Futility Closet - 332-Princess Caraboo

Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to the Futility Closet podcast, forgotten stories from the pages of history. Visit us online to sample more than 11,000 quirky curiosities from monetary gift wrap to an alphabetic byline. This is episode 332. I'm Greg Ross. And I'm Sharon Ross. In 1817, a young woman appeared in the English village of Almansbury, speaking a strange language and seeking food and shelter. She revealed herself to be an eastern princess, kidnapped by pirates from an exotic island. In today's show, we'll tell the story of Princess Caribou, who was both more and less than

Starting point is 00:00:46 she seemed. We'll also discover a June Christmas and puzzle over some monster soup. On the evening of Thursday, April 3rd, 1817, a young woman appeared in Almondsbury, Gloucestershire, eight miles north of Bristol. She wore a black gown with a muslin frill at the neck, a red and black shawl around her shoulders, and a black cotton shawl on her head in the fashion of a turban. She knocked at the door of the village cobbler and spoke to the owners in a language that no one could understand. By her signs, they understood that she was asking for food and shelter.

Starting point is 00:01:27 They gave her some bread and milk, but the cobbler's wife did not feel comfortable admitting her to the house, so they consulted the overseer of the poor. He decided to take her to Samuel Worrell, a county magistrate, to ask his advice. Worrell also had a Greek servant who knew several foreign languages and might help to divine the woman's identity, or at least her nationality. At Knoll Park, the magistrate's residence, the woman was presented to Worrell and his wife, Elizabeth. It turned out that neither they nor their servant could understand her.

Starting point is 00:01:56 They inquired by signs whether she had any papers, and she took from her pocket a few halfpence and a counterfeit sixpence and indicated that she had nothing else. Her appearance offered few clues. pocket a few halfpence and a counterfeit sixpence, and indicated that she had nothing else. Her appearance offered few clues. The arrangement of her shawls suggested that she might be from Asia. She stood about five foot two, her hands were clean, and while she wore no earrings, she showed the marks of having worn them. She looked about 25 years old. Worrell and his wife conferred and decided it would be best to send her to a public house in the village for the night. Concerned at the woman's distress, Mrs. Worrell sent her own maid and footman to accompany her

Starting point is 00:02:30 and asked the landlady to give her a good supper and a comfortable bed in a private room, saying that she'd call on her early the following morning. The woman seemed tired and had trouble walking, but when they reached the parlor of the public house, she was struck to see a print of a pineapple on the wall. She called this an anana and made signs to show that it was a fruit of her own country. She was pleased to see it. At supper, before drinking her tea, she covered her eyes with her hand, appeared to say a prayer, and then bowed her head. Before accepting a second serving of tea, she insisted the cup be washed out, and before she drank it, she repeated her prayer. When she was shown to her room, she was reluctant at first to get into the bed, pointing

Starting point is 00:03:10 instead to the floor, but the landlady's daughter got in to show her that it was comfortable, and after kneeling to say her prayers, the woman got in and went to sleep. At seven the next morning, Mrs. Worrell walked down to the public house. The woman expressed joy at seeing her and gratitude at the change of linen that she'd brought. While her breakfast was being made, the clergyman of the parish brought several books, hoping that she might recognize her country among the illustrations. But they could learn only that she had some knowledge of China and that it had been a ship rather than a boat that had brought her here. Mrs. Worrell took her back to Knoll but said to her, My good young woman, I very much fear that you are imposing upon me, and that you understand

Starting point is 00:03:48 and can answer me in my own language. If so, and distress has driven you to this expedient, make a friend of me. I am a female as yourself, and can feel for you, and will give you money and clothes, and will put you on your journey without disclosing your conduct to anyone. But it must be on condition that you speak the truth. If you deceive me, I think it right to inform you that Mr. Worrell is a magistrate and has the power of sending you to prison, committing you to hard labor, and passing you as a vagrant to your own parish. The woman didn't seem to understand this, but answered in her own tongue. To learn what to call her, Mrs. Worrell wrote her own name on a piece of paper, placed it before her, and repeated it several times. She gave her pen to the woman, but she declined to write anything,

