LIBRARY OF

WELLES LEY COLLEGE

FROM THE FUND OF ELIZABETH W. MANWARING

THE HAUNTED HOMES

AND FAMILY TRADITIONS OF GREAT BRITAIN

CUMXOR HALL.

THE

HAUNTED HOMES

AND FAMILY TRADITIONS OF GREAT BRITAIN

BY

JOHN H. INGRAM

ILLUSTRATED EDITION

LONDON GIBBINGS & COMPANY, LIMITED

18 BURY STREET, W.C.

1897 [All rights reserved}

l^tTo^n

w-^

RP

PBEFACE.

This collection of strange stories and weird traditions has not been compiled with a view of creating un frisson nouveau, bnt to serve as a guide to the geography of Ghostland — a handbook to the Haunted Houses of Great Britain. Many historic tales of apparitions and supernaturally disturbed dwellings are imbedded in British literature ; are frequently alluded to in journalistic and other publications, and are known to everybody by name, but by name only. Most people have heard of "The Demon of Tedworth," "The Lord Lyttleton Ghost Story/' and other celebrated narratives of the uncanny kind, but it is rare to find anyone able to furnish particulars of them : to enable them to do this is the raison d'etre of this work.

The number of dwellings reputed to be haunted is much greater than is commonly supposed ; and

VI PEE FACE.

although steam-engines and speculative builders are rapidly diminishing these lingering relics of the past, Dr. Mackay's words, in his Extraordinary Popular Delusions, anent this theme, are still applicable : — " Who has not either seen or heard of some house, shut up and uninhabitable, fallen into decay, and looking dusty and dreary, whence, at midnight, strange sounds have been heard to issue — the rattling of chains, and the groaning of perturbed spirits ? — a house that people have thought it unsafe to pass after dark, and which has remained for years without a tenant, and which no tenant would occupy even were he paid to do so ? There are hundreds of such houses in England at the present day .... which are marked with the mark of fear — places for the timid to avoid, and the pious to bless themselves at, and ask protection from, as they pass — the abodes of ghosts and evil spirits. There are many such houses in London; and if any vain boaster of the march of intellect would but take the trouble to find them out and count them, he would be convinced that intellect must yet make some enormous strides before such old superstitions can be eradicated."

Although Dr. Mackay may not have exaggerated the number of places having the discredit of being

PKEFACE. Vll

haunted, particulars of the manner of the haunting are generally difficult to obtain : nearly every ancient castle, or time-worn hall, bears the reputation of being thus troubled, but in a very large majority of such cases no evidence is forthcoming — not even the ghost of a tradition ! Guide-books, topographical works, even the loquacious custodian —where there is one — of the building, fail to furnish any details ; were it otherwise, instead of one modest volume a many-tomed cyclopedia would be necessary.

To mention here separately the many sources whence the information contained in this compilation has been drawn would be impossible, and as in most instances the authority for each story has been specified under its respective heading, would be needless ; but still thanks are due and are hereby tendered to those authors whose books have been made use of, and to those noblemen and gentlemen who have aided the work by their friendly information.

In conclusion, it should be remarked that autnors and correspondents having, as far as possible, been allowed to tell their tales after their own fashion, the editor does not hold himself responsible for their opinions. Had he ever entertained any belief what- ever in supernatural manifestations — as evidently many

Vlll PREFACE.

of his authorities do — the compilation of this work would have effectually cured him of such mental weak- ness; but, it must be added, no story has been included the incidents of which have been proved to have been the result of palpable deception, or for which any natural explanation has been found. Trusting that his psychomanteum will exercise no worse effect upon his readers than it has had upon its compiler, he leaves it to their judgment.

JOHN H. INGRAM.

CONTENTS.

		PAGE			PAGE
AJJanbank	.	1	Cheshunt -	m •	37
vAlthirp	-	- 323	Clegg Hall	-	402
t-Ashley Hull		- 326	Combermere Abbey	-	406
Bagley House -	-	- 334	Corby Castle	-	43
Bair Hall	-	4	vCortachy Castle	-	51
Barby	-	6	Creslow Manor House	56
Beaminster School	-	- 10	Cumnor Hall	-	409
* Berry Pomeroy Castle	- 336	* Daintree -	-	59
Bettiscombe House	-	- 341	De Burgh Castle	-	413
Birchen Bower	-	- 345	V-Denton Hall	-	414
Bisham Abbey	-	- 13	Dobb Park Lodge	-	427
Blackadon	-	- 352	Dosmery Pool -	-	433
Black Heddon -	-	- 355	Dunfermline	-	61
Blenkinsopp Castle	-	- 360	Edge Hill -	-	65
Bognor	-	- 367	Edinburgh —
Boiling Hall	-	- 375	^ Canongate	-	70
Botathen -	-	- 15	Gillespie Hospital	-	72
Bowood	-	- 20	Mary King's Close	-	438
Bristol — the Vicar a	ge	22	Trinity -	-	74
Brundon Hall -		- 378	Eastbury House	-	441
Burton Agnes Hall	-	- 380	Enfield Chace -	-	76
^ Calgarth -	-	- 392	-'Epsom — Pitt Place	-	79
V Calverley Hall -	-	- 394	1 Epworth Parsonage	-	82
Cambridge	-	- 24	Esher	-	94
Cambridge University	- 29	Eton -	-	95
Canterbury	-	- 32	Ewshott House -	-	446
Cawood Castle -	-	- 33	* Glamis Castle -	-	98
Chartley Park -	.	- 401	^Glamis Castle -	-	459
Ched worth	m	- 36	" Glasgow (« The Hell Club "	) 101

J.W			PAGE	rji> id.			PAGE
Grayrigg Hall -	-	-	105	Peele Castle	.	-	190
Guildford Grammar	School	473	Perth	•	-	528
Hackwood House	-	-	108	Plymouth -	■	-	192
Hampton Court	-	-	475	Portsmouth	m	.	530
Hand, The Dead (yi	de Ince		Powis Castle	_	-	195
Hall) -	-	-	504	Rainham -	-	-	202
Hanley	-	-	111	Ramhurst Manor House	.	204
Heanor	-	-	113	Rochester -	-	.	212
Heath Old Hall -	-	-	477	Roslin Chapel -	«	-	541
Hereford -	-	-	119	Rushen Castle -	.	.	216
Henhow Cottage	-	-	121	Samlesbury Hall	-	-	544
Hilton Castle	-	-	122	Sampford Peverell	-	-	548
A^ Hinton Ampner Manor H<	mse 481	Sarratt	.	_	219
Holland House -	-	-	126	Scorrier House -	-	.	224
' InceHall -	-	-	502	Settle	_	_	228
Jedburgh Castle	-	-	506	Skipsea Castle -	-	-	555
Lambton Castle	-	-	129	VSmithills Hall -	-	-	5G1
Littlecot House -	-	.	134	Souldern Rectory	.	-	230
London —			1	l^Souter Fell	-	.	568
Argyle Rooms	-	-	138	Spedlin's Tower	-	-	234
Broad Street -	-	-	140	Strachur Manse	-	.	236
Brook Street -	-	-	509	Swinst}'- Hall	-	-	571
James Street, W.C.	-	145	Sykes Lumb Farm	-	-	574
St. James's Palace	.	146	Taunton -	.	_	239
St. James Street	-	-	150	Tedworth -	-	_	242
Southampton Fields	-	514	Tregeagle (vide Dosmerv
* The Hammums	-	-	512	Pool) -	-	-	433
The Tower -	-	-	152	Truro	-	-	252
Lostock Tower -	-	-	517	Tunstead Farm	.	.	579
Lowther Hall -	-	-	156	Ullswater -	m	.	581
Lumley	-	-	158	Waddow Hall -	-	.	585
Mannington Hall	-	-	161	Waltham -	-	-	254
Milford Haven -	-	-	166	Warblington Parsonage	-	256
Montgomery	-	-	520	Wardley Hall -	-	-	602
Nannau	-	-	172	Watton Abbey -	-	-	588
Newstead Abbey	-	-	176	Westminster	-	.	262
North Shields — Stevenson		Westminster — King	Street	264
Street -	-	-	180	Willington Mill -	-	.	266
Okehampton	-	-	526	Windsor Castle - Woodhouselee -	-	-	277
Ottery . -	-	-	183	-	-	285
Oulton High House	-	-	186	Wyecoller Hall -	-	-	600
Oxford University-	-Queen's		Yorkshire. Hall	-	287
College -	-	-	188

CONTENTS.

XI

APPENDIX TO FIEST SEEIES.

Lord Brougham The Rev. T. A. Buckley Caisho Burroughs X John Donne

PAGE

295 297 299 301

"oir John Sherbrooke General Wynyard - The Luminous Woman The Result of a Curse

and

PAGE

304 310 315

APPENDIX TO SECOND SERIES.

^Bath	PAGE		PAGE
- 609	Newark	631
Bowland -	- 612	"Wadebridge -	632
Clifton Park -	- 615	Captain Blomberg's Appari-
/ Edinburgh	- 617	tion	637
Edinburgh Castle	- 622	Smellie and Greenlaw	640
Glenshiray	- 624

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

Cumnor Hall Bisham Abbey Corby Castle Glamis Castle Hackwood House - Hilton Castle Lambton Castle - Lowther Hall New stead Abbey - Peele Castle Powis Castle Rushen Castle Sbedlin's Tower - Berry Pomeroy Castle Bolling Hall Ince Hall - Roslin Chapel

Frontispiece
''oface	p. 13
JJ	43
JJ	98
JJ	108
JJ	122
JJ	129
JJ	156
JJ	176
5}	190
JJ	195
JJ	216
JJ	234
JJ	336
JJ	375
J5	502
»J	541

THE HAUNTED HOMES

AND

FAMILY TRADITIONS OF GREAT BRITAIN,

ALLANBANK.

In North Britain haunted castles, and hereditary ap- paritions, appear to have lingered more persistently and to have had longer leases of existence, than they have had in the less romanticallv inclined southern portion of the island. One of the roost noted Scotch spirits attendant upon a certain family is that known as " Pearlin Jean," so called from a species of lace made of thread with which this spectre is bedecked. "Pearlin Jean's " continuous and demonstrative annoy- ances at Allanbank — a seat of the Stuarts, a family of Scotch baronets — are so thoroughly believed in and widely known, that it has been found difficult to obtain a tern nt for the place.

1

2 HAUNTED HOMES.

Mr. Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, the antiquary, has furnished the following explanatory account of Pearlin Jean's hauntings at Allanbank, together with the cause of her doing so.

" In my youth," says Mr. Sharpe, " Pearlin Jean was the most remarkable ghost in Scotland, and my terror when a child. Our old nurse, Jenny Blackadder, had been a servant at Allanbank, and often heard her rustling in silks up and down stairs, and along the passages. She never saw her ; but her husband did.

" She was a French woman, whom the first baronet of Allanbank,* then Mr. Stuart, met with at Paris, during his tour to finish his education as a gentleman. Some people said she was a nun ; in which case she must have been a sister of Charity, as she appears not to have been confined to a cloister. After some time, young Stuart either became faithless to the lady or was suddenly recalled to Scotland by his parents, and had got into his carriage at the door of the hotel, when his Dido unexpectedly made her appearance, and stepping on the fore-wheel of the coach to address her lover, he ordered the postilion to drive on ; the consequence of which was that the lady fell, and one of the wheels going over her forehead, killed her.

"In a dusky autumnal evening, when Mr. Stuart drove under the arched gateway of Allanbank, he per- ceived Pearlin Jean sitting on the top, her head and shoulders covered with blood.

* Sir "Robert Stuart was created a baronet in the year 1C37.

ALLANBANK. 3

«

After this, for many years, the house was haunted; doors shut and opened with great noise at midnight* the rustling of silks and pattering of high-heeled shoes were heard in bed-rooms and passages. Nurse Jenny said there were seven ministers called in together at one time to lay the spirit ; ' but they did no mickle good, my dear.'

" The picture of the ghost was hung between those of her lover and his lady, and kept her comparatively quiet ; but when taken away, she became worse-natured than ever. This portrait was in the present Sir J. G.'s possession. I am unwilling to record its fate.

" The ghost was designated Pearlin, from always wearing a great quantity of that sort of lace.

"Nurse Jenny told me that when Thomas Blackadder was her lover (I remember Thomas very well), they made an assignation to meet one moonlight night in the orchard at Allanbank. True Thomas, of course, was the first comer ; and seeing a female figure in a light-coloured dress, at some distance, he ran forward with open arms to embrace his Jenny ; when lo, and behold ! as he neared the spot where the figure stood, it vanished ; and presently he saw it again at the very end of the orchard, a considerable way off. Thomas went home in a fright ; but Jenny, who came last, and saw nothing, forgave him, and they were married.

" Many years after this, about the year 1790, two ladies paid a visit at Allanbank — I think the house was then let — and passed the night there. They had never heard a word about the ghost ; but they were disturbed

4 HAUNTED HOMES.

the whole night with something walking backwards and forwards in their bed-chamber. This I had from the best authority."

To this account may be added that a housekeeper, called Betty Norrie, who, in more recent times, lived many years at Allanbank, positively averred that she, and many other persons, had frequently seen Pearlin Jean ; and, moreover, stated that they were so used to her as to be no longer alarmed at the noises she made.

BAIR HALL.

The communicator of the story hereafter detailed was described in Notes and Queries as a well-informed young lady, and as one who firmly believed what she stated. Moreover, it was further remarked that, pre- vious to her seeing the apparition she tells of, she had heard nothing whatever of any story or legend that could have put it into her mind or have caused her to dream of it ; whilst the corroborative evidence of her hostess and her household, would put all idea of a dream or hallucination out of the question. In conse- quence of the correspondence this story called forth, a contributor to Notes and Queries made it fairly evident that the "Bair Hall" visited by the narrator was identical with Torisholme Hall, the property of J. Lodge of Bare, in the county of Lancashire, Esquire.

BAIR HALL.

it

n

A short time ago," states the reiater of this story, 1 went "with a friend to pay a visit to a family in the neighbourhood of Lancaster. We were very cordially received at Bair Hall by the hostess, who assigned to our use a spacious bed-room with old-fashioned furni- ture, and we noticed particularly an old press. My companion and myself retired to bed, and enjoyed a good night's rest. I happened to awaken at about five o'clock, it being a bright summer's morning, broad daylight, and, to my great surprise, saw distinctly within a few feet of the old-fashioned bed, an old gentleman seated in an arm-chair, earnestly gazing at me with a pleasant expression of countenance. I was not alarmed, but surprised, as I had locked the door when I went to bed, and, considering it a mental delusion, I closed my eyes for a moment and looked again ; in the interval the old gentleman had moved his chair, and placed its back against the chamber door ; he was seated in it as before, and gazed at me with rather an amused ex- pression. I turned round to look at my companion ; she was fast asleep. I immediately awoke her, and requested her to look across the room at the door. She could see nothing, neither could I ; the old gentle- man had gone. When I told her what I had seen, she got out uf bed in haste ; we both quitted the room in great alarm, and went to the bed-room of our hostess, who admitted us, and there we remained until it was time to dress.

" The lady asked us if we had opened the old press wardrobe; it appeared we had. * Oh ! ' said she, 'it

6 HAUNTED HOMES.

is only James Bair, my uncle (or great-uncle) ; he does not like anyone but myself to examine his ancient clothes, or interfere with his press. He frequently joins me in the house, and some of the other members of the family also, but they don't like him. With me he often converses/

" I found," concludes the narrator, who does not appear to have had any further encounter with James Bair's apparition, " if any of the roems or closets were locked at night they were found open in the morning, and our hostess thought nothing of it."

BARBY.

Dr Lee, in his work on Glimpses of the Supernatural, furnishes a curious account of the discovery of hidden treasure by the agency of an apparition. He does not appear to entertain the slightest doubts as to the cor- Tectness of his information in this case, and indeed declares, as will be seen later on by the reader, that the circumstances recorded were completely verified.

The events to which Dr. Lee refers are stated to have occurred at Barby, a village of between six and seven hundred inhabitants, in the county of Northampton, situated about eight miles from Rugby, and a little more than five miles from Daventry. A house in this small village was, until recently, reputed to be haunted-

BAKBY. 7

and this in the following manner, according to the authority above referred to.

"An old woman of the name of Webb, a native of the place, and above the usual height, died on March 3rd, 1851, at 2 a.m., aged sixty-seven. Late in life she had married a man of some means, who having pre- deceased her, left her his property, so that she was in good circumstances. Her chief and notorious charac- teristic, however, was excessive penuriousness, she being remarkably miserly in her habits; and it is believed by manv in the village that she thus shortened her days. Two of her neighbours, women of the names of Griffin and Holding, nursed her during her last illness, and her nephew, Mr. Hart, a farmer in the village, supplied her temporal needs ; in whose favour she had made a will, by which she bequeathed to him all her pos- sessions.

"About a month after the funeral, Mrs. Holding, who with her uncle lived next door to the house of the deceased (which had been entirely shut up since the funeral), was alarmed and astonished at hearing loud and heavy thumps against the partition wall, and espe- cially against the door of a cupboard in the room wall, while other strange noises, like the dragging of furniture about the rooms, though all the furniture had been removed, and the house was empty. These were chiefly heard about two o'clock in the morning.

"Early in the month of April a family of the name of Accleton, much needing a residence, took the deceased woman's house — the only one in the village vacant —

8 HAUKTED HOMES.

and bringing their goods and chattels, proceeded to inhabit it. The husband was often absent, but he and his wife occupied the room in which Airs. Webb had died, while their daughter, a girl of about ten years of age, slept in a small bed in the corner. Violent noises in the night were heard about two o'clock — thumps, tramps, and tremendous crashes, as if all the furniture had been collected together and then violently banged on to the floor. One night at 2 a.m. the parents were suddenly awakened by the violent screams of the child. ' Mother ! mother ! there *s a tall woman standing by my bed, a shaking her head at me ! ' The parents could see nothing, so did their best to quiet and compose the child. At four o'clock they were awakened by the child's screams, for she had seen the woman again ; in fact, she appeared to her no less than seven times on seven subsequent nights.

"Mrs. Accleton, during her husband's absence, having engaged her mother to sleep with her one night, was suddenly aroused at the same hour of two by a strange and unusual light in her room. Looking up, she saw quite plainly the spirit of Mrs. Webb, which moved towards her with a gentle appealing manner, as though it would have said ' Speak ! speak ! '

" This spectre appeared likewise to a Mrs. Rad- Dournc, a Mrs. Griffiths, and a Mrs. Holding. They assert that luminous balls of light seemed to go up and towards a trap-door in the ceiling which led to the roof of the cottage. Each person who saw it testified like- wse to hearing a low, unearthly moaning noise, ' strange

BARBY. 9

and unnatural like,' but somewhat similar in character to the moans of the woman in her death-agony.

"The subject -was of course discussed, and Mrs Accleton suggested that its appearance might not im- possibly be connected with the existence of money hoarded up in the roof— an idea which may have arisen from the miserly habits of the dead woman. The hint having been given to and taken by her nephew, Mr. Hart, the farmer, he proceeded to the house, ami witli Mrs. Accleton's personal help, made a search. The loft above was totally dark, but by the aid of a candle there was discovered, firstly, a bundle of old writings, old deeds, as they turned out to be, and afterwards a large bag of gold and bank-notes, out of which the nephew took a handful of sovereigns and exhibited them to Mrs. Accleton. But the knockings, moanings, strange noises, and other disturbances, did not cease upon this discovery. They did cease, however, when Mr. Hart, having found that certain debts were owing bv her, carefully and scrupulously paid them. So much for the account of the haunted house at Barby."

The circumstances detailed were most carefully in- vestigated by Sir Charles Isham and other gentlemen in the neighbourhood, and the conclusion they arrived at was that the above facts were completely verified by the evidence laid before them.

10 HAUNTED HOMES.

BEAMINSTER SCHOOL.

In 1774 the Gentleman's Magazine printed the follow- ing narrative, prefacing it with these words : " The following very singular story eomes well authenticated." In many respects the story may be deemed unique in the history of the supernatural. The apparition appears m broad daylight, and is seen by five children, one of whom did not even know the individual it represented when alive, and yet proved its identity by a wonderful piece of circumstantial evidence. The intense pathos of the unfortunate and evidently -murdered lad, re- appearing amid the scenes of his childish occupations, and where he had been wont to play with those bovs who now could only look upon him as a passing shadow, is most suggestive.

The school of Beminster (Beaminster), says the account, is held in a gallery of the parish church to which there is a distinct entrance from the churchyard. Every Saturday the key of it is delivered to the clerk of the parish by one or the other of the schoolboys. On Saturday, June the 22nd, 1728, the master had dismissed his lads as usual. Twelve of them loitered about in the churchyard to play at ball. It was just about noon. After a short space, four of the lads returned into the school to search for old pens, and were startled bv hearing in the church a noise which they described as that produced by striking a brass pan. They immediately ran to their playfellows in the church-

BEAMINSTEE SCHOOL. 11

yard and told them of it. They came to the conclusion that someone was in hiding in order to frighten them, and they all went back into the school together to discover who it was, but could not find anyone. As they were returning to their sport, on the stairs that lead into the churchyard, they heard in the school a second noise. Terrified at that, they ran round the church, and when at the belfry, or west door, they heard what seemed to them the sound of someone preaching, which was succeeded by another sound as of a congregation singing psalms. Both of these noises lasted but a short time.

With the thoughtlessness of youth the lads soon resumed their sport, and after a short time one of them went into the school for his book, when he saw a coffin lying on one of the benches, only about six feet away. Surprised at this, he ran off and told his playfellows what he had seen, on which they all thronged to the school- door, whence^/z^ of the twelve saw the appari- tion of John Daniel, who had been dead more than seven weeks, sitting at some distance from the coffin, further in the school. All of them saw the coffin, and it was conjectured that why all did not see the apparition was because the door was so narrow they could not all approach it together. The first who knew it to be the apparition of their deceased schoolfellow was Daniel's half-brother, and he, on seeing it, cried out, " There sits our John, with just such a coat on as I have " — (in the lifetime of the deceased boy the half-brothers were usually clothed alike)^ — " with a pen in his hand,

12 HAUNTED HOMES.

and a book before him, and a coffin by him. I '11 throw a stone at him." The other boys tried to stop him, but he threw the stone, as he did so saying, " Take it ! " upon which the apparition immediately disappeared.

The immense excitement this created in the place may be imagined. The lads, whose ages ranged between nine and twelve, were all magisterially examined by Colonel Broadrep, and all agreed in their relation of the circumstances, even to the hinges of the coffin ; whilst their description of the coffin tallied exactly with that the deceased lad had been buried in. One of the lads who saw the apparition was quite twelve years of age, and was a quiet sedate lad for his age ; he entered the school after the deceased boy had left it (on account of illness about a fortnight before his death), and had never seen Daniel in his life-time. This lad, on exami- nation, gave an exact description of the person of the deceased, and took especial notice of one thing about the apparition which the other boys had not observed, and that was, it had a white cloth or rag bound round one of its hands. The woman who laid out the corpse of John Daniel for interment deposed on oath that she took such a white cloth from its hand, it having been put on the boy's hand (he being lame of it) about four days or so before his death.

Daniel's body had been found in an obscure place in a field, at about a furlong distant from his mother's house, and had been buried without an inquest, in consequence of his mother alleging that the lad had been subject to fits. After the appearance of the

BISHAM ABBEY 13

apparition the body was disinterred, a coroner's inquest held, and a verdict returned to the effect that the boy had been " strangled." This verdict appears to have been mainly arrived at in consequence of the depositions of two women " of good repute " that two days after the corpse was found they saw it, and discovered a " black list " round its neck ; and likewise of the joiner who put the body into the coffin, and who had an opportunity of observing it, as the shroud was not put on in the usual way, but was in two pieces, one laid under and the other over the body. A " chirurgeon " who gave evidence could not or would not positively affirm to the jury that there was any dislocation of the neck. So far as can be learnt, no steps were taken to bring anyone to justice on account of the suggested death bv violence ot the lad.

BISHAM ABBEY.

Bisham Abbey, in Berkshire, was formerly the familv seat of the Hobbys, and about the first half of the sixteenth century was in possession of Sir Thomas Hobby, or Hoby, a man of no slight reputation for learning in those days. He married Elizabeth, the third daughter of Sir Anthony Cooke, who shared the general fame of her family for intellectual qualifications. When Sir Thomas went to France as ambassador for

14 HAUNTED HOMES.

Queen Elizabeth his wife accompanied him, and on hia death abroad in 1566 Lady Hoby brought his body home and had it interred in a mortuary chapel at Bisham. Subsequently she married John, Lord Russell.

By her first husband the Lady Hoby is said to have had a son who, when quite young, displayed the most intense antipathy to every kind of study ; and such was his repugnance to writing, that in his fits of obstinacy he would wilfully and deliberately blot his writing-books. This conduct enraged his mother, whose whole family were noted for their scholastic attainments, and who, like her three sisters, Lady Burleigh, Lady Bacon, and Lady Killigrew, was not only an excellent classical scholar, but was also married to a man of literary note, that she chastised the unfortunate lad with all the violence at that period permitted to, and practised by, parents on their children. She beat him, according to the old legend, again and again on the shoulders and head, and at last so severely and unmer- cifully that he died.

It is commonly reported that, as a punishment for her unnatural cruelty, her spirit is doomed to haunt Bisham Abbey, the house where this cruel act of man- slaughter was perpetrated. Several persons have seen the apparition, the likeness of which, both as regards feature and dress, to a pale portrait of her ladyship in antique widow's weeds still remaining at Bisham, is said to be exact and life-like. She is reported to glide through a certain chamber, in the act of washing blood- stains from her hands, and on some occasions her

BOTATHEN. 1 5

apparition is said to have been seen in the grounds of the old mansion.

A very remarkable occurrence in connection with this narrative took place some years ago, according to Dr. Lee, author of Glimpses of the Supernatural. " In taking down an old oak window-shutter of the latter part of the sixteenth century," he states that " a packet o antique copy-books of that period were discovered pushed into the wall between the joists of the skirting, and several of these books on which young Hobby s fiame was written were covered with blots, thus sup- porting the ordinary tradition."

BOTATHEN.

In the second volume of Hitchen's History of Cornwall is given in extenso a most remarkable account of an apparition that is believed to have appeared in that county. The scene of its appearance was a place called Botaden, or Botathen, in the parish of South Petherwin, near Launceston. Various authors have alluded to this marvellous, and, all things considered, inexplicable story ; but as Hitchen appears to have derived his account direct from one of the persons chiefly con- cerned— that is to say, from the Rev. John Ruddle, Head Master of the Grammar School at Launceston, Vicar of Altemon, and Prebendary of Exeter, it is better to follow him.

1G HAUNTED HOMES.

" Young Mr. Bligh," says Hitchen, " a lad of bright parts and of no common attainments, became on a sudden pensive, dejected, and melancholy. His friends, observing the change without being able to discover the cause, attributed his behaviour to laziness, an aversion to school, or to some other motive which they suspected he was ashamed to avow. He was, however, induced to inform his brother, after some time, that in a lield through which he passed to and from school " — that is to say, to and from Launceston Grammar School, ot which, as has alreadv been observed, Mr. Raddle was Head Master — "he was invariably met by the apparition of a woman, whom he personally knew while living, and who had been dead about eight years." Young Bligh is said to have been at this time about sixteen. " Ridi- cule, threats, and persuasions were alike used in vain by the family to induce him to dismiss these absurd ideas. Air. Ruddle was, however, sent for, to whom the lad ingenuously communicated the time, manner, and frequency of this appearance. It was in a field called Higher Broomfield. The apparition, he said, appeared dressed in female attire, met him two or three times while he passed through the field, glided hastily by him, but never spoke. He had thus been occasion- ally met about two months before he took any particular notice of it ; at length the appearance became more frequent, meeting him both morning and evening, but always in the same field, yet invariably moving out of the path when it came close to him. He often spoke, but could never get any reply. To avoid this unwel-

BOTATHEN. 17

come visitor he forsook the field, and went to school and returned from it through a lane, in which place, between the quarry pack and nursery, it always met him. Unable to disbelieve the evidence of his own senses, or to obtain credit with any of his family, he prevailed upon Mr. Ruddle to accompany him to the place.

" i I arose,' says this clergyman, ' the next morning, and went with him. The field to which he led me I guessed to be about twenty acres, in an open country, and about three furlongs from any house. We went into the field, and had not gone a third part before the spectrum, in the shape of a woman, with all the cir- cumstances he had described the day before, so far as the suddenness of its appearance and transition would permit me to discover, passed by.

"'I was a little surprised at it, and though I had taken up a firm resolution to speak to it, I had not the powTer, nor durst I look back ; yet I took care not to show any fear to my pupil and guide, and therefore, telling him that I was satisfied in the truth of his state- ment we walked to the end of the field and returned — nor did the ghost meet us that time but once.

" * On the 27th July, 1665, I went to the haunted field bv mvself, and walked the breadth of it without any encounter. I then returned and took the other walk, and then the spectre appeared to me, much about the same place in which I saw it when the young gentleman was with me. It appeared to move swifter than before, and seemed to be about ten feet from me

2

IS HAUNTED HOMES.

on my right hand, insomuch that I Lad not time to speak to it, as I had determined with myself beforehand. The evening of this day, the parents, the son, and myself, being in the chamber where I lay, I proposed to them our going all together to the place next morning. We accordingly met at the stile we had appointed; thence we all four walked into the field together. We had not gone more than half the field before the ghost made its appearance. It then came over the stile just before us, and moved with such rapidity that by the time we had gone six or seven steps it passed by. I immediately turned my head and ran after it, with the young man by my side. We saw it pass over the stile at which we entered, and no farther. I stepped upon the hedge at one place and the young man at another, but we could discern nothing ; whereas I do aver that the swiftes horse in England could not have conveyed himself out of sight in that short space of time. Two things I observed in this day's appearance : first, a spaniel dog, which had followed the company unregarded, barked and ran away as the spectrum passed by ; whence it is easy to conclude that it was not our fear or fancy which made the apparition. Secondly, the motion of the spectrum was not gradatim or by steps, or moving of the feet, but by a kind of gliding, as children upon ice, or as a boat down a river, which punctually answers the description the ancients give of the motion of these Lamures. This ocular evidence clearly convinced, but withal strangely affrighted, the old gentleman and his wife. They well knew this woman, Dorothy Durant, m

BOTATHEN. 19

her life-time ; were at her burial, and now plainly saw her features in this apparition.

"' The next morning, being Thursday, I went very early by myself, and walked for about an hour's space in meditation and prayer in the field next adjoining. Soon after five I stepped over the stile into the haunted field, and had not gone above thirty or forty paces before the ghost appeared at the further stile. I spoke to it in some short sentences with a loud voice ; whereupon it approached me, but slowly, and when I came near it moved not. I spoke again, and it answered in a voice neither audible nor very intelligible. I was not in the least terrified, and therefore persisted until it spoke again and gave me satisfaction ; but the work could not be finished at this time. Whereupon the same evening, an hour after sunset, it met me again near the same place, and after a few words on each side it quietly vanished, and neither doth appear now, nor hath appeared since, nor ever will more to any man's disturbance. The discourse in the morning lasted about a quarter of an hour.

" ' These things are true,' concludes the Eev. John Ruddle, ' and I know them to be so, with as much certainty as eyes and ears can give me; and until I can be persuaded that my senses all deceive me about their proper objects, and by that persuasion deprive me of the strongest inducement to believe the Christian religion, I must and will assert that the things contained in this paper are true.' " .

2 *

20 UAUKTED HOMES.

BOWOOD.

In the popular Memoirs of Mrs. Schimmelpenninck, the well-known authoress, a curious story connected with Bowood, the seat of the Marquis of Lansdowne, is related as having occurred whilst the celebrated Dr. Priestley was librarian there to Lord Shelburn.

" One day," says Mrs. Schimmelpenninck, " Mr Petty, the precocious and gifted youth, sent for Dr. Priestley (Lord Shelburn, Mr. Petty's father, being then absent, I think, in London). When the doctor entered, Mr. Petty told him he had passed a very restless night, and had been much disturbed by uncomfortable dreams, which he wished to relate to Dr. Priestley, hoping that, by so doing, the painful impression would pass away.

" He then said he dreamed he had been very unwell, when suddenly the whole household was in preparation for a journey. He was too ill to sit up, but was carried lying down in the carriage. His surprise was extreme in seeing carriage after carriage in an almost inter- minable procession. He was alone, and could not speak ; he could only gaze in astonishment. The pro- cession at last wound slowly off. After pursuing the road for many miles towards London, it at last appeared to stop at the door of a church. It was the church at High Wycombe, which is the burial-place of the Shel- burn family. It seemed, in Mr. Petty's dream, that he entered, or rather was carried into the church. He

BO WOOD. 21

looked back; he saw the procession which followed him was in black, and that the carriage from which he had been taken bore the semblance of a hearse. Here the dream ended, and he awoke.

" Dr. Priestley told him that his dream was the result of a feverish cold, and that the impression would soon pass off. Nevertheless, he thought it best to 'send for the family medical attendant. The next day Mr. Petty was much better ; on the third day he was completely convalescent, so that the doctor permitted him to leave his room ; but as it was in January, and illness was prevalent, he desired him on no account to leave the house, and, with that precaution, took his leave. Late the next afternoon the medical man was returning from his other patients ; his road lay by the gates of Bowood, and as Lord Shelburn was away, he thought he might as well call to see Mr. Petty and enforce his directions. What was his surprise, when he had passed the lodge, to see the youth himself, without his hat, playfully running to meet him ! The doctor was much astonished, as it was bitterly cold and the ground covered with snow. He rode towards Mr. Petty to rebuke him for his imprudence, when suddenly he disappeared — whither he knew not, but he seemeh instantaneously to vanish. The doctor thought it very extraordinary, but that probably the youth had not wished to be found transgressing orders, and he rode on to the house. There he learnt that Mr. Petty had just expired. "

22 HAUNTED HOMES.

THE BRISTOL VICARAGE.

In 1846 certain strange doings were reported to be going on in an ancient residence in Bristol. The papers found the matter exciting such interest that they felt bound to notice it, but did so in a half-serious, half- sarcastic spirit, as the following excerpt from the Bristol Times will show. Under the heading of " A Ghost at Bristol," the journal named made this statement: —

"We have this week a ghost story to relate. Yes, a real ghost story, and a ghost story without, as yet, any clue to its elucidation. After the dissolution of the Calendars, their ancient residence, adjoining and almost forming a part of All Saints' Church, Bristol, was converted into a vicarage-house, and it is still (in 1846) called by that name, though the incumbents have for many years ceased to reside there. The present occu- pants are Mr. and Mrs. Jones, the sexton and sextoness of the church, and one or two lodgers; and it is to the former and their servant-maid that the strange visitor has made his appearance, causing such terror by his nightly calls, that all three have determined upon quitting the premises, if indeed they have not already carried their resolution into effect. Mr. and Mrs. Jones's description of the disturbance as given to the landlord, on whom they called in great consternation, is as distinct as any ghost story could be. The noc- turnal visitor is heard walking about the house when the inhabitants are in bed ; and Mr. Jones, who is a

THE BRISTOL VICARAGE. 28

man of by no means nervous constitution, declares he has several times seen a light flickering on one of the walls. Mrs. Jones is equally certain that she has heard a man with creaking shoes walking in the bed-room above her own, when no man was on the premises (or at least ought not to be), and ' was nearly killed with the fright.' To the servant-maid, however, was vouchsafed the unenvied honour of seeing this restless night visitor; she declares she has repeatedly had her bed- room door unbolted at night, between the hours of twelve and two o'clock — the period when such beings usually make their promenades — by something in human semblance. She cannot particularise his dress, but describes it as something antique, and of a fashion 'lang syne gane,' and to some extent corresponding to that of the ancient Calendars, the former inhabitants of the house. She further says, he is ' a whiskered gentle- man' (we give her own words), which whiskered gentleman has gone the length of shaking her bed, and, she believes, would have shaken herself also, but that she invariably puts her head under the clothes when she sees him approach. Mrs. Jones declares she believes in the appearance of the whiskered gentleman, and she had made up her mind the night before she called on her landlord to leap out of the window (and it is not a trifle that will make people leap out of the windows) as soon as he entered the room. The effect of the * flickering light ' on Mr. Jones was quite terrific, causing excessive trembling, and the complete doubling up of his whole body into a round ball, like."

24> HAUNTED HOMES.

As far as can be ascertained no elucidation of this mysterious affair was ever forthcoming. Mrs. Crowe — to whose knowledge the account was brought — sub- sequently wrote to the editor of the Bristol Times, and received a reply that " the whole affair remains wrapped in the same mystery as when chronicled in the pages of" the paper, and this statement was sub- sequently confirmed by Mrs. Jones.

CAMBRIDGE.

In the narrative about to be recited, the appearance of the apparition, and the coincidence of the date of death with its appearance, differ in no way from the usual records of such thinsrs. But the wonderful series of events by which the discrepancies between the official report and the spectral visit were ultimately explained, render this story one of the most marvellous known. Tt is related by Robert Dale Owen, in his famous Footfalls, wherein he declares that although in accord- ance with the wishes of the family some of the names are merely represented by initials, they are all known to him. As, however, the name of the officer subse- quently appeared in print, we shall not be committing any breach of courtesy or of good feeling in stating that Captain German Wheatcroft is the name in full. The story taken as a whole is so truly marvellous,

CAMBRIDGE. 25

that it is deemed but just that it should be given verbatim from Owen's record, not abridging or altering a single foot-note, nor omitting aught save a spiritual episode which does not affect the general narrative. The tale runs thus : —

"In the month of September, 1857, Captain German Wheatcroft, of the 6th (Inniskilling) Dragoons, went out to India to join his regiment.

"His wife remained in England, residing at Cam- bridge. On the night between the 14th and 15th of November, 1857, towards morning, she dreamed that she saw her husband, looking anxious and ill; upon which she immediately awoke, much agitated. It was bright moonlight: and, looking up, she perceived the same figure standing by her bed-side. He appeared in his uniform, the hands pressed across the breast, the hair dishevelled, the face very pale. His large dark eyes were fixed full upon her ; their expression was that of great excitement, and there was a peculiar con- traction of the mouth, habitual to him when agitated. She saw him, even to each minute particular of his dress, as distinctly as she had ever done in her life ; and she remembers to have noticed between his hands the white of the shirt-bosom, unstained, however, with blood. The figure seemed to bend forward, as if in pain, and to make an effort to speak; but there was no sound. It remained visible, the wife thinks, as long as a minute, and then disappeared.

" Her first idea was to ascertain if she was actually awake. She rubbed her eyes with the sheet, and felt

26 HAUNTED HOMES.

that the touch was real. Her little nephew was in bed with her ; she hent over the sleeping child and listened to its breathing : the sound was distinct, and she be- came convinced that what she had seen was no dream. It need hardly be added that she did not again go to sleep that night.

" Next morning she related all this to her mother, expressing her conviction, though she had noticed no marks of blood on his dress, that Captain Wheatcroft was either killed or grievously wounded. So fully impressed was she with the reality of that apparition, that she thenceforth refused all invitations. A young friend urged her soon afterwards to go with her to a fashionable concert, reminding her that she had received from Malta, sent by her husband, a handsome dress cloak, which she had never yet worn. But she posi- tively declined, declaring that, uncertain as she was whether she was not already a widow, she would never enter a place of amusement until she had letters from her husband (if indeed he still lived) of a later date than the 14th of November.

" It was on a Tuesday, in the month of December,

1857, that the telegram regarding the actual fate of

Captain Wheatcroft was published in London. It was

to the effect that he was killed before Lucknow on the

fifteenth of November.

"This news, given in the morning paper, attracted the attention of Mr. Wilkinson, a London solicitor, who had in charge Captain Wheatcroft's affairs. When at a later period this gentleman met the widow, she informed

CAMBRIDGE. 27

him that she had heen quite prepared for the melancholy news, hut that she had felt sure her husband could not have been killed on the 15th of November, inasmuch as it was during the night between the 14th and 15th that he appeared to her.*

" The certificate from the War Office, however, which it became Mr. Wilkinson's duty to obtain, confirmed the date given in the telegram, its tenor being as follows : —

" 4 No. ssp War Office,

30th January, 1858 " * These are to certify that it appears, by the records in this office, that Captain German Wheatcroft, of the 6th Dragoon Gnards, waa killed in action on the loth of November, 1857. f

" ' (Signed) B. Hawes.'

" Mr. Wilkinson called at the office of Messrs. Cox and Greenwood, the army agents, to ascertain if there were no mistake in the certificate. But nothing there appeared to confirm any surmise of inaccuracy. Captain Wheatcroft's death was mentioned in two separate de- spatches of Sir Colin Campbell, and in both the date corresponded with that given in the telegram.

" So matters rested, until, in the month of March,

* " The difference of longitude between London and Lucknow being about five hours, three or four o'clock a.m. in London would be eight or nine o'clock a.m. at Lucknow. But it was in the afternoon, not in the morning, as will be seen in the sequel, that Captain Wheat- croft was killed. Had he fallen on the 15th, therefore, the apparition to his wife would have appeared several hours before the engagement in which he fell, and while he was yet alive and well. — R. D. Owen."

f " Into this certificate, of which I possess the original, an error has crept. Captain German "Wheatcroft was of the 6th (Inniskilling) Dragoons, not of the 6th Dragoon Guards. — R. D. Owen."

28 HAUNTED HOMES.

t

t

1858, the family of Captain Wheatcroft received from

Captain G C , then of the Military Train, a

letter dated near Lucknow, on the 19th of December, 1857. This letter informed them that Captain Wheat- croft had been killed before Lucknow, while gallantly

■ft

leading on the squadron, not on the 15th of November, as reported in Sir Colin Campbell's despatches, but on

the fourteenth, in the afternoon. Captain C was

riding close by his side at the time he saw him fall. He was struck by a fragment of shell in the breast, and never spoke after he was hit. He was buried at the Dilkoosha; and on a wooden cross, erected by his friend,

Lieutenant R of the 9th Lancers, at the head of his

grave, are cut the initials * G. W.,' and the date of his death, the * 14th of November, 1857.'*

" The War Office finally made the correction as to the date of death, but not until more than a vear after the event occurred. Mr. Wilkinson, having occasion to apply for an additional copy of the certificate in April, 1857, found it in exactly the same words as that which I have given, only that the 14th of November had been substituted for the 15th. f

* " It was not in his own regiment, which was then at Mcerut, that Captain Wheatcroft was serving at the time of his death. Immedi- ately on arriving from England at Cawnpore, he had offered his services to Colonel Wilson, of the Gith. They were at first declined, but finally accepted ; and he joined the Military Train then starting for Lucknow. It was in their ranks that he fell. — R. D. Owen."

f " The originals of both these certificates are in my possession : tho first bearing date 30th January, 1858, and certifying, as already shown, to the loth ; the second, dated 5th April, 1859, and testifying to the 14th.— R. D. Owen "

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY. 29

"This extraordinary narrative was obtained by me direct from the parties themselves," says Owen. " The widow of Captain Wheatcroft kindly consented to examine and correct the manuscript, and allowed me

to inspect a copy of Captain C 's letter, giving the

particulars of her husband's death. To Mr. Wilkinson, also, the manuscript was submitted, and he assented to its accuracy so far as he is concerned. I have neglected no precaution, therefore, to obtain for it the warrant of authenticity.

" It is, perhaps," concludes Owen, " the only example on record where the appearance of what is usually termed a ghost proved the means of correcting an erroneous date in the despatches of a Commander- in-Chief, and of detecting an inaccuracy in the certificate of a War-Office."

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY.

Innumerable stones are related of various rooms in the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge being haunted. One of the most circumstantial is given in Howitt's History of the Supernatural, as related to him by Wordsworth, on his return from paying a visit to his brother, Dr. Christopher Wordsworth, then Master of Trinity College, Cambridge. According to the poet's

30 HAUNTED HOMES.

account, as detailed by Howitt, a young man, having just come to enter himself a student at Trinity, brought with him a letter of introduction to Dr. Wordsworth. Upon presenting his introductory epistle, the student asked the Master if he could recommend comfortable quarters to him, and Dr. Wordsworth mentioned some that were at that time vacant. The young man took them.

A few days after this, Dr. Wordsworth, seeing the collegian, asked him how he liked his new quarters. He replied that the rooms themselves were very com- fortable, but that he should be obliged to give them up. Upon being asked what was his reason for doing so, the young freshman replied, Dr. Wordsworth might think him fanciful, but that the rooms were haunted, and that he had been awakened every night by the apparition of a child, which wandered about the rooms moaning, and, strange to say, with the palms of its hands turned outwards ; that he had searched his rooms, and on each occasion found them securely locked, and that he was convinced nothing but an apparition could have traversed them. Dr. Wordsworth said he would now be candid with him, and confess that these rooms had been repeatedly abandoned by students on the plea that they were haunted, but that, having a perfect reliance on his judgment and veracity, from what he had heard of him, he was desirous of seeing whether he would confirm the story, having had no intimation of it beforehand. " Whether," says Howitt, very pertinently, "the young man thanked the

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY. 31

Master for his recommendation of such lodgings, does not appear."

In The Night Side of Nature is given another in- stance of the appearance of an apparition in one of the colleges at Cambridge, but, unfortunately, the name of the college is not given, and only the initial of the ghost-seer's name. The story is that three young men, students at the university, after having been out hunt- ing, met and dined together in the apartments of one of them. After dinner the host and one of his guests, fatigued with their heavy exercise, fell asleep ; but the

third person present, Mr. M , remained awake.

After a time Mr. M beheld the door open, and an

elderly gentleman enter and place himself behind the sleeping owner of the rooms. Having stood there for about a minute, the stranger moved away, and pro* ceeded into the " gyp " room, a small inner chamber, whence there was no other means of exit than through the door he had entered. As the stranger did not come

out again from the " gyp " room, Mr. M woke his

host, and told him that somebody had gone into the room, remarking, " I don't know who it can be."

The young man rose and looked into the " gyp " room, but as there was no one there, he very naturally

accused Mr. M of having been dreaming ; but he

was quite positive that he had not been asleep. He then gave a description of the visitor's appearance, describing him as dressed like a country squire, with gaiters, and so forth. " Why, that 's like my father," 6aid the host, and at once instituted inquiry as to

32 HAUNTED HOMES.

whether the old gentleman had been there, ana had contrived to slip out again unobserved. He had not been seen ; and an early post brought the intelligence of his death, which had occurred about the time he was seen at Cambridge.

CANTERBURY.

In his celebrated Athena* Oxonie?isesi Anthony a Wood, the learned antiquary, states that Dr. Jacob, a well-known medical man. told him the following mar- vellous relation of an apparition that visited his house at Canterbury. "This very story," records a Wood, " Dr. Jacobs told me himself, being then at Lord Teyn- ham's, in Kent, where he was then physician to m} eldest son, whom he recovered from a fever:" Dr Jacob also repeated the relation in a letter which Aubrey, the antiquary, alludes to in his Miscellanies. The story is that " the learned Henry Jacob," a fellow of Merton College, Oxford, died at Dr. Jacob's house at Canterbury.

About a week after Henry Jacob's death, the doctor being in bed and awake, and the moon shining bright into his room, he beheld his deceased cousin standing by the bedside in his shirt, with a white cap on his head, and his "mustachoes turning up, as when he was alive." The doctor pinched himself to be assured that

CAWOOD CASTLE. 33

he was awake, and turned to the other side away from the apparition. After some time he plucked up courage to turn towards it again, and Henry Jacob stood there still. The doctor would have spoken to him, but could not, for which he has been sorrv ever since. In some little time the apparition disappeared.

Not long after this incident the cook-maid, going out to the wood-pile one evening to fetch some wood for the kitchen fire, averred that she saw the apparition of Mr. Henry in his shirt, standing on the pile of wood.

This spectre does not seem to have troubled the doctor any more ; but it is stated that when dying Henry Jacob would fain have told his cousin some- thing, but was not able to. It is imagined, says Aubrev, that he would have informed Dr. Jacob with what person he had deposited the manuscripts of his own writings, which were all the riches he had, and which, it was strongly suspected, fell into the hands of a certain person who printed them under his own name. If anything could bring an author's spirit back to this sphere, certainly such an outrage on his memory would.

CAWOOD CASTLE.

Anyone conversant with the less-known judicial records of the past, is well aware that supernatural evidence frequently formed an important factor in ancient crimi

34 HAUNTED HOMES.

nal trials. One of these curious case3 is recorded in Aubrey's Miscellanies, that mediey of useful and use- less matters, as having taken place in the immediate vicinity of Cawood Castle, Yorkshire. The depositions made at the trial, but for one extraordinary and all- important piece of evidence, were of common-place type. According to the circumstances brought out in the course of investigation, the facts were these: —

On Monday, the 14th of April, 1690, William Bar- wick was out walking with his wife, Mary Barwick, close to Cawood Castle. From motives not divulged at the trial, although shrewdly guessed at by Aubrey, he deter- mined to murder her, and finding a pond conveniently at hand, he threw her in. Deeming, doubtless, that the bodv would soon be discovered where it was, he went the next day to the place, procured a huge spade, and, getting the corpse out of the water, made a grave close by, and buried it.

Apparently satisfied that no one had witnessed his ghastly deed, Barwick actually went on the day he had committed the murder to his wife's sister, and informed her husband, Thomas Lofthouse, that he had taken his wife to a relative's house in Selbv, and left her there. Lofthouse, however, according to his deposition on oath, averred that on the Tuesday after the visit of Barwick, " about half an hour after twelve of the clock, in the day-time, he was watering quickwood, and as he was going for the second pail, there appeared, walking: before him, an apparition in the shape of a woman. Soon after she sat down over against the pona, on a

OAWOOD OASTLE. 35

green hill. He walked by her as he went to the pond, and as he came with the pail of water from the pond, looking sideways to see if she sat in the same place, which he saw she did." The witness then observed that the apparition was dandling " something like a white bag" on her lap, evidently suggestive, indeed, of her unborn babe that was slain with her. Lofthouse now emptied his pail of water, so he averred, and then stood in the yard of his house, to see if he could still see the woman's figure, but she had disappeared. He described her attire as exactly similar to that worn by his sister- in-law at the time of her murder, but remarked that she looked extremely pale, and that her teeth were visible, " her visage being like his wife's sister."

Notwithstanding the horror of this apparition, Loft- house, according to Aubrey's account, did not mention anything about it to his wife till night-time, when, at his family duty of prayers, the thoughts of the appari- tion were so overpowering, that they interrupted his devotion. After he had made an end of his prayers, therefore, he told the whole story of what he had seen to his wife, "who, laying the whole circumstances together, immediately inferred that her sister was either drowned or otherwise murdered, and desired her hus- band to look after her the next day, which was Wednes- day in Easter week." Lofthouse now recalled to mind what Barwick had told him about having left his wife at his uncle's at Selby, and therefore went to him and made inquiries, and found that neither the man nor his wife had been seen or heard of there. This information,

3 *

36 HAUNTED HOMES.

coupled with the appearance of the apparition, increased his suspicions against Barwick to such a degree, that he went before the Lord Mayor of York, and obtained a warrant for the arrest of his brother-in-law.

The culprit, when arrested, confessed the crime, and the body of the murdered woman being disinterred, was found dressed in clothing similar, apparently, to that worn by the apparition. Ultimately Barwick suffered the extreme penalty of the law for his crime.

CHEDWORTH.

According to an anecdote related by Mrs. Crawford, in the Metropolitan Magazine for 1836, Chedworth, the seat of Lord Chedworth, in Gloucestershire, has not escaped the fate common to the residences of most noble families; that is to say, it has a story of an npparition attached to it. The account of this circum- stance is stated to have been told to Mrs. Crawford bv Miss Wright, the adopted child of Lord Chedworth, and daughter of a sister of his. The story, as told by his niece, was, that Lord Chedworth had great doubts as to the existence of the soul in another world, doubts which were equally shared by a gentleman for whom he had a very great friendship.

One morning Miss Wright remarked, when her uncle joined her at the breakfast-table, that he was very thoughtful, had no nppetite, and was unusually silent.

CHESHUNT. 37

At last he said, " Molly " — for thus he was accustomed to call his niece — "I had a strange visitor last night. My old friend B came to me."

"What!" said Miss Wright, "did he come after I went to bed ? "

"His spirit did" said Lord Chedworth, solemnly.

" Oh, my dear uncle ! how could the spirit of a living man appear ? " said she, smiling.

" He is dead, beyond doubt," replied his lordship ; " listen, and then laugh as much as you please. I had not entered my bedroom many minutes when he stood before me. Like you, I could not believe but that I was looking on the living man, and so accosted him; but he (the spirit) answered, ' Chedworth, I died this night at eight o'clock. I came to tell you there is another world beyond the grave ; there is a righteous God that judgeth all!"*

" Depend upon it, uncle, it was only a dream ; " but even as Miss Wright was still speaking, a groom on horseback rode up the avenue, and immediately after- wards delivered a letter to Lord Chedworth, announcing the sudden death of his friend.

CHESHUNT.

In Mrs. Crowe's Night Side of Nature is a remarkable account of a haunted dwelling, stated to be (( in the neighbourhood of the metropolis." Mrs. Crowe neither

38 HAUNTED HOMES.

mentions the name of the locality, nor furnishes more than the initial of the " gentleman engaged in business in London," whose family suffered from the "hauntings" at this residence; but in Howitt's History of the Super- natural these omitted particulars are supplied. Accord- ing to Mr. Howitt, the old-fashioned house referred to by Mrs. Crowe was at Cheshunt, and belonged to Sir Henry Meux ; and the account given by the authoress was taken down from the recital of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Kean, the well-known actors, who also furnished the same particulars to Mr. Howitt. A comparison of the statements given bv Mrs. Crowe and Mr. Howitt enables us to give the following details : —

Mr. Chapman, the brother-in-law of Mr. Kean, and apparently the well-known publisher, had been induced, by the unusually low rental, to purchase the seven years' lease of a large old-fashioned house at Cheshunt. The house was a good country residence, was furnished, and had a considerable quantity of land attached to it, in- cluding a garden and pleasure-ground. The family removed into the place, and Mr. Chapman joined them once or twice a week, as his business engagements permitted.

" They had been some considerable time in the house," says Mrs. Crowe, " without the occurrence of anything remarkable, when one evening, towards dusk, Mrs. Chapman, on going into what was called the oak bed- room, saw a female figure near one of the windows ; it was apparently a young woman with dark hair hanging over her shoulders, a silk petticoat, and a short white

OHESHCJNT. 39

robe, and she appeared to be looking eagerly through the window, as if expecting somebody. Mrs. Chapman clapped her hands upon her eyes, ' as thinking she had seen something she ought not to have seen,' and when she looked again the figure had disappeared.

" Shortly after this, a young girl, who filled the situation of under nursery-maid, came to her in great agitation, saying that she had had a terrible fright, from seeing a very ugly old woman looking in upon her as she passed the window in the lobby. The girl was trembling violently, and almost crying, so that Mrs. Chapman entertained no doubts of the reality of her alarm. She, however, thought it advisable to laugh her out of her fear, and went with her to the window, which looked into a closed court, but there was no one there, neither had any of the other servants seen such a person. Soon after this the family began to find themselves dis- turbed with strange and frequently very loud noises during the night. Among the rest, there was some- thing like the beating of a crowbar upon the pump in the above-mentioned court, but, search as they would, they could discover no cause for the sound.

" One day, when Mr. Chapman had brought a friend from London to stay the night with him, Mrs. Chapman thought proper to go to the oak bed-room, where the stranger was to sleep, for the purpose of inspecting the arrangements for his comfort, when, to her great surprise, someone seemed to follow her up to the fire- place, though, on turning round, there was nobody to be seen. She said nothing about it, however, and

40 HAUNTED HOMES.

returned below, where her husband and the stranger were sitting. Presently one of the servants (not the one mentioned above) tapped at the door, and requested to speak with her, and Mrs. Chapman going out, she told her, in great agitation, that in going up-stairs to the visitor's room a footstep had followed her all the way to the fire-place, although she could see nobody. Mrs. Chapman said something soothing, and that matter passed, she herself being a good deal puzzled, but still unwilling to admit the idea that there was anything extra-natural in these occurrences. Kepeatedly after this these footsteps were heard in different parts of the house, when nobody was to be seen; and often whilst she was lying in bed she heard them distinctly approach her door, wThen, being a very courageous woman, she would start out with a loaded pistol in her hand, but there was never anyone to be seen. At length it was im- possible to conceal from herself and her servants that these occurrences were of an extraordinary nature, and the latter, as may be supposed, felt very uncomfortable. Amongst other unpleasant things, whilst sitting all together in the kitchen, they used to see the latch lifted, and the door open, though no one came in that they could see ; and when Mr. Chapman himself watched for these events, although they took place, and he was quite on the alert, he altogether failed in detecting any visible agent.

" One night, the same servant who had heard the footsteps following her to the bed-room fire-place, happening to be asleop in Mrs. Chapman's chamber, she

CHESHUNT. 41

became much disturbed, and was heard to murmur, ' Wake me ! Wake me!' as if in great mental anguish. Being aroused, she told her mistress a dream she had had, which seemed to throw some light upon these mysteries. She thought she was in the oak bed-room, and at one end of it she saw a young female in an old- fashioned dress, with long dark hair ; whilst in another part of the room was a very ugly old woman, also in old-fashioned attire. The latter, addressing the former, said, * What have you done with the child, Emily ? What have you done with the child ? ' To which the younger figure answered, ' Oh, I did not kill it. He was

preserved, and grew up, and joined the Regiment,

and went to India.' Then, addressing the sleeper, the young lady continued, ' I have never spoken to mortal before, but I will tell you all. My name is Miss Black, and this old woman is nurse Black. Black is not her name, but we call her so because she has been so long in the family.' Here the old woman interrupted the speaker by coming up and laying her hand on the dreaming girl's shoulder, whilst she said something ; but she could not remember what ; for, feeling an excruciating pain from the touch, she had been so far aroused as to be sensible she was asleep, and to beg to be wholly awakened.

" As the old woman seemed to resemble the figure that one of the other servants had seen looking into the window, and the young one resembled that she had herself seen in the oak chamber, Mrs. Chapman naturally concluded that there was something extra- ordinary about this dream ; and she consequently took

42 HAUNTED HOMES.

an early opportunity of inquiring in the neighbourhood what was known as to the names or circumstances of the former inhabitants of this house ; and after much investigation she learnt that, about seventy or eighty years before, it had been in the possession of a Mrs. Ravenhall, who had a niece named Miss Black living with her. This niece, Mrs. Chapman supposed, might be the younger of the two persons who had been seen. Subsequently she saw her again in the same room, wringing her hands, and looking with a mournful signi- ficance to one corner. They had the boards taken up on that spot, but nothing was found.

" One of the most curious incidents connected with this story remains to be told. After occupying the house three years, they were preparing to quit it — not on account of its being haunted, but for other reasons — when, on awaking one morning, a short time before their departure, Mrs. Chapman saw, standing at the foot of her bed, a dark-complexioned man, in a working dress, a fustian jacket, and red comforter round his neck, who, however, suddenly disappeared. Mr. Chapman was lying beside her at the time, but asleep. This was the last apparition that was seen ; but the strange thing is, that a few clays after this, it being necessary to order in a small quantity of coals, to serve till their removal, Mr. Chapman undertook to perform the commission on his way to London. Accordingly, the next day she mentioned to him that the coals had arrived ; which he said was very fortunate, since he had entirely forgotten to order them. Wondering whence they had come, Mrs.

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Chapman hereupon inquired of the servants, who none of them knew anything about the matter ; but, on interrogating a person in the village by whom they had frequently been provided with this article, he answered, that they had been ordered by a dark man, in a fustian jacket and a red comforter, who had called for the purpose ! "

After this last event Mr. Chapman quitted the house, and when he had given up possession found that several previous tenants had been under the necessity of doing so, on account of annovances similar to those his household had suffered from. However, he kept the cause of his removal quiet, and managed to sell his lease to a clergyman who kept a school, but be, in his turn, was compelled to give up the house for the same cause, and for years it stood empty. Ultimately, it was partly pulled down and re-built : and it would seem as if this alteration had broken the spell, for it has been inhabited since, and reported, said Mr. Howitt, in 1863, free from hauntings.

CORBY CASTLE, CUMBERLAND.

The apparition of a "Kadiant Boy," as it is called, is not uncommon in the history of haunted buildings, as various sections of this work will show. Dr. Kerner, the great German authority on spectral affairs, cites an

44 HAUNTED HOMES.

instance of one of these apparitions which was believed to appear only once in seven years, and to be connected in some way with the murder of a child by its mother. Mrs. Crowe, in her Night Side of Nature t refers to the well-known tradition that C(orby ?) Castle, Cumber- land, is haunted by a spirit of this description. A friend of the familv owning this ancient dwelling is authority for the following account of an appearance of the ghostly visitant : it is copied from a manuscript

volume, and it is dated C Castle, December 22nd,

1824 :—

"In order to introduce my readers to the haunted room, I will mention that it forms part of the old house, with windows looking into the court, which, in early times, was deemed a necessary security against an enemy. It adjoins a tower built by the Eomans for

defence ; for C was, properly, more a border tower

than a castle of any consideration. There is a winding staircase in this tower, and the walls are from eight to ten feet thick.

" When the times became more peaceable, our ancestors enlarged the arrow-slit windows, and added to that part of the building which looks towards the river Eden ; the view of which, with its beautiful banks, we now enjoy. But many additions and alterations have been made since that.

" To return to the room in question ; I must observe that it is by no means remote or solitary, being surrounded on all sides by chambers that are constantly inhabited. It is accessible by a passage cut through a

CORBY CASTLE. 4

K

wall eight feet in thickness, and its dimensions are twenty-one by eighteen. One side of the wainscoting is covered with tapestry, the remainder is decorated with old family pictures, and some ancient pieces of embroidery, probably the handiwork of nuns. Over a press, which has doors of Venetian glass, is an ancient oaken figure, with a battle-axe in his hand, -which was one of those formerly placed on the walls of the city of Carlisle, to represent guards. There used to be also an old-fashioned bed and some dark furniture in this room ; but so many were the complaints of those who slept there, that I was induced to replace some of these articles of furniture by more modern ones, in the hope of removing a certain air of gloom, which I thought might have given rise to the unaccountable reports of appari- tions and extraordinary noises which were constantly reaching us. But I regret to say I did not succeed in banishing the nocturnal visitor, which still continues to disturb our friends.

" I shall pass over numerous instances, and select one as being especially remarkable, from the circumstance of the apparition having been seen by a clergyman well known and highly respected in this county, who, not six weeks ago, repeated the circumstances to a company of twenty persons, amongst whom were some who had previously been entire disbelievers in such appearances.

" The best way of giving you these particulars, will be by subjoining an extract from my journal, entered at the time the event occurred.

" Sept. 8, 1803. — Amongst other guests invited to

46 HAONTED HOMES.

C Castle, came the Kev. Henry A. of Redburgh,

and rector of Greystoke, with Mrs. A., his wife, who was a Miss S., of Ulverstone. According to previous arrangements, they were to have remained with us some days ; hut their visit was cut short in a very unexpected manner. On the morning after their arrival we were all assembled at breakfast, when a chaise and four dashed up to the door in such haste that it knocked down part of the fence of my flower-garden. Our curiosity was, of course, awakened to know who could be arriving at so early an hour ; when, happening to turn my eyes towards Mr. A., I observed that he appeared extremely agitated. ' It is our carriage ! ' said he : ' I am very sorry, but we must absolutely leave you this morning.'

" We naturally felt and expressed considerable surprise, as well as regret, at this unexpected departure ; representing that we had invited Colonel and Mrs. S., some friends whom Mr. A. particularly desired to meet, to dine with us on that day. Our expostulations, how- ever, were vain ; the breakfast was no sooner over than they departed, leaving us in consternation to conjecture what could possibly have occasioned so sudden an alteration in their arrangements. I really felt quite uneasy lest anything should have given them offence ; and we reviewed all the occurrences of the preceding evening, in order to discover, if offence there was, whence it had arisen. But our pains were vain; and alter talking a great deal about it for some days, other circumstances banished the matter from our minds.

