Corvallis gazette. [volume] (Corvallis, Benton County, Or.) 1900-1909, 1903-03-31
RecIuses Live Apart
From the World.


One day in the early fifties a Cam
bridgeshire woman passed from hu-
man ken. For over thirty years she
had been seen by none, her meals hav-
ing been left outside her room to be
taken in when no one was by; and it
was only through her neglectfng to do
apprehension as to her safety was
aroused. The door of her room was
forced and she was found dead ON
her bed. The reason for her eccentric
conduct never transpired.
An equally mysterious recluse dwelt
in a Kentish town. A trusted civic
employe, he one morning quit his post
for no ostensible cause and retired to
his house, where he lived on scant
annuity he possessed. Such food as
he needed was purchased by a blind
sister, with whom he lived, and he
gave no sign of existence, save when
at night his steps could be plainly
heard pacing his backyard, which. that
he might escape prying eyes, he had
at his death remained unsolved.
A physician named Blore, who lived
at the end of the eighteenth century,
was suddenly seized with a hatred of
his kind and resolved until his death
never to see or be seen by man. So
he had made large bell-shaped struc-
ture of wickerwork, open at the top
tn od ir Tnf hQ
ing caused it to be placed in the hall
of his house, he, having bidden SOL
emn farewell to his wife and daugh-
tiers, descended through the aperture.
In this case insanity was at the bot
tom of the matter and Blore perished
by his own hand in less than a week
after he had taken possession of his
odd dwelling.
Another curious instance of mania
was that of gentleman whose family
was well known to the writer. He
was stricken with the strange fancy
that he possessed Gorgon's head, so
that everybody who beheld him would
be turned to stone. He therefore re-
tired to couple Of attics, to which
he would admit no one, and, though
doubtless he might with propriety have
been relegated to an asylum, his fam
lily respected his bizarre whim and
he remained religiously secluded for
over three years, when he recovered
his normal senses.
The victim through an accident of a
CHASTITY Disagreement, wealthy Pa
x,ic %ho
a VOW never to be seen again by man.
He kept to a special suite of rooms
in his house, where he was waited
upon by two well-trained blind SER
wants, who were the Intermediates
between himself and the other men,
bers of his household. No exception
was made even in the case of his wife
and children, who, from the day Of his
accident to that of his death, never
again set eyes upon him.
The late e. P. Whipple, the Ameri-
can lecturer and critic, used to tell
of an eccentric New Yorker who, hav-
ing read a pamphlet on immurement
as practiced by the medieval religious
orders, was possessed by an irresisti-
BILE desire to copy their procedure
though not in his own person.
This he gratified with the assistance
of an elderly pauper, who. in consid-
Grafton Of a handsome annuity allowed
to his wife, agreed to be confined in
small dungeon built in the walls. In
this cell he spent four years of his
life, being fed through small aper-
ture so contrived as not to permit
sight Of the voluntary prisoner.
A strange fancy seized a Viennese
matchmaker some years back. He
shut himself up in his house. and till
his death, seven years later. was never
again seen by mortal eyes. All the
windows were closely shuttered and
such communication as he had with
the outside world was carried on after
dark through an aperture made in the
door. He continued, to some extent,
to work at his trade, at which he was
an expert; watches. clocks. ETC., to be
repaired being taken in and returned
through the same small opening.