Loremen Podcast - S3 Ep54: Loremen S3 Ep54 - The Madness of Crowds

Episode Date: January 21, 2021

Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds (1841) is a remarkable compendium of mass hysterias, written by the Scottish curmudgeon Charles Mackay. Alasdair (half-Scottish curmudgeon) takes James on a tour of the stand-out fads, fancies and follies: from Dutch tulip-fanciers, via slow-poisoners, to some cracking haunted house scams. Brace yourself for chilling tales of faux-ghosts. (Fhosts.) Loreboys nether say die! Support the Loremen here (and get stuff): patreon.com/loremenpod ko-fi.com/loremen @loremenpod www.twitch.tv/loremenpod www.instagram.com/loremenpod www.facebook.com/loremenpod @JamesShakeshaft | @MisterABK

Welcome to Lawmen, a podcast about local legends and obscure curiosities from days of yore. I'm Alistair Beckett-King. And I'm James Shakeshaft. And in this episode, I am bringing you extraordinary popular delusions. Not of today. No. But of the past. the year it's charles mckay's book about the madness of crowds ah yes i really like this guy's vibe yeah you're a mckayophile

i like that he he doesn't suffer fools gladly nope doesn't suffer cockneys gladly he doesn't find enjoyment in anything as far as i can see. He was and will remain a Scottish man. I got thinking about hoaxes, James. Oh, yes. Off the back of our hoax law episode about Lucy Lightfoot. I can see how that one would have led to the other, yes. And it got me thinking about hoaxes, James. Oh, yes. Off the back of our hoax law episode about Lucy Lightfoot. I can see how that one would have led to the other, yes. And it got me thinking about a book by Charles Mackay, a Scottish man. Yeah. Chuck Mackay. Charles Mackay. Oh, Charles Mackay. Charles Mackay. And the book was called Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the madness of crowds. Ooh.

1852. Not to be confused with culture warrior Douglas Murray's right-wing diatribe Madness of Crowds, which came out recently. It's what you'll get if you Google it. That book, I haven't read it, but I assume it's about the international communist conspiracy to sap and impurify all our precious bodily fluids.

Yeah. Haven't read it, won't read it. No. Charles McKay's good book is an absolutely crazy ride through just some stuff people believed at different points in history. Things like tulipomania. I feel like we might have brought up tulipomania on the podcast before. Are you familiar with the word?

I'm not as familiar with the word, but I'm guessing I know what it means. Go for it. Is it when the price of tulips went doolally? It is exactly that, yeah. It's quite a famous, very early example of a bubble, like a stock market bubble. But we're in 1630s Holland. Yeah. And I'm just looking at the figures here.

Now, I don't know how much a florin is, but these tulips are worth too many of them. Whatever amount it is worth, 4,000 of them is too much for a tulip, isn't it? I think so. For one bulb? Yeah. So an Admiral Leafkin type of tulip, they've got great names, is worth 4,400 florins. An Admiral van der Eyck is only worth 1,260 florins. But aper augustus was thought to be very cheap at 5,500 florins now to put that in a bit of context four oxen were worth 480 florins oh right 12 sheep were worth 120 florins so that's a sheep is worth 10 florins a semper augustus is worth 5,550 florins it remember that drill tweet about not being able to budget food 200 data 150 rent

800 candles 3600 utility 150 someone who's good at the economy please help me budget this my family is dying the first reply is someone saying spend less on candles he says no so if you thought about spending less on tulips dutch people what was the what was the deal with that people just really got into tulips or was it people just really got into tulips and they were considered a great investment and there was so much confidence that the prices rose and rose and rose completely out of proportion to the actual value of tulips because you could flip them well i mean this is the thing it's a sort of there's a book called devil take the hindmost about the history of speculation and financial crises. Unfortunately, written before our most recent financial crisis. Which one? It's going to apply however many financial crises there are

