Part 8 — SPECTRAL AND SUPERNATURAL APPEARANCES.

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BY R. BALMANNO.

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Belief in the supernatural has obtained credit in the world from the earliest records with which we are acquainted. The Grecian and Roman histories are full of it; even the Sacred Volume contains instances of spectral or preternatural appearances, which can neither be denied nor explained. In all civilized nations, at all times, up to the present period, we have testimony of unequivocal authority, giving minute details of extraordinary facts, on the evidence of individuals of unimpeachable integrity, which confound experience, elude investigation, and baffle research. The wisest of our divines, and the most accomplished of our philosophers are all forced to admit that there are things, with which human comprehension and reason cannot successfully grapple.

We must allow the truth of the remark of that immortal poet, whose commanding intellect and reach of thought, soared far above that of any “man of woman born;”—“there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy.” The boastful wisdom of vain-glorious men, like Voltaire, and such deistical writers, must bow before the Almighty fiat, “Thus far shalt thou go, and NO farther.” That fiat can never be violated by man.

As I am about to give the result of some rather extraordinary circumstances which have either occurred to myself, or to personal friends with whose names the world is well acquainted, it may not be altogether out of place to introduce them, by a short notice of those very singular annoyances to which the family of the Reverend Samuel Wesley, of Epsworth Parsonage, in the county of Leicester, in England, were subjected for a considerable length of time.

And it is remarkable that these extraordinary circumstances were not confined to the experience of one, nor two, nor three individuals, but to a whole family, consisting of nine persons, besides a neighboring clergyman; and it is still more extraordinary that they were not made apparent to one sense alone, but to several, inasmuch as they heard, they felt, and they saw. Confederacy or collusion appears to have been out of the question, and, indeed, to have been strictly guarded against, at the suggestion of Mr. Wesley’s two sons, then absent, whose suspicions were deeply excited.

Both these gentlemen were men of strong sense and highly cultivated mind. Samuel, the elder of the two, was at the time an usher in Westminster High School, and John, so celebrated afterward as the founder of Methodism, was a student of Christ Church, the most aristocratic of all the colleges in Oxford.

These gentlemen, in writing to their parents concerning the appearances, suggested the possibility of collusion, or the work of young men wishing to get access to the house, to enable them to make love to their sisters, who were, however, young ladies of unsullied purity and virtue.

Dismal groans were heard, and strange knockings, three or four at a time. Loud rumblings above and below stairs. Clatterings amongst bottles; footsteps of a man going up and down stairs at all times of the night; dancings in an empty room, whose door was locked; and gobblings like a turkey-cock. Mr. and Mrs. Wesley endeavored at first to persuade the children and servants it was rats within, and mischievous persons without, or that some of their daughters sat up late, and made the noises as a hint to their lovers; but these ideas soon underwent a change. Mrs. Wesley supposed she saw a black badger run from under the bed; and the man, Robert Brown, saw a white rabbit, with its ears erect, and its scut standing straight up, run from behind the oven. A shadow might explain the first, and the last might be owing to the propensity of ignorant persons to exaggerate.

But no such animals had ever been kept on the premises, nor were any such in the neighborhood. Yet, granting them to have been shadows, or an affection of the retina, these in no degree invalidate the other parts of the story, which rest on the concurrent testimony of many intelligent persons.

They cannot be explained by confederacy, collusion, legerdemain, nor ventriloquism, nor by any secret of accoustics. Such things may be preternatural, and yet not miraculous; they may not be in the ordinary course of nature, yet imply no violation of its laws.

The sounds seemed sometimes in the air of the room, and the family could not by any contrivance make such sounds themselves. The pewter trenchers were rattled down—the doors clapped—curtains were drawn—the nursery door was thrown open—the mastiff dog barked violently when the noises first commenced, but ever afterward, and sometimes before the family were sensible of its approach, he ran whining behind some of the company, or into the servant’s bed; and this is a remarkable feature in the case, because the intelligence of a dog is such, and his ear so fine, that he is invariably the first to discover the advance of a stranger—he never shrinks at the approach of man, but becomes fierce and forward to defend his protectors.

It never came by day, until Mr. Wesley ordered a horn to be blown about the premises, and then it was as frequent in the day as in the night. After that, none of the family could go from one room to another without the latch of the room they were going to being lifted before they entered it. It never went into Mr. Wesley’s study, until he reproved it sharply, and called it “a deaf and dumb devil,” and bid it cease to disturb the innocent children, and come to him in his study, if it had any thing to say to him; after which it visited him in his study frequently, nay, once it pushed him in, almost headlong. At other times it slammed the door in his face. There is the mother’s account of it to her son John Wesley, a student at Oxford, his sister Emilia’s account, his sister Mary’s account, his sister Susan’s account, his sister Ann’s, the Rev. Mr. Horne’s account, and Robert Brown, the servant’s account.

All these give long details in letters to the brothers, and other persons.

On one occasion it seemed as if a vessel full of silver were poured on Mrs. Wesley’s breast, and ran jingling about her feet, as she was going down stairs to breakfast with her husband.

The noises continued from the second of December till the end of January following, nearly two months.

None of the family felt the goblin until Mr. Wesley had called it a deaf and dumb devil; after that, they were sensible of being touched, pushed forward. Once or twice, when Mr. Wesley, in his clerical capacity, rebuked it severely, he heard two or three feeble squeaks, a little louder than the chirping of a bird, but not at all resembling the noise made by rats.

The details are so perplexing, that Dr. Southey, from whom the account is in part extracted, does not attempt to explain them. They are better authenticated than any similar story on record, by persons whose testimony, on any other subject, could not for one moment be questioned.

What interest could a quiet, retired, respectable clergyman, of the established Church of England, have for imposing on the world? His acknowledged piety precludes the suspicion; he was fast approaching, and was very near that period of life when he knew he had to account to his Creator for his truth or falsehood. His testimony is supported by that of a brother clergyman, equally pious and respectable, who came to assist in detecting the cheat, if cheat there had been. Can it be for one instant believed, that if there had been collusion, the ladies of the family would not in after life have confessed it to their husbands or children? No less than nine respectable witnesses lived and died in the belief of its supernatural origin, and at their respective deaths, they were as unable to account for the mystery as at the time of its occurrence.

