Christmas Every Day

The perils of being a royal mistress 4

Like Nell Gwynn, Marie-Jeanne Bécu, aka Madame du Barry, rose from the depths of the sex trade to the heights of royal favour. 

She was born in 1743, the illegitimate daughter of a seamstress and a monk. After a convent education, she worked as a street pedlar, a lady’s companion, a shop assistant, and a prostitute. She caught the eye of Jean du Barry, a Gascon nobleman who had made a fortune as a war contractor and who operated as a high-class pimp. He took her as his mistress and with his help she became one of Paris’s most successful courtesans. Her blonde hair, blue eyes, and pretty face (which seems rather insipid in contemporary portraits) eventually attracted Louis XV’s attention in 1768. Since the death of the king’s previous favourite Madame de Pompadour four years earlier, Louis had acknowledged no one as his maîtresse en titre. (Only the French could have invented an official role for a royal doxy, complete with state-funded apartments and privileges.) Du Barry needed a noble title to aspire to that role so a convenient marriage was arranged and she could openly appear at court.  

Du Barry kept her royal lover happy until his death in 1774 by which time she had made powerful enemies for her dabbling in politics and her unbridled extravagance. The new queen, Marie Antoinette, had her banished to a convent for a time and du Barry was never able to return to the court of Louis XVI. She lived quietly on her rural estates until the French Revolution. She managed to survive the first few years of turmoil but her support of counter-revolutionary émigrés led to a sentence of death in December 1793. Her last words on the scaffold were “You are going to hurt me, please don’t hurt me, just one more moment, I beg you!”

A word about The Mahdi

Earlier on this site, I have commemorated General Charles “Chinese” Gordon on this date in 1885 who fell defending the city of Khartoum in Sudan from the forces of an Islamic jihad. Today let’s look at the leader of that movement, Muhammad Ahmad bin Abd Allah known as “The Mahdi”.

Muhammad Ahmad was born in 1844 to a family of boat builders in Sudan who claimed descent from Muhammed, the 7th-century founder of Islam. At an early age he took an interest in religion and after studying with local Sufis, developed a reputation for wisdom and piety. He began to preach and began to attract followers; in 1881 he announced that he was The Mahdi.

The Mahdi is a figure in Islamic eschatology, prophesied to appear in a time of crisis and, accompanied by the Prophet Isa (Jesus), to usher in a new era of justice and universal peace. The hadith literature gives certain signs by which to know the true Mahdi but a multitude of local legends and variations have allowed for wide disagreement in Islam about the figure. Numerous Muslims of Muhammed’s lineage have appeared in history claiming the title.

Recognizing the potential for unrest attendant on anyone claiming the title, the Egyptian government of the Sudan first tried bribing and then arresting Muhammad Ahmad. He eluded capture and began to assemble forces large enough to pose a military threat. He defeated force after force of Egyptian troops, some of them led by British officers. By 1883 after his defeat of Hicks Pasha at the battle of El Obeid he controlled half of Sudan with more tribes coming over to him.

The reign of the Mahdi was not a happy one for those who doubted his claims. His variety of Islam was of the harsh and fundamentalist sort; he also restored the slave trade which the Egyptian authorities had suppressed. His success prompted the British to withdraw from most of the Sudan and to send Charles Gordon to oversee the evacuation of Egyptian garrisons, civilians and administrators. Gordon attempted to convince The Mahdi to come back to obedience and offered him a governorship if he agreed. The reply was stark: “I am the Expected Mahdi and I do not boast! I am the successor of God’s Prophet and I have no need of any sultanate of Kordofan or anywhere else!” Gordon was unable to hold Khartoum and along with all his troops was massacred when the city fell to the Mahdi, who ordered that Gordon’s head be cut off and stuck in a tree “where all who passed it could look in disdain, children could throw stones at it and the hawks of the desert could sweep and circle above.”

The Mahdi did not long survive Gordon, dying six months later of typhus. His successor, known as the Khalifa, ruled Sudan until a British expedition retook the country in 1898.  General Kitchener took the opportunity to desecrate the Mahdi’s tomb, throw his body in the Nile and carry his head home as a souvenir.

 

1840 Birth of the Penny Post

Here are images of stamps from Canada, the USA, and France.

Here are images of British stamps.