COEBY CASTLE. 47

" It was not till we some time afterwards visited the part of the county in which Mr. A. resides, that we learnt the real cause of his sudden departure from

C . The relation of the fact, as it here follows, is

in his own words : —

" ' Soon after we went to bed, we fell asleep : it might he between one and two in the morning when I awoke. I observed that the fire was totally extinguished ; but although that was the case, and we had no light, I saw a glimmer in the centre of the room, which suddenly increased to a bright flame. I looked out, apprehending that something had caught fire ; when, to my amaze- ment, I beheld a beautiful boy, clothed in white, with bright locks resembling gold, standing by my bedside, in which position he remained some minutes, fixing his eyes upon me with a mild and benevolent expression. He then glided gently towards the side of the chimney, where it is obvious there is no possible egress, and entirely disappeared. I found myself again in total darkness, and all remained quiet until the usual hour of rising. I declare this to be a true account of what I saw at C Castle, upon my word as a clergyman.' "

Mrs. Crowe, in alluding to this story in her above- mentioned book, remarks that she was acquainted with some of the family and several of the friends of the

Bev. Henry A , who, she continues, " is still alive,

though now an old man; and I can most positively assert that his own conviction with regard to the nature of this appearance has remained ever unshaken. The circumstance made a lasting impression upon his mind,

48 HAUNTED HOMES.

and he never willingly speaks of it ; but when he does, it is always with the greatest seriousness, and he never shrinks from avowing his belief that what he saw admits of no other interpretation than the one he then put upon it."

As a pendant to this narrative it will be appropriate to relate the story of " The Radiant Boy," so well known in traditionary lore as having appeared to the second Marquis of Londonderry, better known as Lord Castlereagh, whilst on a visit to a gentleman resident in the north of Ireland. The time of this visit would appear to have been about the end of the last century. The story has been variously detailed by different writers, but in the following account, derived from Mrs. Crowe's Ghost Stories, it is less romantically told than usual, and, consequently, has a greater air of vraisemblance. In this form it is stated to have been obtained from a member of the Marquis's family : —

" Captain Stewart, afterwards Lord Castlereagh," reads the account, " when he was a young man, happened to be quartered in Ireland. He was fond of sport, and one day the pursuit of game carried him so far that he lost his way. The weather, too, had become very rough, and in this strait he presented himself at the door of a gentleman's house, and, sending in his card, requested shelter for the night. The hospitality of the Irish country gentry is proverbial ; the master of the house received him warmly, said he feared he could not make him so comfortable as he could have wished, his house being full of visitors already — added to which,

CORBY CASTLE. 49

some strangers, driven by the inclemency of the nigbt, hod sought shelter before him; but that such accommo- dation as he could give he was heartily welcome to : whereupon he called his butler, and, committing his guest to his good offices, told him he must put him up somewhere, and do the best he could for him. There was no lady, the gentleman being a widower.

" Captain Stewart found the house crammed, and a very jolly party it was. His host invited him to stay, and promised him good shooting if he would prolong his visit a few days ; and, in fine, he thought himself extremely fortunate to have fallen into such pleasant quarters.

" At length, after an agreeable evening, they all retired to bed, and the butler conducted him to a large room almost divested of furniture, but with a blazing peat fire in the grate, and a shake-down on the floor, composed of cloaks and other heterogeneous materials. Nevertheless, to the tired limbs of Captain Stewart, who had had a hard day's shooting, it looked very inviting; but, before he lay down, he thought it advisable to take off some of the fire, which was blazing up the chimney in what he thought an alarming manner. Having done this, he stretched h'mseif upon the couch, and soon fell asleep.

'* He believed he had slept about a couple of hours when he awoke suddenly, and was startled by such a vivid light in the room that he thought it was on fire ; but on turning to look at the grate he saw the fire was out* though it was from the chimney the light proceeded.

4

50 HAUNTED HOMES*

He sat up in bed, trying to discover what it was, when he perceived, gradually disclosing itself, the form of a beautiful naked boy, surrounded by a dazzling radiance. The boy looked at him earnestly, and then the vision faded, and all was dark. Captain Stewart, so far from supposing what he had seen to be of a spiritual nature, had no doubt that the host, or the visitors, had been amusing themselves at his expense, and trying to frighten him. Accordingly, he felt indignant at the liberty ; and, on the following morning, when he appeared at breakfast, he took care to evince his dis- pleasure by the reserve of his demeanour, and by announcing his intention to depart immediately. The host expostulated, reminding him of his promise to stay and shoot. Captain Stewart coldly excused him- self, and, at length, the gentleman seeing something was wrong, took him aside and pressed for an explanation ; whereupon Captain Stewart, without entering into particulars, said that he had been made the victim of a sort of practical joking that he thought quite un- warrantable with a stranger.

"The gentleman considered this not impossible amongst a parcel of thoughtless young men> and appealed to them to make an apology ; but one and all, on their honour, denied the impeachment. Suddenly a thought seemed to strike him ; he clapt his hand to his forehead, uttered an exclamation, and rang the bell. ' Hamilton/ said he to the butler, c where did Captain Stewart sleep last night ? '

" ' Well, Sir,' replied the man, in an apologetic tone.

COETACHY CASTLE. 51

* you know every place was full — the gentlemen were lying on the floor three or four in a room — so I gave him the Boy's Room ; but I lit a blazing fire to keep him from coming out.'

" ' You were very wrong,' said the host ; ' you know I have positively forbidden you to put anyone there, and have taken the furniture out of the room to insure its not being occupied.' Then retiring with Captain Stewart, he informed him verv gravely of the nature of the phenomenon he had seen; and at length, being pressed for further information, he confessed that there existed a tradition in his family that whomever the Radiant Boy appeared to would rise to the summit of power, and when he had reached the climax, would die a violent death ; * and I must say,' he added, * the records that have been kept of his appearance go to confirm this persuasion.' "

It is scarcely necessary to remind the reader that sub- sequently Lord Castlereagh became head of the Govern- ment, and, finally, perished by his own hand.

COETACHY CASTLE.

Of all the haunted castles in Great Britain, none, pro- bably, has acquired a greater amount of notoriety than that of Cortachy Castle, the seat of the Earl of Airlie. This ancient stronghold is haunted by the spirit of a

4 *

52 HAUNTED HOMES.

drummer, and whenever his drum is heard it may be accepted, according to the popular belief, as a token of the speedy death of a member of the Ogilvie family. The origin of this tradition is that either the drummer, or some officer whose emissary he was, had excited the jealousy of a former Lord Airlie, and that, in conse- quence, he was put to death by being thrust into his own drum, and flung from the window of the tower in which is situated the chamber where his music is, apparently, chiefly heard. It is said that he threatened to haunt the family if his life were taken ; and he would appear to be as good, or rather as bad, as his word, the strain of his invisible drum having been heard several times even in the memory of living persons, and once, notoriously, quite recently.

The authoress who gives the following account of a somewhat recent occasion when the drummer was heard performing upon his ill-omened instrument, introduces it by the remark that about Christmas, 1844, a letter just received from a member of a distinguished Perth- shire family was sent to her for perusal. The sender, an eminent literary man, accompanied the communica- tion with the remark, " Read the enclosed ; and we shall now have an opportunity of observing if any eveut follow the prognostic."

The information afforded by the letter was to the following effect : —

"Miss Dalrymple, a relative of the present Lady

C , who had been staying some time with the Earl

and Countess at their seat, near Dundee, was invited to

*. ._>—•• .

CORTACHY CASTLE. 53

spend a few days at Cortachy Castle, with the Earl and Countess of Airlie. She went, and whilst she was dressing for dinner, the first evening of her arrival, she heard a strain of music under her window, which finally resolved itself into a well-defined sound of a drum. When her maid came upstairs, she made some inquiries about the drummer that was playing near the house, but the maid knew nothing on the subject. For the moment the circumstance passed from Miss Dalrymple's mind ; but recurring to her again during the dinner, she said, addressing Lord Airlie, 'My Lord, who is your drummer ? ' upon which his lordship turned pale, Lady Airlie looked distressed, and several of the company, who all heard the question, embarrassed; whilst the lady, perceiving that she had made some unpleasant allusion, although she knew not to what their feeling3 referred, forebore further inquiry till she reached the drawing-room, when, having mentioned the circumstance again to a member of the family, she was answered, 'What! have vou never heard of the drummer-boy?' ' No,' replied Miss Dalrymple, ' who in the world is he? ' 'Why,' replied the other, 'he is a person who goes about the house playing his drum whenever there is a death impending in the family. The last time he was heard was shortly before the death of the last Countess (the Earl's former wife) ; and that is why Lord Airlie became so pale when you mentioned it. The drummer is a very unpleasant subject in this family, I assure you ! '

"Miss Dalrymple was naturally much concerned, and

54 HAUNTED HOMES.

indeed, not a little frightened at this explanation, and her alarm being augmented by hearing the sounds on the following day, she took her departure from Cortachy Castle, and returned to Lord C.'s, stopping on her way to call on some friends, where she related this strange circumstance to the family through whom the informa- tion reached me.

" This affair was very generally known in the north, and we awaited the event with interest. The melancholy death of the Countess about five or six months after- wards, at Brighton, sadly verified the prognostic. I have heard that a paper was found on her desk after her death, declaring her conviotion that the drum was for her ; and it has been suggested, that probably the thing preyed upon her mind and caused the catastrophe ; but in the first place, from the mode of her death, that does not appear to be the case ; and, in the second, even if it were, the fact of the verification of the prognostic remains unaffected ; besides which, those who insist upon taking refuge in this hypothesis, are bound to admit, that before people living in the world, like Lord and Lady Airlie, could attach so much importance to the prognostic as to entail such fatal effects, they must have had very good reasons for believing in it."

The incidents just narrated took place, it will be re- collected, in 1844. Five years later, or, to be more precise, on the evening of the 19th of August 1849, a young English gentleman was on his way to the Tulchan, a shooting-lodge belonging to the Earl of Airlie. He was mounted on a stout pony, having a stalwart High-

COETACHY CASTLE. 55

lander for his guide across the wild Forfarshire moor.

For about two hours darkness had fallen upon the sceDes, that is to say, it was about half-past eight in the evening, when the welcome lights, issuing from the windows of the Tulchan, met our traveller's anxious gaze. At the same moment a swell of faint music smote suddenly upon his ear. The sound was as that of a distant band accompanied by the drum, and appeared to emanate from the low ridge of ground below the hunting- lodge in front of him. As it was wafted in ]ouder accents across the moor, he could not forbear from feeling that it had something of an eerie and unearthly character about it. Astonished at such an unaccountable occur- rence in a spot where the Tulchan was the only house within many miles, and where bracken, brown heath, and morass stretched far and wide upon every side of him, the young man called the attention of his guide to the strange burst of music which he had just heard. Muttering that such sounds were "no canny," and pro- fessing that to him they were inaudible, the Highlander urged on his pony to as great a speed as the weary beast could exert after a journey of twenty-five miles, and in a little while the two riders drew rein at the hospitable door of the lodge.

Upon descending from his pony the Englishman learnt that his friend and host, Lord Ogilvie (afterwards tenth Earl of Airlie), had been summoned to London on account of his father's dangerous illness. On the following day the ninth Earl of Airlie breathed his last in Eegent Street, London, thus affording another testi-

5G HAUNTED HOMES.

mony to the truth of the old tradition, that weird music and the sound of the drum haunt the dwellings of the Ogilvies prior to the death of a memher of the family.

CRESLOW MANOR HOUSE.

Creslow, in Buckinghamshire, like so many ancient English manor-houses, has its family ghost. According to Dr. Lee, the old residence is haunted by the restless spirit of a lady long since deceased : she frequents a certain sleeping-chamber in the most ancient portion of the building. She has not often been seen, yet has but too frequently been heard, and only too distinctly, by those who have ventured to sleep in or to enter after midnight the room she appears to deem hers. She is said to come up from the old groined crypt, and always appears to enter by the door at the top of the nearest staircase. After entering the chamber she is heard to walk about it, sometimes in a stately manner, with her long silk train sweeping the floor, and at other times with a quick and hurried motion, with her silken dress rustling violently, as if she were engaged in a desperate struggle. The fact that the whole of this time the lady and her accessories are invisible adds in no slight degree to the horror of the affair.

This haunted chamber, although furnished as a bed- room, is rarely used, and it is said that it cannot be

CBESLOW MANOB HOUSE. 57

entered, even in the day-time, without trepidation and awe. However, some persons have been found bold enough to dare the harmless noises of the mysterious intruder ; and many are the traditions current in Buck- inghamshire respecting the results to these people of the adventure.

The following will suffice as a specimen, and may, according to Dr. Lee, be depended on as authentic : —

" About the year 1850, a gentleman, not many years ago High Sheriff of the county, who resides some few miles distance from Creslow, rode over to a dinuer party; and, as the night became exceedingly dark and rainy, he was urged to stay over the night if he had no objection to sleep in the haunted chamber. The offer of a bed in such a room, so far from deterring him, induced him at once to accept the invitation. He was a strong-minded man of a powerful frame and undaunted courage, and, like so many others, entertained a sovereign contempt for all haunted chambers, ghosts and appari- tions. The room was prepared for him. He would neither have a fire nor a night-light, but was provided with a box of lucifers that he might light a candle if he wished. Arming himself in jest with a cutlass and a brace of pistols, he took a serio-comic farewell of the familv and entered his formidable dormitorv.

" In due course morning dawned ; the sun rose, and a most beautiful day succeeded a very wet and dismal night. The family and their guests assembled in the breakfast room, and every countenance seemed cheered and brightened by the loveliness of the morning.

58 HAUNTED HOMES.

They drew round the table, when the host remarked

that Mr. S , the tenant of the haunted chamber,

was absent. A servant was sent to summon him to breakfast, but he soon returned, saying he had knocked loudly at his door, but received no answer, and that a jug of hot water left there was still stand- ing unused. On hearing this, two or three gentlemen ran up to the room, and, after knocking and receiviug no answer, opened it and entered. It was empty. Inquiry was made of the servants ; they had neither seen nor heard anything of him. As he was a county magistrate, some supposed that he had gone to attend the Board whicb met that morning at an early hour.

" But his horse was still in the stable, so that could not be. While they were at breakfast, however, he came in, and gave the following account of his last night's experiences : — ' Having entered my room,' said he, ' I locked and bolted both the doors, carefully examined the whole room, and satisfied myself that there was no living creature in it but myself, nor any entrances but those which I had secured. I got into bed, and, witb the conviction that I should sleep soundly as usual till six in the morning, was soon lost in a comfortable slumber. Suddenly I was awakened, and, on raising my head to listen, I certainly heard a sound resembling the light soft tread of a lady's footstep, accompanied with the rust- ling as of a silk gown. I sprang out of bed, and, having lighted a candle, found that there was nothing either to be seen or heard. I carefully examined the

DAINTEEE. 59

whole room. I looked under the bed, into the fire- place, up the chimney, and at both the doors, which were fastened just as I had left them. I then looked at my watch, and found it was a few minutes past twelve. As all was now perfectly quiet again, I put out the candle, got into bed, and soon fell asleep. I was again aroused. The noise was now louder than before. It appeared like the violent rustling of a stiff silk dress. A second time I sprang out of bed, darted to the spot where the noise was, and tried to grasp the intruder in my arms. My arms met together, but enclosed nothing. The noise passed to another part of the room, and I followed it, groping near the floor to prevent anything passing under my arms. It was in vain, I could do nothing. The sound died at the doorway to the crypt, and all again was still. I now left the candle burning, though I never sleep comfortably with a light in my room, and went to bed again, but certainly felt not a little perplexed at being unable to detect the cause of the noise, nor to account for its cessation when the candle was lighted.' "

DAINTREE.

In the Rev. John Mastin's History of Naseby, is cited a story of an apparition that was supposed to have appeared to Charles the First at Daintree, near Naseby, previous to the famous battle of that name.

60 HAUNTED HOMES.

The army of Charles, says the historian, consisting of less than 5,000 foot, and about as many horse, was ordered to Daintree, whither the King went with a thorough resolution of fighting. The next day, however, to the surprise of Prince Eupert and all the rest of the army, this design was given up, and the former one of going to the north resumed. The reason of this alter- ation in his plans was alleged to he some presages of ill-fortune which the King had received, and which were related to me, says Mr. Mastin's authority, by a person of Newark, at that time in His Majesty's horse. About two hours after the King had retired to rest, said the narrator, some of his attendants hearing an uncommon noise in his chamber, went into it, where they found His Majesty sitting up in bed and much agitated, but nothing which could have produced the noise they fancied they had heard. The King, in a tremulous voice, inquired after the cause of their alarm, and told them how much he had been disturbed, apparently by a dream, by thinking he had seen an apparition of Lord Strafford, who, after upbraiding him for his cruelty, told him he was come to return him good for evil, and that he advised him by no means to fight the Parliament army that was at that time quartered at Northampton, for it was one which the King could never conquer by arms. Prince Kupert, in whom courage was the predominant quality, rated the King out of his apprehensions the next day, and a resolution was again taken to meet the enemy. The next night, however, the apparition appeared to him a second time, but with looks of anger

DUNFERMLINE. 61

assuring him that would be the last advice he should be permitted to give him, but that if he kept his resolu- tion of fighting he was undone. If His Majesty had taken the advice of the friendly ghost, and marched northward the next day, where the Parliament had few English forces, and where the Scots were becoming very discontented, his affairs might, perhaps, still have had a prosperous issue, or if he had marched immediately into the west he might afterwards have fought on more equal terms. But the King, fluctuating between the apprehensions of his imagination and the reproaches of his courage, remained another whole day at Daintree in a state of inactivity. The battle of Naseby, fought 14th June, 1645, put a finishing stroke to the King'? affairs. After this he could never get together an army fit to look the enemy in the face. He was often heard to say that he wished he had taken the warning, and not fought at Naseby ; the meaning of which nobody knew but those to whom he had told of the apparition which he had seen at Daintree, and all of whom were, subsequently, charged to keep the affair secret.

DUNFERMLINE.

Ont the 31st May 1847, Sir Joseph Noel Paton, the celebrated artist, wrote a letter to Mrs. Crowe, vhich she subsequently published in her eerie work, The

62 HAUNTED HOMES.

Night Side of Nature. This letter, although it only recites a dream, is of a marvellous character when it is considered how numerous were the coincidences required in order to accomplish its prophetic symbolism, if one may so term it. The vision is so clearly por- trayed in Sir Joseph's own letter, and it is obviously, in citations of this kind, so far preferable to give the original words of an authority, that we print the lettei intact.

" That dream of my mother's was as follows," says Sir Joseph. " She stood in a long, dark, empty gallery : on one side was my father, and on the other my eldest sister, Amelia ; then myself, and the rest of the family according to their ages. At the foot of the hall stood my younger sister, Alexes, and above her my sister Catherine — a creature, by the way, in person and mind more like an angel of heaven than an inhabitant of earth. We all stood silent and motionless. At last It entered — the unimagined something that, casting its grim shadow before, had enveloped all the trivialities of the preceding dream in the stifling atmosphere of terror. It entered, stealthily descending the three steps that led from the entrance down into the chamber of horror, and my mother^/* It was Death. He was dwarfish, bent, and shrivelled. He carried on his shoulder a heavy axe ; and had come, she thought, to destroy * all her little ones at one fell swoop.' On the entrance of the shape my sister Alexes leapt out of the rank, interposing herself between him and my mother. He raised his axe and aimed a blow at Catherine, a blow which, to her

DUNFEKMLINE. 63

horror, my mother could not intercept, though she had snatched up a three-legged stool, the sole furniture of the apartment, for that purpose. She could not, she felt, fling the stool at the figure without destroying Alexes, who kept shooting out and in between her and the ghastly thing. She tried in vain to scream ; she besought my father, in agony, to avert the impending stroke ; but he did not hear, or did not heed her, and stood motionless, as in a trance. Down came the axe, and poor Catherine fell in her blood, cloven to ' the white halse bane.' Asrain the axe was lifted bv the inexorable shadow, over the head of my brother, who stood next in the line. Alexes had somewhere dis- appeared behind the ghastly visitant, and with a scream my mother flung the footstool at his head. He vanished, and she awoke.

" This dream left on my mother's mind a fearful apprehension of impending misfortune, ' which would not pass away.' It was murder she feared, and her suspicions were not allayed by the discovery that a man some time before discarded by my father for bad conduct, and with whom she had, somehow, associated the Death of her dream, had been lurking about the place, and sleeping in an adjoining outhouse on the night it occurred, and for some nights previous and subsequent to it. Her terror increased ; sleep forsook her, and every night, when the house was still, she arose and stole, sometimes with a candle, sometimes in the dark, from room to room, listening, in a sort of waking night-mare, for the breathing of the assassin, who, she

64 HAUNTED HOMES.

imagined, was lurking in some one of them. This could not last. She reasoned with herself, but her terror became intolerable, and she related her dream to my father, who, of course, called her a fool for her pains — whatever might be his real opinion of the matter.

" Three months had elapsed, when we children were all of us seized with scarlet fever. My sister Catherine died almost immediately — sacrificed, as my mother in her misery thought, to her (my mother's) over-anxiety for Alexes, whose danger seemed more imminent. The dream -prophecy was in part fulfilled. I also was at death's door — given up by the doctors, but not by my mother : she was confident of my recovery, but for my brother, who was scarcely considered in danger at all, but on whose head she had seen the visionary axe im- pending, her fears were great, for she could not recollect whether the blow had, or had not, descended when the spectre vanished. My brother recovered, but relapsed, and barely escaped with life. But Alexes did not; for a year and ten months the poor child lingered, and almost every night I had to sing her asleep; often, I remember, through bitter tears ; for I knew she was dying, and I loved her the more as she wasted away. I held her little hand as she died, I followed her ;> the grave — the last thing that I have loved on earth. And the dream was fulfilled.

" Truly and sincerely yours,

"J. Noel Faton."

Go

EDGE HILL.

In Lord Nugent' s Memorials of John Hampden is cited, from a pamphlet of Charles the First's time, ono of the most, if not the most, marvellous account of two entire armies of apparitions on record. Somewhat similar, but more distant and weakly testified to phantoms, are averred to have been seen in various times and climes, but, as Lord Nugent points out, this wonderful story is " attested upon the oath of three officers, men of honour and discretion, and of three other gentlemen of credit, selected by the King as com- missioners to report upon these prodigies, and to tran- quillise and disabuse the alarms of a country town ; adding, moreover, in confirmation, their testimony to the identity of several of the illustrious dead, as seen among the unearthly combatants who had been well-known to them, and who had fallen in the battle." " A well supported imposture," adds Lord Nugent, " or a stormy night on the hill-side might have acted on the weakness of a peasantry in whose remembrance the terrors of the Edge Hill fight were still fresh;* but it is difficult to imagine how the minds of officers, sent there to correct the illusions, could have been so imposed upon. It will, also, be observed, that no inference is attempted by

* The battle of Edge Hill, between the forces of the King and those of the Parliament, had been fought about two months previouj %o the first appearance of these apparitions.

66 HAUNTED HOMES.

the witnesses to assist any notion of a judgment of warning favourable to the interests or passions of their own party."

The pamphlet referred to by Lord Nugent was printed immediately after the events it records, on the 23rd of January 1642. It narrates the appearance of the late apparitions, and records the particulars of the Pro- digious Noises of War and Battle, at Edge Hill, near Keinton, in Northamptonshire, and its truth is certified to by " William Wood, Esquire and Justice for the Peace for the same county, and Samuel Marshall, Preacher of God's Word in Keinton, and other persons of quality."

Omitting the introductory matter, which merely refers to the antiquity of, and the great mass of evidence in favour of the reality of apparitions, and modernizing the spelling, this strongly accredited pamphlet reads thus : — -

" Edge Hill, in the very confines of Warwickshire, near unto Keynton, in Northamptonshire, a place, as appears by the sequel, destined for civil wars and battles; as where King John fought a battle with his barons, and where, in defence of the kingdom's laws and liberty, was fought a bloody conflict between His Majesty's and the Parliament's forces. At this Edge Hill, at the very place where the battle was fought, have since, and doth appear, strange and portentous apparitions of two jarring and contrary armies, as I shall in order deliver, it being certified by men of most credit in those parts, as William Wood, Esquire, Samuel Marshall, Minister,

EDGE HILL. 67

and others, on Saturday, which was in Christmas time . . . Between twelve and one o'clock in the morning, was heard by some shepherds, and other countrymen, and travellers, first the sound of drums afar off, and the noise of soldiers, as it were, giving out their last groans; at which they were much amazed, and amazed stood still, till it seemed, by the nearness of the noise, to approach them; at which, too much affrighted, they sought to withdraw as fast as possibly they could ; but then, on the sudden, whilst they were in their cogita- tions, appeared in the air the same incorporeal soldiers that made those clamours, and immediately, with ensigns displayed, drums beating, muskets going off, cannons discharged, horses neighing, which also to these men were visible, the alarum or entrance to this game of death was, one army, which gave the first charge, having the King's colours, and the other the Parliament's at their head or front of the battle, and so pell-mell to it they went. The battle, that appeared to the King's forces seeming at first to have the best, but afterwards to be put into apparent rout. But till two or three in the morning in equal scale continued this dreadful fight, the clattering of arms, noise of cannons, cries of soldiers, so amazing and terrifying the poor men, that they could not believe they were mortal, or give credit to their eyes and ears ; run away they durst not, for fear of being made a prey to these infernal soldiers, and so they, with much fear and affright, stayed to behold the snecess of the business, which at last suited to this efFect. After some three hours' fight, that army which

5 *

68 HAUNTED HOMES.

carried the King's colours withdrew, or rather appeared to fly ; the other remaining, as it were, masters of the field, stayed a good space triumphing, and expressing all the signs of joy and conquest, and then, with all their drums, trumpets, ordnance, and soldiers, vanished. The poor men, glad that they were gone that had so long stayed them there against their wills, made with all haste to Keinton, and there knocking up Mr. Wood, a Justice of Peace, who called up his neighbour, Mr. Marshall, the Minister, they gave them an account of the whole passage, and averred it upon their oaths to be true. At which affirmation of theirs, being much amazed, they should hardly have given credit to it, but would have conjectured the men to have been either mad or drunk, had they not known some of them to have been of approved integrity ; and so, suspending their judgments till the next night about the same hour, they, with the same men, and all the substantial inhabitants of that and the neighbouring parishes drew thither; where, about half an hour after their arrival, on Sunday, being Christmas night, appeared in the same tumultuous warlike manner, the same two adverse armies, fighting with as much spite and spleen as formerly ; and so departed the gentlemen and all the spectators, much terrified with these visions of horror, withdrew them- selves to their houses, beseeching God to defend them from those hellish and prodigious enemies. The next night they appeared not, nor all that week, so that the dwellers thereabout were in good hope they had for ever departed. But on the ensuing Saturday night, in the

EDGE HILL. 69

same place, and at the same hour, they were again seen with far greater tumult, fighting in the manner afore- mentioned, for four hours, or very near, and then vanished. Appearing again on Sunday night, and per- forming the same actions of hostility and bloodshed, so that Mr. Wood and others, whose faith, it should seem, was not strong enough to carry them out against these delusions, forsook their habitations thereabout, and retired themselves to other more secure dwellings; but Mr. Marshall stayed, and some other; and so success- ively the next Saturday and Sunday the same tumults and prodigious sights and actions were put in the state and condition they were formerly. The rumour whereof coming to His Majesty at Oxford, he immediately dis- patched thither Colonel Lewis Kirke, Captain Dudley, Captain Wainman, and three other gentlemen of credit, to take full view and notice of the said business, who, at first hearing the true attestation and relation of Mr. Marshall and others, stayed there till the Saturday night following, wherein they heard and saw the fore- mentioned prodigies, and so on Sunday, distinctly knowing clivers of the apparitions, or incorporeal substances, by their faces, as that of Sir Edmund Varney, and others that were there slain, of which upon oath they made testimony to His Majesty. What this doth portend God only knoweth, and time perhaps will discover; but doubt- lessly it is a sign of His wrath against this land, for these civil wars, which He in His good time finish, and send a sudden peace between His Majesty and Parliament."

70 HAUNTED HOMES.

EDINBURGH: CANONGATE.

About the beginning of the eighteenth century stood h grand mansion near the head of the Canongate, the site of which now, however, is covered with buildings of a very different character. With this old mansion is connected a tale of terror, the circumstances of which were well known and talked about no longer ago than the beginning of the present century. A friend of Sir Walter Scott, in whose early life the story was still current, furnished him with the account from which the following version of the tradition is derived.

At the period referred to, a divine of great sanctity was summoned in the middle of a certain night, to come and pray with a person at the point of death. This was no unusual summons, but the consequences which followed were very terrifying. He was forced into a sedan chair, and, after having been carried for a con- siderable distance, was set down in a remote part of the city, where, at the muzzle of a cocked pistol, he was compelled to submit to being blindfolded. In the course of the discussion which his remonstrances caused, he heard enough, and, indeed, saw enough of their garb, to make him conjecture that the chairmen were greatly above the menial position they had assumed.

After many turnings and windings the sedan was carried up-stairs into an apartment, where the bandage was removed from his eyes, and whence he was con-

EDINBURGH '. CANONGATE. 71

ducted into a bed-chamber, where he found a lady recently delivered of an infant. He was commanded by one of those who had brought him to this place to say such prayers by the lady's bed-side as were suitable for a person not expected to survive a mortal disorder. The divine ventured to remoustrate, observing that the lady's appearance warranted a more hopeful condition. He was sternly commanded to obey his instructions, and so, but with much difficulty, recollected himself -suffi- ciently to acquit himself of the duty enjoined him.

As soon as his ministrations were deemed performed, the divine was again blindfolded ; replaced in the chair, and hurried off, but, as he was being carried down-stairs, he heard the ominous report of a fire-arm. He was taken home safely, and a p irse of gold forced upon him ; but, at the same time, he was warned that the least allusion to the affair which had just transpired would cost him his life. He betook himself to his bed- chamber, but was speedily aroused by his servant with the information that a most furious fire had just broken out in the house of ... , near the head of the Canongate, and that the proprietor's daughter, a lady eminent for her beauty and accomplishments, had perished in the flames.

Our divine had his suspicions, but to have made them public would have availed nothing but to jeopardise his Dwn safety. He was timid, and the family was one of power and distinction, so he soothed himself with the reflection that the deed was done and could not be undone. Time passed ou, and with it carried away

72 HAUNTED nOMES.

some of his fears. He became unhappy at being the sole custodian of so dark a secret, and, therefore, gradually told it to some of his brother clergy, so that by degrees the whole story leaked out.

In due course the divine died, and his terrible tale had become nearly forgotten, when it so happened that a fire broke out again on the very same site where the house of . . . had formerly stood, but where now stood buildings of an inferior style. When the flames were at their height, the tumult which usually attends such a scene, was suddenly suspended by a marvellous appa- rition. A beautiful female, in an extremely rich, but very antique style of night-dress, appeared in the very midst of the fire, and in an awful voice uttered these terrifying words: — "Once burned! twice burned! the third time I will scare you all ! "

"The belief in this story," says our authority, "was formerly so strong, that on a fire breaking out, and seeming to approach the fatal spot, there was a good deal of anxiety testified lest the apparition should make good her denunciation."

EDINBURGH: GILLESPIE HOSPITAL.

On the site where Gillespie Hospital now stands, formerly stood an ancient mansion that some years after the conclusion of the American War of Inde-

EDINBURGH : GILLESPIE HOSPITAL. 73

pendence, was used by the late Lieutenant-General Robertson of Lawers, who had served through the whole of the said war, as his town residence. The General, on his return to Europe, brought with him a negro called "Black Tom," who remained in his service as a servant. Tom's own particular room was on the ground floor of the residence, and he was frequently heard to complain that he could not rest in it, for every night the figure of a headless woman, carrying a child in her arms, rose up from the hearth and frightened him terribly.

No one paid much attention to poor Tom's trouble, altlumgh the apartment had an uncanny reputation, as it was supposed to be the result of dreams caused by intoxication, the negro's character for sobriety not being very remarkable. But a strange thing happened when the General's old residence was pulled down to make way for James Gillespie's Hospital. There under the hearthstone which had caused "Black Tom" so many restless nights, was discovered a box containing the body of a woman, from which the head had been severed, and beside her lay the remains of an infant, wrapt in a pillow-case trimmed with lace. The unfor- tunate lady appeared to have been murdered without any warning; she was fully dressed, and her scissors were yet hanging by a ribbon to her side, and her thimble was also in the box, having apparently dropped from tiie shrivelled finger of the corpse.

74 HAUNTED HOMES,

EDINBURGH: TRINITY.

One of the most curious law suits of recent years occurred at Edinburgh in 1835, concerning the ghost disturbances in a dwelling-house at Trinity, about two miles or so from Edinburgh. This law-suit lasted for two years, and during its progress, Mr. Maurice Lothian, (afterwards Procurator Fiscal for the county), the advo- cate employed by Mr. Webster, the plaintiff, spent many hours in examining the numerous witnesses, several of whom were military officers, and gentlemen of good social position, but without obtaining any solution of the mysterious affair. The account furnished by Mr. Lothian himself is this : —

" Captain Molesworth took the house of a Mr. Webster, who resided in the adjoining one, in May or June 1835, and when he had been in it about two months, he began to complain of sundry extraordinary noises, which, finding it impossible to account for, he took it into his head, strangely enough, were made by Mr. Webster. The latter naturally represented that it was not probable he should desire to damage the reputa- tion of his own house, or drive his tenant out of it, and retorted the accusation. Still, as these noises and knockings continued, Captain Molesworth not only lifted the boards in the room most infected, but actually made holes in the wall which divided his residence from Mr. Webster's, for the purpose of detecting the delin- quent— of course without success. Do what they

EDINBURGH I TRINITY. 75

would, the thing went on just the same ; footsteps of invisible feet, knockings, scratchings, and rustlings, first on one side, and then on the other, were heard daily and nightly. Sometimes this unseen agent seemed to be knocking to a certain tune, and if a question were addressed to it which could be answered numerically, as ' How many people are there in this room ? ' for example, it would answer by so many knocks. The beds, too, were occasionally heaved up, as if somebody were underneath, and where the knockings were, the wall trembled visibly, but, search as they would, no one could be found. Captain Molesworth had had two daughters, one of whom, named Matilda, had lately died ; the other, a girl between twelve and thirteen, called Jane, was sickly, and generally kept her bed ; and as it was observed that wherever she was these noises most frequently prevailed, Mr. Webster, who did not like the mala fama that was attaching itself to his house, declared that she made them, whilst the people in the neighbourhood believed that it was the ghost of Matilda warning her sister that she was soon to follow. Sheriff's officers, masons, justices of the peace, and the officers of the regiment quartered at Leith, who were friends of Captain Molesworth, all came to his aid, in hopes of detecting or frightening away his tormentor, but in vain. Sometimes it was said to be a trick of somebody outside the house, and then they formed a cordon round it ; and next, as the poor sick girl was suspected, they tied her up in a bag, but it was all to no purpose.

76 HAUNTED HOMES.

"At length, ill and wearied out by the annoyances and the anxieties attending the affair, Captain Moles- worth quitted the house ; and Mr. Webster brought an action against him for the damages committed by lifting the boards, breaking the walls, and firing at the wainscot, as well as for the injury clone to his house by saying it was haunted, which prevented other tenants taking it."

Miss Molesworth died soon after " the haunted house '' was quitted, hastened out of the world, so people declared, by the severe measures to which she was subjected whilst she was an object of suspicion. At any rate, the house became quiet after the Captain and his family left it, and the persons who have since inhabited it, so it is said, have not experienced any repetitions of the disturbances.

ENFIELD CHACE.

Mr. T. Westwood, from whose most attractive com- munication to Notes and Queries on the subject of " Ghosts and Haunted Houses," an excerpt is made in another portion of this work, gives the following account of a most singular and, as far as our knowledge of such things extends, unique experience. According to Mr, Westwood's narrative, which no one has as yet appeared to question, he on one occasion was directly and personally " under ghostly influences," or what

ENFIELD CHACE* 77

appeared to be such. His story is, that a in a lonely neighbourhood on the verge of Ecfield Chace, stands an old house, much beaten by wind and weather. It was inhabited when I knew it," states Mr. Westwood, "by two elderly people, maiden sisters, with whom I had some acquaintance, and who once invited me to dine with them, and meet a circle of local guests. I well remember my walk thither. It led me up a steep ascent of oak avenue, openiDg out at the top on what was called the * ridge-road' of the Chace.

" It was the close of a splendid autumn afternoon* through the mossy boles of the great oaks I saw

. . . The golden autumn woodland reel Athwart the emoke of burning flowers . , ,

it

On reaching my destination, the sun had already dipped below the horizon, and the eastern front of the house projected a black shadow at its foot. What was there in the aspect of the pile that reminded me of the corpse described by the poet — the corpse that

Was calm and cold, as it did hold

Some secret, glorying ?

I crossed the threshold with repugnance.

" Having some changes to make in my attire, a servant led the way to an upper chamber, and left me No sooner was he gone than I became conscious of a peculiar sound in the room — a sort of shuddering sound in the room, as of suppressed dread. It seemed close to me. I gave little heed to it at first, setting it down for the wind in the chimney, or a

78 HAUNTED HOMES.

draught from the half open door ; but moving about the room, I perceived that the sound moved with me. Whichever way I turned it followed me. I went to the furthest extremity of the chamber — it was there also. Beginning to feel uneasy, and being quite unable to account for the singularity, I completed my toilet in haste, and descended to the drawing-room, hoping I should thus leave the uncomfortable sound behind me, but not so. It was on the landing, on the stair, it went down with me, alwavs the same sound of shudder- ing horror, faint, but audible, and always close at hand. Even at the dinner- table, when the conversation flagged, I heard it unmistakably several times, and so near, that, if there was an entity connected with it, we ivere tico on one cJiair. It seemed to be noticed by nobody else, but t ended by harassing and distressing me, and I was relieved to think that I had not to sleep in the house that night.

" At an early hour, several of the guests having far to go, the party broke up, and it was a satisfaction to me to breathe the fresh, wholesome air of the night, and feel rid at last of my shuddering incubus.

" When I saw my hosts again, it was under another and ttnhaunted roof. On my telling them what had occurred to me, they smiled and said it was perfectly true, but added they were so used to the sound it had ceased to perturb them. Sometimes, they said, it would be quiet for weeks, at others it followed them from room to room, from floor to floor, pertinaciously, as it had followed me. They could give me no explanation of

EPSOM : PITT PLACE. 79

the phenomenon. It was a sound., no more, and quite harmless.

"Perhaps so, hnt of what strange horror," demands Mr. Westwood, "not ended with life, but perpetuated in the limbo of invisible things, was that sound the exponent ? "

EPSOM: PITT PLACE.

The story of Lord Lyttleton's "warning," as it is termed, has been frequently told, and almost as fre- quently attempts have been made to explain it away. Up to the present time, however, it must be confessed that all the evidence, circumstantial though it be, is in favour of the original tellers of the tale. Well known though the story be, it must not be omitted from this collection.

Thomas, the second Lord Lyttleton, had long led a life of dissipation. As he lay in bed one night at Pitt Place, Epsom, he was awakened out of his sleep, according to his own account, by a noise like the fluttering of a bird about the curtains. On opening his eyes he saw the apparition of a woman, who was, it is generally supposed, Mrs. Amphlett, the mother of a lady he had seduced, and who had just died of a broken heart. Dreadfully shocked, he called out, "What do you want?"

80 HAUNTED HOMES.

" I have come to warn you of your death/' was the reply.

" Shall I not live two months ? " he asked.

"No; you will die within three days," was the response.

The following day Lord Lyttleton was observed to he much agitated in his mind, and when questioned as to the cause, informed several persons of the apparition. By the third day, which was a Saturday, he was observed to have grown very thoughtful, but he attempted to carry it off by saying to those about him, "Why do you look so grave ? Are you thinking about the ghost ? I am as well as ever I was in my life."

He invited company to dinner, doubtless expecting in the midst of society to get rid of unwelcome thoughts. In the evening he said to his guests, " A few hours more and I shall jockey the ghost." At eleven o'clock he retired to his bed-room, and after a time began to undress himself. Meanwhile his servant was preparing a rhubarb draught for him, according to custom; but, having nothing to mix it with, went out of the room for a spoon. By the time he returned Lord Lyttleton was getting into bed, but before the man could give him the draught, he reclined his head back on the pillow, fell into convulsions, and died. The servant's cries aroused the household, they hastened to his assistance, but it was useless, for all was over.

The sequel to this story is as singular, but is less generally known, although quite as well testified to, as reference to the preface to Croker's edition of Bosweli's

EPSOM : PITT PLACE. 81

Life of Johnson will show. Mr. Miles Peter Andrews, the intimate friend of Lord Lyttleton, lived at Dartford, about thirtv miles off. Mr. Andrews was entertaining a large company at his place, and expected a visit from Lord Lyttleton, whom he had just left, apparently in good health. Disturbed, however, by the impressive message he had received from the apparition, the noble- man, without giving Mr. Andrews any intimation of his intention, had determined to postpone his visit.

On the evening of the Saturday, Mr. Andrews finding Lord Lyttleton did not arrive, and feeling somewhat indisposed, retired to bed somewhat early, leaving one of his guests to do the honours of the supper-table on his behalf. He went to bed in a somewhat feverish condition, but had not been lying down long when the curtains at the foot of his bed were drawn open, and he beheld his friend standing before him, in a large- figured bed-gown which was always kept in the house for Lord Lyttleton's exclusive use. Mr. Andrews at once imagined that his friend had arrived alter he had retired to rest, as he had so positively promised to come that day, and knowing how fond the nobleman was of practical joking, cried out to him, "You are at some of your tricks ; go to bed, or I will throw something at you." The reply to which was " // 's all over with me* Andrews."

Still deeming it was Lord Lyttleton joking with him, Mr. Andrews stretched his arm out of the bed, and, seizing one of his slippers, the nearest thing he could get hold of, he flung it at the figure, which then retreated

6

82 HAUNTED HOMES.

to the dressing-room, whence there was no mean* of egress. Upon this Mr. Andrews jumped out of bed, intending to follow and punish his friend for startling him, hut could find nobody in that room, nor in his bed-room, the bolt of which was in its place. He rang his bell, and inquired of the servants where Lord Lyttle- tonwas; but no one had seen him, and the nightgown, when sought for, was found in its usual place. Mr. Andrews, getting annoyed, and unable to solve the mystery, ordered that no bed was to be given to the nobleman, who might find one at the inn for serving him such a trick.

The next morning, Mrs. Pigou, the guest who had headed Mr. Andrew's table when he retired, departed early for London, and on arriving there heard of Lord Lyttleton's death ; she sent an express to Dartford to inform Mr. Andrews, who, when he received the news, was so shocked that he swooned away, and, to use his own words, " was not his own man again, for three years."

EPWORTH PARSONAGE.

In 1716, the Rev. Samuel Wesley, father of the famous John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, was rector of Epworth, in Lincolnshire. During the months of December 1716, and January 1717, the parsonage was haunted in a most unpleasant fashion. The rector kept a diary in which the disturbances were recorded., and which eventually formed the basis of the narrative

\

EPWORTH PARSONAGE, 83

afterwards compiled by his well-known son, for the Arminian Magazine. This account, supplemented by personal inquiries, and carefully written statement of each member of the household, forms not only one of the most marvellous, but also one of the best authen- ticated cases of haunted houses on record. The famous Dr. Priestley, and the equally well-known Dr. Adam Clark, both furnish voluminous particulars of the affair, the latter devoting forty-six pages of his Memoirs of the Wesley Family to the narrative. In his Life of Wesley Southey, in reproducing the accounts of the mysterious disturbances, remarks that, " An author who, in this age, relates such a story and treats it as not utterly in- credible and absurd, must expect to be ridiculed ; but the testimony upon which it rests is far too strong to be set aside because of the strangeness of the relation."

It is needless to reproduce anything like a complete account of the disturbances at Epworth Parsonage, so the reader must be content to have in a somewhat abridged form the narrative drawn up by John Wesley, supplemented by a few additional data gathered from other equally reliable sources.

" On December 2, 1716," says John Wesley, " while Robert Brown, my father's servant, was sitting with one of the maids, a little before ten at night, in the dining- room which opened into the garden, they both heard someone knocking at the door. Robert rose and opened it, but could see nobody. Quickly it knocked again and groaned. ' It is Mr. Turpine,' said Robert, ' he used to groan so.' He opened the door again twice or thrice,

6 *

84 HAUNTED HOMES.

the knocking being twice or thrice repeated ; but still seeing nothing, and being a little startled, they rose up and went to bed. When Robert came to the top of the garret stairs, he saw a handmill, which was at a little distance, whirled about very swiftly. When he related this he said, ' Nought vexed me but that it was empty. I thought if it had been but full of malt he might have ground his hand out for me.' When he was in bed, he heard as it were the gobbling of a turkey-cock close to the bed-side, and soon after the sound of one stumbliug over his shoes and boots ; but there was none there, he had left them below. The next day he and the maid related these things to the other maid, who laughed heartily, and said, * What a couple of fools you are ! I defy anything to fright me ! ' After churning in the evening, she put the butter in the tray, and had no sooner carried it into the dairy than she heard a knock- ing on the shelf where several puncheons of milk stood, first above the shelf, then below. She took the candle and searched both above and below, but, being able to find nothing, threw down butter, tray, and all, and ran away for life.

"The next evening, between five and six o'clock, my sister Molly, then about twenty years of age, sitting in the dining-room reading, heard as if it were the door that led into the hall open, and a person walking in that seemed to have on a silk nightgown, rustling and trailing along. It seemed to walk round her, and then to the door, then round again ; but she could see nothing. She thought, 'It signifies nothing to run away; for,

EPWORTH PARSONAGE. 85

whatever it is, it can run faster than me.' So she rose, put her book under her arm, and walked slowly away. After supper, she was sitting with my sister Sukey (about a year older than her), in one of the chambers, and telling her what had happened. She made quite light of it, telling her, ' I wonder you are so easily frightened. I would fain see what would frighten me/ Presently a knocking began under the table. She took the candle and looked, but could find nothing. Then the iron casement began to clatter. Next the catcfc of the door moved up and down without ceasing. She started up, leaped into the bed without undressing, pulled the bed-clothes over her head, and never ventured to look up until next morning.

" A night or two after, my sister Hetty (a year younger than my sister Molly) was waiting as usual between nine and ten, to take away my father's candle, when she heard someone coming down the garret stairs, walking slowly by her, then going slowly down the best stairs, then up the back stairs and up the garret stairs, and at every step it seemed the house shook from top to bottom. Just then my father knocked, she went in, took his candle, and got to bed as fast as possible. In the morning she told it to my eldest sister, who told her, ' You know T believe none of these things ; pray let me take away the candle to-night, and I will find out the trick.' She accordingly took my sister Hetty's place, and had no sooner taken away the candle, than she heard a noise below. She hastened down-stairs to the hall, where the noise was, but it was then in the

86 HAUNTED HOMES.

kitchen. She ran into the kitchen, when it was drum* mins on the inside of the screen. When she went round it was drumming on the outside, and so always on the side opposite to her. Then she heard a knocking at the back kitchen door. She ran to it, unlocked it softly, and, when the knocking was repeated, suddenly opened it, but nothing was to be seen. As soon as- she had shut it, the knocking began again. She opened it again, but could see nothing. When she went to shut the door, it was violently knocked against her; but she set her knee and her shoulder to the door, forced it to, and turned the key. Then the knocking began again ; but she let it go on, and went up to bed. However, from that time she was thoroughly convinced that there was no imposture in the affair.

" The next morning, my sister telling my mother what had happened, she said, ' If I hear anything myself, I shall know how to judge.' Soon after she begged her mother to come into the nursery. She did, and heard, in the corner of the room, as it were the violent rocking of a cradle; but no cradle had been there for some years. She was convinced it was preter- natural, and earnestly prayed it might not disturb her in her own chamber at the hours of retirement; and it never did. She now thought it was proper to tell my father. But he was extremely angry, and said, * Sukey, I am ashamed of you. These boys and girls frighten one another ; but you are a woman of sense, and should know better. Let me hear of it no more.'

"At six in the evening he had family prayers as

EPWORTH PARSONAGE. 87

usual. When he began the prayer for the King, a knocking began all round the room, and a thundering knock attended the Amen. The same was heard from this time every morning and evening while the prayer for the King was repeated. As both my father and mother are now at rest, and incapable of being pained thereby, I think it my duty to furnish the serious reader with a key to this circumstance.

" The year before King William died, my father observed my mother did not say Amen to the prayer for the King. She said she would not, for she did not believe the Prince of Orange was King. He vowed he would never cohabit with her until she did. He then took his horse and rode away, nor did she hear anything of him for a twelvemonth. He then came back and lived with her as before. But I fear his vow was not forgotten before God."

" Being informed that Mr. Hoole, the vicar of Haxey," resumes John Wesley, " could give me some further information, I walked over to him. He said," referring to the bygone disturbances at Epworth Parson- age, " Robert Brown came over to me and told me your father desired my company ; when I came, he gave me an account of all that had happened, particularly the knock- ing during family prayer. But that evening (to my great satisfaction) we heard no knocking at all. But between nine and ten a servant came in and said, ' Old Jeffrey is coming (that was the name of one that had died in the house), for I hear the signal.' This, they informed me, was heard every night about a quarter before ten. It

88 fiAUNTEfc HOMES*

was towards the top of the Louse, on the outside, at the north-east corner, resembling the loud creaking of a saw, or rather that of a windmill, when tbe body of it is turned about in order to shift the sails to the wind. We then heard a knocking over our heads, and Mr. Wesley, catching up a candle, said, ' Come, Sir, now you shall hear for yourself.' We went up-stairs, he with much hope, and I (to say the truth) with much fear. When we came into the nursery, it was knocking in the next room : when we went there, it was knocking in the nursery; and there it continued to knock, though we came in, and particularly at the head of the bed (which was of wood) in which Miss Hetty and two of her younger sisters lay. Mr. Wesley, observing that they were much affected, — though asleep, sweating, and trembling exceeding, — was very angry, and, pulling out a pistol, was going to fire at the place whence the sound came. But I snatched him by the arm and said, ' Sir, you are convinced that this is something preternatural. If so, you cannot hurt it, but you give it power to hurt you.' He then went close to the place and said, sternly : ' Thou deaf and dumb devil ! why dost thou fright these children who cannot answer for them- selves I Come to me, in my study, that am a man ! ' Instantly it knocked his knock (the particular knock which he always used at the gate), as if it would shiver the board to pieces, and we heard nothing more that night."

Commenting upon this portion of the narrative, as furnished by the Kev. Mr. Hoole, John Wesley remarks :

EPWORTH PARSONAGE. 89

" Till this time my father had never heard the least disturbance in his study. But the next evening, as he attempted to go into his study (of which none had the key but himself), when he opened the door it was thrust back with such violence as had like to have thrown him down. However, he thrust the door open, and went in. Presently there was a knocking, first on one side, then on the other, and, after a time, in the next room, wherein my sister Nancy was. He went into that room, and, the noise continuing, adjured it to speak, but in vain. He then said, ' These spirits love darkness : put out the candle, and perhaps it will speak.' She did so, and he repeated the adjuration ; but still there was only knocking, and no articulate sound. Upon this he said, ' Nancy, two Christians are an overmatch for the devil. Go all of you down-stairs, it may be when I am alone he will have courage to speak.' When she was gone, a thought came into his head, and he said, * If thou art the spirit of my son Samuel, I pray knock three knocks, and no more.' Immediately all was silence, and there was no more knocking at all that night. I asked my sister Nancy (then fifteen years old), whether she was not afraid when my father used that adjuration. She answered she was sadly afraid it would speak when she put out the candle, but she was not at all afraid in the day-time, when it walked after her, only she thought when she was about her work, he might have clone it for her and saved her the trouble."

"By this time," continues John Wesley, "all my sisters were so accustomed to these noises, that they

90 HAUNTED HOMES.

gave them little disturbance. A gentle tapping at their bed-head usually began between nine and ten at night. They then commonly said to each other, * Jeffrey is coming; it is time to go to sleep.' And if they heard a noise in the day, and said to my youngest sister, ' Hark, Kezzy, Jeffrey is knocking above,' she would run upstairs, and pursue it from room to room, saying she desired no better diversion.

"My father and mother had just gone to bed/' says Wesley, citing another instance of these mysterious disturbances, " and the candle was not taken away, when they heard three blows, and a second and a third three, as it were with a large oaken staff, struck upon a chest which stood by the bedside. My father im- mediately arose, put on his nightgown, and, hearing great noises below, took the candle and went down ; my mother walked by his side. As they went down the broad stairs, they heard as if a vessel full of silver was poured upon my mother's breast and ran jingling down to her feet. Quickly after, there was a sound as if a large iron bell were thrown among many bottles under the stairs ; but nothing was hurt. Soon after, our large mastiff dog came, and ran to shelter himself between them. While the disturbances continued he used to bark and leap, and snap on one side and the other, and that frequently before any person in the room heard any noise at all. But after two or three days he used to tremble, and creep away before the noise began. And by this the family knew it was at hand ; nor did the observation ever fail.

EPWORTH PARSONAGE. 91

a

A little before my father and mother came into the hall," says Wesley, resuming the thread of his story, "it seemed as if a very large coal was violently thrown upon the floor, and dashed all in pieces ; but nothing was seen. Mv father then cried out, ' Sukev, do vou not hear ? all the pewter is thrown about the kitchen.' But when they looked all the pewter stood in its place. Then there was a loud knocking at the back door. My father opened it, but saw nothing. It was then at the front door. He opened that, but it was still lost labour, After opening first the one, then the other, several times, he turned and went up to bed. But the noises were so violent all over the house that he could not sleep till four in the morning.

" Several gentlemen and clergymen now earnestly advised my father," concludes Wesley, " to quit the house. But he constantly answered, 'No : let the devil flee from me ; I will never flee from the devil.' But he wrote to my eldest brother, at London, to come down. He was preparing so to do, when another letter came informing him the disturbances were over, after they had continued (the latter part of the time day and night), from the 2nd of December to the end of January."

The elder Wesley's diary fully confirms all the more remarkable portions of John Wesley's Narrative, and even mentions some curious incidents not given by the son : for instance, the Rev. Samuel says, " I have been thrice pushed by an invisible power, once against the corner of my desk in the study, a second time against the door of the matted chamber, a third time against

I

92 HAUNTED HOMES.

the right side of the frame of my study-door, as I was going in."

On the 25th December he records, " Our mastiff came whining to us, as he did always after the first night of its coming ; for then he barked violently at it, but was silent afterwards, and seemed more afraid than any of the children/'

John Wesley, also, received several lengthy letters from various members of the family, corroborating the various details already given, but these communications are too lengthy to cite, besides being frequently but repetitions of the same, or similar stories. From a letter written by Emily Wesley (afterwards Mrs. Harper), some extracts, however, may be given. " A whole month was sufficient to convince anybody," she writes, " of the reality of the thing. ... I shall only tell you what I myself heard, and leave the rest to others.

" My sisters in the paper-chamber had heard noises, and told me of them, but I did not much believe till one night, about a week after the first groans were heard, which was the beginning. Just after the clock struck ten, I went down-stairs to lock the doors, which I always do. Scarce had T got up the west stairs, when I heard a noise like a person throwing down a vast coal in the middle of the fore kitchen. I was not much frighted, but went to my sister Sukey, and we together went all over the lower rooms, but there was nothing out of order. Our dog was fast asleep, and our only cat in the other end of the house. No sooner was I got up- stairs and undressing for bed, but I heard a noise

EPWORTH PARSONAGE. 93

. . . This made me hasten to bed. But my sister, Hetty, who sits always to wait on my father, going to bed, was still sitting on the lowest step of the garret stairs, the door being shut at her back, when, soon after, there came down the stairs behind her something like a man in a loose night-gown trailing after him, which made her fly rather than run to me in the nursery." Emily Wesley, the writer of these words, it may be added, appeared to believe herself followed by this manifestation through life. When writing to her brother John, thirty-four years after the Epworth disturbances had taken place, she alludes to " that wonderful thing called by us Jeffrey " as calling upon her before any extraordinary new affliction.

In summing up the general circumstances attendant upon the disturbances in their household, John Wesley remarks :

" Before it came into any room, the latches were fre- quently lifted up, the windows clattered, and whatever iron or brass was about the chamber rung and jarred exceedingly. -

" When it was in any room, let them make what noise they would, as they sometimes did, its dead hollow note would be clearly heard above them all.

" The sound very often seemed in the air in trhe middle of a room ; nor could they ever make any such themselves, by any contrivance.

"It never came by day till my mother ordered the born to be blown. After that time scarce anyone could go from one room into another but the latch

94 HAUNTED HOMES.

of the room they went to was lifted up before they touched it.

" It never came into my father's study till he talked to it sharply, calling 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 anything to say to him.

" From the time of my mother desiring it not to disturb her from five to six, it was never heard in her chamber from five till she came down-stairs, nor at anv other time when she was employed in devotion."

No satisfactory explanation of these remarkable cir- cumstances has ever, so far as we can discover, been afforded.

ESHER.

Miss Anna Maria Porter, the authoress, and, sister of the still better known writer, Jane Porter, authoress of The Scottish Chiefs, at one period of her life resided at Esher, in Surrey. An aged gentleman of her acquaintance, who lived in the same place, was accus- tomed to visit at her house almost daily, generally making his appearance in the evening, when he would take a cup of tea and read the paper.

One evening Miss Porter saw.him enter the room as usual, and seat himself at the table, but without saying a word. She addressed some remark to him, but received no reply, and, after a few seconds, was surprised

ETON. 95

to see him rise and leave the room without uttering a word.

Fearing that he might have been taken ill suddenly, Miss Porter sent a servant to his house to make inquiries. She sent at once, but the answer the servan!- brought back was that the old gentleman had died suddenly about an hour before.

Miss Anna Maria, it is avowed, believed that she had seen an apparition, and was herself the authority for this story.

ETON.

Several writers of a past generation, including Joseph Glanvill. were fond of relating the story of Major Sydenham and his friend, Captain William Dyke, but it appears to have escaped the researches of modern commentators on the Supernatural. Shortly after the death of Major Sydenham, Dr. Thomas Dyke called on his cousin, Captain William Dyke, of Skilgate, in the county of Somersetshire, and agreed to pass the night with him. At the captain's request, Dr. Dyke agreed to sleep in the same bed with his cousin, but previous to composing himself to sleep, the Doctor was aroused by his companion calling up a servant and bidding the man bring him two of the largest candles he could obtain, and have them lighted.

The Doctor naturally inquired what these were

96 HAUNTED HOMES.

intended for, to which the Captain answered: — "You know, cousin, what disputes the Major and I have had touching the immortality of the soul, on which point we could never yet be resolved, though we so much desired it. And, therefore, it was at length fully agreed between us, that he who died first should, the third night after his funeral, between the hours of twelve and one, come to the little house which is here in the garden, and there give a full account touching these matters to the survivor, who should be sure to be present there at the set time, and so receive a full satisfaction. And this," says the Captain, " is the very night, and I am come on purpose to my present lodging to fulfil my promise."

The Doctor advised him not to follow strange counsels, for which he could have no warrant. The Captain replied, " that he had solemnly engaged," and that nothing should discourage him ; and added, " that if the Doctor should wake awhile with him, he would shake him, if not, he might compose himself to rest ; but, for his own part, he was resolved to watch, that he might be sure to be present at the hour appointed." To that purpose he set his watch by him, and as soon as he perceived that it was half an hour past eleven, he arose, and taking a candle in each hand, went out by a back door, of which he had before got the key, and walked into the garden house, where he continued two hours and a half. At his return he declared he had neither seen nor heard anything more than usual. "But I know," said he, " that the Major would sureiy nay$ come had he been able."

ETON. 97

About six weeks after, the Captain rode to Eton, to place his son a scholar there, when the Doctor went thither with him. They lodged at the sign of the " Christopher," and tarried two or three nights, not lying together njw, as before at Dulverton,but in two several chambers. The morning before they went away, the Captain stayed in his chamber longer than usual, before he called the Doctor. At length he came into the chamber, but with his body shaking and trembling. Whereat the Doctor, wondering, presently demanded, " What is the matter ? " The Captain replied, " I have seen the Major." The Doctor seeming to smile, the Captain said, " If ever I saw him in my life, I saw him but now," and then related to the Doctor what had passed. " This morning, after it was light,*' said he, u one came to my bedside, and suddenly drawing back the curtains, called, ' Captain ! Captain ! ' To whom I replied, ' What, Major ? ' To which he returned, 'I could not come at the time appointed, but I am now come to tell you, That there is a God, and a very just and terrible one, and if you do not turn over a new leaf (the very expression the Doctor punctually remembered) you shall find it so.* " The Captain pro- ceeded : — " On the table there lay a sword which the Major had formerly given me, and after the apparition had walked a turn or two about the chamber, he took up the sword, drew it, and finding it not so bright as it ought to be, cried, c Captain ! Captain ! this sword did not use to be kept after this manner when it was mine*' After which he presently disappeared."

7

9S HAUNTED HOMES.

The Captain was not only thoroughly persuaded of the truth of what he had seen and heard, but was from that time observed to have become quite an altered man. And it was judged, by those who were well acquainted with his conversation, that the remembance of this passage stuck close to him ; and that those words of his dead friend were frequently sounding in his ears during the remainder of his life ; which was something more than two years.

GLAMIS CASTLE.

One of our ancient castles that has long had a reputa- tion for the hauntings and the apparitions that trouble it is Glamis or Glammis Castle, in Forfarshire, the seat of Lord Strathmore. Although the whole pile of buildings appears to suffer under the ban, there is one particular chamber which is especially known as "the Haunted Room." Access to this ominous chamber is said to be now cut off by a stone wall, and none are supposed to be acquainted with its locality save Lord Strathmore, his heir, and the factor of the estate. This wall is alleged to have been erected some few years ago by order of the late proprietor, in consequence of certain mysterious sights and sounds which he had both seen and heard.

"There is no doubt," writes a correspondent of Dr. Lee, " about the reality of the noises at Glamis Castle. Oh one occasion, some years ago, the head of the family.

GLAMIS CASTLE. 09

with several companions, was determined to investigate the cause. One night, when the disturbance was greater, and more violent and alarming than usual — and, it should be premised, strange, weird, and unearthly sounds had often been heard, and by many persons, some quite unacquainted with the ill-repute of the the castle — his lordship went to the Haunted Eoom, opened the door with a key, and dropped back in a dead swoon into the arms of hjs companions; nor could he ever be induced to open his lips on the subject after- wards."

A well-known antiquary furnishes the following local legend connected with the old stronghold, to account for the sights and noises heard about it. He states that the tradition is that in olden time, during one of the constant feuds between the Lindsays and the Ogilvies, a number of the latter clan, flying from their enemies, came to Glamis Castle and begged hospitality of the owner. He did not like to deny them the shelter of his castle walls, and therefore admitted them, but, on the plea of hiding them, so it is averred, he secured them all in a large out-of-the-way chamber — that afterwards known as the haunted one — and there left them to starve. Their bones lie there till this day, according to the common tradition, their bodies never having been removed. It has been suggested that it was the sight of these which so startled the late Lord Strathmore on entering the room, and which caused him, subsequently, to have it walled up. The scene is believed to have been particularly horrifying, some of the unfortunate

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captives having died apparently in the act of gnawing the flesh from their arms.