It commenced without apparent or ostensible cause, and terminated with no other effect than the annoyance of an amiable family.

I shall now endeavor to relate a few remarkable circumstances which have occurred either to myself or to personal friends, on whose veracity I place implicit reliance; they are altogether unlike the preceding, and I think I shall be enabled to show that, by a quiet, cool, persevering investigation, we may generally be enabled to account in a natural way, for imaginary preternatural circumstances and appearances, although the senses may have been many times deceived.

Every story or averment of the sort ought to be taken quære tamen, or sed quære, as the lawyers have it—searched, sifted, scrutinized.

In Scotland, the land of second-sight, of brownies, bogles, kelpies, and fairies, a superstition prevailed when I was a child, which was called the Dead Candle. It was said that when a person was in the last agony, in the act of departing this life, a pale blue gleam of light, resembling the flame of a small spirit-lamp, was seen to flit slowly across the room and through the passages, and disappear, without its being evident whence it came, or whither it went. It was said and supposed to be the soul of the departed, taking its flight for eternity. Many were the dismal narratives of the dead candle, to which, while a mere boy, I had listened amongst the servants of my father’s household.

In a certain ancient city in Scotland which I could name, the houses are very large and very old; they are built entirely of granite, having very thick walls, in a far more substantial manner than houses of the present day.

The different floors, or flats, as they are there called, are shut off from the general stair-case, and are let out to separate families, each having a complete suite of apartments within itself.

In a large antique house of this sort, in the city alluded to, whilst I and my brother were at school, under the charge of a sister considerably older than ourselves, there resided in the flat above us, a young lady who was lying dangerously ill of a brain fever. One night, about eleven o’clock, during her illness, some time after my brother and I had retired to bed, and as I lay thinking of the poor girl, I distinctly saw a faint gleam of light pass across the foot of the bed in which I and my brother were reposing. The house at the moment was perfectly still, and the beam of light passed without the slightest sound; its appearance exactly corresponded with what, in my childhood, I had been told was presented by a “dead candle.” I was considerably alarmed, but probably not so much as might have been expected in a boy twelve years of age, inasmuch as from my earliest years, my parents had endeavored to disabuse my mind of all superstitious fancies, and the venerable and venerated clergyman, at whose school I then was, had, I believe, almost eradicated them.

I watched the light as it slowly moved across the inequalities of the bed-clothes, over my own and brother’s feet; and as its appearance recalled all the dismal stories of dead candles, I fully expected the young person who lay sick had just then expired. But next morning I found that although she had been exceedingly ill, she was still alive.

On the following night, about the same hour, I again saw the self-same appearance, in every respect as on the preceding night. The pale beam of light was clearly and palpably defined, moving slowly athwart the foot of the bed, as it had done on the former occasion; it was impossible I could be mistaken—seeing is believing.

The young lady certainly did die that night, about the very hour that I saw what I then verily believed to be her dead candle. I found it impossible to divest myself of the impressions with which my infant mind had been imbued; but what was, perhaps, rather singular in so young a person as I then was, I concealed the circumstance of seeing her spirit even from my brother; he was my senior by some years, and I well knew he would have jeered and laughed at me, if I had told him—I was a trifle more sensitive to ridicule then than now. My brother had been asleep on both occasions and did not see it.

Of course, I pondered much on so extraordinary an appearance, which I then actually believed to be a real dead candle, and it was not long before I had all doubt respecting its reality removed. On the following night, at the same hour, I saw the apparition a third time, and—the explanation shall be detailed in the sequel.

I was indebted to my late eminent friend, Henry Fuseli, R. A., the celebrated historical painter, for the following story of a spectral apparition which he himself saw.

During the time of his residence in Italy as a student at Rome, he had gone on an excursion to Frascati, where he intended to remain all night, but having changed his intention, he returned to Rome, rather late in the night. Being fatigued with the journey, which he performed as a pedestrian, and having gained access to his apartments without calling for a light, or otherwise disturbing the family in whose house he resided, he undressed in the dark and retired to rest.

On awaking, between two and three o’clock in the morning, he was horror-stricken to behold in the dim light afforded by the now risen moon, the figure of an angel of majestic proportions, arrayed in a loose flowing robe of radiant whiteness, hovering over the foot of his bed.

He gazed on the seraphic vision with straining eyes, lost in amazement to observe that, at one moment it seemed to approach with outstretched arms, as if intending to descend and embrace him, and then gracefully and slowly recede, gazing all the time with deep, fixed attention on his countenance.

As far as his terror permitted, he observed that always between the approach and retreat of the vision there was a pause, as if it hesitated, and stopped in uncertainty.

All the while the Seraph was palpably floating “in thin air.” The artist was both astonished and alarmed at so terrifying a phantom, even although the purity of its robe threw a halo of glory around it exceedingly Corregiesque.

In that Catholic country, where visions of saints are seen, and apparitions visible, the phantom, to a good Catholic, would probably have been hailed as a manifestation of Divine presence, a Beatification of the blessed Virgin.

Not so, however, to a sturdy Swiss—a Protestant Master of Arts—educated in the school and church of John Calvin, the contemporary, school-fellow, and friend of Lavater, Hess, Bodmer, and Bretinger.

But notwithstanding all this, it shook his nerves to their inmost extremity, and made each particular hair like quills; and as he once said to me with deep-toned emphasis, “it made my marrow cold.” For a length of time he continued spell-bound, with his large blue eyes riveted on the vision as intensely as his own sublime Hamlet glares on the ghost of his father. Those in this country who remember the penetrating eyes and look of the late lamented Dr. Follen, can easily picture to themselves Henry Fuseli, for there was a striking resemblance between them.

Becoming at last overpowered by the agony of his fears, and almost mad with excitement and apprehension, involuntarily and sudden as lightning, he sprung from the bed, and with outstretched arms clutched at the angelic form, as it came floating majestically toward him, and seemed to court his embrace.