since 1999. And it just goes through how all the crazy stuff that went on. There's a myth, which I possibly read about in that book, but I cannot track down, about people trying to make the black tulip. Trying to grow a black tulip has been a huge deal. If you could achieve it, it would be worth loads of money. Alexander Dumas wrote a book about it. And there's a story about a man who'd finally grown a black tulip and some tulip traders came around and they offered him absolutely loads of money. And he held out and he said, no, I want more. And they gave him him more and they gave him until eventually you know they gave him absolutely stacks of florins and he went okay and he sold the black tulip and they crushed it they trampled into the ground right in front of him what and he said why did why did you do that and they explained it's because now the black

tulip that we have grown is worth even more oh because it's the only one oh black tulips don't exist so that almost certainly didn't happen. Plus, I can't find any source for it, but I'm pretty certain I didn't make it up. Well, or a really cool idea for a film. Like a Tarantino film set in a florist's. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Bulb fiction. Very good.

But the stock market was crazy in the early days. Would you believe a terrible idea that has ruined many lives started in England? No. In the city of London, in Johnson's coffee shop. People started to trade shares for the first time. And in the early days of buying stocks and shares, there were basically no rules. So you could do crazy stuff like if you've got a pound, you could buy shares to the value of a pound.

And then you could take out a loan against the value of those shares. And then you could use that loan to buy more shares. And then you could take out a loan against the value of those shares i think i hope you can see what the problem is here that you could keep doing that infinitely and when the shares drop in value you kill yourself is what usually happens in those situations but in those days the buildings weren't that tall so flinging yourself out of the window probably didn't help that much you just land in poo you land in a big pile of mud and poo land in a big pile of mud and poo. Land in a big pile of poo.

Now you're massively in debt and covered in poo. Thanks, capitalism. That's what they want. That's what they want you to do. Capitalism wants you to fall into poo. Probably. Because then they'd charge you to clean your clothes. McKay's book covers absolutely loads of things.

It covers the slow poisoners, which he thinks it's a fad. Basically, it's women poisoning their husbands very slowly so that people think that they're just ill and then they die. And I don't, I mean, it's not fidget spinners, is it? I don't think that's a fad in the sense of, it's not those, it's not jumpers that change colour with temperature. Global hypercolour. It's not novelty mouse mats. What's interesting is that as sort of liberal divorce laws come into existence and women are able to earn a living independently, weirdly the necessity of murdering one's husband falls into the background and women stop poisoning their husbands as much.

I just feel like I don't think that's a fad so much as a practical solution to a problem. It's not trendy. No, it's not like what are you doing this week, Janine? Poisoning my husband. Ooh, arsenic. We use mercury. So Charles McKay's book has some amazing chapter titles. You've got Tulipamania. Tulipamania.

You've got the South Sea Bubble. You familiar with the South Sea Bubble? It's another one of your stock market crazies. Everybody thought there was gold lying around on the beaches in the South Seas. They put all their money in and everyone lost it oh good i thought it might have been people trying to sell bits of the south sea because it's very easy to forge a sea is this your sea sir it tastes like brine so yeah it must be um the alchemist the magnetizers which i think means hypnotizers he's not a a magnet truther.

He does believe in magnets. Oh, no, but you used to get them people that would, in your Guinness books of records or your Hamelin book of weird stuff, that would have loads of forks and spoons stuck to them. Yeah, they're usually Russian, aren't they? It's usually a Russian kid with a lot of ledges on his body, holding half of a cutlery drawer allegedly that's not really that's a wide child more than it is a physics defying wonder so that's lying a

kid down yeah pouring a cutlery drawer on it and turning the camera on its side yeah doing an elaborate painting on the floor of a Russian interior lie the kid down covering with crockery couple of plates for good measure you're famous It's before Blu-Tack was widespread. Actually, it wouldn't work. Wouldn't work. Blu-Tack doesn't stick to skin, guys. Here's a beautifully titled chapter, Influence of Politics and Religion on the Hair and Beard.

