LINKS WITH THE PAST

Evening Star, Issue 14530, 5 December 1910, Page 8

LINKS WITH THE PAST

JOHNSON, CHARLES 1., WESLEY, AND | CAPTAIN COOK. ( The following interesting letters recent iy appeared in the Loudon 'Times':

I was born in 1819. When 1 was five years off' 1 was taken to visit Mr Grant, tho aired minister of Cawdor, iu Nairnshire, who had entertained .Johnson and lloswoll on their tour in Scotland in 1773. Boswell tells ihat he dreaded a whole evening for Johnson, but "Mr Grant, an intelligent, well-bred minister, entertained us by his conversation." When 1 was.six years old 1 was in a house in which a lady lived who was bom in 1726. whoso brother was Icilled at Culiodcn.— Your obedient, A. Campbell Fraser, Ivciinburgh.

During one of many visits that I paid to 11. Uuizot at his chateau in Normandy, Li; Val Riclier, the party generally were discussing links with tho past. This was about. forty years ago. I wu.s telling M. tiiiizot bow, When the Dulcc of Wellington v 17691851) paid his iirst visit to Chelsea Hospital as its governor, a vory aged, bedridden pensioner told the Duke some memories of his long life, and added:—"Your Grace would hardly believe it if 1 told you how my old unclo used to take me on liis Unco and tell j me how his father had held him up above i tho heads of the crowd to sec the great King's head cut. off." , M. Uuizot (1787-1874) then t (old n:o that! his mother-in-law, Mine de Mculan, had (teen j told by her mother, Mine de St. Cliaiiiand. ; that in her extreme youth she. had seen (he ' Duchessc d'Aiigouleme, a tkuiglrter-in-luw of Charles IX. (1560-74), who was at that, ' time iu her extreme old age, having married ; iu her extreme youth, the Due d'Angonleme, ! illegitimate son of Charles LX. by Mane j Touchet, and ho was extremely old when li.: ! married her. j

I hold in my hand, as I writ<\ (his paper. vellow with age. Many years after M. Guizot's death I showed it. to his eldest daughter, Mine de Witt, and she fully confirmed its bcingi an accurate report, of what her father had frequently told them. I asked her to attest it, which she did. and this paper bears her signature-—" (iuizoi de Witt, Bale. 17 December, 1885."—William Warren Vernon, tho Athenteiun. August 9. It may interest your readers to know that someone is more fortunate than Mr Warren Vernon, being one link closer to thoDuehesse d'Angonlerue. I have known the Marquis Montinort. He, had known bis grandmother well. She had been brought up by the Duchess d' Angoulcme, who had married the illegitimate son of Charles IX. of Vran-e. -- I remain, vours. cite, Madeleine de I'eyronnet 129 Marino Parade, Brighton, August 12.' J'.S.--1 have also known Marquis de Sigy. who was a page of Louis XV. (1710-1774). The late Mr Edward Hawkins, of the Hvitish Museum, whom I knew well in my boyhood, used to tell his friends that when he w-is a child he was once touched- i.e., palled on the head—by l>r Samuel Johnson. Dr Johnson had himself been touched, for King's evil, bv Queen Anne.— Robert, A. Eden, Vicar of Old St. I'iincras, Wilton Rectory, Salisbury, August 13. My father, who was bom in 1789. had a great value for oral tradition, and alwavs impressed on his children- that, his mother had, as a young girl, visited an old soldier who had fought for King James at the battle of the Boyne, 1690. So there are only two links between me and this veteran. -1.. M. Forster, West llaekhurst, Abinger Hammer, Dorking, August 8. As you arc still publishing those intorrsiin<r records. I beg to offer you the. following: Mv grandmother's grandmother was Susanna,'sister to John We-lev il7o>l7m). My aunt, Frances Martha Voysey, sat on Johu Wesley's kuoe. I am over eighly-two years of age, and my aunt, died at the age 'of eighty-four. I wa-« seven years old_ when my grandmother died.-Charles Voyscy, Annes'lov Lodge, Flail's lane, August 16.

Hay I add to your other illustration? of connexion with the past, my own rcmint--ccnco? I once met on the road at. Worthing in the year 1845 or 18-16 an old man who was then in his 100 th year, and wis walking to Brighton to sec the American CoiKttl in order to obtain help from him as a naturalised American citizen. During .-. lout' conversation with him 1 found lhat ho had gone round the world with Captain Cook m "}iis last, expedition, :iud had Lien actually present at hi.; massacre, the particulars of which he described, having been one of ihe fhip's company which had rowerl him ashore. He afterwards volunteered in the service, of the United Flutes. Hence his intended appeal to the Consul. A notice of his death at. Brighton some two months after mv interview with him appeared in your pages, with particulars of his life and the circumstances as before detailed to mo.—W. 11. Davov, Dean of I.larvlafl", LlnnduT, August, 16. T am not a very aged person as ycf, but T have an interesting recollection of the character of which some instances have been given already in your columns. Some time towards the end of the sixties I was at, a garden parly at the house of a Dr Browne, near Knot Dereham, in Norfolk. .My father, who was a squire of that part, of Ihe world, and always interested in history, called me up to him as he was talking io our host.. Dr Browne then fold me that his grandfather, with whom he was intimate, had told him when he iras a hoy that he (the grandfather) had seen Charles Edward the Pretender march into Derby and out of Derbv in the '4s that is, 165 years ago.—Alfred 11. Haggard. Adverting io ihe letter of the Vicar of Old Si. Patients in 'The Times' of yesterday, I may mention that in the Do jUetl'ort avenue of Old St. Pancras Churchyard are tho grave and tombstone of Lady Caroline Drumrnond (nee Mackenzie). Countess De MeH'ort, ob. 1846. In her girlhood she was it great favorite of Dr Johnson, who visited her father Kenneth, seventh and last Earl of Scaforth. Chief of Kiniail. He would salute her as "his little. Jacobitish mistress"—his sympathies being in accord with -those of Iter House. I, her grandchild, have lain in her iritis. Queen Anne, born in 1665. " touched " Dr Johnson —his touch-piece is in the British Museum: he touched a hand that touched me. Thus there, are but two links, or three touches, between one who lived 245 years ago and YV.E.D.-M., August, 17.