Note 205.1 — RITUAL AND BELIEF

Sir Walter Scott’s novel, The Pirate, was based on the deeds and capture of one John Gow. This man was taken prisoner in the Orkney Islands and afterwards tried before the High Court of Admiralty in London, condemned for piracy and executed. Before his capture he had become affianced to an Orcadian girl. “It is said,” writes Sir Walter in the advertisement prefixed to the book, “that the lady whose affections Gow had engaged went up to London to see him before his death, and that, arriving too late, she had the courage to request a sight of his dead body; and then, touching the hand of the corpse, she formally resumed the troth-plight which she had bestowed. Without going through this ceremony she could not, according to the superstition of the country, have escaped a visit from the ghost of her departed lover, in the event of her bestowing upon any living suitor the faith which she had plighted to the dead.”205.1 In the Orkney Islands these superstitions were then vivid. If we may judge by a phrase in the record of a witch-trial at Kirkwall, it was the belief in the early part of the seventeenth century that a man slain at the going down of the sun remained neither living nor dead, but was capable of sexual intercourse with any woman who would yield herself to him; in return for which he gave “a guidly fe,” in the shape of second sight and power of divining the future.205.2 A circumstantial and horrible account of a series of occurrences of the same period in Iceland is given by contemporary authorities. A man of position named Ivar Eyjulfsson was wedded to Herdis, daughter of Sera Magnus Jonsson of Ottrardal. They lived at Reykjarfjörd on affectionate terms; and the husband often prayed his wife in case of his death not to marry again, or something untoward would happen. In the year 1604, despite foreboding dreams during the whole of the previous winter, he went to sea with four companions. On taking leave of his wife and father-in-law as if he never expected to see them again, he reiterated his injunctions to her to remain single. A quarrel arose at sea between Ivar and one of his companions named Jon; the boat foundered, and Ivar, Jon, and another of the crew were drowned. The bodies came to shore at Langardal, and were buried in the churchyard there. On digging the grave an older grave, lying in heathen fashion north and south, was found; and just where the breast of the corpse lay was a great stone, and beside it an iron arrowhead. This incident seems to have been regarded as having some connection with the spooks which were subsequently manifested. Whatever that connection may have been, it speedily began to be noised abroad that Ivar and Jon “walked,” and that their quarrel was far from being ended with their death. After a year or two of widowhood Herdis was courted by an honourable man, one Sturla Gottskalksson, and on her father’s advice consented to marry him. Already, however, she had been suffering from an ulcer on the foot; and after she had given her consent to Sturla it became worse. Nor was this all. One night her first husband came to her bed and had intercourse with her. Another night she struggled with him, seizing the coverlet with her teeth to protect herself from him. One disaster followed another. A black blister on her tongue burst and sloughed away half of that member. In spite of all, the formal betrothal took place; but it was followed by such an exhibition of ghostly fury that even Sturla wished to withdraw, and only Sera Magnus’ firmness in insisting on the wedding prevented the engagement from being broken off. When the wedding was solemnized, no sooner had the vows been spoken in the church than Herdis uttered a piercing cry, and those of the company who, being Sunday-born children, had the gift of seeing spirits beheld Ivar’s ghost approach her. Such was the horror and confusion that the ceremony had to be cut short, and the newly wedded pair left the church without the customary prayer and blessing. The persecution was repeated every time that Sturla attempted to consummate the marriage, until even ordinary folk who were not ghost-seers saw how the ghost waylaid the unfortunate Herdis. Recourse was had to a renowned practitioner of supernatural arts, who by his incantations succeeded in making things somewhat quieter in the house; but after awhile matters were as bad as ever, and his spells ceased to be effective. Sometimes Ivar appeared alone, sometimes with Jon, and then both were usually in fierce contest. If the word of God were read they slunk out of the house; as soon as the reading was over they returned. Herdis was again subjected to the dead man’s assaults; and the magician could only protect her by setting on her lap a woman holding upright a naked blade of steel. At length the ghost attacked the magician himself, and, blowing in his mouth, caused him a frightful ulcer in the neck; so that he was compelled to leave the place, declaring that he could not cope with all the devils that followed Ivar’s ghost. Herdis sought refuge in a chapel, but in vain. She returned home, therefore; and shortly after, on a Sunday morning, a loud crash was heard; her bed had broken down, and two of its timbers had fallen to the ground. That was the culmination of the ghostly persecution. The unhappy woman breathed her last. The magician said, when he heard of it, that the ghost had strangled her. Then he did what, by all the rules of the ghostlayer’s art, he ought to have done before. Venturing back to Sturla’s house, he ordered Ivar’s grave to be opened. Ivar’s body and that of Jon were found undecayed, but right evil to look upon. They were disinterred and burnt, and with that all manifestations came to an end.208.1