Alas! poor youth, he little dreamt what an angel is composed of—the beatific form was evanescent; he caught the radiance, but it was unearthly—fleshless—boneless—a shadow, “an unreal mockery;” like Ixion, he had embraced—that which shall appear hereafter.

The next incomprehensible circumstance which I shall relate, occurred to myself. When I first became a resident in the Temple, “eating” my way into the technicalities of English jurisprudence, I rented chambers, consisting of a suite of three rooms and a spacious entrance hall, in one of those ancient brick tenements, which have what I believe architects call a well-staircase, built of solid timber from bottom to top, intended to last, as they have lasted, for ages. Each suite has two doors, a strong outer one, with a very substantial lock, and an inner, which can also be locked, should occasion require, or when the occupant is absent on circuit.

They are snug, cosy places—for bachelors—these Inns of Court, whether it be in the Temple, the most ancient of all, or Lincoln’s, Grey’s, Clement’s, Clifford’s, Furnival’s, Serjeant’s, or Staple’s Inn.

Most of them have extensive squares, besides gardens of great extent, with fountains and jets of water playing under old ancestral trees. All are extra parochial, and the whole have peculiar privileges—let the limbs of the law alone for that! There are gates at the various entrances, strong enough to defy the force of a battering-ram, which are carefully barred, bolted, and locked, every night at ten o’clock, and none, save inmates having chambers, are admitted after that hour.

The benchers, barristers, and students, resident within the precincts of the Temple, number from one thousand two hundred to fifteen hundred persons, which will give some idea of the extent of the societies of the Inner and Middle Temple. Respectable elderly females, called laundresses, who mostly reside in the neighborhood, come every morning to clean the rooms, light the fires, prepare breakfast, &c., &c.

That glorious spirit, Charles Lamb, was a Templer, at the time I speak of, and rented chambers not far from my own. Perchance I may hereafter give some reminiscences of dear Elia.

The first night I slept in the Temple was the most melancholy and uncomfortable which, in the whole course of my life, I remember ever to have passed.

It was toward the end of the long vacation, during autumn, when most of the profession were in the country. I felt a solemn awe steal over me as I locked the outer-door upon myself in a suite of large, lofty, gloomy rooms, some centuries old, which were wainscoted and paneled from floor to ceiling, with fifty, perhaps five hundred coats of paint, that had once been white.

Melancholy and heavy did the hours pass, until I lit my reading lamp, and took up that detested collection of Commentaries, the text book of lawyers; but I soon laid it aside in disgust. A Black-snake could not have been more loathsome to me than was Blackstone, that dismal, solitary, sad, and heavy evening.

Finding it impossible to read, or write, or do any one thing in the way of study, I passed through the hall into the very dark bed-room, and my uncomfortable fears, or fancies, induced me to take down a long antique rapier, which I had hung up at the head of my bed, and I was silly enough to plunge it underneath, in case any assassin or robber might be lying perdu under it. So “stern was the dint,” that I had some difficulty in withdrawing the point from the wainscot, into which it had penetrated on the further side of the bed. Ridiculous as it now seems, I continued this practice of pinking the panels for some nights afterward. There were five or six floors in the house, on all which were suites of chambers. Mine were on the floor which, in this country, would be called the second; in England it is known as the first. On entering from the courtyard, you ascended three stone steps into a long passage, in which were a set of chambers, directly underneath mine. At the end of the passage you ascended a short flight of nine steps to a landing, and then went up nine more, making in all eighteen steps from the entrance hall. These eighteen steps landed you close to the door of my apartments. I am thus particular for very good reasons, to be stated presently.

It was during the second, or possibly the third night after I had taken possession of the rooms, between ten and eleven o’clock, that I heard a very heavy foot coming along the paved court. Whoever it was, ascended the three stone steps, came along the entrance hall, up the stairs, and made a sudden dead stop at my door. I waited, expecting every moment to hear some one knock, but all was silent, the intruder stirred no further. I went softly, a tip-toe, to the door, listened, put my ear to the key-hole, but could hear no one move or breathe.

I thought it very singular, and stood considering what I should do. After remaining ten minutes breathless, with the light in my hand, I came away, thinking as there were two stout doors between us, each of which had strong patent locks, the person outside would find it a difficult matter to get at me, if so disposed; but I kept a lamp burning all night, and had my rapier ready at hand.

The following night, after I was in bed, I distinctly heard from the window of the room, which opened upon the stair-case, the same heavy tread coming up the stairs, and again it stopped close to my door. What can the man want haunting my door? thought I. I lay long immovable, with my head raised from the pillow, scarcely drawing my breath—but I could hear no further movement. Finally, I concluded it might be some drunken man, who, having no home, had somehow contrived to get into the Temple before the gates were closed, and had probably since then been sitting under the cloisters, and was now come to lie down and sleep on the mat. I determined to get up early in the morning and give him into the custody of the porters at the gate-house.

As the Temple bell struck four, I rose, dressed hastily, and went to the door; but the bird was flown—no trace of him was there. I thought I might, possibly, have been deceived, although the sound of the heavy tread coming up the stairs, and stopping exactly at my door, was so distinct, and the death-like stillness of the house at the time, seemed to preclude the possibility of mistake; but to guard against any chance of future deception, I counted the number of steps on the stairs, and found them to be eighteen, as I have stated.

Although I watched attentively the next night, the unwelcome footsteps were not heard; but on the succeeding one I heard them distinctly—counted the sound of the foot on the three stone steps—the walk along the passage—then the first nine risings—the turn—and the succeeding nine steps landed him close to my door. No mistake now, thought I to myself. I was burning with rage at the fellow’s pertinacity, and going boldly to the door, whipt it open in a twinkling, and found—what thinkest thou, reader? Exactly that which the Dutchman caught in his famous bear-trap—“nothing at all.” Not a soul was there. And yet that a heavy man had entered, had come along the hall, had ascended the stair, and had stopped at my door, I felt as morally certain as I could have been of any thing whatever. I could have sworn to it, because on this last occasion the night was remarkably still, so still, indeed, that I could distinctly hear the pattering of the drops of water, as they fell into the basin from the jet d’eau in the quadrangle of Garden Court. I had heard the footsteps on the pavement of the court-yard, before the person entered the door. The adjoining houses were too large and too solid for a sound from them being audible, and I had now several times heard the same footsteps, agreeing in every particular, and always stopping at my own door. I was completely baffled and at fault.

