Chapter X: Appendix: 307 (8)

At this juncture, Lascaris, who was still wandering in Germany, took pity on the misfortunes of his young neophyte, and endeavoured to extricate him from his embarrassing position by means of a young doctor named Pasch, who was a personal friend of the ennobled apothecary’s boy. Their manœuvres resulted in the imprisonment of Pasch at the fortress of Sonneinstein, while Bötticher was closely confined in another castle at Kœnigstein.

Two years and a half passed away. At the end of that time Pasch succeeded in escaping at the expense of his limbs, and died after a few months, bitterly complaining of the treachery of the adept Lascaris, who had deserted him completely in his danger.

Bötticher remained in confinement with every opportunity to manufacture the philosophical stone, which, however he failed to accomplish; but what with his apothecary’s training and his prison experiments, he had become skilled in several departments of chemistry. He discovered the process for the production of red porcelain, and afterwards that of white, very superior in quality to the substances already known by that name. These inventions proved as valuable to the tyrannical Elector as the accomplishment of the _magnum opus_. Bötticher was restored to his favour, and again enjoyed his baronial title, but in his liberty he surrendered himself to an immoderately luxurious life, and died in 1719 at the age of thirty-seven years.

Bötticher was by no means the only apothecary’s boy who was enriched with the powder of Lascaris, and despatched to preach the gospel of alchemy with practical demonstrations. Godwin, Hermann, Braun, and Martin of Fitzlar are mentioned among these half-initiated labourers, who shone till their stock-in-trade was exhausted, and then disappeared in succession.

In the meantime, Lascaris himself was not idle. On the 16th February 1609 he is believed to have changed mercury into gold and gold into silver, a double transmutation, considered by alchemical connoisseurs to be the evidence of an unparalleled adeptship. Liebkneck, counsellor of Wertherbourg, was a witness of this transmutation.

In the same year a goldsmith of Leipsic was visited by a mysterious stranger, who is unanimously identified with Lascaris, and who showed him a lingot, which he declared was manufactured by art, and which proved in assaying to be gold of twenty-two carats. It was purified by the goldsmith with antimony, and part of it was presented to him by the unknown as a memorial of the alleged transmutation.

Shortly after, a lieutenant-colonel in the Polish army, whose name was Schmolz de Dierbach, and who had inherited from his father a belief in alchemical science, was conversing on the subject at a café, when he was accosted by a stranger, who presented him with some powder of projection. It was of a red colour, and a microscopic examination revealed its crystalline nature. It increased the weight of the metals which it was supposed to transmute to an extent which chemical authorities declare to be physically impossible. The recipient made use of it generously, distributing to his friends and acquaintance the gold it produced in projection. The unknown donor is identified in the imagination of German historians with the mysterious Lascaris, who is supposed, in the same anonymous and unaccountable manner, to have enriched the Baron de Creux with a box of the precious powder, and to have gratified the amateur Hermetic ambition of the Landgrave of Hesse Darmstadt through the commonplace medium of the post. In a word, every anonymous adept who appeared at this period in or about Germany is supposed to be Lascaris.

The last of his debtors or victims was the son of a Neapolitan mason, Domenico Manuel, who claims to have been mysteriously initiated into the transmutatory art in the year 1695. He was put in possession of a small quantity both of the white and red tinctures. Being insufficient to really enrich himself, he determined to trade upon the wonders they produced, and obtained large sums from wealthy amateurs for the privilege of beholding the consummation of the great work. He perambulated Spain, Belgium, and Austria, obtaining large sums, under the pretence of preparing the tincture, not only from private individuals, but from the Emperor Leopold and the Palatine Elector. In different places he assumed names that were different. Now he was Count Gaëtano, now Count de Ruggiero; at other times he called himself Field Marshal to the Duke of Bavaria, Commandant of Munich, a Prussian major-general, and by other titles. In 1705 he appeared at Berlin, where he imposed on the King himself for a brief period, after which, unable to ratify his transmutatory engagements, he was convicted of treason and hanged. This occurred on the 29th of August 1709.

DELISLE.

This artist, whose Christian name is unmentioned by his biographers, is included by Figuier among the emissaries or disciples of Lascaris, and much information concerning him will be found in the _Histoire de la Philosophic Hermétique_ by his contemporary, Langlet du Fresnoy. He was a rustic of low birth in Provence, and he became acquainted with alchemical experiments by entering the service of a gentleman who was believed to be in possession of the stone. This gentleman is supposed to have received the prize from Lascaris. His operations, however, fell under suspicion, and he was forced to quit France. He retired into Switzerland, accompanied by Delisle, who is said to have assassinated him in the mountains, and to have thus got possession of a considerable quantity of the transmuting powder. However this may be, the servant, re-entered France in disguise, and about the year 1708 attracted general attention by changing lead and iron into silver and gold. He perambulated Languedoc, the Dauphiné, and Provence. At Sisteron he connected himself with the wife of a certain Alnys, who eventually shared his fortunes for the space of three years. His renown was increased by the apparent simplicity of his operations. He spread powder and oil over iron, thrust it into the fire, and brought it out a bar of gold. He distributed nails, knives, and rings partially transmuted, and was particularly successful in his experiments with common steel.