Ooh. There's a lovely chapter on the popular follies of great cities. Oh, yeah. Which are mostly just people doing weird stuff, like saying the word quaz. Yep, apparently people just started saying quaz when you couldn't go anywhere without hearing quazes. He says that every alehouse resounded with quaz,

every street corner was noisy with it, and every wall for miles around was chalked with it. Quaz, quaz, quaz, quaz, quaz. Is it like at festivals after that Partridge episode where they shouted Dan? It probably is. Where he shouts Dan a lot, and then that started happening at festivals all the time.

Other phrases that came in and out of fashion include shouting, what a shockin' bad hat! And it's very hard not to say that in a Northeastern accent. That's nice, though. What a shockin' bad hat! Just bullying, really, that one. But did it lead to less hats being worn? Well, he speculates that many people would have had to buy new hats

off the back of being publicly shamed. So you think that that particular fad might have been initiated by Big Hat? How are we going to sell all these hats? Have we got too many hats? We did a head count. We got it wrong. We've got too many hats. What are we going to do?

Every man can own only one hat. Every woman one smaller hat. We need a quicker too many hats. What are we going to do? Every man can own only one hat. Every woman one smaller hat. We need a quicker turnover of hats. I'm just going to go around places and start shouting that people have got rubbish hats. What a fucking bad hat. And then it just sort of caught on. That's my guess.

That's my hypothesis as to how that happened. That is terrifyingly plausible. The hooky walker is an interesting one. People just shouted walker. If, he he says a lively servant girl was importuned for a kiss by a fellow she did not care about she cocked her little nose and cried walker does it so that solved the problem there but what does it mean doesn't mean anything it's nonsense the most confusing one by far is there he goes with his eye out

i like that one he does suggest that there she goes with her eye out has a sort of vulgar connotation. Oh. So maybe. Has your mother sold a mangle? There's another. And what, people would just say this? People would just say it. I don't know if this is popular madness or is it just cockneys?

And is that just a popular madness? Is it just cockneys being cockneys? Has your mother sold a mangle? To be fair, that popular madness has to have been created within the sound of bow bells. And there's an interesting one. And actually, I've heard this mentioned on the TV show QI. I've got this faint memory of Stephen Fry saying that people would run into pubs and say, who are you?

Which I think is, we still do that. It's just, he's pronouncing it wrong. It's, who are you? That still exists. we still do that it's just he's pronouncing it wrong it's who are you that still exists we still do it and somehow it has passed stephen fry by that people still do say who are you well it's like when someone repeats your telephone number back to you in the wrong with the wrong cadence it doesn't sound like you tell you just don't recognize it yeah it's horrible isn't it this just sounds like this guy was baffled or annoyed by like local slang yeah i

think so like people used to say get get out you smell all the time wherever i went people would say oh what's that horrible smell is this you i'm being charles mckay now oh okay okay right i think he's just being bullied he had a bad hat he had an hat. And no one knew who he was. One massive eye dangling. Yeah. Presumably someone had written Quaz on his back. Yep. And he didn't have his mangle with it. And he was not carrying a mangle, as every honest Cockney would have been.

He also insists that the Vox Populi wore itself hoarse by singing the praises of The Sea! The Sea! Which I think we should bring back. Just yelling. The Sea! He would have really done his nut at Twitter. singing the praises of the sea the sea which i think we should bring back just yelling the sea he would have really done his nut at twitter because it's like that every single day all of that every single day a new one a challenge to simply tweet the sea the sea yeah upon listening to this if you're on the twitch yeah the Wow. There's a thing going around where people just keep going, this?

I just can't mangle because of the lack of mangles. Me, nothing. Everyone else, what a horrible hat. Me, goes and buys a new hat. I think it's good that McKay didn't live to see today

because he wouldn't not have been able to handle it. People are simply photographing their lunch and putting it on social media. It's madness. Why would you think I was interested in that? Just doing very basic observational comedy. It's just sea shanties. Why?