Notice any difference? Of course, you do. British stamps, uniquely in the world, do not carry the name of the country that issues them. Only the portrait of the current monarch is needed to denote them as a product of Great Britain, the country that invented the modern postal system. A 19th-century account explains:

The 10th of January 1840 will be a memorable day in the history of civilization, as that on which the idea of a Penny Postage was first exemplified. The practical benefits derived from this reform, are so well known that it is needless to dwell upon them. Let us rather turn attention for a few moments to the remarkable, yet most modest man, whom his species have to thank for this noble invention.

Rowland Hill, born in 1795, was devoted through all his early years, even from boyhood, to the business of a teacher. At the age of forty, we find him engaged in conducting the colonization of South Australia upon the plan of Mr. Edward
Gibbon. Wakefield, for which his powers of organization gave him a great advantage, and in which his labours were attended with a high degree of success. It was about the year 1835, that he turned his attention to the postal system of the country, with the conviction that it was susceptible of reform. Under enormous difficulties he contrived to collect information upon the subject, so as to satisfy himself, and enable him to satisfy others, that the public might be benefited by a cheaper postage, and yet the revenue remain ultimately undiminished. The leading facts on which he based his conclusions have been detailed in an authoritative document. ‘The cost of a letter to the Post-Office he saw was divisible into three branches.

First, that of receiving the letter and preparing it for its journey, which, under the old regime, was troublesome enough, as the postage varied first in proportion to the distance it had to travel; and again, according as it was composed of one, two, or three sheets of paper, each item of charge being exorbitant. For instance, a letter from London to Edinburgh, if single, was rated at 1s. 1½d.; if double, at 2s. 3d.; and if treble, at 3s. 4½d.; any-the minutest-inclosure being treated as an additional sheet. The duty of taxing letters, or writing upon each of them its postage, thus became a complicated transaction, occupying much time and employing the labour of many clerks. This, and other duties, which we will not stop to specify, comprised the first of the three branches of expense which each letter imposed on the office. The second was the cost of transit from post-office to post-office. And this expense, even for so great a distance as from London to Edinburgh, proved, upon careful examination, to be no more than the ninth part of a farthing!

The third branch was that of delivering the letter and receiving the postage-letters being for the most part sent away unpaid. Rowland Hill saw that, although a considerable reduction of postage might and ought to be made, even if the change rested there, yet that, if he could cheapen the cost to the Post office, the reduction to the public could be carried very much further, without entailing on the revenue any ultimate loss of serious amount. He therefore addressed himself to the simplification of the various processes. If, instead of charging according to the number of sheets or scraps of paper, a weight should be fixed, below which a letter, whatever might be its contents, should only bear a single charge, much trouble to the office would be spared, while an unjust mode of taxation would be abolished.

This led to the proposal for pre-payment by stamped labels, whereby the Post-office is altogether relieved from the duty of collecting post-age. Thus, one by one, were the impediments all removed to the accomplishment of a grand object—uniformity of postage throughout the British Isles.’

106 BC The birth of Cicero

Marcus Tullius Cicero was born on this date to a family of the equestrian class who had made it big in the chickpea business.  (Cicer is the Latin name for that useful legume). He was given an excellent education in philosophy rhetoric and the law and, as any young ambitious Roman of the elite did, embarked on the cursus honorum. In his life of public service, he rose from praefect to aedile to praetor to consul to provincial governor. Cicero earned a reputation as the greatest orator of his age and was a deadly advocate in the law courts, particularly fame for his prosecution of Cataline and his would-be rebels.

Cicero’s downfall came when he meddled in factional politics and chose the wrong side in the last days of the corrupt republic. He cheered the assassination of Caesar and made an enemy of the dictator’s heir and best friend, Octavian Caesar and Mark Antony who put him on a death list. He was murdered on December 7, 43 BC, and his head and hands were nailed up in the Forum. 

Cicero’s speeches, letters, and books were considered to be written in the purest form of Latin and inspired much imitation during the Renaissance. (The reader will recall the demand of the dying prelate in Robert Browning’s poem “The Bishop Orders His Tomb at St Praxed’s” that his epitaph be in finest “Tullian” style.) His works have never been out of print for the last 500 years.

Since he would have been 2128 years old today, it seems fitting to conclude with remarks from his book On Old Age.

When I reflect on this subject I find four reasons why old age appears to be unhappy: first, that it withdraws us from active pursuits; second, that it makes the body weaker; third, that it deprives us of almost all physical pleasures; and, fourth, that it is not far removed from death.

The greatest states have been overthrown by the young and sustained and restored by the old. … Rashness is the product of the budding-time of youth, prudence of the harvest-time of age.

No one is so old as to think that he cannot live one more year.