Cerisy, prior of New Castel, was employed by the Bishop of Senez to collect evidence concerning the truth of these marvels. An old gentleman offered Delisle a retreat at his castle of La Palud, where the alchemist, surrounded by admirers, received the daily visits of the curious. In Lenglet’s “History of Hermetic Philosophy,” there is a letter from the Bishop of Senez to the Minister of State and Comptroller-General of the Treasury at Paris, in which the prelate, who at first was incredulous, professes his inability to resist the evidence of actual transformation performed before himself and several vigilant witnesses, who took every precaution against deception. There is also the Report of M. de Saint-Maurice, President of the Mint at Lyons, who testifies to the following facts. That he was accompanied by Delisle into the grounds of the Chateau de Saint Auban in May 1710, where he uncovered a basket that was sunk in the ground. In the middle of this basket there was an iron wire, at the end of which he perceived a piece of linen with some object tied up in it. He took possession of this parcel, carried it into the dining-room of the Chateau, and by the direction of Delisle he exposed its contents--a blackish earth about half a pound in weight--to the rays of the sun. After a quarter of an hour the earth was distilled in a retort of a portable furnace, and when a yellow liquor was perceived to flow into the receiver, Delisle recommended that the recipient should be removed before a viscous oil then rising should flow into it. Two drops of this yellow liquor, projected on hot quicksilver, produced in fusion three ounces of gold, which were presented to the Master of the Mint. Afterwards three ounces of pistol bullets were melted and purified with alum and saltpetre. Delisle handed Saint-Maurice a small paper, desiring him to throw in a pinch of the powder and two drops of the oil used in the first experiment. This done, the matter was covered with saltpetre, kept fifteen minutes in fusion, and then poured out on a piece of iron armour, which reappeared pure gold, bearing all assays. The conversion to silver was made in the same manner with white powder, and the certificate which testifies to these occurrences was officially signed on the 14th December 1760.

A part of the gold manufactured in this manner by Delisle was subjected to refinement at Paris, where three medals were struck from it; one of them was deposited in the king’s cabinet. It bore the inscription _Aurum Arte Factum_.

With all his alchemical skill, Delisle was unable to read or write, and in disposition he was untractable, rude, and fanatical. He was invited to Court, but he pretended that the climate he lived in was necessary to the success of his experiments, inasmuch as his preparations were vegetable. The Bishop of Senez, suspecting him of unwillingness rather than inability, obtained a _lettre de cachet_, after two years of continual subterfuge on the part of the alchemist, who was thereupon arrested and taken on the road to Paris. During the journey, his guards, after endeavouring to extort his supposed riches, wounded him severely on the head, in which state, on his arrival at the Bastille, he was forced to begin his alchemical operations, but after a short time he persistently refused to proceed, tore continually the bandages from his wound in the frenzy of his desperation, and in the year following his imprisonment he poisoned himself.

His illegitimate son, Alnys, by some means inherited a portion of the powder from his mother. He wandered through Italy and Germany performing transmutations. On one occasion he made projection before the Duke of Richlieu, then French ambassador at Vienna, and who assured the Abbé Langlet that he not only saw the operation performed, but performed it himself, twice on gold and forty times on silver.

Alnys made a considerable collection of gold coins, ancient and modern, while on a journey through Austria and Bohemia. On his return to Aix he presented himself to the President of Provence, who desired him to call the next day. Alnys, suspecting an intention to arrest him, fled in the interim. He was afterwards imprisoned at Marseilles, whence he contrived to escape to Brussels. It was here, in 1731, that he gave some philosophic mercury to M. Percell, the brother of Langlet de Fresnoy, which mercury the recipient fermented imperfectly, but succeeded so far as to convert an ounce of silver into gold. The death of a certain M. Grefier shortly after some operations on corrosive sublimate, by which Alnys proposed to instruct him in alchemy, made it necessary for him to depart, and he was heard of no more.

JOHN HERMANN OBEREIT.

This writer, as much mystic as alchemist, was born at Arbon at Switzerland in 1725, and died in 1798. He inherited from his father a taste for transcendental chemistry, and the opinion that metals could be developed to their full perfection, but that the chief instrument was the grace of God, working in the soul of the alchemist. He laboured unceasingly at the physical processes, hoping thereby to restore the fallen fortunes of his family, but his laboratory was closed by the authorities as endangering the public safety. He contrived to make evident the harmless nature of his employment, and was received into the house of a brother of the physiognomist Lavater. He celebrated, he informs us, a mystical marriage with a seraphic and illuminated shepherdess named Theantis, the ceremony taking place in a castle on the extreme summit of a cloud-encompassed mountain. His bride after thirty-six days of transcendental union, which was neither platonic nor epicurean, but of a perfectly indescribable character, departed this life, and the bereaved husband, during the whole night of her decease, bewailed her in a mystical canticle. _La Connexion Originaire des Esprits et des Corps, d’apres les principes de Newton_, Augsbourg, 1776, and _Les Promenades de Gamaliel, juif Philosophe_, were bequeathed by Obereit to a neglectful posterity.

TRAVELS, ADVENTURES, AND IMPRISONMENTS OF JOSEPH BALSAMO.

The notorious Count Cagliostro appears from an impartial review of his history and phenomenal exploits, to have been one of those characters not uncommonly met with in the chequered annals of occultism. Even as the modern “mediums,” who outrage the confidence of their believers by leavening the supernatural bread, whereof the ghastly patent is their prerogative and birthright, with the unrighteous mammon of material conjuring, and even as those conjurors who are sometimes supposed to still further perplex their audience by supplementary compacts with “spooks,” this high priest of transcendental trickery would seem to have possessed, perhaps unconsciously, a certain share of occult gifts, which assisted no little his unparalleled rogueries. Mystical knowledge beyond that of the age in which he lived was undoubtedly his, and though it was still superficial, he had a genius for making the most of it.

