia Britannica describes the Comte de Saint-Germain ae: "A celebrated adventurer who, by the assertion of some extraordinary secrets of Nature, exercised considerable influence at several European courts.' Of his birth and parentage nothing is known." We have the testimony of the Marquise de Pompadour's lady-in-waiting in the w;ell-known "Memoirs- of, Madame du Hausset" for ■ Saint-Germain's marvellous jewellery and the mystery surrounding his age. Madame du Hauseet writes: "He showed Madame de Pompadour a little box- full of rubies, topazes and diamonds; Saint-Germain selected a superb ruby and tossed it over to me with a gesture of indifference. The court jeweller afterwards offered me 1500 francs for it. *'A man as" amazing a 'witch, he came often to see Madame de Pompadour. This Comte de Saint-Germain wished to make people believe he had lived 'for several centuries. He described the beauty of Mary Stuart in the height of , her youth as Queen of France.

Describing the baffling Comte de Saini-Cermain of Pompadour days, known in German}) as "Der IVundermann" and believed by the abbot of a Smiss monastery to be the Wandering Jerv himself. Mysteries concerning him are amazing no less for their plenitude than for their inexplicability. IVise men have given up trying to puzzle it all out. . . .

" r VVh< l t sort of a man was King Francis; a king I could have loved?' asked Madame de Pompadour, and I laughed heartily at her question. (King i Francis 11., husband of Mary Stuart, had at that time been dead nearly 200 years.) " 'A good sort of fellow, too fiery—l could have given the boy a useful piece of advice, but he would not have lit-lened,' Saint-Germain told her. " 'You seem to have known them all," said Madame de Pompadour. "'Sometimes,' Saint-Germain answered, 'T amuse myself not by making people believe, but by letting them be" licve that I linve lived from time immemorial.' But you do not tell us your age, and give yourself out as very old. Our

friend Madame de Gergy, who was wife of the French Ambassador at Venice 50 years ago, says that she knew you there —and that you are not changed in the least.' " 'It is true, madame, that I knew Madame de Gergy long ago.' "But according to her story,' Madame de Pompadour said, 'you must now be over a century old.' " It may be so, but I admit that even more possibly the respected lady is in her dotage.'" According to Madame du Hausset, Saint-Germain looked to be a man about 50 years of age when he first became a visitor to the Pompadour's apartments during the year 1760. The aged Madame ■de Gergy asserted that he looked precisely the same in Venice about the year 1710. Nor was she the only one, ripe in years, to come forward with the same evidence. Many old people at that time claimed to have known Saint-Gerinain when they were young, and openly declared that he had not changed at all for a century. He always looked the same—a beautifully dressed, well-preserved man of about 50 years of age! Madame du Hausset observes that on occasion she heard Saint-Germain speak quietly of a childhood spent in places, on magnificent terraces glowing beneath an azure sky. Listening to his enthralling story, she gained the impression that he referred to the glories of ancient Egypt. It became the general belief in Paris that Saint-Germain was the illegitimate son of the King of Portugal. Another rumour had it that he was the natural son of the Queen of Spain. The Due de Choiseul, most responsible French Minister at that time, had every rumour investigated in the hope of bringing •ignominy upon Saint-Germain. Not a single piece of reliable evidence could be found. In any case, both King Louis and the Marquise de Pompadour continued to treat him as a person of consequence. Meanwhile the French police watched Saint-Germain's every movement to discover the source of his great income. They argued that he must be financed by other European Powers for the purpose of espionage in France. Their reasons for this suspicion were based on an exploit of Saint-Germain when he resided in England during the Jacobite rising of 1745. It was significant that Saint-Germain's arrival in London coincided with the invasion of England by Prince Charles Kdward Stuart's army, when the latter managed to evade the Duke of Cumberland and march as far south as Derby.

Horace Walpole in a letter dated December 9, 1745, to a friend in Florence, writes:— "The other day they seized an odd man who goes by the name of Count Saint-Germain. He has been here these two years, and will not tell us who he is, or whence, but professes that he does not go by his right name. He sings, plays on the violin wonderfully, composes, is mad and not very sensible. "He is called an Italian, a Spaniard, a Pole; a somebody who married a great fortune in Mexico, and ran awet with her jewels to Constantinople; a priest, a fiddler, a vast nobleman. "The Prince of Wales has bad unsatiated curiosity about him, but in vain. However, nothing has been made out against him; he is released, and, what convinces me he is no gentleman, stays here and complains of his being taken up for a spy." Even the infallible English of the 18th century failed to penetrate the mystery of >the Comte de Saint-Germain, iind poured forth their ridicule for lack of common sense. French spies continued to shadow Saint-Germain, and in 1762 they traced him as far ks St. Petersburg. Here it Mamed cert&ia that he played an im-