Thus much for the tradition that accounts for the weird disturbances which, if Dr. Lee's correspondent may he credited, were still in a state of activity not very long ago. Among other strange instances, the writer states that " on one occasion a lady and her child were staying for a few days at the castle. The child was asleep in an adjoining dressing-room, and the lady, having gone to bed, lay awake for awhile. Suddenly a cold blast stole into the room, extinguishing the night-light by her bedside, but not affecting the one in the dressing-room beyond, in which her child had its cot. By that light she saw a tall mailed figure pass into the dressing-room from that in which she was lying. Immediately there- after there was a shriek from the child. Her maternal instinct was aroused. She rushed into the dressing- room and found the child in an agony of fear. It described what it had ssen as a giant, who came and leant over its face."

We are unable to learn when this disturbing appa- rition appeared, but it is to be hoped not since Lord Strathmore had the Haunted Boom walled up ; that, it is most devoutly to be hoped, shut in all unpleasant sights, even if it could not quite suppress the sounds,

ji p ii « ;«^*—

GLASGOW HELL CLUB. 101

GLASGOW : THE HELL CLUB.

There is a somewhat well-known story, of an extremely startling character, related by Mrs. Crowe, under the title of the " Glasgow Hell Club," in that chapter of The Night Side of Nature styled " The Future that Awaits us." The story, notwithstanding its sensationalism, is declared to be a relation of facts, of which a contemporary account was published, but was bought up by the family of the chief actor in the drama. As usual in such cases, a few copies escaped destruction, and the narrative was reprinted and widely diffused. Mrs. Crowe's version of this " undoubted and well attested fact," is as follows: — " Some ninety years ago, there flourished in Glasgow a club of young men, which, from the extreme pro- fligacy of its members and the licentiousness of their orgies, wras commonly called the ' Hell Club.' Besides these nightly or weekly meetings, they held one grand annual saturnalia, in which each tried to excel the other in drunkenness and blasphemy ; and on these occasions there was no star amongst them whose lurid light was more conspicuous than that of young Mr. Archibald B., who, endowed with brilliant talents and a handsome person, had held out great promise in his boyhood, and raised hopes, which had been com- pletely frustrated by his subsequent reckless dissi- pations.

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" One morning, after returning from this annual festival, Mr. Archibald B., having retired to bed, dreamt the following dream : —

" He fancied that he himself was mounted on a favourite black horse that he alwavs rode, and that he was proceeding towards his own house, then a country seat embowered by trees, and situated upon a hill, now entirely built over and forming part of the city, when a stranger, whom the darkness of night prevented his distinctly discerning, suddenly seized his horse's reins, saying, * You must go with me ! '

" ( And who are you?' exclaimed the young man, with a volley of oaths, whilst he struggled to free himself.

'"That you will see by and by,' returned the other, in a tone that excited unaccountable terror in the youth, who, plunging his spurs into his horse, attempted to fly. But in vain : however fast the animal flew, the stranger was still beside him, till at length, in his desperate efforts to escape, the rider was thrown, but instead of being dashed to the earth, as he expected, he found himself falling — falling — foiling still, as if sinking into the bowels of the earth.

"At length, a period being put to this mysterious descent, he found breath to inquire of his companion, who was still beside him, whither they were going : * Where am I ? where are you taking me ? ' he ex- claimed.

" ' To hell ! ' replied the stranger, and immediately

GLASGOW HELL CLUB. 103

interminable echoes repeated the fearful sound, ' To hell ! to hell ! to hell ! '

"At length a light appeared, which soon increased to a blaze ; but instead of the cries and groans, and lamentiugs the terrified traveller expected, nothing met his ear but sounds of music, mirth and jollity; and he found himself at the entrance of a superb building, far exceeding any he had seen constructed by human hands. Within, too, what a scene! No amusement, employment, or pursuit of man on earth, but was here being carried on with a vehemence that excited his unutterable amazement. ' There the young and lovely still swam through the mazes of the giddy dance ! There the panting steed still bore his brutal rider through the excitement of the goaded race ! There, over the midnight bowl, the intemperate still drawled out the wanton song or maudlin blasphemy ! The gambler plied for ever his endless game, and the slaves of Mammon toiled through eternity their bitter task ; whilst all the magnificence of earth paled before that which now met his view ! '

" He soon perceived that he was amongst old acquaintances whom he knew to be dead, and each, he observed, was pursuing the object, whatever it was, that had formerly engrossed him ; when, finding himself relieved of the presence of his unwelcome conductor, he ventured to address his former friend, Mrs. D., whom he saw sitting as had been her wont on earth, absorbed at loo, requesting her to rest from the game, and intro duce him to the pleasures of the place, which appeared

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to him to be very unlike what he had expected and, indeed, an extremely agreeable one. But with a cry of agony, she answered, that there was no rest in hell; that they must ever toil on at those very pleasures; and innumerable voices echoed through the interminable vaults, ' There is no rest in hell ! ' Whilst, throwing open their vest, each disclosed in his bosom an ever- burning flame ! These, they said, were the pleasures of hell ; their choice on earth was now their inevitable doom ! In the midst of the horror this scene inspired, his conductor returned, and, at his earnest entreaty, restored him again to earth ; but as he quitted him, he said, ' Remember ; in a year and a day we meet again ! '

" At this crisis of his dream the sleeper awoke feverish and ill ; and whether from the effects of the dream, or of his preceding orgies, he was so unwell as to be obliged to keep his bed for several days, during which period he had time for many serious reflections, which terminated in a resolution to abandon the club and his licentious companions altogether.

" He was no sooner well, however, than they flocked around him, bent on recovering so valuable a member of their society ; and having wrung from him a confession of the cause of his defection, which, as may be supposed, appeared to them eminently ridiculous, they soon con- trived to make him ashamed of his good resolutions. He joined them again, resumed his former course of life, and when the annual saturnalia came round, he found himself with his glass in his hand, at the table, when

GEAYEIGG HALL. 105

the president, rising to make the accustomed speech, began by saying, ' Gentlemen : this being leap-year it is a year and a day since our last anniversary,' &c. &c. The words struck upon the young man's ear like a knell ; but ashamed to expose his weakness to the jeers of his companions, he sat out the feast, plying himself with wine even more liberally than usually, in order to drown his intrusive thoughts ; till, in the gloom of a winter's morning he mounted his horse to ride home. Some hours afterwards, the horse was found with his saddle and bridle on, quietly grazing by the road-side, about half-way between the city and Mr. B's house; whilst a few yards off lay the corpse of his master."

Comment on this weird tale is needless on our part, unless it be to remark that it would "point a moral" in a far more emphatic manner were the real names given of the young man whose fate is supposed to be described.

GRAYBIGG HALL.

In Duchetiana it is stated by Sir G. B. Duckett, that not a vestige remains of those extensive foundations which, a hundred years ago, attested the solidity and importance of the Westmoreland Ducketts' residence, the Manor House known formerly as Grayrigg Hall. A strange story is told of the last member of this opulent family, who inhabited this line old English

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mansion ere it was dismantled. The narrative has been detailed with great similarity in various works, such as Ferguson's Early Cumberland and Westmoreland Friends, and Backhouse's Life of Hoivgill, and is popularly known as " The Quaker's Curse and its Ful- filment."

Francis Howgill, a noted member of the Society of Friends, resided at Todthorne, near Grayrigg, in Westmoreland, about the middle of the seven- teenth centurv. At one time he travelled about the south of England preaching, and when he visited Bristol, in company with his compatriot, John Oamm, his preaching was made the occasion of great rioting. In 1663 he returned to his own neighbourhood, whither his reputation had apparently preceded him, for, upon arriving at the market-place of Kendal, he was summoned to appear before the Justices, who were holding a court in a tavern. They tendered Howgill the oath of allegiance when he came before them, and as he refused to take it they committed him to con- finement in Appleby jail. It may be pointed out, as a matter of history, that in the earliest days of the brotherhood, members of the Society of Friends were often subjected to severe penalties and much persecution for their refusal to conform to the taking of judicial oaths. At Appleby the judges of Assizes also tendered Howgill the same oath and, on his refusal to swear it, ordered him to be indicted at the next Assizes. Mean- while they offered to release him from custody if he would give a bond for his good behaviour in the interim,

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but this he refused to do, and therefore was re-com- mitted to prison.

During his imprisonment a curious incident happened. Howgill was allowed by the magistrates to go home to Grayrigg for a few days on private affairs, and in the course of the time he was at liberty the Quaker felt himself compelled to # visit a justice of the name of Duckett, residing at Grayrigg Hall, who was a great persecutor of the Quakers, and was, also, one of the magistrates concerned in committing him to prison. Francis Howgill, on this occasion, was accompanied by a friend who, over the initials " J. D." would appear to have left a written report of the interview. Justice Duckett expressed much surprise at seeing Howgill, and said to him, " What is your wish now, Francis ? I thought you had been in Appleby jail." Howgill replied to this effect, " No, I am not, but I am come with a message from the Lord. Thou hast persecuted the Lord's people, but His hand is now against thee, and He will send a blast upon all that thou hast, and thy name shall rot out of the earth, and this thy dwelling shall become desolate, and a habitation for owls and jackdaws." When Howgill had delivered this message, the Justice trembled, and said, " Francis, are you in earnest ? " To which Howgill responded, "Yes, I am in earnest, it is the word of the Lord to thee, and there are many now living who will see it."

This prediction by the Quaker appears to have been remarkably fulfilled ; for, according to the testimony of James Wilson, who was a minister among the Friends,

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and who lived at one time at Grayrigg Foot, in West4 moreland, this Justice Duckett had several children, and all those children died without leaving any issue, whilst some of them came to poverty. James Wilson himself had repeatedly given alms at his door to a woman, the last of the Duckett family, who hegged her bread from door to door. Grayrigg Hall passed into the posses- sion of the Lowther family, was dismantled, fell into ruins, and in 1777 little more than its extensive founda- tions were visible. After having long been the habita- tion of " owls and jackdaws," the ruins were entirely removed, and a farmhouse erected upon the site of the old Hall. And thus the Quaker's curse was fulfilled.

HAOKWOOD HOUSE.

In April, 1862, one of those stories of haunted houses, which are continually " cropping up," both in print and in private conversation, went the usual round of the press. The London correspondent of Saunders's News Letter, having read the comments of his contemporaries, told the tale in his own fashion, as below. It should be

premised that the " Mr. E " of the story is Mr.

Henry Phillip Eoche, the friend of Lord Weslbury, and, thanks to that friendship, was by him appointed one of the Eegistrars of the London Court of Bankruptcy. " Eeally, what with Mr. Home, Mr. Forster, and Sir

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Bulwer Lytton's Strange Story" says the correspondent, "London Society seems just now affected with a general phantom mania. The last new phase of the malady is a ghost story which has lately obtained extensive currency in what are called the ' upper circles/ and which claims for its believers two counsel learned in the law, and the Lord High Chancellor himself. I don't pretend to vouch that the story can pretend to the ' ghost' of a foundation for its existence, I merely testify that it is being talked of by ' everybody,' and that the first question asked at most dinner-tables is, ' Have you heard of Lord Westbury's ghost ? '

" The story runs thus : — Lord Westbury lately pur- chased Hackwood House, an old mansion near Basing- stoke, the property of Lord Bolton. Snatching a spare day or two to obtain a more minute inspection of his investment, he took with him two of the gentlemen belonging to his official establishment, both members of the learned profession. On separating for the night,

the bedroom destined for one of them, a Mr. R ,

was found to be on the opposite side of the hall to those of the other gentlemen ; he therefore shook hands and said ' good-night' in the hall, leaving the others talking there. He had not been very long asleep before he 1 felt' himself awoke, but could neither hear nor perceive anything. By degrees, however, he became conscious of something luminous on the side of the room opposite his bed, which gradually assumed the appearance of a woman clothed in grey. He at first thought it was an optical illusion, next that his companions were playing

110 HAUNTED HOMES.

him some phosphoric trick, and then, turning round, he composed himself to sleep again.

'• Further on in the night he was awoke again, and then at once he saw the same figure brilliantly conspi- cuous on the wall. Whilst he was gazing at it, it seemed to leave the wall and advance into the middle of the apartment. He immediately jumped out of bed, rushed to it, and, of course, found — nothing. He was so im- pressed with the power of the delusion, that he found it impossible to seek any more sleep, and, as the day was beginning to break, he dressed and made his way into the grounds, where he walked for some time, pondering over the illusion so forcibly produced upon him.

" On his return to his room he wrote out an exact account of what he thought he had seen, it being then quite clear to him that it was no trick played by others, but simply an hallucination of his own brain. At the breakfast-table, however, he began to fancy that he had been cleverly imposed on by his friends, as they com- menced at once bantering him on his night's rest, broken sleep, and so forth Wishing to detect them if possible, he pretended unconsciousness and utter ignorance of their meaning, when, to his horror, one of them exclaimed, ' Come, come, don't think we didn't see one of the women in grey follow you into your room last night.' He rushed up-stairs, produced his written account, which he gave them to read, and the conster- nation became general. On inquiry, of course, they found the legend of a murder done in the days of yore, and ths Lord Chancellor is supposed to be exceedingly

HANLEY. Ill

vexed at an incident which has decidedly shut up one room in his house for ever, if not, in all probability, tabooed the mansion altogether. Thus much do the ' upper ten thousand ' aver — how truly is quite another question."

HANLEY.

In August, 18G4, the Spiritual Magazine, published an account stated to have been related to the Stafford- shire Sentinel in the previous year, of an apparition that had appeared to Mr. William Ridgway, a well- known pottery owner, of Hanley, Staffordshire. It is a curious circumstance that the manufacturer should have concealed the story from all his family and friends, and, after so many years of silence, have revealed it to an apparent stranger. The editor of the newspaper in question does not, and, of course, in the circum- stances, cannot produce any corroborative evidence of Mr. Ridgway's belief that he had seen the apparition of his deceased mother, nor does he state why the story was held back until three months after Mr. Ridg- way's death. However, it is not our present purpose to question the editor's narrative but to cite it.

" For many years the family of the Ridgways," remarks our authority, " have held a high and influential position in the commercial world. Their name will go down to

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posterity as promoters of the beautiful art which gives wealth and fame to the Staffordshire potteries. William was in partnership with his elder brother, John, and was esteemed for his manly courage, untiring energy, and great probity of character ; no man doubted the word of William Ridgway ; it is, therefore, of great value in the support of the belief in and reality of appari- tions to have the testimony of such a man, and I am able to give a well-authenticated story from the columns of the Staffordshire Sentinel, where a memoir of this much-respected gentleman appeared, about the time of his death in April last. The story is thus related: —

" The two brothers became partners with their father at the same time, when Mr. William was twenty-one years' old, and on equal terms, and their own partner- ship continued many years after his death.

"Immediately after this event they had a dispute which of the two should have the paternal mansion. Mr. John maintained the right of the elder^ Mr. William the claim of an increasing family. The controversy threatened to culminate in a quarrel, when, about ten o'clock on a light evening, William beheld the apparition of his deceased mother, near to the side of the entrance of the house.

" The appearance was perfect as life, and she addressed him audibly and distinctly, saying, ' William, my dear, let your brother have the house, and God will make it right with you.' The next morning he simply said to his brother. 'John, you shall have the house.* But he never divulged the reason why h3 said this,

fifiANOR. 113

etther to his brother, or his wife, or to any human being, until he related it to us in the month, of June J8G3.

"The superstitious may regard this statement in one aspect, and the philosophical in another, but all must admit that its truth is simply a question of credibility. No one would doubt Mr. Ridgway's word, and few will believe that the eyes and ears of the then young man were deceived by an illusion. Happily, the friendship of the two brothers was uninterrupted, and it continued unbroken through life."

HEANOR, DERBYSHIRE.

In that remarkable work, Footfalls on the Boundary of Another World, Robert Dale Owen publishes an interesting account of an apparition, supposed to have appeared about the time of the death of tl.e person it represented. This account was supplied by Mr. Wil- liam Howitt, the well-known author, it having happened in his own family ; and in accordance with our usual custom of giving as nearly as possible the original narrator's own words — the only proper course in such cases — the story referred to above shall be told as Mr. Howitt tells it in his letter dated Higbgate, March 28, 1859.

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" The circumstance you desire to obtain from me is one which I have many times heard related by my mother. It was an event familiar to our family and the neighbourhood, and is connected with my earliest memories ; having occurred about the time of my birth, at my father's house at Heanor, Derbyshire, where I was born.

'My mother's family name, Tantum, is an uncommon one, which I do not recollect to have met with except in a story of Miss Leslie's. My mother had two brothers, Francis and Richard. The younger, Richard, I knew well, for he lived to an old age. The elder, Francis, was, at the time of the occurrence I am about to report, a gay young man, about twenty, unmarried, handsome, frank, affectionate, and extremely beloved by all classes throughout that part of the country. He is described, in that age of powder and pig-tails, as wearing his auburn hair flowing in ringlets on his shoulders, like another Absolom, and was much admired, as well for his personal grace as for the life and gaietv of his manners.

" One fine calm afternoon my mother, shortly after a confinement, but perfectly convalescent, was lying in bed, enjoying from her window the sense of summer beauty and repose ; a bright sky above, and the quiet village before her. In this state she was gladdened by hearing footsteps, which she took to be those of her brother Frank, as he was familiarly called, approaching the chamber door. The visitor knocked and entered. The foot of the bed was towards the door, and the

HEANOR. 115

curtains at the foot, notwithstanding the season, were drawn, to prevent any draught. Her brother parted them, and looked in upon her. His gaze was earnest and destitute of its usual cheerfulness, and he spoke not a word. ' My dear Frank,' said my mother, ' how glad I am to see you! Come round to the bedside, I wish to have some talk with you.'

" He closed the curtains, as if complying ; but instead of doing so, my mother, to her astonishment, heard him leave the room, close the door behind him, and begin to descend the stairs. Greatlv amazed, she hastilv rang, and when her maid appeared she bade her call her brother back. The girl replied that she had not seen him enter the house. But my mother insisted, saying, * He was here but this instant, run ! Quick ! Call him back ! I must see him ! '

" The girl hurried away, but, after a time, returned, saying that she could learn nothing of him anywhere ; nor had anyone in or about the house seen him either enter or depart.

*'f Now, my father's house stood at the bottom of the village, and close to the high road, which was quite straight ; so that anyone passing along it must have been seen for a much longer period than had elapsed. The girl said she had looked up and down the road, then searched the garden, a large, old-fashioned one, with shady walks; but neither in the garden nor on the road was he to be seen. She had inquired at the nearest cottages in the village, but no one had noticed him pass.

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" My mother, though a very pious woman, was far from superstitious; yet the strangeness of this cir- cumstance struck her forcibly. While she lay ponder- ing upon it, there was heard a sudden running and excited talking in the village street. My mother listened, it increased, though up to that time the village had been profoundly still ; and she became convinced that something very unusual had occurred. Again she rang the bell, to inquire the cause of the disturbance. This time it was the monthly nurse who answered it. She sought to tranquillize my mother, as a nurse usually does a patient. ' Oh, it is nothing particular, ma'am,' she said, ' some trifling affair,' which she pretended to relate, passing lightly over the particulars. But her ill-suppressed agitation did not escape my mother's eye. ' Tell me the truth,' she said, ' at once. I am certain something very sad has happened.' The woman still equivocated, greatly fearing the effect upon my mother in her then situation; and at first the family joined in the attempt at concealment. Finally, however, my mother's alarm and earnest entreaties drew from them the terrible truth that her brother had just been stabbed at the top of the village and killed on the spot.

" The melancholy event had thus occurred. My uncle, Francis Tantum, had been dining at Shipley Hall with Mr. Edward Miller Mundy, Member of Parliament for the county. Shipley Hall lay off to the left of the village as you looked up the main street from my father's house, and about a mile distant from it ; while

HEANOR. 117

Heanor Fall, my uncle's residence, was situated to the right; the road from the one country seat to the other crossing nearly at right angles the upper portion of the village street, at a point where stood one of the two village inns, the ' Admiral Rodney,' respectably kept by the widow H ks. I remember her well — a tall, fine- looking woman, who must have been handsome in her youth, and who retained, even past middle age, an air superior to her condition. She had one only child, a son, then scarcely twenty. He was a good-looking, brisk, young fellow, and bore a very fair character. He must, however, as the event showed, have been of a very hasty temper.

"Francis Tantum, riding home from Shipley Hall after the early country dinner of that day, somewhat elated, it may be, with wine, stopped at the widow's inn, and bade the son bring him a glass of ale. As the latter turned to obey, my uncle, giving the youth a smart switch across the back with his riding-whip, cried out, in his lively joking way, ' Now, be quick, Dick ; be quick ! '

" The young man, instead of receiving the playful stroke as a jest, took it as an insult. He rushed into the house, snatched up a carving-knife, and darting back into the street, stabbed my uncle to the heart as he sat on his horse, so that he fell dead, on the instant, in the road.

" The sensation tnrougnoui tne quiet village may be imagined. The inhabitants, who idolised the murdered man, were prevented from taking summary vengeance

113 HAUNTED HOMES.

on the homicide only by the constables carrying him off to the office of the nearest magistrate.

"Young H ks was tried at the next Derby

Assizes ; but (justly, no doubt, taking into view the sudden irritation caused by the blow) he was convicted of manslaughter only ; and, after a few months im- prisonment, returned to the village ; where, notwith- standing the strong popular feeling against him, he continued to keep the inn, even after his mother's death. He is still present to my recollection, a quiet, retiring man, never guilty of any other irregularity of conduct, and seeming to bear about with him the constant memory of his rash deed — a silent blight upon his life.

" So great was the respect entertained for my uncle, and such the deep impression of his tragic end, that so long as that generation lived the church bells of the village were regularly tolled on the anniversary of his death.

" On comparing the circumstances and the exact time at which each occurred, the fact was substantiated that the apparition presented itself to my mother almost instantly after her brother had received tho fdial stroke.**

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HEREFORD.

The Rev. Dr. Bretton, towards the close of his career appointed rector of Ludgaf.e, early in life held a living in Hereford. He had married a daughter of Dr. Santer, a lady well known for her piety and virtue, but who died and left an infant to her husband's care. The child was entrusted to the charge of an old servant of Mrs. Bretton, who had since married, and who nursed it in her own cottage, near the doctor's residence. The story, which has often been related in various collections and in different ways, according to the original account, states that one day when the woman was nursing the infant, the door of her cottage was opened, and a lady entered so exactly resembling the late Mrs. Bretton in dress and appearance, that she exclaimed, " If my mistress were not dead, I should think you were she ! " Whereupon, the apparition told her she was so, and requested her to go with her, as she had business of importance to communicate. Alice objected, being very much frightened, and entreated her to address herself rather to Dr. Bretton ; but Mrs. B. answered, that she had, endeavoured to do so, and had, been several times in his room for that purpose, but he was still asleep, and she had no power to do more towards awaketiing him than once uncover his feet, Alice then pleaded that she had nobody to leave with her child ; but Mrs. B. promising that the child should sleep till her return,

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she at length obeyed the summons, and having accom- panied the apparition into a large field, the latter bade her observe how much she measured off with her feet, and having taken a considerable compass, she made her go and tell her brother that all that portion had been wrongfully taken from the poor by their father, and that he must restore it to them, adding, that she was the more concerned about it, since her name had been used in the transaction. Alice then asking how she should satisfy the gentleman of the truth of her mission, Mrs. B. mentioned to her some circumstances known only to herself and this brother ; she then entered into much discourse with the woman, and gave her a great deal of good advice, till, hearing the sound of horse-bells, she said, " Alice, I must be seen by none but yourself/' and then disappeared.

When the apparition had gone away the servant pro- ceeded to the residence of her master, and acquainted him with what had occurred. Dr. Bretton admitted that he had actually heard someone walking about in his room in a way that he could not account for, as no one was visible. He then mentioned the matter to his brother, who laughed heartily at it, until Alice communicated to him the secret which she was com- missioned to reveal to him : upon hearing it he changed his tone, and declared himself ready to make the resti- tution required. Dr. Bretton, it may be remarked, never made any secret of the affair, but discussed it freely with many persons.

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HENHOW COTTAGE.

An account of a haunted neighbourhood, as described in 3. Sullivan's Cumberland and Westmoreland, illus- trates either the long term of years apparitions are doomed to haunt the scenes of their former life, or the tenacity of tradition. Sullivan, referring to other pre- vious cases of supernatural troubles it had been his lot to record, remarks, that if some incredulous individuals may consider the evidence already proffered unsatis- factory, they should investigate that of the Henhow spectre, " the truth of which they may ascertain by a little inquiry." This particular case, he remarks, happened about twenty-three years ago, and the man to whom the spectre appeared lived in Martindale, at a cottage called "Henhow." His wife had heard some unaccountable noises in or around the house, and in- formed her husband, but no further notice was taken. One morning he had to go to his work at an early hour and, having several miles to walk, he started soon after midnight. He had not got above two hundred yards: from the house, when the dog by which he was accom- panied gave signs of alarm. He looked round —at the other side of the wall that bounded the road, appeared a woman, keeping pace with him, and carrying a child in her arms. There was no means of escape; he spoke to the figure, and asked her what "was troubling her." Then ghe told him her story. She had once lived at Henhow,

122 HAUNTED HOMES.

and had been seduced. Her seducer, to cloak his guilt and her frailty, met her by appointment at a certain market town, and gave her a medicine, the purpose of which is obvious. It proved too potent, and killed both mother and child. Her doom was to wander thus for a hundred years, forty of which were already expired. On his return home at night, the man told what he had seen and heard, and when the extraordinary story spread through the dale, the " old wives " were enabled to recall some almost forgotten incidents precisely identical with those related by the apparition. The seducer was known to be a clergyman. <c The occurrence is believed to have made a lasting impression on the old man," says Sullivan, "who still lives, and was until very lately a shepherd on the fells. There can be no moral doubt that he both saw and spoke with the apparition ; but what share his imagination had therein, or how it had baen excited, are mysteries, and so they are likely to remain."

HILTON CASTLE.

Formerly the homes of nearly every Scottish, and of many English, families of importance were haunted by domestic spirits known as " Brownies." Hilton Castle, once one of the most magnificent dwellings in the north of England, but now hastening to decay, among other weird inhabitants was a long while, perchance still is,

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frequented by a Brownie, popularly known as the '* Cauld Lad of Hilton." As a rule, these domestic spectres appear to have taken up their abode in any suitable dwelling, without the usual precedent of a crime, as is the case with a ghost or apparition of the ordinary type, and to have generally employed themselves for the benefit of the household. The antiquary Surtees, in his History of Durham, assumes the being that haunted Hilton Castle to have been one of these somewhat commonplace spirits, and although there are other more eerie stories of the Cold Lad, it will be as well to give the historian's account first.

The Cauld Lad, he says, was seldom seen, but was heard nightly by the servants, who slept in the great hall. If the kitchen were left in perfect order, they heard him amusing himself by breaking plates and dishes, hurling the pewter in all directions, and throw- ing everything into confusion. If, on the contrary, the apartment had been left in disarray, a practice which the servants found it most prudent to adopt, the inde- fatigable goblin arranged everything with the greatest precision. This poor spirit, whose pranks were never of a dangerous or hurtful character, was at length banished from his haunts by the usual and universally known expedient of presenting him with a suit of clothes. A green cloak and hood were laid before the kitchen fire, and the domestics sat up watching at a prudent distance. At twelve o'clock the sprite glided gently in, stood by the glowing embers, and surveyed the garments provided for him very attentively, tried them

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on, and seemed delighted with his appearance in them, frisking about for some time and cutting several somer- saults, till, on hearing the first cock-crow, he twitched his mantle about him and disappeared with the male- diction usually adopted on such occasions : —

" Here 's a cloak, and here 's a hood, The Cauld Lad o' Hilton will do no more good."

Although this spirit was thus summarily disposed of by the historian, the inhabitants of Hilton and its viciniiy for many generations continued to believe in its frequent reappearance, and over the glowing embers told wonderful tales of its deeds. So strange were its doings at times, and so frequent its apparition, that it was difficult to retain the domestics in the castle. Among other stories told of the terror with which it contrived to imbue the minds of the servants, is one of a dairy- maid who was too fond of helping herself to the richest cream the pantry afforded. One day, as this not over scrupulous young woman was taking her usual sips from the various pans, the Cauld Lad suddenly addressed her from some invisible vantage-ground, " Ye taste, and ye taste, and ye taste, but ye never gie the Cauld Lad a taste ! " On hearing this appalling accusation, the affrighted maid dropped the spoon on the ground, rushed out of the place, and could never be induced to enter it again.

The local tradition of the " Cold Lad," more closely assimilates his nature to that of any ordinary ghost or apparition, and in no way to the Brownie of our fore- fathers. The popular idea is that a lad, a domestic of

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the house, was cruelly ill-treated and kept confined in a cupboard, and the cupboard is, or was quite recently, pointed out by the guide who shows visitors over the house, as " the place where they used to put the Cold Lad.*' He is supposed to have received the suggestively awesome name of the " Cold Lad," from hi3 stiff and stark form having been discovered in the cupboard.

Surtees endeavours to explain the origin of this ancient legend by reference to a murder of Roger Skelton, apparently a servant, by his master, Robert Hilton, of Hilton, on the 3rd July 1609. Hilton was found guilty of having killed Skelton, but received a pardon some few months after his conviction. According to the old tale, the lord of Hilton one day, in a fit of wrath or intemperance, enraged at the delay in bringing his horse after he had ordered it, rushed to the stable, and finding the boy, whose duty it was to have brought the horse, loitering about, he seized a hay-fork, and struck him with it. Intentionally or not, he had given the lad a mortal blow. The tale proceeds to tell how the murderer covered his victim with straw until night- time, when he took the body and flung it into the pond, where, indeed, the skeleton was discovered in the last Lord of Hilton's time.

With such ghastly and such ghostly traditions con- nected with it, it is no wonder that Hilton Castle is a haunted placo.

126 EAUNTED HOMES.

HOLLAND HOUSE.

The History of Holland House by the .Princess Marie Lichtenstein, the adopted daughter of the present Lady Holland, is a -well-known popular account of one of the most interesting London residences extant. The many highly-gifted men and beautiful women, who have frequented Holland House for several generations past, have endowed it with memories of a most attractive nature ; but the Princess Marie's work tells us that reminiscences of a far less pleasing character hover about the old house, and, indeed, that, like most respect- able dwellings of any antiquity, Holland House is haunted, At least two ghostly legends, according to the fair authoress, are connected with it.

An ancient manor-house, belonging to Sir William Cope, it is believed, formerly stood where Holland House now stands, and, so it would seem, was incor- porated in the present mansion. Sir William Cope's daughter and heiress, Isabel, was married to Sir Henry Eich, created Baron Kensington in 1622, and sent to Spain by James the First, to assist in negociating a marriage between Prince Charles and the Infanta. In 1624 he was created Earl of Holland, and it was this same nobleman, as the Princess tells us, '* who added to the building its wings and arcades, and more than this, he employed the best artists of the time in decorating the interior."

HOLLAND HOUSE* 127

Clarendon describes the Earl as " a very handsome man. of a lovely and winning presence, and gentle conversation." He played, says the historian, a con- spicuous part during the reign of Charles the First and the commencement of the struggle with the Parliament. After having stood in high favour with Queen Henrietta, he fell under suspicion of disloyalty, which was confirmed by his lending Holland House for a meeting between Fairfax and certain discontented members of Parliament. The year following, having rejoined the Koyalists. he was taken in arms at St Neot's, and, having been imprisoned in Warwick Castle, he was condemned to death, and beheaded in March 1648-9 in Palace Yard. Warburton, in a note to Clarendon's History, says : " He lived like a knave, and died like a fool. He appeared on the scaffold dressed in a white satin waistcoat, and a white satin cap with silver lacec After some divine conference with a clergyman and an affectionate leave-taking with a friend, he turned to the executioner and said, ' Here, my friend, let my clothes and my body alone ; there is ten pounds for thee — that is better than my clothes, I am sure of it. And when you take up my head, do not take off my cap.' " He appears, however, even by Warburton's account, to have died with much firmness, and his head was severed by one blow from his body.

This Lord Holland, the first of his name, and the chief builder of Holland House, is, the Princess Lichten- stein tells us, believed to yet haunt one room of the splendid old mansion. " The gilt room is said to be

128 HAUNTED HOMES.

tenanted Dy the solitary ghost of its first lord, who, according to tradition, issues forth at midnight from behind a secret door, and walks slowly through the scenes of former triumphs with his head in his hand. To add to this mystery, there is a tale of three spots of blood on one side of the recess whence he issues — three spots which can never be effaced."

In the grounds of Holland House is " the Green Lane," formerly called " Nightingale Lane," as long as nightingales frequented it. " It is," says the Princess, " a long avenue, like an immense gallery arched with trees and carpeted with grass, the distant light at the end softening down into that misty blue so peculiar to dear England." This avenue is the scene of a " spiritual experience," chronicled by Aubrey in his Miscellanies, and which is as follows : —

" The beautiful Lady Diana Rich, daughter to the Earl of Holland, as she was walking in her father's garden at Kensington, to take the air before dinner, about eleven o'clock, being then very well, met her own apparition, habit and everything, as in a looking-glass. About a month after she died of small-pox. And 'tis said that her sister, the Lady Isabella Thinne, saw the like of herself also before she died. This account I had from a person of honour."

"A third sister, Mary, was married to the Earl of Breadalbane," we are informed, and it has been recorded that she also, not long after her marriage, had some such warning of her approaching dissolution.

And so the old tradition has remained, and who would

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wish, it removed ? Belonging to past times, it should" be respected. But whether we respect tradition or not, it is a received fact that, whenever the mistress of Holland House meets herself, Death is hovering about her.

LAMBTON CASTLE.

At Lambton Castle, in Durham, there is shown the figure of a man in armour, cut in stone, having some- thing like razors set in his back-plate. He is repre- sented in the act of thrusting his sword down the throat of a dragon or serpent. The tradition which is typified by this ancient figure, and which for centuries has been identified with the Lambton family, now repre- sented by the Earl of Durham, is one of the most singular and notorious in England. Burke, in his Vicissitudes of Families, gives the tale at some length, but derives it chiefly from Surtees, the historian and antiquary, and from him, with some few additional particulars from other local authorities, we purpose giving it in a somewhat abridged form.

According to the old legend the Lambtons " were so brave that they feared neither man nor God," and, appa- rently, had no respect for the Sabbath. One Sunday, therefore, the reckless heir of the race, according to his profane custom, went to fish in the river Wear, and, after trving his piscatorial skiU for a long time without

9

180 HAUNTED HOMES.

success, vented his disappointment in curses loud and deep, much to the distress of passers hy on their road to church. At length his luck appeared as if about to change, for he felt something struggling at the end of his line. Pulling it carefully to land, in expectation of capturing a great fish, he was wofully disappointed and enraged to find it was a worm or snake, of repulsive appearance. He cleared it from his hook, and flung it into an adjacent well, remarking to a passer-by that he thought he had caught the devil, and requesting his opinion on the strange animal. The stranger, after looking into the well, remarked that he had never seen anything like it before, that it was like an eft, but that it had nine holes on each side of its mouth, and opined that it betokened no good.

After a while, the heir of the Lambtons repented of his evil courses, and proceeded to a distant land, in order to wage war against the infidels. During the seven long years that he was absent from home, a most distressing and unexpected state of affairs had come to pass. The worm or serpent, which he had flung into the well on that desecrated Sabbath, had grown so large that it had to seek another and more capacious place of residence. The locality which it selected as its favourite abode was a small hill near the village of Fatfield, on the north side of the river Wear, about a mile and a half below Lambton Castle; and at last, so great was its length, and so great was its strength, that it could, and would, wind itself round this hill, which is upwards of throe hundred yards in circumference, in a triple cord,

LAMBTON CASTLE. 131

in such a manner that traces of its folds have remained almost to within memory of the last generation. It became a terror to the whole country, committing all kinds of devastation on the flocks and herds, arid poison- ing the pasture with its reeking breath. In vain did the knights and gentlemen thereabouts endeavour to slay this monster, it was a match for the best of them, always leaving them minus life or limb ; for although many of them had succeeded in cutting it asunder, the severed parts had reunited immediately, and the worm remained whole as before the conflict.

Finally, the heir of Lambton returned from the wars; he was naturally distressed to learn of the desolation of his ancestral lands, and still more so when he discovered that the cause of all the misery was really due to the monster he had drawn to land on the long bygone desecrated Sabbath. He determined, at all risks, to endeavour to destroy the monster ; but as all previous adventurers had failed, he deemed it best, before under- taking the conflict, to consult a witch or wise woman as to the best method of proceeding. Accordingly, he applied to a witch, and, after having been reproached as the cause of all the misery brought upon the country, she advised him how to act. He was directed to provide himself with a coat of armour covered with razors, and, by means of that and his trusty sword, promised success, that is to say, conditionally upon his making a solemn vow to kill the first living thing which he should meet after slaying the worm. Lambton agreed to the conditions ; but was informed that if he failed to keep his word, the

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132 HAUNTED HOMES.

" Lords of Lambton for nine generations should not die in their beds," no very great hardship, it might be deemed, for that martial age.

According to his instructions, the knight had a suit of armour covered with razors made, and having donned this, he instructed his aged father that when he had destroyed the worm, he would blow three blasts upon his horn as a signal of his victory, whereupon his favourite greyhound was to be let loose, so that it might run to him, and therefore be the first thing that would meet him, and thus be slain in fulfilment of his agree- ment with the witch. The father promised and gave his blessing, and young Lambton, having made the vow enjoined, started on his dangerous expedition. As soon as he approached the hill round which the worm was coiled, it unwound itself and came down to the river- side to attack him. Nothing daunted by its hideous aspect, the knight struck at it with might and main, yet without appearing to make any impression upon it beyond increasing its rage. It now seized its opponent in its horrid folds and sought to strangle him; but the more tightly it grasped him, the more frightfully was it wounded, the razor blades cutting it through and through. But as often as the monster fell to the ground cut by the knight's terrible coat of mail, as often, says the legend, did the severed pieces re-unite, and the wounds heal up. Lambton, seeing that the worm was not to be destroyed in this way, stept into the river Wear, whither the monster followed him. The change of position proved fatal to the worm, for as fast as the pieces were

LAMBTON OASTLE, 133

cut off by the razors they were carried away by the stream, and the monster, being unable to re-unite itself was, after the desperate conflict, at last utterly de- stroyed.

As soon as Lamb ton had achieved the victory, he blew three blasts upon his horn ; but his father, in the excitement of the moment, forgot to have the greyhound unloosened, and in his impatience ran out of the castle to greet his son, and was the first living being that met his gaze. The knight embraced his father, and again blew his horn, upon which the hound was let loose, and, running towards Lambton, was slain. But this was too late to retrieve matters, his vow having enjoined the slaying of the first living creature that he should meet with, and his father had been the first to meet him. So the curse was on the house of Lambton, and for nine generations not one of its lords could die in his bed.

Sir Bernard Burke points out that popular tradition traces the curse back to Robert Lambton, who died without issue in 1442, leaving the estates to his brother Thomas, but bequeathing by his will to his " brother, John Lambton, knight of Rhodes, 100 marks." In an ancient pedigree this John Lambton, knight of Rhodes, is described as he " that slew the worm," and as " Lord of Lambton after the death of four brothers without male issue." His son Robert is said to have been drowned at Newbrig, near the chapel where the knight had registered his rash and unperformed vow, and tradition specifies a bedless death for each successive nine generations of the Lords of Lambton. After

134 HAUNTED HOMES.

adverting to the various ways and places in which different heirs of Lamb ton met with death, our chief authority for this portion of the legend concludes : —

Great curiosity prevailed in the life-time of Henry to know if the curse would " hold good to the end." He died in his chariot, crossing the new bridge, in 1761, thus giving the last connecting link to the chain of circumstantial evidence connected with the history of the worm of Lambton. His succeeding brother, General Lambton, who lived to a great age, fearing that the prophecy might be possibly fulfilled by his servants, under the idea that he could not die in his bed, kept a horsewhip beside him in his last illness, and thus eluded the prediction. Although the spell put on this ancient family by the witch is said to have been broken by the death of Henry Lambton in 1761, yet neither of the two last lords have died at home, and this, to the knights of ancient times, says Burke, " would have been sorer punishment than dying in the battle-field, for they loved to sleep in their own country and with their fathers."

LITTLECOT HOUSE.

Littlecot House, or Hall as it is sometimes called, \ the ancient seat of the Darrells, is two miles from Hungerford in Berkshire. It stands in a low and lonely situation, and is thoroughly typical in appearance of a

LITTLECOT HOUSE. 135

haunted dwelling. On three sides it is surrounded by a park, which spreads over the adjacent hill, and on the fourth by meadows, through which runs the river Kennet. A thick grove of lofty trees stands on one side of the gloomy building, which is of great antiquity, and would appear to have been erected towards the close of the age of feudal warfare, when defence came to be no longer the principal object in a country mansion. The interior of the house, however, presents many objects appropriate to feudal times. The hall is very spacious, paved by stones, and lighted by large transon windows. The walls are hung with coats-of-mail and helmets, and on every side are quantities of old-fashioned pistols and guns, and other suitable ornaments for an old baronial dwelling. Below the cornice at the end of the hall, hangs a row of leathern jerkins, made in the form of shirts, and supposed to have been worn as armour by the retainers of the Darrell family, to whom the old Hall belonged. An enormous oaken table, reaching nearly from one end of the chamber to the other, might have feasted the entire neighbourhood, and an appendage to one end of it made it answer at other times for the old game of shuffleboard. The rest of the furniture is in a corresponding style, or was a few years ago ; but the most noticeable article is an old chair of cumbrous workmanship, constructed of wood, curiously carved, with a high back and triangular seat ; it is said to have been used by Judge Popham, in the days of Elizabeth.

The entrance into the hall of this ancient mansion is at one end by a low door, communicating with a passage

136 HAUNTED HOMES.

that leads from the outer door in the front of the house to a quadrangle within ; at the other it opens upon a gloomy stair-case, by which you ascend to the first floor, and, passing the doors of some bed-chambers, enter a narrow gallery which extends along the back front of the house from one end to the other of it. This gallery is hung with old family portraits, chiefly in Spanish cos- tumes of the sixteenth century. In one of the bed- chambers, which you pass in going towards the gallery, is a bedstead with blue furniture, that time has now made dingy and threadbare ; and in the bottom of one of the bed-curtains you are shown a place where a small piece has been cut out and sewn in again. To account for this curious circumstance, and for the apparitions which tenant this haunted chamber, the following terrible tale is told : —

" It was on a dark rainy night in the month of November, that an old midwife sat musing by her cottage fireside, when on a sudden she was startled by a loud knocking at the door. On opening it she found a horseman, who told her that her assistance was required immediately by a person of rank, and that she should be handsomely rewarded, but that there were reasons for keeping the affair a strict secret, and therefore she must submit to be blind-folded, and to be conducted in that condition to the bed-chamber of the lady. With some hesitation the midwife consented; the horseman bound her eyes, and placed her on a pillion behind him. After proceeding in silence for many miles, through rough and dirty lanes, they stopped^ and the midwife

LITTLECOT HOUSE. 137

was led into a house which, from the length of her walk through the apartments, as well as the sounds about her, she discovered to be the seat of wealth and power.

" When the bandage was removed from her eyes, she found herself in a bed-chamber, in whicli were the lady on whose account she had been sent for, and a man of a haughty and ferocious aspect. The lady was delivered of a fine boy. Immediately the man commanded the midwife to give him the child, and, catching it from her, he hurried across the room, and threw it on the back of the fire that was blazing in the chimney. The child, however, was strong, and by its struggles rolled itself off upon the hearth, when the ruffian again seized it with fury, and, in spite of the intercession of the mid- wife, and the more piteous entreaties of the mother, thrust it under the grate, and, raking the live coals upon it, soon put an end to its life.

" The midwife, after spending some time in affording all the relief in her power to the wretched mother, was told that she must be gone. Her former conductor appeared, who again bound her eyes, and conveyed her behind him to her own home; he then paid her hand- somely and departed. The midwife was strongly agitated by the horrors of the preceding night, and she imme- diately made a deposition of the facts before a magistrate. Two circumstances afforded hopes of detecting the house in which the crime had been committed ; one was, that the midwife, as she sat by the bed-side, had, with a view to discover the place, cut out a piece of the hed-curtain, and sewn it in again ; the other was, that as she had

138 HAUNTED HOMES.

descended the staircase she had counted the steps. Some suspicion fell upon one Darrell, at that time the proprietor of Littlecot House and the domain around it. The house was examined, and identified by the midwife, and Darrell was tried at Salisbury for the murder. By corrupting his judge, he escaped the sentence of the law, but broke his neck by a fall from his horse in hunting, a few months afterwards. The place where this hap- pened is still known by the name of DarreU's Stile, — a spot to be dreaded by the peasant whom the shades of evening have overtaken on his way."

This is the fearsome legend connected with Littlecot House, the circumstances related are declared to be true, and to have happened in the reign of Elizabeth. With such a tale attached to its guilty wails, no wonder that the apparition of a woman with dishevelled hair, in white garments, and bearing a babe in her arms, haunts that gloomy chamber.

LONDON : ARGYLE ROOMS.

In the well-known diary of Thomas Raikes, and under date of December 26, 1832, is recounted a very singular account of an apparition which appeared to a young lady at the Argyle Kooms, a highly-fashionable estab- lishment in those days, and, need it be stated, then noted for a class of entertainment very different from that it afterwards became known for. Mr. Raikes, who had

LONDON : ARGYLE ROOMS. 139

the anecdote from a member of the lady's family chiefly concerned, tells the story in these words : —

"It is now about fifteen months ago that Miss

M , a connection of my family, went with a party of

friends to a concert at the Argyle Rooms. She appeared there to be suddenly seized with indisposition, and, though she persisted for some time to struggle against what seemed a violent nervous affection, it became at last so oppressive that they were obliged to send for their carriage and conduct her home. She was for a long time unwilling to say what was the cause of her indisposition ; but, on being more earnestly questioned, she at length confessed that she had, immediately on arriving in the concert-room, been terrified by a horrible vision, which unceasingly presented itself to her sight. It seemed to her as though a naked corpse was lying on the floor at her feet ; the features of the face were partly covered by a cloth mantle, but enough was apparent to convince her that the body was that of Sir

J Y . Every effort was made by her friends at

the time to tranquillize her mind by representing the folly of allowing such delusions to prey upon her spirits, and she thus retired to bed ; but on the following day

the family received the tidings of Sir J Y having

been drowned in Southampton river that very night by the oversetting of his boat ; and the body was afterwards found entangled in a boat-cloak. Here," remarks Raikes, " is an authenticated case of second sight, and of very recent date."

140 HAUNTED HOMES.

LONDON : BROAD STREET.

One of those stories of apparitions which are so frequently alluded to, but of which the facts are appa- rently, chiefly or entirely unknown to most authors of supernatural works, is that related by the Rev. Dr. Scott, an eminent divine in his days. The narrative of this most marvellous affair originally appeared in The History and Reality of Apparitions, from which curious little work we shall transcribe it. The editor of that book, which was published in 1770, and who was, apparently, de Foe, asserts that this story had never appeared in print before, and adds of the Rev. Dr. Scott, that he was not only a man whose learning and piety were eminent, but one whose judgment was known to be good, and who could not be easily imposed upon.

According to the story, Dr. Scott was sitting alone by his fireside in the library of his house in Broad Street ; he had shut himself in the room to study and, so it is alleged, had locked the door. In the midst of his reading happening to look up, he was much astounded to see, sitting in an elbow-chair on the other side of the fire-place, a grave, elderly gentleman, in a black velvet gown and a long wig, looking at him with a pleased countenance, and as if about to speak. Knowing that he had locked the door, Dr. Scott was quite confounded at seeing this uninvited visitor sitting in the elbow-

LONDON : BROAD STREET. 141

chair, and from the first appears to have suspected its supernatural character. Indeed, so disturbed was he at the sight of the apparition, for such it was, that he was unable to speak, as he himself acknowledged in telling the story. The spectre, however, began the discourse by telling the doctor not to be frightened, for it would do him no harm, but came to see him upon a matter of great importance to an injured family, which was in danger of being ruined. Although the doctor was a stranger to this family, the apparition stated that knowing him to be a man of integrity it had selected him to perform an act of great charity as well as justice.

At first Dr. Scott was not sufficiently composed to pay proper attention to what the apparition propounded; but was rather more inclined to escape from the room if he could, and made one or two futile attempts to knock for some of his household to come up ; at which his visitor appeared to be somewhat displeased. But, as the doctor afterwards stated, he had no power to go out of the room, even if he had been next the door, nor to knock for help, even if any had been close at hand.

Then the apparition, seeing the doctor still so confused, again desired him to compose himself, assuring him that he would not do him the slightest injury, nor do anything to cause him the least uneasiness, but desired that he would permit him to deliver the business he came about, which, when he had heard, he said, he would probably see less cause to be surprised or apprehensive than ho did now.

142 . HAUNTED HOMES.

By this time "Dr. Scott had somewhat recovered him- self, and encouraged by the calm manner in which the apparition addressed him, contrived to falter out :

" In the name of God, what art thou ? "

" I desire you will not be frightened," responded the apparition. " I am a stranger to you, and if I tell you my name you will not know it. But you may do the business without inquiring farther." The doctor could not compose himself, but still remained very uneasy, and for some time said nothing. Again the apparition attempted to reassure him, but could only elicit from him a repetition of the ejaculation, " In the name of God, what art thou ? "

Upon this, says the narration, the spectre appeared to be displeased, and expostulated with Dr. Scott, telling him that it could have terrified him into com- pliance, but that it chose to come quietly and calmly to him ; and, indeed, made use of such civil and natural discourse that the doctor began to grow a little more familiar, and at last ventured to ask what it wanted of him. Upon this the apparition appeared to be very gratified, and began its story. It related that it had once owned a very good estate, which at that time was enjoyed by its grandson ; two nephews, however, the sons of its younger brother, were then suing for possession of the property and, owing to certain family reasons which the doctor could not or would not specify, were likely to oust the young man from his property. A deed of settlement, being the conveyance of the inheritance, could not be found and without it the

LONDON: BROAD STEEET. 143

owner of the estate had every reason to fear he would be ejected.

" Well," said Dr. Scott, "what can I do in the case?"

" Go to my grandson," said the apparition, "and direct him where to find the missing deed, which is concealed in a place where I put it myself/' And then it gave the doctor minute particulars of the chest wherein the needed document was hidden stowed away in an old lumber- room. When the apparition had impressed the matter thoroughly upon the doctor's mind, Dr. Scott not unnaturally asked his visitor why it could not direct the grandson himself to recover the missing deed. " Ask me not about that," said the apparition ; " there are divers reasons, which you may know hereafter. I can depend upon your honesty in it in the mean- time."

Still Dr. Scott did not like to take upon himself the strange mission, whereupon the apparition seemed to grow angry, and even begin to threaten him, so that he was at last compelled to promise compliance. The apparition then assumed a pleasant aspect, thanked him, and disappeared.

The strangest part of this strange story yet remains to be told. At the earliest opportunity Dr. Scott posted away to the address given him by the apparition, or dream as some persons deemed it. He asked for and wras at once introduced to the gentleman the apparition had sent him to, and to his surprise was received most, cordially by him. Dr. Scott's surprise was, indeed, quickened when the stranger entered most unreservedly

144 HAUNTED HOMES.

into the particulars of his law-suit, telling him that he had had a dream the previous night, in which he had dreamed that a strange gentleman came to him, and assisted him to find the deed which was needed to confirm him in the possession of his estate.

This assured Dr. Scott that it was not a dream which he had had, and that he was really selected to discover the missing document. Making himself agreeable to his host, he eventually got him to take him all over his splendid old mansion. Finally, he beheld just such a lumber-room as the apparition had told him of, and on entering it, saw an exact facsimile of the chest described to him by his supernatural visitant. There was an old rusty key in it that would neither turn round, nor come out of the lock, which was exactly what the apparition had forewarned him of! At the doctor's request a hammer and chisel were sent for, and the chest broken open, and, after some difficulty, a false drawer was found in it. This being split open, there lay the missing parchment spread out flat over the whole breadth of the bottom of the trunk !

The joy of the young heir, and of his family, may be imagined, whilst their surprise can have been no less. Whether Dr. Scott informed them of the means by which he was led to make the discovery is not stated; but it is alleged the production of the needed deed confirmed the owner in the possession of his estates. As this gentleman was still living, the narrator was not inclined to publish his name ; and, now-a-days, the chances of discovering it are, doubtless, far less than they were in

London: james street, w.o. 145

his time of finding the missing document. Regard it how we may, as a dream or a coincidence, certainly Dr. Scott's adventure was a very marvellous one.

LONDON : JAMES STREET, W.C.

In his Miscellanies, Aubrey records in his very conciso manner, the account of an apparition that appeared to a lady who lodged in James Street, Covent Garden. This lady was beloved by Lord Mohun's son and heir, M a gallant gentleman, valiant, and a great master of fencing and horsemanship " ; but, although she wa3 very handsome, she was of lowlier lineage than her lover. Mr. Mohun, on account of some reason not stated, had a quarrel with " Prince Griffin," and a challenge result- ing therefrom, agreed to meet his antagonist in the morning at Chelsea-fields, and there fight him on horseback.

In the morning Mr. Mohun started off to keep his appointment, but by Ebury Farm he was met by some people who quarrelled with and shot him. These folk were supposed to have been acting under " Prince Griffin's " orders, as Mr. Mohun, being so much the better horseman was, it is suggested, certain to have proved victorious had he met his opponent in the manner agreed upon.

Mr. Mohun was murdered about ten o'clock in the

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146 HAUNTED HOMES.

morning; and at the identical time of his death, his mistress, being in bed at her lodgings in James Street, saw her- lover come to her bed-side, draw the curtains, look upon her, and then go away. She called after him, but received no answer. She then knocked for her maid, and inquired for Mr. Mohun, but the maid said she had not seen him, and he could not have been in the room, as she had the key of it in her pocket.

This account the narrator had direct from the mouths of the lady and her maid.

LONDON: ST. JAMES'S PALACE.

In a small collection of more or less known accounts of apparitions, edited by T. M. Jarvis, and published in 1823, under the title of Accredited Ghost Stories, is one which describes the appearance of the Duchess of Mazarine, after her death, to Madame de Beauclair. The name of the authority for this story is not given, but Mr. Jarvis declares that he solemnly protested Lis conviction of the truth of it, and that several other persons of undoubted credit, alive when the narrative was published, were also satisfied as to its being a relation of fact.

The Duchess of Mazarine, need it be premised, was

mistress to Charles the Second, whilst Madame de

Jjeauclair held a similar position towards his brother

and successor, James the Second. These two women

ore said to have been greatly attached to each other, a

London : st. james's palace. 147

somewhat singular circumstance when their positions are taken into consideration.

After the burning of Whitehall these favourites of royalty were removed to St. James's Palace, where they were allotted very handsome suites of apartments, but, says our author, " the face of public affairs being then wholly changed, and a new set of courtiers as well as rules of behaviour come into vogue, they conversed almost wholly with each other." The truth would appear to be that these women, being neglected on account of new favourites, had a fellow-feeling for each other, and, as is not unusual in such cases, began to discuss matters of a graver nature than had been their custom hitherto. In one of the more serious consulta- tions which these ci-devant favourites held together on the immortality of the soul, they discussed the doctrine of apparitions, and made a solemn stipulation that whichever one died first, she should return, if there was a possibility of so doing, and give the other an accoun of what position she was in in the next life.

This promise, says the account, was often repeated, and the Duchess happening to fall sick, and her life despaired of by all about her, Madame de Beauclair reminded her of her solemn promise, to which Her Grace responded that she might depend upon her performance of it. These words passed between them not above an hour before the dissolution of the Duchess, and were spoken before several persons who were in the room, although they did not comprehend the meaning of what they heard.

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148 HAUNTED HOMES*

" Some years after the Duchess's decease, happening,* says our author, "in a visit I made to Madame de Beauclair, to fall on the topic of futurity, she expressed her disbelief of it with a great deal of warmth, which a little surprising me, as being of a quite contrary way of thinking myself, and had always, by the religion she professed, supposed her highly so." In answer to her interlocutor's arguments, the lady related her compact with her departed friend, and, in spite of all he could urge, deemed the non-appearance of her friend's appari- tion was a proof of the non-existence of a future state.

Some months after this conversation, its narrator states that he was visiting at an acquaintance of Madame de Beauclair. " We were just set down to cards, about nine o'clock in the evening, as near as I can remember," is his record, " when a servant came hastily into the room and acquainted the lady I was with that Madame de Beauclair had sent to entreat she would come that moment to her, adding that if she desired ever to see her more in this world she must not delay her visit."

The lady having a severe cold, and hearing that Madame de Beauclair was, apparently, in good health, declined to accede to this request, but on receiving a second, still more urgent message, accompanied by a bequest of a casket containing the watch, chain, necklace, and other trinkets of Madame de Beauclair, hastened to that lady's apartments, accompanied by our narrator. On arrival at Madame's, he sent up his name, and was requested to come up with his companion at once.

Upon entering the room where Madame de Beauclair

1

London: st. james's palace. 140

was, she informed him, after a few introductory words, that she would very soon pass from this world into that eternity which she once doubted, but was now assured of. She then proceeded to declare that she had seen the Duchess of Mazarine. "I perceived not how she entered," was her statement, " but, turning my eyes towards yonder corner of the room, I saw her stand in the same form and habit she was accustomed to appear in when living : fain would I have spoken, but had not the power of utterance. She took a little circuit round the chamber, seeming rather to swim than walk, then stopped by the side of that Indian chest, and, looking on me with her usual sweetness, said, ' Beauclair, between the hours of twelve and one this night you will be with me.' The surprise I was in at first being a little abated, I began to ask some questions concerning that future world I was so soon to visit ; but, on the opening of my lips for that purpose, she vanished from my sight."

i It was now nearly twelve, and Madame de Beauclair not appearing to be suffering from any ailment, they endeavoured to revive her spirits ; but, says the narrator, ** we scarce began to speak, when suddenly her counte- nance changed, and she cried out, ' 0 ! I am sick at heart.' Mrs. Wood applied some restoratives, but to no effect. She grew still worse, and in about half an hour expired, it being exactly the time the apparition had foretold."

f- ^~T-^~-

150 HAUNTED HOMES.

LONDON : ST. JAMES STREET,

It is a carious circumstance that more buildings having a reputation for being haunted are discoverable in towns and cities than in sparsely populated places. The British metropolis, despite its gas-lamps and guardian police, contains many residences that even now are left to the mercies of those spectral tenants who alone inhabit them. It must be confessed, however, that instead of increasing, the number of these disturbed residences, for reasons obvious to all, is rapidly de- creasing. It is not many years since a house in St. James Street, the number of which it is as well to omit, acquired considerable notoriety on account of the un- pleasant noises which took place in it. It had stood empty for a long time, in consequence of the annoyances to which the various tenants who had tried it had been subjected. There was one apartment in particular which nobody was able to occupy without being disturbed.

On one occasion a youth who, having been abroad for a considerable time, had not any knowledge of the evil reputation this chamber had acquired, was put there to sleep on his arrival, as it was hoped his rest might not be disturbed. In the morning, however, he complained sadly of the terrible time he had had in the night, with people looking in at him between the curtains of his bed, and he avowed his determination to terminate his visit

London: st. james street. 151

at once, as he could not possibly sleep there any more.

After this period the house was again vacant for a considerable time, but was at length taken and work- men were sent in to put it in habitable repair. One day, when the men were away at their dinner, says our informant, " the master builder took the key with him and went to inspect progress, and having examined the lower rooms, he was ascending the stairs, when he heard a man's foot behind him. He looked round, but there was nobody there, and he moved on again ; still there was somebody following, and he stopped and looked over the rails, but there was no one to be seen. So, though feeling rather queer, he advanced into the drawing-room, where a fire had been lighted, and wishing to combat the uncomfortable sensation that was creeping over him, he took hold of a chair, and drawing it resolutely along the floor, he slammed it down upon the hearth with some force, and seated himself in it ; when, to his amazement, the action, in all its par- ticulars of sound, was immediately repeated by his unseen companion, who seemed to seat himself beside him on a chair as invisible as himself. Horror-stricken, the worthy builder started up and rushed out of the house,"

152 HAUNTED H0ME3

LONDON : THE TO WEE.

There is no place in the kingdom one would deem more likely to be haunted than that strange conglomera- tion of rooms, castles, and dungeons, known as the Tower of London. For many centuries it has been the scene of numberless deaths by violence, some by public execution and others by private murder, until it is scarcely metaphorical language to declare that its walls have been built out of human bones and cemented by human blood. That ghosts and spectres have haunted its weird precincts no believer in the supernatural can doubt; and, if we may credit all that has been told Df it of late years, its apparitions are not yet quite beings of the past. In Notes and Queries for 1860, the late Edmund Lenthal Swifte, Keeper of the Crown Jewels, published a remarkable account of a spectral illusion witnessed by himself in the time-honoured for- tress ; and his account, together with such additions and explanations as a subsequent correspondence in- voked, shall now be presented to the reader: —

" I have often purposed to leave behind me a faithful record of all that I personally know of this sirauge story," writes Mr. Swifte, in response to an inquiry as to particulars of the ghost in the Tower of London. " Forty-three years have passed, and its impression is as vividly before me as on the moment of its occur- rence . . . but there are yet survivors who can testify

LONDON : THE TOWEE. 153

that I have not at any time either amplified or abridged my ghostly experiences.

"In 1814 I was appointed Keeper of the Crown Jewels in the Tower, where I resided with my family till my retirement in 1852. One Saturday night in October, 1817, about ' the witching hour/ I was at supper with my wife, her sister, and our little boy, in the sitting- room of the Jewel House, which — then comparatively modernised — is said to have been the ' doleful prison ' of Anne Boleyn, and of the ten bishops whom Oliver Cromwell piously accommodated therein. . . .

" The room was — as it still is — irregularly shaped, having three doors and two windows, which last are cut nearly nine feet deep into the outer wall ; between these ;s a chimney-piece, projecting far into the room, and (then) surmounted with a large oil-painting. On the night in question the doors were all closed, heavy and dark cloth curtains were let down over the windows, and the only light in the room was that of two candles on the table ; I sate at the foot of the table, my son on my right hand, his mother fronting the chimney-piece, and her sister on the opposite side. I had offered a glass of wine and water to my wife, when, on putting it to her lips, she paused, and exclaimed, ' Good God ! what is that? ' I looked up, and saw a cylindrical figure, like a glass-tube, seemingly about the thickness of my arm, and hovering between the ceiling and the table ; its contents appeared to be a dense fluid, white and pale azure, like to the gathering of a summer-cloud, and incessantly mingling within the cylinder This lasted

154 HAUNTED HOMES.

about two minutes, when it began slowly to move before my sister-in-law ; then, following the oblong- shape of the table, before my son and myself; passing behind my wife, it paused for a moment over her right shoulder [observe, there was no mirror opposite to her in which she could there behold it]. Instantly she crouched down, and with both hands covering her shoulder, she shrieked out, '0 Christ! It has seized me!' Even now, while writing, I feel the fresh horror of that moment. I caught up my chair, struck at the wainscot behind her, rushed up- stairs to the other children's room, and told the terrified nurse what I had seen. Meanwhile, the other domestics had hurried into the parlour, where their mistress recounted to them the scene, even as I was detailing it above stairs.

"The marvel," adds Mr. Swifte, " of all this is enhanced by the fact that neither my sister-in-law nor my son beheld this 'appearance? When I the next morning related the night's horror to our chaplain, after the service in the Tower church, he asked me, might not one person have his natural senses de- ceived ? And if one, why might not two ? My answer was, if two, why not two thousand ? an argu- ment which would reduce history, secular or sacred, to a fable."

c< Our chaplain," remarked Mr. Swifte in a subsequent communication to Notes and Queries, " suggested the possibilities of some foolery having been intromitted at my windows, and proposed the visit of a scientific friend, who minutely inspected the parlour, and made

LONDON : THE TOWER. 155

the closest investigation, but could not in any way solve the mystery."