Joseph Balsamo, whatever has been advanced to the contrary by himself[AJ] or his admirers, was the son of Peter Balsamo and Felicia Bracconieri, both of humble extraction. He was born at Palermo, in Sicily, on the 8th of June 1743. His parents are authentically described as honest tradespeople and good Catholics, who were careful in the education of their offspring, and solicitous for their spiritual welfare. Their shop drew much custom in the populous neighbourhood which divided the handsome _Rue del Cæsaro_. While his children were still young, Peter Balsamo died, and, left under the inadequate control of a widowed mother, Joseph betrayed, even in his earliest years, a selfish and indolent disposition, greatly neglecting the scanty educational advantages which were afforded him. According to other accounts, he was taken under the protection of his maternal uncle, who endeavoured to instruct him in the principles of religion, and to give him an education suitable to his age and prospects; but, even from his infancy, he showed himself uniformly averse to a virtuous course of life. His uncle was a worthy _bourgeois_ of Palermo, who foresaw, by the vivacity and penetration of his nephew, that he might easily become proficient in letters and the sciences.[AK] By him he was desired to embrace an ecclesiastical career, as the royal road to distinction in those days. Accordingly, at the age of thirteen he was placed in the Seminary of St Roch di Palermo, where he proved his independence and aversion to discipline by continually running away. Recaptured in vagabond company, he was committed, with no very favourable character, to a certain father-general of the Bon Fratelli, who was passing through Palermo. The father-general took charge of him and straightway carried him to a Benedictine convent on the outskirts of Cartagirone. There the walls were high, and the caged dove was in the keeping of an inflexible _frère tourier_. He assumed perforce the habit of a novice, and the father-general discovering his aptitude for natural history and, more especially, his herbalistic tastes, placed him under the tuition of the conventual apothecary, from whom, as he afterwards acknowledged, he learned the first principles of chemistry and medicine. Figuier states that in a short time he was able to manipulate the drugs with astonishing sagacity; but even then it was remarked that he seemed eager to discover those secrets which would further the interests of charlatanry.[AL] In strict accordance with his natural perversity, he did not fail to give various instances of his innate viciousness, and drew down upon himself the continual chastisements of his superiors. One day the involuntary novice, whose irregularities were to some extent excusable on the ground of the constraint that was put on him, but who often outstripped all bounds, was set to read during dinner in the refectory a certain portion of an exceedingly edifying martyrology, and yielding, says one writer with pious indignation, to an inspiration of Belial, he substituted for the sacred text a blasphemous version suggested by his own dissolute imagination, perverting the sense and the incidents, and pushed his audacity so far as to substitute for the saintly names those of the most notorious courtesans of the period. A severe penance was imposed on the insolent offender; but one night he found means to evade the vigilance of his guardians, escaped from the convent, crossed the intervening country, and after some days of joyous gipsying and vagabond wanderings, he arrived at Palermo. Some knowledge of the principles of chemistry and medicine was about the total of the advantages he had derived from the discipline of conventual life. His uncle began to despair of him, but advice and remonstrances were alike lost upon the young reprobate, who derided them all, and employing a certain portion of his time in the cultivation of a natural taste for drawing, he otherwise abandoned himself to unbridled excesses. He associated with rascals and ne’er-do-wells; his drunkenness, gambling, and general libertinage, led him into perpetual brawling; and he was frequently in the hands of the police, whom he is said to have taken special pleasure in resisting, frequently delivering by force the prisoners whom they had arrested. He has been also accused of forging tickets of admission to the theatres, and selling them with characteristic effrontery. One of his uncles coaxed him back for a time into his house, and was rewarded by the robbery of a considerable quantity of money and some valuable effects. He became an intermediary in the amorous intercourse of a female cousin with one of his friends. He carried _billets-doux_ to and fro between them, and made the entire transaction personally profitable by extorting money from his friend, persuading him that the fair cousin had a partiality for presents, including both money and jewellery, and, of course, appropriating the funds which were entrusted to him. Graver crimes were soon laid to his charge. There was a certain dissolute Marquis Maurigi in Palermo who coveted an inheritance which had been willed to a pious establishment, and knowing Balsamo, to him were his projects confided, and an expedient was presently forthcoming. Joseph had a relative who was a notary, and by frequenting his office he found means to forge a will, bearing every mark of authenticity, in favour of the Marquis, who made good his claim to the estate, and no doubt liberally recompensed the skill and pains of his confederate. The falsification was discovered many years after, but the guilty parties were both of them far away. It was also rumoured that Balsamo was a party to the assassination of a wealthy canon, but the matter is exceedingly doubtful. He was many times arrested on various charges, but eluded justice, either by the absence of direct proof against him, or by the credit of his relations, and the exertions of reputable persons of Palermo, who took interest in his family. It will scarcely be credited that at this period Balsamo was only fourteen years of age. Naturally endowed with artistic aptitudes, he soon began to give lessons in drawing, and seems to have been many times on a fair way to reformation. His skill in arms is also acknowledged, but, conscious of his superiority, his street brawls frequently ended in duels; his impetuosity even prompted him to take up the gauntlet for his companions, and he scorned danger.

The most notorious of his youthful exploits, and that which caused him to commence his life-long wanderings, was the adventure of the concealed treasure, which has been variously related.