Starting point is 00:04:30 shook her head, and said, caribou, caribou, pointing to herself. The next day, Saturday, she was taken into Bristol and examined by the mayor, but nothing further was learned about her country, language, origin, or destination. She was committed to St. Peter's Hospital, as was the normal practice in Bristol for vagrants and the poor. She was treated well there, but refused to eat or drink until Mrs. Worrell visited her again on Monday, so she arranged to have her taken to her husband's office in Bristol, where she stayed for 10 days. They tried every day to discover her country and language, but they had no success until a Portuguese man, Manuel Aineso, said he was able to understand her and undertook to interpret her language. He said she was a person of consequence who'd been kidnapped from an island in the East Indies, brought to England against her will, and deserted.

Starting point is 00:05:18 He said the language she spoke was a mixture of the languages used on the coast of Sumatra and on other islands in the East. spoke was a mixture of the languages used on the coast of Sumatra and on other islands in the east. This story was so intriguing that Mrs. Worrell took the woman back to Null, and she remained there from April 3rd to June 6th, receiving many visitors who were eager to talk with her. One gentleman in particular who'd made several voyages to the East Indies and China devoted himself to writing out her story after drawing it out of her through signs and gestures. He said that her name was Caribou and that she came from an island called Javasu, the daughter of a Chinese father and a Malay mother. While walking with three attendants in her garden there, she had been seized by pirates and sold to the captain of a brig. When they reached the coast of England,

Starting point is 00:05:59 she had jumped overboard, exchanged her clothing with a woman she met, wandered about for six weeks, and came at last to Almansbury. When this story appeared in the newspapers, it brought a new flood of visitors and questions. The voyage that had brought the princess to England was a bit hard to pin down. She expressed the times and distances involved by making knots in a string, and could even draw a chart of the ship's progress. But when asked to point out the flags that had been hoisted in the various ports she'd visited, she covered her eyes and shook her head, as if to say that she'd been kept below and had never seen them. But she showed pleasure at seeing a Chinese chain purse,

Starting point is 00:06:35 which she said was native to her father's country, and she demonstrated how to wear a scarf in both the Chinese style and that of javasu, both of which veiled her face. Javasu, she told them, was known for its cinnamon, white pepper, rice, mother of pearl, flying fish, and exotic apples. As the weeks went by, her hosts learned intimately the habits of a java soup princess. She prepared her own food, preferred rice to bread, ate no meat, and drank only water and tea. She would exercise with a bow and arrows, with a stick for a sword at her right side, a gong on her back, and a tambourine in her hand. Sometimes she would

Starting point is 00:07:11 twist her hair and roll it up on top of her head, where she would fasten it with a skewer. The tenants and farmers around Knoll and at Albansbury grew fond of her, and she often visited them and their daughters. Every morning and night she said her prayers, and on Tuesday she fasted rigidly and climbed dangerously onto the roof of the mansion to adore the sun. Returning to Knoll one evening, Mrs. Worrell found her sitting high in a tree. She explained that all the women in the house had gone into the village, and she feared contamination from the men. There's no telling how long this might have gone on, but on the evening of June 9th, Mrs. Worrell received a surprising visit from a Mr. Mortimer, a surgeon in Bristol.

