| ‘The bones of a human foetus, extracted from the navel of a poor woman at Coxwold in 1701 by Mr Birbeck of York, who presented them to me. ..Paper stained to a perfect claret colour by the urine of Capt Croft of Leeds. The fatal stick cut out of the body of Edmund Preston of Leeds, the noted butcher, thought to be the best footman in England; he died of the wound he received by it in skipping over a hedge after some strayed sheep, in 1700…….A shred of a man’s skin, extremely thick, being tanned’. |
| ‘Four score stones of different forms and bigness, some an inch and a half long, others roundish and rugged, voided from the penis of an aged minister Mr Creswick of Beghall and sent me by his executor Mr Priestly, who had a box containing about six hundred of them; they are dark coloured and gritty. Some large stones voided and others cut out of the urethra of Joshua, the son of Thomas Spurret of Leeds; two very odd ones taken out of the right kidney, and two very large found in the bladder when he was dissected Nov. 1711 by the ingenious Mr S. Pollard , who presented them to me. But the most remarkable one is voided 16 Febr. 1710 by Anne Moorcraft a poor widow…It is 4½ inches in circumference one way and above half a foot the other. This was the acceptable present of the Reverend Mr Scot Vicar of Wakefield. …Another in the form of a heart, lately voided by an ancient person at Ardsley and sent me by Dr Craister.’ |
| ‘Here are some plum stones voided by Mrs C. (with one of these balls that endangered her life) though she had not of twelve months eaten any of that fruit’. |
| ‘upon whose thumbs, fingers and toes grew certain horny excrescencies, which fell off once a year.. The Reverend Dr Wroe of Manchester College obliged me with one of these horns, which is three inches long… A late author has given us the picture of Mary Davis of Chester, with two growing upon her head.’ |
| ‘A pugill (loam) of the dust (unmixed with Earth) of a noble Countess, not easily distinguished from common dust and ashes .But the most noted of all the humane curiosities is the hand and arm cut off at the elbow, positively attested to be that of the celebrated Marquis of Montrose, whose quarters were disposed of to several cities of Scotland. It hath never been interred, has a severe wound in the wrist, and seems really to have been the very hand that wrote the famous epitaph (Great, Good and Just) for King Charles 1st, in whose cause he suffered. Dr Pickering would not part with it ‘till the descent into Spain; when dreading it should be lost in his absence, he presented it to this respository, where it has more than once had the same honour that is paid to the greatest ecclesiastical Prince in the World.’ |
| 'The pizle of a Hippopotamus (the Behemoth mentioned in Job) twenty inches long, the glans now being dried, but seven inches round. A young cat (littered at Leeds) with six feet and two tails having two distinct bodies from the mid back….. A prodigious tooth of an elephant; it is eleven inches in circumference, besides what hath been broken off. The bones of this creature are frequently exposed as humane, and this accordingly passed as a Giant’s Tooth, but is one of the grinders of an elephant.’ |
| ‘The horn of an anonymous creature, curiously wreathed; it is black and shining, 3½ inches in length and 1½ thick at the root, whence it tapers to a sharp point.’ |
| ‘Laughton wool from the Isle of Man, remarkable because not to be met with at any certain place; but that one only sheep of a whole flock hath of this dark coloured wool.’ |
| ‘Two horns each 6½ inches long that grew out of the foot of a sheep killed in the Shambles at this town… ..The quills of a porcupine, 10½ inches long, alternately black and white from end to end, but the black commonly of a triple proportion. These were plucked by a virago from a living porcupine at Leeds. ....The pizle of a sea tortoise 12 inches long and 2½ round. Their embraces continue a whole lunary month, as a grave author tells us.’ |
| ‘A crocodile, six foot wanting three inches in length, the same animal that is called the Leviathan in Job. There are some in Panama 100 foot long.’ |
| ‘called The Bird of God, by the natives of the Molucca Islands who worship them. It was not long since generally believed, not by the vulgar only, but the greatest naturalists themselves, that they wanted feet; and I lately saw one, that, to countenance this error, was mutilated; but all persons are now sufficiently convinced that this is false, both by the testimony of eye witnesses, and the birds themselves brought over entire, as this was from Java, by Dr Midgley, who presented it to me.’ |
| ‘A chicken with four legs hatched at Leeds…Another chicken with four legs and as many wings; this, to prevent the fate of the former, I put into spirits of wine.’ |
| ‘The pizle of a whale in length a yard and a quarter, and at the glans above a foot round, and though now shrunk up and hard as horn.’ …….’Part of the fin of another great fish, vulgarly called a Bottle-nose, 25 of which were cast upon the Yorkshire shore.’ |
| ‘But the most remarkable of all is an ash coloured one, from the top of the Appalachian mountains, that part Virginia on the west, from the rest of the American continent; upon which mountains great numbers of them, and other shells are found, which is an undeniable argument of an universal deluge.’ repository, where it has more than once had the same honour that is paid to the greatest ecclesiastical Prince in the World.’ |
| ‘a prodigious swarm of flies ..which went with such a force.. that persons were forced to turn their backs to them, to the wonder of those that were abroad.’ |
| ‘very much bewitched the inhabitants from the more polite Europeans to the barbarous Hottentots.’ |
| ‘The kernels of the coconut, of which chocolate is made, small at one end, about the size of almonds, but not so flat. In some parts of the West Indies , these cacaos pass for monies, and are given to the poor; and with the chocolate the Indians treat Noble Men that pass through their country.’ |
| ‘Artificial curiosities, Various editions of the Bible, Manuscripts, Ancient Writings, and Antiquities and Appendix. |
MARTIN TARPEY |