I tried to account for it in every way I could think of, and failed in all. So I determined, the next time I heard the mysterious unknown, to dash down stairs and seize him in the act of entering from the court-yard. I had become excited, nervous, and was perpetually on the watch. Sooner than expected, my curiosity was amply gratified; for the very next night, as I patiently sat on the watch, scarcely drawing my breath, I heard the well-known sounds,

“Tramp, tramp, along the court,

Stump, stump, into the hall.”

I bounded down the stairs like a tiger on his prey, and as I leapt into the passage, the frightful unknown was discovered—the mystery cleared completely and satisfactorily. I could scarcely believe my own eyes; but as I had expended much valuable time, and much deep thought in endeavoring to elucidate the mystery, I shall beg permission to leave the solution, and the reader to ponder, think, weigh, and determine, as I had done. He shall be gratified hereafter; and I doubt not will wonder at much as I did.

This affair of mine was, however, mere child’s play, compared with the long series of mysterious occurrences which happened to a very dear friend, whom I shall call Mr. Crofton. He is yet alive, and I hope he will long live to enjoy the happiness and felicity to which he is eminently entitled. He is a gentleman who has been long and favorably known in the literary world as author of many popular and highly embellished works; and he is, moreover, in common parlance, as good a fellow as ever stirred a tumbler—and many is the recherché goblet compounded by his delicate hand, which I have sipped, listening to his sparkling wit, and most interesting conversation long years ago. This gentleman being then a bachelor, and of very studious habits, occupied lodgings in a remarkably quiet house, in a quiet street, leading from Holborn to Bloomsbury Square, where he had a large, elegant, richly furnished room, with a spacious bay-window, and excellent attendance; in short, he found himself as comfortably situated as is possible or compatible for a bachelor—to feel. There was no other lodger in the house—no children—no pet-animals—no parrot—and no piano. The family consisted of a respectable old gentleman who had a respectable old wife, both of whom were strictly

“Sober, steadfast, and demure.”

The female attendant was one of those sweet, artless, rosy-cheeked damsels, which I verily believe no country on the face of the earth can produce equal to England, in the same station of life.

Mr. Crofton was eminently happy. In process of time, however, as is generally the lot of humanity, where people begin to feel themselves too happy, he was somewhat annoyed by frequently finding his books and papers in disorder, his pens split up to the plume, and his ink sputtered or overturned.

Now, Mr. Editor, I am very sure you can sympathize with my friend in these petty annoyances. Did you never feel your bile, if you have any, bubbling up, on returning to your sanctum, after having left your papers and proofs in apple-pie order, finding them all knocked into pi, as your affectionate friends, the compositors, would call it?

But Mr. Crofton being a gentleman of an uncommonly amiable disposition, said little, in fact nothing, about it, believing it to be occasioned by the maid, in her assiduity to keep his room “tidy.”

As, however, repeated and increased annoyances of this kind will, in time, ruffle the sweetest temper, Mr. Crofton one day, in the mildest possible manner, ventured to tell the damsel it would much oblige him, if she would be kind enough always to leave his papers and books exactly as she found them. To his surprise, the girl burst into tears, and said she was very glad he had named it, as she had now an excuse for giving her mistress warning to quit her service.

On inquiring her reason for conduct which seemed to him rather extraordinary, she said, “There is something wrong about this house, sir. I never touch your books or papers, and sometimes when I am cleaning the room, I hear whisperings near me, sometimes groans and moanings, as of a person in distress. I have searched every corner, but can discover nothing. I am sure the house is haunted by the spirit of some woman who has been murdered.”

Mr. Crofton was more surprised at this recital, than he chose to express, as he had himself reason to suspect there was some secret mystery to be cleared up; but he comforted Marianne with the assurance that, if she would say nothing about it, and would endeavor to arrange the room whilst he was taking his breakfast in the bay-window, he would lock the door when he went out to his office, and carry the key with him.

This plan proved extremely acceptable to Marianne, because Mr. Crofton’s kind, gentlemanly manners, and very handsome Christmas present, had probably made a deeper impression on her simple heart, than she was, perhaps, aware of, or would have been willing to admit.

Soon after this arrangement was entered into, Mr. Crofton was seized with a complaint to which he was occasionally subject; it was, in fact, a fit of the gout; and during the first night of his confinement to the house, as he lay reading, with his candle on a small round-table, which stood close by the bed-side, he noticed that the light was becoming paler and fainter; when looking up from his book, he was astonished and amazed beyond the power of utterance, to observe that the table was moving, silently and slowly away, and by degrees gliding from the bed-side.

At first he could scarcely believe his own eyes, he fancied he was laboring either under an optical delusion, delirium, or hallucination of the brain, induced by his illness; but on reaching out his hand to feel whether the table was absolutely removed, he became sensible, beyond all doubt, that it had not only moved away, but was then silently traversing the room. He watched its slow progress along the floor with intense emotion, and noticed that, when it reached the right hand side of the fire-place, its usual stand, it became stationary.

The effect of this unaccountable movement of the table, combined with previous circumstances, operated on Mr. Crofton’s corporeal system, just as if he had swallowed a dozen papers of James’s powders. At first he became cold as lead, but when the table stopped, and the candle appeared to be burning blue, and he was every instant expecting something would appear, he burst into a violent perspiration, and the fear of taking cold prevented him from getting up to investigate the cause of the table’s volition; so he continued gazing and perspiring until the candle, which was nearly burnt out, dropped down into the socket; and as the light alternately flickered up or fell, he again saw the table, of its own mere motion, making its way back toward the bed-side, as slowly as it had retreated, and then it stopped at the exact spot from whence it had taken its mysterious departure, of which he made certain by rising on his elbow, and raising the slide in the candlestick; and just at that moment he fancied he heard a mouse run along the carpet; yet the idea of a mouse moving a table backward and forward, across a large room, was too absurd to be entertained for a moment. In a state of most painful perplexity and suspense he passed the first part of the night, but at last fell asleep; and on awakening late the next day, he found the copious perspiration which he had been thrown into, had had the most salutary effect on his gout. When he got up, he minutely examined the table; but after a long inspection of it, he failed to discover the slightest cause for its extraordinary perambulations backward and forward along the room.