An avaricious goldsmith, named Marano, resided at Palermo. He was a weak, superstitious man--a believer in magic, says M. Louis Figuier--and he was much attracted by the mystery which, even at this period, is declared by Figuier to have surrounded the life and escapades of Balsamo, who already posed as an initiate of the occult sciences. Joseph was now seventeen years of age, of handsome mien and haughty carriage, speaking little, but holding his hearers spell-bound by the magnetic fascination of his glance. He had been seen evoking spirits; he was believed to converse with angels, and to obtain by their agency an insight into the most interesting secrets. He had, in fact, radically changed; the common rogue was developing into the transcendental impostor. Marano lent an attentive ear to the stories concerning him, and burned with anxiety to behold “the friend of the celestial spirits.” The first interview took place in the lodging of Balsamo; the goldsmith fell on his knees before him, and Balsamo, after receiving his homage, raised him condescendingly from the ground, and demanded in a solemn manner why he had come to him.

“Thanks to your daily communion with spirits, you will easily know,” answered Marano, “and you should have no difficulty in assisting me to recover the money which I have wasted among false alchemists, or even to procure me more.”

“I can perform this service for you, provided you believe,” said Balsamo, with composure.

“Provided I believe!” cried the goldsmith; “I believe, indeed.”

An appointment was made for the next day in a meadow beyond the town, and the interview ended without another word.

This version of the story is more romantic than probable, and we owe it to the vivacity of a Frenchman’s imagination, which is never more brilliant than when employed in the perversion or embellishment of history. According to the more sober _Aventures de Cagliostro_, Marano had for some time been acquainted with the youthful charlatan, who sought him one day at his own residence, and said to him: “You are aware of my communications with the supernal spirits; you are aware of the illimitable potency of the incantations to which I devote myself. Listen! In an olive field, at no great distance from Palermo, there is a buried treasure according to my certain knowledge, and by the help of a ceremonial evocation I can discover the precise spot where the spade of the seeker should be driven in. The operation, however, requires some expensive preliminaries; sixty ounces of gold are absolutely needed. Will you place them at my disposal?”

Marano declaimed against the preposterous extravagance of the demand, maintaining that the herbs and drugs utilised in alchemical experiments were exceedingly moderate in their price.

“’Tis well,” said Balsamo, coldly. “The matter is soon settled; I shall enjoy the vast treasure alone. A blessing when shared is but half a blessing for those who participate in it.”

On the morrow, however, Marano sought out the enchanter, having been agonised by the gold fever the whole night.

“I am furnished with the sum you require,” he said. “But I pray you to bargain a little with the spirits, and endeavour to beat them down.”

“Do you take them for sordid speculators?” cried the magician, indignant. “The devil is no Jew, though he abode full long in Judea. He is a magnificent seigneur, living generously in every country of the world. Treat him with respect, he returns a hundredfold. I shall find elsewhere the sixty ounces of gold, and can afford to dispense with your assistance.”

“It is here,” said Marano, drawing quickly a leather bag from his pocket, and the arrangements were soon made.

At moonlight they repaired to the olive field, where Balsamo had secretly made preparations for the approaching evocation. The incantatory preliminaries were sufficiently protracted, and Marano panted with terror under the influence of the magical charms, till it seemed to him that the very earth shivered beneath his feet and phantoms issued from the ground. Marano fell prostrate on his face, an action apparently foreseen, for there and then the wretched goldsmith was belaboured unmercifully with sticks by the infernal spirits, who left him at length for dead, taking flight in the company of the enchanter, and fortified by the possession of the sixty ounces of gold. On the morrow, the goldsmith, fortunately discovered by muleteers, was carried disconsolately home, and forthwith denounced Balsamo to the law. The adventure spread everywhere, but the magician had sailed for Messina.

These are the facts of the case, but the mendacious chronicle of Louis Figuier, alchemical critic and universal manufacturer of light scientific literature, offers us a far more ornate and attractive version. There the adept and his miserable dupe repair to a place appointed at six o’clock in the morning, Balsamo in dignified silence motioning the goldsmith to follow him, and proceeding with a pre-occupied aspect along the road to the chapel of Saint Rosalia for the space of a whole hour. They stopped at length in the middle of a wild meadow, and in front of a grotto, before which Balsamo extended his hand, and solemnly declared that a treasure was buried within it which he himself was forbidden to touch, which was guarded by devils of hell, which devils might, however, be bound for a brief period by the angels who commonly responded to his potent magical call.

“It only remains to be ascertained,” he remarked in conclusion, “whether you will scrupulously fulfil the conditions which must be imposed on you. At that price, the treasure may be yours.”

The credulous goldsmith impetuously implored him to name them.

“They cannot be learned from my lips,” said Balsamo loftily. “On your knees, in the first place!”

He himself had already assumed the posture of adoration. Marano hastened to imitate him, and immediately a clear, harmonious voice in the celestial altitude pronounced the following words--words, says the Frenchman, more delicious in the ears of the covetous miser than all the symphonies of aërial choirs.

“Sixty ounces of pearls, sixty ounces of rubies, sixty ounces of diamonds, in a coffer of enchased gold, weighing one hundred and twenty ounces. The infernal genii who protect this treasure will place it in the hands of the worthy man whom our friend has brought, if he be fifty years of age, if he be no Christian--if--if--if--” and a series of conditions followed which Marano perfectly united in his own penurious person, even to the last, which was thus formulated:--“And if he deposit at the entrance of the grotto, before setting foot therein, sixty ounces of gold to propitiate the guardians.”

“You have heard,” said Balsamo, who, already on his feet, began to retrace his steps, completely ignoring the utter stupefaction of his companion.

“Sixty ounces of gold!” ejaculated the miser with a dismal groan, and torn by the internal conflict of avarice and cupidity; but Balsamo heeded the exclamation as little as the groan, and regained the town in silence.

