ged into notice, from her hiding-place in one of
the outskirts of London, an ancient woman whose surroundings forcibly
illustrate the persevering vitality of even the insanest forms of
religious belief. Joanna Southcott and her fanaticisms we are apt to
associate with Dr. Faustus, alchemy, and persons and things of that
kind, as belonging to an age with which we have no personal concern. Yet
this is a mistake. The followers of the fatidical Joanna may still be
counted by thousands in Great Britain, particularly in its metropolis;
and their acknowledged head, in strict accordance with the fitness of
things, is a woman. She is a very old woman, too, her age symbolizing,
perhaps, the longevity to which her crazy superstition is destined.
Elizabeth Peacock is the name of this relic of the past. For many years
she itinerated as a preacher, and at the great age of one hundred and
three her health is still vigorous. Modern priestesses, however, not
unlike the prophets of antiquity, are subject to be scanted of due
honor, or, at all events, of what is more essential than this as
contributing to keep soul and body from parting company prematurely. The
fact of her being in a state of destitution was notified not long ago to
the magistrate of the Lambeth police-court, and that unappreciative
functionary, while consenting to subscribe, with others, for her relief,
openly expressed his conviction that she would be best off in the
workhouse. Altogether, the old creature is a bit of a curiosity. She has
had three husbands, and the last of them, whom she married in 1852,
killed himself only the other day, possibly from finding the twofold
burden of domestic predication and a helpmeet of five score too much for
his nerves. If sane, the ungrateful fellow ought, in all reason, to have
had the grace to survive her; for when he undertook matrimony, as he had
nothing to turn his hand to, she instructed him herself in the art and
mystery of cooperage. At that time, so robust a specimen of anility was
she, she could pitch an empty cask across the street, and her credulity
is as strong at this moment as her arm was of yore. We conclude, from
her story, that the proper stuff for making prophetesses of the baser
sort has, even in our day, only to be looked for to be discovered.

* * * * *

Our countrymen have lately learned to admire, in its Western
transformation, the extremely clever _Rubaiyat_ of Omer Khayyam. An