When the young die I am reminded of a strong flame extinguished by a torrent; but when old men die it is as if a fire had gone out without the use of force and of its own accord, after the fuel had been consumed; and, just as apples when they are green are with difficulty plucked from the tree, but when ripe and mellow fall of themselves, so, with the young, death comes as a result of force, while with the old it is the result of ripeness. To me, indeed, the thought of this “ripeness” for death is so pleasant, that the nearer I approach death the more I feel like one who is in sight of land at last and is about to anchor in his home port after a long voyage.

In short, enjoy the blessing of strength while you have it and do not bewail it when it is gone, unless, forsooth, you believe that youth must lament the loss of infancy, or early manhood the passing of youth. Life’s race-course is fixed; Nature has only a single path and that path is run but once, and to each stage of existence has been allotted its own appropriate quality; so that the weakness of childhood, the impetuosity of youth, the seriousness of middle life, the maturity of old age—each bears some of Nature’s fruit, which must be garnered in its own season.

1814 The death of a prophetesss

When I was a young man, still in my teens, I visited London. The attractions included an English  girl I had met back in Saskatoon, Carnaby Street, the British Museum, and London newspapers. I was dazzled by the journalism, high and low. One advertisement in a tabloid caught my eye — it demanded that the Bishops open Joanna Southcott’s Box. It was implied that untold wisdom and cosmic secrets would be revealed and national calamities averted if they did. Who was Joanna Southcott? And what was in her box? Here is a near-contemporary account of the remarkable woman.

Joanna Southcott was born about the year 1750, of parents in very humble life. When about forty years old, she assumed the pretensions of a prophetess, and declared herself to be the woman mentioned in the twelfth chapter of the Book of Revelation. She asserted that, having received a divine appointment to be the mother of the Messiah, the visions revealed to St. John would speedily be fulfilled by her agency and that of the son, who was to be miraculously born of her. Although extremely illiterate, she scribbled much mystic and unintelligible nonsense as visions and prophecy, and for a time carried on a lucrative trade in the sale of seals, which were, under certain conditions, to secure the salvation of the purchasers. The imposture was strengthened by her becoming subject to a rather rare disorder, which gave her the appearance of pregnancy after she had passed her grand climacteric. The faith of her followers now rose to enthusiasm. They purchased, at a fashion-able upholsterer’s, a cradle of most expensive materials, and highly decorated, and made costly preparations to hail the birth of the miraculous babe with joyous acclamation.

The delusion spread rapidly and extensively, especially in the vicinity of London, and the number of converts is said to have amounted to upwards of one hundred thousand. Most of them were of the humbler order, and remarkable for their ignorance and credulity; but a few were of the more educated classes, among whom were two or three clergymen. One of the clergymen, on being reproved by his diocesan, offered to resign his living if ‘the holy Johanna,’ as he styled her, failed to appear on a certain day with the expected Messiah in her arms. About the close of 1814, however, the prophetess herself began to have misgivings, and in one of her lucid intervals, she declared that ‘if she had been deceived, she had herself been the sport of some spirit either good or evil.’

On the 27^th of December in that year, death put an end to her expectations—but not to those of her disciples. They would not believe that she was really dead. Her body was kept unburied till the most active signs of decomposition appeared; it was also subjected to a post-mortem examination, and the cause of her peculiar appearance fully accounted for on medical principles. Still, numbers of her followers refused to believe she was dead; others flattered themselves that she would speedily rise again, and bound themselves by a vow not to shave their beards till her resurrection.

It is scarcely necessary to state, that most of them have passed to their graves unshorn. A few are still living, and within the last few years several families of her disciples were residing together near Chatham, in Kent, remarkable for the length of their beards, and the general singularity of their manners and appearance. Joanna Southcott was interred, under a fictitious name, in the burial-ground attached to the chapel in St. John’s Wood, London. A stone has since been erected to her memory, which, after reciting her age and other usual particulars, concludes with some lines, evidently the composition of a still unshaken believer, the fervor of whose faith far exceeds his inspiration as a poet.

In the twentieth century the sealed box she had left behind was, indeed, opened. She had specified that it was to be examined only in a time of national crisis and in the presence of 24 bishops of the Church of England. In 1927 one bishop was found who agreed to be present at the opening — it contained only a few odd papers, a lottery ticket, and a horse pistol. True believers insisted that this was not the genuine casket and that the Panacea Society continues to hold it in a secret location until a conclave of 24 bishops is assembled.