In reply to further communications later on, the Jewel- Keeper stated that his wife did not perceive any form in the cylindrical tube, hut only the cloud or vapour which both of them at once described. Her health was not affected, nor was her life terminated, as had been sug- gested, by the apparition which both had seen ; nor could it have been, as Mr. Swifte pertinently pointed out, a fog or vapour that seized his wife by the shoulder. Finally, replying to the suggestion of f< phantasmagoric agency," Mr. Swifte not only made it clear that no optical action from outside could have produced any manifestation within, through the thick curtains, but also, that the most skilful operator could not produce an appearance visible to only half the persons present, and that could bodily lay hold of one individual among them. The mystery remains unsolved.

A more tragical incident, following hard on the visita- tion to his own habitation, is thus alluded to by Mr. Swifte ; and although the tale has been told by many, and in many different ways, as he was so closely connected with it, it is but just that the Keeper's version should be the one accepted.

" One of the night-sentries at the Jewel Office," records our authority, " was alarmed by a figure like a huge bear issuing from underneath the jewel-room door," — as ghostly a door as ever was opened to or closed on a doomed man. " He thrust at it with his bayonet, which stuck in the door, even as my chair dinted the

156 HAUNTED HOMES.

wainscot ; he dropped in a fit, and was carried senseless to the guard-room.

" When on the morrow I saw the unfortunate soldier in the main guard-room," continues Mr. Swifte, " his fellow-sentinel was also there, and testified to having seen him on his post just before the alarm, awake and alert, and even spoken to him. Moreover, I then heard the poor man tell his own story. ... I saw him once again on the following day, but changed beyond my recognition ; in another day or two the brave and steady soldier, who would have mounted a breach or led a forlorn hope with unshaken nerves, died at the presence of a shadow."

Mr. George Offor, referring to this tragedy, speaks of strange noises having also been heard when the figure resembling a bear was seen by the doomed soldier.

LOWTHER HALL.

According to Mr. J. Sullivan, in his Cumberland and Westmoreland, the latter county never produced a more famous spectre, or " bogie," to give the local term, than Jemmy Lowther, well known for want of a more appro- priate name, as the "bad Lord Lonsdale"; infamous as a man, he was famous as a ghost. This notorious character, who is described as a modern impersonation of the worst and coarsest feudal baron ever im-

LOWTHER HALL. 157

ported into England by the Conqueror, became a still greater terror to the neighbourhood after death than he had ever been during his life. So strongly had super- stitious dread of the deceased nobleman impregnated the popular mind, that it was asserted as an absolute fact, that his body was buried with difficulty, and that whilst the clergyman was praying over it it very nearly knocked him from his desk.

When placed in his grave, Lord Lonsdale's power of creating alarm was not interred with his bones. There were continual disturbances in the hall and noises in the stables ; and, according to popular belief, neither men nor animals were suffered to rest. His Lordship's phantom " coach and six " is still remembered and spoken of, and still believed in by some to be heard dashing across the country. Nothing is said of the " bad lord's " shape or appearance, and it is doubtful whether the spectre has ever appeared to sight, but it has frequently made itself audible. The hall became almost uninhabitable on account of the dead man's pranks, and out of doors was, for a long time, almost equally dreaded, as even there there was constant danger of encountering the miscreant ghost. Of late years this eccentric spirit appears to have relinquished its mortal haunts, and by the peasantry is believed to have been laid for ever under a large rock called Wallow Crag.

158 HAUNTED HOMES.

LUMLEY.

Many judicial decisions have been based upon, or in- fluenced by, the presumed testimony of apparitions, These pages contain more than one historical record of such cases, but none more singular than that of Anne Walker, which may be found fully detailed in the works of the famous Dr. Henry More, the Platonist.

In 1680, according to Dr. More, there lived at Lumley, a village near Chester-le-Street, in the county of Durham, a widower named Walker, who was a man in good circumstances. Anne Walker, a young relation of his, kept his house, to the great scandal of the neigh- bourhood, and, as it proved, with but too good cause. A few weeks before this young woman expected to become a mother, Walker placed her with her aunt, one Dame Cave, in Chester-le-Street, and promised to pro- vide both for her and her future child. One evening towards the end of November, this man, in company with Mark Sharp, an acquaintance of his, came to Dame Cave's door, and told her they had made arrange- ments for removing her niece to a place where she could remain in safety till her confinement was over. They would not say where it was, but as Walker bore in most respects an excellent character, he was allowed to take the young woman away with him, and he pro- fessed to have sent her away with his acquaintance Sharp into Lancashire.

LUMLEY. 159

" Fourteen days after," runs the story, one Graeme, a fuller who lived about six miles from Lumley, had been engaged till past midnight in his mill; and on coming down-stairs to go home, in the middle of the ground floor he saw a woman, with dishevelled hair, covered with blood, and having five large wounds on her head. Graeme, on recovering a little from his first terror, demanded what the spectre wanted ; "I/' said the apparition, " am the spirit of Anne Walker," and then proceeded to tell Graeme the particulars which have already been related as to her removal from her aunt's abode. "When I was sent away with Mark Sharp,'"' it proceeded, " he slew me on such a moor," naming one that Graeme knew, " with a collier's pick, threw my body into a coal pit, and hid the pick under the bank; and his shoes and stockiugs, which were covered with blood, he left in a stream." The apparition proceeded to tell Graeme that he must give information of this to the nearest Justice of the Peace, and that till this was done he must look to be continually haunted.

Graeme wrent home very sad ; he dared not bring such a charge against a man of so unimpeachable a character as Walker, and yet he as little dared to incur the anger of the spirit that had appeared to him. So, as all weak minds will do, he went on procrastinating, only ho took care to leave his mill early, and while in it never to be alone. Notwithstanding this caution on his part, one night, just as it began to be dark, the apparition met him again, in a more terrible shape, and with every cir- cumstance of indignation, Yet he did not even then

160 HAUNTED HOMES.

fulfil its injunction, till, on St. Thomas's Eve, as he was walking in his garden, just after sunset, it threatened him so effectually that in the morning he went to a magistrate, and revealed the whole thing.

" The place was examined, the body and the pickaxe found, and a warrant was granted against Walker and Sharp. They were, however, admitted to bail, but in August, 1681, their trial came on before Judge Daven- port, at Durham. Meanwhile the whole circumstances were known all over the north of England, and the greatest interest was excited by the case. Against Sharp the fact was strong that his shoes and stockings, covered with blood, were found in the place where the murder had been committed ; but against Walker, except the accounts received from the ghost, there seemed not a shadow of evidence. Nevertheless, the judge summed up strongly against the prisoners, the jury found them guilty, and the judge pronounced sentence upon them that night, a thing which was unknown in Durham, either before or after. The prisoners were executed, and both died professing their innocence to the last. Judge Davenport was much agitated during the trial, and it was believed," says the historian, " that the spirit had also appeared to him, as if to supply in his mind the want of legal evidence."

161

MANNINGTON HALL.

Whether Lord Orford's Norfolk residence Las the general reputation of being haunted, or whether the occasion of the much-talked-of spectral illusion to Dr. Augustus Jessop is the only known instance of an apparition having appeared there, we are not in a position to state. The remarkable story, as communicated by Dr. Jessop, the well-known antiquary, to the Athenceum of January 1880, is as follows.

On the 10th of October 1879, Dr. Jessop drove to Lord Orford's from Norwich. It was his intention to spend some time at the Hall in examining and making extracts from various scarce works, which he had long been seeking for, and which he now learnt were in Lord Orford's library.

He arrived at Mannington at four in the afternoon, and, after some agreeable conversation, dressed for dinner. Dinner took place at seven, and was partaken of by six persons, including Dr. Jessop and his host. The con- versation is declared to have been of a pleasant character, to have been chiefly concerned with artistic questions, and the experiences of men of the world, and to have never trenched upon supernatural subjects. After dinner cards were introduced, and at half-past ten, two of the guests having to leave, the party broke up. Dr. Jessop now desired to be permitted to sit up for some hours, in order to make extracts from the works already referred

11

162 HAUNTED HOMES.

to. Lord Orford wished to leave a valet with his guest, hut the doctor deeming that this might embarrass him, and cause him to go to bed earlier than he wished, requested to be left to his own devices. This was agreed to, the servants were dismissed, and the host and his other guests retired to their rooms, so that by eleven o'clock Dr. Jessop was the only person down-stairs.

The apartment in which he was preparing to set to work for a few hours is a large one, with a huge fire- place ' and a great old-fashioned chimney, and is furnished with every luxury. The library, whence Dr. Jessop had to bring such volumes as he needed, opens into this room, and in order to obtain the works he wanted he had not only to go into it, but when there to mount a chair to get down the books he required. In his very circumstantial account of the affair, the anti- quary relates that he had altogether six small volumes, which he took down from their shelves and placed in a little pile on the table, at his right hand. In a little while he was busily at work, sometimes reading, sometimes writing, and thoroughly absorbed in his occupation. As he finished with a book he placed it in front of him, and then proceeded with the next, and so on until ho had only one volume of his little pile of tomes left to deal with. The antiquary being, as he states, of a chilly temperament, sat himself at a corner of the table with the fire at his left. Occasionally he rose, knocked the fire together, and stood up to warm his feet. In this manner he went on until nearly one o'clock, when he appears to have congratulated himself upon the rapid

MANNINGTON HALL. 163

progress lie had made with his task, and that after all he should get to hed by two. He got up, and wound up his watch, opened a bottle of seltzer-water, and then, reseating himself at the table, upon which were four silver candlesticks containing lighted candles, he set to work upon the last little book of the heap. What now happened must be told in Dr. Jessop's own words : —

" I had been engaged upon it about half an hour," said he, referring to the little volume, " and was just beginning to think that my work was drawing to a close, when, as I was actually writing, I saw a large white hand within a foot of my elbow. Turning my head, there sat a figure of a somewhat large man, with his back to the fire, bending slightly over the table, and apparently examining the pile of books that I had been at work upon. The man's face was turned away from me, but I saw his closely-cut reddish-brown hair, his ear, and shaved cheek, the eye-brow, the corner of the right eye, the side of the forehead, and the large high cheek-bone. He was dressed in what I can only describe as a kind of ecclesiastical habit of thick-corded silk, or some such material, close up to the throat, and a narrow rim or edging, of about an inch broad, of satin or velvet, serving as a stand-up collar, and fitting close to the chin. The right hand, which had first attracted my attention, was clasping, without any great pressure, the left hand ; both hands were in perfect repose, and the large blue veins of the right hand were conspicuous. I remember thinking that the hand was like the hand of Velasquez's magnificent * Dead Knight/ in the National

11 •

164 HAUNTED HOMES.

Gallery. I looked at my visitor for some seconds, and was perfectly sure that he was not a reality. A thou* sand thoughts came crowding upon me, but not the least feeling of alarm, or even uneasiness ; curiosity and a strong interest were uppermost. For an instant I felt eager to make a sketch of my friend, and I looked at a tray on my right for a pencil ; then I thought, ' Up-stairs I have a sketch-book — shall I fetch it?' There he sat, and I was fascinated ; afraid not of his staying, but lest he should go,

" Stopping in my writing, I lifted my left hand from the paper, stretched it out to the pile of books, and moved the top one. I cannot explain why I did this — my arm passed in front of the figure, and it vanished. I was simply disappointed and nothing more. I went on with my writing as if nothing had happened, perhaps for another five minutes, and had actually got to the last few words of what I had determined to extract, when the figure appeared again, exactly in the same place and attitude as before. I saw the hands close to my own ; I turned my head again to examine him more closely, and I was framing a sentence to address him when I dis- covered that I did not dare to speak. / was afraid of the sound of my own voice. There he sat, and there sat I. I turned my head again to my work, and finished writing the two or three words I still had to write. The paper and my notes are at this moment before me, and exhibit not the slightest tremor or nervousness. I could point out the words I was writing when the phantom came, and when he disappeared. Having finished my

MANN1NGT0N HALL. 1G5

task, I shut the book, and threw it on the table ; it made a slight noise as it fell — the figure vanished.

" Throwing myself back in my chair, I sat for some seconds looking at the fire with a curious mixture of feeling, and I remember wondering whether my friend would come again, and if he did whether he would hide the fire from me. Then first there stole upon me a dread and a suspicion that I was beginning to lose my nerve. I remember yawning ; then I rose, lit my bed-room candle, took my books into the inner library, mounted the chair as before, and replaced five of the volumes ; the sixth I brought back and laid upon the table where I had been writing when the phantom did me the honour to appear to me. By this time I had lost all sense of uneasiness. I blew out the four candles and marched off to bed, where I slept the sleep of the just or the guilty — I know not which — but I slept very soundly."

And that is the conclusion of the story, so far as Dr. Jessop's published account goes, Numerous eluci- dations have been attempted by the wise, and the— otherwise; but whether hallucination, spectral illusion, or trickery, no one has been enabled to prove, and as the hero of the tale declines to proffer " explanation, theory, or inference," the affair continues to be a mystery.

166 HAUNTED HOMES.

MILFOED HAVEN.

In July 1858, Mr. John Pavin Phillips, a well-known contributor to Notes and Queries, furnished that valu- able publication with some instances of " Second Sight and Supernatural Warnings," which had occurred either to himself, or to his most immediate relatives. The whole country of Pembroke, Mr. Pavin Phillips states, is rife with tales of this class, and, indeed, he might have added, every county of the three kingdoms as well, so universal and deeply-defined is the belief in them. From the stories, for the authenticity of which this gentleman vouches, may be cited the following.

" Many years ago, seven or eight members of the family of my paternal grandfather, were seated at the door of his house on a fine summer evening, between the hours of eight and nine o'clock. The parish church and its yard are only separated from the spot by a brook and a couple of meadows. The family happened to be looking in the direction of the churchyard, when they were amazed by witnessing the advent of a funeral procession. They saw the crowd, and the coffin borne on men's shoulders come down the pathway towards the church, but the distance was too great to enable them to recognise the faces of any of the actors in the scene. As the funeral 'cortege neared the church porch, they distinctly saw the clergyman, with whom they were personally acquainted, come out in his surplice to meet

MILFOED HAVEN. 167

the mourners, and saw him precede them into the church. In a short time they came out, and my rela- tives saw them go to a particular part of the yard, where they remained for a time long enough to allow the remainder of the supposed funeral rites to he per- formed. Greatly amazed at what he beheld, my grand- father sent over to the church to inquire who had been buried at that unusual hour. The messenger returned with the intelligence that no person had been buried during that day, nor for several days before. A short time after this a neighbour died, and was buried in the precise spot where the phantom interment was seen."

The whole of Mr. Pavin Phillips's family would appear to have possessed the faculty of ghost-seeing, or rather to have been endowed with the capability, so well known among the Scotch, of Second Sight. In another instance of this power of foreseeing events his mother was the medium. Her father, says our authority, " lived on the banks of one of the many creeks or pills with which the beautiful harbour of Milford Haven is indented. In front of the house is a large court, built on a quay wall to protect it from the rising tide. In this court my mother was walking one fine evening, rather more than sixty years ago " (this was written in 1858), " enjoying the moonlight and the balmy summer breeze. The tide tvas out, so that the creek was empty. Suddenly my mother's attention was aroused by hearing the sound of a boat coming up the pill ; the measured dip of the oars in the water, and the noise of their revo- lution in the rowlocks, were distinctly audible. Pre-

1G8 HAUNTED HOMES.

sently she heard the keel of the boat grate on the gravelly beach by the side of the quay wall. Greatly alarmed, as nothing was visible, she ran into the house, and related what she had heard. A few days afterwards, the mate of an East Indiaman, which had put into Milford Haven for the purpose of undergoing repair, died on board, and his coffined corpse was brought up the pill, and landed at the very spot where my mother heard the phantom boat touch the ground."

In the next incident of supernatural foresight related by Mr. Pavin Phillips, it is in a servant of the family that the power is manifested, so that it would appear as if the locality, rather than the dwellers in it, were haunted. He relates that in the year 1838 he was on a visit to his parents, " who, at that time, resided on the spot on which my mother was born, and where she passed the latter years of her life. Within a short distance of the house stood a large walled garden, which was approached through a gate leading into a stable-yard. From underneath the garden wall bubbled d well of delicious spring water, whence the domestic offices were supplied. It was a custom of the family, in the summer time, that the water for the use of the house should be brought in late in the evening, in order that it might be cool, and it was the duty of a servant to go out with a yoke and a couple of pails to fetch the water just before the time of closing up the house for the night. One evening the girl had gone out for this purpose ; the night was beautifully fine, the moon shining so brightly that the smallest object was distinctly

MILFORD HAVEN. 169

visible. Tho servant had not been absent many minutes when she ran into the house without her burden, and throwing herself into a chair in a state of extreme terror, fainted away. Restoratives having been used, she recovered a little and, upon being questioned as to the cause of her alarm, she told us that as she was stooping over the well, about to fill one of her pails, she suddenly found herself in the midst of a crowd of people who were carrying a coffin, which they had set down at the gate of the stable-yard. As she had received no intimation of the approach of the con- course by any sound of footsteps, she was greatly alarmed, and as the object borne by the throng did not tend to tranquillise her nerves, she took to her heels, leaving her pails behind her. As no persuasion could induce her to return to the well, I offered to do so for her, and to ascertain the cause of her terror. When I arrived at the stable-yard, there was neither coffin nor crowd to be seen, and upon asking a neighbour, whose cottage commanded a view of the well, whether she had seen a funeral go by, she put a stop to any further inquiry by asking me * who had ever heard of a funeral at ten o'clock at night ? ' To which pertinent query I could only reply by stating what the servant professed to have seen. So the matter rested for a few weeks, when there occurred an unusually high tide in Milford Haven. The water rose above the level of the ordinary springs, filling the creek, and flowing into the court in front of the house. It only ebbed when it had reached the door. The roadway at the end of the pill was im-

170 HAUNTED HOMES.

passable. A person having died on the opposite side of the inlet a few days before this, the funeral took place on the morning of the high tide ; and as it was impossible to take the corpse to the parish church by the usual route, the bearers crossed the pill in a boat with the coffin and having laid it down at the gate of our stable - yard, remained there until the boat could bring over the remainder of the funeral concourse."

The last instance of this insight into the future which we shall cite from Mr.Pavin Phillips's highly suggestive and interesting communication, is the record of an inci- dent of the character referred to which occurred to him himself, in the year 1848, upon his return home after several years' absence. "A few days after my arrival," he states, "I took a walk one morning in the yard of one of our parish churches^ through which there is a right of way for pedestrians. My object was a twofold one : firstly to enjoy the magnificent prospect visible from that elevated position ; and secondly, to see whether any of my friends or acquaintances who had died during my absence were buried in the locality. After gazing around me for a short time, I sauntered on, looking at one tombstone and then at another, when my attention was arrested by an altar-tomb enclosed within an iron railing. I walked up to it, and read an inscription which informed me that it was in memory of Colonel

. This gentleman had been the assistant Poor

Law Commissioner for South Wale*, and while on one of his periodical tours of inspection, he was seized with apoplexy in the workhouse of my native town, and died

MILFORD HAVEN. 171

in a few hours. This was suggested to my mind as I read the inscription on the tomb, as the melancholy event occurred during the period of my absence, and I was only made cognisant of the fact through the medium of the local press. Not being acquainted with

the late Colonel , and never having even seen him,

the circumstances of his sudden demise had long passed from my memory, and were only revived by my thus viewing his tomb. I then passed on, and shortly after- wards returned home. On my arrival my father asked me in what direction I had been walking ? I replied,

1 In churchyard, looking at the tombs, and among

others I have seen the tomb of Colonel , who died

in the workhouse.' 'That,' replied my father, 'is im- possible, as there is no tomb erected over Colonel 's

grave/ At this remark I laughed. ' My dear father/ said I, ' you want to persuade me that I cannot read. I was not aware that Colonel was buried in the church- yard, and was only informed of the fact by reading the inscription on the tomb.' * Whatever you may say to the contrary,' said my father, ' what I tell you is true,

there is no tomb over Colonel 's grave.5 Astounded

by the reiteration of this statement, as soon as I had dined I returned to the churchyard, and again inspected all the tombs having railings round them, and found that my father was right. There was not only no tomb

bearing the name of Colonel , but there was no

tomb at all corresponding in appearance with the one I had seen. Unwilling to credit the evidence of my own senses, I went to the cottage of an old acquaintance of

172 HAUNTED HOMES.

my boyhood, who lived outside of the churchyard gate,

and asked her to show me the place where Colonel

lay buried. She took me to the spot, which was a green mound, undistinguished in appearance from the sur- rounding graves. Nearly two years subsequent to this occurrence, surviving relatives erected an altar-tomb, with a railing round it, over the last resting-place of Colonel — , and it was, as nearly as I could remem- ber, an exact reproduction of the memorial of my day- dream."

Verily, " there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy ,"

NANNATT.

Nannau, the ancient residence of the Vaughan family, in Merionethshire, is said to stand upon the highest ground of any gentleman's seat in Great Britain. In the days of the famous Owen Glendower, this roman- tically-situated dwelling was occupied by Howel Sele, a first cousin of the Welsh prince. The cousins do not appear to have lived on friendly terms, Howel Sele siding with the Lancastrians, whilst Glendower, it need scarcely be remarked, was a fierce Yorkist. Ultimately their antagonism came to a fatal termination. There

NANNAU. 173

are several versions of the legend, but it is better to adopt that related by Pennant because, although it does not accord with some of the ballads on the subject, it appears to have a historic basis. The historian states that Glendower and Sele having long been at variance, the Abbot of Kymmer brought them together in hopes of reconciling them, and had, apparently, succeeded in effecting this charitable purpose. Whilst the two cousins were out hunting together, after their apparent recon- ciliation, Owen observed a doe feeding, and remarked to Howel, who was considered the best archer of the day, that there was a fine mark for him. Howel bent his bow and, pretending to take aim at the doe, suddenly turned and discharged his arrow full at Glendower's breast : —

Then cursed Howel's cruel shaft, His royal brother's blood had quaffed,

Alas ! for Cambria's weal ! But the false arrow glanced aside, For 'neath the robe of royal pride,

Lay plate of Milan steeL*

Fortunately for him the Welsh chieftain, as described by the poet, had armour beneath his clothes, and there- fore received no hurt. But, enraged at his kinsman's treachery, he turned upon him fiercely, and although Howel was fully armed, after a short conflict, slew him ! The next thing was how to dispose of the body ; and according to the ballad of the Spirit's Blasted Tree, by the Kev. George Warrington, it wa3 Madog, Glen-

* The Demon Oak, by Walter Thornbury.

174 HAUNTED HOMES.

dower's companion, who suggested for the place of sepulture — -

A broad and blasted oak,

Scorcbed by tbe ligbtning's vivid glare,

Hollow its stem from branch to root, And all its shrivelled arms were bare.

Be this, I cried, the proper grave

(The thought in me was deadly sin) :

Aloft we raised the bapless chief,

And dropped his "bleeding corpse within.

After this dire catastrophe Glendower returned in haste to his stronghold, without, of course, giving any information to the Lord of Nannau's people. Howel was sought for in every direction, hut was nowhere to be found. His alarmed retainers hunted through all the recesses of the neighbouring forest, the while his sorrow- ing wife shut herself up from all comfort in the solitude of her gloomy castle. The years passed by, and no tidings reached Nannau of the missing lord : —

Yet Fancy, in a thousand shapes.

Bore to his home the chief once more ;

Some saw him on High Mod's top, Some saw him on the winding shore.

With wonder fraught, the tale went round- Amazement chained the hearer's tongue,

Each peasant felt his own sad loss, Yet fondly o'er tho story hung.

Oft by the moon's pale shadowy light,

His aged nurse, and steward gray. WduM lean to catch the storied sounds,

Or mark the flitting spirit stray.

NANNATJ. 175

Pale lights on Cader's rocks were seen,

And midnight voices heard to moan ; 'Twas even said the Blasted Oak,

Convulsive, heaved a hollow groan

But still the fate of Howel Sele remained unknown to everyone save Glendower and bis companion Madog. At last, after ten years of silence, Glendower died, and the partaker of the chieftain's secret was at liberty to reveal the mystery ; his lord's last words being : —

To Sole's sad widow bear the tale,

Nor let our horrid secret rest : Give but his corse to sacred earth,

Then may my parting soul be blest,

Madog hastened to obey his prince's last behest, and, as soon as events allowed, betook himself to Nan nan's saddened home, and told the horrified and long-hoping wife that she was a widow indeed. The revelation was rapidly noised abroad among the retainers, and confirm- ation of it demanded; Madog led them to the blasted oak, which was hastily rent open, and the bleaching skeleton exposed to view : —

Back they recoiled — the right hand still, Contracted, grasped the rusty sword ;

Yv'hich erst in many a battle gleamed,

And proudly decked their slaughtered lord.

They bore the corse to Vanner's shrine, With holy rites and prayers address'd ;

Nine white-robed monks the last dirge sang, And gave the angry spirit rest.

But notwithstanding the burial rites were read, and

17G HAUNTED nOMES.

many masses said for their dead lord, his spirit was not believed to be at rest, and almost down to the present day the fearsome peasant has dreaded to pass at night by the blasted oak, " the hollow oak of the demons." Until its fall and destruction on the 13th of July 1813, the haunted tree was an object of nocturnal dread, and the poet could truly say: —

And to this day the peasant still

With fear avoids the ground ; In each wild branch a spectre sees,

And trembles at each rising sound.

NEWSTEAD ABBEY.

Like so many old baronial residences, Newstead has the reputation of beiug haunted, and that by more than one spectre. But the name and fame of the last of the Byron s of Newstead has over-clouded and obscured all previous tenants, mortal or otherwise, and flung a pall of poetic melancholy over the whole domain that no spiritual apparitions can survive. The legends connected with Newstead are manv, and descend from that mysterious maid of Saracen birth or residence, whose form and features are so frequently repeated in the ancient panel-work of the Abbey's interior, down to Lord Byron's immediate predecessor in the title and estates. "Devil Byron," as this man was called,

NEWSTEAD ABBEY. 177

among other wild tales connected with his name, was said to he haunted by the spirit of a sister, whom he refused to speak to for years preceding her death in consequence of a family scandal, notwithstanding her heart-rending appeals of " Speak to me, my lord ' Do speak to me ! - Ebenezer Elliott, in a ballad he wrote on this legend, int/oduces the apparitions of both * Devil Byron" and his sister as riding forth together in foul weather, the lady still making passionate appeals to the immovable brother to speak to her :—

Well sleep the dead : in holy ground

Well sleeps the heart of iron ; The worm that pares his sister's cheek,

What cares it for Byron ?

Yet when her night of death comes round,

They ride and drive together ; And ever, when they ride and drive,

Wilful is the weather.

On mighty winds, in spectre coach,

Fast speeds the heart of iron ; On spectre-steed, the spectre-dame

Side by side with Byron.

Oh, Night doth love her ! Oh, the clouds

They do her form environ 1 The lightning weeps— it hears her sob—

" Speak to me, Lord Byron I "

•

On winds, on clouds, they ride, they drive.—

Oh, hark, thou heart of iron ! The thunder whispers mournfully,

" Speak to her, Lord Byron I "

Another family apparition which is said to have

12

178 HAUNTED HOMES,

haunted the old Abbey, was that of " Sir John Byron the Little, with the Great Beard." An ancient portrait of this mysterious ancestor, some few years since, was still hanging over the door of the great saloon, and was said to sometimes descend at midnight from its sombre frame, and promenade the state apartments. Indeed, this ancient worthy's visitations were not con- fined to night only ; one young lady, on a visit to the Abbey some years ago, positively asserting that in broad daylight, the room of his chamber being open, she saw Sir John the Little sitting by the fire-place, and reading out of an old-fashioned book.

Many other apparitions have been seen about this ancient time-honoured building, and Washington Irving mentions that a young lady, Lord Byron's cousin, when she was staying at the Abbey, slept in the room next the clock, and that one night, when she was in bed, she saw a lady in white come out of the wall on one side of the room and go into the wall on the other side. Many curious noises and strange sights have been heard and seen by residents and visitors at Newstead; but the best known and most noted spectre connected with the place, and immortalised by Byron's verse, is the "Goblin Friar." The particular chamber that this spectre is sup- posed to especially frequent, and which is known par excellence, as "the Haunted Chamber," adjoins Byron's bed-room. During the poet's residence this dismal- looking room was occupied by his page, a beautiful ooy, whom the scandal-loving female servants would have was a girl.

NEWSTEAD ABBEY. 179

Lord Byron, and many others, not only believed in the existence of the Black Friar, but asserted that they had reallv seen it. It did not confine its visitations, however, to the "haunted chamber," but at night walked the cloisters and other portions of the Abbey:

A monk arrayed In cowl, and beads, and dusky garb, appeared,

Now in the moonlight, and now lapsed in shade, "With steps that trod as heavy, yet unheard.

This apparition is the evil genius of the Byrons, and its appearance portends misfortune of some kind to the member of the family to whom it appears. Lord Byron fully believed that he beheld this apparition a short time before the greatest misfortune of his life, his ill-starred union with Miss Millbanke. Alluding to his faith in these things, he said : —

I merely mean to say what Johnson said,

That in the course of some six thousand years,

All nations have believed that from the dead A visitant at intervals appears ;

And what is strangest upon this strange head, Is that whatever bar the reason rears

'Gainst such belief, there 's something stronger still

In its behalf, let those deny who will.

And he thus introduces the presumed duties, as it were, of the Black Friar : —

By the marriage-bed of their lords, 'tis said,

He flits on the bridal eve ; And 'tis held as faith, to their bed of death

He conies — but not to grieve.

ISO HAUNTKD HOMES.

When an heir is born, he is heard to mourn.

And -when aught is to befall That ancient line, in the pale moonshine,

He walks from hall to hall.

His form you may trace, but not his face, i

Tis shadowed by his cowl ; But his eyes may be seen from the folds between,

And they seem of a parted soul.

Among the numerous people who have asserted that they saw the Black Friar was a Miss Kitty Parkins, a relative of the poet ; and she is even said to have made a sketch of the apparition from memory,

NORTH SHIELDS: STEVENSON

STREET.

The following account, certainly one of the most remarkable in our collection, is related upon the autho* rity of Mrs. Crowe, who introduces it in her Night Side of Nature, as having been furnished to her by the Mrs. L. of the story, herself a lady, remarks Mrs. Crowe, " with whose family I am acquainted."

A few years since, Mrs. L. took a furnished house, in Stevenson Street, North Shields, and she had been in it a very few hours before she was perplexed by hearing feet in the passage, though whenever she opened the door she could see nobody. She went to the kitchen*

NORTH SHIELDS : STEVENSON STREET. 181

and asked the servant if she had not heard the same sound ; she said she had not, but there seemed to be strange noises in the house. When Mrs. L. went to bed, she could not go to sleep for the noise of a child's rattle, which seemed to be inside her curtains. It rattled round her head, first on one side then on the other ; then there were sounds of feet and of a child crying, and a woman sobbing; and, in short, so many strange noises, that the servant became frightened, and went away. The next girl Mrs. L. engaged came from Leith, and was a stranger to the place ; but she had only passed a night in the house, when she said to her mistress, u This is a troubled house you 've got into ma'am," and she described, amongst the rest, that she had repeatedly heard her own name called by a voice near her, though she could see nobody.

One night Mrs. L. heard a voice, like nothing human, close to her, cry, " Weep ! Weep ! Weep ! " Then there was a sound like someone struggling for breath, and again, " Weep ! Weep ! Weep ! ' Then the gasping, and a third time, " Weep ! Weep ! Weep ! " She stood still, and looked steadfastly on the spot whence the voice proceeded, but could see nothing ; and her little boy, who held her hand, kept saying, " What is that, Mamma? What is that ? " She describes the sound as most frightful. All the noises seemed to suggest the idea of childhood, and of a woman in trouble. One night, when it was crying round her bed, Mrs. L. took courage and adjured it; upon which the noise ceased for that time, but there was no answer. Mr. L. was

182 HAUNTED HOMES.

at sea when she took the house, and when he came home, he laughed at the story at first, but soon became so convinced the account she gave was correct, that he wanted to have the boards taken up, because, from the noises seeming to hover much about one spot, he thought perhaps some explanation of the mystery might be found. But Mrs. L. objected that if anything of a painful nature were discovered she should not be able to continue in the house ; and, as she must pay the year's rent, she wished, if possible, to continue for the whole period.

She never saw anything but twice; once, the appear- ance of a child seemed to fall from the ceiling close to her, and then disappear ; and another time she saw a child run into a closet in a room at the top of the house ; and it was most remarkable that a small door in that room which was used for going out on the roof, always stood open. However often they shut it, it was opened again immediately by an unseen hand, even before they got out of the room, and this continued the whole time they were in the house ; whilst night and day, someone in creaking shoes was heard pacing backwards and forwards in the room over Mr. and Mrs. L.'s heads.

At length the year expired, and, to their great relief, they quitted the house ; but five or six years afterwards, a person who had bought it having taken up the floor of that upper room to repair it, there was found, close to the small door above alluded to, the skeleton of a child. It was then remembered that, some years before, a

OTTERY. 183

gentleman of somewhat dissolute habits had resided there, and that he was supposed to have been on very intimate terms with a young woman servant who lived with him ; but there had been no suspicion of anything more criminal.

OTTERY,

The famous Dr. Abererombie, in his Inquiries concern- ing the Intellectual Powers, adduces, as an undoubted fact, one of the most singular and inexplicable stories on record. The marvel of this story does not merely consist in the wonderful coincidence of the two con- curring and synchronous dreams, but also in the per- sistent way with which the mother held that she had not dreamed her son appeared to her, but that he had really, if not in body then in spirit, been to her bedside and spoken to her. The account of this extraordinary affair was written by one of the persons concerned ; that is to say, the Rev. Joseph Wilkins, who at the time it occurred, in 1754, he being then twenty-three years of age, was usher in a school at St. Mary Ottery, Devon- shire, celebrated as the birth-place of Coleridge. Wil- kins subsequently became a well-known dissenting minister.

" One night," runs his narrative, "soon after I was in bed, I fell asleep, and dreamed I was going to Lon

184 HAUNTED HOMES.

don. I thought it would not be much out of my way to go through Gloucestershire, and call upon my friends there. Accordingly, I set out, hut remembered nothing that happened by the way till I came to my father's house ; when I went to the front door and tried to open it, but found it fast. Then I went to the back door, which I opened and went in ; but finding all the family were in bed, I crossed the rooms only, went up- stairs, and entered the chamber where my father and mother were in bed. As I went by the side of the bed on which my father lay, I found him asleep, or thought he was so ; then I went to the other side, and having just turned the foot of the bed, I found my mother awake, to whom I said these words : " Mother, I am going a long journey, and am come to bid you good-bye.' Upon which she answered in a fright, * Oh, dear son, thou art dead ! ' With this I awoke, and took no notice of it more than a common dream, except that it appeared to me very perfect.

" In a few days after, as soon as a letter could reach me, I received one by post from my father; upon the receipt of which I was a little surprised, and concluded something extraordinary must have happened, as it was but a short time before I had a letter from my friends, and all were well. Upon opening it I was more sur- prised still, for my father addressed me as though I were dead, desiring me, if alive, or whose ever hands the letter might fall into, to write immediately; but if the letter should find me living, they concluded I should not live long, and gave this as the reason of their fears :

OTTERY. 185

That on a certain night, naming it, after they were in bed, my father asleep and my mother awake, she heard somebody try to open the front door; but finding it fast, he went to the back door, which he opened, came in, and came directly through the rooms upstairs, and she perfectly knew it to be my step ; but I came to her bedside, and spoke to her these words : ' Mother, I am going a long journey, and have come to bid you good- bye.' Upon which she answered me in a fright, ' Oh, dear son, thou art dead ! ' — which were the circum- stances and words of my dream. But she heard nothing more, and saw nothing more; neither did I in my dream. Much alarmed she woke my father, and told him what had occurred ; but he endeavoured to appease her, persuading her it was only a dream. She insisted it was no dream, for that she was as perfectly awake as ever she was, and had not the least inclination to sleep since she was in bed.

" From these circumstances I am inclined to think it was at the very same instant when my dream happened, though the distance between us was about one hundred miles ; but of this I cannot speak positively. This occurred while I was at the academy at Ottery, Devon, in the year 1754, and at this moment every circum- stance is fresh upon my mind. I have, since, had frequent opportunities of talking over the affair with my mother, and the whole was as fresh upon her mind as it was upon mine. I have often thought that her sensations as to this matter were stronger than mine. What may appear strange is, that I cannot remember

186 HAUNTED HOMES.

anything remarkable happening hereupon. This is only a plain, simple narrative of a matter of fact."

As the Rev. Joseph Wilkins points out, at the con- clusion of this marvellous story, nothing remarkable followed it; his own death, which his mother had so much feared was portended, did not take place until November 22, 1800, when he was in the seventieth year of his age. The Gentleman's Magazine, in its obituary of Wilkins, remarked that, " for liberality of sentiment, generosity of disposition, and uniform integrity, he had few equals and hardly any superiors."

OULTON HIGH HOUSE.

Oulton High House, in Suffolk, now a school, was long known as <; the Haunted House." It was built in 1550 by one of the Hobarts, and still retains a fine old mantelpiece, and other curious carved work, as ancient as the house itself. It is popularly believed to have acquired its ill-omened title on account of some deed of darkness committed within its precincts. At mid- night, according to tradition, a wild huntsman and his hounds, together with a white lady carrying a poisoned cup, are supposed to issue forth and go their feverish rounds.

The origin of one member of this spectral group is traced back to the reign of George II., and the story is that the owner at that period of the High House, a

OULTON HIGH HOUSE. 187

roystering squire, returning home from the chase un- expectedly, discovered his wife with an officer, his guest, in too familiar a friendship. High words followed, and the injured hushand striking his wife's lover, the man drew his sword and drove it through his assailant's heart. The assassin and his guilty love fled, carrying away with them all the jewels and gold they could obtain possession of.

After a lapse of several years the guilty woman's daughter, who had been forgotten in the hasty de- parture, having grown to womanhood, was affianced to a youthful farmer of the neighbourhood. A bleak November night, on the eve of the marriage, as the happy pair were sitting together in the old hall, a car- riage, black and sombre as a hearse, with closely-drawn curtains, and attended by servants clad in sable liveries, drew up to the door. These men, who were masked, rushed into the hall, and seizing the young girl, carried her off in the carriage to her unnatural mother, after having stabbed her betrothed as he vainly endeavoured to rescue her. A grave is stated to be pointed out in the cemetery at Namur, as that in which was laid the corpse of the unhappy daughter, her mother having, so it is alleged, completed the catalogue of her crimes by poisoning the hapless girl. And after that, there is little wonder that the old residence was haunted by the spectre of the wretched woman, as wife and as mothel equally criminal. As to what the weird huntsman and his ghostly hounds signify, tradition is silent.

188 HAUNTED HOMES.

OXFORD UNIVERSITY: QUEEN'S

COLLEGE.

Like most of the older foundations of Alma Maier, Queen's College has had its ghost. The Kev. Mr. More of Leyton, Essex, formerly of Queen's, Oxford, a man of veracity and learning, who died in 1778, left this story of an apparition that favoured his own college with a visit.

Mr. John Bonnell was a commoner of Queen's College, Oxford. He was remarkable in his person and gait, and, from a peculiar manner he had of holding up his gown behind, might be recognised almost as readily by his back as by his face.

" On Sunday, November the 18th, 1750, at noon, Mr. Ballard, who was then of Magdalen College, and myself," says Mr. More, "were talking together at Parker's door. I was then waiting for the sound of the trumpet for dinner, and suddenly Mr. Ballard cried out, ' Dear me, who is that coming out of your college? ' I looked, and saw, as I supposed, Mr. Bonnell, and replied, * He is a gentleman of our house, and his name is Bonnell ; he comes from Stanton Harcourt.' ' Why, bless me,' said Mr. Ballard, ' I never saw such a face in all my life.' I answered slightly, ' His face is much the same as it always is ; I think it is a little more inflamed and swelled than it is sometimes, perhaps he has buckled his band too tight, but I should not have

oxfoed : queen's college. 189

observed it if you had not spoken.' ' Well,' said Mr. Ballard again, ' I never shall forget him, as long as I live ' ; and appeared to be much disconcerted and frightened.

(t This figure I saw without any emotion or suspicion," proceeds Mr. More; "it came down the quadrangle, came out at the gate, and walked up the High Street. We followed it with our eyes till it came to Catherine Street, where it was lost.

" The trumpet then sounded, and Mr. Ballard and I parted ; and I went into the hall, and thought no more of Mr. Bonnell.

" In the evening the prayers of the chapel were desired for one who was in a very sick and dangerous condition. When T came out of the chapel, I inquired of one of the scholars, James Harrison, in the hearing of several others who were standing before the kitchen fire, who it was that was prayed for, and was answered, ' Mr. Bonnell, senior.' * Bonnell senior ! ' said I, with astonishment; what is the matter with him? He was very well to-day, for I saw him go out to dinner.' 'You are very much mistaken,' answered Harrison, ' for he has not been out of his bed for some days.' I then asserted more positively that I had seen him, and that a gentle- man was with me who saw him too.

" This came presently to the ears of Dr. Fothergill, who had been my tutor. After supper he took me aside, and questioned me about it, and said he was very sorry 1 had mentioned the matter so publicly, for Mr. Bonnell was dangerously ill. I replied I was very sorry too,

190 HAUNTED HOMES.

but I had done it innocently. The next day Mi. Bonnell died."

Mr. More states that Mr. Ballard was applied to, and bore witness to the fact that the figure he had so particularly noticed was stated to be Mr. Bonnell, who was of Queen's, and came from Stanton Harcourt. It may, also, be added that when this curious story, found among the Rev. Mr. More's papers at his decease, was published in the Gentleman }s Magazine t and other contemporary publications, the particulars were con- firmed, in various ways, by persons referred to in the story. As the account of an apparition or wraith of a person on the pjir.t of death, seen by more than one individual, it is by no means unique in literary records.

PEELE CASTLE.

In no portion of the British kingdom are legends more rife, and superstitions more tenacious, than in the Isle of Man. Of the various romantic ruins which bedeck the island, and around which tradition has flung its ivy-like tendrils, none are more picturesque or more closely con- nected with mediaeval myths than Peele Castle. Among other marvellous stories told of the supernatural beings which haunt its precincts is the following, to be found in the pages of Waldron, whose account of the island

H -Jl <

PEELE CASTLE. 191

is an inexhaustible mine of Manx legendary and folk lore.

" An apparition, which they call the Manthe Doog, in the shape of a shaggy spaniel, was stated to haunt the Castle in all parts, but particularly the guard-chamber, where the dog would constantly come and lie down hy the fire at candle-light. The soldiers lost much of their terror hy the frequency of the sight ; yet, as they believed it to be an evil spirit, waiting foi an opportunity to injure them, that belief kept them so far in order, that they refrained from swearing and discourse in its presence, and none chose to be left alone with such an insidious enemy. Now, as the Manthe Doog used to come out and returr- by the passage through the church, by which also some- body must go to deliver the keys every night to the Captain, they continued to go together, he whose turn it was to do that duty being accompanied by the next in rotation.

"But one of the soldiers, on a certain night, being much disguised in liquor, would go with the key alone, though it really was not his turn. His comrades in vain endeavoured to dissuade him ; he said he wanted the Manthe Doog's company, and he would try whether he were dog or devil ; and then, after much profane talk, he snatched up the keys and departed. Some time afterwards a great noise alarmed the soldiers, but none of them would venture to go and see what was the cause. When the adventurer returned, he was struck with horror and speechless, nor could he even make such signs as might give them to understand what had

192 HAUNTED HOMES.

happened to him, but he died, with distorted features, in violent agony. After this none would go through the passage, which was soon closed up, and the apparition was never more seen in the castle."

"This accident happened about three-score years since," says Waldron, " and I heard it attested by several, but especially by an old soldier, who assured me he had seen it (i.e. the Manthe Doog), oftener than he had then hairs on his head."

PLYMOUTH.

Amongst the innumerable multitude of buildings which have the reputation of being haunted, it will be noted that by far the larger number are haunted by strange noises and mysterious sounds only, but few of them really attaining to the dignity of being visited by visible beings. Some of the places, however, which have had the character of being disturbed by unusual and unaccountable noises are very interesting from the suggestiveness of these noises : in the following account, for instance, and indeed in many others, the ghostly but invisible visitants appear to be condemned to return to the occupations they followed before they shuffled off the mortal coil, and to resume, after their incorporeal fashion, the labours of their past life.

The mother of the famous premier, George Canning,

PLYMOUTH. 1Q3

after the death of her first husband, became an actress, and married an actor. Becoming a widow for the second time, she married a third husband, named Hunn, and under his name appears to have acted in the pro- vinces. Among other provincial towns Mrs. Hunn visited Plymouth, but previous to her arrival there she had requested Mr. Bernard, who was in some way con- nected with the theatre there, to procure lodgings for her in the town. When Mrs. Hunn arrived, she was met by Mr. Bernard with the intimation that if she were not afraid of a ghost, he could obtain very com- fortable lodgings for her at a very low rate, " for there is," said he, " a house belonging to our carpenter that is reported to be haunted, and nobody will live in it. If you like to have it, you may, and for nothing, I believe, for he is so anxious to get a tenant ; only you must not let it be known that you do not pay any rent for it."

Mrs. Hunn, alluding to theatrical apparitions, said it would not be the first time she had had to do with a ghost, and that she was very willing to encounter this one ; so she had her luggage taken into the house in question, and the bed prepared. At her usual hour, she sent her maid and her children to bed, and curious to see if there was any foundation for the rumour she had heard, she seated herself with a couple of candles and a book, to watch the event. Beneath the room she occupied was the carpenter's workshop, which had two doors ; the one which opened into the street was barred and bolted within; the other, a smaller one, opening into

13

194 HAUNTED HOMESo

the passage, was only on the latch ; and the house was, of course, closed for the night. She had read somewhat more than half an hour, when she perceived a noise issuing from this lower apartment, which sounded very much like the sawing of wood ; presently, other such noises as usually proceed from a carpenter's workshop were added, till, by-and-bye, there was a regular concert of knocking and hammering, and sawing and planing, &c. ; the whole sounding like half a dozen busy men in full employment. Being a woman of considerable courage, Mrs. Hunn resolved, if possible, to penetrate the mystery ; so, taking off her shoes, that her approach might not be heard, with her candle in her hand, she very softly opened her door and descended the stairs, the noise continuing as loud as ever, and evidently pro* ceeding from the workshop, till she opened the door, when instantly all was silent — all was still— not a mouse was stirring ; and the tools and the wood, and everything else, lay as they had been left by the workmen when they went away. Having examined every part of the place, and satisfied herself that there was nobody there, and that nobody could get into it, Mrs. Hunn ascended to her room again, beginning almost to doubt her own senses, and question with her- self whether she had really heard the noise or not, when it re-commenced, and continued, without intermission, for about half an hour. She however went to bed, and the next day told nobody w7hat had occurred, having determined to watch another night before mentioning the affair to anyone. As, however, this strange scene

<m> - /few

•as

1 <~

POWIS CASTLE. 195

was acted over again, without her being able to dis- cover the cause of it, she now mentioned the circum- stance to the owner of the house and to her friend Mr. Bernard ; and the former, who would not believe it, agreed to watch with her, which he did. The noise began as before, and he was so horror-struck that, instead of entering the workshop as she wished him to do, he rushed into the street. Mrs. Hunn continued to inhabit the house the whole summer, and when referring afterwards to the adventure, she observed that use was second nature ; and that she was sure, if any night these ghostly carpenters had not pursued their visionary labours, she should have been quite frightened lest they should pay her a visit up- stairs.

POWIS CASTLE.

According to Camden this ancient stronghold was formerly called " Kasteth Koch," or Ked Castle, on account of the colour of the stone with which it was built. It stands on a rocky elevation in the midst of a well-wooded park, and despite the restoration which it has undergone at the hands of Sir Eobert Smirke is not considered " a thing of beauty." If the outside be irregular in style the interior is heavy and gloomy, and thoroughly appropriate for the localisation of ghostly legends. It possesses, among other interesting relics,

3 *

196 HAUNTED HOMES.

a state chamber, still maintained in the exact condition it was in when prepared for the reception of Charles I. Since the time of Queen Elizabeth, when the surround- ing estate was purchased by the Heberts, Powis Castle has been the seat of the Earls Powis. There are naturally various legends connected with this time- honoured dwelling, one being that the lake in the Castle park, from which the adjacent town of Welshpool takes its name, " shall sometime overflow and deluge the town." But there is also a well-authenticated and most circumstantial ghost story of Powis Castle, for the record of which we are indebted to the Autobiography of Thomas Wright, of Birkenshaw.

In 1780, it became known to the townsfolk of Welsh- pool, that there was living amongst them a certain poor unmarried woman who had conversed with the Castle ghost, and that it had confided a great secret to her. The woman thus selected for this alleged trust was a member of the Methodist Society, and "had become serious under their ministry." Mr. John Hampson, a well-known preacher amongst the Wesleyan Methodists, being desirous of probing this strange story to the core, sent for the woman, and earnestly besought her to tell him the whole truth about the affair. She promised to give him as exact an account as she possibly could, and then proceeded with the following narration, to the correctness of which many persons could bear witness. She described herself as a poor woman who obtained a livelihood by spinning hemp and line, and stated that it was customary for the farmers and gentlemen of the

POWIS OASTLE. 197

district to grow enough hemp or line in their fields for their own home-consumption, and as she was a good hand at spinning, she was accustomed to go from house to house to inquire for work. It was the custom at houses where she stayed, to provide her with meat and drink, and if necessary with lodging, whilst she was thus employed, and when she left to make her some little present.

One day she chanced to call at Earl Powis's country residence, Red Castle as it was called, to inquire for work, according to custom. The " quality," as she termed the family, were at this time in London, hut had, as usual, left the steward and his wife, with certain other servants, to take charge of the place during their absence. The steward's wife set her to work, and in the evening told her that she must stay all night with them, as they had more work for her to do next day. When it was time to go to bed, three of the servants, each carrying a lighted candle in her hand, conducted her to the room she was to sleep in. It was an apart- ment on the ground floor, with a boarded floor and two sash windows, and was grandly furnished, with a hand- some bedstead in one corner of it. They had made up a good fire for her, and had placed a chair and table before it, with a large lighted candle upon the table. They informed her that that was to be her bed-room, and that she might go to bed whenever she pleased. They then wished her a good night, and all withdrew together, pulling the door quickly after them, so as to hasp the spring-sneck in the brass lock that was upon it.

198 HAUNTED HOMES.

When the servants had thus hastily departed, the poor spinster gazed around at the grand furniture, and was in no slight astonishment that they should put such a person as she was in so fine a room and so comfort- able a bed, with all the conveniences of fire, chair, table, and candle. After having made a survey of the place, she sat down, and took out of her pocket a small Welsh Bible which she always carried about with her, and in which she always read a chapter, chiefly in the New Testament, before she said her prayers and retired to rest.

Whilst the woman was reading she heard the door opeu, and turning her head, was astonished to see a gentleman enter the room ; he wore a gold-laced hat and waistcoat, with coat and the rest of his attire to correspond. He walked down by the sash window to the corner of the room, and then returned. When he came, as he returned to the first window, the bot- tom of which was nearly breast high, he rested his elbow on the bottom of the window and the side of his face upon the palm of his hand, and stood in that leaning posture for some time, with his side partly towards her. She looked at him earnestly to see if she knew him, but although, from her frequent intercourse with them, she had a personal knowledge of all the family and its retainers, he appeared to be a perfect stranger to her. She supposed, afterwards, that he stood in this manner to eucourage her to speak ; but as she did not utter a word, after some little time he walked off, pulling the door to after him as the servants had done previously. She began now to be much

POWIS CASTLE. 199

alarmed, concluding it to be an apparition, and that they had put her in that grand room because it was haunted. And that was reallv the case.

For some long time past the room had been so dis- turbed that nobody could sleep in it peaceably, and as she passed for a very serious woman, the servants con- ceived the fine project of putting the poor Methodist and the spirit together, in order to see what the result would be.

Startled at the thought that it was an apparition she had seen, the woman rose from her chair, and kneeling down by the bedside, began saying her prayers. Whilst she was praying the apparition came in again, walked round the room, and came close behind her. She now endeavoured to speak, but when she attempted it she was so agitated that she could not utter a word. The apparition walked out of the room again, pulling the door after it as it had done before. She begged that God would strengthen her, and not suffer her to be tried bevond what she was able to bear ; she now recovered her spirits somewhat, and thought she felt more con- fidence and resolution, and determined if it came in again she would speak to it if possible. Presently it came in again, walked round the room, and came behind her as before. She turned her head and said, —

" Pray, Sir, who are you, and what do you want ? "

It lifted its finger, and said, —

"Take up the candle and follow me, and I will tell you."

She got up, took up the candle, and followed it out

200 HAUNTED HOMES.

of the room. It led her through a long boarded pas- sage till they got to the door of another room, which it opened and went into. It was a very small room, or what might be called a large closet.

" As the room was small, and I believed him to be a spirit," said she, in her recital of the affair, " I stopped at the door ; he turned and said, —

" « Walk in ; I will not hurt you/

" So I walked in. Then he said, —

" * Observe what I do.'

" I said, < I will/

" He stooped and tore up one of the boards of the floor, and there appeared under it a box with an iron handle in the lid. He said, —

" * Do you see that box V

" I said, ' Yes, I do.'

" He then stepped to one side of the room, and showed me a crevice in the wall, where he said a key was hid that would open it. He said, — >

" ' This box and key must be taken out and sent to the Earl in London ' ; naming the Earl and his place of residence in the metropolis. He said, —

" ' Will you see it done ? '

" I said, * I will do my best to get it done.'

" He said, ' Do, and I will trouble the house no

more.' "

It then walked out of the room and left her. As soon as the woman saw that the apparition had de- parted, she went to the room-door and set up a loud shout. The steward and his wife, together with all the

POWIS OASTLE. 201

other servants, ran to her immediately ; they were all clinging to one another and carrying lights. It seems that they had all been waiting to see the issue of the interview between the woman and the apparition. They asked her what was the matter. She then told them all that had taken place, and showed them the box. The steward dare not meddle with it, but his wife was of a more courageous temperament, and with the assist- ance of the other servants, tugged it out, and found the key in the place indicated by the apparition. The woman stated that, by the way in which they lifted it, it appeared to be pretty heavy, but that she did not see it opened, and, therefore, did not know what it con- tained ; whether money or writings of importance to the family, or both. The servants took it away with them, and the woman averred that she then went to bed and slept peaceably till the morning.

It appeared, from what was subsequently learnt, that the box and its contents were sent to the Earl in Lon- don, together with an account of how it was discovered and by whom. The Earl immediately sent down orders to his steward to inform the poor woman, who had been the means of the discovery, that if she would come and reside in his family she should be comfortably provided for for the remainder of her days ; or, if she did not care to reside constantly with them, if she would let him know when she wanted assistance, she should be liberally supplied at his lordship's expense as long as she lived.

And according to the account related by Mr. John

202 HAUNTED HOMES.

Hampson, it was a fact well known in the neighbour- hood that the woman had been supplied from the Earl's family ever since the time when the affair was said to have happened.

RAINHAM.

Kainham, the seat of the Marquis Townshend, in Nor- folk, has long been noted for its ghost known as " the Brown Lady." Mrs. Crowe, and many other writers on apparitions and kindred themes, have alluded to the circumstance of this family residence being haunted by a spectral woman, but their references are very slight and the particulars they give exceedingly meagre. Mrs. Crowe, indeed, mentions that many persons have seen " the Brown Lady," and speaks of a guest who one day inquired of his host, " Who was the lady in brown that he had met frequently on the stairs ? ' But the most circumstantial account of the appearance of this appari- tion would appear to be that given by Lucia C. Stone, in Rifts in the Veil. This record she states she re- ceived from an eye-witness, and as a proof of its authenticity draws attention to the fact that the names of all parties concerned are given in full. The time of the incidents, however, cannot be given any nearer than between 1835 and 1849.

According to this narrative a large party had assem-

RAINHAM. 203

bled at Rainham, in order to pass the Christmas there. Lord and Lady Charles Townshend were the host and hostess on this occasion, and among the assembled guests were Colonel and Mrs. Loftus, and Miss Page, a cousin of the latter. Colonel Loftus was a brother of Lady Charles and cousin to Lord Charles, being a Townshend on his mother's side.

There was a tradition in the Townshend family that at certain intervals the apparition of a lady attired in brown brocade had been seen flitting about the build- ing ; but nothing had occurred for some long time past, and the old stories respecting the hauntings had been well-nigh forgotten.

One night Colonel Loftus and a gentleman named Hawkins sat up rather late over a game of chess ; they went up-stairs, and were bidding each other " good- night," when Mr. Hawkins exclaimed, " Loftus, who is that standing at your sister's door? How strangely she is dressed." Colonel Loftus, who was near-sighted, put up his glass and followed the figure, which went on for some little distance, when he lost sight of it. A second night she appeared to him, and this time, to prevent her escape, he went up a staircase which would bring him face to face with her. There, in a full light, stood a stately lady in her rich brocade, a sort of coif on her head, the features clearly defined ; but where there should have been eyes were nothing but dark hollows.

"These were the two appearances he described to me," says Lucia Stone, (e and he sketched her after-

204 HAUNTED HOMES.

wards. I saw the sketch just after his return from Rainham. The lady was seen hy several others, and I have heard the stories, but not from their own lips, so I forbear to give them ; but perhaps I should mention that the cousin of Mrs. Loftus, Miss Page, whom I knew very intimately, asked Lord Charles if he too believed in the apparition ? He replied, ' I cannot but believe, for she ushered me into my room last night.'

The servants were frightened, and one after the other gave warning. Lord Charles Townshend, thinking that, perhaps, after all, it might be a trick on the part of someone in the house, had various alterations made in the way of bolts, locks, and so forth. This proving useless, he engaged some of the London police force to come down, and made them assume his livery ; but they were unable to discover anything during their stay at Kainham.

There does not seem to be any known legend con- nected with the appearance of the apparition of "the Brown Lady."

RAMHURST MANOR-HOUSE.

When the complicated developments of the tale con- nected with this Kentish Manor-house are known, it must be acknowledged that the affair is one of the most mysterious on record. Robert Dale Owen, from whose

RAMHURST MANOR-HOUSE. 205

singular work, Footfalls on the Boundary of Another World, this strange story is extracted, does not furnish the actual names of the ladies from whom he derived his information about the haunting of Ramhurst, but veils their identity under initials ; and as we have no other authority for the account than his, it will be necessary, in this instance to follow his example.

Ramhurst Manor-house, it must be premised, is an ancient residence near Leigh, in Kent. In October 1857, and for several subsequent months, it was occu- pied by Mrs. R , the wife of an English officer of

high rank, and her servants. From the time this ladv first occupied the place she, and every inmate, were disturbed by knockings, unaccountable voices, and the sounds of mysterious footsteps. The strange voices were generally, but not invariably, heard proceeding from an unoccupied room, and were sometimes as of someone talking in a loud tone, sometimes as if some person were reading aloud, and occasionally as if screaming. The servants were, as may be imagined, in a great state of terror, and although they did not

see anything, the cook one day informed Mrs. R

that in broad day she heard the rustle of a silk- dress close behind her, and which seemed to touch her ; but on turning suddenly round, thinking it was her mis- tress, she could not see anyone, much to her surprise

and horror. Mrs. R 's brother, a young officer

addicted to field sports, and quite incredulous on the subject of ghostly visitations, was much disturbed and annoyed by these strange voices, which he asserted must

206 HAUNTED HOMES.

be those of his sister and a lady friend of hers sitting up chatting at night. Twice, when a voice which he considered to resemble his sister's rose to a scream, he rushed into her bed-room, between two and three o'clock in the morning, with a gun in his hand, but only to find her sleeping quietly.

" On the second Saturday in the above month of

October," says our authority, " Mrs. R drove over

to the railway station at Tunbridge, to meet her friend

Miss S , whom she had invited to spend some

weeks with her. This young lady had been in the habit of seeing apparitions, at times, from early child- hood.

" When, on their return, at about four o'clock in the afternoon, they drove up to the entrance of the Manor- house, Miss S perceived on the threshold the

appearance of two figures, apparently an elderly couple, habited in the costume of a former age. They appeared as if standing on the ground. She did not hear any voice, and not wishing to render her friend uneasy, she made at that time no remark to her in connection with this apparition.

" She saw the appearance of the same figures, in the same dress, several times within the next ten days, sometimes in one of the rooms of the house, sometimes in one of the passages — always by daylight. They appeared to her surrounded by an atmosphere nearly of the colour usually called ' neutral tint.' On the third occasion they spoke to her, and stated that they had been husband and wife, that in the former days they

EAMHUKST MANOR-HOUSE. 207

had possessed and occupied that Manor-house, and that their name was Children. They appeared sad and down- cast, and, when Miss S inquired the cause of their

melancholy, they replied that they had idolized this property of theirs ; that their pride and pleasure had centred in its possession ; that its improvement had engrossed their thoughts; and it troubled them to know that it had passed away from their family, and to see it now in the hands of careless strangers."

To Miss S , the ghost-seer, the voices of the

apparitions were not only perfectly audible, but also intelligible ; but it does not appear certain, so far as our record goes, that others who heard the conversing were enabled to comprehend what was said by the spirits. Meanwhile, Mrs. R , thinking that some- thing unusual had occurred to her friend in connection with the household disturbances, questioned her on the

subject, and was then informed by Miss S of what

she had seen and heard from the apparitions. Hitherto

Mrs. R , though her rest had been disturbed by

the frequent noises, had not seen anything, nor, indeed,

had anyone save Miss S ; but about a month after

the latter lady had had the interview with the spectres styling themselves Mr. and Mrs. Children, they made another optical manifestation.

One day, Mrs. R , who had ceased to expect the

appearance of the apparitions to herself, was hurriedly dressing for dinner, " her brother," to cite from Owen, " who had just returned from a day's shooting, having called to her in impatient tones that dinner was served

208 HAUNTED HOMES.

and that he was quite famished. At the moment of completing her toilet, and as she hastily turned to leave her bed-chamber, not dreaming of anything spiritual, there in the doorway stood the same female figure

Miss S had described, identical in appearance and

in costume, even to the old point-lace on her brocaded silk dress, while beside her on the left, but less distinctly visible, was the figure of her husband. They uttered no sound ; but above the figure of the lady, as if written in phosphoric light in the dusk atmosphere that sur- rounded her, were the words ' Dame Children* together with some other words, intimating that, having never aspired beyond the joys and sorrows of this world, she had remained * earth-bound.'

" These last words Mrs. E scarcely paused to

decipher ; for a renewed appeal from her brother, as to whether they were to have any dinner that day, urged her forward. The figure, filling up the doorway, remained stationary. There was no time for hesitation, she closed her eyes, rushed through the apparition and into the dining-room, throwing up her hands and ex- claiming to Miss S , * Oh ! my dear, I 've walked

through Mrs. Children ! ' "

This was the only time Mrs. R saw anything of

the apparitions during her residence in the old Manor- house, nor do they seem to have appeared again to

anyone there, save Miss S . Mrs. R had her

bedroom not only lit up by a blazing fire, but also by candles, whilst a lighted lamp was kept burning in the corridor. Miss S , however, appears to have

EAMHURST MANOR-HOUSE. 209

been honoured with subsequent interviews by the appa- ritions, and from her conversations with them learnt that the husband's name was Richard, and that he had died in 1753. She remarked that the costumes in which they appeared " were of the period of Queen Anne or one of the early Georges, she could not be sure which, as the fashions in both were similar."