A short time after this unaccountable movement of the table, a friend came to breakfast with him one morning, and as the maid servant could not with propriety be in the room to arrange it, during the time his friend was there, they went out together, leaving the breakfast equipage on the table, to be removed, and the room put to rights, at leisure.

When Mr. Crofton returned in the afternoon, Marianne’s handsome features, as she let him in, indicated that all was not right. She followed him up stairs.

“Oh, sir,” were her first words, “I have been so frightened; I’ll never enter this room alone again.”

“Why, what’s the matter, Marianne?”

“The matter, sir! Why, as soon as you and Mr. Brooke went out, sir, I set about cleaning the room, and directly heard those dreadful mutterings all around me, with such sighs, and such groans, and weeping and distress, and as I was removing the ashes from under the grate, one of your books was thrown at me with such force, I do believe if it had hit me, it would have been the death of me. The house is haunted by evil spirits; I am sure some horrid murder has been committed.”

“Do you hear any thing of this in any other of the rooms, Marianne?”

“No, sir, only in yours, sir; and I cannot think of staying longer in such a shocking place—there, sir,” said she, starting, “did you hear that?”

Now Mr. Crofton did hear something, at the very moment, but the noise was of a vague, confused nature, difficult to comprehend. It annoyed him exceedingly, however, as he found it impossible to account for or explain the cause of the disturbances, but he was possessed of an indomitable courage, and affected to treat it all lightly, so begging the girl to say nothing about the matter, nor by any means to think of leaving her place; he put a guinea into her hand, and told her to continue as good and virtuous a girl as she had ever been, and to fear nothing.

Always on his return home in the afternoon, the girl was in the habit of lighting the fire, and having done so, one evening, Mr. Crofton immediately afterward went out to call on his friend Mr. Priestly, the bookseller, with whom he staid and took tea. He came home about nine o’clock, and on unlocking his door, was horrified to behold a creature, which to all outward appearance was the devil, standing on his cloven hoofs at the farther side of the table, engaged in munching some pears which Mr. Crofton had left on a plate. The creature, or being, was large and black, it had horns, which were sharp and slightly crooked, and an enormous beard. This frightful apparition stared Mr. Crofton full in the face, with a pair of large, black, oblique, glittering eyes, the glance from which seemed to pierce his very soul! And still it kept its place at the table devouring the fruit. There was a peculiarly offensive effluvia in the room—it was not exactly brimstone, but equally nauseous and strong. From the extremely offensive odor which was emitted, however, it was soon apparent that the intruder was no other than an enormous he-goat! but how it had obtained access to the room was inexplicable. Mr. Crofton hesitated not a moment what was to be done; he instantly relocked the door, went down stairs and procured a musket, which having charged with buck-shot, he almost immediately, or in less than five minutes, as he told me, returned to his room, fully determined to shoot the hateful beast, but what was his astonishment on entering the door, to meet, instead of a goat, a very fine, large bashful Newfoundland dog, wagging his bushy tail in the most friendly manner. Mr. Crofton could scarcely credit his own eyes—the room still smelt of a goat, but there was no mistake about the noble, honest dog! Now it happened that Mr. C. was uncommonly fond of dogs—who that has a heart is not? So he laid aside the musket and all hostile intentions, but he made an immediate examination of his canine visiter’s paws, to verify whether there was not among them a cloven foot! The scrutiny was satisfactory, but whether it was dog or devil, he was allowed to escape, and happy he seemed thereat.

The mystery seemed to thicken, and Mr. Crofton now felt really uneasy. He spoke to his landlord on the subject, but it was quite clear from the old gentleman’s artless manner, and the real alarm he manifested, that he was entirely ignorant of the cause of the disturbances.

He sent for a police officer, and had every part of the room and the whole house carefully examined, but no clue to a discovery could be obtained.

To guard against future surprises, Mr. Crofton procured and kept a brace of pistols, constantly loaded, at the head of his bed, and directed Marianne, as she lighted the fire, to put the poker between the bars, in order that it might be always red hot.

Now let me assure you, Mr. Editor, that a red hot poker is a potent weapon in the hands of an angry man.

I can of my own personal knowledge vouch, that from some singular crotchet in his head, arising probably from apprehension of personal danger, the late eminent antiquary and author, Francis Douce, invariably, during the winter months, kept his poker in the fire! I observed he always took it out and laid it aside to cool, whenever I entered his noble library to settle a Shakspearean difficulty, or resolve a disputed point of antiquity; and I noticed, that from long service in the fiery ordeal, his poker was half burnt away, and become very short, and as thin as a skewer toward the point; in fact it bore a striking resemblance to some men’s love—it was become—“too hot to hold!”

Neither dog nor devil ever again made their appearance in the room; but one afternoon, when Mr. Crofton had caught a cold, and was lying down on his bed, he was startled to notice the closet-door near the fire-place slowly and cautiously opening—and at last, the apparition of a human head, upon the upper shelf of the closet! Its large, round, black eyes were fixed on his, exactly like those of a rattlesnake intent on its prey. The head had a horrible indescribable grin, or ghastly smile. For a second, surprise at the apparition paralyzed him, but his natural intrepidity rallied the next, he seized a pistol, and pointing it at the head—which still grinned—he pulled the trigger, but the weapon flashed in the pan; he instantly seized the other, but before he could point it and draw the trigger, the door closed, and the pistol only flashed like the former. Mr. Crofton sprung from his bed, seized the red-hot poker, rushed to the closet and whipt open the door, but the head had vanished, whither did not appear; he thrust the poker against the back of the closet, between the shelves, where the head had appeared, but the brick wall was solid.