I think it's really interesting that the sea shanty thing has taken off on social media in the last few weeks. I really like it. It's interesting that people are surprised that folk songs are really fun to sing. Because if you're in the sea shanty world, which I'm sea shanty adjacent. The sea, the sea, you're always tweeting.

I'm always tweeting about the sea. It's so cool that people have suddenly remembered that sea shanties are fun. I think that, yeah, that's the thing. The point is that they're very easy to join into. That is the whole deal with sea shanties. Yeah. You rarely hear about any other kind of shanty. I assume it comes from chant, I guess, shanty.

Oh, and they're drunk because of the rum. Yeah. We're going to do a shanty. So I think there's been some criticism of whether Mackay's reporting is wholly accurate. He's been accused of exaggerating the seriousness of tulipomania. Okay. One person managed to sell a tulip bulb for a few grand and wouldn't stop banging on about it. Which you wouldn't. Yeah, no. If you bought one for

two lasts of wheat, four lasts of rye, four fat oxen, eight fats wine, twelve fat sheep, two hogshead of wine, four tonnes of beer, two tonnes of butter, one thousand pounds of cheese, a complete bed, a suit of clothes and a silver drinking cup for one tulip. Bulb. You'd be

dining out on that for a while. Yes. Well, literally and figuratively that's too much cheese to even put on the bed by the way that dining out on a thing the phrase to dine out on something i don't think i've ever fully understood that what does it does it mean that people invite you to their house in order to hear this story i think that's it yes is that the point i think that's what it means right okay not that you literally eat the story well no i just thought it was like like when picasso did that drawing to pay a bill in a cafe wouldn't show if you could go in a little chef and just

like when they bring the bill around go have i told you about the time i saw someone buy a tulip and then you get your dinner for free i don't think it's that okay cool yeah i had a little look at mass hysterias because I think we talked about them on the pod before about there's the fan death in Korea. Yes. Where people are afraid that electric fans will kill you if you have them on in the overnight time.

Yes. Disclaimer, they won't. Yeah, but there was all sorts of reasons that people thought that they did, that they somehow chilled the body and gave you hypothermia or they blew all the oxygen out the room or something i love that one but they just didn't no they just didn't no it turns out fans at night time behave the same as fans during the day yeah i looked up some very old ones went around nunneries uh back in the middle ages there was one who Went round nunneries back in the Middle Ages. There was one... Who went round nunneries?

These fads. Oh, the fads. There was a biting fad. What? A nun in the 1400s started biting her companions and the behaviour spread through other convents all around Germany, Holland and Italy. Communicating from nun to nun?

Mm. Was it spread through the bites? I don't know if it was a sort of a were-nun. Nun to nun. Was it spread through the bites? I don't know if it was a sort of a were-nun. The last thing we want is zombie nuns marauding across Europe. Now would be the time.

Now's your moment, nuns. Yeah. Things can't get any weirder, surely. Oh, no, it's were-nuns. Yeah, humanity destroyed, not with a bang, but with a wimple. Oh, very nice. Yes. That is a top-notch nun pun if you only need one nun pun in your life i don't normally do any puns on the podcast i'm i'm inordinately pleased with

that i don't think you need to that's bought you you could potentially as far as i understand it you could dine out on that nun pun and then there was another one where they started meowing nuns oh yeah yeah i mean you gotta wonder if nuns are a bit bored yeah i didn't yeah is it a bit boring being married to christ i think if there's so many of them you you would feel a little bit shunned he probably hasn't got time like even your birthday he's gonna have to spend it some of it with other nuns, whose birthday it also is. Yeah. There was a dancing plague in Strasbourg.

What, yeah? In 1518, people took to dancing for days. Presumably non-stop. Otherwise, it's just, they had a party. Yeah, it's just having a nice time, that. And Mackie just didn't understand. These people, for hours they sit around talking and smiling.

