The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1896-11-08
HOBBIES OF GREAT MEN
IDI0sYyCRACIEs WHICH HISTORY
HAS SEEN FIT TO RECORD.
The Poet Philosopher Goethe Made q
P~laything of Snakes and REM
brandt Loved a Monkey.

1t is related Of him that one day he was
discovered by an ambassador crawling or
all fours with the Dauphin on his back and
the rest of the Soyal children urging him
to equine feats. He was not abashed, and,
without raising, said to the intruder:
Have you children, Mr.. Embassador?'
Yes, sire"
I'm that case" replied Henry. "I shall
proceed with my sport"
"A fondness for children was a feature in
the character of the Duke of Wellington
and also in hat of his great adversary.
Napoleon. 1t is difficult to realize this i'm
perious man., this terror of nations, dan-
ding the young King of Rome in his arms
and laughingly daubing his face with sauce
from his breakfast plate. Yet it is so re-
corded OF him. Another of his weaknesses
was for the music of bells. He would stop
in the midst of a discussion on the gravest
subjects TO listen to a village peal, and
be surprised and almost indignant if those
about him failed to evince a corresponding
interest.
'"They remind me-" he said on one occa-
sion. 'of the first year 1 passed at Brienne.
1 was happy then"
Music, indeed. in one form or another.
has been the hobby of many great men.
Milton delighted to play upon the organ,
and composed many tine chants to psalms.
Gainsborough performed with no little skill
on the volin. Many of the anxious and
feverish hours of Luther were solaced by
his flute. The great reformer, however,
had another favorite recreation in the game
of skittles or ninepins. Probably the sue
cess attending his labors never gave him
so keen an eXhilaration of pleasure as did
the knocking down of all the pins at
one stroke. Byron loved flowers. and
kept his room constantly ecked with them.
He said that he drew from them his In
spiration. In the latter years of his life
he formed a great affection for dogs, and
generally had some of them about him.
A favorite one, on its demise, received the
honor of a Byronic epitaph. Many famous
len have displayed a similar fondnesS for
ani.nals, and in not a few instances the
animi.l chosen has been or a KIND not uSu-
ally connected with household pets.
CARDINAL RICHELIEU'S CATS.
Cardinal Richelieu found amusement in
a collection of cats. The poet Cowper
tanned hares and spent much Of his time
feeding and fondling them Goethe made
friends with an animal of far less inviting
description. 1t is related Of him that he
rarely passed a day without bringing from
q. chimney corner a live snake, which he
kept there. and caressed it like a bosom
friend. Hardly a more agreeable form was
taken by Rembrandt, who became devoted
to an ape. When he heard OF this animals
death he was so overcome with grief that
h introduced 1tnS uGei Its its figure e. into the n a group 81 p,I ne
Needless 10 say, the family in question
refused to recognize this unseemly addi-
ton to their numbers. and the painter de-
Ginning TO erase it the picture was left on
his hands. 1t is said to be still in exist
ence.
these is the friendship which Poisson made
Of a spider to beguile the tedium of soil
tary confinement in the Bastile. That a
creature of this kind should show itself
amenable to such influences is. perhaps,
more TO be wondered at than that a man
so placed should desire to tame it:
James i was another lover OF animals,
but he does not seem to have confined
his fayorS to any particular variety. He
kept a private menagerie in st. James
Park. wherein all manner of beasts were
gathered together and tended them with
%scrupulous care. Stables, white gyrfalcons
are told. among the most highly priced
specimens in this collection. About the
year 1929 the King of Spain obtained the
ic presentation of an ELEPHANT and five cam
els. The former of these appears to have
been a somewhat costly visitor to enter
well as two English ones for mis- sole serv-
ice, and a "breefe noate what the chardges
Of the elephant and his keepers are in the
Q31S.) This computation, however, does not
seem to have covered the entire expense,
TOT the DTeeIe 0OdIt IL SupDlcIIfcIlltu
by the following: Besides, his keepers af-
frme that from the month of September
until April he must drink mot water) but
wyne-and from April until September he
must rave a gallon of wyne the daye."
VAGARIES OF GENIUSES.
Apart from animals, the vagarieS OF
great men have taken many singular
forms. Beethoven was possessed of a con-
tinual desire to change lodgings. Hardly
was he installed in one set of apartments
than he would discover some defect
in them and set about searching
for others. What a field is there here,
surely, for the enterprising tourist. He
would be an unlucky man, indeed, who
should fail to unearth at least one of the
great composers many abodeS.
. zee a maS ,ne Haius OF me
of science that he restricted himself for
the ordinary purposes OF life TO the use
of one eye, reserving the other solely for
his telescope. 1t is almost Incompetent
sible that a man should thus voluntarily
deprive himself of one OF his most useful
members, but ii is recorded that by these
means he was able to achieve many inter-
esting results. and we may, therefore. pre-
that he considered himself sufficient
ly rewarded.
Perhaps, however, the most potent mo-
tive actuating eccentricities has been the
consideration of health. a strange mania
was that of Ferdinand IL. Grand Duke of
Tuscany, VINO died in the year 1910. He
was frequently seen by his biographer pac-
ing up, and down his room between two
large thermometers. upon one or the other
of which he would keep his eyes constant
ly fixed while increasingly employed in put
ting on and taking Oft a variety of skull
caps or different degrees of warmth. ac-
cording to the variations of heat and cold
by the Instruments. Another
man with a curious fondness for skullcaps
was the Able De st. Martin, who in the
seventeenth century made himself ridicu-
louS by his vagaries. He always wore nine
of these articles 20 keep off the cold. and.
furthermore, nine pairs of stockings. His
mode of passing the night was more re-
still. He caused TO be constructed
for himself a bed of bricks. beneath which
was a furnace so ranged that he could
regulate IL to the degree of warmth he
might require and his bed was fitted with
the able used to creep when he retired at
night.
Even more ridiculous was the contr;v-
ance which the great French mathema-
protection of his health. He encased him
self in a species of box. the interior of
which, by some mechanical means, was
kept at the only temperature at which he
While enveloped in this clumsy affair he
was necessarily confined to one spot. but
he provided means for the freedom Of his
head and hands. Even the ills of rheu-
and asthma one would have
thought were preferable to existence under
such circumstances as this. But the
French Mathematician. we must believe
was of a different opinion.
A Berlin Charity.
Washington Post.
The Pingree system of giving unoccu-
pied city lots 10 the poor of the commnn-
ity for cultivating potatoes and other yaoa
4 n hlaC va nc arn0 ~ In --rs- ., =