Showing posts with label chamberstick. Show all posts
Showing posts with label chamberstick. Show all posts

Wednesday, 16 November 2011

Fitzjames' Demonic Companion




This enlargement from the engraving published in the Illustrated London News seems to show a grotesque face peering out from James Fitzjames' bedside table. The item is a type of candle lantern sometimes described as a 'chamberstick with storm glass'. I've looked at thousands of pictures of candlesticks and lanterns on the web but so far I have been unable to find a picture of anything similar. I've found a few examples with a pierced foliage pattern on the gallery supporting the glass but nothing resembling a face. Perhaps it was a souvenir of Fitzjames' travels, or maybe even it was never really there and is just a private joke by the engraver.

The surprising Polar connections of a small seaside town: Part 1, Robert McClure.

Hastings has been my home for more than twenty years - a timespan very similar to that of my interest in the history of arctic exploration. ...