The clew was, however, at last found; it was plain and palpable all the annoyances had proceeded from that closet. Detection soon followed—ample and astounding—but as its details lead back to, and are connected with the fiercest and bloodiest period recorded in history, I shall for a short time defer the explanation, whilst I relate the circumstantial account of a spectral vision which appeared to two intelligent persons, at or near the same moment of time. I give it on the authority of a lady of the highest respectability, who is connected with some of the first families in the city of New York. She related it one evening, when ghost stories and second-sight—fruitful themes—were the subject of discussion; and I was not a little surprised to learn, at the same time, that there is a family in New York, consisting of two maiden sisters, of high respectability, natives of New Jersey, who are subject to those mysterious, melancholy and terrible visitations, identical in every respect with what is known in the Highlands of Scotland, as the “second-sight.” Equal ridicule has been attached to the second-sight as to Mesmerism and clairvoyance; the very name is almost enough to raise a smile, yet I am assured that the ladies in question, could, if they chose, relate circumstances of a character so dismal, that they would change smiles into tears, and ridicule into awe.

It ought to be remembered that the fearful visitation of the second-sight is involuntary to the party who is subject to it. It is sudden, unexpected, and unforeseen at the time of its occurrence, and renders its victim miserable and melancholy to the last degree.

Of this I can vouch, that my friend, the late James Miller, M.D., of Islington, near London, has often assured me he knew from boyhood a servant of Sir John Sinclair’s, who resided at his castle near Thurso, in Caithness, who was one of these pitiable beings, and the doctor related to me many of the man’s fearful and fatal predictions, which came to pass, literally, under his, the doctor’s, own personal knowledge, when he was resident in that part of Scotland. But I digress.

The vision related by the lady I allude to, I considered so singular, that I requested the favor of her to write it down for me. She kindly complied with my request, and the following is a verbatim copy of her letter. The names, of course, I suppress.

“Dear Sir,—The vision or dream which you wished me to relate, is, as nearly as I can recollect it, as follows: James, the second son of Mrs. G****, who lives in the south of England, was suddenly awakened one night, by the apparition of his elder brother Charles, who seemed visibly to approach his bed, dressed in his night-clothes, looking pale and death-like. Charles was at the time absent in the West Indies, and when the family last heard from him, was in perfect health, so that James had no anxious fears respecting him, and although the vision made a powerful and painful impression on his mind, as it was likely to do from its vividness, he determined to think no more of it, but compose himself again to sleep. He had, however, been so much startled by the unearthly look of his brother, that he found sleep impossible, and therefore rose to take a few turns about his room, in order to shake off the melancholy impression, and he remarked, on looking at his watch, that it was then just three in the morning!

“When the usual breakfast hour arrived, he went down to the parlor, where the family were assembled. His mother appeared exceedingly dejected, and complained of violent headache, which she accounted for by saying she had been much shocked during the night, at having been awakened by the appearance of her eldest son, who seemed as if alive in her room, and to approach her bedside in his night-clothes, looking at her with fixed eyes, and a countenance so pallid and corpse-like, that she could not get rid of the impression and belief that he was either dead or dying!

“James and her other children rallied her upon her superstitious fears and faith in dreams and visions, and endeavored to dissipate her fears. James appeared carelessly to inquire, whether she knew at what hour of the night the vision appeared, and was answered it must have been a few minutes before three in the morning, as she heard the hall clock strike three directly after the spectre vanished.

“Nothing further was said on the subject, but as soon as James left the parlor, he went to his own room, and wrote a minute account of his own and his mother’s dream or visitation, mentioning the precise hour and day of the month when it occurred.

“He sealed up the paper and asked his eldest sister to certify in writing, that he had delivered that sealed paper to her that day.

“Both of them had almost forgotten the circumstance, when, about two months afterward, a letter arrived from Jamaica, conveying the sad intelligence that their brother had died there, at the very moment—allowing for the difference of time—of his death-like appearance to his mother and brother!

“Mr. James G**** was a student of medicine at the University of Edinburgh, and resided in the same house in which I lived, at the time he related to us the circumstances. I regret that although only a few years have elapsed since I heard him relate it, the exact dates which he then communicated have escaped my memory, and I will not attempt to supply them. He was a young gentleman of undoubted veracity, and I believe the circumstances to be true as stated.

“New York, 22d December, 1840.”

In remarking on this communication, I will not say it is impossible that the extraordinary circumstance of two persons having each the same dream—I will call it—at the same hour, and that both believed they were awakened by the phantom of a distant relative, may not be explained by natural causes, as some things of a similar character were attempted to be explained, under the word “spirit,” in an early edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica, but in the absence of facts, what do such attempts amount to? Probabilities and possibilities!

But in this instance, although the young man’s death may have been imprinted on his mother’s and brother’s imagination—from apprehension of his fate, we will say, by reading or hearing of the ravages of yellow fever—which, however, is not alluded to in the lady’s interesting letter, the singularity is, how the dream, or phantom, should come to visit both—at precisely the same hour—and dressed exactly alike, and that so vividly, as to awake them in fear and terror!

It would be folly to attempt a rational explanation—such things are beyond human comprehension. We may speculate, but we can never penetrate the veil under which the Divine Will has shrouded such mysteries; yet I have not the shadow of a doubt that in some future state of existence, they will, to those who walk aright in this, be made clear and manifest, and we will then, possibly, wonder how near, how very close we have been allowed to approach the threshold, without being able to cross it! “Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther!”

I well remember one lovely starlight night, walking on the terrace in front of Somerset House with Henry Fuseli, and whilst speculating on futurity, he told me that he and Lavater had made a solemn agreement, that whichever should die first, would, if permitted, make himself manifest to the other, in some way. Lavater died many years before his friend, but Mr. Fuseli informed me with a sigh, he had never, in any way, waking or dreaming, made himself manifest. It is, perhaps, useless to mention that Fuseli was a classical scholar of very high attainments, and I know that he was a firm, undoubting believer in the immortality of the soul. He died at the ripe age of 86, whilst on a visit to the Dowager Countess of Guilford, and whilst on his death-bed, within an hour of the time his immortal spirit took its flight for a better world, he had an impression that he heard soft sweet music in the room, and faintly inquired of the countess, why she had placed musical snuff-boxes on the bed. Yet the dying man never had an ear for music, and could not distinguish one air from another—music was all perfectly monotonous to him—but the music which he imagined he then heard was to him heavenly. This impression on the ear seems altogether different to that made on the visual organ of many persons on the approach of death. Fervently do we pray that such impressions as visited the dying hour of Henry Fuseli, may equally be the blissful harbinger to eternity of all such good men.