Deeply impressed with the mystery that appertained

to the old Manor-house, Mr. R endeavoured to

elucidate it by making inquiries among the servants and in the neighbourhood, but without success. No one knew that the house had ever been owned or inhabited by persons of the name of " Children," although a nurse

in the family, Sophy 0 -, had spent all her life in the

vicinity. About four months afterwards, and when her mistress had given up all hopes of unravelling the mystery, Sophy went home for a holiday to her father's at Riverhead, near Sevenoaks. During her visit she called on a sister-in-law, an old woman of seventy, who fifty years previous had been housemaid in a family residing in Ramhurst Manor-house. Sophy asked her old sister-in-law if she had ever heard of a family named Children living at the Manor, and was informed that there was no such familv there in her time, but she recollected having been informed by an old man, that in his boyhood he had assisted to keep the hounds of the Childrens who were then residing at Ramhurst. On her return Sophy communicated this information to

Mrs. R , who thus learnt that a family named

Children had once really occupied the Manor-house,

14

:

210 HAUNTED HOMES.

but beyond that she was unable to learn anything about them.

In December 1858, Robert Dale Owen, being in the

company of the two ladies referred to, Mrs. E and

Miss S , learnt all the particulars of the haunting

and the apparitions already given. Having accepted an invitation to spend Christmas week with some friends living near Sevenoaks, he determined to prosecute further inquiries about the haunted Manor, and its former inhabitants in the neighbourhood. He sought out Sophy and questioned her closely about the

disturbances at the Manor-house during Mrs. R -'s

residence, but was enabled to elicit little more than confirmatory evidence of what the reader knows already. Nor did his inspection of the churches and graveyards of Leigh and Tunbridge afford him any fresh informa- tion about the Children family, save that a certain George Children left, in the year 1718, a weekly gift of bread to the poor, and that another George Children, his descendant, who had died about forty years pre- vious, and who had not resided at Ramhurst, had a marble tablet in Tunbridge Church erected to his memory.

Thus far Mr. Owen had not obtained any further particulars of much value, but having been referred to a neighbouring clergyman, by him he was lent a docu- ment that contained the following extract from the Hasted Papers, which are preserved in the British Museum, and may be consulted there : —

" George Children . . . who was High Sheriff of

EAMHURST MANOE-HOUSE. 211

Kent in 1698, died without issue in 1718, and by will devised the bulk of his estate to Eichard Children, eldest son of his late uncle, William Children, of Hed- corn, and his heirs. This Eichard Children, who settled himself at Ramhurst, in the Parish of Leigh, married Anne, daughter of John Saxby, in the parish of Leeds, by whom he had issue four sons and two daughters/'' &c.

Thus Mr. Owen had ascertained that the first of the Children family who had occupied Kamhurst as a residence was named Eichard, and that he settled there in the early part of George I.'s reign, but he was still ignorant of the date of his death, which, it will have been noted, was given by the apparition as 1753. Being referred by an antiquarian friend to Hasted's History of Kent, published in 1778, he fo md the following para- graph : —

" In the eastern part of the parish of Lyghe (now Leigh), near the river Medway, stands an ancient man- sion, called Eamhurst, once reputed a manor, and held of the honour of Gloucester. ... It continued in the Culpepper family for several generations. ... It passed by sale into that of Saxby, and Mr. William Saxby conveyed it by sale to Children. Eichard Children, Esq., resided here, and died possessed of it in 1753, aged eighty-three years. He was succeeded in it by his eldest son, John Children, of Tunbridge, Esq.," &c.

" Thus I verified," remarks Eobert Dale Owen, " the last remaining particular, the date of Eichard Children s death. It appears from the above, also, that Eichard

14 *

212 HAUNTED HOMES.

Children was the only representative of the family who lived and died at Eamhurst ; his son John being de- signated not as of Eamhurst, hut as of Tunhridge. From the private memoir above referred to, I had pre- viously ascertained that the family seat after Eichard's time was Ferox Hall, near Tunbridge.

"It remains to be added that in 1816, in consequence of events reflecting no discredit on the family, they lost all their property, and were compelled to sell Earn' hurst, which has since been occupied, though a some- what spacious mansion, not as a family residence, but as a farm-house. I visited it, and the occupants as- sured me that nothing worse than rats or mice disturb it now."

ROCHESTER.

Baxter's Certainty of the World of Spirits contains one of the most marvellous and, apparently, best authenticated stories of modern miracles extant. If it be accepted as fact it will be a difficult matter to doubt any supernatural incident merely on account of its inex plicability. The story was sent to Baxter by the Eev. Thomas Tilson, the minister of Aylesford, near Maid- stone, in Kent, within five weeks of the event to which it referred happening ; the narrator was on the spot, and therefore had every opportunity of disproving or confirming the statements made ; whilst the names and residences of the witnesses are given, together with the

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ROCHESTER.

213

3xact time and place of the occurrences to which they ,estify. It would be difficult to adduce any historic jvent with, apparently, better testimony of its accuracy. Mr. Tilson's story, as written out for Baxter, is this : —

" Mary, the wife of John Goffe, of Rochester, being iffiicted with a long illness, removed to her father's louse at West Mailing, which is about nine miles dis- tant from her own. There she died June the 4th, this )resent year, 1691.

" The day before her departure she grew very im- patiently desirous to see her two children, whom she iad left at home to the care of a nurse. She prayed ler husband to hire a horse, for she must go home and lie with the children. When they persuaded her to the contrary, telling her she was not fit to be taken out of ler bed, nor able to sit on horseback, she entreated ,hem, however, to try. ' If I cannot sit/ said she, ' I ,vill lie all along upon the horse ; for I must go to see ny poor babes.'

" A minister who lived in the town was with her at ;en o'clock that night, to whom she expressed good lopes in the mercies of God, and a willingness to die. But,' said she, ' it is my misery that I cannot see my mildren.' Between one and two o'clock in the morning he fell into a trance. One, widow Turner, who watched ;vith her that night, says that her eyes were open and ixed and her jaw fallen. She put her hand upon her ring 0' nouth and nostrils, but could perceive no breath. She ,hought her to be in a fit, and doubted whether she

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212

HAUNTED HOMES.

Children was the only representative of the family whc lived and died at Kamhurst ; his son John being de signated not as of Kamhurst, but as of Tunbridge From the private memoir above referred to, I had pre viously ascertained that the family seat after Richard'* time was Ferox Hall, near Tunbridge.

"It remains to be added that in 1816, in consequenc< of events reflecting no discredit on the family, the] lost all their property, and were compelled to sell Kam hurst, which has since been occupied, though a some what spacious mansion, not as a family residence, bu as a farm-house. I visited it, and the occupants as sured me that nothing worse than rats or mice distur

it now.

>>

ROCHESTER.

Baxter's Certainty of the World of Spirits contain one of the most marvellous and, apparently, bes authenticated stories of modern miracles extant. If i be accepted as fact it will be a difficult matter to doub any supernatural incident merely on account of its inex plicability. The story was sent to Baxter by the Rev Thomas Tilson, the minister of Aylesford, near Maid stone, in Kent, within five weeks of the event to whic it referred happening ; the narrator was on the spot and therefore had every opportunity of disproving o confirming the statements made ; whilst the names au residences of the witnesses are given, together with th

exact oc: testify. & events.

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ROCHESTER. 213

exact time and place of the occurrences to which they testify. It would be difficult to adduce any historic event with, apparently, better testimony of its accuracy. Mr. Tilson's story, as written out for Baxter, is this : —

" Mary, the wife of John Goffe, of Rochester, being afflicted with a long illness, removed to her father's house at West Mailing, which is about nine miles dis- tant from her own. There she died June the 4th, this present year, 1691.

" The day before her departure she grew very im- patiently desirous to see her two children, whom she had left at home to the care of a nurse. She prayed her husband to hire a horse, for she must go home and die with the children. When they persuaded her to the contrary, telling her she was not fit to be taken out of her bed, nor able to sit on horseback, she entreated them, however, to try. ' If I cannot sit,' said she, 'I will lie all along upon the horse ; for I must go to see my poor babes.'

" A minister who lived in the town was with her at ten o'clock that night, to whom she expressed good hopes in the mercies of God, and a willingness to die. * But,' said she, 'it is my misery that I cannot see my children.' Between one and two o'clock in the morning she fell into a trance. One, widow Turner, who watched with her that night, says that her eyes were open and fixed and her jaw fallen. She put her hand upon her mouth and nostrils, but could perceive no breath. She thought her to be in a fit, and doubted whether she were dead or alive.

214 HAUNTED HOMES.

ffThe next morning this dying woman told her mother that she had been at home with her children. * That is impossible,' said the mother, ' for you have been in bed all the while.' ' Yes,' replied the other, ' but I was with them last night when I was asleep.'

" The nurse at Rochester, widow Alexander by name, affirms, and says she will take her oath on't before a magistrate, and take the sacrament upon it, that a little while before two o'clock that morning she saw the likeness of the said Mary Goffe come out of the next chamber (where the elder child lay in a bed by itself), the door being left open, and stood by her bedside for about a quarter of an hour; the younger child was there lying by her. Her eyes moved and her mouth went, but she said nothing. The nurse, moreover, says that she was perfectly awake ; it was then daylight, being one of the longest days in the year. She sat up in her bed and looked steadfastly upon the apparition. In that time she heard the bridge clock strike two, and a while after said, ' In the name of the Father, who art thou.' Thereupon the appearance removed and went away. She slipped on her clothes and followed, but what became on't she cannot tell. Then, and not before, she began to be grievously affrighted, and went out of doors and walked upon the wharf (the house is just on the river-side) for some hours, only going in now and then to look to the children. At five o'clock she went to a neighbour's house and knocked at the door, but they would not rise. At six she went again ; then they rose and let her in. She related to them all

ROCHESTER. 215

0

that had passed ; they would persuade her she was mis- taken or dreamt. But she confidently affirmed, * If ever I saw her in all my life, I saw her this night.'

" One of those to whom she made the relation (Mary the wife of John Sweet), had a messenger come from Mailing that forenoon, to let her know her neighbour Goffe was dying and desired to speak with her. She went over the same day, and found her just departing. The mother, among other discourse, related to her how much her daughter had longed to see the children, and said she had seen them. This brought to Mrs. Sweet's mind what the nurse had told her that morning; for till then she had not thought to mention it, but dis- guised it, rather, as the woman's disturbed imagination.

" The substance of this I had related to me/' savs

' ml

Mr. Tilson, "by John Carpenter, the father of the deceased, the next day after her burial, July the 2nd. I fully discoursed the matter with the nurse and two neighbours, to whose house she went that morning. Two days after, I had it from the mother, the minister that was with her in the evening, and the woman who sat up with her that last night. They all agree in the same story, and everyone helps to strengthen the other's testimony. They appear to be sober, intelligent persons, far enough off from designing to impose a cheat upon the world, or to manage a lie; and what temptation they could lie under for so doing I cannot conceive." And thus ends this incomprehensible affair.

216 HAUNTED HOMES.

KUSHEN CASTLE.

To mention many of the curious supernatural legends connected with the Castle of Rushen, in Castletown, Isle of Man, might only excite ridicule, and yet belief in the wildest of them still lingers in the vicinity. Among other terrifying apparitions which still, or until very recently did haunt this ancient stronghold is that of a woman who, some years ago, was executed for the murder of her child. The quantity and quality of the testimony adduced in corroboration of the appearance of this spectre is absolutely startling, many persons of good position and acknowledged veracity giving con- firmatory evidence. Their united testimony is to the effect that an apparition of the executed woman fre- quently passes in and out of the castle gates when they are shut, in the presence of the sentinels and other spectators. Indeed, it is alleged that the sight of this phantom has become quite familiar to them ; but no one has yet had the courage to speak to it, therefore it has not been enabled to unfold the object of its ap- pearance.

In his quaint Description of the island, Waldron gives the following curious tradition as connected with the venerable Manx Castle, in which, he states, there is an apartment that has never been opened in the memory of man. The persons belonging to the castle are very cautious in giving any reason for it, it is alleged, but

mm i

KUSHEN OASTLE. 217

the natives unconnected with the castle aver that there is something supernatural in it, and tell you that for- merly the place was inhabited by giants, who were dislodged by Merlin, and such as were not driven away are spell-bound beneath the castle. In proof of this they relate a very strange story which is told by Waldron in these terms : —

" They say there are a great many fine apartments under ground, exceeding in magnificence any of the upper rooms. Several men of more than ordinary courage have, in former times, ventured down to explore the secrets of this subterranean dwelling-place, but none of them ever returned to give an account of what they saw. It was, therefore, judged expedient that all the passages to it should be continually shut, that no more might suffer by their temerity. About some fifty or fifty-five years since a person possessed of uncommon boldness and resolution begged permission to visit these dark abodes. He at length obtained his request, went down, and returned by the help of a clue of pack-thread which he took with him, which no man before had ever done, and brought this amazing discovery : — That after he had passed through a great number of vaults, he came into a long narrow place, which, the further he penetrated, he perceived that he went more and more on a descent, till having travelled, as near as he could guess, for the space of a mile, he began to see a gleam of light which, though it seemed to come from a vast distance, was the most delightful object he ever beheld. Having at length arrived at the end of that lane of

218 HAUNTED HOMES.

darkness, he perceived a large and magnificent house, illuminated with many candles, whence proceeded the light he had seen. Having, before he began the expe- dition, well fortified himself with brandy, he had courage enough to knock at the door, which, on the third knock, was opened by a servant, who asked him what he wanted. 'I would go as far as I can,' replied our adventurer ; ' be so kind, therefore, as to direct me how to accom- plish my design, for I see no passage but that dark cavern through which I came.' The servant told him he must go through that house, and accordingly led him through a long entry and out at a back door. He then walked a considerable way, till he beheld another house more magnificent than the first, and, all the windows being open, he discovered innumerable lamps burning in everv room.

" Here also he designed to knock, but had the curi- osity to step on a little bank which commanded a view of a low parlour, and looking in, he beheld a vast table in the middle of the room, and on it, extended at full length, a man, or rather monster, at least fourteen feet long, and ten or twelve round the body. This pro- digious fabric lay as if sleeping, with his head upon a book, with a sword by him, answerable to the hand which he supposed made use of it. The sight was more terrifying to our traveller than all the dark and dreary mansions through which he had passed. He resolved, therefore, not to attempt an entrance into a place inhabited by persons of such monstrous stature, and made the best of his way back to the other house,

SARRATT, HERTFORDSHIRE. 219

when the same servant who reconducted him informed him that if he had knocked at the second door he would have seen company enough, but could never have re- turned, on which he desired to know what place it was, and by whom possessed. The other replied that these things were not to be revealed. He then took his leave, and by the same dark passage got into the vaults, and soon afterwards once more ascended to the light of the

sun."

Such is the marvellous legend told by the historian of Manxland, and he adds to it the statement that " whoever seems to disbelieve it is looked on as a person of weak faith," by the islanders, of course.

SARRATT, HERTFORDSHIRE.

In that most curious collection of stories by Mrs. Crowe, styled The Night Side of Nature, is recounted a marvellous narrative, received from a professional gen- tleman resident in London ; his relation is to this effect : —

" I was, some few years since, invited to pass a day and night at the house of a friend in Hertfordshire, with whom I was intimately acquainted. His name was

B , and he had formerly been in business as a

saddler, in Oxford Street, where he had realised a hand-

220 HAUNTED HOMES.

some fortune, and had now retired to enjoy his otium cum dignitate in the rural and beautiful village of Sarratt.

" It was a gloomy Sunday, in the month of November, when I mounted my horse for the journey, and there was so much appearance of rain, that I should certainly have selected some other mode of conveyance had I

not been desirous of leaving the animal in Mr. B 's

straw-yard for the winter. Before I got as far as St. John's Wood, the threatening clouds broke, and by the time I reached Watford I was completely soaked. However, I proceeded, and arrived at Sarratt before my friend and his wife had returned from church. The moment they did so, they furnished me with dry clothes, and I was informed that we were to dine at the house of

Mr. D , a very agreeable neighbour. I felt some

little hesitation about presenting myself in such a cos- tume, for I was decked out in a full suit of Mr. B rs,

who was a stout man, of six feet in height, whilst I am rather of the diminutive order; but my objections were over-ruled ; we went, and my appearance added not a little to the hilarity of the party. At ten o'clock we

separated, and I returned with Mr. and Mrs. B to

their house, where I was shortly afterwards conducted to a very comfort %r* bed-room.

" Fatigued with my day's ride, I was soon in bed, and soon asleep ; but I do not think I could have slept long before I was awakened by the violent barking of dogs. I found that the noise had disturbed others as well as myself, for J heard Mr. B , who was lodged in the

SARRATT, HERTFORDSHIRE. 221

adjoining room, open his window and call to them to be quiet. They were obedient to his voice, and as soon as quietness ensued, I dropped asleep again ; but I was again awakened by an extraordinary pressure upon my feet ; that I was perfectly awake I declare ; the light that stood in the chimney-corner shone strongly across the foot of the bed, and I saw the figure of a well-dressed man in the act of stooping, and supporting himself in so doing by the bed-clothes. He had on a blue coat, with bright gilt buttons, but I saw no head ; the curtains at the foot of the bed, which were partly looped back, just hung so as to conceal that part of his person. At first, I thought it was my host, and as I had dropped my clothes, as is my habit, on the floor, at the foot of the bed, I supposed he was come to look after them, which rather surprised me ; but just as I had raised myself upright in bed, and was about to inquire into the occa- sion of his visit, the figure passed on. I then recollected that I had locked the door ; and becoming somewhat puzzled, I jumped out of bed; but I could see nobody; and on examining the room, I found no means of ingress but the door through which I had entered, and one other; both of which were locked on the inside. Amazed and puzzled, I got into bed again, and sat some time ruminating on the extraordinary circumstance, when it occurred to me that I had not looked under the bed. So I got out again, fully expecting to find my visitor, whoever he was, there ; but I was disappointed. So after looking at my watch, and ascertaining that it was ten minutes past two, 1 stepped into bed again, hoping

222 HAUNTED hOMES.

now to get some rest. But alas ! sleep was banished for that night ; and after turning from side to side, and making vain endeavours at forgetfulness, I gave up the point, and lay till the clock struck seven, perplexing my brain with the question of who my midnight visitor could be ; and also how he had got in and how he had got out of my room. About eight o'clock, I met my host and his wife at the breakfast-table, when, in answer to their hospitable inquiries of how I had passed the night, I mentioned, first, that I had been awaked by the

barking of some dogs, and that I had heard Mr. B

open his window and call to them. He answered that two strange dogs had got into the yard and had disturbed the others. I then mentioned my midnight visitor, ex- pecting that they would either explain the circumstance, or else laugh at me and declare I must have dreamt it. But, to my surprise, my story was listened to with grave attention ; and they related to me the tradition with which this spectre, for such I found they deemed it to be, was supposed to be connected. This was to the effect, that many years ago a gentleman so attired, had been murdered there, under some frightful circumstances ; and that hi3 head had been cut off. On perceiving that I was very unwilling to accept this explanation of the mystery — for I had always been an entire disbeliever in supernatural appearances — they begged me to prolong my visit for a day or two, when they would introduce me to the rector of the parish, who could furnish me with such evidence with regard to circumstances of a similar nature, as would leave no doubt on my mind as to the

SAEEATT, HEETFOEDSHIEE. 223

possibility of their occurrence. But I had made an en- gagement to dine at Watford, on my way back ; and I confess, moreover, that after what I had heard, I did not feel disposed to encounter the chance of another visit from the mysterious stranger; so I declined the proffered hospitality, and took my leave.

" Some time after this, I happened to be dining in

C Street, in company with some ladies resident in

the same county, when, chancing to allude to my visit to Sarratt, I added that 1 had met with a very extraordinary adventure there, which I had never been able to account for; when one of these ladies immediately said, that she hoped I had not had a visit from the headless gentle- man, in a blue coat and gilt buttons, who was said to have been seen by many people in that house.

" Such is the conclusion of this marvellous tale as regards myself; and I can only assure you that I have related facts as they occurred ; and that I had never heard a word about this apparition in my life, till

Mr. B related to me the tradition above alluded to.

Still, as I am no believer in supernatural appearances, I am constrained to suppose that the whole affair was the product of my imagination."

224 HAUNTED HOMES.

SCORRIER HOUSE.

Ir seems impossible to explain away the well vouched- for facts of the following marvellous historic incident by any theory of coincidence. The points of identity between the tragedy enacted afar off and the dreams in Cornwall are so many, that the Calculus of Probabilities would scarcely include their agreement within the rules of the Possible. And if not by coincidence, by what law can the mystery be analysed ? It is not our task, however, to attempt to solve the problem, but to tell the story, basing our narrative upon the account which was given in the Times newspaper of August 16th, 1868. It was on the night of the 11th of May 1812, accord- ing to the version of the story told by the Times during the life-time of Mr. Williams, that that gentleman, then residing at Scorrier House, near Kedruth, in Cornwall, awoke his wife, and in great agitation informed her that he had dreamed he was in the lobby of the House of Commons, and had seen a man shoot with a pistol a gentleman who had just entered the lobby, and who was said to be the Chancellor. Mrs. Williams verv naturally replied that it was only a dream and endea- voured to calm her husband by recommending him to go to sleep again. He did fall asleep again, but shortly afterwards awoke his wife and told her that he had had the same dream a second time. Upon this, Mrs. Wil- liams suggested that he had been so disturbed by his

no

SCORKIER HOUSE. 225

former dream that it bad probably dwelt on his mind, and, therefore, begged him to try and compose himself and go to sleep, which he did. Once more, for the third time, the vision was repeated ; whereupon, not- withstanding his wife's entreaties that he would be quiet, and trv to forsret the affair, Mr. Williams arose and dressed himself, it then being between one and two o'clock in the morning.

At breakfast Mr. Williams's sole subject of conversa- tion was the vivid dreams by which his night's rest had been disturbed. In the afternoon he had occasion to go to Falmouth, where he gave every acquaintance he met particulars of his strange visions.

The following day Mr. Tucker, of Trematon Castle accompanied by his wife, a daughter of Mr. Williams, visited at Scorrier House. No sooner were the family greetings over than Mr. Williams related his wonderful dream to the new arrivals ; as Mrs. Williams laughingly remarked to her daughter, her father would not even allow Mr. Tucker to be seated before he told him of his nocturnal visitation. Upon hearing his father-in-law's statement, Mr. Tucker observed that it might do very well in a dream to have the Chancellor in the lobby of the House of Commons, but that he would Ljver be found there in reality.

Subsequently, Mr. Tucker inquired what sort of a man the person shot appeared to be ; and when Mr. Williams described him with great minuteness, he re- marked, "Your description is not at all that of the Chancellor, but is certainly exactly that of Mr. Perceval,

15

226 HAUNTED HOMES.

the Chancellor of the Exchequer ; and, although he has been to me the greatest enemy I ever met with, for a supposed cause which had no foundation in truth " (or words to that effect), " I should be exceedingly sorry, indeed, to hear of his being assassinated, or of any injury of the kind happening to him." Mr. Tucker then asked Mr. Williams if he had ever seen Mr. Per- ceval, and was told that he never had seen him, nor had ever even written to him, either on public or private matters ; in short, that he had never had anything to do with him, nor had he ever been in the lobby of the House of Commons in his life.

In the midst of this conversation, and whilst the two gentlemen were still standing, they heard a horse gallop up to the door of the house, and immediately afterwards Mr. Michael Williams, of Treviner, son of Mr. Williams, of S comer, entered the room, and said that he had galloped out from Truro, a distance of seven miles, having seen a gentleman there who had come by that evening's mail from London, who said that he was in the lobby of the House of Commons on the evening of the 11th, when a man called JBellingham had shot Mr. Perceval, the Chancellor of the Exchequer ; and that, as it might occasion some great ministerial changes, and might affect Mr. Tucker's political friends, he had come out as fast as he could to make him acquainted with it, having heard at Truro that he had passed through that place in the afternoon on his way to Scorrier House.

After the astonishment which this unexpected fulfil-

SCORRIER HOUSE. 227

ment of the dream caused had a little subsided, Mr. Williams most particularly described the appearance and dress of the man whom he beheld in his dreams fire the pistol, as he had previously described Mr. Perceval.

Some six weeks after the fatal affair, Mr. Williams, having business in London, availed himself of the op- portunity to go, accompanied by a friend, to the House of Commons, where, as has already been stated, he had never been before. As soon as he came to the steps at the entrance of the lobby, he stopped and said, " This plaoe is as distinctly within my recollection in my dream as any room in my house " ; and he repeated the obser- vation when he entered the lobby. He then pointed out the exact spot where Bellingham stood when he fired, and which Mr. Perceval had reached when he was struck by the ball, and where and how he fell. The dress and appearance of both Mr. Perceval and his assassin, Bellingham, are declared to have agreed exactly, even to the most minute particular, with the descriptions given by Mr. Williams.

The Times, when furnishing its readers with this wonderful story, drew attention to the fact that Mr. Williams was still alive, and would, therefore, have denied any inaccuracy in their account, whilst many of the witnesses to whom he had made known the particu- lar of his dreams directly after he had had them were also living. Moreover, added the editor, he had received the whole statement from a correspondent of unquestion- able veracity.

15 *

223 HAUNTED HOMES.

SETTLE.

In April, 1876, the following very curious account of an apparition that was seen by three children at once was communicated to the Psychological Society by Mr. Hensleigh Wedgwood. The documentary story, written by Mrs. S. H. Fox, of Falmouth, had been handed to Mr. Wedgwood by Mrs. Backhouse, wife of the Member of Parliament for Darlington. It is to this effect : —

In the early part of the last century a member of the Society of Friends, living at Settle, in Craven, had to take a journey to the borders of Scotland. This lady left her family, consisting of a little boy and two little girls, in charge of a relative, who, in lieu of sending frequent letters (iu those days a slow and costly mode of communication between places wudely remote), en- gaged to keep a journal, to be transmitted to the mother r.t any convenient opportunity, of all that concerned the little ones, who wrere aged respectively seven, six, and four.

After an absence of about three weeks, and when on her homeward journey, the Quakeress was seized with illness and died at Cockermouth, even before her hus- band at Settle could hear by post that she had been taken ill. The season was winter, when in the moun- tainous borderland between the counties the conveyance of letters by postmen on foot was an especially length- ened and difficult process. The friends at whose house

SETTLE. 229

the event occurred, seeing the hopeless nature of the attack, made notes of every circumstance attending the last hours of the dying wife and mother, for the satis- faction of her family, so that the accuracy of the several statements as to time as well as facts was beyond the doubtfulness of mere memory, or of even any uncon- scious attempt to bring them into agreement with each other. One morning, between seven and eight o'clock, on the relation at Settle going into the sleeping room of the three children, she found them all sitting up in their beds in great excitement and delight, crying out, "Mamma has been here! Mamma has been here!" And the little one said, " She called, c Come, Esther! ,M Nothing could make them doubt the fact, intensely visible as it was to each of them, and it was carefully noted down to entertain the mother on her speedily expected return to her home.

That same morning, as she lay dying on her bed at Cockermouth, to those who were watching her tenderly and listening for her latest breath, she said, " I should be ready to go if I could but see my children." She then closed her eyes, they thought to re-open them no more ; but after ten minutes of perfect stillness she looked up brightly and said, " I am ready now; I have been with my children," and then at once peacefully passed away. When the notes taken at the two places were compared, the day, hour, and minute were the same.

" One of the three children," says Mrs. Fox, " was my grandmother, Sarah Birkbeck (daughter of William

230 HAUNTED HOMES.

Birkbeck, banker, of Settle), afterwards wife of Dr. Fell, of Ulverton, from whom I had the above account almost literally as I have repeated it. The elder was Morris Birkbeck, afterwards of Guildford. Both these lived to old age, and retained to the last so solemn and reverential a remembrance of the circumstance that they rarely would speak of it, or permit any allusion to it, lest it should be treated with doubt or levity. Esther, the youngest of the three, died soon after. Her brother and sister only heard the child say that her mother called her, but could not speak with any certainty of having themselves heard the words, nor did they seem sensible of any communication from her but simply of her standing there and looking at them. My grandmother and her brother," is the testimony of Mrs. Fox, " were both persons remarkable for strong matter-of-fact, rather than imaginative, minds, and to whom it was especially difficult to accept anything on faith, or merely hearsay evidence, and who by nature would be disposed to reject whatever seemed beyond the region of reason or of common experience."

SOULDERN RECTORY.

In the register of Brisly Church, Norfolk, against the 12th of December 1706, stands the following words, which may serve as introduction to the extraordinary

SOULDERN RECTORY. 231

storv we have to tell in connection with Souldern Eectory : —

"I, Robert Withers, M.A., vicar of Gately, do insert here a story which I had from undoubted hands ; for I have all the moral certainty of the truth of it possible."

The narrative referred to by Mr. Withers is as given in the following sentences, but not in the precise words of that gentleman, as they only furnish a very abridged account of the mysterious affair, besides deviating slightly from the more circumstantial and exact par- ticulars given in the private correspondence, subse- quently published in the Gentleman's Magazine, which passed between the Rev. John Hughes, of Jesus College, Cambridge (the learned editor of St. Ghrysostom on the Priesthood) t and the Rev. Mr. Bonwicke, very shortly after the events referred to took place. Mr. Hughes, who derived his information from Mr. Grove, public registrar of the Cambridge University, and the intimate friend of Mr. Shaw, writes thus : —

" The Rev. Mr. Shaw, formerly fellow of St. John's College, Cambridge, and subsequently rector of Souldern, a college living within twelve miles of Oxford, on the night of the 21st of July 1706, was sitting by himself smoking a pipe and reading, when he observed somebody open the door, and turning round was astounded to see the appearance of Mr. Naylor, formerly his fellow collegian at St. John's, and his intimate friend, but who had been dead fully five years. The apparition came into the room, garbed apparently in exactly the same clothes, and in exactly the same

232 HAUNTED HOMES.

manner, as Mr. Navlor had been accustomed to at the University. Mr. Shaw was, of course, intensely amazed, but asserted that he " was not much affrighted, " and, after a little while recollecting himself, desired his visitor to sit down; this the apparition of Mr. Naylor did, drawing the chair up to his old friend and sitting by him. They then had a conference of upwards of an hour and a half, during which the visitor informed Mr. Shaw that he had been sent to give his old friend warning of his death, which would be very soon and very sudden. The apparition also mentioned several others of St. John's, particularly the famous Orchard, whose deaths were at hand. Mr. Shaw asked him if he could not give him another visit; but he said " No," as his (the apparition's) alloted time was but three days, and that he had others to visit who were at great distances apart. Mr. Shaw had an intense desire to inquire about the apparition's present condition, but was afraid to mention it, not knowing how it would be taken. At last he expressed himself in this manner : —

" Mr. Naylor, how is it with you in the other world ? '

He, the apparition, answered with a brisk and cheer- ful countenance, "Very well."

Mr. Shaw proceeded to ask, " Are there any of our old friends with you ? "

" Not one," responded he; "but Orchard will be with me soon, and you not long after."

After this discourse the apparition took its leave and went out. Mr. Shaw offered to accompany it out of the room, but it beckoned with its hand that he should

SOULDERN RECTORY. 233

stay where he was, and seeming to turn into the next room, disappeared.

The next day Mr. Shaw made his will, and not very long after, being seized with an apoplectic fit while he was reading service in church, he fell out of the desk, and died almost immediately.

" He was ever looked upon as a pious man and a good scholar," says Mr. Hughes, who had the story of the apparition from Mr. Grove, a particular friend of Mr. Shaw, and who, being on a visit to Souldern soon after the event, had the whole particulars from the minister's own lips. Mr. Grove returned to Cam- bridge soon afterwards, and meeting with one of his college, was told that Mr. Arthur Orchard was dead.

On the 21st of January 1707, the Rev. M. Turner, writing to the Rev. Mr. Bonwicke, with reference to this story, says, " There 's a circumstance relating to the apparition which adds a great confirmation to it, which, I suppose, Mr. Hughes did not tell you. There is one, Mr. Cartwright, a Member of Parliament,* a man of good credit and integrity, an intimate friend of Mr. Shaw, who told the same story with Dr. Grove (which he had from Mr. Shaw), at the Archbishop of Canterbury's table ; but he says further, that Mr. Shaw told him of some great revolutions in states, which he won't discover, being either obliged to silence by Mr. Shaw, or concealing them upon some prudent and polite reason."

Mr. Shaw, it may be added, had been a noted enemy

* I.e. for Northamptonshire.— Editor

23-1 HAUNTED HOMES.

to a belief in apparitions, and in company was accustomed to inveigh against any credence being placed in them, but after his presumed interview with the apparition of his old friend, spoke of that in such a way, with his more intimate acquaintances, as quite convinced them of his belief in its spirituality ; one of whom, the Rev. Richard Chainbre, vicar of Sopping- ton, Shropshire, wrote out an account, still extant, of the affair as related to him by Mr. Shaw.

SPEDLIFS TOWER.

*

ThA ancient fortress bore the reputation, for a long number of years, of being haunted by the spirit of a certain man, known in the flesh as Porteous. The story of this haunting has been frequently told by Grose, the antiquary, and other well-known writers, and the truth of the events about to be recorded has been most emphati- cally asserted by persons of respectability and credit ; indeed, many a ghost story passes current that has not had such corroborative evidence as this tale of antique lore.

Spedlin's Tower, which stands on the south-west bank of the Annan, in the time of Charles the Second was in the possession of Sir Alexander Jardine, of Applegarth. At one time this baronet had confined in the dungeon of his tower a miller, named Porteous, who was suspected,

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spedlin's tower, 235

truthfully or not cannot be known, of having set fire wilfully to his own premises ; the alleged object tradition does not condescend to inform us. Sir Alexander Jar- dine, soon after this man's incarceration, was suddenly called away to Edinburgh, and carrying the keys of the dungeons with him, forgot or disregarded his prisoner, until he was passing through the West Port, when, it has been suggested, perhaps the sight of the warder's kevs brought to his mind his own. He sent back im- mediately a courier to liberate the unfortunate man, but Porteous had, in the meantime, perished of hunger.

No sooner was he dead than his ghost began to tor- ment the household, and no rest was to be had within Spedlin's Tower by day or by night. In this dilemma Sir Alexander, according to old use and wont, summoned a whole legion of ministers to his aid; and by their strenuous efforts, Porteous was at length confined to the scene of his mortal agonies where, however, he con- tinued to scream occasionally at night, '"'Let me out, let me out, for I 'm deem' o' hunger ! '" He also used to flutter against the door of the vault, and was always sure to remove the bark from any twig that was sportively thrust through the key-hole.

The spell which thus compelled the spirit to remain in bondage was attached to a large black-lettered Bible, used by the exorcists, and afterwards deposited in a stone-niche, which still remains in the wall of the stair- case ; and it is certain that after the lapse of many years, when the family repaired to a newer mansion (Jardine Hall), built on the other side of the river, the

236 HAUNTED HOMES.

Bible was left behind, to keep the restless spirit in order. On one occasion, indeed, the volume requiring to be re-bound was sent to Edinburgh ; but the ghost, getting out of the dungeon, and crossing the river, made such a disturbance in the new house, hauling the baronet and his lady out of bed, and committing other annoyances, that the Bible was recalled before it reached Edinburgh, and replaced in its former situation.

The good woman who told Grose this story in 1788, declared that should the Bible again be taken off the premises, no consideration whatever should induce her to remain there a single night. But the charm seems to be now broken, or the ghost must have become either quiet or disregarded ; for the old Bible has been removed, and is now kept at Jardine Hall.

STRACHUR MANSE.

Although the name of the person chiefly concerned in the following narrative is concealed under the initial " S," the reference to the house where he had his remarkable vision, and the fact that it was then occupied by a relative of the gallant Captain, will afford sufficient means of identification to the curious. Premising this, it will now suffice to say that some

few years ago Captain S was spending a single

night in the Manse of Strachur, in Argyleshire. This

STRACHUB MANSE. 23?

residence was then in the occupation of some relations of the Captain, and, so far as is known, had not at that time the reputation of being haunted.

Soon after the weary guest had retired to rest, the curtains of the bed were opened and somebody looked in upon him. Supposing it to be some inmate of the house who was not aware that the bed was occupied, the Captain took no notice of the circumstance till, it being two or three times repeated, he at length said, "What do you want ? Why do you disturb me in this manner ? "

" I come," replied a voice, " to tell you that this day twelvemonth you will be with your father."

After this Captain S was no more disturbed. In

the morning he related the circumstance to his host, but, being an entire disbeliever in all spiritual pheno- mena, without attaching any importance to the warning.

In the natural course of events, and quite irrespective of this visitation, on that day twelvemonth he was again at the Manse of Strachur, on his way to the north, for which purpose it was necessary that he should cross the ferry of Craigie. The day was, however, so exceedingly stormy, that his friend begged him not to go ; but he pleaded his business, adding that he was determined not to be withheld from his intention by the ghost, and although the minister delayed his departure by engaging him in a game of backgammon, he at length started up, declaring he could stay no longer. They therefore proceeded to the water, but found the boat was moored to the side of the lake, and the boat*

238 HAUNTED HOMES.

man assured them that it would be impossible to cross.

Captain S , however, insisted, and as the old man was

firm in his refusal, he became somewhat irritated, and

laid his cane lightly across his shoulders.

"It ill becomes you, Sir," said the ferryman, "to

strike an old man like me ; but since you will have your

way, you must. I cannot go with you, but my son

will ; but you will never reach the other side, he will be

drowned, and vou too."

The boat was then set afloat, and Captain S ,

together with his horse and servant, and the ferryman's

son, embarked in it.

The distance was not great, but the storm was

tremendous ; and having, with great difficulty, got half

way across the lake, it was found impossible to proceed.

The danger of tacking was of course considerable ; but, since they could not advance, there was no alternative

but to turn back, and it was resolved to attempt it. The manoeuvre, however, failed, the boat capsized, and they were all precipitated into the water.

"You keep hold of the horse, I can swim," said

Captain S to his servant, when he saw what was

about to happen.

Being an excellent swimmer, and the distance from the shore inconsiderable, he hoped to save himself, but he hod on a heavy topcoat, with boots and spurs. The coat he contrived to take off in the water, and then struck out with confidence ; but, alas ! the coat had got entangled with one of the spurs, and as he swam it clung to him, getting heavier and heavier as it became

TAUNTON. 239

saturated with water, even dragging him beneath the stream. He, however, reached the shore, where his anxious friend still stood watching the event, and as the latter bent over him, he was just able to make a gesture with his hand, which seemed to say, " You see, it was to be ! " and then expired.

The boatman was also drowned, but, by the aid of the horse, the servant escaped.

I

TAUNTON.

Stories of haunted houses and ghostly tales are very prevalent in the western counties. Somersetshire is especially rich in these things, and one of the most suggestive accounts, of the many which have appeared in the pages of Notes and Queries, relates to this county. Mr. T. Westwood, who furnished the follow- ing narrative to the above publication, gave it as a faithful report, so far as he was concerned, and we re- produce it in the words of our authority : —

In the year 1840 I was detained for several months in the sleepy old town of Taunton. My chief associate during that time was a fox-hunting squire — a bluff, hearty, genial type of his order, with just sufficient intellectuality to temper his animal exuberance. Many were our merry rides among the thorpes and hamlets of pleasant Somersetshire ; and it was in one of these

^10 HAUNTED HOMES.

excursions, while the evening sky was like molten copper, and a fiery March wind coursed like a race- horse over the open downs, that he related to me the story of what he called his Luminous Chamber.

" Coming back from the hunt, after dark, he said he had frequently observed a central window, in an old hall not far from the roadside, illuminated. All the other windows were dark, but from this one a wan, dreary light was visible ; and as the owners had deserted the place, and he knew it had no occupant, the lighted window became a puzzle to him.

" On one occasion, having a brother squire with him, and both carrying good store of port wine under their girdles, they declared they would solve the mystery of the Luminous Chamber then and there. The lodge was still tenanted by an aged porter ; him they roused up, and after some delay, having obtained a lantern, and the keys of the hall, they proceeded to make their entry. Before opening the great door, however, my squire averred he had made careful inspection of the front of the house from the lawn. Sure enough, the central window was illuminated — an eerie, forlorn- looking light, made it stand out in contrast to the rest — a dismal light, that seemed to have nothing in common with the wrorld, or the life that is. The two squires visited all the other rooms, leaving the luminous room till the last. There was nothing noticeable in any of them ; they were totally obscure. But on enter- ing the luminous room a marked change was percep- tible. The light in it was not full, but sufficiently so

TAUNTON. 211

beneath them to distinguish its various articles of furni- ture, which were common and scanty enough. What struck them most was the uniform diffusion of the light ; it was as strong under the table as on the table, so that no single object projected any shadow on the floor, nor did they themselves project any shadow. Looking into a great mirror over the mantel-piece, nothing could be weirder, the squire declared, than the reflection in it of the dim, wan-lighted chamber, and of the two awe- stricken faces that glared on them from the midst — his own and his companion's. He told me, too, that he had not been many seconds in the room before a sick faintness stole over him, a feeling — such was his expres- sion, I remember — as if his life were being sucked out of him. His friend owned afterwards to a similar sen- sation. The upshot of it was that both squires de- camped crestfallen, and made no further attempt at solving the mystery.

"It had always been the same, the old porter grum- bled ; the family had never occupied the room, but there were no ghosts — the room had a light of its oun.

*'A less sceptical spirit might have opined that the room was full of ghosts — an awful conclave — viewless, inscrutable, but from whom emanated that deathly and aeauiy luminousness.

"My squires must have gone the way of all squires ere this. After * life's fitful fever,' do they { sleep well ' ? Or have they both been 'sucked' into the luminous medium, as a penalty for their intrusion ? "

u

242 HAUNTED HOMES,

TEDWORTH.

Joseph Glanvil, whose unjustly neglected Essays con- tain some of the most magnificent germ thoughts of his age, wrote a curious work on witchcraft entitled Saddu- cismus Triumphatus. This work contains what its author styles " a choice collection of modern relations," referring to more or less known cases of apparitions, and similar supernatural phenomena. The chief of these relations is an account of the haunting of a house at Tedworth, Wiltshire, belonging to a Mr. John Mompes- son, and considering the length of time the disturbances endured, the position of the people who investigated the case, and the unfathomable mystery in which it still remains, it may be considered one of the most remark- able instances of its kind on record. Following the particulars furnished by Glanvil, who personally investi- gated the whole affair, the extraordinary story may be thus detailed : —

In March, 1661, Mr. Mompesson, who was a man of good family and well endowed with worldly possessions, in his magisterial capacity caused to be arrested and sent to Gloucester Jail as a rogue and vagabond a wandering beggar, who had been going about the country annoying people by his vehement solicitations for alms, and disturbing their quiet by the noisy beating of a large drum. Mr. Mompesson committed him to prison and had the drum consigned to the custody of

TEDWORTH. 243

the bailiff, and to this circumstance was attributed all the disturbances to which the unfortunate magistrate and his household were subsequently subjected.

In the month following the vagrant's arrest Mr. Mompesson had occasion to visit London, but just before his departure the bailiff, for reasons not stated, took an opportunity of sending the man's drum to the magistrate's house. When he returned from his journey to the metropolis, Mr. Mompesson was informed by his wife that they had been much frightened during his absence bv thieves, and that the house had been nearly

Mr * •*

broken into. He had not been home above three nights when noises similar to those that had terrified his family in his absence were again heard. It was a great knocking at the doors and outside of the house. " Hereupon he got up," to follow Glanvil's account, " and went about the house with a brace of pistols in his hands. He opened the door where the great knocking was, and then he heard the noise at another door. He opened that also, and went out round his house, but could discover nothing, only he still heard a strange noise and hollow sound. When he got back to bed there was a thumping and drumming on the top of his house, which continued a good space, and then by degrees went off into the air.

" After this," according to Glanvil, " the noise of thumping and drumming was very frequent, usually five nights together, and then it would intermit three. It was on the outside of the house, which was most of it of board. It constantly came as they were going to

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244 HAUNTED HOMES.

sleep, whether early or late. After a month's distur- bance without, it came into the room where the drum lay, four or five nights in seven, within half an hour after they were in bed, continuing almost two. The sign of it, just before it came, was a hurling in the air over the house ; and at its going off, the beating of a drum, like that at the breaking up of a guard. It continued in this room for the space of two months, which time Mr. Mompesson himself lay there to observe it.

Mrs. Mompesson's confinement now taking place, the distressing noises politely refrained from manifesting themselves; but " after this civil cessation," as Glanvil phrases it, of about three weeks, the disturbances re- turned " in a ruder manner than before, and followed and vexed the youngest children, beating their bedsteads with that violence that all present expected that they would fall to pieces. In laying hands on them one could feel no blows, but might perceive them to shake exceedingly. For an hour together it would beat" the "Tattoo," and "several other points of war, as well as any drummer. After this they would hear a scratch- ing under the children's bed, as if by something that had iron talons. It would lift the children up in their beds, follow them from one room to another, and for a while haunted none particularly but them."

" On the 5th of November," says Glanvil, " it made a mighty noise ; and a servant observing two boards in the children's room seeming to move, he bid it give him one of them. Upon which the board came (nothing

TEDWORTH. 245

moving it that he saw) within a yard of him. The man added, * Nay, let me have it in my hand ' ; upon which the spirit, devil, or drummer pushed it towards him so close that he might touch it. This," continues Glanvil, " was in the day-time, and seen by a whole roomful of people. That morning it left a sulphureous smell behind it which was very offensive.

" At night the minister, one Mr. Cragg, and several of the neighbours came to the house on a visit. Mr. Cragg went to prayers with them, kneeling at the children's bedside, where it then became very trouble- some and loud. During prayer-time the spirit withdrew into the cock-loft, but returned as soon as prayers were done ; and then, in sight of the company, the chairs walked about the room of themselves, the children's shoes were hurled over their heads, and every loose thing moved above the chamber. At the same time a bed-staff was thrown against the minister, which hit him on the leg, but so favourably that a lock of wool could not have fallen more softly."

As Mr. Mompesson found his youngest children were suffering so much from these persecutions, he had them removed, and lodged them at the house of a neighbour. His eldest daughter, who was about ten years of age, was taken into her father's own room, where there had not been any disturbance for a month or so. " As soon as she was in bed," continues the narration, " the disturbance began there again, continuing three weeks, drumming and making other noises; and it was observed that it would answer exactly, in drumming, anything

246 HAUNTED HOMES.

that was beaten or called for," just in the same way as with the modern spirit-rappings, it has been suggested.

Among the many things noted or reported of this house-haunting was, "that when the noise was loudest, and came with the most sudden and surprising violence, no dog about the house would move, though the knock- ing was oft so boisterous and rude that it hath been heard at a considerable distance in the fields, and awakened the neighbours in the village," none of whom lived very near Mr. Mompesson's bewitched abode.

On one occasion when the village blacksmith, a fellow who feared neither man nor devil, slept with John, the footman, so that he might hear the supernatural noises and be cured of his incredulity, " there came a noise in the room as if one had been shoeing a horse, and some- what came, as it were, with a pair of pincers," snipping away at the sceptical blacksmith the chief part of the night. Next day the invisible being came panting like a dog out of breath, and a woman who was present taking up a staff to knock at it, the weapon "was caught suddenly out of her hand and thrown away; and company coming up, the room was presently filled with a bloomy noisome smell, and was very hot, though without fire, in a very sharp and severe winter. It con- tinued in the bed, panting and scratching for an hour and a half, and then went into the next room, when it knocked a little, and seemed to rattle a chain."

For two whole years, with some occasional inter- missions, these disturbances continued, creating such intense excitement, not only in the vicinity of Tedworth,

TEDWORTH. 247

but all over the country, that at last the King sent a Commission to specially investigate the circumstances, and to draw up and furnish him with a report of the whole affair. Whatever, however, may have "been the cause, during the visit of the Royal Commission the disturbances ceased, and no manifestations took place. " As to the quiet of the house when the courtiers were there," says Glanvil, " the intermission may have been accidental, or, perhaps, the demon was not willing to give so public a testimony of those transactions which might possibly convince those whom he had rather should continue in unbelief of his existence."

However, no sooner were the Royal Commissioners gone than the mysterious annoyance recommenced, and was manifested in many unpleasant fashions; sometimes it purred like a cat, or beat the children's legs black and blue; once it put a long spike into Mr. Mompesson's bed, and a knife into his mother's; filled the porringers with ashes, hid a Bible in the grate, and turned the money in people's pockets black. On one occasion a servant of Mr. Mompesson's averred that he had not only heard but seen this pertinacious demon, which came and stood at the foot of his bed. " The exact shape and proportion of it he could not discover ; but he saw a great body, with two red and glaring eyes, which, for some time, were fixed steadily on him, and at length disappeared."

In the meanwhile, Mr. Mompesson believed, and several of his friends appear to have had a similar opinion, that all the noises and troubles were occasioned

tt

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248 HAUNTED HOMES.

by the imprisoned drummer who was still in jail at Gloucester. In confirmation, as it were, of this idea, the following evidence is given :

During the time of the knocking," says Glanvil,

when many were present, a gentleman of the company said, 'Satan, if the drummer set thee to work, give three knocks, and no more,' which it did very distinctly, and stopt. Then the gentleman knockt to see if it would answer him as it was wont; hut it did not. For farther trial, he bid it, for confirmation, if it were the drummer, to give five knocks and no more that night, which it did, and let the house quiet all the night after. This was done in the presence of Sir Thomas Chamberlain, of Oxford, and divers others."

In the meantime, the drummer being visited one day in jail by a person from the neighbourhood of Ted worth, he asked what was the news in Wiltshire, and, so it is alleged, whether people did not talk a great deal about a drumming in a gentleman's house there ? The visitor replied that he had heard of nothing ; to which the drummer responded: "I have done it; I have thus plagued him ; and he shall never be quiet until he hath made me satisfaction for taking away my drum."

Mr. Mompesson had the drummer taken up again, and this time for felony, for the supposed witchcraft about his house. The grand jury found a true bill against the man, but he was acquitted, his connection with the disturbances not being proved.

What subsequently became of the drummer is rather uncertain, but that he was eventually tried and convicted

TEDWOETH. 249

of witchcraft at Salisbury appears to be a fact, as also that he was sentenced to transportation for the crime. The leniency of the sentence is said to have excited no little surprise at that time, the offence of which he was found guilty generally being punished by death.

Hitherto the history of the haunting at Tedworth is only a recapitulation of what Glanvil took down from the mouths of other people, but his own personal expe- riences should not be ignored in any account of this extraordinary affair. In January 1662 he visited the scene of the disturbance himself, and furnishes the following record of what he observed : —

"About this time I went to the house on purpose to inquire the truth of those passages, of which there was so loud a report. It had ceased from its drumming and ruder noises before I came thither ; but most of the more remarkable circumstances before related were con- firmed to me there, by several of the neighbours together, who had been present at them. At this time it used to haunt the children, and that as soon as they were laid in bed. They went to bed that night I was there, about eight of the clock, when a maid-servant, coming down from them, told us it was come. The neighbours that were there, and two ministers who had seen and heard divers times, went away ; but Mr. Mompesson and I, and a gentleman that came with me, went up. I heard a strange scratchiug as we went up the stairs, and when we came into the room, I perceived it was just behind the bolster of the children's bed, and seemed to be against the tick. It was loud scratching, as one with

250 HAUNTED HOMES.

long nails could make upon a bolster. There were two little modest girls in the bed, between seven and eleven years old, as I guessed. I saw their hands out of the clothes, and they could not contribute to the noise that was behind their heads. They had been used to it, and had still somebody or other in the chamber with them, and therefore seemed not to be much affrighted. I, standing at the bed's head, thrust my hand behind the bolster, directing it to the place whence the noise seemed to come. Whereupon the noise ceased there, and was heard in another part of the bed. But when I had taken out my hand it returned, and was heard in the same place as before. I had been told that it would imitate noises, and made trial by scratching several times upon the sheet, as five, and seven, and ten, which it followed, and still stopped at my number. I searched under and behind the bed, turned up the clothes to the bed-cords, graspt the bolster, sounded the wall behind, and made all the search that possibly I could, to find if there were any trick, contrivance, or common cause of it. The like did my friend ; but we could discover nothing. So that I was then verily persuaded, and am so still, that the noise was made by some demon or spirit. After it had scratched about half an hour or more, it went into the midst of the bed, under the children, and then seemed to pant, like a dog out of breath, very loudly. I put my hand upon the place, and felt the bed bearing up against it, as if something within had thrust it up. I grasped the feathers to feel if any living thing were in it. I looked under, and everywhere about, to see if

TEDWOBTH. 251

there were any dog, or cat, or any such creature, in the room, and so we all did, but found nothing. The motion it caused by this panting was so strong, that it shook the rooms and windows very sensibly. It continued more than half an hour, while my friend and I stayed in the room, and as long after, as we were told.

"It will, I know, be said by some, that my friend and I were under some affright, and so fancied noises and sights that were not. This is the eternal evasion. But if it be possible to know how a man is affected when in fear, and when unaffected, I certainly know, for mine own part, that during the whole time of my being in the room, and in the house, I was under no more afTrightnient than I am while I write this relation. And if I know that I am now awake, and that I see the objects that are before me, I know that I heard and saw the particulars that I have told."

Thus ends the Rev. Joseph Glanvil's account of this extraordinary affair, from which Mr. Mompesson, as he remarks, " suffered by it in his name, in his estate, in all his affairs, and in the general peace of his family," because, as the same authority points out, " the un- believers, in the matter of spirits and witches, took him for an impostor, many others judged the permission of such an extraordinary evil to be the judgment of God upon him for some notorious wickedness or impiety. Thus his name was continually exposed to censure, and his estate suffered by the concourse of people from all parts to his house ; by the diversion it gave him from his affairs ; by the discouragement of servants, by

252 HAUNTED HOMES.

reason of which he could hardly get any to live with him ; to which I add the continual hurry that his family was in, the affrights, and the watchings and dis- turbance of his whole house (in which himself must needs be the most concerned). I say if these things are considered, there will be little reason to think he would have any interest to put a cheat upon the world, in which he would most of all have injured and abused himself."

Mr. Mompesson, writing on the 8th of November 1672, or ten years after the events recorded had taken place, besides pointing out that no discovery had been made of any cheat, declared most solemnly that he knew of none, as he had, indeed, testified at the assizes. " If the world will not believe it," he concluded, "it shall be indifferent to me, praying God to keep me from the same or the like affliction."

TRURO.

Probably the last person one would imagine selected for a supernatural warning was Samuel Foote, the mimic and buffoon. And yet the so-called "English Aristophenes " not only dwelt in a haunted house, or at least believed so, but was closely connected with the chief characters of one of the most unnatural tragedies our judicial records have preserved. Foote's maternal

TKTJRO. 253

uncles were Sir John Goodere and Captain Goodere, a naval officer. In 1740 the two brothers dined at a friend's house near Bristol ; for a loner time they had been on bad terms owing to certain money transactions, but at the dinner table a reconciliation was, to all appearance, arrived at between them. On his return home, however, Sir John was waylaid by some men from his brother's vessel, acting by his brother's authority, carried on board, and deliberately strangled ; Captain Goodere not only unconcernedly looking on, but actually furnishing the rope with which the crime was committed. For this atrocity the fratricidal officer and his confederates were tried at the Bristol assizes, found guilty, and executed.

But, say the biographers of Foote, the strangest part of this terrible tale remains to be told. On the night the murder was perpetrated Foote arrived at his father's house at Truro ; he describes himself as having been kept awake for some time by the softest and sweetest strains of music he had ever heard. At first he tried to fancy it was a serenade got up by some of the family to welcome him home; but not beinsr able to discover any trace of the musicians, he was com- pelled to come to the conclusion that the sounds were the mere offspring of his imagination.

Some short time afterwards Foote learnt the par- ticulars of his uncle's terrible fate, and remarking that the murder had been consummated at the same hour of the same night that he had been haunted by the mysterious sounds, he arrived at the conclusion that it

254 HAUNTED HOMES.

was a supernatural warning, and this impression he is^ said to have retained to the last moments of his existence.

WALTHAM, ESSEX.

In his Treatise on Spirits, John Beaumont recites a very singular account of an apparition seen by the daughter of Sir Charles Lee, and related to the Bishop of Gloucester by the lady's father himself. It is considered one of the best authenticated cases on record.

Sir Charles Lee had one only daughter by his first wife, who died at the child's birth. At her own desire, Lady Everard, sister of the deceased lady, had the child with her to educate it, and kept it under her care until she was of marriageable age. Ultimately, Miss Lee was engaged to Sir William Perkins, and the marriage was agreed upon, when it was prevented in an extraordinary manner. " Upon a Thursday night," to quote the Bishop's own words, Miss Lee, i{ thinking she saw a light in her chamber after she was in bed, knocked for her maid, who presently came to her ; and she asked her why she left a candle burning in hei chamber. The maid said she left none, and there was none but what she brought with her at that time. Then she said it was the fire ; but that, her maid told her, was quite out, and said she believed it was only a dream.

WALTHAM. ESSEX. 2->5

whereupon she said it might be so, and composed her- self again to sleep. But about two of the clock she was awakened again, and saw the apparition of a little woman between her curtain and her pillow, who told her she was her mother, that she was happy, and that by twelve o'clock that day she should be with her. Whereupon she knocked again for her maid, called for her clothes, and when she was dressed went into her closet, and came not out again till nine, and then brought out with her a letter, sealed, to her father, brought it to her aunt, the Lady Everard, told her what had happened, and desired that as soon as she was dead it might be sent to him. But the lady thought she was suddenly fallen mad, and thereupon sent presently away to Chelmsford for a physician and surgeon, who both came immediately; but the physician could discern no indication of what the lady imagined, or of any indisposition of her body Notwithstanding the lady would needs have her let blood, which was done accordingly. And when the young woman had patiently let them do what they would with her, she desired that the chaplain might be called to read prayers ; and when the prayers were ended she took her guitar and psalm-book, and sate down upon a chair without arms, and played and sung so melodiously and admir- ablv, that her music-master, who was there, admired at it. And near the stroke of twelve she rose, and sat herself down in a great chair with arms, and presently, fetching a strong breathing or two, immediately ex pired ; and was so suddenly cold as was much wondered

256 HAUNTED HOMES.

at by the physician and surgeon. She died at Waltham, in Essex, three miles from Chelmsford ; and the letter was sent to Sir Charles, at his house in Warwickshire ; but he was so afflicted with the death of his daughter, that he came not till she was buried. But when he came he caused her body to be taken up and to be t buried by her mother at Edmonton, as she desired in her letter."

This event occurred in 1662, and there is no record, so far as we are aware, that any later, or, indeed, any previous, supernatural manifestations took place at Lady Everard's place.

WABBLINGTON PAKSONAGE.

The following account of the hauntings at Warblington Parsonage, Hampshire, furnishes particulars of a story often referred to by writers on the supernatural, but which, apparently, they have never read, and only speak of by repute. The original version, as now repeated, was given in a letter written by Caswell, the mathe- matician, to the learned Dr. Bentley, whilst the latter was living at the house of Stillingfleet, the celebrated Bishop of Worcester. The name of the deceased person who was supposed to have appeared was suppressed at the time, for obvious reasons, but it has since been discovered to have been the Rev. Sebastian Pitfield, who was incumbent in 1677. An

WARBLINGTON PARSONAGE. 257

extract from Caswell's letter to Bentley will serve to introduce the narrative itself ; he writes : —

"I have sent you enclosed a relation of an appa- rition. The story I had from two persons, who each had it from the author, and yet their accounts somewhat varied, and passing through more mouths has varied much more ; therefore I got a friend to hring me the author, at a chamber, where I wrote it down from the author's mouth, and which, when I read it to him, and gave him another copy, he said he could swear to the truth of it as far as he was concerned. He is the curate of Warblington, Bachelor of Arts in Trinity College, Oxford, about six years standing in the University. T hear no ill report of his behaviour here. He is now gone to his curacy. He has promised to send up the hands of the tenant and his man, and the farmer's men, as far as they are concerned. Mr. Brereton, the rector, would have him say nothing of the story, for that he can get no tenant, though he has offered the house for ten pounds a year less. Mr. P., the former incumbent, whom the apparition represented, was a man of a very ill report, supposed to have got children of his maid, and to have murdered them ; but I advised the curate to say nothing himself of this last part of P., but to leave that to the parishioners who knew him."

The narrative enclosed by Caswell, of the apparition, as written out by the curate, the Rev. Thomas Wilkins, on the 15th of December 1695, is as follows : —

"At Warblington, near Havant, Hampshire, within six miles of Portsmouth, in the parsonage-house, dwelt

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258 HAUNTED HOMES.

Thomas Perce, the tenant, with his wife and child, a man-servant Thomas, and a maid-servant. About the beginning of August 1695, on a Monday, about nine or ten at night, all being gone to bed except the maid with the child, she being in the kitchen, and having raked up the fire, took a candle in one hand, and the child in the other arm, and turning about, saw someone in a black gown walking through the room, and thence out of the door into the orchard. Upon this the maid, hasting up-stairs, having recovered but two steps, cried out ; on which the master and mistress van down, found the candle in her hand, she grasping the child about its neck with the other arm. She told them the reason of her crying out ; she would not that night tarry in the house, but removed to another belonging to one Henry Salter, farmer, where she cried out all the night from the terror she was in, and she could not be persuaded to go to the house upon any terms.

" On the morrow, Tuesday, the tenant's wife came to me, lodging then at Havant, to desire my advice, and have consultation with some friends about it. I told her I thought it was a flam, and that they had a mind to abuse Mr. Brereton, the rector, whose house it was. She desired me to come up. T told her T would oomo up and sit up, or lie there, as she pleased ; for then, as to all stories of ghosts, or apparitions, I was an infidel. I went thither and sat up the Tuesday night with the tenant and his man-servant. About twelve or one o'clock I searched all the rooms in the house, to see if anybodv were hid there to impose upon me. At last we came,

WARBLINGTON PARSONAGE. 259

into a lumber-room; there I smiling told the tenant that was with me, that I would call for the apparition, if there was any, and oblige him to come. The tenant then seemed to be afraid, but I told him I would defend him from harm, and then I repeated Barbara celarent Darii, &c. jestingly ; on this the tenant's, countenance changed, so that he was ready to drop down with fear. Then I told him I perceived he was afraid, and I would prevent its coming, and repeated Baralipton, &c, and then he recovered his spirits pretty well, and we left the room and went down into the kitchen, where we were before, and sate up there the remaining part of the night, and had no manner of disturbance.

"Thursday night the tenant and I lay together in one room, and he saw something walk along in a black gown and place itself against a window, and there stood for some time, and then walked off. Friday morning, the man relating this, I asked him why he did not call me, and I told him I thought that it was a trick or flam ; he told me the reason why he did not call me was that he was not able to speak or move. Friday night we lay as before, and Saturday night, and had no dis- turbance either of the nights.

" Sunday I lay by myself in one room (not that where the man saw the apparition), and the tenant, and his man in one bed in another room, and betwixt twelve and two the man heard something walk in their room at the bed's foot, and whistling very well, and at last it came to the bed's bide, drew the curtain, ami looked on them. After some time it moved off; tLicn Lho

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260 HAUNTED HOMES.

man called to me, desired me to come, for that there was something in the room went about whistling. I asked him whether he had any light, or could strike one ; he told me no. Then I leapt out of bed, and not staying to put on my clothes, went out of my room, and along a gallery to the door, which I found locked or bolted. I desired him to unlock the door, for that I could not get in ; then he got out of bed and opened the door, which was near, and went immediately to bed again. I went in three or four steps, and it being a moonlight light, I saw the apparition move from the bedside, and stop up against the wall that divided their room and mine. I went and stood directly against it, within my arm's length of it, and asked it, in the name of God, what it was that made it come disturbing of us ? I stood some time expecting an answer and receiving none, and thinking it might be some fellow hid in the room to fright me, I put out my arm to feel it, and my ha?id seemingly icent through the body of it, and felt no manner of substance till it came to the wall; then I drew back my hand, and still it was in the same place.