Barring-out

A Christmas-time ritual and example of social inversion or “topsy-turvy”. In Britian school boys would bar the door and refuse the master entrance until ritual verses were exchanged and a holiday was granted. The usual pattern was for boys to gather weapons and provisions as Christmas drew near and then seize the school or, more often, a single classroom;  if they could hold out for a set period, usually three days, they were allowed an extension of the usual Christmas holidays or a relaxation of the normal rate of flogging. If the master broke in they were generally beaten severely or given extra tasks. 

The first mention of it comes in 1558 where it is treated as already having been an old custom. Charles Hode’s 1660 manual A New Discovery of the Old Art of Teaching Schools suggested a set of rules be drawn up whereby masters were given warning and formal demands agreed on by head boys.  The tradition in known in Scotland from 1580 and there are some seventeenth-century Irish examples.  The growing tendency to spell out student’s rights in school charters rendered it obsolete and by the nineteenth century it had virtually disappeared in England — the last recorded barrings out of the schoolmaster seems to have been in 1938 in Derbyshire and 1940 in Northumberland.

Outside of the British Isles the custom can also be seen amongst the Pennsylvania Dutch, in Belgium, Denmark, and Holland where St Thomas’s Day was a time to bar out the master until he treated them to a drink.

1853 Birth of a pistolero

Who would have thought that one of America’s most iconic Western gunmen was born in Canada? Bartlomew William Barclay “Bat” Masterson first saw the light of day on this date in 1853 in the Eastern Townships of Quebec, an English-speaking area of that largely francophone province. His Irish immigrant family moved to the USA and settled in Kansas.

In his late teens Bat took up buffalo hunting and while search for a herd of bison in traditional Indian territory in 1874 took part in the famous Second Battle of Adobe Walls. He, other hunters, and a wagon train of settlers found themselves under siege at a trading post in the Texas panhandle when they were attacked by a party of Commanche, Cheyenne and Kiowa warriors, 700 strong. After 5 days they were rescued by cavalry and they abandoned the post to be burned by the vexed indigenes.

Masterston then scouted for the Army for a time, killed a man in a gunfight over a woman, and settled in Dodge City where he became a lawman. His handiness with a pistol led to many a posse, the capture of outlaws, and association with some of the legends of the West. Bat was friends with Buffalo Bill Cody, Wyatt Earp, Soapy Smitth, and Doc Holliday.

In the 1880s Masterton dabbled in journalism, gambling, and theater ownership; his taste in women ran to other men’s wives, circus performers, and dance-hall girls. In 1902 he moved to New York where his colourful turns of phrase, love of boxing, and exciting adventures in the West led to him becoming a journalist. He became friends with Theodore Roosevelt who always had a soft spot and a government patronage job for a manly man. Masterton was also a timekeeper for some high-stakes boxing matches. He died, diabetic and overweight in 1921 in New York.

Though not as great a subject of popular culture as Buffalo Bill or Wyatt Earp, the figure of Bat Masterton appears in a number of movies, but most notably in an eponymous  television series starring Gene Barry.

1837 William Lyon Mackenzie calls for an uprising

On this date Toronto newspaper publisher William Lyon Mackenzie called on his neighbours to rebel against their British colonial rulers with this Proclamation to the People of Upper Canada:

We have planted the Standard of Liberty in Canada, for the attainment of the following objects:

Perpetual Peace, founded on a government of equal rights to all, secured by a written constitution, sanctioned by yourselves in a convention to be called as early as circumstances will permit. 

Civil and Religious Liberty, in its fullest extent, that in all laws made, or to be made, every person to be bound alike.

The Abolition of Hereditary Honors, of the laws of Entail and Primogeniture, and of hosts of pensioners who devour our substance. 

A Legislature, composed of a Senate and Assembly chosen by the people. 

An Executive, to be composed of a Governor and other officers elected by the public voice. 

A Judiciary, to be chosen by the Governor and Senate, and composed of the most learned, honorable, and trustworthy, of our citizens. The laws to be rendered cheap and expeditious. 

A Free Trial by Jury — Sheriffs chosen by you, and not to hold office, as now, at the pleasure of our tyrants. The freedom of the press. Alas for it, now! The free presses in the Canadas are trampled down by the hand of arbitrary power. 

The Vote by Ballot — free and peaceful township elections. 

The people to elect their Court of Request Commissioners and Justices of the Peace — and also their Militia Officers, in all cases whatsoever. 

Freedom of Trade — every man to be allowed to buy at the cheapest market, and sell at the dearest.

No man to be compelled to give military service, unless it be his choice. 