It's a hysteria. Every weekend they go to the beach, nearly to sit and splash in the water. Cannot be explained rationally. I call it beach fever. And more recently, the 2016 clown sightings.

Yes, of course. Because there was, there had been some a couple of years previously, like the 2016 clown sightings. Yes, of course. Because there had been some a couple of years previously, like the Northampton clown, and another one, I think it was in Chicago in America, there was a clown in a cemetery, and that did the rounds on social media. And then in 2016, they just got more and more reports, which seemed to be there weren't any clowns.

It was just made up. Well, I guess what probably happens is, once there are rumours that people are weren't any clowns it was just made up well i i guess what probably happens is once there are rumors that people are dressing up as clowns some people probably do dress up as clowns confirming and expanding the rumors yeah but nobody was nobody was murdered by a clown i mean that's a low bar isn't it although i think that what yeah there was one which wasn't it john wayne gacy famously a whole bunch of people got murdered by a clown but he's not in clown gear oh so one clown murders a bunch of people and that's it and now all clowns uh retired with the same yeah that's probably one of the bits they do as well isn't it where they all get tarred with the same brush probably yeah now all clowns

are having the same bucket of what we thought was water, but turns out to be confetti thrown at them. Outrageous. Well, they're all carpooling, so they probably chat. They would have known him. Is it John Wayne Gacy? Did I get the name right? Yes. One of the worst John Waynes.

My favourite chapter in the book is the chapter on haunted houses, where he debunks haunted houses. It's the death knell of our podcast, really, this book. Oh, no. He takes his sceptical eye and casts it all over a haunted house, several haunted houses, in fact. It's funny that you mentioned nuns. Have you got another pun?

No, no, that was my last one. The first story I have involves monks, which are basically similar to nuns, aren't they? Basically man nuns. And this story is the haunting of the Palace of Valvaire in France. Ooh la la. You know that it pains me to tell a story set in France, but I'll do it.

I'll do it for the podcast. So this takes place in the reign of King Louis, not the monkey from The Jungle Book, but the King of France, King Louis IX of France, who, well, I misunderstood this. He was known as Saint Louis, and I thought that was like a gangster nickname. Saint Louis.

And then I only realised afterwards that, no, he became a saint. That's why they call him that. No, he was canonised, yeah. It's obvious when you say it, but to begin with, I was thinking, weird nickname. This story is about the monks of Saint Bruno, who were about six guys, and they were given a lovely little house in Chantilly, near Paris,

to be their little monastery. And you would expect that they were grateful. Yeah, I would have thought so. They'd just been given a whole house. You would have thought so. But out of the window, you could see the Palace of Valver, an ancient and abandoned building, which was way nicer. And does not the Bible say, do envy a nearby building?

I'm pretty certain it's in there. They really wanted to live not in the lovely house they'd been given, but in the palace of Valverde. But they were monks. They couldn't just ask for it. Their humility, their monkishness prevented them from just ringing up the king and saying, King Louis, can we have a nicer house, please? And then, according to Mackay,

frightful shrieks were heard to proceed from that house. At night, blue, red and green lights were suddenly seen to glimmer from the windows and as suddenly to disappear. The clanking of chains was heard and the howling as of persons in great pain. At last, a great spectre clothed all in pea green with a long white beard

and a serpent's tail took his station regularly A great spectre clothed all in pea green with a long white beard, and a serpent's tail took his station regularly at midnight in the principal window of the palace, and howled fearfully and shook his fists at the passengers. Ah. He shook his fists, James. The devil appeared and went like, You passers-by! Oh, how I hate you!

I think I see what they've done here, these monks. No, I don't think you have, because you've, I assume, have been taken in and think that that was actually the devil manifesting. Yeah, they summoned the devil. King Louis sent out people to investigate, and they heard all these awful, awful tales. And the monks of St. Bruno, like the guy helping Columbo solve the mystery, said, you know what? Actually, we're monks, so we could move in to the palace of Vauvert

using our monk abilities and just let all the rest and just calm the whole thing down. We'd rather stay here in Chantilly in our little house. But we could, if you want, move into the palace. And King Louis said, well, that's very reasonable. And do you know what happened? I hope it fixed that problem. Actually, shockingly, it did, yes.