Starting point is 00:07:47 He'd been approached that morning by a Mrs. Neal, who told him that she knew the mysterious visitor very well. She was an Englishwoman who'd lodged in her house in the suburbs of Bristol six months earlier. While Mrs. Worrell was reacting to this, a Wheelwright's son arrived from Westbury to say that he'd seen the woman drinking spirits and water in a public house shortly before her first arrival at Almondsbury. Mrs. Worrell determined to get to the bottom of things. She treated the woman kindly that evening and in the morning took her to Bristol, ostensibly so she could finish sitting for a portrait by Edward Byrd, the noted court painter. But when they reached town, she took her instead to Mr. Mortimer and confronted her with the proof of her deceit. Caught off guard, the woman tried speaking in Javasu, but Mrs. Worrell threatened to summon Mrs. Neal,

Starting point is 00:08:31 and the woman finally acknowledged her deception. She begged Mrs. Worrell not to cast her off or to send for her father, and Mrs. Worrell agreed on condition that she explain who she was and how she had come there. Her name was Mary Wilcox, and she was a cobbler's daughter from Witheridge in Devon. With no education and an impatient and wild disposition, she had run away from home and supported herself through begging and various jobs as a servant. At length, she decided to emigrate to America, but on arriving in Bristol, she learned that the ship would not sail for 15 days and had decided to seek support in the interim by presenting herself as a mysterious There's no denying that this is deceitful, but without excusing what she did,

Starting point is 00:09:15 it's worth taking a minute to admire how well she did it. When she knocked on the cobbler's door in Almansbury, she couldn't have had the whole story prepared in advance. She couldn't know what questions she would be asked or what answers it might be necessary to invent. She had to think on her feet, remembering the whole story as its details proliferated and as it attracted more and more attention. She was able to do this because the people around her believed she couldn't understand English. So they would talk about her in her presence, often trying to impress each other with their knowledge of distant lands. And she could draw freely on what she heard to fulfill their expectations.

Starting point is 00:09:48 For example, she heard one gentleman say that it was customary in the East to put vegetable poison on the point of a dagger. The next time a dagger was put into her hands, she went to a flower stand, rubbed the leaves between her fingers, applied the juice to the point, touched her arm, and pretended to swoon. The man may not even have been right. Still, he'd given her exactly what she needed to convince him. Similarly, people showed her books describing exotic places and languages, hoping that she might recognize the illustrations. She could simply read these to gather material for her tale.

Starting point is 00:10:19 In both cases, there was no evidence of her method. Her memory was exceptional, and as she accumulated knowledge, her act became more and more convincing. This trend reached its absurd culmination with Manuel A. Nesso, the man who pretended to understand her. Consider that scene from her point of view. She was an Englishwoman deliberately speaking gibberish, and he was a Portuguese who claimed to understand the gibberish and to translate it into English. She could understand the tale he was imputing to her, but she couldn't contradict it without revealing her own deceit. She was forced to accept and memorize his version of events while pretending not to understand his words.

Starting point is 00:10:56 That foundation was elaborated by the gentleman who traveled in the East Indies. He thought he was drawing out her story when in fact he was conniving unwittingly with her in inventing it. Together they built up an elaborate description of an exotic island that never existed. They decided that Caribou's father wore a gold button in his cap, with three peacock's feathers on the right side of his head, and a twisted gold chain round his neck to which was suspended a large square locket of amber-colored stone set in gold. When his people approached him they made their obeisance on both knees,

Starting point is 00:11:28 lifting the right hand to the right temple, and presented fruit in a dish balanced upon the points of the fingers, and so on. The main danger was that she might slip up and speak English inadvertently, but in this she was remarkably disciplined. In all her time at Null, no one ever heard her speak anything but the gibberish Javasu language she had invented. Not the housekeeper who slept with her, nor even the servants who lay awake to hear her talk in her sleep. She did talk, but always in Javasu.

Starting point is 00:11:53 And she managed that language with remarkable consistency. In time, she invented a vocabulary of 69 Javasu words. Savi meant rain, boti an arrow, tuzar a ship, and nater the arm. She once fell asleep in a carriage, and when Mrs. Worrell stirred her, she awoke immediately in character, speaking her own language and suitably oblivious to English. Despite all this deception, it's doubtful she had committed any crime. She never published anything under the name Caribou or used it in any financial transaction. She refused all gifts of money, and she never took anything that didn't belong to her, though she had many opportunities.