" Till now," declares Mr. Wilkins, "I had not the least fear, and even now had very little ; then I adjured it to tell me what it was. When I had said those words it, keeping its back against the wall, moved gently along towards the door. I followed it, and it, going out at the door, turned its back towards me. It went a little along the gallery, I followed it a little into the gallery, and it disappeared, where there was no

WARBLINGTON PAKSONAGE. 261

corner for it to turn, and before it came to the end of the gallery, where were the stairs. Then I found myself very cold from my feet as high as my middle, though I was not in great fear. I went iuto the bed betwixt the tenant and his man, and they complained of my being exceedingly cold. The tenant's man leaned over his master in the bed, and saw me stretch out my hand towards the apparition, and heard me speak the words ; the tenant also heard the words. The apparition seemed to have a morning gown of a darkish colour, no hat nor cap, short black hair, a thin, meagre visage of a pale swarthy colour, seemed to be of about forty- five or fifty years old, the eyes half shut, the arms hanging down, the hands visible beneath the sleeves, of a middle stature. I related this description to Mr. John Lardner, rector of Havant, and to Major Battin of Langstone, in Havant parish ; they both said the description agreed very well to Mr. P(itfield), a former rector of the place, who has been dead above twenty years. Upon this the tenant and his wife left the house, which has remained void since.

" The Monday after last Michaelmas," resumes Mr. Wilkins, " a man of Chodson, in Warwickshire, having been at Havant fair, passed by the foresaid parsonage house about nine or ten at night, and saw a light in most of the rooms of the house. His pathway being close by the house, he, wondering at the light, looked into the kitchen window, and saw only a light ; but turning himself to go away, he saw the appearance of a man in a long gown. He made haste away ; the appa-

262 HAUNTED HOMES.

rition followed him over a piece of glebe-land of several acres to a lane, which he crossed, and over a little meadow, and then over another lane to some pales which belong to farmer Henry Salter, my landlord, near a barn, in which were some of the farmer's men and some others. This man went into the barn, told them how he was frighted and followed from the parsonage- house by an apparition, which they might see standing against the pales if they went out. They went out, and saw it scratch against the pales, and make a hideous noise. It stood there some time, and then disappeared. Their description agreed with what I saw. This last account I had from the man himself whom it followed, and also from the farmer's men."

In conclusion may be appended to this very circum- stantial document of the Rev. Thomas Wilkins, the statement that it was subsequently alleged that the Rev. Sebastian Pitfield, whom the apparition was presumed to personify, had murdered his own illegitimate children.

WESTMINSTER.

Among the many extremely curious stories of appari- tions which correspondence on them and kindred sub- jects has elicited, is the following, which was fur- nished bv Mr. T. J. Allman to the columns of Notes and Queries. It was communicated to that gentleman, the

WESTMINSTER. 263

well-known publisher (it is believed), by the Rev. Mr.

L , a clergyman of the Church of England ; but as

it was published without Mr. L 's consent having

been first obtained, his name was not given. Unfortu- nately, no more definite address than Westminster can be given, that being the locality, however, where the apparition appeared to Captain L . The clergy- man's narrative is this : —

" One evening, some two years since, my brother, an officer in the army, residing at Westminster, surprised me with a late visit at my house in Holloway, just as we were retiring to rest. ' Brother ! ' exclaimed he, in an excited manner, ' mother is dead ! ' ' When and how* did you hear ? ' I replied, as she was living some con- siderable distance from town, and was, a3 far as we both knew, although aged, in good health. ' I have seen her pass me twice this evening in my room, with her head bandaged up, and I could not rest till I saw you,' was his answer.

" In consequence of his conviction and entreaties, it was determined to take the first train in the morning to the locality where our mother resided, and, upon our arrival, sure enough we found, to my surprise, that our mother had died suddenly the previous evening at the exact hour my brother had witnessed the apparition."

For the truth of this story Mr. Allman stated he would vouch.

264 HAUNTED HOMES.

WESTMINSTER: KING STREET.

In his Miscellanies, Aubrey cites the singular narrative of Captain Henry Bell, originally given in the Preface to the translation of Luther's Table Talk. Captain Bell begins by declaring that whilst employed beyond the seas in various State affairs for King Charles II. and his successor, James II., he had heard much lamen- tation made over the great destruction, by burning and otherwise, of Martin Luther's Discourses. This work, which was supposed to have largely promoted the reformation, was condemned by Pope Gregory XIII., and placed under the ban of the Empire by Rudolph III. This latter monarch ordered that all printed copies of the work should be burned, and that any person retaining a copy would be liable to the punishment of death. In consequence of this rigorous edict, and the stringency with which it was enforced, in a little while no copies were obtainable.

A certain Caspar von Sparr, however, according to Captain Bell's account, accidentally discovered a copy, in 1626, which had escaped the wholesale destruction the work had suffered. As the prosecution of Protes- tantism still continued, this gentleman was afraid to retain possession of the interdicted book, and yet, un- willing to destroy it, thought of Captain Bell. Know- ing that he was thoroughly acquainted with German, he forwarded him the wonderfully preserved work, earnestly

WESTMINSTER: KING STREET. 2()5

impressing upon him the utility of translating it into English.

Captain Bell did not appear to he in any great hasto to comply with this request, but, nevertheless, took the work in hand, " and many times began to translate the same," as he remarks, "but always I was hindered therein, being called upon about other business, inso- much that by no possible means I could remain by that work." About six weeks after he had received the book from Germany, "it fell out," to cite his own words, " that being in bed with my wife, one night between twelve and one o'clock, she being asleep, but myself yet awake, there appeared unto me an ancient man, standing at my bedside, arrayed in white, having a long and broad white beard hanging down to his girdle, who, taking me by the right ear, spake these words following unto me : f Sirrah, will not you take time to translate that book which is sent unto you out of Germany ? I will provide for you both place and time to do it' ; and then he vanished out of my sight.

" Whereupon, being much affrighted," Captain Bell continues, " I fell into an extreme sweat, insomuch that, my wife awaking, she asked me what I ailed. I told her what I had seen and heard ; but I never did heed or regard visions nor dreams, and so the same fell soon out of my mind.

m

" Then about a fortnight after I had seen the vision, on a Sunday, I went to Whitehall to hear the sermon, after which ended, I returned to my lodging, which was then in King Street, Westminster, and sitting down

266 HAUNTED HOMES.

to dinner with my wife, two messengers were sent from the Council Board to carry me to the keeper of the gate-house at Westminster, there to be safely kept, until further orders from the Lords of the Council."

This was done, avers Bell, without any cause being shown ; but his real offence, according to Aubrey, was that he had much importuned the Lord Treasurer for considerable arrears which were due to him, and which that official not being willing to discharge, " clapt him up into prison." Be the cause what it may, Bell was detained in close confinement for ten years, five of which, he states, he spent in translating the work of Luther above referred to. As he quaintly remarks, " I found the words very true which the old man in the aforesaid vision said unto me, ' i" will shortly provide you both place and time to translate it.' w

WILLINGTON MILL.

Willington is a hamlet, lying in a deep valley between Newcastle-on-Tyne and North Shields. Thirty years ago it consisted of a parsonage, some few cottages, a mill, and the miller's house. The mill is, or was thirty years ago, a large steam flour-mill, like a factory, and near it, but completely detached, was the miller's house.

WILLINGTON MILL. 26

rm

Messrs. Unthank and Proctor were the proprietors and workers of the mill, aud Mr. Joseph Procter, one of the partners, resided in the house adjoining it. Mr. Procter, a respectable member of the Society of Friends, a man in the prime of life, was married to a lady belonging to the same religious fraternity, and was the father of several young children.

The house in which Mr. Procter resided was built about the beginniug of the present century, and as described by Mr. Howitt in 1847, had nothing spectral in its appearance, although located in a somewhat wild- looking region, just off the river Tyne. The railway runs close by it, and engines connected with coal mines are constantly at work in its vicinity. When rumours as to the miller's residence being haunted began to spread, Mr. Procter, it is alleged, although evidently much troubled by the disturbances in his dwelling, was unwilling to give publicity to his troubles. Apparently this unwillingness wore off eventually, as in course of time Mr. Procter frequently communicated with the Press on matters connected with the singular events at Wellington.

The chief published authority for an account of the haunted house at Willington, would appear to be a pamphlet reprinted in The Local Historian's Table Book, whence Mr. Howitt and Mrs. Crowe derived their particulars, and whence the following statement is chiefly taken.

" We have visited the house in question," says the writer of the pamphlet referred to, " and it may not be

268 HAUNTED HOMES.

irrelevant to mention that it is quite detached from the mill, or any other premises, and has no cellaring under it. The proprietor of the house, who lives in it, de- clines to make public the particulars of the disturbance to which he has been subjected, and it must be under- stood that the account of the visit we are about to lay before our readers is derived from a friend to whom Mr. Drury presented a copy of his correspondence on the subject, with power to make such use of it as he thought proper. We learned that the house had been reputed, at least one room in it, to have been haunted forty years ago, and had afterwards been undisturbed for a long period, during some years of which quietude the present occupant lived in it unmolested. We are also informed that, about the time that the premises were building there were reports of some deeds of darkness having been committed by someone employed about them."

The writer of this account, after alluding to the strange things seen and heard, or said to have been seen and heard, by various persons in the neighbourhood, proceeds to quote the following correspondence which, he remarks, " passed between individuals of undoubted veracity." The copy of the first letter on the subject, written by Mr. Edward Drury, of Sunderland, to Mr. Procter, reads thus: —

" 17th June 1840. "

" Sir, — Having heard from indisputable authority, viz. that of my excellent friend, Mr. Davison, of Low Willi ngton, farmer, that you and your family are dis-

WILLINGTON MILL. 2G9

turbed by most unaccountable noises at night, I beg leave to tell you that I have read attentively Wesley's account of such things, but with, I must confess, no great belief; but on account of this report coming from one of your sect, which I admire for candour and simplicity, my curiosity is excited to a high pitch, which I would fain satisfy. My desire is to remain alone in the house all night, with no companion but my own watch-dog, in which, as far as courage and fidelity are concerned, I place much more reliance than upon any three young gentlemen I know of. And it is, also, my hope that if I have a fair trial I shall be able to unravel this mystery. Mr. Davison will give you every satisfaction if you take the trouble to inquire of him concerning me. I am, &c."

In response to this application, Mr. Procter sent the lollowing note : —

" Joseph Procter's respects to Edward Drury, whose note he received a few days ago, expressing a wish to pass a night in his house at Willington. As the family is going from home on the 23rd instant, and one of Unthank and Procter's men will sleep in the house, if E. D. feels inclined to come, on or after the 24th, to spend a night (sic) in it, he is at liberty so to do, with or without his faithful dog, which, by-the-bye, can be of no possible use, except as company. At the same time, J. P. thinks it best to inform him that particular dis- turbances are far from frequent at present, being only occasional, and quite uncertain ; and, therefore, the

270 HAUNTED HOMES.

satisfaction of E. D.'s curiosity must be considered as problematical. Tbe best chance will be afforded by his sitting up alone in the third story till it be fairly daylight, say 2 or 3 a.m.

" Willington, 6th mo. 21st, 1840.

" J. P. will leave word with T. Maun, foreman, to admit ED."

The Procters left home on the 23rd of June, leaving the house in charge of an old servant, who, being out of place on account of ill-health, was induced to under- take the duty during their absence. On the 3rd of July, Mr. Procter returned home, having been recalled by business matters, and on the evening of the same day Mr. Drury and a companion arrived unexpectedly. After the house had been locked up for the night, every corner of it underwent minute examination on the part of the visitors. The room out of which the apparition was accustomed to issue was found to be too shallow to contain any person. Mr. Drury and his companion were well provided with lights, and satisfied themselves that there was no one in the house besides Mr. Procter, his servant, and them- selves.

Some correspondence which subsequently took place between Mr. Drury and Mr. Proctor, with respect to the ill effects of what he did see had had upon the former, and the request of the latter for a detailed account of his visitor's experience, need not be given, as the following letter, copied verbatim, will

WILLINGTON MILL. 271

fully describe what Mr. Drury says he really saw and heard : —

" Sunderland, July 13th, 1840.

"Dear Sir,

" I hereby, according to promise in my last letter, forward you a true account of what I heard and saw at your house, in which I was led to pass the night from various rumours circulated by most respectable parties, particularly from an account by my esteemed friend. Mr. Davison, whose name I mentioned to you in a former letter. Having received your sanction to visit your mysterious dwelling, I went, on the 3rd of July, accompanied by a friend of mine, T. Hudson. This was not according to promise, nor in accordance with my first intent, as T wrote you I would come alone; but I felt gratified at your kindness in not alluding to the liberty I had taken, as it ultimately proved for the best. I must here mention that, not expecting you at home, I had in my pocket a brace of pistols, deter- mining in my mind to let one of them drop before the miller, as if by accident, for fear he should presume to play tricks upon me; but after my interview with you, I felt there was no occasion for weapons, and did not load them, after you had allowed us to inspect as minutely as we pleased every portion of the house. I sat down on the third-story landing, fully expecting to account for any noises that I might hear in a philo- sophical manner. This wras about eleven o'clock p.m. About ten minutes to twelve we both heard a noi^c, as

272 HAUNTED HOMES. /

if a number of people were pattering with their bare feet upon the floor, and yet, so singular was the noise, that I could not minutely determine from whence it proceeded. A few minutes afterwards we heard a noise, as if someone was knocking with his knuckles among our feet ; this was followed by a hollow cough from the very room from which the apparition proceeded. The only noise after this, was as if a person was rustling against the wall in coming up-stairs. At a quarter to one, I told my friend that, feeling a little cold, I would like to go to bed, as we might hear the noise equally well there ; he replied, that he would not go to bed till daylight. I took up a note which I had accidentally dropped, and began to read it, after which I took out my watch to ascertain the time, and found that it wanted ten minutes to one. In taking my eyes from the watch they became riveted upon a closet door, which I distinctly saw open, and saw also the figure of a female, attired in greyish garments, with the head inclining downwards and one hand pressed upon the chest as if in pain, and the other, viz. the right hand, extended towards the floor with the index finger pointing downwards. It advanced with an apparently cautious step across the floor towards me; immediately as it approached my friend, who was slumbering, its right hand was extended towards him. I then rushed at it, giving, as Mr. Procter states, a most awful yell ; but, instead of grasping it, I fell upon my friend, and I recollect nothing distinctly for nearly three hours afterwards. I have since learnt that

WILLINGTON MILL, 273

I was carried down-stairs in an agony of fear and terror.

"I hereby certify that the above account is strictly true and correct in every respect.

" Edward Drury."

The appearance in print of Mr. Drury's letter naturally created a great sensation. Mr. Procter re- ceived a large number of letters in consequence of the publication, many of them, it is alleged, being from individuals in various positions of society, informing him that their residences were, and had long been, subjected to similar disturbances to those alleged to trouble his.

Other instances of the way in which Mr. Procter's house was haunted are recorded by Mr. Howitt. On one occasion another apparition was seen by four wit- nesses, who were enabled to watch its proceedings for the space of ten minutes. They were on the outside of the building, when they beheld the apparition of a bare- headed man, in a flowing robe like a surplice, gliding backwards and forwards about three feet from the floor, or level with the bottom of the second-story window, seeming to enter the wall on each side, thus presenting the spectators with a side view in passing. " It then stood still in the window, and a part of the figure came through both the blind, which was close down, and the window, as its luminous body intercepted the view of the framework of the window. It was semi-trp-nsparent, and as bright as a star, diffusing a radiance ail around.

18

274 HAtJNT&D HOMES.

As it grew more dim, it assumed a blue tinge, and gradually faded away from the head downwards." The foreman, one of the spectators, passed close to the house under the window, and also went up to inform the family, but found the house locked up. " There was no moonlight," says the account, " nor a ray of light visible anywhere about, and no person near."

"One of Mrs. Procter's brothers, a gentleman in middle life and of a peculiarly sensible, senate, and candid disposition," says Mr. Howitt, " assured me that he had himself, on a visit there, been disturbed by the strangest noises. That he had resolved, before going, that if any noises occurred he would speak, and demand of the invisible actor who he was, and why he came thither. But the occasion came, and he found himself unable to fulfil his intention. As he lay in bed one night, he heard a heavy step ascend the stairs towards his room, and someone striking, as it were, with a thick stick on the bannisters as he went along. It came to his door, and he essayed to call, but his voice died in his throat. He then sprang from his bed, and, opening the door, found no one there, but now heard the same heavy steps deliberately descending, though perfectly invisible, the steps before his face, and accompanying the descent with the same loud blows on the bannisters." A thorough search was at once made of the premises, in the company of Mr. Procter, but nothing was discovered that would account for the mysterious noises.

From two young ladies who, whilst on a visit to Mr.

WILLINGTON MILL, 275

Procter's, were annoyed by the apparition, Mr. Howitt received this terrifying account of their experiences : — " The first night, as they were sleeping in the same bed, they felt the bed lifted up beneath them. Of course they were much alarmed. They feared lest someone had concealed himself there for the purpose of robbery. They gave an alarm, search was made, but nothing was found. On another night their bed was violently shaken, and the curtains suddenly hoisted up all round to the very tester, as if pulled by chords, and as rapidly let down again, several times. Search again produced no evidence of the cause. The next day they had the curtains totally removed from the bed, resolving to sleep without them, as they felt as though evil eyes were lurking behind them. The consequences of this, how- ever, were still more striking and terrific. The following night, as they happened to awake, and the chamber was light enough — for it was summer — to see everything in it, they both saw a female figure, of a misty substance and bluish-grey hue, come out of the wall at the bed s head, and through the head-board, in a horizontal position, and lean over them. They saw it most distinctly. They saw it, as a female figure, come out of, and again pass into, the wall. Their terror became intense, and one of the sisters, from that night, refused to sleep any more in the house, but took refuge in the house of the foreman during her stay, the other shifting her quarters to another part of the house."

Among the various forms in which these disturbances were manifested at Mr. Procter's house were, according to

18 *

276 HAUNTED HOMES*

the statements made by different persons to Mr. Howitt a noise like that of a pavior with his hammer thumping on the floor ; at other times similar noises are heard coming down the stairs ; frequently are heard coughs, sighs and groans, as of a person in distress, and some- times there is the sound of a number of little feet pattering on the floor of the upper chamber when the female apparition has more particularly exhibited itself, and which, for that reason, is solely used as a lumber- room. " Here these little footsteps," says the narrative, "may be often heard, as if careering a child's carriage about, which in bad weather is kept up there." Some- times, again, it utters the most blood-curdling laughter, whilst it does not even confine itself to making " night hideous," but appears in broad daylight. " On one occasion, a young lady assured me," says Mr. Howitt, " she opened the door in answer to a knock, the house- maid being absent, and a lady in a fawn-coloured silk entered and proceeded up-stairs. As the young lady, of course, supposed it to be a neighbour come to make a morning call on Mrs. Procter, she followed her up to the drawing-room, where, however, to her astonishment, she did not find her, nor was anything more seen of her."

Two apparitions appear to have haunted the house, one in the likeness of a man, as already described, which is luminous, and passes through the walls as if they offered no solid obstacle to it, and which is well known to the neighbours by the name of " Old Jeffrey." The other is the figure of a female in greyish garments, as described by Mr. Drury. She is said to be sometimes

WINDSOR CASTLE. 277

seen sitting wrapped in a sort of mantle, with her head depressed and her hands crossed on her lap. " The most terrible fact is that she is without eyes."

After enduring these terrible annoyances for some years, Mr. Procter, apprehensive of the ill effect they might have upon his children, says Mr. Howitt, quitted "Wellington and removed to North Shields, and subse- quently to Tynemouth. At neither of these new abodes was he troubled by any similar manifestations. Mr. Procter states that a strange lady, strange to the district, being thrown into a clairvoyant state, and asked to go to the Mill, she described the priest and the grey lady, the two apparitions which haunted it. She also added that the priest had refused to allow the female ghost to confess a deadly crime committed at that spot many years ago, and that this was the troubling cause of the poor woman's apparition.

WINDSOR CASTLE.

Windsor, like most of our old castles, whether the residences of royalty, nobility, or commonalty, has had its apparitions. It is well known that previous to the assassination of George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham by Felton, an apparition of the Duke's father, Sir George Villiers, had appeared to, and sent him warning of his approaching fate by, a certain person ; but it has

278 HAUNTED HOMES.

created endless controversy that the accounts of this apparition, as recorded by Aubrey, Lord Clarendon, and others, are so various and varied. It never appears to have occurred to anyone to remark that it is just as probable that the apparition may have appeared to three or more persons, at different times and places, as to one, and that, looking at the different stories from this point of view, all the alleged discrepancies disappear, and, in fact, the various records of the marvellous story, instead of contradicting, serve to corroborate one another.

In Notes and Queries for July, I860, Mr. Hargrave Jennings published a very curious and circumstantial account of the appearance, on three separate occasions, of an apparition of Sir George Villiers to one Parker, formerly a servant of Sir George, and at that time in the employment of his son, the Duke. This letter, originally published some few years after the Duke's death, is of considerable interest ; but as it, in many respects, parallels other and less accessible accounts, it may be passed over in favour of the story as told by Lord Clarendon and Aubrey. According to the account furnished by the former in his History of the Rebellion. the apparition of Sir George Villiers appeared to an officer in the King's Wardrobe, in Windsor Castle. This man, says Clarendon, was of a good reputation for honesty and discretion, and at the time referred to was about fifty years of age.

" He had in his youth been bred in a school in the parish where Sir George Villiers, the father of the Duke, lived, and had been much cherished and obliged, in that

WINDSOR CASTLE. 279

season of his age, by the said Sir George, whom after- wards he never saw.

" About six months before the miserable end of the Duke of Buckingham, about midnight, this man being in his bed at Windsor, where his office was, and in good health, there appeared to him, at the side of his bed, a man of a very venerable aspect, who drew the curtains of his bed, and, fixing his eyes upon him, asked him if he knew him.

" The poor man, half dead with fright and appre- hension, being asked the second time whether he remem- bered him, and having in that time called to his memory the presence of Sir George Villiers, and the very clothes he used to wear, in which at that time he seemed to be habited, he answered him that he thought him to be that person. He replied he was in the right, he was the same, and that he expected a service from him, which was, that he should go from him to his son, the Duke of Buckingham, and tell him if he did not somewhat to ingratiate himself with the people, or at least to abate the extreme malice which they had against him, he would be suffered to live but a short time.

" After this discourse he disappeared, and the poor man (if he had been at all waking), slept very well till morning, when he believed all this to be a dream, and considered it no otherwise.

" The next night, or shortly after, the same person appeared to him again, in the same place, and about the same time of the night, with an aspect a little more severe than before, and asked him

280 HAUNTED HOMES.

whether he had done as he required of him ; and per- ceiving he had not, gave him very severe reprehensions, told him he expected more compliance from him, and that, if he did not perform his commands, he should enjoy no more peace of mind, but should always be pursued by him, upon which he promised him to obey.

" But the next morning, waking out of a good sleep, though he was exceedingly perplexed with the lively representation of all particulars to his memory, he was willing still to persuade himself that he had only dreamed, and considered that he was a person at such a distance from the Duke, that he knew not how to gain admission to his presence, much less had any hope of being believed in what he should say ; so he spent some time in thinking what he should do, and in the end he resolved to do nothing in the matter.

" The same person appeared to him the third time, with a terrible countenance, and bitterly reproached him for not performing what he had promised to do. The poor man had by this time recovered the courage to tell him that, in truth, he had deferred the execution of his com- mands, upon considering how difficult a thing it would be for him to get any access to the Duke, having acquaintance with no person about him ; and if he should obtain admission to him, he should never be able to persuade him that he was sent in such a manner; that he should at least be thought to be mad, or to be set on and employed by his own, or the malice of other men, to abuse the Duke, and so he should be sure to be undone.

" The apparition replied, as he had done before, that

, " WINDSOR CASTLE. 281

he should never find rest till he had performed what he required, and therefore he were better to despatch it ; that the access to his son was known to be very easy, and that few men waited long for him. As for his gaining credit, he would tell him two or three particulars, which he charged him never to mention to any person living but to the Duke himself, and he should no sooner hear them but he should believe all the rest he said ; and so, repeating his threats, he left him.

"In the morning the poor man, more confirmed by the last appearance, made his journey to London, where the Court then was. He was very well known to Sir Ralph Freeman, one of the Masters of Requests, who married a lady that was nearly allied to the Duke, and was himself well received by him. To him this man went, and though he did not acquaint him with all the particulars, he said enough to let him know there was something extraordinary in it, and the knowledge he had of the sobriety and discretion of the man made the more impression on him. He desired that, by his means, he might be brought to the Duke, in such a place and in such a manner as should be thought fit, affirming that he had much to say to him, and of such a nature as would require much privacy, and some time and patience in the hearing.

" Sir Ralph promised that he would first speak to the Duke of him, and then he should understand his pleasure. Accordingly, the first opportunity, he did inform him of the reputation and honesty of the man, and then what he desired, and of all he knew of the matter.

282 HAUNTED HOMES.

" The Duke, according to his usual openness and condescension, told him that he was the next day early to hunt with the King, that his horses should attend him at Lambeth bridge, where he should land by five o'clock in the morning, and, if the man attended him there at that hour, he would walk and speak with him as long as should be necessary.

" Sir Ealph carried the man with him the next morning, and presented him to the Duke at his landing, who received him courteously, and walked aside in con- ference near an hour ; none but his own servants being at that hour in that place, and they and Sir Ealph at such a distance that they could not hear a word, though the Duke sometimes spoke loud, and with great com- motion, which Sir Ralph the more easily perceived, because he kept his eyes always fixed upon the Duke, having procured the conference upon somewhat he knew there was of extraordinary.

" The man told him, in his return over the water, that when he mentioned those particulars which were to gain him credit (the substance whereof, he said, he durst not impart to him), the Duke's colour changed, and he swore he could come at that knowledge only by the Devil, for that those particulars were only known to himself, and to one person more, who he was sure would never speak of it.

" The Duke pursued his purpose of hunting, but was observed to ride all the morning with great pensiveness, and in deep thoughts, without any delight in the exercise he was upon ; and before the morning was spent, he left

WINDSOR OASTLE. 283

the field and alighted at his mother's lodgings in White- hail, with whom he was shut up for the space of two or three hours, the noise of their discourse frequently reaching the ears of those who attended in the next rooms. And when the Duke left her, his countenance appeared full of trouble, with a mixture of anger — a countenance that was never before observed in him in any conversation with her, towards whom he had a profound reverence ; and the Countess herself (for though she was married to a private gentleman, Sir Thomas Compton, she had been created Countess of Buckingham shortly after her son had first assumed that title) was, at the Duke's leaving, found overwhelmed in tears, and in the highest agony imaginable.

"Whatever there was in all this," says Clarendon, "it is a notorious truth, that when the news of the Duke's murder (which happened within a few months after), was brought to his mother, she seemed not in the least degree surprised, but received it as if she had foreseen it ; nor did afterwards express such a degree of sorrow as was expected from such a mother, for the loss of such a son."

This is the story as repeated by the grave historian of the so-called "Rebellion," with the assurance that it is "upon a better foundation of credit than usually such discourses are founded upon." Other versions of the mysterious affair were published some few years after the Duke of Buckingham's murder ; and although the discrepancies in them have never been explained, still there has been a sufficient similarity in the leading

23-1 HAUNTED HOMES.

features of the narratives to cause most people to imagine that they were all derived from one source. But this does not necessarily follow. If the apparition appeared to different people and at different times — a d it does not seem more wonderful that it should have manifested itself to two or more individuals than to one — the variations in the tales told of its appearance are readily explicable. Lilly, the astrologer, notoriously published a false version of the story ; and it was for that reason only that Sir Edmund Wyndham, who was fully acquainted with the facts of the case, gave the narrative that ultimately passed into the hands of Aubrey, the antiquary, and by him is thus told : —

" To one, Mr. Towes, who had been school-fellow with Sir George Villiers, the father of the first Duke of Buckingham (and was his friend and neighbour), as he lay in his bed awake (and it was daylight), came into his chamber the phantom of his dear friend, Sir George Villiers. Said Mr. Towes to him, ' Why, you are dead, what make you here ? ' Said the knight, ' T am dead, but cannot rest in peace for the wickedness and abomi- nation of my son George, at Court. I do appear to you, to tell him of it, and to advise and dehort him from his evil ways.' Said Mr. Towes, * The Duke will not believe me, but will say that I am mad, or dote. Said Sir George, ' Go to him from me, and tell him by such a token (a mole) that he had in some secret place> which none but himself knew of.' According, Mr. Towes went to the Duke, who laughed at his message. At his return home, the phantom appeared again, and

WOODHOUSELEE, 285

told him that the Duke would be stabbed a quarter of a year after ; ' and the warning which you will have of your death, will be, that your nose will fall a bleeding.' All which accordingly fell out so.

" This account I have had in the main," says Aubrey, " from two or three ; but Sir William Dugdale affirms what I have here taken from him to be true, and that the apparition told him of several things to come, which proved true, e.g. of a prisoner in the Tower that shall be honourably delivered. This Mr. Towes had so often the ghost of his old friend appear to him, that it was not at all terrible to him. He was Surveyor of the Works at Windsor, by the favour of the Duke. Being then (i.e. at that time) sitting in the hall, he cried out, ' The Duke of Buckingham is stabbed ! ' He was stabbed that very moment."

" This relation Sir William Dugdale had from Mr. Pine, neighbour to Mr. Towes ; they were sworn brothers." Sir Edmund Wyndham married the daughter of Mr. Pine, and possessed a large roll of manuscript wherein Mr. Towes had recorded the particulars of his conferences with the apparition.

WOODHOUSELEE.

Many of our haunted houses are indebted to ancient feud3, in which their owners suffered or inflicted murder, for their present troubles. Scotland especially has

286 HAUNTED HOMES.

reaped a crop of ghostly legends and terrifying tradi- tions from the homicidal tendencies of its former notables. The apparition of Lady Hamilton, of Both- wellhaugh, is an enduring monument of the blood- thirsty spirit of the age in which she lived. Her husband, Hamilton of Bothwellhaugh, exists in history as the barbarous murderer of the Regent Murray, whom he shot as he passed through Linlithgow on the 23rd of January 1569 ; bat if any man can be excused for such a crime as assassination, it must be pleaded that Bothwellhaugh is he. Whilst Hamilton was from home, a favourite of the Regent seized his house and, in a cold night, turned out his wife, Lady Bothwell, naked into the open fields, where before next morning she became furiously mad. Her infant, it would seem, also perished either by cold, neglect, or, more probably, murder. The ruins of the mansion of Woodhouslee, whence Lady Bothwell was expelled in the brutal manner which occasioned her insanity and death, are still to be seen, or were some few years since, in a hollow glen beside the river Esk. Popular report tenants these ruius with the unfortunate lady's ghost ; and so tenacious is this spectre of its rights, that, a part of the stones of the ancient edifice having been employed in building or repairing the present mansion, the apparition has deemed it one of her privileges to haunt that house also. But a very few years since this apparition of Lady Bothwell, who always appears in white, and with her child in her arms, excited no slight disturbance and terror among the domestics at the new

YORKSHIRE : — HALL. 287

Woodhouselee, which is situated on the slope of the Pentland Hills, distant at least four miles from the ancient dwelling. Whether this apparition still haunts either old or new mansion we have been unable to learn.

YORKSHIRE : HALL.

In March, 1880, a communication was handed to the editor of Notes and Queries by a well-known contributor of that invaluable publication. The narrative it con- tained was headed, " Ghost or Nightmare ? " clearly an incorrect title, if any credence is to be given to its author. The young lady who indited the communica- tion is described as intelligent, whilst " her hereditary acumen" is declared to be such as "precludes altogether the possibility of any self-deceit in regard to her own personal experiences, as narrated by herself. Moreover, as it is pointed out, hers is not the only evidence on the subject, as the reader will notice. The contributor to Notes and Queries remarks that it is " in the con- viction that this statement contains matter of un- questionable interest to every sort of thinker/' that it is submitted to the consideration of his readers. Evidently acquainted, not only with the fair communi- cator of the narrative, but also with the locality to which his friend refers, H.C.C. states that " the scene of the occurrences is an old mansion in the north of

288 fiAUNTED HOMES.

Yorkshire ; cosy and cheerful, though large, and lonely in point of site."

The young lady's experiences in this haunted dwelling are thus graphically described : —

" What I am going to relate happened to myself while staying with some north-country cousins, last July, at their house in Yorkshire. I had spent a few days there in the summer of the previous year, but without then hearing or seeing anything out of the common. On my second visit, arriving early in the afternoon, I went out boating with some of the family, spent a very jolly evening, and finally went to bed, a little tired, perhaps, with the clay's work, but not the least nervous. I slept soundly until between three and four, just when the day was beginning to break. I had been awake for a short time when suddenly the door of my bed-room opened, and shut again rather quickly. I fancied it might be one of the servants, and called out, * Come in ! ' After a short time the door opened again, but no one came in — at least, no one that I could see. Almost at the same time that the door opened for the second time, I was a little startled by the rustling of some curtains belonging to a hanging wardrobe, which stood by the side of the bed ; the rustling continued, and I was seized with a most un- comfortable feeling, not exactly of fright, but a strange, unearthly sensation that I was not alone. I had had that feeling for some minutes, when I saw at the foot of the bed a child, about seven or nine years old. The child seemed as if it were on the bed, and came glid-

YORKSHIRE: - — —HALL. 2S9

ing towards me as I lay. It was the figure of a little girl in her night-dress — a little girl with dark hair and a very white face. I tried to speak to her, but could not. She came slowly on up to the top of the bed, and I then saw her face clearly. She seemed in great trouble; her hands were clasped and her eyes were turned up with a look of entreaty, an almost agonized look. Then, slowly unclasping her hands, she touched me on the shoulder. The hand felt icy cold, and while I strove to speak she was gone. I felt more frightened after the child was gone than before, and began to be very anxious for the time when the servant would make her appearance. Whether I slept again or not, I hardly know. But by the time the servant did come, I had almost persuaded myself that the whole affair was nothing but a very vivid nightmare. However, when I came down to breakfast, there were many remarks made about my not looking well — it was observed that I was pale. In answer I told my cousins that I had had a most vivid nightmare, and I remarked if I was a believer in ghosts I should imagine I had seen one. Nothing more was said at the time upon this subject, except that my host, who was a doctor, observed that I had better not sleep in the room again, at any rate not alone.

" So the following night one of my cousins slept in the same room with me. Neither of us saw or heaid anything out of the way during that night or the early morning. That being the case, I persuaded myself that what I had seen had been only imagination, and much

19

290 HAUNTED HOMES.

against everybody's expressed wish, I insisted the next night on sleeping in the room again, and alone. Accord- ingly, having retired again to the same room, I was kneeling down at the bed-side to say my prayers, when exactly the same dread as before came over me. The curtains of the wardrobe swayed about, and I had the same sensation as previously, that I was not alone. I felt too frightened to stir, when, luckily for me, one of my cousins came in for something which she had left. On looking at me she exclaimed, ' Have you seen any- thing ? ' I said * No,' but told her how I felt, and, without much persuasion being necessary, I left the room with her, and never returned to it. When my hostess learnt what had happened (as she did immediately) she told me I must not sleep in that room again, as the nightmare had made such an impression on me ; I should imagine (she said) all sorts of things and make myself quite ill. I went to another room, and during the rest of my visit (a week), I was not troubled by any reappearance of the little girl.

" On leaving, my cousin, the eldest daughter of the doctor, went on a visit with me to the house of an uncle of mine in the same county. We stayed there for about a fortnight, and during that time the * little girl ' was alluded to only as my 'nightmare.'

" In this I afterwards found there was a little reticence, for, just before leaving my uncle's, my cousin said to me, ' I must tell you something I have been longing to tell you ever since I left home. But my father desired me not to tell you, as, not being very strong, you might

Yorkshire: hall. 291

be too frightened. Your nightmare was not a nightmare at all, but the apparition of a little girl ! She then went on to tell me that this * little girl ' had been seen three times before, by three different members of the family ; but as this was some nine or ten years since, they had almost ceased to think anything about it until I related my experiences on the morning after the first night of my second visit.

" My cousin further went on to tell me that her younger sister whilst in bed had one morning, about day-break, to her great surprise, seen a little girl with dark hair, standing with her back to her, looking out of the window. She took this figure for her little sister, and spoke to it. The child not replying, or moving from her position, she called out to it, 'It's no use standing like that; I know you. You can't play tricks with me.' On looking round, however, she saw that her little sister, the one she thought she was addressing, and who was sleeping with her, had not moved from the bed. Almost at the same time the child passed from the

window into the room of her (my cousin's) sister A ,

and the latter, as she afterwards declared, distinctly saw the figure of a child with dark hair standing by the side of a table in her room. She spoke to it, and it instantly disappeared. The ' little girl ' was subsequently again seen, for the last time before I saw it, by my cousin's

father, Dr. H . It was in the early daylight of a

summer's morning, and he was going up-stairs to his room, having just returned from a professional visit. On this occasion he saw the same child (he noticed its

19 *

292 HAUNTED HOMES*

dark hair) running up the stairs immediately before hiras until it reached his room and entered it. When he got into the room it was gone.

" Thus the apparition has been seen three times by the family, and once by me. I am the only one, how- ever, that has seen its face. It has, also, never been seen twice in the same room by anyone else."

No refutation, explanation, or continuation of this mysterious matter appears to have been attempted as yet by anyone.

APPENDIX.

MISCELLAK EOUS

295

LORD BROUGHAM,

In the Life and Times of Lord Brougham, written by Himself and published in 1871, is given the following strange story, which shall be repeated in the autobiogra- pher's own words. " A most remarkable thing happened to me," records brougham, ,J so lemarkable, that I must tell the story from the beginning. After I left

the High School (in Edinburgh), I went with G ,

my most intimate friend, to attend the classes in the University. There was no divinity class, but we fre- quently in our walks discussed and speculated upon many grave subjects, among others, on the immortality of the soul, and on a future state. This question and the possibility, I will not say of ghosts walking, but of the dead appearing to the living, were subjects of much speculation ; and we actually committed the folly of drawing up an agreement, written with our blood, to the effect that whichever of us died first should appear to the other, and thus solve any doubts we had enter- tained of the ' Life after Death.'

"After we had finished classes at the College, G

went to India, having got an appointment there in the Civil Service. He seldom wrote to me, and after the

296 HAUNTED HOMES.

lapse of a few years, I had almost forgotten him ; moreover, his family having little connection with Edinburgh, I seldom saw or heard anything of them, or of him through them, so that all the old schoolboy intimacy had died out, and I had nearly for- gotten his existence. I had taken, as I have said, a warm bath ; and while in it and enjoying the comfort of the heat after the late freezing I had undergone, I turned my head round towards the chair on which I had depo- sited my clothes, as I was about to get out of the bath.

On the chair sat G , looking calmly at me. How I

got out of the bath I know not, but on recovering my senses I found myself sprawling on the floor. The ap- parition, or whatever it was that had taken the likeness

of G , had disappeared. The vision produced such

a shock, that I had no inclination to talk about it, or to speak about it even to Stuart; but the impression it made upon me was too vivid to be easily forgotten ; and so strongly was I affected by it, that I have here written down the whole history with the date 19th December, and all the particulars as they are now fresh before me, No doubt I had fallen asleep ; and that the appearance presented to my eyes was a dream, I cannot for a moment doubt, yet for years I had had no communication with G , nor had there been any- thing to recall him to my recollection ; nothing had taken place during our Swedish travels, either con- nected with G or with India, or with anything

relating to him or to any member of his family. I recollected quickly enough our old discussion, and the

THE REV. T. A. BUCKLEY. 297

bargain we had made. I could not discharge from my

mind the impression that G must have died> and

that his appearance to me was to be received by me as a proof of a future state."

This was on December 19, 1799. In October 1862, Lord Brougham added as a postscript : —

"I have just been copying out from my journal the account of this strange dream : certissima mortis imago. And now to finish the story begun about sixty years since. Soon after my return to Edinburgh, there arrived

a letter from India, announcing G 's death ! and

stating that he had died on the 19th of December."

THE REV. T. A. BUCKLEY.

Literature, ghostly literature especially, is replete with stories of the fulfilment by the dead of ante mortem promises. Abroad, the recorded instances of this mys- terious completion of the compact with the survivor are, apparently, more numerous than in the British Isles ; but we know of none described more circumstan- tially, and yet with more conventionality, than a case mentioned in Newton Crosland's new Theory of Appari- tions,

On the 30th January 1856, at the early age of thirty, died the Rev. Theodore Alois Buckley, author of The Dawnings of Genius, a work on the enrly lives of eminent m^1 and formerly one of the chaplains of

298 HAUNTED HOMES.

Christ Church, Oxford. He was a man of extraordinary ability, but, says Mr. Orosland, " his life was unfor- tunate, and his death sad." When he was alive and well at Oxford, about the year 1850, conversing on the subject of ghosts one day with a mutual frieud, Mr. Kenneth R. H. Mackenzie, a gentleman who contributed the chapter on " Chatterton" to the above-mentioned work, the two friends entered into a compact that, who- ever departed this life first, should, if permitted, visit the other as an apparition ; and the signal of commu- nication was arranged to be the placing of a ghostly hand on the brow of the survivor. On the night of the 2nd of February, about twelve or half-past twelve o'clock, Mr. Mackenzie was lying in bed, watching the candle expiring, preparing his mind for sleep, and not thinking of his departed friend, when he felt placed over one eye and his forehead a cool damp hand. On looking up he saw Buckley in his ordinary apparel, and with his portfolio under his arm, as in life, standing at the bedside. The figure, as soon as it was recognised, retreated to the window; and after remaining plainly in sight for about a minute, disappeared. A few nights after- wards, the spectral Buckley again made his appearance, bearing in his hand the exact image of a letter, which Mr. Mackenzie at once identified as an old one that he had casually picked up from his letter-box in the course of the day. The letter was one that had been formerly written by Mr. Buckley to his friend Mr. Mackenzie.

«wt/«7

BURROUGHS.

In his account of " Apparitions," Aubrey relates some curious particulars of one that was believed to haunt Caisho Burroughs, eldest son of Sir John Burroughs; and if the antiquary's record, derived from his friend Monson, might be credited, it is one of the best authenticated stories of its class now extant. Sir John Burroughs, a high-spirited gentleman, who subse- quently perished in the ill-fated siege of Kochelle, being sent by Charles I. as envoy to the Emperor of Germany, took with him his son Caisho. Subse- quently Sir John made a tour through Italy, leaving Caisho at Florence to learn the language.

Whilst residing in the Tuscan capital, young Bur- roughs fell passionately in love with a beautiful cour- tesan, a mistress of the Grand Duke. At last their intimacy became so notorious that it came to the Grand Duke's ears, and he, it is alleged, grew so jealous that he formed the design of having Caisho assassinated. Warned by some of the English residents in Florence of the fate awaiting him, the young man hastily left the city, without even acquainting his mis- tress of his intended departure. When the Grand Duke found himself baulked of his anticipated vengeance on his rival, he vented his spite on his mistress, " in most reproachful language," and she, on her side, "resenting

300 HAUNTED HOMES.

the sudden departure of her gallant, of whom she was roost passionately enamoured, killed herself."

At the very moment that the unfortunate woman expired in Florence, her apparition^ so it is alleged, appeared to her lover at his residence in London. Colonel Remeo, a Member of Parliament, and after- ward's an officer of Charles II. 's household, was sleeping with young Burroughs, and he, also, is said to have seen the apparition. This ghost, it is averred, re- proached her lover for his conduct in flying from her so suddenly, and leaving her exposed to the fury of the Grand Duke. She informed him of her tragical fate, and warned him that he should be slain in a duel.

Henceforth this spectre frequently appeared to Caisho, even when his younger brother, after Sir John Burrough's death, was sleeping with him. As often as the apparition came, the unfortunate man, unable to restrain his mental anguish, " would cry out with great shrieking and trembling of his body, saying, 1 O God ! here she comes — she comes ! ' " These visitations continued from time to time until Caisho's death. He was killed in a duel, and the morning be- fore his death the apparition appeared to him for the last time. " Some of my acquaintances have told me," says Aubrey, " that he was one of the most beautiful men in England, and very valiant, but proud and bloodthirsty."

The rumour of this haunting of Caisho Burroughs had spread so widely that it reached the King's ears. Charles I. was so interested in the account, Aubrey declares, that he cross-examined Sir John Burroughs,

JOHN DONNE, 801

as also Colonel Keraeo, as to the truth of the matter, and. in consequence of tlieir report, thought it worth his while to send to Florence in order to make inquiries there. The result of the King's investigations in Tuscany was, the story states, that it was found that the unhappy woman had expired at the very time her apparition first appeared to her lover in London, when he was in bed with Colonel Remeo. Mi. Monson, Aubrey's authority for this marvellous account, was intimate with Sir John Burroughs and both his sons, and declared that when- ever Caisho alluded to the affair he wept bitterly.

JOHN DONNE.

In Tsaak Walton's life of the well-known Dean of St. Paul's is a very strange family legend, that is none the less worthy of quotation that it has been so often told. According to the old piscatorial biographer, Dr. Donne and his wife were living at one time in the house of Sir Robert Drury, in Drury Lane. The Lord Haye being about to depart to the Court of Henry IV. of France, on an Embassy from James I. of England, Sir Robert Drury resolved to accompany him to the French Court, and to be present at his audience there. No sooner had Sir Robert formed this resolution, than he deter- mined Dr. Donne should be his companion on the journey. This desire having been made suddenly

302 HAUNTED HOMES.

known to Mrs. Donne, "who was not only in very bad health, but also expecting her speedy confinement, she was so distressed, and protested so earnestly against her husband's departure, saying that she had a presentiment that some ill would occur in his absence, that finally the doctor laid aside all thoughts of his projected journey, and determined to stay at home.

When Sir Eobert heard of this he exerted himself to the utmost to alter Dr. Donne's determination; and the doctor, fearing that after all the many benefits he had received from his friend, he should be deemed unthank- ful if he so persistently declined to accompany him, told his wife so ; who, therefore, with very great reluc- tance, at last gave way, and most unwillingly assented to her husband's departure. The visit was to last for two months, and was begun within a little while after Mrs. Donne's consent had been gained.

The party reached Paris safely. Two days after their arrival there, Donne was left alone in the room where Sir Eobert and he, with some others, had dined. About half-an-hour after his departure, Sir Robert returned, and found Dr. Donne where he had left him, but in sucli a state of agitation, and so strangely altered in his looks, that he was perfectly amazed at him, and earnestly desired him to inform him what had hap- pened during the short space of time in which he had been left. At first Donne was not sufficiently collected to reply, but after a long and perplexed pause, answered :

"I have seen a dreadful vision since I saw you. I

JOHN DONNE. 303

have seen my dear wife pass twice by me through this room, with her hair hanging about her shoulders, and a dead child in her arms ; this I have seen since I saw you.':

To this Sir Robert responded :

" Surely, Sir, you have slept since I saw yon, and this is the result of some melancholy dream, which I desire you to forget, for you are now awake."

Dr. Donne's reply to this was :

"I cannot be surer that I now live, than that I have- not slept since I saw you, and am sure that at her second appearing she stopped and looked me in the face and vanished."

Nothing would alter Dr. Donne's opinion that he had had a vision, and the next day he was more than ever confirmed in his idea, affirming it with such a deliberate confidence that he finally persuaded Sir Robert that there must be some truth in the vision. Determined to learn the truth as speedily as possible, the knight sent a special messenger back to England, to learn how it fared with Mrs. Donne : whether still alive, and, if alive, in what state. On the twelfth day the messenger re- turned to Paris with the information that he had found and left Mrs. Donne very ill in bed, and that, after a long and dangerous confinement she had been delivered of a dead child; the date and hour of the child's birth having proved to have been, so it is alleged, identical with that at which Dr. Donne affirmed he had seen the apparition pass by him in the room.

304 HAUNTED HOMES.

SIB JOHN SHERBROKE AND GENERAL WYNYARD.

Of all the stories of apparitions extant, none, probably, has excited so much discussion as that of the Wynyard ghost. With variations of one kind and another it has been published in many dozens of works, and has been continually discussed at the mess dinners of our army in every part of the world. From time to time inquiries have been made about the circumstances in Notes and Queries, in the pages of which invaluable publication nil the facts of the case have been gradually revealed. From the periodical referred to, and from other sources of credit, we have been enabled to compile a complete history of the affair.

In 1785, the 33rd Regiment, at the time commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Forke, was stationed at Sydney, in the island of Cape Breton, off Nova Scotia. Among the officers of this regiment were Captain (afterwards Sir John) Sherbroke and Lieutenant (afterwards General) George Wynyard. These two young men are said to have been connected by similarity of tastes and studies, and to have spent together in literary occupa- tion much of that vacant time which was squandered bv their brother officers in those excesses of the table that, in those days at least, were deemed part of the accom- plishments of the military character.

On the 15th of October of the above year, between

SIB JOnN SHBRBROKE AND GEN. WTNYARD. 305

eight and nine o'clock in the evening, these two officers were seated before the fire in Wynyard's parlour drink- ing coffee. It was a room in the new barracks, and had two doors, the one opening on an outer passage, the other into Wynyard's bed-room. There were no other means of entering the sitting-room but from the pas- sage, and no other egress from the bed-room but through the sitting-room ; so that any person passing into the bed-room must have remained there unless he returned by the way he entered. This point is of con- sequence to the story.

As these two young officers were thus sitting toge- ther, Sherbroke, happening accidentally to glance towards the door that opened to the passage, observed a tall youth of about twenty years of age, but pale and very emaciated, standing beside it. Struck with the pre- sence of a perfect stranger, he immediately turned to his friend, who was sitting near him, and directed his attention to the guest who had thus strangely broken in upon their studies. As soon as Wynyard's eyes were turned towards the mysterious visitor his countenance became agitated. " I have heard/' said Sherbroke, " of a man's being as pale as death, but I never saw a living face assume the appearance of a corpse, except Wynyard's at that moment." As they looked silently at the form before them — for Wynyard, who seemed to apprehend the import of the appearance, was deprived of the faculty of speech, and Sherbroke, perceiving the agitation of his friend, felt no inclination to address it — as they looked silently on the figure, it proceeded

20

£06 HAUNTED HOMES.

|

slowly into the adjoining apartment, and in the act of passing them cast its eyes with an expression of some- what melancholy affection on young Wynyard. The oppression of this extraordinary presence was no sooner removed than Wynyard, seizing his friend by the arm, and drawing a deep breath, as if recovering from the suffocation of intense astonishment and emotion, muttered in a low and almost inaudible tone of voice, "Great God! my brother ! " "Your brother!" re- peated Sherbroke, " what can you mean, Wynyard ? There must be some deception. Follow me." And immediately taking his friend by the arm, he preceded him into the bed-room, which, as I before stated, was connected wTith the sitting-room, and into which the strange visitor had evidently entered. I have already said that from this chamber there was no possibility of withdrawing, but by the way of the apartment through which the figure had certainly passed, and as certainly never had returned. Imagine, then, the astonishment of the young officers when, on finding themselves in the centre of the chamber, they perceived that the room was untenanted. Another officer, Lieutenant (afterwards Colonel) Ralph Gore, coming in, joined in the search,! but without avail. Wyuyard's mind had received an impression, at the first moment of his observing it, that the figure which he had seen was the spirit of his brother. Sherbroke still persevered in strenuously believing that some delusion had been practised.

At the suggestion of Lieutenant Gore, they took note of the day and hour in which the event had happened,.

SIB JOHN SHERiBROKB AND GEN. WYNYARD. 307

but they resolved not to mention the occurrences in the regiment, and gradually they persuaded each other that they had been imposed upon by some artifice of their fellow officers, though they could neither account for the reason, or suspect the author, or conceive the means of its execution. They were content to imagine any- thing possible rather than admit the possibility of a supernatural appearance. But though they had at- tempted these stratagems of self-delusion, Wynyard could not help expressing his solicitude with respect to the safety of the brother whose apparition he had either seen or imagined himself to have seen ; and the anxiety which he exhibited for letters from England, and his frequent mention of his fears for his brother's health, at length awakened the curiosity of his comrades, and eventually betrayed him into a declaration of the cir- cumstances which he had in vain determined to conceal.

The story of the silent and unbidden visitor was no sooner bruited abroad than the destiny of Wynyard's brother became an object of universal and painful interest to the officers of the regiment ; there were few who did not inquire for Wynyard's letters before they made any demand after their own, and the packets that arrived from England were welcomed with a more than usual eagerness, for they brought Hot only remem- brances from their friends at home, but promised to afford the clue to the mystery which had happened among themselves. By the first ships no intelligence relating to the story could have been received, for they

20 *

308 HAUNTED nOMES.

had all departed from England previously to the ap- pearance of the spirit. At length the long- wished- for vessel arrived. All the officers had letters except Wynyard. Still the secret was unexplained. They examined the several newspapers ; they contained no mention of any death, or of any other circumstance connected with his family that could account for the preternatural event. There was a solitary letter for Sherbroke, still unopened. The officers had received Iheir letters in the mess-room at the hour of supper. After Sherbroke had broken the seal of his last packet, and cast a glance on its contents, he beckoned his friend away from the company and departed from the room. All were silent. The suspense of the interest was now at its climax ; the impatience for the return of Sherbroke was inexpressible. They doubted not but that letter had contained the long-expected intelligence. At the interval of an hour Sherbroke joined them. No one dared be guilty of so great a rudeness as to inquire the nature of his correspondence ; but they waited, in mute attention, expecting that he would himself touch upon the subject. His mind was manifestly full of thoughts that pained, bewildered, and oppressed him. He drew near to the fire-place, and, leaning his head on the mantel-piece, after a pause of some moments, said iu a low voice to the person who was nearest to him, " Wynyard 's brother is no more!" The first line of Sherbroke's letter was, " Dear John, break to your friend, Wynyard, the death of his favourite brother." He had died on the day, nnd at the very hour, on which

SIR JOHN SHERBROKE AND GEN. WYNYARD. 300

his friends had seen his spirit pass so mysteriously through the apartment.

Some years after, on Sherbroke's return to England, lie was walking with two gentlemen in Piccadilly, when on the opposite side of the way, he saw a person bearing the most striking resemblance to the figure which had been disclosed to Wynyard and himself. His companions were acquainted with the story, and he instantly directed their attention to the gentleman oppo- site, as the individual who had contrived to enter and depart from Wynyard 's apartment without their being conscious of the means. Full of this impression, he immediately went over, and at once addressed the gentle- man ; he now fully expected to elucidate the mystery. He apologised for the interruption, but excused it by relating the occurrence which had induced him to the commission of this solecism in manners. The gentle man received him as a friend. He had never been out of the country, but he was another brother of the youth whose spirit had been seen.

This story is related with several variations. It is sometimes told as having happened at Gibraltar, at others in England, at others in America. There are also differences with respect to the conclusion. Some say that the gentleman whom Sir John Sherbroke after- wards met in London, and addressed as the person whom he had previously seen in so mysterious a manner, was not another brother of General Wynyard, but a gentleman who bore a strong resemblance to the family. But, however, the leading facts in every account are the

o

10 HAUNTED HOMES,

same. Sir John Sherbroke arid General Wynyard, two gentleman of veracity, were together present at the spiritual appearance of the brother of General Wynyard, the appearance took place at the moment of dissolution, and the countenance and form of the ghost's figure were so distinctly impressed upon the memory of Sir John Sherbroke, to whom the living man had been unknown, that, on accidentally meeting with his likeness, he per- ceived and acknowledged the resemblance.

It maybe added that the brother of General Wynyard, who died on;the 15th of October 1785, was John Otway Wynyard, af the time of his death lieutenant in the 3rd Regiment of Foot Guards.

Colonel Gore, being asked many years afterwards by Sir John Harvey to give an account of the affair, so far as it came within his cognizance, testified in writing to the main facts of the narrative here given ; and Sir John Sherbroke, forty years after the event, assured his friend, General Paul Anderson, in the most solemn manner, that he believed the appearance he had seen to have been a ghost or spirit, and this belief, he added, was shared by his friend Wynyard.

THE LUMINOUS WOMAN.

The following startling relation was furnished to Robert Dale Owen by a clergyman of the Church of England, chaplain to a British legation abroad. Although the

/

THE LUMINOUS WOMAN. 311

narrator's name is not given, Owen had the consent of the Rev. Doctor to communicate it in any case in which he might deem it would serve the cause to advance which his work, Footfalls on the Boundary of Another World, was written. It is not given now, for ohvious reasons, but the story is too characteristic to be omitted, and shall, therefore, be given as nearly as possible in the narrator's own terms : —

"In the year 185- I was staying, with my wife and children, at a favourite watering- place. In order to attend to some affairs of my own, I determined to leave my family there for three or four days. Accordingly, one day in August, I took the railway, and arrived in

the evening, an unexpected guest, at Hall, the

residence of a gentleman whose acquaintance I had re- cently made, and with whom my sister was then staying.

" I arrived late ; soon afterwards went to bed, and before long fell asleep. Awaking after three or four hours, I was not surprised to find I could sleep no more ; for I never rest well in a strange bed. After trying, therefore, in vain again to induce sleep, I began to arrange my plans for the day.

" I had been engaged some little time in this way, when I became suddenly sensible that there was a light in the room. Turning round, I distinctly perceived a female figure ; and what attracted my especial attention was, that the light by which I saw it emanated from itself. I watched the figure attentively. The features were not perceptible. After moving a little distance, it disappeared as suddenly as it had appeared.

312 HAUNTED HOMES.

" My first thoughts were that there was some trick. I immediately got out of hed, struck a light, and found my bedroom-door still locked. I then carefully examined the walls, to ascertain if there were any other concealed means of entrance or exit ; but none could I find. I drew the curtains and opened the shutters ; but all outside was silent and dark, there being no moonlight.

" After examining the room well in every part, I betook myself to bed and thought calmly over the whole matter. The final impression on my mind was that I had seen something supernatural, and, if supernatural, that it was in some way connected with my wife. What was the appearance ? What did it mean ? Would it have appeared to me if I had been asleep instead of awake ? These were questions very easy to ask and very difficult to answer.

" Even if my room-door had been unlocked, or if there had been a concealed entrance to the room, a practical joke was out of the question. For, in the first place, I was not on such intimate terms with my host as to warrant such a liberty ; and, secondly, even if he had been inclined to sanction so questionable a proceeding, he was too unwell at the time to permit me for a moment to entertain such a supposition.

" In doubt and uncertainty I passed the rest of the night ; and in the morning, descending early, I imme- diately told my sister what had occurred, describing to her accurately everything connected with the appearance I had witnessed. She seemed much struck with what I told her, and replied, * It is very odd ; for you have

THE LUMINOUS WOMAN. 313

heard, I dare say, that a lady was, some years ago, murdered in this house ; but it was not in the room you slept in.' I answered that I had never heard anything of the kind, and was heginniug to make further inquiries about the murder, when I was interrupted by the entrance of our host and hostess, and afterwards by breakfast.

" After breakfast I left without having had any oppor- tunity of renewing the conversation. But the whole affair had made upon me an impression which I sought in vain to shake off. The female figure was ever before my mind's eye, and I became fidgety and anxious about my wife. 'Could it in any way be connected with her? was my constantly recurring thought. So much did this weigh on my mind that, instead of attending to the busi- ness for the express purpose of transacting which I had left my family, I returned to them by the first train ; and it was only when I saw my wife and children in good health, and everything safe and well in my house- hold, that I felt satisfied that, whatever the nature of the appearance might have been, it was not connected with any evil to them.

" On the Wednesday following 1 received a letter from my sister, in which she informed me that, since I left, she had ascertained that the murder was committed in the very room in which I had slept. She added that she purposed visiting us next day, and that she would like me to write out an account of what I had seen, together with a plan of the room, and that on that plan she wished me to mark the place of the appearance and of the disappearance of the figure.

814 HAUNTED HOMES.

" This I immediately did ; and the next day, when my sister arrived, she asked me if I had complied with her request. I replied, pointing to the drawing-room table, 'Yes; there is the account and the plan.' As she rose to examine it, I prevented her, saying, 'Do not look at it until you have told me all you have to say, because you might unintentionally colour your story by what you may read there.'

"Thereupon she informed me that she had had the carpet taken up in the room I had occupied, and that the marks of blood from the murdered person were there, plainly visible, on a particular part of the floor. At my request she also then drew a plan of the room, and marked upon it the spots which still bore traces of blood.

"The two plans — my sister's and mine — were then compared, and we verified the most remarkable fact, that the places she had marked as the beginning and ending of the traces of blood, coincided exactly ivith the spots marked on my plan as those o?i which the female figure had appeared and disappeared.

"I am unable to add anything to this plain statement of facts," remarks the narrator. " I cannot account in any way for what I saw. I am convinced no human being entered my chamber that night; yet I know that, being wide awake and in good health, I did distinctly see a female figure in my room. But if, as I must believe, it was a supernatural appearance, then I am un- able to suggest any reason why it should have appeared to me. I cannot tell whether, if I had not been in the

THE RESULT OF A CURSE. 815

room, or had been asleep at the time, that figure would equally have been there. As it was, it seemed con- nected with no warning nor presage. No misfortune of any kind happened then, or since, to me or mine, Tt is true that the host, at whose house I was staying, when this incident occurred, and also one of his chil- dren, died a few months afterwards; but I cannot pre- tend to make out any connection between either of these deaths and the appearance I witnessed. . . . But what I distinctly saw, that, and that only, I describe."

It. is unfortunate that there is no evidence available as to whether this was the only appearance recorded of the apparition ; or whether it was known to have ever been seen before or after the night on which the nar- rator of the above account beheld it.

THE RESULT OF A CURSE.

In Dr. Lee's Glimpses of the Supernatural — a collec- tion of ghost tales and revivified mediseval legends — is given a marvellous narrative of the results of a curse, as, according to the reverend author, "fresh evidence of the existence of the supernatural amongst us, had we only eyes to see and ears to hear." We include the story in our collection as a fair specimen of the way in which such subjects are treated in our days, but must suggest that it would bear a greater air of vraisemhlance were

316 HAUNTED SOMES.

the names of some at least of the persons introduced given, or some more definite clue to the localities afforded. The story, as told by Dr. Lee, is this : —

"The younger son of a Nova Scotia baronet, under promise of marriage, betrayed the only surviving daughter of a Northumbrian yeoman of ancient and respectable family, nearly allied to a peer, so created in William the Fourth's reign. She was a person of rare beauty and of considerable accomplishments, having received an education of a very superior character in Edinburgh. After her betrayal, she was deserted by her lover, who fled abroad. The night before he left, however, at her earnest request, he met her in company with a friend, with the avowed intention of promising marriage in the future, when his family, as he declared, might be less averse to it.

" After events show that this was merely an empty promise, and that he had no intention of fulfilling it. A long discussion took place between the girl and her betrayer, in the presence of the female friend in question, a first cousin of her father. High words, strong phrases, and sharp upbraidings were uttered on both sides ; until at last the young man, in cruel and harsh language, turning upon her fiercely, declared that he would never marry her at all, and held himself, as he maintained, perfectly free to wed whom he should choose.

" * You will be my certain death,' she exclaimed, ' but death will be more welcome than life.'

" l Die and be ,' he replied.

THE RESULT OF A CURSE. 317

" At this the girl, with a wail of agony, swooned away. On her recovery she seemed to gather up her strength to pronounce a curse upon him and his. She uttered it with deliberation, yet with wildness and bitterness, maintaining that she was his wife, and would haunt him to the day of his death ; declaring at the same time to her relation present, ' And you shall be the witness.'

" He left the place of meeting without any recon- ciliation or kind word, and, it was believed, went abroad. In less than five months, in giving birth to her child, she died, away from her home, and was buried with it (for the child, soon after its baptism, died likewise) in a village church-yard near Ambleside. Neither stone nor memorial marks her grave. Her father, a widower, wounded to the quick by the loss of his only daughter, pined away and soon followed her to his last resting-place.

