Hi, CapriUni:

I've skimmed through this thread and I have not seen any mention of the tale of the Pied Piper of Hamelin... so I thought I'd mention it. :-)

In the version of the tale with which I'm familiar, there was one lame boy who could not keep up with the other children who were led by the Piper through the "door" in the mountain, and could not reach the door before it closed. Looking it up today on Wikipedia, I find reference to the Brothers Grimm version in which there are two children (one lame, the other blind) left behind by the Piper; Wiki also alludes to an unidentified version in which there are three children (the first lame, the second deaf [but curious enough to follow the crowd], the third blind) shut out of the mountain.

As a child hearing this story, I always thought it was terribly cruel of the Piper to leave the lame boy behind, since I was being told that all the other kids ended up in some happy land on the other side of the closed door, away from the selfish and greedy adults of the town. Now, I wonder if that part of the story was a variation on the narrative of the story of Job ("I only am escaped alone to tell thee" [of the tragedy that has befallen thee]), since the lame boy of Hamelin was the one who told the townspeople what had happened to the kids while the adults were in church.

Of course, this particular folk tale is based on an actual event: the disappearance of the children of the town of Hamelin, Germany, circa 1284. Too bad no one knows the real reason why. But it's curious that a lame boy was inserted into the tale to be the messenger of bad news.

Segue to the chat about mercury (from posts in April 2011): Hatters (makers of hats) were indeed affected by mercury poisoning because mercury was used in the curing of pelts and the production of felt for hats (around the 18th to 19th centuries). The buildup of the toxin in their bodies resulted in vision problems, confused speech, excessive anxiety and timidity, dementia, and sometimes eventual death. I don't know how bronze got into the discussion of mercury (maybe it was in a blog entry?).

SharonA