Starting point is 00:12:29 As with some other imposters we've covered on this show, if she'd invested her obvious intelligence, imagination, resourcefulness, and self-possession into any honorable undertaking, she might have been hugely successful. But her main motive seems to have been a love of mischief. Indeed, if she'd managed to escape in time to America as she'd planned, we might still be wondering who she was. After her unmasking, she was more popular than ever, visited by nobility, linguists, painters, physiognomists, and craniologists, all of them eager to see and talk with this remarkable fraud.

Starting point is 00:13:00 Some pitied her, some condemned her, and others upheld her, but she showed no signs of contrition. Rather, she seemed pleased at the number of people she'd fooled for so long. Mrs. Worrell, with her customary liberality, sent her on to Philadelphia in June 1817. There she tried to capitalize on her fame by appearing on stage as Princess Caribou, but she made little money at it. In 1824, she returned to England and exhibited herself there, but with little success. In time, she settled in Bristol, married, and had a daughter. She spent 30 years supplying the Bristol infirmary with leeches, which were then an

Starting point is 00:13:35 important medical commodity. If anything, she seems to have been embarrassed by the episode of her deceit at Knoll. Children still sometimes ran after her, calling caribou. But she might have been forgiven for carrying off a fraud that's been remarked on for two centuries. At the time, journalist John Matthew Gutsch called it an instance of consummate art and duplicity exceeding any occurrence in the annals of modern imposture. Thank you. is our Patreon campaign, as that gives us an ongoing source of support so that we can commit to the amount of time that the podcast takes to make. Patreon also gives us a good way to share some extras with our show's supporters, like extra information on some of the stories,

Starting point is 00:14:35 outtakes, more lateral thinking puzzles, and peeks behind the scenes of the show. You can learn more about our Patreon campaign at patreon.com slash futilitycloset, or see the support us section of our Patreon campaign at patreon.com slash futilitycloset, or see the support us section of our website for the link. And thanks so much to everyone who helps keep Futility Closet going. The puzzle in episode 323, and no spoiler here, was about why someone would sketch a battle plan using their non-dominant

Starting point is 00:15:05 left hand. Jez Sterling in Stafford, England wrote, in a recent lateral thinking puzzle, the question was who wrote battle plans using their non-dominant hand? I thought I instantly knew the answer. Admiral Horatio Nelson was one of the heroes of Britain battling against the French. He would probably also be a suitable answer to the puzzle, but for a different reason. He lost his dominant hand in battle, but continued to lead, so no doubt wrote up his battle plans. One of his left-handed letters has been reprinted in the online Daily Mail. And Jez sent a link to a 2014 article that shows a photo of one of Nelson's first letters written left-handedly in 1798, after he lost his right

Starting point is 00:15:46 arm in the Battle of Santa Cruz de Tenerife in 1797. The article says, The injury would become Admiral Horatio Nelson's constant reminder of failure, but it did not stop him planning his future missions. And a 2010 article in The Guardian says that Nelson was reportedly back at work within a half hour of the amputation and signing orders with his left hand a few hours later. So I would imagine that Jez is right and there is no reason to suppose that Nelson didn't continue to write up his bottle plans with his non-dominant hand. The Guardian reports that a curator at the Wellcome Library who has studied some of Nelson's letters said, The handwriting with his left hand is so much more interesting, not as neat and regular, but full of character. The writing with his right hand is absolute standard schoolboy stuff.

Starting point is 00:16:34 But they also note that as Nelson didn't become famous until the year after he lost his right arm with his victory at the Battle of the Nile, there were many fewer surviving letters that he wrote right-handed, and thus, showing less character or not, they tend to be worth significantly more. That's interesting. That's almost a puzzle in itself. I would have thought that his left-handed letters would have been worth more, just for the novelty or just the interest value that he had to write them with his left hand, but I guess if there's just fewer of the right-handed ones around. That's what drives it. but I guess if there's just fewer of the right-handed ones around.