No. None of the problems occurred ever again from that point onwards. How lucky. Explain that. Yeah. What a coincidence. That's a good scam. I mean, I think the thing is that they perpetrated a massive scam.

It's a scam. It's a huge hoax. I love it. That's really good very well thought out although it kind you kind of think they'd hoped that just the lights might have worked and then like okay to get some chains get some green leggings and then a third yeah a second pair where we just stuff one of the legs to make a tail yeah get up on my shoulders and put this big coat on but they did it and it worked oh such a good scam i've got one last haunted house for you now maybe this one well it's a bit scooby-dooey isn't it like is it gonna be a scam yes it's definitely scam not necessarily

it might be real ghost this time that is the fear because watching scooby-doo with a kid who's a little bit too young to be properly introduced to the world of ghosts. You don't know. Because some Scooby-Doos, it does turn out to be a ghost. I can understand that because your children are young and you don't want them seeing pictures of men pointing at cupboards. Oh, God, no. Jeez Louise. You don't want to expose them to that world. They have got all that to come.

Protect them from it for as long as possible. Yep. Like little Harry Potters, they're going to find out that your dad was a podcaster. You're a podcaster. The year is 1649. The English Civil War is happening, slash has happened. Let's not get too specific. But the point is the parliamentarians are in power.

Right. And I'm always sad about this because we got rid of the monarchy and then we brought it back just because the parliamentarians were so boring they tried to implement a hereditary system ruling the country they did do that that's yes there's that and they banned christmas and dancing and what i didn't realize about oliver cromwell being hung drawn and quartered he'd already died he died some years previously somewhat takes the edge off it, though. Yeah, he died. And then his son became the whatever, protector or whatever for a bit. And then they went back.

They were like, actually, this is the same as Kings. And the other Kings were more fun. Let's get Kings back. Yeah, at least we had a little bit of a dance. And when the Kings came back, they were like, we better sort of show our power by digging up the corpse of a man. Nothing would show our unstoppable power than beating up a corpse. Yeah.

That'll scare him. He was himself a prankster, Oliver Cromwell. Oh, do you think he might have not been dead? He was a victim of the ultimate prank. What, disinterment? Yeah, being dug up and cut into four. Hilarious. You've been punked.

It's still more tasteful than those pranks, those quote-unquote pranks that YouTubers play on their girlfriends. Just leave him. Become a slow poisoner, please. So the year is 1649. The Long Parliament are sending out commissioners to get rid of the iconography of the monarchy. So a group of these lads are sent to the Royal Palace of Woodstock.

They rock up and their job is to, according to Mackay, efface all the emblems of royalty about it. But they were fairly driven out by their fear of the devil. So it's several guys accompanied by someone called Giles Sharp, who's there as the clerk,

just helping them out. And he helped them in destroying all of the symbols and even uprooting a noble old tree merely because it was called the king's oak. That's how zealous they were. They cut down the oak tree and threw it on the fire

in the dining room to cook their dinners. Ugh. Awful. Imagine what the king would think about that. He'd be furious. See the king's oak

so roughly treated. And then things started to get strange. This is the account of about a fortnight, 14 days in their lives. During the first two days, I'm going to do in McKay's 14 days in their lives during the first two days i'm going

to do in my case fake scottish accent again during the first two days they heard some strange noises about the house but they paid no great attention to them on the third however they began to suspect they had got into bad company for they heard as they thought a supernatural dog under their bed which gnawed their bedclothes on the next day the chairs and tables began to dance apparently of their own accord and dancing they don't like that. Yes a double offence. On the fifth day something came into the bedchamber and walked up and down and fetching the warming pan out of the withdrawing room made so much noise with it that they thought five church bells were ringing in their ears. Five church bells. On the sixth day the plates and dishes were thrown up and Clever.