The above story related by a lady, coincides in some degree with a visitation which occurred to Sir Walter Scott and his lady, at Abbotsford, who were both awakened by some extraordinary noise on the premises. He says in a letter—“The night before last, we were awakened by a violent noise, like the drawing of heavy boards along the new part of the house. I fancied something had fallen, and thought no more about it. This was about two in the morning. Last night, at the same witching hour, the very same noises occurred. So I got up, with Beardies’ broad-sword under my arm, but nothing was out of order, neither could I discover what occasioned the disturbance.

“I protest to you, the noise resembled half a dozen men putting up boards and furniture, and nothing can be more certain than that there was nobody on the premises at the time.”

It subsequently appeared, that at the exact hour mentioned by Scott, Mr. George Bullock died suddenly in London. He was a particular friend of Sir Walter’s, and had been very active in planning, and procuring articles of antiquity and old furniture for the embellishment of Abbotsford. The circumstance appeared to have made a strong impression on Sir Walter’s mind. But I think I could show—as I certainly believe—that the death of Mr. Bullock, at the time when Sir Walter and Lady Scott fancied they heard noises, was merely a coincidence.

A near and dear relative of my own, a manufacturer, whose dwelling-house adjoined the factory, was so successful in business, that his wife, according to the superstition of the period, thought he was assisted by fairies during the night! The excellent lady and her maid servants from hearing the sound of the machinery all day, thought they heard the “good people” making the same noise in the night; and, as I was told, they more than once went slyly and softly to the factory-door, which they opened with the greatest caution, in order to gratify that laudable curiosity, falsely attributed to the fair sex!—they longed to see the little folks whom they heard so well, but the moment they peeped in, that instant the fairies ceased! The accuracy of the eye, exactly as in the case of Scott, destroyed the deception of the ear!

But Sir Walter’s eye, in consequence probably of irregularity of the stomach, was sometimes more at fault than his ear. Once, while crossing the hall at Abbotsford, he believed he saw Lord Byron standing before him, but the imaginary form soon faded into a plaid cloak hanging on a screen. At another time, on his way to Abbotsford, he supposed he saw a shepherd in his plaid, standing on the moor a short distance from the road, but the man vanished as soon as Scott came opposite to him, but reappeared after he had passed a little way. Sir Walter turned his horse to ride up to the man, who again vanished, into a pit as he supposed, but on searching for it, he found it was merely an optical delusion, the ground was all smooth and firm.

It is now high time I should enter the Confessional, and render to the reader—if he or she have followed me so far—my account—detailing the mystery of the “dead candle,” and sundry other marvels contained in this article.

Imprimis, then. Of the annoyances to which the family of Mr. Wesley were subjected, I have little further to add. The story must stand or fall on the degree of credibility attached to the witnesses, but, as Doctor Southey says, it is better authenticated than any similar story on record.

In reading the letters written from Egypt, by the sister of Mr. Lane, author of the Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians, she details a series of annoyances to which she and her brother’s family were subjected, in a house at Cairo, supposed to be haunted by an ’Efreet, or evil spirit, in consequence of a murder having been committed in it.

Some of the events closely resemble those which befel the family at Epsworth parsonage, consisting of knockings, and other annoyances, at all hours of the night, which eluded investigation; none of the native maid servants would remain in the house over a week, and although it was in every respect a delightful and most desirable residence, Mr. Lane and his sister were reluctantly compelled to abandon it.

My own detection of the “dead candle” arose in this way. On the third night of its appearance, the beam of light was as clearly defined to my sight as it had been on the two preceding nights, but it was now passing across the bed clothes more quickly, and was accompanied by a faint rustle, and that sound flashed the truth upon my mind in a moment. It was my own sister crossing the hall, and the ray of light from her live candle shining through the key-hole of the door!

I had formed a boyish admiration for the young lady who was ill, and apprehension for her fate, and thoughts of her, kept me much longer awake than usual. On the two first nights my sister crossed the hall slowly and noiselessly, in order that she might not disturb the dying sufferer, but now that the sad catastrophe was over, she moved quicker, and I could hear her!

The ANGEL—whose radiant effulgence had excited such fearful emotion in the mind of Henry Fuseli, was neither more nor less than the white dress of an Italian lady, which his hostess, not expecting his return from Frascati before the following day, had hung up on a cord stretched across the room, to dry, and its slow floating movements were occasioned by the air from the window, which was left open to facilitate the drying.

Fatigued by his long walk, he undressed the moment he gained his own apartment, and retired to rest without observing the signora’s robe, or that the window was open. The moon had risen whilst he was asleep, and was faintly shining on the white drapery when he awoke, and the effect, to an imaginative mind like his, gave it the appearance of animation.

The whole story, as related by him, was glorious—but who could relate a ghost story, or any story, like Fuseli? His choice and powerful language, and his acting of the scene, were inimitable. He was equally successful in any comic story, although in a dryer way; even his description of the manner in which the present Lady Jersey catches a flea! was irresistible. What action, what emphasis, what a look. You could have almost sworn you saw the indignant flash of her ladyship’s bold, brazen eye, and her long nose, when she discovered the little blood-sucker upon her cream-colored skin. The recollection of it is so perfect at this moment that I cannot resist a laugh as I write; but the manner of the thing I must defer until I give my Reminiscences of Harry Fuseli, in which I shall try to detail some of his literary combats at the table of Joseph Johnson, where he vanquished the great Porson, with his, Porson’s, own chosen weapon, Greek.

But his angelic ghost story was absolutely terrific; after having worked one up to the highest pitch of excitement, the denouement came so entirely unexpected. With a low, sepulchral tone, he would say, “I was mad with apprehension; and in an agony which I could not repress, I sprung up like a maniac, clutched the apparition in my arms, and came down like a dog, and broke both my shins on a d—d chair!—instead of an angel, I grasped a white gown, perhaps smock, of some Italian trollop.”

