Historical Mysteries | Page 2

with its accompaniment of diabolical falseness,
for an explanation of her adventure. But hysteria does not serve the turn.
The girl had been for years in service with a Mr. Wintlebury, a publican.
He gave her the highest character for honesty and reserve; she did not
attend to the customers at the bar, she kept to herself, she had no young
man, and she only left Wintlebury's for a better place--at a Mr. Lyon's,
a near neighbour of her mother. Lyon, a carpenter, corroborated, as did
all the neighbours, on the points of modesty and honesty.
On New Year's Day, 1753, Elizabeth wore her holiday best--'a purple
masquerade stuff gown, a white handkerchief and apron, a black
quilted petticoat, a green undercoat, black shoes, blue stockings, a
white shaving hat with green ribbons,' and 'a very ruddy colour.' She
had her wages, or Christmas-box, in her pocket--a golden half guinea in
a little box, with three shillings and a few coppers, including a farthing.
The pence she gave to three of her little brothers and sisters. One boy,
however, 'had huffed her,' and got no penny. But she relented, and,
when she went out, bought for him a mince-pie. Her visit of New
Year's Day was to her maternal aunt, Mrs. Colley, living at Saltpetre
Bank (Dock Street, behind the London Dock). She meant to return in
time to buy, with her mother, a cloak, but the Colleys had a cold early
dinner, and kept her till about 9 P.M. for a hot supper.
Already, at 9 P.M., Mr. Lyon had sent to Mrs. Canning's to make
inquiries; the girl was not wont to stay out so late on a holiday. About 9
P.M., in fact, the two Colleys were escorting Elizabeth as far as
Houndsditch.
The rest is mystery!
On Elizabeth's non-arrival Mrs. Canning sent her lad, a little after ten,
to the Colleys, who were in bed. The night was passed in anxious
search, to no avail; by six in the morning inquiries were vainly renewed.
Weeks went by. Mrs. Canning, aided by the neighbours, advertised in

the papers, mentioning a report of shrieks heard from a coach in
Bishopsgate Street in the small morning hours of January 2. The
mother, a Churchwoman, had prayers put up at several churches, and at
Mr. Wesley's chapel. She also consulted a cheap 'wise man,' whose
aspect alarmed her, but whose wisdom took the form of advising her to
go on advertising. It was later rumoured that he said the girl was in the
hands of 'an old black woman,' and would return; but Mrs. Canning
admitted nothing of all this. Sceptics, with their usual acuteness,
maintained that the disappearance was meant to stimulate charity, and
that the mother knew where the daughter was; or, on the other hand, the
daughter had fled to give birth to a child in secret, or for another reason
incident to 'the young and gay,' as one of the counsel employed
euphemistically put the case. The medical evidence did not confirm
these suggestions. Details are needless, but these theories were
certainly improbable. The character of La Pucelle was not more
stainless than Elizabeth's.
About 10.15 P.M. on January 29, on the Eve of the Martyrdom of King
Charles--as the poor women dated it--Mrs. Canning was on her knees,
praying--so said her apprentice--that she might behold even if it were
but an apparition of her daughter; such was her daily prayer. It was as
in Wordsworth's Affliction of Margaret:
I look for ghosts, but none will force Their way to me; 'tis falsely said
That ever there was intercourse Between the living and the dead!
At that moment there was a sound at the door. The 'prentice opened it,
and was aghast; the mother's prayer seemed to be answered, for there,
bleeding, bowed double, livid, ragged, with a cloth about her head, and
clad in a dirty dressing-jacket and a filthy draggled petticoat, was
Elizabeth Canning. She had neglected her little brother that 'huffed her'
on New Year's Day, but she had been thinking of him, and now she
gave her mother for him all that she had--the farthing!
You see that I am on Elizabeth's side: that farthing touch, and another,
with the piety, honesty, loyalty, and even the superstition of her people,
have made me her partisan, as was Mr. Henry Fielding, the well-known
magistrate.

Some friends were sent for, Mrs. Myers, Miss Polly Lyon, daughter of
her master, and others; while busybodies flocked in, among them one
Robert Scarrat, a toiler, who had no personal knowledge of Elizabeth.
A little wine was mulled; the girl could not swallow it, emaciated as
she was. Her condition need not be described in detail, but she was very
near her death, as the medical evidence, and that of