And that is the most dramatic way of saying swapped pillows for logs. They usurped the pillows. On the eighth and ninth days, there was a cessation of hostilities. But on the tenth, the bricks in the chimney became locomotive and rattled and danced about the floors and round the heads of the commissioners all the night long. On the eleventh, the demons ran away with their britches. And on the twelfth, filled their beds so full of pewter platters that they could not get into them. On the thirteenth night, the glass became unaccountably seized with a fit of cracking

and fell into shivers in all parts of the house. On the 14th, there was a noise as if 40 pieces of artillery had been fired off and a shower of pebble stones, which so alarmed the commissioners, that struck with great horror, they cried out to one another for help. Wow. Explain that series of events that all could have been done by a man. Explain that, James. I think it was done by a man.

Okay, that's an interesting theory. If he'd have gone in straight away into their bedrooms, banging the bedpans, they would have instantly thought, there's a man in here banging our bedpans. But he seeded the ideas of ghosts early on like a latter day latter day former day derren brown towards the end it's very much falling back on sort of scout hut pranks like oh there's loads of cutlery in my bed yeah that's not ghosts don't do

that he sort of peeked at the logs thing thought that's gonna to get him. And it didn't. And he had two days thinking. Yeah. Rattle the chimneys, put some cutlery in the beds, smash the windows and pebbles. But you were right. It was the work of the man they thought was called Giles Sharp, the clerk. His real name was Joseph Collins. And he was a staunch royalist, an undercover royalist slash fake ghost. So they would have pulled the ghost's mask off. Old man Joseph Collins, the royalist slash fake ghost so they would have pulled the ghost's mask off

old man Joseph Collins the royalist and in fact he had as McKay says passed his early life within the bowers of Woodstock so that he knew every hole and corner

of the place and the numerous trap doors and secret passages that abounded in the building that's how he did it so that is popular delusions and the madness of crowds just I'm scraping the surface here, James.

I think we're going to be going back to that book. I think we might. There's a lot of crazy stuff. Do you want to score it? Yeah, I think so. I've got some strong opinions. All opinions are my own. Oh, really?

Well, my opinions are the opinions of my employer, James Shakespeare. First category is Supernatural. Yeah. I haven't really heard a very good explanation for how people when seeing someone else doing something that makes them do something and some of these mass hysterias are like physical illness yeah yeah and rashes and stuff like that and dancing and simply dancing i wouldn't want to do that It's odd that that could be catching but just the idea of it is catching. And that's kind of supernatural.

Yeah, I mean, I don't agree with you but I'm prepared to go with this for the sake of points. It's going to be a point. A point. Because a nun bit a nun. I'm getting a point. Because nuns bit nuns, biting nuns. It's nun eat nun. Monks are getting on each

other's shoulders. Pillows get in exchange for logs. what is this world coming to um so i would yeah one it's one okay fair enough that's better than i was expecting second category names i think the book has a great title the book has a great title memoirs of extraordinary popular delusions and the madness of crowds and the madness of crowds. And the madness of crowds. And just even the categories, you know, Tulipomania. Tulipomania is a great name. The South Sea Bubble.

List of engravings. There's so many good headings. It's got some good names, but it's not going to get past a three. And Tulipomania is doing most of the work. All right. I was really hoping there would be like a Tulipomania style madness with the scoring here.

And you'd be just candying out. Thousands of florins worth. Vastly in excess of the value of the story. But OK. My next category is original prankster. O.P. Yes. Yes.

It's an offspring song from the 90s. The original prankster. And the only reason that that's the category is that as far as I can tell, nobody in this episode was pretty fly. Brackets for a white guy. Clothes brackets. So in conclusion, original prankster is the category.