When they were on the point of separating, Marano appeared to have resolved.

“Grant me one instant!” he cried in a piteous voice. “Sixty ounces of gold? Is that the irrevocable condition?”

“Undoubtedly,” said Balsamo, carelessly.

“Alas! alas! And at what hour to-morrow?”

“At six o’clock in the morning and, mark, at the same spot.”

“I will be there.”

This was the parting speech of the goldsmith, and, as it were, the last gasp of his conquered avarice. On the morrow, punctual to the appointed time, they met as before, Balsamo with his habitual coolness, Marano with his gold. They arrived in due course at the grotto, where the angels, consulted as on the previous day, returned the same oracles. Balsamo assumed ignorance of what would take place. With a terrific struggle, Marano deposited his gold and prepared to cross the threshold. He took one step forward, then started back, inquired if there were no danger in penetrating into the depths of the cavern, was assured of safety if the gold had been faithfully weighed, entered with more confidence, and again returned, these manœuvres being repeated several times, under the eyes of the adept, whose expression indicated the most uninterested indifference. At length, Marano took courage and proceeded so far that a return was impossible, for three black, muscular devils started out from the shadows and barred his path, giving vent to the most alarming growls. They seized him, forced him to whirl round and round for a long time, and then while the unhappy creature vainly invoked the assistance of Balsamo, they proceeded to cudgel him lustily till he dropped overwhelmed to the ground, when a clear voice bade him remain absolutely silent and motionless, for he would be instantaneously despatched if he stirred either hand or foot. The wretched man did not dare to disobey, but after a long swoon the complete stillness encouraged him to raise his head; he dragged himself as best he could to the mouth of the terrible grotto, looked round him, and found that the adept, the demons, and the gold had alike vanished.

* * * * *

When Balsamo arrived at Messina he was furnished with a very handsome sum to support the expenses of his sojourn therein, for the lion’s share of the booty obtained from the goldsmith had, of course, fallen to himself. He lodged in one of the chief inns near the port, and had prepared himself for further adventures, when he suddenly remembered that he had an old and affluent aunt in the town whom he took occasion to visit, but only to discover that she had recently died, leaving the bulk of her fortune to different churches of Messina, and distributing the rest to the poor. Doubtless the dutiful nephew paid to the memory of this ultra-Christian relation a just tribute of regrets, and anxious to inherit at least something from a person so eminent in sanctity, he determined to assume her family name, joined to a title of nobility, and from that time forward he commonly called himself the Count Alessandro Cagliostro. His penetrating and calculating mind, says one of his biographers, understood the prestige which attached to a title at a period when the privileges of birth still exercised an almost undisputed influence.

It was in the town of Messina that Balsamo first met with the mysterious alchemist Altotas, whom in his fabulous autobiography he represented as the oriental tutor of his infancy. As he was promenading one day near the jetty at the extremity of the port, he encountered an individual singularly habited, and possessed of a most remarkable countenance. This person, aged apparently about fifty years, seemed to be an Armenian, though, according to other accounts, he was a Spaniard or Greek. He wore a species of caftan, a silk bonnet, and the extremities of his breeches were concealed in a pair of wide boots. In his left hand he held a parasol, and in his right the end of a cord, to which was attached a graceful Albanian greyhound.

Whether from curiosity or by presentiment, Cagliostro saluted this grotesque being, who bowed slightly, but with satisfied dignity.

“You do not reside in Messina, signor?” he said in Sicilian, but with a marked foreign accent.

Cagliostro replied that he was tarrying for a few days, and they began to converse on the beauty of the town and on its advantageous situation, a kind of oriental imagery individualising the eloquence of the stranger, whose remarks were, moreover, adroitly adorned with a few appropriate compliments. He eluded inquiries as to his own identity, but offered to unveil the past of the Count Cagliostro, and to reveal what was actually passing in his mind at that moment. When Cagliostro hinted at sorcery, the Armenian smiled somewhat scornfully, and dilated on the ignorance of a nation which confused science with witchcraft, and prepared faggots for discoverers.

His hearer, much interested, ventured to ask the address of the illustrious stranger, who graciously invited him to call. They walked past the cathedral and halted in a small quadrilateral street shaded by sycamores, and having a charming fountain in the centre.

“Signor,” said the stranger, “there is the house I inhabit. I receive no one; but as you are a traveller, as you are young and courteous, as, moreover, you are animated by a noble passion for the sciences, I permit you to visit me. I shall be visible to you to-morrow a little before midnight. You will rap twice on the hammer”--he pointed as he spoke to the door of a low-storied house--“then three times more slowly, and you will be admitted. Adieu! Hasten at once to your inn. A Piedmontese is trying to possess himself of the seven and thirty ounces of gold that are secured in your valise, and which is itself shut up in a press, the key of which is in your pocket at this moment. Your servant, signor!” and he departed rapidly.

Cagliostro, returning in all haste, discovered the thief in the act, and, as a lawful and righteously indignant proprietor, he forthwith delivered him to justice.

On the morrow, at the time appointed, he knocked at the door of the little house inhabited by the Armenian. It was opened at the fifth blow without any visible agency, and closed as soon as the visitor had entered. Cagliostro cautiously advanced along a narrow passage, illuminated by a small iron lamp in a niche of the wall. At the extremity of the passage a spacious door sprang open, giving admittance into a ground-floor parlour which was illuminated by a four-branched candelabra, holding tapers of wax, and was, in fact, a laboratory furnished with all the apparatus in use among practical alchemists. The Armenian, issuing from a neighbouring cabinet, greeted the visitor, inquired after the safety of the gold, had intelligence of the truth of his clairvoyance, and of the deserved fate of the malefactor, but cut short the expressed astonishment and admiration of Cagliostro by declaring that the art of divination was simply the result of scientific combinations and close observations. He ended by asking his hearer if he denied the infallible certitude of judicial astrology, but the self-constituted count denied nothing except the superior power of virtue over self-interest, whereat the Armenian inquired to whom he was indebted for his training.