The invisible and mysterious personage who had, as I supposed, so pertinaciously haunted the door of my chambers, was a large, heavy man, employed as a porter in a shop near Temple Bar. His wife was a respectable laundress, who, unknown to me, occupied the basement of the house. The entrance hall was rather dark, and as I had just taken possession, I had not observed a narrow passage which, by proceeding a few steps beyond the foot of the stairs leading up, led to a staircase going down, having exactly the same number of steps, and, in consequence of the whole staircase from bottom to top being a species of conductor, the sound of footsteps going down was conveyed up so perfectly, that to any one sitting in my rooms it was impossible for the nicest ear to tell, whether the person was coming up or going down; and the floor of the basement being of brick, the sound was lost the moment it was trodden on.

I was perfectly dumb-foundered when I saw the big fellow pass quietly by me without taking the least notice; and I felt a mighty inclination for a fight, in consequence of his having so cruelly disappointed and mocked my determined belief in a ghost. But, like Mr. Van Buren, “sober second thought,” induced me to retrace my steps, and walk quietly up stairs, somewhat like a president walking down, when he is unexpectedly turned to the right-about. My Andrea Ferrara was hung upon its peg, from which it was never afterward removed, during all the unhappy years I afterwards passed as a Templar in those old-fashioned rooms. What reminiscences do they not now revive?

The vexatious annoyances to which my friend, Mr. Crofton, was so long subjected, arose from an admirably concocted scheme of female waggery, in which a youth bore a principal part; but to render its details intelligible, it is, as formerly hinted, necessary to digress a little into history.

In the year 1794, during the frenzy excited by the French Revolution, when every throne in Europe was shaken to its centre, a society was formed in London for the pretended reform, although it was in fact for the overthrow of the English Government.

It was called the London Corresponding Society for Constitutional Reform, and it was in secret correspondence with Robespierre, and other monsters of that terrible tribunal which never spared, until it had deluged France with the blood of 1,022,351 of its best citizens. Start not, reader, in doubt, there is no mistake in the figures—ONE MILLION, TWENTY-TWO THOUSAND, THREE HUNDRED AND FIFTY-ONE victims, male and female, adults and children, perished under the axe of the accursed guillotine, or other wholesale murders, perpetrated during the Reign of Terror.

May its bloody horrors be a lesson and A WARNING to nations, in all future time, to beware or the perils attending MOB LAW!

The London Corresponding Society was headed by Hardy, Horne Tooke, Thelwall, and other turbulent spirits of the time. But by the firmness of the Prime Minister, William Pitt, son of the Earl of Chatham, the leaders were apprehended in their own homes, during the night, and tried for high treason. But the society, although with greater privacy, still held its sittings, and in order to defeat the government police, one of its agents hired two houses adjoining each other, where, with extraordinary care and secrecy, a secret passage was constructed between the two, by means of closets, so artfully contrived, that at a moment’s warning the members could escape with their papers from one house to the other, and elude the chance of capture.

In the room where the traitors met, the back of the closet was built up of bricks, resting on strong shelves, which were fixed to a door of strong plank. This door, with its shelves and brick back, swung on well oiled pivots. The bricks were whitewashed, and were firmly attached to the shelves, which were furnished with China and crockery, coated with fine dust, to make it appear, on looking into the closet, as if it had not been opened for a long time.

The closet in the adjoining house, resembled it exactly, except in the arrangement of its contents. The back or swing door, on that side next to the committee-room, had strong secret bolts, which kept all firm in its place.

The two houses had passed into the occupation of different persons, years after the society ceased to exist, without the secret of the “corresponding” closets having been divulged; but at the time when Mr. Crofton occupied his apartment, the servants of the adjoining house had discovered the secret of the bolts and swing door, in consequence of a brick coming loose, in driving a nail, and with that amiable curiosity generally attributed to the fair sex, and probably from envy of her beauty, and of hearing some compliments paid to Marianne’s graceful figure, they determined on the species of pantomime which they so successfully put in practice, being mainly aided in it by a youth of great inventive genius, and a very dare-devil at mischief.

The disarrangement of the books, papers, pens and ink, with suppressed mutterings, groans, weepings and wailings, can therefore be easily understood.

The movement of the table was effected by means of a long piece of string, of the color of the carpet, which the young genius first passed round one of the table-casters, then around the foot of the bed, and the two ends of the string brought through the closet under the door, by pulling either one end or the other, he could withdraw or advance the table at pleasure; when the manœuvre was complete, he let go one end, and, in nautical phrase, “hauled in the slack.” The withdrawing of the cord was what Mr. Crofton took for a mouse.

The goat was obtained from the stable-yard of the George and Blue Boar, a well-known Inn on the other side of Holborn, in the immediate neighborhood; and the dog was one which the lad had enticed from the street. Being perfectly cognizant of every thing said or done in Mr. Crofton’s apartment, they overheard the conversation about the pistols and poker, and found it necessary to be rather cautious. They were perfectly aware of Mr. Crofton’s out-goings and in-comings, and during his absence, the charges were withdrawn from his pistols, and plugs of lead, covered with cotton, introduced, and firmly rammed down. When the girl stealthily opened the closet door, she was not aware Mr. Crofton was at home, and the appearance of her head on the shelf, in the act of reconnoitering, led to the detection and exposure of the whole thing; for the landlord was so exasperated, he had them all up before the police. Ample apology, however, was made, and the joke, from its ingenuity, forgiven. But the party-walls of both houses were restored to their original condition, putting an effectual stop to all further correspondence, or tricks, upon Mr. Crofton; but I believe it may have been this very extraordinary affair, that induced him to write one of his most popular works; and I only wonder he was never induced to work up the details of the mystery (which I have so imperfectly attempted) into a tale, or drama, of exciting interest. With reference to my chambers in the Temple, when I spoke of the unhappy years I had passed in them, I alluded to the contrast which they presented to the felicity which a married life soon afterward conferred on —

An Unbeliever in Spectral or Supernatural Appearances.