Right, okay. We've got some very original pranks. Yeah, we have. Did you think with the pillow thing that they put the pillowcases on the logs? I'm certain that they did, yes, because you wouldn't get into bed if it were a log. No.

But putting it inside the case, you'd be be like and now to rest my weary head after another day of doing the lord protectorate's work ouch i will simply slam my head down on my pillow as i do every night yes allow me to plunge my face into the downy softness as is my want what is this barkish hardness i experience upon my visage? A log? Fie! And so forth. Shut up, Martin.

We're trying to sleep. And, you know, the monks, the Catholic monks, swapping original sin for original pranks. Yeah. Pretending to be the devil. Dressing up as... See, they got more original as it went on. First of all, it was like lights and people going,

ooh, and that didn't take. It's basically school disco to begin with. That was probably what they did. They're just having a party. But then they had to escalate it and become more and more original. Whereas The Devil of Woodstock, he peaked too soon. He did, yes. Perhaps even with the dog

one. Do you think that was him? It could have been a royalist dog. Perhaps a corgi. Definitely a corgi. Yeah. Put a dog under the bed to gnaw at their sheets or it was him just going i hope they don't look um so four not not five not five are you pranking me no no no it's a prank where it turns out it's actually five because the woodstock guy really ran out of ideas and he had two days off to think about it. Final category. Quaz. Oh, look at the state of that hat.

It's a shocking bad hat. Oh, that's a shocking bad hat. The sea! The sea! I'm not sure if they shouted it or sang it. Hiya, mate. Where's your mango? It's in the sea. I want to give that Quaz out of Quaz.

Quaz out of Quaz? Quaz! I'm very happy with that. You're like, how it started is just a picture of you looking sad. And now how it's going is a picture of you with a speech bubble saying quaz. Well, it's quaz for now. Thank you, listeners. Yeah, quaz off.

Quaz. Quaz. You've been listening to Lawmen with me, Alistair Beckett-King. And me, James Shakeshaft. If you are tired of hearing about hoaxes, we've got something special for you next week. Yeah, we've had a very sceptical January, but don't you worry. We thought we'd get in Chris Cantrell with

a very chilling tale for a spot of supernatural whimsy. Famed liar and fabulous Chris Cantrell returns to the podcast with Tales of Ghosts. We probably don't have time to plug the Patreon, but hey it's patreon.com forward slash

lawmenpod. You know how to spell it. Some people say they don't read their reviews. Yes. I've never understood why, because normally mine are so glowing. It's valuable feedback, I've always thought. However, we got our first iTunes one-star review. First suggests first of many. I don't like that. And it's got writing. It's not just one and done iTunes one-star review. First suggests first of many. I don't like that.

And it's got writing. It's not just one and done, one star and gone. So maybe we can learn from the feedback and improve the podcast. Starts well. A great show. Nice. Ruined. Ah.

Because they can't keep their political opinions out of it. Will never listen again. When I read that, I thought that is really unfair. But in this episode, you say capitalism wants you to fall in poo. So maybe we're not as politically neutral as we think. Maybe our far-left agenda does keep creeping in. That's true. The review was improved, though, by Twitter user Andy B. Flynn. He punctuated it in such a way that it's glowing now.

He Lionel Hoodstead, didn't he? Yeah. It now reads, a great show. Ruined? Because they can't keep their political opinions out of it? Never. Listen again. Oh, that's lovely. I kept wondering why I had George Michael's careless whisper going through my head

all yesterday after reading that review. No, I'm never going to listen listen again political opinions got me reeling well if you endorse or tolerate our political opinions maybe you could remedy this yes we've been cancelled essentially for our outspoken politics yeah yeah yeah we've been totally silent if you can hear this we've been silenced if you're listening to this know that we've been silenced. If you're listening to this, know that we've been silenced. So please get onto one of the review websites. Give us a five-star review. Will you praise our political opinions?

So it's got a lovely poll quote, just a great show. Yeah, a great show and just a big star.