Vices and Volumes | Navigate Irish and British History's Absurdities from 1800s Books

In 1884, Irish born Lady Colin Campbell published articles in Cassell's Family Magazine teaching young women how to become "the perfect lady." Two years later, she'd be in court defending herself in the divorce scandal of the century—her intimate life dissected in newspapers across Britain.
This episode explores the impossible standards Lady Colin Campbell outlined for Victorian women: white-headed pins must never project from black dresses, collars must be changed daily, sitting with crossed legs was unforgivable, and women must suppress all natural reactions to absurdity. When a page slips and falls surrounded by dinner rolls, or a cake bowls up the room, a perfect lady neither speaks nor smiles. Even at home, exhausted with children clinging to their skirts, women were expected to maintain "freshness and attractiveness" at all times.
But who was the woman behind these rigid rules? Gertrude Elizabeth Blood was born in County Clare, Ireland in 1857 and later educated in Dublin. At 23, she met Lord Colin Campbell and became engaged within three days. What seemed like a fairy tale became a nightmare when her husband infected her with syphilis—a disease he'd concealed before their marriage. In 1886, both parties filed for divorce in a trial so explicit that "intercourse" appeared in newspapers and multiscopes became known as "what the butler saw machines" after the butler's keyhole testimony.
The episode contrasts Lady Colin Campbell's advice with the even more demanding standards of Isabella Beeton, whose ideal dinner party featured rented hothouse pineapples, out-of-season fruit, and servants in white kid gloves. The gap between these aspirations and reality trapped women in impossible positions—unable to acknowledge their struggles without admitting social failure.
Yet Lady Colin Campbell survived. After social ostracism, she became the first female editor of a London newspaper not exclusively for women, succeeding George Bernard Shaw as art editor of The World. She wrote over 200 articles, became an expert in fencing and fly fishing, exhibited landscape paintings, and earned genuine respect from the brilliant minds of her era. Shaw called her wit "lightning" and her journalism unmatched. She famously called Oscar Wilde "the great white slug."
From Cassell's Family Magazine (1884), this episode examines what the pursuit of perfection actually cost Victorian women—and the remarkable resilience required to survive it.

In August 1852, Sir Francis Bond Head arrived in post-Famine Dublin and hired a local cabman as his guide. What followed was a tour where historical accuracy took a backseat to the ancient Irish tradition of entertaining visitors—a cultural practice rooted in Brehon Law's requirement to provide travelers with oigidecht: hospitality that included food, shelter, and importantly, entertainment.
The cabman's version of history was undeniably creative. Nelson had lost his left arm rather than his right, the statue in College Green depicted "William the Conqueror" rather than William III (six centuries apart), and Dublin's name supposedly derived from "Double-Inn—two houses stuck into one" rather than the Irish Dubh Linn (black pool). Yet his enthusiasm was genuine, his delivery engaging, and his purpose clear: to provide his passenger with an entertaining experience while earning his fare.
Head had arrived after a storm-tossed midnight Channel crossing, navigating Morrison's Hotel by single candlelight. By morning, mounted on horseback for observation, he was immediately approached by barefoot boys seeking work—a reminder that Dublin in 1852 was still recovering from the Great Famine. The phrase "I'm wake with the hunger," spoken by an elderly beggar woman, would have carried particular weight just months after the famine's official end.
This episode explores Head's observations of Dublin at a transitional moment: the city's exceptional air quality (Phoenix Park's 1,750 acres and Georgian squares provided what Head called "magnificent lungs" compared to coal-choked British industrial cities), the melancholy sight of Daniel O'Connell's empty Merrion Square house still bearing his brass nameplate five years after his death, and the democratic mixing of classes on jaunting cars heading to Donnybrook Fair—soldiers, gentlemen, and working people all sharing the same twopenny ride.
Head, a former Royal Engineer who'd fought at Waterloo and served disastrously as Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada, brought an engineer's eye to Dublin's architecture and infrastructure. His account captures both the Georgian grandeur and the visible poverty, the political monuments and the human stories, the formal Vice-Regal visits and the street-level encounters that revealed a city's character.
What he may not have fully understood was that the cabman's performance wasn't ignorance—it was a cultural tradition of hospitality through storytelling, where entertaining the visitor served both social custom and economic necessity.
Features readings from A Fortnight in Ireland (1852) by Sir Francis Bond Head, a source frequently cited by historians studying post-Famine Ireland.