“I was about to say to the solicitude of my uncles and to the apothecary in the Convent of the Bon Fratelli,” said Cagliostro; “but to what purpose? You undoubtedly know.”

“I know,” replied the strange individual, “that you have trained yourself; that the apothecary, equally with your uncles, has but opened for you the door to knowledge. What are your plans?”

“I intend to enrich myself.”

“That is,” said the other, grandiloquently, “you would make yourself superior to the imbecile mob--a laudable project, my son! Do you propose to travel?”

“Certainly, so far as my thirty-seven ounces of gold will take me.”

“You are very young,” said the Armenian. “How is bread manufactured?”

“With flour.”

“And wine?”

“By means of the grape.”

“But gold?”

“I come to inquire of yourself.”

“We will solve that problem hereafter. Listen to me, young man. I propose to depart for Grand Cairo, in Egypt. Will you accompany me?”

“With all my heart!” exclaimed Cagliostro, overjoyed, and they sat down in large oak chairs, each at one end of the table where the candelabra was placed.

“Egypt,” said the Armenian, “is the birthplace of all human science. Astronomy alone had Chaldea for its fatherland; there the shepherds first studied the courses of the stars. Egypt availed itself of the astro-Chaldean initiations, and soon surpassed the methods and increased the discoveries of the shepherds. Since the reign of the Pharaoh Manes, and of his successors, Busiris, Osymandyas, Uchoreas, and Moeris, Egyptian knowledge has advanced with giant strides. Joseph, the dream-reader, established the basis of chiromancy; the priests of Osiris and Isis invented the Zodiac; the Cosmogonies of Phre and Horus revealed agriculture and other physical sciences; the priestesses of Ansaki unveiled the secrets of philtres; the priests of Serapis taught medicine. I might proceed with the sublime enumeration, but to what end? Will you faithfully follow me to Egypt? I hope to embark to-morrow, and we shall touch at Malta on the way--possibly also at Candia--reaching the port of Phare in eight days.”

“’Tis settled!” cried the delighted Cagliostro. “I have my thirty-seven ounces of gold for the journey.”

“And I not a single crown.”

“The devil!” ejaculated Cagliostro.

“What matters it? What need to have gold when one knows how to make gold? What need to possess diamonds when one can extract them from carbon more beautifully than from the mines of Golconda? Go to! you are excessively simple.”

“Therefore, by your leave, I intend to become your disciple.”

The Armenian extended his hand, and their departure was fixed for the morrow.

This Altotas, or Althotes, we are assured by Figuier, was no imaginary character. The Roman Inquisition collected many proofs of his existence, without, however, ascertaining where it began or ended, for the mysterious personage vanished like a meteor. According to the Italian biography of Joseph Balsamo, Altotas was in possession of several Arabic manuscripts, and assumed great skill in chemistry. According to Figuier, he was a magician and doctor as well, though others represent him despising and rejecting the abused name of physician. As to his divinatory abilities, he had already given a signal proof of their extent to his pupil, but he showed him that he was acquainted with all his Palermese antecedents.

They embarked on board a Genoese vessel, sailed along the Archipelago, landed at Alexandria, where they tarried for forty days, performing several operations in chemistry, by which they are said to have produced a considerable sum of money, but whether by transmutation or by imposture is not apparently clear. Cagliostro’s respect for his master did not prevent him, with true Sicilian subtlety, inquiring as to his own antecedents, till Altotas, weary of resorting to the same stratagems of evasion, declared to him once for all that he was himself in complete ignorance as to his birth and parentage.

“This may surprise you,” he said, “but science, which can enlighten us on the part of another, is almost invariably impotent to instruct us concerning ourselves.”

He declared himself to be much older than would appear, but that he was in possession of certain secrets for the conservation of strength and health. He had discovered the scientific methods of producing gold and precious stones, spoke ten or twelve languages fluently, and was acquainted with almost the entire circle of human sciences. “Nothing astonishes me,” he said, “nothing grieves me, save the evils which I am powerless to prevent, and I trust to reach in peace the term of my protracted existence.”

He confessed that his name of Altotas was self-chosen, yet was it truly his. His early years had been passed on the coast of Barbary, near Tunis, where he belonged to a Mussulman privateer, who was a rich and humane man, and who had purchased him from pirates, by whom he had been stolen from his family. At twelve years of age he spoke Arabic like a native, read the Koran to his master, who was a true believer, studied botany under his direction, and learned the best methods for making sherbet and coffee. A post of honour was in store for him in the household of his master; but destiny decreed that when Altotas was sixteen, the worthy Mussulman should be gathered to his fathers. In his will he gave the young slave his liberty, and bequeathed him a sum which was equivalent to six thousand _livres_, wherewith Altotas quitted Tunis to indulge his passion for travelling.