Starting point is 00:17:03 That's what drives it. The main story in episode 323 was about how after British naval officer James Holman was blinded by a mysterious illness, he began to travel the world alone, experiencing it all in his unique way. Will Denahan wrote, In episode 323, you describe the feats of the traveler James Holman. Although his story is certainly fascinating, what stuck with me most was the nature of the mystery illness that blinded him. A near 250-year-old case of joint aches and gradual visual loss in a 24-year-old

Starting point is 00:17:34 is not much to go on diagnostically, but I would say my top differential is a reactive arthritis. Reactive arthritis usually arises as a reaction to the bacteria that cause food poisoning or STDs, sexually transmitted diseases. Either of these seem fairly likely for a chap aboard a ship in the late 1700s. The syndrome is classically a triad of symptoms, inflammation of the joints, arthritis, urinary tract, urethritis, and eyes, uveitis. Often students remember this with the catchy rhyme, can't see, can't pee, can't climb a tree. Historically, it was called Reiter's syndrome, but this is now discouraged

Starting point is 00:18:10 as Reiter was a physician for the Nazis. Other causes I thought of include the direct effect of other STDs such as syphilis or other arthritic conditions such as juvenile idiopathic arthritis or rheumatoid arthritis. If it's the latter, then I suppose his initial diagnosis of rheumatism isn't a million miles away. I was really surprised at how little they knew or were able to help him. They just thought it was somehow related to cold and wet aboard ship, which is almost nothing to go on. Yeah, like that would make you lose your eyesight. So he went back home and just had to hope that the condition would remit, not even knowing what it was. Wow. to hope that the condition would remit, not even knowing what it was. Wow.

Starting point is 00:18:51 Will also included, spoiler alert, a follow-up to the puzzle in episode 325 about doctors being wished a Merry Christmas by patients who don't expect to see them for several months starting in July. After the puzzle, I'd asked if any doctors listening to our show have had this happen to them to let us know. Will said, also one of your lateral thinking puzzles in episode 325 involved patients saying Merry Christmas to their doctors in the summertime because of the six monthly appointment scheduling. I've personally never been wished Merry Christmas by a patient in the summer before, although I will caveat that by

Starting point is 00:19:19 saying that because I work in anesthetics and intensive care, my patients aren't usually capable of much chit-chat. As always, a big thanks to my friend Andy Uncle Rogers, who first told me about your fantastic podcast, a real highlight every week. So good point there. I could have been more specific about what kind of doctors might be able to weigh in on that. Yeah, that's true. There's some of them who probably don't talk much.

Starting point is 00:19:40 And Rachel Hamilton wrote, I am a doctor, and while I don't know that I give or receive Christmas greetings in July, I do usually start in September. I see my patients with diabetes every three to four months. So if after the appointment is over, we book the next one for the following year. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year exchanges are usually made. That makes sense. And Cameron Arps had a different explanation. Here in New Zealand, midwinter Christmas celebrations are a thing for anyone from the Northern Hemisphere who like having snow in the season. So there's a lot of Merry Christmases in June slash July here too.

Starting point is 00:20:13 That must be confusing. That would be like someone from New Zealand coming to the Northern Hemisphere and wishing people Merry Christmas in June because they're used to saying it during the warmer months, right? Oh, yeah. I hadn't thought about that, that it would work in the reverse. It must be really confusing. I mean, it's understandable what it's confusing. I always wonder if it's confusing for people who live in places like New Zealand when they see American Christmas specials that focus on snow, or all the American Christmas songs that have to do with snow. Because they all do.