portant part in the great conspiracy against the Russian Emperor, Peter 111., in the July of that year. It was a clever scheme which ended in placing Catherine the Great on the throne of Russia, but no evidence of the part Saint-Germain played in it ever came to light. The man of mystery made a leisurely return south by way of Germany. It was in Germany that Saint-Germain met a young man who, on his own confession, begged to become a pupil — and the pupil was none other than Ales- , sandro Cagliostro, afterwards the > greatest charlatan in Europe. Accord- [ ing to Cagliostro, in his "Memories , Authentiques," Saint-Germain was the real founder of Freemasonry and the | man who initiated him into its rites. The news of Saint-Germain's return to Paris seems to have preceded him. , for the Due de Choiseul brought all his influence to bear upon the King that the man of mystery might be turned back from the frontiers of France. But Louis apparently looked forward to a renewal of his conversations with the entertaining Wundermann, and refused his Minister's earnest advice. The Comte de Saint-Germain was welcomed back to Versailles with open arms. Soon afterwards the Comte brought a final and all-powerful enemy against himself. Saint-Germain and his servant

approached the entrance to the cathedral of Notre Dame, where a crowd of Parisians were resting upon the seats beneath its shade during the heat of a summer afternoon. Here stood a great symbol of the Crucifixion, and near it ho paused to gaze closely at the painracked features of the Saviour. The curiosity of the Parisians was aroused and they drew nearer so that his comments were heard distinctly by many people. "A wonderful likeness," Saint-Germain observed. "This is just as we saw Him on the hill outside the city that day." "Your lordship forgets I have been in his service for only 500 years," the attendant said, humbly. The citizens of Paris drew back in alarm, shocked by this outrageous statement, which was duly reported to the Cardinal's secretary. A cry of "heresy!" went up 011 all sides, and the Church at once found a strong supporter in the Due de Choiseul. King Louis was helpless in face of the Church's demand, the one great institution always his master when it claimed a victim.

Saißt-Germain was forced to leave Paris that same night, in the summer of 1775, and he fled to Schleswig-Hol-stein, where he sought refuge with an old friend—the Landgrave Charles of Hesse. All agreed in Paris that they had seen the last of the amazing Comte de Saint-Germain—and all were afterwards proved to be wrong. The last incidents ever to be recorded about this man are indeed the strangest of all. Until the year 1785, the French police were satisfied that Saint-Germain still lived in Schleswig-Holstein, and in that year they received the report of hia death. The event was duly recorded in State papers. Four years later, however, a police spy reported the arrival of a suspicious person in Paris, and the description was so familiar to the French secret' service that they at once investigated the matter. "A middle-aged man, well dressed, rich, speaks French with a Jewish accent." "The Comte de Saint-Germain!" "No. He calls himself Major Frazer. An Englishman. His papers prove it." Men grown old in the service of the French police were called upon to identify the mysterious "Major Frazer," and all agreed he was none other than SaintGermain—the same man they had known 30 years ago. His appearance was still— except that his clothes conformed to the change of fashion—the same as when he entertained the Marquise de Pompadour in the height of her power and popularity at Versailles. But the Pompadour had been dead 25 years! It was impossible! The police dared not bring a charge against "Major

Frazer" for fear of bringing ridicule upon themselves. In French State Paper® it is recorded: —

"Major Frazer is decidedly not English, though he speaks the language. Yet he is the same man we knew as the Conite de Saint-Germain —the clothes of black silk, the Jewish accent —and none know the source of his income." Inquiries were made about the report of Saint-Germain's death from Schlea-wig-Holstein. and it was learned that Charles of Hesse had presumed the death and come into possession of all SaintGermain's papers and correspondence. The Landgrave flatly refused to say a word about his late friend, although he admitted he had confidential information on the subject. Just what Charles of Hesse knew about the most mysterious man in' Europe was tiever discovered. When Charles' son Frederic became Landgrave he did not find a single paper relating to Saint-Germain. It was decided thaf "Major Frazer" must leave France at once, and this time he sought sanctuary in travelling across Europe. His movements were duly reported to the French police from time to time, and the last heard of him was from a small alpine village. A man answering to the same old description was seen to leave the village alone, walking in the direction of the St. Gothard Pass. Soon after his departure a heavy snowstorm began in which it was thought the lonely' traveller had met a tragic end. A month after this Information reached Paris, a letter came into the hands of -the French police, a. letter written by the abbot of a lonely monastery high up on the St. Gothard Pass: — "We have had a heavy storm. The snow is thick upon lis, and out of it came a stranger to our gates. I knew him at once, from the description written down by Matthew Paris as he received it from the Armenian archbishop. We gave him food, although we feared him. "None other thar the Jew has passed this way. ..."