Cagliostro represented that he had followed his instructor into Africa and the heart of Egypt, that he visited the pyramids, making the acquaintance of the priests of different temples, and penetrating into the arcana of their mysterious sanctuaries. Moreover, he declares himself to have visited, during the space of three years, all the principal kingdoms of Africa and Asia. These statements are identical in their value with the romantic story of his education in the palace of the muphti at Medina. It is altogether doubtful whether he ever visited Arabia, which was in any case the extreme limit of his wanderings, and he is subsequently discovered at Rhodes still in the society of Altotas, and pursuing, in common with that mysterious being, his doubtful chemical operations.

At Malta they had letters of introduction to the Grand Master, Pinto, and tarried for some time to work in his laboratory, for the “supreme chief of Maltese chivalry” was infatuated with alchemical experiments, and, after the fashion of that extravagant period, had a strong bias towards the marvellous. The history of the failure or success of the errant adepts remains in the laboratory of the Grand Master; but from this moment Altotas, the chemist and alchemist--Altotas, the phenomenal, the wise man, the scientist--disappears completely. “Malta was his sepulchre, or haply the place of his apotheosis.” “There,” says the Count, in his Memoir, “it was my misery to lose my best friend, the most wise, the most illuminated of mortals, the venerable Altotas. He clasped my hands shortly before his death. ‘My son,’ he said, in a failing voice, ‘keep ever before thine eyes the fear of the Eternal and the love of thy neighbour. Thou wilt soon learn the truth of all which I have taught thee.’”

With every mark of respect on the part of the Grand Master, and accompanied by the Chevalier d’Aquino, of the illustrious house of Caramania, and himself a Knight of Malta, Cagliostro repaired to Naples, where he supported himself for some time with money which had been presented to him by Pinto, and perhaps by loans from his possibly opulent companion, who, however, eventually quitted him to proceed into France. In Naples Cagliostro met with a Sicilian prince who was infected by the prevalent gold fever, and was so enraptured with the high-sounding theories of Cagliostro that he invited him to his chateau in the neighbourhood of Palermo, where they might pursue their operations in common. It was imprudent, but the pupil of the great Altotas could not resist the desire to revisit his native land. He tarried a certain period with his companion, but going one day into Messina, he encountered an old acquaintance, a certain dissolute priest, his confederate in the affair of Marano, and who had, in fact, acted as one of the sable fiends whose stout clubs had agonised the unfortunate goldsmith. The adventurer warned Cagliostro not to enter Palermo, where justice was highly offended at his youthful indiscretions. He persuaded him to join fortunes with himself, return to Naples, and there open a gaming-house for the benefit, or rather for the bleeding, of the wealthy foreigners who visited Italy. This method of gold-making was quite after the heart of his hearer, who soon took his leave of the Sicilian prince, but they were regarded with so much suspicion by the Neapolitan Government that they retired into the Papal states. Cagliostro’s companion had, however, received the tonsure, and he trembled for his safety on the consecrated ground which was the stronghold of the Holy Inquisition, so he hastened his departure to less orthodox places, and does not figure further in the chequered history of his brother in chicanery.

Cagliostro remained, and is said to have assumed several different characters, occasionally including the sacerdotal habit. According to some accounts, he made himself remarkable for his extreme piety, visiting all the churches, fulfilling the duties of religion, and frequenting the palaces of cardinals. By means of some letters of recommendation which he had brought with him from Naples, he obtained access to several persons of distinction, among others to the Seneschal de Breteuil, at that time Ambassador from Malta to Rome, and who, hearing of his former connection with the Grand Master, received him with much warmth, and procured him other honourable connections. One illustrious dupe ensured others, and we find him in a short time established in the Holy City, retailing wonderful recipes and specifics for all the diseases which afflict fallen humanity in Rome and the universe. Crowns and ducats flowed in upon him; he lived in some state and luxury, refraining, however, from scandalous enjoyments.

The Italian biography which represents the opinions, embodies the researches, and champions the cause of the Inquisition, draws, however, a different picture to those of Saint-Felix and Louis Figuier. “He employed himself at this period,” says this doubtful, because indisputably biassed, authority, “in making drawings on paper, the outlines of which were produced by means of a copperplate engraving, and afterwards were filled up with Indian ink. These he sold as designs made by means of the pen alone. Having taken up his abode at the Sign of the Sun, in the neighbourhood of the Rotunda, he quarrelled with one of the waiters and suffered imprisonment for three days.”

Whatever these statements are worth, there is no doubt hanging over the most important incident of his Roman career. It was in that place and at this period that he first beheld the young and beautiful Lorenza Feliciani, and having in two days fallen violently in love with her, he demanded her in marriage from her father, who, fascinated by his birth, his aristocratic name, and opulent appearance, consented, together with the lady. The marriage took place, not without _éclat_, says one section of the witnesses, and the pair resided in the house of the father-in-law. The Italian life, minimising to the uttermost the success of Cagliostro, says that he received as a dower a trifling fortune proportionate to their condition.

According to the testimony of all the biographers, inquisitorial or otherwise, Lorenza was not only young and beautiful, but “rich in every quality of the heart, being tender, devoted, honest, and modest;” but her husband conceived the diabolical design of advancing his fortunes at the expense of her honour, and in private conversation took occasion to rally her notions of virtue, which he sought to undermine. The first lesson which the young bride received from her husband, according to her own confession, was intended to instruct her in the means of attracting and gratifying the passions of the opposite sex. The most wanton coquetry and the most lascivious arts were the principles with which he endeavoured to inspire her. The mother of Lorenza, scandalised at his conduct, had such frequent altercations with her son-in-law, that he resolved to remove from her house, and in other quarters found it a simpler task to corrupt the mind and morals of his wife. Then, according to the Italian author, he presented her to two persons well qualified for the exercise of her talents, having instructed her to entangle them both by her allurements. With one of these she did not succeed, but over the other she acquired a complete victory. Cagliostro himself conducted her to the house destined for the pleasure of the lover, left her alone in his company, and retired to another chamber.