Starting point is 00:20:40 The main story in episode 54 was about how three prisoners escaped Stalag Luft 3, a German POW camp, in 1943 by having a man hidden inside a vaulting horse dig a tunnel while other prisoners vaulted continuously over it to mask the sound of the digging. Gordon Lee Pard sent an amusing follow-up to the story. sent an amusing follow-up to the story. In 1950, a film, The Wooden Horse, was made about the escape. An actor, Peter Butterworth, auditioned for a part in the film and was rejected because he didn't look dashing enough. He accepted the rejection, then told the filmmakers that he had not only been in the camp at the time of the escape, but had been part of the escape committee organizing events to make noise to hide the sound of the digging. The director was so embarrassed that he changed the name of the lead character to Peter as an apology. I wasn't familiar with British actor Peter Butterworth, but probably some of our UK listeners are. Wikipedia tells me that he was best known for his roles in the Carry On series of comedy films, in which he was in 16 of

Starting point is 00:21:41 them, as well as associated Christmas specials, a TV series, and theater productions, in addition to other films and TV work, including two episodes of Doctor Who. Interestingly, Butterworth had met Talbot Tolley Rothwell, who later wrote many of the carry-on films, while they were both imprisoned at Stalag Luft III. But although Butterworth was one of the Walters who helped cover for The Digging at the Camp, when he auditioned for a role in the film in 1949, he was told that the filmmakers found him unconvincingly heroic or athletic enough. The Mirror had an article about this with the headline, Carry On's Peter Butterworth Rejected to Play Himself in Role Because He Was Too Fat.

Starting point is 00:22:20 Because apparently that's what Butterworth was told when he asked more specifically what the problem was. I like the word unconvincingly. It says a lot about the film industry. In episode 318, I reported on Dorkin's Magnificat, the chief mouser at Southwark Cathedral in London, who had decided in 2008 that the cathedral was going to be her new home, but had had to retire at the end of 2019 due to failing health and then passed away in September of last year. A couple of our listeners

Starting point is 00:22:50 let us know about a nice follow-up to this story, including Timothy Green in Ireland, who dared me to try to mispronounce his name, and who wrote, Hello Sharon and Greg. I am happy to pass on the news that not long following the passing of Dorkin's Magnificat, the cathedral has adopted another cat. The Cat Cuddles Sanctuary, which also helped to care for Dorkin's, has a statement on their Facebook page with some beautiful photos reporting that one of their rescue cats, Hodge, is now resident at Southwark Cathedral. The Facebook statement links to a history of Hodge on their own website telling the story of how he was found on the streets with a nasty infection and nursed back to health in the sanctuary. So it seems that the Cat Cuddle

Starting point is 00:23:30 Sanctuary suggested Hodge to the cathedral, and Hodge coincidentally ended up arriving there for a trial period on the same day that Dorkins died. Based on posts on their website, the members of the clergy have been quite charmed by the newest addition to their family, and Hodge was officially adopted on December 6th. Greg had mentioned to me that Hodge was the name of Samuel Johnson's cat, and at first I thought that the cathedral had named him that in honor of Johnson, who, according to a post on the subject on the cathedral's website, is actually depicted in one of the stained glass windows there. But when I read the posts on the Cat Cuddles site, I saw that they had named him Hodge themselves while they were nursing him back to health. So apparently just a bit of a coincidence there. According to the Cathedral site, Johnson was quite fond of his Hodge and

Starting point is 00:24:13 thought him to be a very fine cat. And apparently at the Cathedral, they now think the same of their Hodge. And for anyone who wants to keep updated about what Hodge is doing, he has his own Twitter account, as apparently Dorkins had before him. And that's at Hodge the Cat. Thanks so much to everyone who writes to us. We're always sorry that we can't read all the email that we get on the show, but we really do appreciate getting your comments, updates, and feedback. So if you have any of those to share, please send them to podcast at futilitycloset.com. of those to share, please send them to podcast at futilitycloset.com. It's my turn to try to solve a lateral thinking puzzle. Greg is going to give me an interesting sounding situation, and I have to try to figure out what's going on, asking yes or no questions.