"Five years had passed, and the female cousin of the old yeoman, being possessed of a competency, had gone to live in London, when, on a certain morning in the spring of the year 1842, she was passing by a church in the West End, where, from the number of carriages waiting, she saw that a marriage was being solemnized. She felt mysteriously and instinc- tively drawn to look in. On doing so, and pressing forwards towards the altar, she beheld, to her astonish- ment, the very man, somewhat altered and weather-worn, who had caused so much misery to her relations, being married (as on inquiring she discovered) to the daughter

318 HAUNTED HOMES.

of a rich city merchant. This affected lier deeply, bring- ing back the saddest memories of the past. But, as the bridal party were passing out of the church, and she pushed forward to look, and be quite sure she had made no mistake, both herself and the bridegroom at one moment saw an apparition of her relation, the poor girl whom he had ruined, dressed in white, with flowing hair and a wild look, holding up in both hands her little infant. Both seemed perfectly natural in appear- ance and to be of ordinary flesh and blood. There was no mistaking her certain identity. This occurred in the full sunshine of noon, and under a heavy Palladian porch in the presence of a crowd. The bridegroom feurned deathly pale in a moment, trembled violently, and then, staggering, fell forward down the steps. This occasioned a vast stir and sensation among the crowd. It seemed incomprehensible. The bridegroom, said the church officials in answer to inquiries, was in a fit. He was carried down the steps and taken in the bridal carriage to his father-in-law's house. But it was re- ported that he never spoke again ; and this fact is mentioned in a contemporary newspaper account of the event. Anyhow, his marriage and death appeared in the same number of one of the daily papers.

" And although the family of the city merchant knew nothing of the apparition, what is thus set forth was put on record by the lady in question, who knew the mysterious circumstances in all their details, which record is reasonably believed by her to afford at once a signal example of retributive justice «;**' niaikud

THE EESULT OF A CURSE. 319

piece of evidence of the supernatural. Names, for various reasons, are not mentioned here. The truth of this narrative, however, was affirmed on oath by the lady in question," why or wherefore Dr. Lee does not state, "before two justices of the peace at Windsor, on October 3rd- 1848, one of whom was a beneficed clerary- man in the diocese of Oxford, well known to the editor of this volume, to whom this record was given in the year 1857 (when he was assistant minister of Berkley Chapel) by a lady of rank who worshipped there."

THE HAUNTED HOMES

LSD

FAMILY TKADITIONS OF GKEAT BEITAIN.

ALTHOKP.

Althorp, the magnificent Northamptonshire seat of Ear] Spencer, has been the residence of its proprietors from the " olden time," as Baker says, in his history of the county. The simplicity of its exterior is fully com- pensated by the attractions within : its magnificent library is one of the wonders of England, and its superb collection of paintings another. Since Althorp has been in possession of the Spencers it has been hon- oured by two royal visits; the first was paid by the Queen and the elder son of James the First, and the second by William the Third, in 1695, when a large gathering

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324 HAUNTED HOMES.

of the nobility and gentry of the county took place in honour of the event.

That a residence of the antiquity and importance of Althorp should have a ghost is nothing unusual; if, indeed, it had several it need not be a matter of wonder, as such things go. The apparition which is connected with Earl Spencer's palatial dwelling, however, is not of the character one generally finds connected with places of that rank, nor are we aware that it habitually haunts the place, but it is so remarkable an instance of ghost-seeing, related to us on such good authority, that is well worth record here.

Mr. (afterwards Archdeacon) Drury was invited by Lord and Lady Lyttleton to accompany them on a visit to Earl Spencer, the lady's father, then at Althorp. After dinner Mr. Drury and Lord Lyttleton amused them- selves with billiards, and continued so late at their game that at last one of the servants went to them to request that when they went to bed they would extinguish the lights themselves. He asked them to be very careful in doing so, as Lord Spencer was always uneasy about fire. Looking at their watches, they were amazed to find that it was past two, and both of them went to bed without further delay.

Mr. Drury was awakened from his slumbers by the reflection of a light falling on his face; opening his eyes, he beheld at the foot of his bed a man dressed as a stable-man, in striped shirt and flat cap, and carrying a lantern with the bull's-eye turned full upon the dis- uirbud sleeper.

ALTHORP. 325

" What do you want, my man ? Is the house on fire ? " exclaimed Mr. Drury ; but he received no reply, liis visitor remaining silent and immovable.

" What do you mean by coming into a gentleman's room in the middle of the night? What business have you here?" he demanded, but, unable to elicit any response, became more imperious in his remarks, bidding the fellow be gone as an impudent scoundrel, whose conduct should be reported to his master.

The figure then slowly lowered the lantern and passed into the dressing-room, from which there was no other means of exit than that bv which he had entered.

" You won't be able to get out that way," Mr. Drury called out, and then, overcome by drowsiness, he dropped off to sleep again, without even waiting to see the result.

Next morning Mr. Drury remarked to Lady Lyttleton that it was a very odd thing, but a stable-man had walked into his room in the middle of the night, and would not go away for some long time, adding, " I sup- pose the man was drunk, but he did not look so '* ; and he then proceeded to describe his dress and general appearance.

Lady Lyttleton turned pale. : You have described," she said, " my father's favourite groom, who died a fortnight ago, and whose duty it was to go round the house after everyone had gone to bed, to see that the lights were extinguished, and with strict orders to enter any room where one was seen burning."

Mr. Dairy's feelings may be imagined, and that he

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326 HAUNTED HOMES.

never slept in that room again alone will readily be assumed ; but whether he, or anyone else at Althorp, ever beheld the apparition of the dead groom again is another matter, about which we are unable to furnish any information.

ASHLEY HALL.

In a work styled News from the Invisible World, pur- porting to be a collection of remarkable narratives on "the certainty of supernatural visitations," by " T. Ottway," is given an account of certain marvellous occurrences which are stated to have taken place at " Ashley Park," Cheshire. .This Ashley Park would appear to be identical with Ashley Hall, and the " Man- nerings" of the narratives but another name for the Merediths, whose country seat the Hall once was. Ottway's account, which has been followed here, was derived from someone at Cambridge University, but his name and position are untold.

Ashley Hall, it may be premised, is somewhat more than a mile south-east of Bowdon, and is pleasantly situated on the banks of the Bollen. According to the description given in Omerod's History oj Cheshire, the exterior is stuccoed, and finished with gables ; the in- terior contains an old entrance-hall, and a variety of

ASHLEY HALL. 327

apartments, more or less altered, but retaining, in general, an air of respectable antiquity.

The story which I am about to relate, says our autho- rity, has reference to a subject often discussed and little understood — the connection which exists between this shifting scene and the world of spirits. "It is of little import to the reader," the narrator opines, " whether I am a sceptic or a convert to the theory. It may be more material for him to be assured that he is troubled with the details on the authority of one whose fortitude I have often witnessed, and for whose veracity I could pledge my own. I give the story, as nearly as I can recollect, in her own words."

"You know theMannerings of Cheshire, andremember their seat, Ashley Park. It was when I had just left school that I accompanied my intimate friend, Miss Mannering, on a visit to her mother at Ashley. Mrs. Mannering was a widow, blessed with an ample fortune and great animal spirits, who laughed, and ate, and talked, and played the kind hostess, and delighted in seeing everyone happy about her ; who thanked God that she had ' not a nerve in her body ' ; and hoped she should die as she had lived — comfortably. The house was crowded with company, ana Mrs. M. made an apology for being obliged to assign to me, as my bed- chamber, the ' Cedar Room.' It was a large, fine, old apartment, wainscotted with cedar, and, from there being a door at each end of it, which led to different parts of the house, had, on high days and holidays, been used as an ante-chamber. There were no old pictures, no Gothic

828 HAUNTED HOMES.

furniture, no tapestry, to predispose the imagination to superstitious feelings, or to foster in the mind melan- choly forebodings.

" The windows were sashed — the fire-place good, but neither Gothic nor over-large — and the room itself, though of unusual dimensions, had the appearance of antiquity, unaccompanied by anything sombre. We had been dancing, and I went to bed in high spirits. It was between two and three in the morning, when I awoke with a start, and saw distinctly a female figure pass through my room. I enquired without fear who was there. There was no answer. The figure proceeded slowly onwards, and disappeared at the door. It struck me as being singular, but, knowing the house to be filled with company, and that the greater part were strangers to the endless labyrinth of staircase and ante-room which overrun the mansion, I concluded some heedless guest had mistaken my chamber, or that one of the servants, forgetting the circumstance of its being inhabited, had literally put it to its old use — a passage-room. At all events, thought I, it will be cleared up at breakfast ; and without feeling any alarm, or attaching any impor- tance to the incident, I struck the hour by my watch, and fell asleep. The next morning I was somewhat startled by finding both the doors locked on the inside, and by recollecting with what care I had turned the key the preceding evening. The breakfast-bell, however, disturbed the train of my ruminations. I hurried hastily down-stairs, and thought no more on the subject. In the course of conversation, my kind hostess inquired

ASHLEY HALL. 329

how I had slept. ' Very soundly,' said I, ' except that I was rather surprised by someone who, no doubt by mistake, passed through my room at two this morning.' Mrs. Mannering looked earnestly at me, seemed on the point of asking me a question, checked herself, and turned away.

" The next night I went to bed earlier, and, at nearly the same hour, the figure appeared. But there was no doubt now upon my mind. On this occasion I saw the face. Its pale countenance, its large, melancholy black eyes, its step noiseless as it glided over the oaken floor, gave me a sensation that I can never forget. Terrified as I was, I fixed my eyes on it. It stood before me — then slowly receded ; when it reached the middle of the room, stopped — and while I looked at it, was not. I own it affected me strangely. Sleep for the remainder of the night was impossible. And though I endeavoured to fortify my mind by recollecting all I had heard and read against the theory, to persuade myself that it was illu- sion, and that I should see no more of it, I half deter- mined to conclude my visit at once, or, at all events, tc change my room immediately. Morning came — bright sunny morning — and the race-ball of the morrow, and a dread of the ridicule which would follow my determina- tion, overpowered my resolution. I was silent, and — I stayed.

" The third night came. I confess, as the evening drew in, I shuddered at the idea of going to bed. I made excuses; I talked over the events of the night; I played; I sang ; I frittered away minute after minute ; and so well did my stratagem succeed, that two, thf

880 HAUNTED HOMES.

dreaded hour, was past long ere I entered my room. I admit, that had I retired to rest, on the first evening of my visit at Ashley, with the impressions that, in spite of myself, forced themselves upon me in this, imagination might then have claimed a part in what I witnessed. But the feelings were wholly distinct. On the first night I had seen nothing — knew nothing. On this, I was steeling my mind against the worst.

"After a determined and minute investigation of the room, after a thorough examination of every closet and coruer, after barring and bolting each door with a beating heart, a woman's fears (shall I confess it ?) stole over me ; and, hastily flinging myself on the bed, I muffled up my face entirely in the clothes. After lying in this manner for two hours in a state of agony that baffles all description, I ventured to cast a hurried glance around the room. It must be, I thought, near daybreak. It was so ; but by my side stood the figure — her form bent over me, her face so close to mine that I could have touchad it; her white drapery leaning over me, so that my slightest motion would have dis- composed it. I looked again, to convince myself that it was no deception, and — have no recollection of any- thing further.

" When I came to myself it was nearly noon. The servants and, indeed, Mrs. Mannering herself had re- peatedly knocked at the door, and, receiving no answer, were unwilling to disturb me. My kind hostess was alone in the breakfast-room when I entered, and was preparing to rally me on my early hours, when, evi-

ASHLEY HALL. 381

dently struck by my appearance, she inquired if I was well. 'Not particularly,' said I, faintly; ' and, if you will allow me, I return home this morning.' She looked at me in silence for some moments, and then said with emphasis, ' Have you any particular reason ? Nay, I am sure you have,' she continued, as her keen, penetrating eyes detected an involuntary tremor. ' I have no concealments/ was my reply, and immediately I detailed the whole transaction. She heard me gravely, without interruption, or expressing any surprise. ' I am grieved, beyond measure, my dear young friend, for the event; I certainly have heard strange and unac- countable stories about that room ; but I always treated them as idle tales, quite unworthy of credit. This is the first time for years it has been occupied, and I shall never cease to reproach myself for having tried the experiment. But, for God's sake ! ' she added, 'don't mention it. Assure me, promise me, you will not breathe a syllable on the subject to any living being. If, among these ignorant and superstitious people, the inexplicable occurrence should once get wind, not a servant would stay with me.' I assented ; and on all her offers of a different room, pressing entreaties to remain, and promises of fresh arrangements, I put a decided negative. Home I returned that morning.

" A long interval elapsed before I again visited Ashley. Miss Mannering, my kind and warm-hearted friend, had sunk into an early grave, and I had had, in the interim, to stem the torrent of affliction, and buffet with its waves. At length, a most pressing and per-

332 HAUNTED HOMES.

sonal invitation brought me under Mrs. Mannering's roof. There I found her sister, who, with three young children, were laughing and revelling away their Christ- mas. Lady Pierrepoint was one of those fortunate women who, by dint of undaunted assurance, and, as Poor Eichard informed his friends, * an unparalleled tongue,' had contrived to have her own way through life. Her first exploit, on coming to Ashley, was to fix upon the cedar-room for the children. In vain poor Mrs. Mannering pointed out its faults. She 'was afraid they would find it cold.' Her ladyship ' wished them to be hardy.' 'It was out of the way.' ' So much the better ; their noise would not be troublesome.' l I fear

' went on Mrs. Mannering. ' Don't know what it

is,' said Lady Pierrepoint. ' In short,' she continued, with her imperturbable face, ' this room or none.' And Mrs. Mannering, not daring to avow the real cause of her fears, yet feeling that further contest was useless, saw, with feelings of horror, the little cribs and rocking horses, nurses and nine-pins, formally established in the dreaded apartment.

" Things went on very smoothly for a fortnight. No complaints of the cedar-room transpired, and Mrs. Mannering was congratulating herself on the happy turn affairs had taken, when, one day, on her going into the nursery, she saw her little nephews busily engaged in packing up their playthings. ' What, are you tired of Ashley, and going to leave me?' ' Oh, no ; but we are going to hide away our toys from the White Lady. She came last night, and Sunday night. And she had

ASHLEY HALL. 333

such large black eyes, and she stood close by our cribs — just here, aunt. Who is she, do you know ? for Fred says she never speaks. What does she do here, and what does she want ? '

" 'What a wretched, miserable woman I am!' cried the panic-stricken Mrs. Mannering. 'Every hope I had entertained of this abominable affair is dashed to the ground for ever ; and if, by any chance, Lady Pierre- point should discover Oh, they must be moved

directly. Ring the bell ! Where's the housekeeper? I'll give no reason — I '11 have no reason. Oh, Manner- ing ! to what sorrows have you not exposed your widow ! ' In spite of all inquiries, interrogatories, and surmises, moved the little Pierrepoints were that very evening. Our precautions, however, were all but de- feated ; for one of the little magpies began after dinner: 1 Mamma, I 've something to tell you about the White Lady.' He was instantly crammed almost to suffoca- tion with sweetmeats. The rest were very shortly trundled out of the room, choking with bon-bons. And I shall never forget the piteous expression of Mrs. Mannering's countenance, as she passed me with her party, or her declaration : c God forgive me ! but I see very clearly this White Lady will put me in my grave.'

" The room was then shut up for some years, and I can give no account of what passed at Ashley in the interim. The last time I was there was on the day on which young Mannering came of age. His mother had been receiving the loud and rustic, but not, on that account, the less sincere, congratulations of the tenants

334 HAUNTED HOMES.

on the lawn, when she was told her more courtly visitors were awaiting her in the drawing-room. On this occa- sion the sins of the cedar-room were forgotten, and it was once more used as an ante-chamber. To enter it, throw off her shawl and bonnet, and run to a large swing-glass which stood near a window, was the work of an instant. She was hastily adjusting her dress, when she started, for she saw — reflected at full length in the glass beside her — the figure of the White Lady !

"It was days before the brain-fever, which her fright and her fall brought on, would allow her to give any connected account of what, til] then, appeared an in- explicable occurrence. Her reason and recollection gradually returned, but her health — never. A few weeks afterwards she quitted Ashley Park for — the grave ! "

BAGLEY HOUSE.

In an interesting paper on " Devonshire Ghosts," con- tributed by Miss Billington to Merry England, for August 1883; is an account of Bagley House, near Bridport, a well-known haunted building. About this old residence various ghostly legends have clustered, but Miss Billington refers mainly to a traditional Squire Lighte. This worthy was formerly owner of Bagley.

BAGLEY HOUSE. 335

"He had been hunting one day," says our authority, u and after reaching home had gone away again and drowned himself. His groom had followed him with a presentiment that something was wrong, and arrived at the pond in time to see the end of the tragedy. As he returned, he was accosted by the spirit of his drowned master, which unhorsed him. He soon fell violently ill, and never recovered; one of the consequences of this illness being that his skin peeled entirely off! Shortly after Squire Lighte's suicide his whole house was troubled with noisy disturbances which were at once associated with the evil deed of self-destruction. It was suggested that the spirit should be formally and duly ' laid ' or exorcised. A number of the clergy went, therefore, for that purpose, and succeeded in inducing the ghost to confine itself to a chimney in the house for a certain number of years ; it is not known exactly now for how long.

" For many years after this, however, the place remained at peace ; but on the expiration of the power of the charm, very much worse disturbances broke out again. Raps would be heard at the front door; steps in the passage and on the stairs, doors opening and closing. The rustle of ladies dressed in silk was audible in the drawing-room, and from that room the sound was traced into a summer-house in the garden. The crockery would all be violentlv moved, and at certain rare intervals a male figure, dressed in old-fashioned costume, is said to have made itself visible and walked about the house. The neighbours say that these extraordinary

336 HAUNTED HOMES,

occurrences continued for many years. They believe in them most firmly, and are of opinion that as long as the house stands it will be thus troubled."

BERRY POMEEOY CASTLE.

Berry Pomeroy Castle is situated in the midst of some of the most beautiful scenery of Devonshire. Its remains are very extensive and imposing, and attract many visitors from Torquay and neighbourhood. Artists are ' especially drawn to the place by its well-deserved I reputation for presenting eligible points of view for study. The ruin consists of a mass of late Tudor buildings, grouped around an inner court, and sur- rounded by an escarped bank of great height. There is but one approach ; a gateway with spaces for two port- cullises, and two flanking towers. The walls are clad with ivv ; and trees, almost as ancient as the castle itself, are scattered about the grounds. The picturesque beauty of the situation is heightened and completed by the river, which winds round the charming ruins. With this delightful spot a terrible tragedy is connected, the details of which have been given to us in some such words as these :

Somewhat more than a century ago, Dr. Walter Farquhar, who was created a baronet in 1796, made a temporary sojourn in Torquay. This phvsician was

H

H m < o

o

BERRY POMEEOY CASTLE. 337

quite a young man at that time and had not acquired the reputation which, after his settlement in London, pro- cured him the confidence and even friendship of royalty. One day, during his stay in Devon, he was summoned professionally to Berry Pomeroy Castle, a portion of which building was still occupied by a steward and his wife. The latter was seriously ill, and it was to see her that he had been called in. Previous to seeing his patient Dr. Farquhar was shown into an outer apartment and requested to remain there until she was prepared to see him. This apartment was large and ill-proportioned; around it ran richly-carved panels of oak that age had changed to the hue of ebony. The only light in the room was admitted through the chequered panes of a gorgeously-stained window, in which were emblazoned the arms of the former lords of Berry Pomeroy. In one corner, to the right of the wide fire-place, says the narrative attributed to the doctor, was a flight of dark oaken steps, forming part of a staircase leading appa- rently to some chamber above ; and on these stairs the fading gleams of summer's twilight shone through.

While Dr. Farquhar wondered, and, if the truth be told, chafed at the delay which had been interposed between him and his patient, the door opened, and a female somewhat richly dressed entered the apartment. He, supposing her to be one of the family, advanced to meet her. Unheeding him she crossed the room with a hurried step, wringing her hands, and exhibiting by her motions the deepest distress. When she reached the foot of the stairs, she paused for an instant, and then

338 HAUNTED HOMES.

began to ascend them with the same hasty step and agitated demeanour. As she reached the highest stair the light fell strongly on her features, and displayed a countenance, youthful, indeed, and beautiful, but in which vice and despair strove for mastery. " If ever human face," to use the doctor's own words, " exhibited agony and remorse ; if ever eye, that index of the soul, portrayed anguish uncheered by hope, and suffering without interval ; if ever features betrayed that within the wearer's bosom there dwelt a hell, those features and that being were then present to me."

Before he could make up his mind on the nature of this strange occurrence, he was summoned to the bed- side of his patient. He found the lady so ill as to require his undivided attention, and had no opportunity, and in fact no wish, to ask any questions which bore on a different subject to her illness.

But on the following morning, when he repeated his visit, and found the sufferer materially better, he com- municated what he had witnessed to the husband, and expressed a wish for some explanation. The steward's countenance fell during the physician's narrative, and at its close he mournfully ejaculated: " My poor wife ! my poor wife ! " " Why, how does this relation affect her ? " " Much, much ! " replied the steward, vehemently. " That it should have come to this ! I cannot — cannot lose her ! You know not," he continued in a milder tone, " the strange, sad history ; and — and his lordship is extremely averse to any allusion being ever made to

Berry pomeroy castle. 339

tne circumstance, or any importance attached to it; bat I must and will out with it ! The figure which you saw- is supposed to represent the daughter of a former baron of Berry Pomeroy, who bore a child to her own father. In that chamber above us the fruit of their incestuous intercourse was strangled by its guilty mother; and whenever death is about to visit the inmates of the castle she is seen wending her way to the scene of her crimes with the frenzied gestures you describe. The day my son was drowned she was observed; and now my wife ! "

"I assure you she is better. The most alarming symptoms have given way, and all immediate dancrer is at an end."

" I have lived in and near the castle thirty years/' was the steward's desponding reply, " and never knew the omen fail."

" Arguments on omens are absurd," said the doctor, rising to take his leave. " A few days, however, will,

I trust, verify my prognostics, and see Mrs. S

recovered."

They parted mutually dissatisfied. The lady died at noon.

Many years intervened and brought with them many changes. The doctor rose rapidly and deservedly into repute; became the favourite physician and even per- sonal friend of the Prince Kegent, was created a baronet, and ranked among the highest authorities in the medical world.

When he was at the zenith of his professional career,

340 HAUNTED HOMES,

a lady called on him to consult him about her sister, whom she described as sinking, overcome, and heart- broken, by a supernatural appearance.

" I am aware of the apparent absurdity of the details which I am about to give," she began, " but the case will be unintelligible to you, Sir Walter, without them. While residing at Torquay last summer, we drove over one morning to visit the splendid remains of Berry Pomeroy Castle. The steward was very ill at the time (he died, in fact, while we were going over the ruins), and there was some difficulty in getting the keys. While my brother and I went in search of them, my sister was xeit alone for a few moments in a large room on the ground-floor ; and while there — most absurd fancy ! — she has persuaded herself she saw a female enter and pass her in a state of indescribable distress. This spectre, I suppose I must call her, horribly alarmed her. Its features and gestures have made an impression, she says, which no time can efface. I am well aware of what you will say, that nothing can possibly be more preposterous. We have tried to rally her out of it, but the more heartily we laugh at her folly, the more agitated and excited does she become. In fact, I fear we have aggravated her disorder by the scorn with which we have treated it. For my own part, I am satisfied her impressions are erroneous, and arise entirely from a depraved state of the bodily organs. We wish for your ?ninion ; and are most anxious you should visit her without delay/'

'Madam, I will make a point of seeing your sister

BETTISCOMBE HOUSE. 341

immediately; but it is no delusion. This I think it proper to state most positively, and previous to anv interview. I, myself, saw the same figure, under some- what similar circumstances, and ahout the same hour of the day ; and I should decidedly oppose any raillery or incredulity being expressed on the subject in your sister's presence."

Sir Walter saw the young lady next day, and after being for a short time under his care she recovered.

Our authority for th® above account of how Berry Pomeroy Castle is haunted, derived it from Sir Walter Farquhar, who was a man even more noted for his probity and veracity than for his professional attain- ments, high as they were rated. The story has been told as nearly as possible in Sir Walter's own words.

BETTISCOMBE HOUSE.

There is a certain old farmstead known as Bettiscombe, or Bettiscombe House, in a parish of the same name, about six miles from Bridport, in Dorsetshire. This ancient dwelling, which is still inhabited, is celebrated for the so-called "Screaming Skull' that it contains. There are various versions of the cause and conse- quences of the malign influence exercised by this relic of humanity. Mr. William Andrews, in his essay on Skull Superstitions, states that the peculiar superstition attachiug to the Bettiscombe skull is, " that if it be

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■ m

340

HAUNTEJJ) HOMES,

a lady called on him to consult him about her sister, whom she described as sinking, overcome, and heart- broken, by a supernatural appearance.

" I am aware of the apparent absurdity of the details which I am about to give," she began, "but the case will be unintelligible to you, Sir Walter, without them While residing at Torquay last summer, we drove ovei one morning to visit the splendid remains of Bern Pomeroy Castle. The steward was very ill at the tim< (he died, in fact, while we were going over the ruins) and there was some difficulty in getting the keys. WhiL my brother and I went in search of them, my sister wa reit alone for a few moments in a large room on th ground-floor ; and while there — most absurd fancy !— she has persuaded herself she saw a female enter an pass iier in a state of indescribable distress. Thi spectre, I suppose I must call her, horribly alarme her. Its features and gestures have made an impressior she says, which no time can efface. I am well aware c what you will say, that nothing can possibly be mor preposterous. We have tried to rally her out of it, bu the more heartily we laugh at her folly, the mor agitated and excited does she become. In fact, I fea we have aggravated her disorder by the scorn withwhic we have treated it. For my own part, I am satisfied he impressions are erroneous, and arise entirely from depraved state of the bodily organs. We wish for you ^ninion: and are most anxious vou should visit he without delay.""

' Madam, I will make a point of seeing your siste

• hen

i details |

i' them.

of Berry the tin e ruins) ?. While

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. Toil

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aware o be raor

of it, to

BETTISCOMBE HOUSE.

o

41

immediately: but it is no delusion. This I think it proper to state most positively, and previous to anv interview. I, myself, saw the same figure, under some- what similar circumstances, and about the same hour of the day ; and I should decidedly oppose any raillery or incredulity being expressed on the subject in your sister's presence."

Sir Walter saw the young lady next day, and after being for a short time under his care she recovered.

Our authority for th* above account of how Berry Pomeroy Castle is haunted, derived it from Sir Walter Farquhar, who was a man even more noted for his D t^probity and veracity than for his professional attain- ments, high as they were rated. The story has been told as nearly as possible in Sir Walter's own words.

BETTISCOMBE HOUSE.

There is a certain old farmstead known as Bettiscombe, e morJor Bettiscombe House, in a parish of the same name, & about six miles from Bridport, in Dorsetshire. This oi ancient dwelling, which is still inhabited, is celebrated be for the so-called " Screaming Skull " that it contains. ■T f^n i There are various versions of the cause and conse- quences of the malign influence exercised by this relic . ^ of humanity. Mr. William Andrews, in his essay on Skull Super stit,io?is, states that the peculiar superstition .^attaching to the Bettiscombe skull is, "that if it be

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42 HAUNTED HOMES.

brought out of the house, the house itself would rock to its foundations, while the perpetrator of such an act of desecration would certainly die within the year.

" Various changes of tenancy and furniture have been made" in the old homestead, says Mr. Andrews, "but the skull holds its place. It is not known when the * ghastly tenant ' first took up its abode in the place, but it has been there for a considerable period. The skull has been stated to be that of a negro ; and the legend was that it belonged to a faithful black servant of an early possessor of the property — a Pinney, who, having lived abroad for some time, brought home this memento of his humble follower."

The tradition related by Mr. Andrews, however, is far too simple and conventional to satisfy the cravings of the hunter after hauntings ; his premises are not tragic enough to account for such fearsome results; it is, therefore, comforting to learn that local legends impart a more gruesome aspect to the affair. It is needless to enter too closely into an investigation of the origin of the story : for most readers the following interesting account of a visit paid to the " screaming skull," will supply all that can be desired on the subject. In the August of 1883, Dr. Richard Garnett, of the British Museum, his daughter, and a friend, whilst stay- ing at Charmouth, about seven or eight miles from Bettis- combe, hearing reports about the skull and its strange performances, determined to pay it a visit. The result of their expedition is thus told by Miss Garnett : —

" One fine afternoon a party of three adventurous

BETTISCOMBE HOUSE. 343

spirits started off, hoping to discover the skull and investigate its history. This much we knew, that the skull would only scream when it was buried, and so we hoped to get leave to inter it in the churchyard.

" The village of Bettiscombe was at length reached, pr^i we found our way to the old farm-house, which stuud at the end of the village by itself. It had evi- dently been a manor-house, and a very handsome one too. We were admitted into a fine paved hall, and attempted ' to break the ice ' by asking for milk ; we then endeavoured to draw the good woman of the house into conversation by admiring the place and asking, in a guarded manner, respecting the famous skull. On this subject she was most reserved; she had only lately taken the farm-house, and had been obliged to take possession of the skull also ; but she did not wish us to suppose that she knew much about it, it was a veri- table ' skeleton in the closet' to her. After exercising great diplomacy we persuaded her to allow us a sight of it. We tramped up the fine old oak staircase till we reached the top of the house, when, opening a cupboard door, she showed us a steep winding staircase leading to the roof, and from one of the steps the skull sat grinning at us. We took it in our hands and examined it carefully ; it was very old and weather-beaten, and certainly human. The lower jaw was missing; the forehead very low and badly proportioned. One of our party, who was a medical student, examined it long and gravely, and then, after first telling the good woman that he was a doctor, pronounced it to be, in his opinion.

344 HAUNTED HOMES.

the skul] of a negro. After this oracular utterance she resolved to make a clean breast of all she knew, which, however, did not amount to much. The skull, we were informed, was that of a negro servant, who had lived in the service of a Eoman Catholic priest ; some differ- ence arose between them, but whether the priest mur- dered the servant in order to conceal some crimes known to the negro ; or whether the negro, in a fit of passion, killed his master, did not clearly appear. How- ever, the negro had declared before his death that his spirit would not rest unless his body was taken to his native land and buried there. This was not done, he being buried in the churchyard at Bettiscombe. Then the haunting began : fearful screams proceeded from the grave ; the doors and windows of the house rattled and creaked ; strange sounds were heard all over the house ; in short, there was no rest for the inmates until the body was dug up. At different periods attempts were made to bury the body, but similar disturbances always recurred. In process of time the skeleton disappeared, all save the skull which we now saw before us.

" We were naturally extremely anxious to bury the skull, and remain in the house that night to see what would happen; but this request was indignantly refused, and we were promptly shown off the premises."

Therefore the reputation of "the Screaming Skull of Bettiscombe House remains unimpaired.

33

345

BIECHEN BOWEE.

Most accounts of haunted duellings are connected with, if, indeed, they are not derived from, some terrible tragedy. The legend of the old haunted house at Birchen Bower is, however, not without its comic ele- ment. As usual, gold is at the bottom of the story. Whatever amount of credence the reader may be willing to give to the sights and sounds declared to appertain to Birchen Bower, that some kind of hereditary trouble belongs to it can scarcely be denied, as the following particulars, derived chiefly from an article by Mr. James Dronsfield, in the Oldham Chronicle for 1869, will make manifest.

About the latter end of July 1869, a body buried in Harpurhey Cemetery was declared to be that of old Miss Beswick, whose mummified corpse had long been ex- hibited as a curiosity in the Manchester Museum. For upwards of a century, so it was alleged, the rightful heirs of Birchen Bower, Kose Hill and Cheetwood Estates had been kept out of their property by a crafty stratagem, and the burial of the body of the so long deceased lady was to be the means of restoring to the family of the former owners their long-withheld domains.

The ancient homestead of Birchen Bower, Hollin- wood, was a quaint four-gabled edifice, built in the form of a cross, and remarkable for the beauty of its summer surroundings. All of it, save the southern wing, was demolished some vears ago ; but the spirit or whatever

346 HAUNTED HOMES.

else it may be termed, belonging to tbe residence, did not desert the spot when so much of its beauty and in- terest was destroyed. A large barn, that is still, or was recently, standing, and which bears the initials of the Beswick family engraved on it, with the date of 1728, but which appears to have been built much earlier, is the centre of quite a number of legends and superstitious stories.

Miss, or Madame Beswick, as she is often called, is the nucleus about which all these curious myths gather. Who she really was would seem to be somewhat un- certain, but tradition states that she lived at Bower House, and farmed the estate, until old age compelled her to retire to a little stone cottage which stood on the brink of the mill-stream that ripples through the sloping front garden. The old lady was said to be very wealthy, and when the rebels under Prince Charlie visited the neighbourhood in 1745, she was terribly afraid they would requisition her belongings, so secreted " vast sums of money and articles of value " about the pre- mises. The Scottish intruders did not carry the war into Miss Beswick's territory, but the relatives of the old lady could never afterwards induce her to reveal where the hidden treasures were. A few days before her death, it is said, she promised if they would carry her up to Bower House she would disclose the secret and point out wThere the gold was secreted, but they neglected the opportunity. She became suddenly worse, and died, leaving the whole affair enveloped in mystery.

Here was, indeed, a capital foundation for a ghost

BIRCHEN BOWER. 347

story! But better material lurks behind. A hundred years passed away, and the body of Miss Beswick was not buried ! Why this interment was so long deferred has been variously stated, but the following account would appear to embody the most popular, if not, in- deed, the most historical elements of the case. A bro- ther of Miss Beswick was supposed £o have been considered dead, but just before the coffin-lid was screwed down signs of animation were noticed ; restora- tives were applied, and, after having been in a trance for several days, he revived, and lived for many years after. This circumstance is supposed to have made so intense an impression upon the mind of Miss Beswick, that she left her estates to Dr. White, her medical attendant, to be held by him as long as her body was kept above ground. The doctor embalmed the body, and thus was enabled to keep it unburied, and so withhold the pro- perty from the long-expectant descendants of the Beswick family.

Whatever may be fact and what fiction about this tradition is not in our power to say, but the following extract from the Manchester Guardian of Saturday, August 15 th, 1868, is certainly confirmatory of some portions of the popular account : —

"A Curious Interment. — On the 22nd of July were committed to the earth in the Harpurhey Cemetery the remains of Miss Beswick, removed from the Peter Street Museum. There is a tradition that this lady, who is supposed to have died about one hundred years ago, had acquired so strong a fear of being buried alive

348 HAUNTED HOMES,

that she left certain property to her (medical?) attendant, so long (so the story runs) as she should be kept above ground. The doctor seems to have embalmed the body with tar, and then swathed it with a strong bandage, leaving the face exposed, and to have kept ' her' out of the grave as long as he could. For many years past the mummy has been lodged in the rooms of the Manchester Natural History Society, where it has long been an object of much popular interest. It seems that the Commissioners, who are charged with the re- arrange- ment of the Society's collections, have deemed this specimen undesirable, and have at last buried it."

One of the curious arrangements tradition asserts Miss Beswick bargained for was that every twenty-one years her body should be brought to Birchen Bower and remain there for one week, and old folks — who should know about it — declare the body was taken there at the stipulated times, and put in the granary of the old farmstead. Thus far, nothing beyond the eccentricity of humanity has been cited, but the eccentricities of a supernatural being have now to be referred to. In the morning, state these authorities, when the corpse was fetched, the horses and cows were always found let loose, and sometimes a cow would be found up in the hay-loft, although how it came there was, indeed, a mystery, as there was no passage large enough to admit a beast of such magnitude. The last prank of this description played by Miss Beswick, so far as our infor- mation goes, was a few years ago, when a cow belonging to the farmer then tenanting the place was found on the

BIRCHEN BOWER. 349

hay-loft, and it was the firm belief of many thereabouts that supernatural agency had been employed to place it there. What made it particularly ominous was the fact that it was the fourteenth anniversary of seven years since Miss Beswick died, and it was a well-established fact that something supernatural happened or was seen at the expiration of every seven years at Birchen Bower. How the cow was got up was a mystery to everyone, whilst that blocks had to be borrowed from Bower Mill to let it down through the hay-hole outside the barn was an equally well known fact.

After Miss Beswick's death, her old house was divided into several dwellings, and many strange stories are rife of the marvellous things therein seen and heard. One family had grown so familiar with the apparition of the old lady in the silken gowu that they were in no way alarmed when she appeared. Sometimes when they were seated at supper a rustling of silk would be heard at the front entrance, and presently a lady arrayed in black silk would glide through the room, walk straight into the parlour, and then disappear at one particular flag- stone. It was a harmless spirit, annoying no one, and her appearance never drew forth any further remarks from the family than " Hush ! the old lady comes again." In another part of the dwelling an inmate had a treadle-lathe for wood-turning, which he used after his day's work was over in doing petty jobs of joinery for the neighbours. Sometimes when he went into his little work-room an invisible visitor would be working away with the lathe in full motion.

350 HAUNTED HOMES.

It is now about eighty-five years since the almost forgotten " Barley Times " made sad oppression amongst the poor people of this country. Protection had nearly ruined the nation ; flour was at a fearful price, and good bread scarcely obtainable. As a body the hand- loom weavers were starving for want of food ; but one of them, " Joe at Tamer's," made such large purchases and seemed so flush of money that everybody was puzzled. It was well known that Joe had a large family of small children, who were supposed to depend for their daily bread upon his labours with the shuttle, and yet it was clear that they were stinted neither in food nor clothing. Joe lived in one wing of Birchen Bower house, and it was whispered that he had found the gold which had been hidden by "Madame" Beswick. Years passed away before the source of Joe's wealth was dis- covered ; but eventually he confessed that he had pulled up the floor of the haunted parlour, intending to put up a loom for one of his children to learn to weave, and in digging the treadle-hole he had found a tin vessel filled with gold wedges, each valued at three pounds ten shillings. He never mentioned the circumstance to anyone at the time, but took his find to Oliphant's, in St. Anne's Square, Manchester, and got it changed into current coin. People were still living a few years ago who knew "Joe at Tamer's," and the tin vessel in which he found the gold is said to be still preserved by his descendants.

It was thought that the discovery of her hidden trea- sure would break the snell, and that Madame Beswick's

BIBCflEN BOWER, S5l

troubled spirit would now rest; but this is not the case. Some few years ago she was seen near the old well by the brook-side, when a presumed heir of the estates was pressing his claim. A rustic was goiug to fetch a pail of water ; but when he got to the well he beheld a tall lady standing by it, wearing a black silk gown and a white cap with a frilled border of those stiff, old- fashioned puffs which were formerly worn. She stood there in the dusk, in a defiant or threatening attitude, streams of blue light seeming to dart from her eyes and flash on the horror-stricken man. This appearance of the lady's apparition was considered as a token that she would get no rest until the estates had reverted to the real heir. In light of the hitherto want of success of the Beswicks to regain the property, notwithstanding their frequent efforts, the old lady's spirit appears doomed for a very lengthy and uncertain space of time to walk the earth.

Madame Beswick, indeed, still haunts the old neigh- bourhood ; on clear, moonlight nights she walks in a headless state between the old barn and the horse- pool, and at other times assumes the forms of different animals, but is always lost sight of near the horsepool : this causes some folk to fancy that she concealed something there during the Scottish invasion, which she is now desirous of pointing out to anyone courageous enough to speak to her.

On dark and dreary winter nights the barn, it is said, appears to be on fire ; a red glare of glowing heat being observable through the loop-holes and crevices of the

352 HAUNTED HOMES.

building, and strange, unearthly noises proceed from it, as if Satan and all his imps were holding jubilee there. Sometimes, indeed, the sight is so threatening that the neighbours will raise an alarm and knock up the farmer and tell him the barn is in flames. When the premises are searched, however, nothing is found wrong, every- thing is in order, and the neighbours go terror-stricken home, fully convinced that they have witnessed another of Madame Beswick's supernatural pranks

BLACKADON.

The belief in headless spectres of not only human, but equine and canine beings is very widely spread through- out England, as readers of Charles Hardwick's Tradi- tions, and other kindred works, are well aware. In the western counties the myth is frequently localised, as at Plymouth, where Sir Francis Drake has been seen driving a hearse drawn by headless horses, and followed by a pack of headless hounds. In Cornwall such appa- ritions are quite common, one of the most noted being that told of by the Rev. Thistleton Dyer in One and All. The Rev. Richard Dodge, early in the last century, vicar of Talland, near Looe, in Cornwall, like several other Cornish clergymen, was very eccentric. His singularities impressed the surrounding peasantry with a great awe of him, and to meet him on the highway

BLACEADON. 353

after dark inspired, it is averred, the utmost consterna- tion and terror. At that lonesome time he was believed to drive along the evil spirits, some of whom were visible in various sorts of shapes, and pursue them with his whip in a most audacious manner. Not unfre- quently, too, he would be seen in the churchyard at midnight, to the great horror of passers-by. As an exorcist Mr. Dodge had a great reputation ; he was supposed to be deeply versed in the black art, and able, not only to raise ghosts, but to " lay" them in the Red Sea, or other convenient resting-place, by a nod of his head. A truly useful clergyman for the time and locality, although, indeed, his fame was not confined te his own parish nor limited to the age in which he lived.

One day a messenger arrived at his house with a note from Mr. Mills, Rector of Lanreath, to this effect : " On divers occasions has the labourer, returning from his work across the moor, been frightened nigh into lunacy by sounds and sights of a very dreadful character. The appearance is said to be that of a man, habited in black, driving a carriage drawn by headless horses. My present business is to ask your assistance in this matter, either to reassure the minds of the country people if it only be a simple terror, or, if there be any truth in it, to set the troubled spirit of the man at rest."

This was quite sufficient to put a man of Mr. Dodge's temperament upon his mettle. The next night, accom- panied by Mr. Mills, he set out to visit the haunted

354 HAUNTED HOMES.

locality; but, although the night "was dark and murky, they could catch no glimpse of the ghostly driver, and only hear the occasional howling of dogs belonging to distant farm-houses, or else the melancholy wailing oi the wind, as it soughed across the moor. After some long time the clergymen became wearied of waiting, and decided that it was useless to watch any longer then, but they agreed to meet again some other night in hopes of meeting the spectre.

They separated, Mr. Dodge for the vicarage at Tal- land, and Mr. Mills for his rectory at Lanreath. Mr. Dodge had not proceeded far before his steed became excessively restive, and, although he applied whip and spur, the beast grew most uneasy, pricked up its ears, snorted, and swerved from side to side of the road, as if something stood in the path before it. This continued for some time, until Mr. Dodge, thinking it dangerous to attempt to pursue his journey, threw the reins on the neck of the horse, when it immediately started back towards the moor, and, with immense rapidity, carried him to the spot where he had parted from his com- panion. On nearing this place, the horse seemed seized with incontrollable fury ; and the vicar was horrified to behold Mr. Mills prostrate on the ground, and by bis side, the much-dreaded spectre of the black coach and the headless horses !

Jumping down to the assistance of his insensible friend, Mr. Dodge raised his lips in prayer, when, in- stantly, the spectre screamed, " Dodge is come ! I must be gone ! " and leaped into its chariot, whipping furi-

BLACK HEDDON. 355

ously the headless horses, and vanishing into the dark- ness of the night. The rector's horse, which had taken flight on beholding its own headless kith and kin, galloped off homewards at a terrible rate. The sound of its hoofs, as it dashed madly through the quiet little village, aroused the cottagers, who, deeming their clergyman had been thrown and, perhaps, killed, turned out in a body to seek for him. On arriving at Blacka- don, they discovered their rector, supported by Mr. Dodge, but in an insensible condition. They escorted him home, and, in a few days, much to the satisfaction of everybody, he recovered completely from the ill effects of his severe fright and fall. Curious to relate, from that time, nothing has been seen or heard of this ghost and its headless horses driving over that moor.

BLACK HEDDON.

Black Heddon, a quiet village near Stamfordham, in Northumberland, acquired an unenviable notoriety some fifty years or so ago, on account of a troublesome spectre by which it was haunted. The supernatural being, whose pranks so disturbed this picturesque but secluded place, was known as " Silky," on account of its silken and rustling attire. It is a strange but by no means unparalleled circumstance, that spirits bearing the same name, and endowed with similar characteristics,

23

856 HAUNTED HOMES.

have rendered untenantable the once famed manor- house of Chirton, as well as many other ancient English dwellings. Although Eicharclson, in his Table-Booh of Traditions, asserts that " Silky " has now disappeared from Black Heddou, and has ceased her manifold methods of annoying its inhabitants, this scarcely seems borne out by facts, if our information may be relied on. The tradition of her vagaries was too deeply im- pressed upon the locality to be quite eradicated in one generation or so.

" Silky," although occasionally manifesting herself, or itself, in various shapes and ways, has a marked predilection for making herself visible in the semblance of a female dressed in silken attire.

Many a time, when one of the more timorous of the community had a night journey to perform, has he, unawares and invisibly, been clogged and watched by this spectral tormentor, who, at the dreariest part of the road, the most suitable for thrilling surprises, would suddenly break forth in dazzling splendour. If the •person happened to be on horseback, a sort of exer- cise for which " Silky" evinced a strong partiality, she would unexpectedly seat herself behind him, " rattling in her silks." Then, after the enjoyment of a comfort- able ride, with instantaneous abruptness, she would dissolve "into thin air," leaving the bewildered horse- man in blank amazement.

At Belsay, two or three miles from Black Heddon, the spectre had a favourite resort. It was a romantic crag, finely studded with trees, under the gloomy shadov

BLACK HEDDON. 357

of which she loved to wander all the live-long night. Here often has the Delated peasant beheld her dimly through the sombre twilight, as if engaged in splitting great stones, or hewing, with many a stroke, some stately monarch of the grove. Whilst he thus stood and gazed, he would suddenly hear the howling of a resistless tempest rushing through the woodland, while to the eye not a leaf was seen to quiver, nor a spray to bend.

The bottom of this crag is washed by a picturesque hike or fish-pond, at whose outlet is a waterfall, over which a venerable tree, sweeping its shadowy arms, adds to the impressiveness of the scene. Amid the complicated and contorted limbs of this tree " Silky " possessed a rude chair, where she was wont, in her moodier moments, to sit, rocked by the winds, enjoying the rustling of the storm through the woods, or the rush of the cascade during the pauses of the gale. This tree, so consecrated by the terrors of the vicinity, was carefully preserved through the care of the late proprietor, Sir Charles M. L. Monk, Bart.*, of Belsay Castle, and, though no longer tenanted by its ghostly visitant, it yet spreads majestically its time-hallowed canopy over the mysterious spot, and still, in memory of its spectral occupant, bears the name of " Silky's Seat/'

" Silky '' exercised a marvellous influence over the brute creation. Horses — which would appear to possess a discernment of spirits superior to man, at least are more sharp-sighted in the dark — were in an extraordinary degree sensitive to her presence and control. Having

23 *

358 HAUNTED HOMES.

once perceived the effects of her power, she seems to have had a perverse pleasure in meddling with and arresting them in the midst of their lahours. When this misfortune occurred there was no ordinary remedy brute force could devise to make the restive beast resume the proper and intended direction. Expostulation, soothing, whipping, and kicking were all exerted in vain. The ultimate resource, unless it might be her whim to revoke the spell in the interim, was Witch-wood or Kowan tree, an antidote of unfailing efficacy in this as in all similar cases.

One night, an unfortunate farm-servant was the selected victim of her mischievous frolics. He had to go to a colliery at some distance for coals, and it was late in the evening before he could return. i{ Silky" waylaid him at a bridge, henceforth called " Silky's Brig," lying a little to the south of Black Heddon, on the road between that place and Stamfordham. Just as he had arrived at the " height of that bad eminence " the keystone, horses and cart became fixed and immovable ; and in that melancholy plight might man and beast have continued, quaking, sweating, and paralysed, till morning light, had not a neighbouring servant come up opportunely to the rescue, carrying some of the potent Witch-wood with him. On the arrival of this seasonable aid the charm was effectually broken, and in a short time both man and coals reached home in safety.

" Silky " was wayward and capricious, but at length her erratic course came to an end. She abruptly dis-

BLACK HEDDON. 359

appeared. It had been long surmised, by those who paid attention to the matter, that she was the troubled phnntom of some person who had died miserably, in consequence of being overtaken by mortal agony before she was able to disclose the whereabouts of a great treasure she was in possession of, and on that account could not lie still in her grave. About the period referred to, a domestic female servant, being alone in one of the rooms of a house at Black Heddon, was frightfully alarmed by the ceiling above suddenly giving way, and the dropping from it, with a prodigious clash, of something black, shapeless, and uncouth. The servant did not stop to scrutinize an object so hideous and startling, but fled to her mistress, screaming at the pitch of her voice, " The deevil 's in the house ! The deevil 's in the house ! He 's come through the ceil- ing ! " With this terrible announcement, the whole family were speedily convoked, and great was their consternation at the idea of the foe of mankind being amongst them in a visible form. In this appalling extremity, a considerable time elapsed before anyone could brace up courage to face " the enemy," or be prevailed on to go and inspect the cause of the alarm. At last the mistress, who happened to be the most stout- hearted, ventured into the room, when, instead of the personage on whose account such awful apprehensions were entertained, a great dog's skin lay on the floor, black and hideous enough forsooth, but filled with gold. The house where this occurred was, at the time, occu- pied by the Hepples, respectable yeomen of the place;

360 HAUNTED HOMES.

their descendants were still the proprietors of it in 1844, and, it is said, had acquired a very considerable sum from " Silky's" long hidden treasure.

After this, " Silky " was neither seen nor heard, is the opinion of the narrator of the above circumstances. " Her destiny was accomplished, her spirit laid, and she now," according to this informant, "sleeps as peace- fully aud unperturbed as the degenerate and unenter- prising ghosts of more recent times."

BLENKINSOPP CASTLE.

Grim, gaunt, and hoary, the fragmentary ruins of the ancient fortress of Blenkinsopp, stand as a shadowy semblance of the majestic strength which the castle wore in former ages. Upwards of five centuries have elapsed since this border stronghold was erected upon a commanding knoll on the western frontier of North- umberland, and naturally so antique a building has gathered about it a garment of tradition. The most noteworthy legend attached to Blenkinsopp, and one most devoutly believed in by the neighbouring peasantry, is that of "The White Lady," whose apparition has haunted the castle for centuries and even now appears from time to time.

The legend which accounts for this long-existent phantom, this rival to "The White Lady of Skipsea/' is related with more or less minuteness by various

BLENKINSOPP CASTLE. 361

historians; but in the following version, derived from Richardson's Table Book of Traditions, the more salient points of the story will be found.

Bryan de Blenkinsopp, or <? Blenship " as the name is provincially contracted into, was gallant and brave ; in a private feud, a border raid, or on the battle-field, he was ever first. The mighty and brave ranked him rvs one of their number ; the harps of the minstrels sang his praises in numerous lays, whilst divers bright eyes looked fondly and favourably on the form of the dark and handsome warrior. But with all his good qualities, and they were many, Bryan de Blenkinsopp had a failing which ultimately wrecked his fortune. This failing was an inordinate love of wealth ; this vice he cherished in secret, and as earnestly though vainly sought to discard ; it grew with his growth and strengthened with his strength, and gnawed into his very soul.

At the marriage of a brother warrior with a lady of high rank and fortune, amongst other health-drinkings was given that of Bryan de Blenkinsopp and his " ladye love." "Never/' said Bryan, "never shall that be until I meet with a lady possessed of a chest of gold heavier than ten of my strongest men can carry into my castle." This extraordinary announcement was received by the company in silence, but the many looks of sur- prise which were exchanged did not escape his jealous observation. Ashamed of having betrayed his secret thoughts, he quitted the place, and his country.

After an absence of many years Sir Bryan returned,

362 HAUNTED HOMES.

bringing with him not only a wife, but also a box of gold that took twelve of his strongest men to carry into the Castle. There was great feasting and rejoicing for many days for the lord's return, amongst friends and followers, and the fame of his wealth was spread far and wide. After a length of time it began to be whispered that the life of the rich baron was anything but a happy for he and his lady quarrelled continually; she, ETri the assistance of the followers who accompanied her, having secreted the chest of gold in some part of the castle, and refused to give it up to her lawful husband and master. Whom she was or whence she came was unknown; her followers spoke a foreign tongue, so nothing could be gleaned from them. Some folks even hinted that she was not a human being, but an imp of darkness sent with her wealth to ensnare Sir Bryan's soul.

One day the young lord suddenly left the Castle, and went no one knew whither. His lady was inconsolable for her loss, and filled the whole castle with her lamen- tation. The vassals were despatched to all parts in order to discover whither he had fled, but without success. After searching in vain, and waiting for more than a year, she and her attendants started forth in search of the missing man.

The fate of Bryan de Blenkinsopp and his wife is enveloped in mystery, and there is no hand to draw aside the impenetrable veil and show us if ever they met again, through what climes they wandered, or on what field he fell ! Certain it is that neither ever returned to

BLENKINSOPP CASTLE. 363

Blenkinsopp. Tradition asserts that the lady, filled with remorse for her undutiful conduct towards her lord, cannot rest in her grave, but must needs wander back to the old castle and mourn over the chest of wealth — the cursed cause of all their woe — so uselesslv buried beneath the crumbling ruins. Here she must continue to wander until someone possessed of sufficient courage to follow her to the vault shall discover and remove the hidden treasure, and so give her perturbed spirit rest.

The knowledge of this tradition naturally inclined the surrounding peasantry to regard the old castle with superstitious awe, and certain comparatively recent events have contributed, in no slight degree, to heighten the impression. The following curious circumstance was communicated to Richardson by Mr. W. Pattison, of Bishopwearmouth.

More than thirty years ago, said this correspondent in an account written nearly forty years ago, there lived, in two of the more habitable apartments of the weather- beaten walls of the massive structure raised by Thomas de Blenkinsopp, a labourer of the estate, and his family. Both rooms appear to have been used as sleeping chambers, because, as we are informed, one night, after retiring to rest, the parents were alarmed by loud, reiterated screams, issuing from the adjoining apart- ment. Rushing in, they found one of their children, a boy, sitting up in bed, trembling, bathed in perspira- tion, and evidently in extreme terror.

"The White Lady! the White Lady I" screamed

"■v

364 HAUNTED HOMES.

the lad, holding his hands before his eyes as if to shut out some frightful object.

. " What lady ? n cried the astonished parents, looting around the room, which, to all appearance, was entirely untenanted ; " there is no lady here."

" She is gone/' replied the boy, " and she looked so angry at me because I would not go with her. She was a fine lady — and she sat down on my bedside, and wrung her hands and cried sore ; then she kissed me and asked me to go with her, and she would make me a rich man, as she had buried a large box of gold, many hundred years since, down in the vault, and she would give it me, as she could not rest as long as it was there. When I told her I durst not go, she said she would carry me, and was lifting me up when I cried out and frightened her away."

A tale so singular, and yet, to all appearance, narrated with fidelity, filled the old people with fear and astonish- ment. It was currently reported that the Castle was haunted by a white lady, although since their entrance into the dreary abode they had hitherto been undis- turbed. Persuading themselves that the child had been dreaming, they succeeded in quieting and getting him to sleep. The three following nights they were disturbed in the same manner — the child repeating the same story, with little variation, when, after a little consideration, they removed him, and were no longer troubled with the spectre; yet, such was the terror with which it in- spired him, that he dared not enter into any part of the old castle alone, even in daylight.

BLENKINSOPP CASTLE. 365

When the boy grew to manhood, although a sensible person, adds Mr. Pattison, he invariably persisted in the truth of his statement, and said that at forty years of age he could recall the scene so vividly as to make him shudder, as if still he felt her cold lips press his checks, and the death-like embrace of her wan arms. He was alive in 1805, and had become a settler in Canada.

The belief that treasure lies buried in Blenkinsopp Castle was not a little strengthened, some years ago, by the arrival of a strange lady at the neighbouring village. She, it would appear, had dreamt that a large chest of gold lay buried in the castle vaults, and, although she had never seen it before, she instantly recognised the castle as the same she had seen in her dream. She staved

■r

several weeks, awaiting the return of the owner of the property to ask leave to search. She had, meanwhile, made the hostess of the inn her confidant, with strict injunctions not to divulge it to anyone. The landlady, unable to preserve so interesting a secret, appears to have told it to every person in the village, but always accompanied with a caution similar to that she had re- ceived herself: " Dinna ye be speaking on 't." Whether from the circumstances having acquired such publicity, or from reasons unknown to our informant, cannot be said, but, at any rate, the unknown lady suddenly de- parted, without, of course, having accomplished the purpose of her pilgrimage to Blenkinsopp.

Up till 1820 some poor families continued to occupy a few of the more habitable rooms of the old castle, but even these are now ruinous and deserted. A few years

366 HAUNTED HOMES.

ago, the occupier of the neighbouring farm gave orders for the vaults underneath the keep to be cleared out, for the purpose of wintering cattle therein. On removing the rubbish, a small doorway, level with the bottom of the keep, was discovered. On clearing out the entrance, the workmen were surprised by the appearance of a large swarm of meat-flies, and the place itself smelt damp and noisome. The news soon spread abroad that the entrance to the " Lady's Vault" had been discovered, and people flocked in great numbers to see it. Of the whole number assembled, however, but one man was found willing to enter. He described the passage as narrow, and not sufficiently high to admit of a man walking upright. He walked in a straightforward direc- tion for a few yards, then descended a flight of steps, after which he again proceeded in a straightforward course until he came to a doorway ; the door itself had fallen to pieces, the bolt was rusting in its fastening, and the hinges clung to the post with shaky hold. At this juncture the passage took a sudden turn, and a lengthened flight of precipitous steps presented them- selves. Opening his lantern, and turning the light, he peered down the stairs into the thick darkness, but, en- countering thick noxious vapours, his candle was ex- tinguished, and he was obliged to grope his way back to his companions. He made another attempt, but never descended the second flight of stairs; and so little curio- sity had their employer about the matter, that he ordered it to be closed up, and the contents of the vault remain undiscovered to this day, "When I saw the place/' records

BOGNOS. 367

Mr. Pattison, u some time after this adventure, the hole had been partially opened by some boys, who were amusing themselves with tossing stones therein, and listening to the hollow echoes as they rolled in the depths of the mysterious cavern."

BOGNOR.

The number for August 10th, 1867, of All the Year Hound, contained the following very strange circumstan- tial narrative of a supernatural character. It purports to have been "taken down in shorthand from the lips of the narrator," and the transcriber is believed to have been Charles Dickens himself. The story is related as " a pendant to the paper which recently appeared in this journal headed 'Is it Possible?' (particulars of which will be found under the heading of " Hampton Court"); to which story a note was added by the editor, believed to have been, at that time, as also in this instance, Charles Dickens.

This " simple narrative," as it is editorially described, is said to have been derived from a man getting on in years, " who, distrustful of all other people's experience verging on what we impertinently term the supernatural, scarcely even ventures to believe his own." "As a state ment at first hand," says the supposed transcriber, whose alleged transcription is evidently the work of an experienced litterateur. " as a statement at first hand of

368 haunted homes.

an appearance testified to by the narrator and corrobo- rated by his ,wife, both living, it has seemed to me, while simply transcribing the notes, to possess an interest often wanting in more artistic stories of artificial manufacture." After these introductory words the tc transcriber " proceeds to give his story in the following terms :—

"My wife's sister, Mrs. M , was left a widow at

the age of thirty-five, with two children, girls, of whom she was passionately fond. She carried on the draper's business at Bognor, established by her husband. Being still a very handsome woman, there were several suitors for her hand. The only favoured one amongst them was a Mr. Barton. My wife never liked this Mr. Bar- ton, and made no secret of her feelings to her sister, idiom she frequently told that Mr. Barton only wanted to be master of the little haberdashery shop in Bognor. He was a man in poor circumstances, and had no other motive in his proposal of marriage, so my wife thought, than to better himself,

"On the 23rd of August, 1831, Mrs. M — - arranged to go with Barton to a pic-nic party at Goodwood Park, the seat of the Duke of Richmond, who had kindly thrown open his grounds to the public for the day. My wife, a little annoyed at her going out with this man. told her she had much better remain at home to look after her children and attend to the business. Mrs.

M , however, bent on going, made arrangements

about leaving the shop, and got my wife to promise to ive to her little girls wliile she was away.

BOGNOB, 869

if'Vhe party sot cut in a four-wheeled phaeton; will;

fi pair of ponies driven by Mrs. M , and a g\<? for

which I lent my horse.

"Nov; we did not expect them to come back till nine or ten o'clock, at any rate. I mention this particularly to show that there could be no expectation of their earlier return in the mind of my wife, to account for what follows.

" At six o'clock that bright summer's evening my wife went out into the garden to call the children. Not finding them, she went all round the place in her search till she came to the empty stable; thinking they might have run in there to play, she pushed open the door; there, standing in the darkest corner, she saw Mrs.

M . My wife was surprised to see her, certainly ;

for she did not expect her return so soon; but, oddly enough, it did not strike her as being singular to see her there. Vexed as she had felt with her all day for going, and rather glad, in her woman's way, to have something entirely different from the genuine casus belli to hang a retort upon, my wife said : ' Well, Harriet, I should have thought another dress would have done quite as well for your picnic as that best black silk you have on.' My wife was the elder of the twain, and had always assumed a little of the air of counsellor to her sister. Black silks were thought a great deal more of at that time than they are just now, and silk of any kind was held particularly inconsistent wear for Wes- leyan Methodists, to which denomination we belonged.

"Receiving no answer, my wife said : * Oh, well,

3?0 HAUNTED HOMES.

Harriet, if you can't take a word of reproof without being sulky, I '11 leave you to yourself;' and then she came into the house to tell me the party had returned, and that she had seen her sister in the stable, not in the best of tempers. At the moment it did not seem extra- ordinary to me that my wife should have met her sister in the stable.

" I waited in-doors some time, expecting them to

return my horse. Mrs. M was my neighbour, and,

being always on most friendly terms, I wondered that none of the party had come in to tell us about the day's pleasure. I thought I would just run in and see how they had got on. To my great surprise the servant told me they had not returned. I began, then, to feel auxiety about the result. My wife, however, having seen Harriet in the stable, refused to believe the servant's assertion ; and said there was no doubt of their return, but that they had probably left word to say they were not come back, in order to offer a plausible excuse for taking a further drive, and detaining my horse for another hour or so.

" At eleven o'clock Mr. Pinnock, my brother-in-law. who had been one of the party, came in, apparently much agitated. As soon as she saw him, and before he had time to speak, my wife seemed to know what he had to say.

"'What is the matter?' she said; * something has happened to Harriet, I know ! '

" ' Yes,' replied Mr. Pinnock ; ' If you wish to see her alive you must come with me directly to Goodwood.'

BOGNOB. 371

" From what he said it appeared that one of the ponies had never been properly broken in; that the man from whom the turn-out was hired for the day had

cautioned Mrs. M respecting it before they started;

and that he had lent it reluctantly, being the only pony to match in the stable at the time, and would not

have lent it at all had he not known Mrs. M to be

a remarkably good whip.