The interview and the offers made to her were such as entirely corresponded to the wishes of the husband, but the wife on this occasion did not exhibit a proper instance of conjugal obedience, and upon imparting the whole affair confidentially to her husband, received the most bitter reproach and the most violent and dreadful menaces. He also repeatedly assured her that adultery was no crime when it was committed by a woman to advance her interests, and not through affection for other men. He even added example to precept, by showing how little he himself respected the ties of conjugal fidelity--that is, apparently, he sold himself to lascivious females of advanced age, and on these occasions aroused his dormant passions by drinking a certain Egyptian wine, composed of aromatics which possessed the necessary qualities for the completion of his intention. His wife, hearkening at length to his instructions, was conducted several times to the place where she had formerly proved so disobedient to his orders. She sometimes received, says the same witness, either clothes or trinkets, and sometimes a little money, as the reward of her condescension. One day her husband wrote a letter, in the name of his wife, in which he begged the loan of a few crowns; these were immediately sent. In return for them an interview was promised during the course of the next day, and the lady was faithful to the appointment.

Such is the version of this disgraceful business given by the enemies of Cagliostro, but all biographers agree that he corrupted the morals of his wife. Indeed, the only question is whether the transaction took place on the sordid scale described by the Italian writer. Other authorities tell us that his success tempted “a beautiful Roman--Lorenza Feliciani--to share his rising fortunes. Unscrupulous, witty, and fascinating, Lorenza was an admirable partner for Cagliostro, who speedily made her an adept in all his pretended mysteries.” Whatever were her natural virtues or failings, it is highly improbable that she sold her uncommon attractions for such paltry and miserable advantages.

The house which was taken by Cagliostro became the resort of sharpers, two of whom, Ottavio Nicestro, who was eventually hanged, and a so-called Marquis d’Agriata, both Sicilians, became intimate associates of their host. With the latter he was frequently closeted for hours together. Their occupation is uncertain; but as Cagliostro’s wealth increased at no ordinary rate, and as the Marquis was an unparalleled proficient in the production of counterfeit writing, they are supposed to have succeeded in forging numerous bills of exchange; and it is, at any rate, certain that the letters patent by which the great charlatan was authorised to assume the uniform of a Prussian colonel, which he subsequently did to his definite advantage, were the production of this skilful miscreant. But a quarrel arose between the three confederates; Nicastro betrayed his accomplices, the Marquis fled from Rome, Cagliostro and the unhappy Lorenza incontinently following his example.

Our three fugitives took the road to Venice, reached Bergamo, and there practised several unparticularised rogueries, till their identity was discovered by the Government. The marquis again managed to escape, the others after a short imprisonment were expelled from the town, and being stripped of all their resources, undertook a pilgrimage into Galicia, hoping to cross Spain, through the charity of the clergy and conventual communities. They travelled through the territories of the King of Sardinia, through Genoa, and so arrived at Antibes. From this moment the life of the Count Cagliostro was for several years one of incessant wandering. According to the Italian biographer, as beggary proved unprofitable, Lorenza was again forced by her husband to augment their resources through the sale of her charms. In this way they arrived at Barcelona, where they tarried for six months, the same course of infamous prostitution, followed by Lorenza with the most manifest reluctance, contributing in the main to their support.

From Barcelona they proceeded to Madrid, where also certain noble Spaniards proved sensible to the charms of Lorenza. From Madrid they journeyed to Lisbon, and thence sailed to England, where Cagliostro is said to have adopted the profession of a common quack, to have fallen into prison, to have been bought out by his wife, in whose person he still continued to traffic, bartering her charms to every opulent man who wished to become a purchaser; but the frequency of her prostitutions has probably been grossly exaggerated.

An English Life of the Count Cagliostro, dedicated, in 1787, to Madame la Comtesse, and written in the interests of the charlatan, gives a singular account of his misfortunes in London, showing that when he arrived there he was in possession of plate, jewels, and specie to the amount of three thousand pounds, that he hired apartments in Whitcomb Street, where he dedicated a large portion of his time to his favourite studies of chemistry and physics, and that all he suffered must be entirely attributed to the profuse generosity and charity of himself and his lady.

In 1772, Cagliostro and his wife crossed over to France, accompanied by one M. Duplaisir, who lodged with them at Paris, and seems to have been intimate with Lorenza. But Cagliostro was insatiable, says St Felix. He sold his honour at a high price, and the fortune of Duplaisir melted in the crucible of another’s follies and extravagances. At length, in alarm, the victim took leave of his rapacious guests, not without strongly warning Lorenza to return to her parents, for he had learned to esteem the natural good qualities which she possessed. According to one account, she attempted to follow this advice, but others say that she sought refuge from incessant prostitution with Duplaisir himself. In either case, Cagliostro had recourse to the authority of the king, and obtaining an order for her arrest, she was imprisoned in the penitentiary of Sainte Pélagie, and was detained there several months, during which Cagliostro abandoned himself to a life of congenial dissipation. The sale of a certain wash for beautifying the complexion appears to have procured him a considerable revenue about this period.

The imprisonment of Lorenza did not prevent a reconciliation with her husband immediately after her release, which occurred on December 21, 1772, on which date, having obtained under false pretences some magnificent dresses from the _costumiers_, Cagliostro appeared at the ball of a dancing-master in a peculiarly brilliant costume.