Starting point is 00:24:58 This is from listener Lucy. An 1828 engraving by William Heath shows an English woman reacting in horror to what she calls monster soup. What device is she holding when doing this? She's holding a device? Yes. Is the device the monster soup? No. Okay, so she's reacting to something called monster soup. Something that she calls monster soup.

Starting point is 00:25:26 She calls monster soup and she's holding something while reacting. Yes. Okay. Is monster soup something edible? Something edible by humans. I'll say yes. Something edible by humans. Is it made from monsters?

Starting point is 00:25:46 Depends on your point of view, I guess. Is the term monster used to mean like large as opposed to, I don't know, we think of Frankenstein's monster. I know, like monster in monster soup. I understand. Ask me a yes or no question. Okay. Monster in monster soup. I understand.

Starting point is 00:26:03 Ask me a yes or no question. Okay. Is the term monster in monster soup the same kind of monster like we say Frankenstein's monster? I'll say yes. Okay. You mean as opposed to just size? Size or some other meaning of the word monster. No, I'll say yes to that.

Starting point is 00:26:21 Okay. So monster meaning something that we would consider freakish, scary, unnatural, something along those lines. Yeah, repellent. Repellent. So is this soup made from something repellent? Yeah, yes. Yes. Is the contraption she's holding, did it somehow help make the soup?

Starting point is 00:26:49 No. Is it intended to consume the soup? No. Is she trying to defend herself in some way from something? No. You said she's reacting in horror. Yes. Does the soup appear to be alive? Yes. The soup, and by soup, do you mean like a liquidy food? The soup. And by soup, do you mean like a liquidy food? I'll say yes. There is a liquidy food that appears to be alive. I'll say yes to that. Huh. Is it some kind of organism that I would understand or recognize or composed of some kind of organism that I would understand or recognize? I'll say yes.

Starting point is 00:27:28 Something that they just didn't understand at the time that this engraving was made? That they didn't understand the nature of or? No, I think they did. They did understand the nature of it the way that we would understand it today? I'll say yes, yes. Okay. She wouldn't have formed this opinion without the help of the device. Without using the device.

Starting point is 00:27:50 Oh, it's like a microscope. Yes. Wow. She's looking at something microscopic, like little bacteria or viruses or something, like just microscopic organisms. Yeah, we may as well kick this a little further along. What do you suppose it is that she's looking at? What's the medium that they're in? Reacting in horror.

Starting point is 00:28:10 And this is an engraving that was published publicly. Like her own spit. No. Well, that would be horrifying if you looked at your own saliva and saw all these little things in it or something. But this is advancing a public cause of some concern. Oh, like looking for cholera or something. Like looking for polluted water. Yeah, basically that's it. She's holding a microscope and looking at the Thames River water that was being supplied to London residents. The title

Starting point is 00:28:34 reads, microcosm dedicated to the London water companies brought forth all monstrous, all prodigious things, hydras and organs and chimeras dire. In the 1820s, concern was growing about pollution in the Thames. The first outbreaks of cholera arose in 1831 and 1832. Wow, that was a very interesting puzzle. Thanks, Lucy. Thank you, Lucy. And if you have a puzzle you'd like to send in for us to try, please send that to us at podcast at futilitycloset.com.

Starting point is 00:29:03 Futility Closet is a full-time commitment for us and is supported entirely by our incredible listeners. If you'd like to become one of the awesome supporters of our celebration of the quirky and the curious, please check out the support us section of the website at futilitycloset.com, where you can find a donate button and a link to our Patreon page. At our website, you can also graze through Greg's collection of over 11,000 trivia tidbits. Browse the Futility Closet store for Penguin adorned merch. Learn about the Futility Closet books and see the show notes for the podcast

Starting point is 00:29:35 with the links and references for the topics we've covered. If you have any comments or feedback for us, please email us at podcast at futilitycloset.com. Our music was all written and performed by the always amazing Doug Ross. Thanks for listening, and we'll talk to you next week.

Futility Closet - 332-Princess Caraboo

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