Ample funds to be reserved from the vast natural resources of our country to secure the blessings of education to every citizen. 

A frugal and economical Government, in order that the people may be prosperous and free from difficulty.

An end forever to the wearisome prayers, supplications, and mockeries attendant upon our connection with the lordlings of the Colonial Office, Downing Street, London.

The opening of the St. Lawrence to the trade of the world, so that the largest ships might pass up to Lake Superior, and the distribution of the wild lands of the country to the industry, capital, skill, and enterprise of worthy men of all nations.

This was viewed by most Upper Canadians as smacking too much of republicanism, innovation, and the example of the United States. Despite Mackenzie’s attempts to lead a march on Toronto and to involve American and Quebecois supporters, the rebellion was a pathetic flop. Mackenzie fled to the US where he was jailed for violating the Neutrality Act.

The Hartlepool Monkey

According to legend, a monkey in a French military uniform was washed up on the shore during the Napoleonic Wars near Hartlepool, England, the sole survivor of a shipwreck. Locals were said to have been baffled by the beast and, supposedly moved by ignorance of what a real Frenchman looked like, hanged the monkey as a spy. 

Some have suggested that it was a “powder-monkey” — a ship’s boy charged with carrying ammunition — that was hanged. Others claim that it was only a myth suggested by a popular song of the era:

In former times, mid war an’ strife,
The French invasion threatened life,
An’ all was armed to the knife,
The Fishermen hung the Monkey O!

The Fishermen wi’ courage high,
Seized on the Monkey for a spy,
“Hang him” says yen, says another,”He’ll die!”
They did, and they hung the Monkey O!

They tried every move to make him speak,
They tortor’d the Monkey till loud he did squeak
Says yen, “That’s French,” says another “it’s Greek”
For the Fishermen had got drunky, O!

“He’s all ower hair!” sum chap did cry,
E’en up te summic cute an’ sly
Wiv a cod’s head then they closed an eye,
Afore they hung the Monkey O!

What is undeniable is that the inhabitants of Hartlepool have warmly embraced the accusation of simiancide and adopted the incident as a part of their public identity. There are two statues to the little hominid in the town; H’Angus the Monkey is the official mascot of Hartlepool United football team and one of the men wearing the costume won election as mayor running under the name of “H’Angus” and promising free bananas for school kids. The Hartlepool Rovers rugby team’s crest is a beret-wearing monkey hanging from a gibbet.

1968 Birth of Ol’ Dirty Bastard

On November 15, 1968, a poverty-stricken couple in Brooklyn welcomed the birth of a baby boy whom they named Russell Tyrone Jones. This child would grow up to be a famous entertainer, but not under his birth name, for young Russell would, in his meteoric  career, ply his trade under various noms de musique: ODB, Ason Unique, Dirt McGirt, Joe Bananas, Dog Osirus, Big Baby Jesus, Ol’ Dirty Chinese Restaurant, and Knifey McStab – but it is when he employed the sobriquet Ol’ Dirty Bastard that he would achieve everlasting fame. Well, everlasting until his 2004 drug overdose death. He was much missed by his 13 children and employees of the New York justice system who came to know the engaging rapper through his numerous violations of penal statutes.

It is not unusual for aspiring entertainers to change their names. Archibald Leach became (quite understandably) Cary Grant; Lucille Fay LeSueur became Joan Crawford; and Doris Kappelhoff took the name Doris Day. Tammy Wynette was once Virginia Pugh; Jon Stewart was born Jonathan Stuart Leibowitz. But no part of the stardust and glitter industry resorts to name changes as much as rap music. So hats off today to

Drake, born Aubrey Drake Graham

Eminem, once Marshall Bruce Mathers III

50 Cent, Curtis James Jackson III

Flavor Flav, aka William Jonathan Drayton Jr.

Lil Bow Wow, Shad Gregory Moss

Lil’ Kim, Kimberly Denise Jones

Lil Nas X, born Montero Lamar Hill 

Lil Peep, né Gustav Elijah Åhr

Lil Wayne, once Dwayne Michael Carter Jr.

Lil Yachty, Miles Parks McCollum

Notorious B.I.G., born Christopher George Latore Wallace

Puff Daddy, Sean Love Combs

Travis Scott, né Jacques Bermon Webster II

Wicca Springs Eternal, aka Adam McIlwee

YoungBoy Never Broke Again, or Kentrell DeSean Gaulden

Young Thug, Jeffery Lamar Williams

Yung Bruh, born Jazz Ishmael Butler