Ever wondered how people survived winter before central heating? Spoiler: they didn't always.
This episode takes you inside the Georgian and Victorian bedchamber, where staying warm could literally cost you your life. We're talking about warming pans filled with poisonous fumes, feather beds crawling with insects, and bed curtains so tightly drawn you could suffocate before morning. One household manual even suggested testing this theory with a caged bird at your bedside—which, unsurprisingly, nearly died by dawn.
But the Victorians weren't just sitting around freezing. They were innovating. We'll explore the remarkable air-pump mattress of 1823—a proto-waterbed with valves, stop-cocks, and convenient tassels you could pull from your pillow to adjust firmness in the night. Imagine Victorian couples arguing at 3 a.m.: "Stop pulling the tassel, you're making it too firm!"
Once you survived the night, you had to get dressed. Victorian winter fashion wasn't just about looking elegant—it was thermal engineering wrapped in seal-skin and given exotic names. We're talking about creations like The Diplomatt (with enormous sleeves and seal-skin trim), The Mexican (black cloth with embroidered white silk), and The Semiramis (named after an Assyrian queen because why not?). These weren't just fashion statements; they were survival gear with marketing departments.
And then there's food. Winter soup was serious business, and we'll dive into a heated debate from 1880 about charity soup kitchens. Should soup for the poor contain actual meat, or would that spoil them? One writer insisted that if "starving poor" refused meatless pea soup, they should be "improved morally and physically by being kept without meat." His solution? Pig's head soup so greasy it would "quite equal to mock turtle." Delicious.
Through readings from rare books—including my own battered, spineless copy of "A New System of Practical Domestic Economy" (1823)—we'll discover the elaborate rituals, surprising innovations, and occasionally questionable attitudes that defined Victorian winter survival.
Features readings from:
"A New System of Practical Domestic Economy" (1823, anonymous author)
"The Englishwoman's Domestic Magazine" (1861)
Cassell's Family Magazine: "Winter Soups: How to Make Them" by A.G. Payne (1880)
Modern life is easy. We complain about winter from heated homes while wearing fleece and microwaving soup. The Victorians had to earn their warmth through constant vigilance, specialized knowledge, and frankly, a shocking amount of work. This episode is a reminder to appreciate your electric blanket, your North Face jacket, and the fact that your mattress doesn't require a pump with decorative tassels.
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Keywords: Victorian history, Georgian era, 19th century, 18th century, vintage books, historical books, winter survival, domestic history, social history, rare books, history podcast, Victorian era, British history, Irish history, period history, household management, historical innovation

What if the two topics you could never, ever mention in polite conversation were yourself and your enemy? Welcome to Victorian feminine conversation, where your tongue was an "unruly member" requiring constant restraint.
In this episode, we're diving into Matilda Ann Mackarness 1888 conduct book "The Young Lady's Book," where the chapter on conversation is actually a masterclass in silence. Discover why ladies withdrew to the drawing room after dinner to discuss only servants and babies while gentlemen debated politics and business. Learn which words—awfully, stunning, checky—threatened the very foundations of the English language in the Great Slang Crisis of the 1880s. And meet the young woman so paralyzed by conversational rules that when a gentleman tried engaging her, she could only manage two words in a grave monotone: "So you said."
But here's the devastating irony: Matilda Mackarness herself violated every rule she prescribed. Widowed at 43 with seven children and "very slender provision" (Victorian speak for near-poverty), she had to write constantly to survive—producing over 40 books between 1849 and 1881. She couldn't afford to be silent. She couldn't worry whether discussing her hardships was "egotism." She had to speak, loudly and persistently, through every book and periodical she could sell.
So why did she teach young ladies to bind their tongues? Was she protecting them? Believing in the rules? Or was she quietly handing over survival strategies for navigating a world where women had no power at all?
We'll explore the economics of being "agreeable" (new books cost £150 in today's money), the divine surveillance of idle words ("a heavy reckoning will be demanded"), and why women's speech—like women's bodies—was considered fundamentally unruly and requiring external control.
From pure springs flowing effortlessly to the tongue that required constant correction, this is Victorian feminine conversation in all its terrified, tongue-tied glory.
Features readings from "The Young Lady's Book" (1888) by Matilda Ann Mackarness

Two hounds clung to each other all night on a hedge surrounded by freezing floodwater. When the water receded the next morning, they were found "closely clasping each other—without doubt, it was the friendly warmth which they afforded each other that kept both alive." This is Peter Beckford in crisis, showing his true character when his beloved pack faced disaster.
Part 2 of our journey through the 1787 hunting masterpiece moves from literary art to practical animal care—revealing both Beckford's surprisingly advanced veterinary knowledge and the dangerous medical practices of his era. Discover his mange treatments: sulfur, whale oil (train oil), and turpentine created an effective, safe remedy still used today in some forms. But red mange required something stronger—quicksilver (liquid mercury) mixed with turpentine and hog's lard, rubbed directly onto the dog's skin for three consecutive days. It killed the parasites. It also frequently killed the dogs and likely poisoned the staff applying it without gloves (rubber gloves weren't invented until 1894).
Learn about the distemper epidemic devastating kennels across Britain with 50-90% mortality rates, Beckford's experimental treatments (Peruvian bark with port wine, opium-based Norris drops), his proto-scientific approach ("I shall not recommend such as have not been tried with success"), and his surprisingly modern insight that fresh air, clean bedding, isolation of sick animals, and feeding multiple dogs together to encourage eating were the best defenses.
But the emotional heart of this episode is the river crossing disaster: floodwater so deep horses nearly swam, current so strong it swept hounds downstream, freezing temperatures leaving survivors unable to walk. Beckford watched helplessly as his pack exhausted themselves trying to reach him, their "well-known tongues as such I had never heard before or without pleasure." The scene of two hounds spending the night clinging to each other on a hedge is genuinely moving.
Yet here's the contradiction: a man who knew each hound by name, kept detailed performance records, and showed extraordinary compassion for animal suffering lived comfortably on profits from Jamaican sugar plantations worked by enslaved people he never met. Between 1780-1786, five hurricanes destroyed his income, his wife left him, his son gambled away fortunes, and by the end, he was selling estates and mortgaging what remained.
Features readings from "Thoughts on Hunting" by Peter Beckford (1787), including kennel design, veterinary treatments, the river disaster account, and his philosophical comparison of hunting to other sports.