" On reaching Goodwood, it seems, the gentlemen of the party had got out, leaving the ladies to take a drive round the park in the phaeton. One or both of the ponies must then have taken fright at something in the

road, for Mrs. M had scarcely taken the reins

when the ponies shied. Had there been plenty of room she would readily have mastered the difficulty; but it was in a narrow road, where a gate obstructed the way. Some men rushed to open the gate — too late. The three other ladies jumped out at the begin- ning of the accident; but Mrs. M still held on to

the reins, seeking to control her ponies, until, finding it was impossible for the men to get the gate open in time, she, too, sprang forward ; at the same instant the ponies came smash on to the gate. She had made her spring too late, and fell heavily to the ground on her head. The heavy, old-fashioned comb of the period, with which her hair was looped up, was driven into her skull by the force of the fall. The Duke of Richmond, a witness to the accident, ran to her assist- ance, lifted her up, and rested her head upon his knees. The only words Mrs. M had spoken were uttered

24

372 HAUNTED HOMES.

at the time : " Good God, my children ! '' By direction of the Duke she was immediately conveyed to a neigh- houring inn, where every assistance, medical and other- wise, that forethought or kindness could suggest was afforded her.

"At six o'clock in the evening, the time at which my wife had gone into the stable and seen what we now

knew had been her spirit, Mrs. M -, in her sole

interval of returning consciousness, had made a violent but unsuccessful attempt to speak. From her glance having wandered round the room, in solemn, awful wistfulness, it had been conjectured she wished to see some relative or friend not then present. I went to Goodwood in the gig with Mr. Pinnock, and arrived in time to see my sister-in-law die at two o'clock in the morning. Her only conscious moments had been those in which she laboured unsuccessfully to speak, which had occurred at six o'clock. She wore a black silk

dress.

" When we came to dispose of her business, and to wind up her affairs, there was scarcely anything left for

the two orphan girls. Mrs. M 's father, however,

being well to do, took them to bring up. At his death, which happened soon afterwards, his property went to his eldest son, who speedily dissipated the inheritance. During a space of two years the children were taken as visitors by various relations in turn, and lived an unhappy life with no settled home.

" For some time I had been debating with myself, how to help these children, having many boys and girls

BOGNOIt. 373

of my own to provide for. I had almost settled to take them myself, bad as trade was with me at the time, and bring them up with my own family, when one day business called me to Brighton. The business was so urgent that it necessitated my travelling at night.

" I se<" cut from Bognor in a close-headed gig on a beautiful moonlight winter's night, when the crisp frozen snow lay deep over the earth, and its fine glistening dust was whirled about in little eddies on the bleak night- wind — driven now and then in stinging powder against my tingling cheek, warm and glowing in the sharp air. I had taken my great dog ' Bose ' (short for * Boat- swain ' ) for company. He lay, blinking wakefully, sprawled out on the spare seat of the gig beneath a mass of warm rugs.

" Between Littlehampton and Worthing, is a lonely piece of road, long and dreary, through bleak and bare open country, where the snow lay knee-deep, sparkling in the moonlight. It was so cheerless that I turned round to speak to my dog, more for the sake of hearing the sound of a voice than anything else. ' Good Bose,' I said, patting him, ' there 's a good dog ! ' Then sud- denly I noticed he shivered, and shrank underneath the wraps. Then the horse required my attention, for he gave a start, and was going wrong, and had nearly taken me into the ditch.

" Then I looked up. Walking at my horse's head, dressed in a sweeping robe, so white thfft it shone dazzling against the white snow, I saw a lady, her back turned to me, her head bare ; her hair dishevelled and

24*

374 HAUNTED HOMES.

strayed, showing sharp and black against her white "Iress.

" I was at first so much surprised at seeing a lady, ao dressed, exposed to the open night, and such a night as this, that I scarcely knew what to do. Recovering myself, I called out to know if I could render assistance — if she wished to ride ? No answer. I drove faster, the horse blinking, and shying, and trembling the while, his ears laid back in abject terror. Still the figure maintained its position close to my horse's head. Then I thought that what I saw was no woman, but perchance a man disguised for the purpose of robbing me, seeking an opportunity to seize the bridle and stop the horse. Filled with this idea, I said, ' Good Bose ! hi ! look a3 it, boy ! ' but the dog only shivered as if in fright. Then we came to a place where four cross roads met.

" Determined to know the worst, I pulled up the horse. I fetched Bose, unwilling, out by the ears. He was a good dog at anything from a rat to a man, but he slunk away that night into the hedge, and lay there, his head between his paws, whining and howling. I walked straight up to the figure, still standing by the horse's head. As I walked, the figure turned, and I saw Harriet's face as plainly as I see you now — white and calm — placid, as idealized and beautified by death. I must own that, though not a nervous man, in that instant I felt sick and faint. Harriet looked me full in the face with a long, eager, silent look. I knew then it was her spirit, and felt a strange calm corne over me, for I knew it was nothing to harm me. When J

BOLLING HALL. 375

could speak, I asked what troubled her. She looked at me still, never changing that cold fixed stare. Then I felt in my mind it was her children, and I said :

" * Harriet ! is it for your children you are troubled ? '

" No answer.

" ' Harriet,' I continued, ' if for these you are trou- bled, be assured they shall never want while I havs power to help them. Rest in peace ! '

" Still no answer.

" I put up my ho.nd to wipe from my forehead the cold perspiration which had gathered there. When I took my hand away from shading my eyes, the figure was gone. I was alone on the bleak snow-covered ground. The breeze, that had been hushed before, breathed coolly and gratefully on my face, and the cold stars glimmered and sparkled sharply in the fat blue heavens. My dog crept up to me and furtively licked my hand, as who should say, ' Good master, don't be angry, I have served you in all but this.'

"I took the children and brought them up till they could help themselves."

BOLLING- HALL.

' ;

Bolling, or Bowling Hall, near Bradford, the residence of J. M. Tankard, Esq., is a fine old manor-house in a very good state of preservation ; the present owner

o

76 HAUNTED HOMES.

having done everything to render it convenient and comfortable without sacrificing its ancient appearance. This Hall was formerly the abode of the Boilings ; but in 1502 Eosamund Boiling, sole heiress of the pro- perty, carried it by marriage into the Tempest family, from whom it passed through the hands of several successive owners until finally it became the property of the present proprietor.

Some portions of this picturesque old place are very ancient; the embattled western tower, says Mr. William Scruton, to whom we are chiefly indebted for the infor- mation contained in this chapter, appearing, from its weather-beaten masonry and the thickness of its walls, to date not later than the reign of Edward the Third. Another tower of great antiquity flanks the other end of the fabric. That portion of the front which lies between the towers seems, from the ornate style of its architecture, to have been the work of earlier Tempests, and contains two large embayed windows, of which the western bay with heavy mullions is the window of " the ghost chamber." This haunted room is above the break- fast room, and formerly communicated by a passage, now bricked up, with the kitchens and servants' apart- ments. Its plaster ceiling is beautifully moulded, being covered with an elaborate tracery of conventionally treated branches bearing fruit and flowers, that, with the birds resting on them, issue out of the mouths of horses, boars, and other animals. The walls, which are covered with oak panels, painted a light colour, are surrounded by a curious cornice and frieze, consisting of human

BOLLING HALL. 377

heads and grotesque animals in relief. The lofty carved oak mantel-piece is very remarkable ; it is supported by two fluted columns, which support a canopy ornamented with oak and vine leaves and sprays, below which are portraits of Sir Eichard Tempest and Rosamund his wife, painted on wood, and in a remarkably good state of preservation, considering the three centuries and a half which have elapsed since they were painted.

The last Tempest who held sway at Boiling Hall was Richard, styled by Markham <( a weak, imprudent man, a Royalist and a gamester." When the Puritan party finally triumphed, this Tempest compounded for his estates by a heavy fine, which, coupled with his gambling proclivities, led to his ruin. In the autumn of 1658 he died in the King's Bench, a prisoner for debt. Accord- ing to the current legend he staked and lost Boiling Hall and all his estates at cards, during the deal exclaiming :

" Now ace, deuce, and tray, Or farewell, Boiling Hall, for ever and aye I "

No wonder if this Royalist reprobate's uneasy spirit haunts its squandered-away Hall ; but what his ancient dwelling is chiefly noted for is for an apparition which visited it, or, rather, rendered itself visible at the time of his ownership of the place.

During the Civil War Bradford was closely invested by the Royalists under the Earl of Newcastle. This nobleman, who had made Boiling Hall his head-quarters, being enraged at the slaughter of the Earl of Newport, prepared instructions for a general massacre of the

378 HAUNTED HOMES.

inhabitants, men, women, and children ; no quarter to be given to any. However, before the town capitulated, different orders were issued, and instructions given that none should be put to death. The reason of this great change of orders is generally attributed to supernatural intervention. Popular tradition declares that a female arrayed in white appeared in the Earl's bed-chamber at Boiling Hall, and besought mercy for the townsfolk. Ac- cording to the well-known account of Mr. Joseph Lister, who was in Bradford during the siege, " it was generally reported that something came on the Lord's Day night, and pulled the clothes off his bed several times, and cried out with a lamentable voice ' Pity poor Bradford!' that then he sent out his orders that neither man, woman, nor child should be killed in the town ; and that then the apparition which had so disturbed him left him and went away."

There does not appear to be any record of another appearance of this apparition, but the story of its visit to the Earl is an old and widely-diffused one; wherefore it would not do to omit from this collection the account of " The Boiling Hall Ghost/'

BBUNDON HALL.

Mr. Barham, in his life of his father, the author of the world-famed Ingolchby Legends, cites the following curious circumstances from the reverend author's diarv.

BEUNDON HALL. 379

Barham states that the story is current in the Carter family, of which his first wife was a member, and that it was told to him bv Dr. Roberts : —

11 One dav," proceeds his narrative, " about the year 1785, two lads, one of whom was the uncle of the lady in question, were playing in the large hall of Brandon Hall, a mansion situated on the borders of Suffolk," and at that time the property of the Carters, but which afterwards passed into the possession of the Hurrells. The attention of the boys was suddenly caught by the opening of a door, usually kept locked, which led to the more ancient part of the landing ; and they were more astonished still by the appearance of a strange lady dressed in blue satin, who slowly walked towards the great staircase, stamped three times on a large slab of blue stone which lay at the foot, and then, con- tinuing her walk across the hall, disappeared through a door opposite the one by which she had entered. The boys, more puzzled than frightened, left off playing, and ran and told Mrs. Carter, the mistress of the house, and the mother of the narrator's (Mr. Roberts') uncle. She immediately fainted. Subsequently she told her son that the apparition had been frequently seen by other members of the family, and that there was a very dreadful story connected with it — which, however, she declined to communicate. Some years afterwards, the house having, I believe, changed hands in the interval, certain repairs were undertaken, in the course of which

* It is actually in Essex, and now forms part of Sudbury. — Ed

380 HAUNTED HOMES.

the entrance to a large vault was discovered, concealed by the stone upon which the lady in blue satin had stamped. On examination two skeletons were found below ; a gold bracelet was on the arm of one, and gold spurs were lying near the feet of the other. In addition, a goblet having some dark-coloured sediment at the bottom, supposed to be blood, was found in a recess in the wall, and a considerable quantity of infants' skulls and bones were heaped up in one corner. Lastly, a considerable sum in gold coin was brought to light."

The present representative of the Hurrells informs me that he is ignorant of the tradition attaching to Brundon Hall ; but he adds that a pair of antique spurs and a sword were directed by his great grandfather in his will to be preserved as heir-looms in the family.

How far this coincidence may be thought to corrobo- rate the story of the well-known Sudbury apparition, afterwards to be referred to, must be left to the reader to decide.

BURTON AGNES HALL.

Amongst the haunted houses of Great Britain those which are the permanent residence of certain skulls are the most curious. Various grand old halls, quaint farm-houses, and ancient dwellings, scattered about the kingdom, are troubled at times by all kinds of super-

BURTON AGNES HALL. 381

natural disturbances, in consequence of some long and carefully preserved skull being removed from its resting- place, or otherwise interfered with. These pages fur- nish several singular instances of such legends con- nected with old ancestral dwellings, but none more mvsterious, or devoutly believed in, than that con- nected with Burton Agnes Hall, the family seat of Sir Henry Somerville Boynton.

Burton Agnes is a picturesque village, between Brid- lington and Driffield, in the East Hiding of Yorkshire. It has some pretty cottages, a handsome church, con- taining several splendid tombs of the Boynton, Griffiths, and Somerville families (one of the last dating back to 1336), and the grand old Hall, the residence of the Boyntons. The village, which is chiefly, if not entirely, owned by the Boyntons, lies on the slope of the Wolds ; a long chain of hills sweep round it from Flamborough Head on the north, whence extensive views over the lowlands of Holderness are obtainable.

The Hall, says Mr. F. Ross, from whose interesting article in the Leeds Mercury much of the following in- formation is derived, is a large and picturesque building of red brick, with stone quoins — a mixture of the Tudor, Elizabethan, and Jacobean styles, with a long broken faQade, ornamented with octagonal bays in the wings, and mullioned windows. In the interior are a grand hall, with a fine carved screen, behind which is the magnificent staircase ; a noble gallery, containing a choice collection of paintings — an apartment which has not its equal for many miles. All the chief apartments

382 HAUNTED HOMES.

are profusely ornamented with carved woodwork, over the fire-place of the hall being a curious specimen re- presenting " The Empire of Death." Inigo Jones is said to have designed the Hall, and Rubens to have decorated some portions of the interior. Inwardly and outwardly, this English home is as magnificent as it it curious yet comfortable. From the grand entrance gateway, an avenue of yew-trees stretches away to the porch of the Hall, producing a picturesque effect. Standing, as the edifice does, on an elevation, the panorama seen over the surrounding neighbourhood from its windows is both grand and impressive. Alto- gether, Burton Agnes Hall might be deemed, in every respect, a desirable dwelling. But there is a skeleton, or, rather, a portion of one, in this splendid mansion.

In the course of centuries the estates had passed, by descent, into possession of the De Somervilles, Griffiths, and Boynton families, until they became vested in the persons of three sisters, co-heiresses. A painting at the Hall, represents these three ladies in costumes of the Elizabethan period ; and in one of the upper rooms is the portrait of a lady, apparently one of these three, the bodily representative of the spirit which haunts the ancient mansion, and who is familiarly and irreverently called "Awd Nance," by the domestics. The skull of this lady is preserved at the Hall, much against the will, it is averred, of the inhabitants thereof, but it is more than mortal dare do to remove it. When this relic of mortality is left quietly upon its resting-place, all goes well ; but whenever any attempt is made to remove it,

BUETON AGNES HALL. 383

most diabolical disturbances and unearthly noises are raised in the house, and last until it is restored. The story to account for these phenomena, as told by Mr. Ross, is as follows : —

" The three ladies, co-heiresses of the estate of Burton \ Agnes, were in possession of considerable wealth, and had : very exalted ideas of the dignity of the family. For a while they resided in the ancient mansion, which had been the home of several generations of Griffiths and Somervilles ; but it had become dilapidated, and was altogether out of fashion with the existing Eliza- bethan style of architecture, now merging into the Jacobean, and the three ladies began to think it alto- gether too mean for the residence of so important a family as theirs. They had many consultations on the subject, and, at length, determined to erect a hall in such a style as should eclipse the splendour of all the mansions in the neighbourhood, even that of the mighty Earls of Northumberland at Leckonfield, a few miles distant. The most active promoter of the scheme was Anne, the younger sister, who could talk, think, and dream of nothing but the magnificent home to be erected for themselves and their descendants. Money they had in abundance. They called in the best archi- tects of the day to furnish designs ; bricklayers, masons, and carpenters were soon at work building up the mansion, and then, for the decorative portions, the genius of Inigo Jones and the talents of Rubens were employed on whatever portion of the interior that wa3 susceptible of artistic treatment. In process of time it

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emerged from the hands of artists and workmen, like a palace erected by the Genii of the Arabian Nights, a palace encrusted throughout on walls, roof, and furni- ture with the most exquisite carvings and sculptures of the most skilled masters of the age, and radiant with the most glowing tints of the pencil of Peter Paul.

"Of the three sisters, Anne took the most lively in- terest in the new house. She witnessed the uprising walls, the development of the architectural features of the grand facade, and the outgrowth of the chiselled design of the interior under the cunning handicraft of the carvers and sculptors, with the most rapturous "de- light ; and, when it was completed, could never suffi- ciently admire its symmetrical proportions, noble hall, stately gallery, and manifold artistic enrichments.

" Some little time after its completion and occupation by its lady owners, Anne, the enthusiast, paid an after- noon visit to the St. Quentins, at Harpham, about nightfall proposing to return home. She was wholly unattended, excepting by a dog, as the houses were only about a mile apart, singing merrily as she went along. As she approached St. John's Well, she perceived two ruffianly-looking mendicants stretched on the grass by its side. This was a very numerous and dangerous class, since the dissolution of the monasteries, at whose gates they had been supplied with food, and lived by traversing the country, and going from abbey to priory and priory to abbey, being generally too lazy to apply themselves to work ; and although parochial Poor Laws had been passed in the two or three preceding reigns, it

BUKTON AGNES HALL. 385

had been left in a great measure to the people to contri- bute to the poor funds, more by way of a benevolence than as a compulsory rate, so that many parishes shirked the collection altogether, and thus the roads of the country and the streets of the towns swarmed with sturdy beggars, who would take no denial when they were able to demand alms bv threats and violence. The lady approached them with some tremor, but did not feel much fear, as she was still within the precincts of Hnrpham, and not far from those who would afford her protection. The men rose as she came up to them, and asked alms, and she drew out her purse and gave them a few coins ; but in doing so the glitter of her finger-ring attracted their notice, and, in a threatening tone, they demanded that it should be given up to them. As it was a heirloom that she had inherited from her mother, she valued it above all price, and declared she could not, on any account, give up her mother's ring. ' Mother or no mother,' replied one of the men in a gruff tone, * we mean to have it, and if you do not bestow it freely, we must take it.' So saying, he seized her hand and attempted to draw off the ring. At this manifes- tation of violence she screamed aloud for help, when the other ruffian, exclaiming, ' Stop that noise ! ' struck her a blow on the head with his stick, and she fell senseless to the earth. Her screams had reached the village, and some rustics came hurrying up, upon which the villains made a hastv retreat, without beinsf able to get the ring from her finger. She was found, as it was supposed, dead or dying, and was carried carefully to

386 HAUNTED HOMES.

Harpham Hall, where, under the care of Lady St. Quentin and the application of restoratives, she re- covered sufficiently to be removed the following day to her home. Although she was restored to sensibility she was suffering acutely from the blow, and was placed in bed in a state of utter prostration ; she remained so for a few days, becoming weaker gradually, until, despite the tender nursing of her sisters, and the best medical advice that York could afford, she fell a victim to the brutal attack of the robbers, and was buried in the church of Burton Agnes.

" During these few intervening days she was alter- nately sensible and delirious ; but in whichever state she was, her thoughts seemed to turn on what had latterly been the passion of her life — her affection for her fondly loved home. ' Sisters,' said she, ' never shall I sleep peacefully in my grave in the churchyard unless I, or a part of me at least, remain here in our beautiful home as long as it lasts. Promise me this, dear sisters, that when I am dead my head shall be taken from my body and preserved within these walls. Here let it for ever remain, and on no account be removed. And under- stand and make it known to those who in future shall become possessors of the house, that if they disobey this my last injunction, my spirit shall, if so able and so permitted, make such a disturbance within its walls as to render it uninhabitable for others so long as my head is divorced from its homo' Her sisters, to pacify her, promised to obey her instructions, but without any in- tention of keeping the promise, and the bodv was laid

BUETON AGNES HALL. 387

entire and unmutilated under the pavement of the church.

" About a week after the interment, as the inhabitants of the Hall were preparing one evening to retire to rest, they were alarmed by a sudden and loud crash in one of the up-stairs rooms ; the two sisters and the domestics rushed up together in great consternation, but after much trembling came to the conclusion that some heavy piece of furniture had fallen, and the men-servants, of whom there were two in the house, went up-stairs to ascertain the cause of the noise, but were not able to find anything to account for it. The household became still more alarmed at this report, and for a long time were afraid to go to bed; but hearing nothing further, at length retired, and the night passed away without further disturbance. Nothing more occurred until the same night in the following week, when the inmates were aroused from sleep in the dead of the night by a loud clapping to, seemingly, of half a dozen of the doors. With fear-stricken countenances and hair standing on end, they struck lights and mustered up sufficient courage to go over the house. They found all the doors closed, but for a while the clapping continued, but always in a different part of the house, remote from where they were. At length the disturbance ceased, and as nothing untoward followed the noise of the preceding A-eek, they again ventured to return to their beds, where they lay sleepless and quaking with fear until daylight.

"Another week of quietness passed away, but on the corresponding night they were again disturbed by what

25

388 HAUNTED HOMES.

appeared to be a crowd of persons hurrying along the galleries and up and down the stairs, which was followed by a sound of groaning as from a dying person. On this occasion they were all too terrified to leave their beds, but lay crouching under the bed-clothes perspiring with fear. The following day the female servants fled from the house, refusing to remain any longer in com- panionship with the ghost which, they all concluded, was the author of the unearthly noises.

M The two ladies took counsel with their neighbour, Mr., afterwards Sir, William St. Quintin and the Vicar of the parish. In the course of conversation it occurred to them that the noises took place on the same night of the week that Anne had died, and the sisters remembered her dying words, and their promise that some part of her body should be preserved in the house ; also her threat that if her wish were not complied with, she would, if she were so permitted, render the house un- inhabitable for others, and it appeared evident that she was carrying out her threat. The question then was : What was to be done in order to carry out her wish, and the clergyman suggested that the coffin should be opened to see if that could throw any light on the matter. This was done the following day, when a ghastly spectacle presented itself. The body lay with- out any marks of corruption or decay, but the head was disengaged from the trunk, and appeared to be rapidly assuming the semblance of a fleshless skull. This was reported to the ladies, who, although terrified at the idea, agreed to the suggestion of the Vicar that the skull

BURTON AGNES HALL. 389

should be brought to the house, which was done, and so long as it was allowed to remain undisturbed on the table where it was placed, the house was not troubled with visitations of a ghostly nature.

" Many attempts have since been made to rid the Hall of the skull, but without success ; as whenever it has been removed the ghostly knockings have been resumed, and no rest or peace enjoyed until it has been restored. On one occasion a maid-servant threw it from the win- dow upon a passing load of manure, but from that moment the horses were not able to move the waggon an inch, and despite the vigorous whipping of the wag- goner, all their efforts were in vain, until the servant confessed what she had done, when the skull was brought back into the house, and the horses drew the waggon along without the least difficulty. On another, one of the Boyntons caused it to be buried in the garden, when the most dismal wailings and cries kept the house in a state of disquietude and alarm until it was dug up and restored to its place in the Hall, when they ceased."

A correspondent of Mr. Ross, to whom, indeed, that gentleman was indebted for some of the particulars already given, furnished him with the following account of his own personal experience of the Burton Agnes hauntings, gained during a night spent at the Hall. He writes : —

" Some forty years ago, John Bilton, a cousin of mine, came from London on a visit to the neighbour- hood, and having a relative, Matthew Potter, who was a gamekeeper on the estate, and resided in the Hall, he

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390 HAUNTED HOMES.

paid him a visit, and was invited to pass the night there. Potter, however, told him that, according to popular report, the house was haunted, and that if he were afraid of ghosts he had better sleep elsewhere ; but John, who was a dare-devil sort of a fellow, altogether untinctured by superstitious fancies, replied, ' Afraid ! not I, indeed ; I care not how many ghosts there may be in the house so long as they do not molest me.' Potter then told him of the skull and the portrait of ' Awd Nance,' and asked him if he would like to see the latter ; the skull, it would appear, from what followed, was not then in the house. He replied that he should like to see the picture, and they passed into the room where it was hanging, and Potter held up the candle before the portrait, when, in a moment, and without any apparent cause, the candle became extinguished, and defied all attempts at * blowing in again/ and they were obliged to grope their way to the bed-room in the dark. They occupied the same bed, and Potter was soon asleep and snoring ; but Bilton, ruminating over the tale of the skull and the curious circumstance of the sudden extinguishment of the light in front of the portrait of the ghost, lay awake. When he had lain musing for half an hour, he heard a shuffling of feet outside the chamber door, which at first he ascribed to the servants going to bed, but as the sounds did not cease, but kept increasing, he nudged his bed-fellow, and said, f Matty, what the deuce is all that row about? ' ' Jinny Yew- lats ' (owls), replied his companion, in a half-waking tone, and turning over, again began to snore. The

BUKTON AGNES HALL. 391

noises became more uproarious, and it seemed as if ten or a dozen persons were scuffling about in the passage just outside, and rushing in and out of the rooms, slam- ming the doors with great violence, upon which he gave his friend another vigorous nudge in the ribs, exclaim- ing, ' Wake up, Matty ; don't you hear that confounded row ? What does it all mean ? ' ' Jinnv Yewlats,' again muttered his bed-fellow. ' Jinny Yewlats,' replied Bilton, 'Jinnv Yewlats can't make such an infernal uproar as that.' Matty, who was now more awakened, listened a moment, and then said, ' It's Awd Nance, but ah nivver take any notice of her,' and he rolled over and again began to snore. After this ' the fun grew fast and furious,' a struggling fight seemed to be going on outside, and the clapping of the doors reverberated in the passage like thunder-claps. He expected every moment to see the chamber door fly open, and Awd Nance with a troop of ghosts come rushing in, but no such catastrophe occurred, and after a while the noises ceased, and about daylight he fell asleep. " The writer adds that his cousin, though a fear-nought and a tho- rough disbeliever in the supernatural, told him that he never passed so fearful a night before in his life, and would not sleep another night in the place if he were offered the Hall itself for doing so. He further adds that his cousin was a thoroughly truthful man, who might be implicitly believed, and that he had the narrative from his own lips on the following day."

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CALGAETH.

In a series of articles on the English Lakes, contributed by Mr. Moncure D. Conway to Harper s Magazine, are many little quaint bits of legendary lore, collected here and there in happily styled " Wordsworthshire." One curious story told by our American cousin respect- ing the manner in which an ancient building near Ambleside is haunted, and the cause of this visitation, must be told in his own words, as there does not appear to be any other available source of information.

" As we gained the height beyond Bowness, on the road to Ambleside," relates Mr. Conway, " we paused for some time ; and while my comrade the artist . . . passes an hour of ecstasy over the southward view of Winder- mere, my eyes were dwelling on an ancient farm and homestead over against the northward water, with which is associated one of the weird legends of this region. Calgarth is the name of it, and it is not picturesque enough for the guide-books to do more than mention it. Miss Martineau praises the owner for leaving depres- sions in his walls in order that travellers may look across his estate to the scenery beyond, and mentions that the arms of the Phillipsons are still there in the kitchen, carved amid a profusion of arabesque devices over the ample fire-place. But none of our professional guides appear to have got hold of the story of the place as it is known to the more aged peasants.

" It runs that Calgarth (which seems to be from Old

CAL GARTH. 393

Norse Kalgarde, a vegetable garden) was a bit of ground owned by a bumble farmer named Kraster Cook and his good wife Dorothy. But their little inheritance was coveted by the chief aristocrat and magistrate of the neighbourhood, Myles Phillipson. The Phillip- sons were a great and wealthy family, but they could not induce Kraster and Dorothy to sell them this piece of ground to complete their estate. Myles Phillipson swore he M have that ground, be they * live or deead ' ; but as time went on, he appeared to be more gracious, and once he gave a great Christmas banquet to the neighbours, to which Kraster and Dorothy were invited. It was a dear feast for them. Phillipson pretended they had stolen a silver cup, and sure enough it was found in Kraster's house — a ' plant ' of course. The offence was then capital ; and as Phillipson was the magistrate, Kraster and Dorothy were sentenced to death. In the court-room, Dorothy arose, glowered at the magistrate, and said, with words that rang through the building : —

" ' Guard thyself, Myles Phillipson ! Thou thinkest thou hast managed grandly ; but that tiny lump of land is the dearest a Phillipson has ever bought or stolen; for you will never prosper, neither your breed ; whatever scheme you undertake will wither in your hand ; the side you take will always lose ; the time shall come no Phillipson will own an inch of land ; and while Calgarth walls shall stand, we '11 haunt it night and day — never will ye be rid of us !

" Thenceforth the Phillipsons had for their guests two skulls, They were found at Christmas at the head

394 HAUNTED HOMES.

of a stairway ; they were buried in a distant region, but they turned up in the old house again. The two skulls were burned again and again ; they were brayed to dust and cast to the wind; they were several years sunk in the lake ; but the Phillipsons never could get rid of them. Meanwhile old Dorothy's weird went on to its fulfilment, until the family sank into poverty, and at length disappeared."

The well-known Dr. Watson, Bishop of Llandaff, was at one time an occupant of Calgarth, and, whilst residing there, in order to satisfy local fears, went through a solemn form of " laying " the two ghostly skulls. For a time, at least, this had the desired effect, and Dorothy and Kraster have remained quiet of late years.

CALVERLEY HALL.

Calverley is an old-fashioned village in Yorkshire, chiefly known to historians and strangers as the scene of a terrible tragedy which took place early in the 17th century. The Hall, although now modernised and otherwise mutilated, and subdivided into seven dwell- ings, still retains many remains of its ancient pictur- esqueness. Once the residence of the ancient Calverley family, whose pedigree is traced back to the time of the Empress Maud, and of whom Mr. John Batty has preserved records, in his History of Rothwell, as far

CALVERLEY HALL. 395

back as 1457, and amongst whose most distinguished scions may be mentioned the late 0. S. Calverley, the poet, old Calverley Hall was formerly a place of great importance as well as mediaeval comfort. Mr. William Scruton, in The Yorkshireman of January 5th, 1884, describes fully the present condition of the fine old place, telling of traces of ancient carving ; of oak ceilings and battlemented corbels; of decorated Gothic windows, and of many vestiges of the former grandeur of the place.

One chamber in particular is not only noteworthy on account of its fine oaken panelling and archaic specimens of fresco work, but because it was therein that the " bloodie deed" which has rendered the place for ever dreadful and dreaded was committed. The doorway, says Mr. Scruton, which led to the flight of steps down which Walter Calverley threw the servant, is now blocked up.

The story of the tragedy connected with Calverley Hall has been a favourite theme for authors and anti- quarians from the days of John Whitaker, to those of John Timbs, but all that is necessary to repeat of it here may be given from a very condensed account by Mr. Samuel Margerison, of Calverley, cited in the above number of The Yorkslrireman. He says: —

"Walter Calverley, whose father was a rich Roman Catholic, was a wild, reckless man, though his wife was a most estimable and virtuous ladv. It is said that he inherited insanity from his mother's family. Be that as it may, on the 23rd of April, 1604, he went into a

396 HAUNTED HOMES.

fit of insane frenzy of jealousy, or pretended so to do. The fact was he had- completely beggared himself, and got ' over head and ears * into debt. Money-lenders were pressing him hard, and he had become desperate. Rushing madly into the house he snatched up one and then another of his children ; plunged his dagger into them, threw them down, and then attempted to take the life of their mother. A steel corset which she wore was luckily in the way, and saved her life. The assassin, however, thought he had killed her, and left hurriedly. He then mounted his horse, intending to kill the only other child he had, Henry, a ' brat at nurse,' who was then at Norton. He was pursued by some villagers : his horse fell and threw him off, and so he was caught. When brought to trial at York he refused to plead, knowing that thereby his estates would not be forfeited to the Crown, but would descend to his surviving son. [And this according to the well-known law of peine forte et dure.]

" Walter Calverley was punished for his crime by being pressed to death at York Castle. Tradition saith that an old servant was with him when they were put- ting the stones on his chest that were to crush out his life, and that the wretched criminal begged him to put him out of his misery by sitting on the stones, saying, * A pund o' more weight lig on, lig on.' The old servant complied with his request, but was straightway hanged for his pains. Walter was buried at St. Mary's, Castle- gate, York ; but there is a tradition that, after several pretended interments, his body was secretly buried at

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Calverley, among the remains of the sixteen previous generations of the Calverleys."

Little wonder that after so dire a tragedy, Calverley and its precincts were regarded as haunted ground. Walter's spirit, says Mr. Scruton, could not rest. He was often seen galloping about the district at night on a headless horse, and was generally accompanied by a number of followers similarly mounted, who delighted to run down any poor benighted folks who happened to be thereabouts. These spectral horsemen generally dis- appeared into a cave in the wood, but this cave has now been quarried away. At last the ghostly horseman became so troublesome that the Vicar of Calverley Church undertook the task of laying it, and, for a time at least, succeeded in getting rid of the " Bogie." Walter was not to appear again, " as long as hollies grew green in Calverley Wood." The hollies still grow green in that wood, but, apparently, something has occurred to pre- vent the spell from being quite successful, as the follow- ing incidents would seem to show.

The Kev. Richard Burdsall, a devoted Wesleyan preacher, having to preach at Calverley, about a century ago, was entertained as a guest at the Hall, on a cer- tain Saturday evening in the month of January. "About twelve o'clock," records the rev. gentleman, " I was conducted up one pair of stairs into a large room which was surrounded by an oaken wainscot after the ancient plan. . . . After my usual devotions I laid down to rest. I had not been asleep long before I thought something crept up to my breast, pressing me much. I

398 HAUNTED HOMES.

was greatly agitated, and struggled hard to awake. In this situation, according to the best judgment I could form, the bed seemed to swing as if it had been slung in slings, and I was thrown out on the floor. When I came to myself I soon got on my knees, and returned thanks to God that I was not hurt. Committing my- self to His care, I got into bed the second time. After lying for about fifteen minutes, reasoning with myself whether I had been thrown out of bed, or whether I had got out in my sleep, to satisfy me fully on this point, I was clearly thrown out a second time from between the bed-clothes to the floor, by just such a motion as before described. I quickly got on my knees to pray to the Almighty for my safety, and to thank Him that I was not hurt. After this I crept under the bed, to feel if there was anything there; but I found nothing. I got into bed for the third time. Just as I laid myself down I was led to ask, 'Am I in my right senses ? ' I answered, ' Yes, Lord, if ever I had any.' I had not lain a minute before I was thrown out of bed a third time. After this I once more crept under the bed to ascertain whether all the cords were fast, and examined until I touched all the bed-posts ; but I found all right. This was about one o'clock. I now put on my clothes, not attempting to lie down any more. ... I was after- wards told that this very house had formerly been the residence of Calverley, who, in the reign of King James, was tried at York for the murder of his wife and two children, and, standing neuter, was pressed to death in the castle."

OALVERLEY HALL. 399

Such is the worthy preacher's record of the way in which he was tormented in the haunted Hall ; but other, and more recent manifestations of spectral agency, are believed to have taken place. " The last mad freak of the ghost of poor Walter Calverley," according to Mr. Scruton, took place about twelve years ago, when, towards the close of the vear, " the bell in the church tower began to toll at one o'clock in the morning, and went on tolling for a long, long time. Men came rush- ing to the scene, some of whom bad come out of warm, comfortable beds, and some who had not been in bed at all. All were struck dumb with terror and cold. The keys could not be found. Toll, toll, toll ! still went out the mysterious sounds in the night winds. At last came the keys ; but just as they rattled at the key- hole the noise stopped, and all was silent as death."

Although such supposed direct manifestations of Walter Calverley's ghostly powers have not been repeated of late, certain weird signs of the tragedy are, it is said, still visible. Stains of blood — irremovable stains — are yet to be seen on the floor ; and there is a flag, one particular flag, in the cellar, which always has a mysterious damp place on it; all the other flags are dry save this. " Wise men have tried," says Mr. Scruton, "to account for this; but, as yet, have signally failed. Here it is, plain to be seen, and what one sees, one can believe."

A correspondent writes that a Bradford paper, published in March 1874, in an article entitled Cal- verley, Forty Years Ago, gives the following anecdote in

400 HAUNTED HOMES.

proof of how strong an impression had been made upon the public mind by the old legend connected with this place. The writer of the article describes how, in his youthful days, he assisted at an attempt to raise the ghost of the old murderous squire ; the modus operandi, he says, was as follows : —

About a dozen of the scholars having leisure, and fired with the imaginative spirit, used to assemble after school-hours close to the venerable church of Calverley and then put their hats and caps down on the ground, in a pyramidal form. Then, taking hold of each other's hands, they formed a " magic circle,'' holding firmly together, and making use of an old refrain : —

" Old Calverley, old Calverley, I have thee by the ears, I '11 cut thee into collops, unless thee appears."

Whilst this incantation was going on, crumbs of bread (saved from their dinner), and mixed with pins, were strewn on the ground, the meanwhile the lads tramped round in the circle with a heavy tread. Some of the more venturesome boys had to go round to each of the church doors, and whistle aloud through the key-holes, repeating the magical couplet which their comrades in the circle were chanting. At this culminating point a pale and ghostly figure was expected to appear, and, on one occasion, some such apparition does seem to have issued forth, apparently from the church. The lads, in their terrified haste to avoid the ghost's fearful grasp, scampered off as fast as their legs would carry them, leaving their hats and caps scattered about the ground as legitimate spoil for old Calverley.

401

CHAETLEY PARK.

One of the most bizarre superstitions of any time or clime is connected with Chartley, near Lichfield, a seat of the Ferrers family. When the immense possessions of the Ferrers were forfeited by the attainder of the Earl after his defeat at Burton Bridge, where he led the rebellious barons against Henry the Third, the Chartley estate, being settled in dower, was alone reserved to the family.

In the Park of Chartley, still described as a wild and romantic spot, untouched by the hand of the agricul- turist, and left in its primitive state, is preserved a singular species of wild cattle, declared to be indigenous, and of a race nearly extinct. In Bewick's Quadrupeds, the principal external appearances which distinguish this breed of cattle from all others are thus described : " their colour is invariably white, muzzles black; the whole of the inside of the ear, and about one third of the outside, from the tip downwards, red ; horns white with black tips, very fine, and bent upwards."

In the year the battle of Burton Bridge was fought and lost, a black calf was born in this unique race; and the downfall of the grand house of Ferrers happening about the same time, gave rise to the tradition, stiU current, that the birth of a dark-hued, or parti-coloured calf from the wild breed in Chartley Park, is a sure ome?i of death within the same year to a member of the Ferrers family. It is a noticeable coincidence, says

402 HAUNTED HOMES.

the Staffordshire Chronicle of July 1835, that a calf of this description has been born whenever a death has happened in the family of late years. The decease of the seventh Earl Ferrers, and of his countess, and of his son, Viscount Tamworth, and of his daughter, Mrs. William JollifFe, as well as the deaths of the son and heir of the eighth Earl, and of his daughter, Lady Francis Shirley, were each preceded by the ominous birth of the fatal-hued calf. In the spring of 1835 an animal perfectly black was calved by one of this mysterious tribe, in the Park of Chartley, and the por- tentous event was speedily followed by the death of the Countess, the second wife of the eighth Earl Ferrers. This outre family tradition has served for the ground- work of a romantic, once popular novel, entitled Charlie//, or the Fatalist.

CLEGG HALL.

In Roby and Wilkinson's suggestive work on Lan- cashire Let/ends, to which we are indebted for some of the traditions in this volume, is an account of the Clegg Hall tragedy. The story, as given in the work just referred to, is as follows : —

" Clegg Hall, about two miles N.E. from Rochdale* stands on the only estate within the parish of Whalley which still continues in the local family name. On this

OLEGG HALL. 403

site was the old house built by Bernulf de Clegg and Quenilda his wife, as early as the reign of Stephen. Not a vestige of it remains. The present comparatively modern erection was built by Theophilus Ashton, of Koch dale, a lawyer, and one of the Ashtons of Little Clegg, about the year 1620. After many changes of occupants, it is now in part used as a country ale-house; other portions are inhabited by the labouring classes, who find employment in that populous manufacturing district. It is the property of the Fentons, by purchase from the late John Entwisle, Esq., of Foxholes.

" To Clegg Hall, or rather what was once the site of that ancient house, tradition points through the dim vista of past ages as the scene of an unnatural and cruel tragedy. It was in the square, low, dark man- sion, built in the reign of Stephen, that this crime is said to have been perpetrated, — one of those half- timbered houses, called 'post-and-petrel/ having huge main timbers, crooks, &c, the interstices being wattled and filled with a compost of clay and chopped straw. Of this rude and primitive architecture were the houses •of the English gentry in former ages. Here, then, was that horrible deed perpetrated which gave rise to the stories yet extant relating to the ' Clegg Hall boggarts.' The prevailing tradition is not exact as to the date of its occurrence ; but it is said that some time about the thirteenth or fourteenth century, a tragedy re- sembling that of the ' Babes in the Wood ' was perpe- trated here. A wicked uncle destroyed the lawful heirs of Clegg Hall and estates — two orphan children that

•20

404 HAUNTED HOMES.

were left to his care — by throwing them over a balcony into the moat, in order that he might seize on their inheritance. Ever afterwards — so the story goes — the house was the reputed haunt of a troubled and angry spirit, until means were taken for its removal, or rather expulsion.

" Of course, this ' boggart,' " says Mr. Wilkinson, " could not be the manes of the murdered children, or it would have been seen as a plurality of spirits ; but was, in all likelihood, the wretched ghost of the ruffianly relative, whose double crime would not let him rest in the peace of the grave. Even after the original house was almost wholly pulled clown, and that of a.d. 1620 erected on its site, the ' boggart' still haunted the ancient spot, and its occasional visitations were the source of the great alarm and annoyance to which the inmates were subjected. From these slight mate- rials, Mr. Roby has woven one of those fictions, full of romantic incident, which have rendered his Traditions of Lancashire* so famous. We have taken such facts only," concludes Mr. Wilkinson, " as seem really tra-

* " It is only just to state," remarks Mr. Wilkinson, " that the story of ' Clcgg Hall Boggart ' was communicated to Mr. Roby b}*- Mr William Nuttall, of Rochdale, author of Le Voi/ageur, and the com- poser of a ballad on the tradition. In this ballad, entitled ' Sir Roland and the Clegg Hall Boggart,' Mr. Nuttall makes Sir Roland murder the children in bed with a daggei\ Remorse eventually drove him mad, and he died raving during a violent storm. The Hall was ever after haunted by the children's ghosts, and also by demons, till St. Antonea (St Anthony) with a relic from the Virgin's shrine, exorcised and laid the evil spirits."

CLEGG HALL. 405

ditionary, recommending the lovers of the marvellous to the work just cited for a very entertaining tale on this subject."

To this meagre if suggestive account of a popular story, may be added, that in a curious manuscript volume, now, or recently, the property of Dr. Charles Clay, of Manchester, Mr. Nuttall notes that " many ridiculous tales were told of the two boggarts of Clegg Hall, by the country people." That there were two, all local accounts would seem to testify. " At one time,0 proceeds Mr. Nuttall, " they (the country people) un- ceasingly importuned a pious monk in the neighbour- hood to exorcise or * lay the ghosts,' to which request he consented. Having provided himself with a variety of charms and spells, he boldly entered on his under- taking, and in a few hours brought the ghosts to a parley. They demanded, as a condition of future quiet (the sacrifice of) a body and a soul. The spectators (who could not see the ghosts), on being informed of their desire, were petrified, none being willing to become the victim. The cunning monk told the tremblers: ' Bring me the body of a cock, and the sole of a shoe.' This being done, the spirits were forbidden to ' revisit the pale glimpses of the moon ' till the whole of the sacrifice was consumed. Thus ended the first laying of the Clegg Hall boggarts."

Unfortunately, the plan of laying the ghosts adopted by the wily priest has not proved; permanently success- ful ; whether the " sacrifice" has been wholly consumed, or the fact that the spirit of the demand not being

26*

406 HAUNTED HOMES.

truly acceded to is the cause, is, of course, unknown, but, for some reason or other, the two ghosts continue to walk, and the belief in their appearance is as complete and as general as ever.

\

COMBERMEBE ABBEY.

The following account of an apparition haunting a room in Combermere Abbey is from Ail the Year Round, in which journal, however, the writer, who derived the story from the persons chiefly concerned, only gives their initials. Combermere Abbey, in Cheshire, it should be stated, stands in a delightful richly-timbered park, many of the trees being of great age and size. The ancient abbey was founded in the twelfth century, by Hugh de Malbanc, and its site was selected with the taste generally shown by the Cistercian order in the selection of sites for their habitations. It is one of the most romantic spots in the whole county, and is situated on the banks of a natural lake. This lake, at present about three-quarters of a mile in length, winds about like a river, and appears, from a general view of the surrounding ground, to have formerly wound round the back of the abbey, and thus to have formed a natural moat, a very needful appendage in those days to all buildings of any pretensions in that neighbourhood of Welsh marauders*

OOMBEBMEBB ABBEY. 407

Upon the dissolution of monasteries, in the 34th year of Henry the Eighth's reign, the abbey was granted to George Cotton, Esq., and has since been held and in- habited by his lineal descendants, without interruption down to the present day — Viscount Combermere, the present possessor, being the representative of the family. A part of the ancient conventual buildings was preserved in the mansion which the Cottons erected on acquiring the property, a portion of which was the monastic re- fectory, now converted into a handsome library, hung round with ancient portraits of different members of the family. The antique appearance of the old walls has, however, been entirely destroyed by modern alterations.

Connected with this fine old mansion is the following story, given in All the Year Round, on the 24th of Decem- ber 1870. The narrator pointedly remarks that " Direct ocular evidence, or the strongest circumstantial evidence, being the rule in courts of law, nothing is hereafter stated on the warrant of the writer that would not be considered good legal evidence. The facts come direct from the witnesses themselves, and were by them repeated to the writer." He then proceeds to state that Com- bermere Abbey, in Cheshire, the ancestral seat of the Cotton family, is the scene to which the writer invites the reader's attention.

" The old part of this fine old mansion has been made into bed-rooms and offices, not being in keeping with the splendour of modern requirements. Thus, what used to be called the e coved saloon ' was first degraded into a nursery, and is now used as a bed-room. When

408 HAUNTED HOMES.

the late Lord Cotton grew old, this room, in which he had played as a child, was occupied by his niece, Miss P., who before her marriage resided in the house. Lady Cotton's dressing-room was only divided from the ' coved saloon ' by a short corridor.

" One evening Miss P. was alone, dressing for a very late dinner, and as she rose from her toilet-glass to get some article of dress, she saw standing near her bed — a little iron one, placed out in the room away from the wall — the figure of a child dressed in a very quaint frock, with an odd little ruff round its neck. For some moments Miss P. stood and stared, wondering how this strange little creature could have entered her room. The full glare of the candle was upon its face and figure. As she stood looking at it, the child began to run round the bed in a wild distressed way, with a look of suffering in its little face.

"Miss P., still more and more surprised, walked up to the bed and stretched out her hand, when the child suddenly vanished, how or where she did not see, but apparently into the floor. She went at once to Lady Cotton's room, and inquired of her to whom the little girl could belong she had just seen in her room, ex- pressing her belief that it was supernatural, and describ- ing her odd dress and troubled face.

" The ladies went down to dinner, for many guests were staying in the house. Lady Cotton thought and thought over this strange appearance. At last she re- membered that Lord Cotton had told her that one of his earliest recollections was the grief he felt at the

CUMNOR HALL. 409

sudden death of a little sister of whom he was very fond^ fourteen years old. The two children had been playing together in the nursery — the same ' coved saloon ' — running round and round the hed overnight. In the morning, when he woke, he was told she had died in the night, and he was taken by one of the nursery-maids to see her laid out on her little hed in the * coved saloon/ The sheet placed over her was removed to show him her face. The horror he had felt at the first sight of death made so vivid an impression on him that in extreme old age he still recalled it. The dress and face of the child, as described by Miss P., agreed precisely with his remem- brance of his sister. Both Lady Cotton and Miss P. related this to the writer."

CUMNOR HALL.

Cumnor Hall was a large, quadrangular building, ecclesiastical in style, having formerly belonged to the dissolved Monastery of Abingdon, near which Berkshire town it was situated. It has acquired a romantic in- terest from the poetic glamour flung over it by Mickle, in his ballad of Cumnor Hall, and by Sir Walter Scott, in his novel of Kenilworth. Both authors allude to it as the scene of Lady Amy Robsart's murder, and, al- though the contemporary coroner's jury pronounced the lady's death to have been accidental, and modern anti-

416 HAUNTED HOMES.

quarians* endeavour to exonerate Lord Robert Dudley (afterwards Earl of Leicester) from having bad any hand in bis wife's tragic end, the matter is still enveloped in mystery.

According to the evidence given before the Coroner, Lady Dudley, on Sunday, the 8th of September, 1560, had ordered all her household to go to a fair then being held at Abingdon. Mrs. Odingsell, her companion, had remonstrated with her for this order, observing that the day was not a proper one for decent folks to go to a fair; whereupon her Ladyship grew very angry, and said, "All her people should go."" And they went, leaving only Lady Dudley and two other women in the house. Upon their return the unfortunate lady was found dead at the bottom of a flight of stairs, but whether fallen by accident, or through suicide, or flung there by assassins, is, seemingly, an unfathomable mystery.

Sir Walter Scott, taking Mickle's ballad for his authority, assumed that a foul murder had been com- mitted, and, in his romance of Kenilworth, gives the following dramatic but purely imaginative account of the affair. Lady Dudley, miscalled the Countess of Leicester,! is described as imprisoned in an isolated tower, approached only by a narrow drawbridge. Half- way across this drawbridge is a trap-door, so arranged that any person stepping upon it would be precipi-

* Vide Canon Jackson's paper in Wiltshire Archaeological Magazine for May 1877, on " Amye Robsart."

t Lord Dudley was not created Earl of Leicester until 29th Sep- tember 1563, three years after his wife's death.

CUMNOB HALL, 41]

tated below into a darksome abyss. Varney, the chief villain of the novel, rides into the courtyard and gives a peculiar kind of whistle, which Amy recognises, and, deeming her husband is coming, rushes out, steps on the trap-door, and falls headlong down. " Look down into the vault," says Varney to Foster ; " what seest thou ? " "I see only a heap of white clothes, like a snow-drift," said Foster. " Oh, God ! she moves her arm!' "Hurl something down upon her: thy gold- chest, Tony, it is a heavy one."

The imputation of this terrible crime, derived by Scott from Mickle, was obtained, by the latter, from Ash- mole's Ajitiqaities of Berkshire, the compiler of which work is said to have found the accusation against Lord Dudley in a book styled Leicester's Commonwealth, a publication published in 1584, four years before Dud- ley's death, and publicly condemned by the Privy Council as an infamous and scandalous libel. It is interesting to know that Amy Eobsart, who is believed to have been born at Stansfield Hall, Norfolk, a house which obtained a fearful notoriety some years ago as the scene of the murder of the Jermyns by Rush, was married publicly at Sheen, in Surrey, on 4th June 1550, instead of clandestinely, as generally stated. King Edward the Sixth, then only eleven years old, kept a little diary (preserved in the British Museum), and, says Canon Jackson, to whom we are indebted for much of the information given here, therein alludes to the marriage in these terms : —

" 1550, June 4. Sir Robert Dudeley, third sonne to

412 HAUNTED HOMES.

th' Erie of Warwick, married S. Jon. Kobsartes daughter, after wich mariage, ther were certain gentle- men that did strive who shuld first take away a goose's head which was hanged alive on two cross posts."

Although the jury and Lady Dudley's relatives agreed to accept the poor woman's death as accidental, the country folk about Cumnor would not forego their idea that foul play had been resorted to. Ever since the fatal event, the villagers have asserted that " Madam Dudley's ghost did use to walk in Cumnor Park, and that it walked so obstinately that it took no less than nine parsons from Oxford 'to lay her/ That they at last laid her in a pond, called 'Madam Dudley's Pond'; and, moreover, wonderful to relate, the water in that pond was never known to freeze afterwards."

Notwithstanding the " laying of Madam Dudley," however, her apparition still contrives at intervals to reappear, and he is a brave, or a foolhardy man, who dares to visit, at nightfall, the haunts of her past life. Mickle's ballad is still applicable :

" And in that Manor now no more

Is cheerful feast and sprightly ball ; For ever, since that dreary hour, Have spirits haunted Cumnor Hall.

" The village maids, with fearful glance, Avoid the ancient mossgrown wall ; Nor ever lead the merry dance,

Among the groves of Oumnor Hall.

*' Full many a traveller oft hath sighed And pensive wept the countess's fall, As, wandering onward, they espied

The haunted towers of Cumnor Hall."

413

DE BUKGH CASTLE.

There is, or perhaps it would be better to say, there ■was, according to the account given in Ottway's work on apparitions, a very ancient castle in Lancashire, near Liverpool, called Castle de Burgh, belonging to a family of that name. Some years since, Mr. de Burgh, the owner, died, and the castle was then let out to some of the tenantry, among whom was a carpenter. One even- ing, about two years after the death of Mr. de Burgh, as this carpenter was employed in his workshop, a quarter of a mile or so from the castle, melting glue, and only four of his men with him, he perceived a gentleman in mourning passing the lathe where the men were at work. He was immediately seized with a violent trem- bling and weakness, his hair stood on end, and a clammy sweat spread over his forehead. The lights were put out, he knew not how, and, at last, in fear and terror, he was obliged to return home. On his arrival at the castle, as he was passing up the stairs, he heard a footstep behind him, and, on turning round, he per- ceived the same apparition. He hastily entered his room, bolted, locked, and barred the door, but, to his horror and surprise, these offered no impediment to his ghostly visitor, for the door sprang open at his touch, and he entered the room ! The apparition was seen by various others, all of whom asserted it bore the strongest resemblance to their deceased master ! One gentleman spoke to it, and the spirit told him " that he was not

414 HAUNTED HOMES.

happy." Here our information rests, and whether the apparition has ceased from troubling or not, we have no recent evidence to show.

DENTON HALL.

A considerable portion of the following account of Denton Hall is derived from notes and information kindly furnished to us by William Aubone Hoyle, Esquire, the present occupant of the famous old man- sion. From Mr. Hoyle's description we learn that the Hall is situated a few miles distant from Newcastle-on- Tyne, on the Carlisle road, and close to the site of the old wall of Severus. It is a venerable building, stand- ing on a gentle eminence, embosomed in trees. Its time-worn aspect amply confirms the antiquity it boasts of; records carrying its history back to the very begin- ning of the sixteenth century being extant; but the original building was far older. It is said to have been built of stones taken from the old Koman wall. The east and west fronts, partially overgrown with ivy, are of a very picturesque aspect ; the exterior of the edifice is a plain but interesting example of a manorial resi- dence of the Tudor period, with that excessive solidity characteristic of ancient dwellings near the Border. It has been stated that many of the windows, especially those near the ground, formerly resembled narrow

DENTON HALL. 415

arrow-slits, rather than apertures for the admission of light and air, but nothing about the Denton Hall of to-day affords the slightest evidence of such having ever been the case.

About a century ago, while the old Hall was in the occupancy of the famous Mrs. Montagu, the interior underwent a destructive process of modernizing, being fitted up in the George the Third style, and many of its antique characteristics hidden or disfigured. The original windows still remain, divided into three, four, or five lights, by stone mullions, whilst some of the old carved fire-places preserve their original appearance, one in the kitchen being seventeen feet wide.

This old Hall, which for several generations was the mansion-house of the lords of the manor in which it stands, is approached by a short avenue of fine old trees. It does not boast a very extensive prospect, but is surrounded by pretty gardens. The traces of a moat are stated to have been once discernible, but no vestige of it now remains. In this antique house and its grounds, says Mr. Hoyle, " we tread on ground which once knew footsteps yet more venerable than those of its builders. History and tradition indicate this spot as once occupied by the ministers of religion, and there is good reason to believe that a chapel was maintained here by the Monks of Tynemouth, when they were lords of this fair estate. Traces of a chapel and cemetery have been found in the gardens, and a carved baptismal font is still preserved." As is usual with nearly all antique buildings once used for ecclesiastical purposes,

416 HAUNTED HOMES.

tradition assigns underground communications to Denton; a passage having existed formerly, so it is asserted, between the Hall and the Priory, by means of which the monks could quit and return to their convent, on business or pleasure, without being exposed to public observation. In the lower garden, supposed to have served as a cemetery for the monks, have been found at intervals stone coffins and other relics of its former occupants ; and in digging for the formation of the pleasure garden to the south of the Hall, steps, supposed to lead to a vaulted chamber, were disclosed.

Records of families connected with the Hall extend back to the time of Edward the Second, in the ninth year of whose reign John de Denton obtained from the King a grant of certain lands. He died before 1325, but his descendants for some generations held posses- sion of the surrounding property. In 1380, the manor of Denton was assigned, by the King's license, to the Prior and Convent of Tynemouth, a small lien only being held by the original family. Shortly after the Eeformation the property is found to be in the hands of the Erringtons, a family connected by marriage with, and descended from the Dentons. The Erringtons took an active part in the affairs of the country; one of them, Lancelot Errington, aided by his nephew Mark, by a ruse capturing Holy Island Castle on behalf of James Stuart, the old Chevalier, in the Rebellion of 1715. Denton next passed into the hands of a family named Rogers, and the last of this race dying without issue, in 1760, it became the property of the well-known

DENTON HALL. 417

Honourable Edward Montagu and the residence of his equally celebrated wife, the famous Mrs. Elizabeth Montagu. This lady resided chiefly at Denton Hall, or Castle as it was then frequently styled, until her death there in 1800, when it became the property of her nephew, Matthew Montagu, afterwards Lord Kokeby, in the possession of whose descendants it still remains.

Mrs. Montagu, whose literary talents and beauty were the frequent themes of her contemporaries, and whose society and conversation were eagerly sought for by them, is recorded by Mr. W. Aubone Hoyle to have "resided long at Denton Hall, and during her lifetime caused it to be the resort of the celebrated men of that period : Dr. Johnson, G-oldsmith, Garrick, Sir Joshua Eeynolds, and other persons of renown were her guests. A gloomy chamber, rendered still more gloomy by tradition pointing to it as the especial haunt of the spirit of Denton Hall, is called ' Dr. Johnson's Chamber/ but from its window is beheld a pleasant landscape of field, pasture, and wood, whilst to the right some gigantic sycamores throw up their broad green foliage. A shady walk beneath lofty and venerable trees is seen from the window and is known as * Johnson's walk/ in consequence of the great lexicographer having been fond of its studious seclusion. An old bookcase and desk used by the learned moraliser during his visits to Denton Hall still remain in the house.

" On the demise of Mrs. Montagu, some large boxes filled with letters were left in the attics, and these

418 HAUNTED HOMES.

letters," Mr. Hoyle records, on his father entering the house, were found to have been burnt by the woman in charge. " On questioning the female Vandal as to her motives for the act, she replied, * Indeed, we found them very useful, very, for the fires and such like ; and they could not be very valuable, there were too many of a sort for that ! A vast there were ; a vast from one, Mr. Reynolds ! ' "

For two or three years after the death of Mrs. Mon- tagu the house remained empty, till Richard Hoyle, Esq., of Swift Place, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, took up his residence there, and there his descendants have continued to reside, notwithstanding the fact that their possession of it is disputed, or rather shared, by a supernatural being. That Denton Hall is the abode of this mysterious guest is firmly believed in, even at the present time, not only by the vulgar folk, but by persons of superior education and social rank, we learn from indisputable evidence.

The spirit of Denton Hall not only makes known its presence by sound, but also, at times, by sight. It is a benevolent spirit, apparently, and the old pitmen of the last century are stated to have averred that more than once they have been warned by it to fly from im- pending danger in the mine. " Examples, supported by credible testimony," remarks our informant, " are not wanting, in which apparitions have fulfilled some office of warning or mercy to beings yet amongst the living; and such seems to be the mission of this spirit. It takes the form of a woman dressed in a white silk

DENTON HALL. 419

dress of antique fashion, and is commonly called ' Silky/ although also known as * Old Barbery ' ; but what being of other days, returned from the regions of silence, or what its object, are questions of mystery, perhaps never to be solved. A dim tradition only remains of a lovely girl falling a victim, by strangling, to the fury of a jealous sister.

" Silky's haunts are not confined to any particular room, although two rooms especially have a ghostly reputation. She has been seen flitting along the pas- sages, up the stone stair-cases, and outside the house in the shady walks. On one occasion, to the terror of an old nurse, she stood silently in the doorway, barring the entrance ; on another, she seized the hand of a sleeping inmate of the house, in the middle of the night, and drew it towards her, leaving a touch that was felt with pain for days. A death in the family, however distant, or a warning of good or ill fortune, is frequently marked by her sudden appearance, apparently indiscri- minately, to anyone in the house ; or the same occasions are marked by unearthly noises. It was but lately (1884) that Silky was heard, apparently dragging some- thing through two unoccupied rooms, down a flight of stairs, to a window which was flung open.

"Instances have occurred," says our correspondent, " of visitors having been so frightened as never to have returned to the house; a notable instance having occurred about fifty years ago, when two sisters of Macready, the famous actor, who were guests, came down one morning to breakfast, and requested to be sent

27

420 HAUNTED HOMES.

from the house at once, declaring they would never revisit it. They could never be persuaded to confess what it was that had terrified them.

" On another occasion the door of a bed-room has been noiselessly thrown open, and Silky has rustled into the middle of the room, with a warning arm extended. Silky has rarely been heard to speak, never by any of the present inmates of the Hall ; but tradi- tion tells of a visitor being addressed and warned about eighty years ago ; and the villagers around Denton have stories of a voice heard at night, of a voice warning them, whenever sickness or death was at any of their doors, and this they attribute to the kindly spirit of Silky."

The tradition of the visitor who was addressed and warned at Denton Hall, may have reference to the account recorded in Moses Kichardson's Table Book of Remarkable Occurrences. From that work we learn that the lady to whom the spirit spoke told her experi- ences to Mr. Thomas Doubleday, by whom it was com- municated to the work mentioned. The account given in the Table Book has evidently undergone some editorial revision, and bears more trace of the roman- cist's art than of the amateur's diction. Somewhat abridged, the story ascribed to the lady is as follows: —

" A day or two after my arrival at Denton Hall, when all around was yet new to me, I had accom- panied my friends to a bal] given by a gentleman in the neighbourhood, and returned heartily fatigued, though much delighted. At this time I need not blush, nor you smile, when I say that on that even-

DENTON HALL. 421

ing I had met, for the second time, one with whose des- tinies mv own were doomed to become connected, and that his attentions to me from that period became too marked and decided to be either evaded or misunder- stood.

" I think I was sitting upon an antique carved chair, near to the fire, in the room where I slept, busied in arranging my hair, and probably thinking over some of the events of a scene doomed to be so important to me. Whether I had dropped into a half slumber, as most persons endeavour to persuade me, I cannot pretend to say ; but on looking up — for I had my face bent towards the fire — there seemed sitting on a similar high-backed chair on the other side of the ancient tiled fire-place, an old lady, whose air and dress were so remarkable that to this hour they seem as fresh in my memory as they were the day after the vision. She appeared to be dressed in a flowered satin gown, of a cut then out of date. It was peaked and long-waisted. The fabric of the satin had that extreme of glossy stiff- ness which old fabrics of this kind exhibit. She wore a stomacher. On her wrinkled fingers appeared some rings of great size and seeming value ; but, what was most remarkable, she wore also a satin hood of a peculiar shape. It was glossy like the gown, but seemed to be stiffened either by whalebone or some other material. Her age seemed considerable, and the face, though not unpleasant, was somewhat hard and severe and indented with minute wrinkles. I confess that so entirely was my attention engrossed by what was passing in my

27*

422 HAUNTED HOMES.

mind, that, though I felt mightily confused, I was not startled (in the emphatic sense) by the apparition. In fact, I deemed it to be some old lady, perhaps a house- keeper, or dependant in the family, and, therefore, though rather astonished, was by no means frightened by my visitant, supposing me to be awake, which I am convinced was the case, though few persons believe me on this point.

" My own impression is that I stared somewhat rudely, in the wonder of the moment, at the hard, but lady-like, features of my aged visitor. But she left me small time to think, addressing me in a familiar half- whisper and with a constant restless motion of the hand which aged persons, when excited, often exhibit in addressing the young. 'Well, young lady,' said my mysterious companion, * and so you 've been at yon hall to-night! and highly ye've been delighted there ! Yet if ye could see as I can see, or could know as I can know, troth ! I guess your pleasure would abate. 'Tis well for you, young lady, peradventure, ye see not with my eyes ' — and at the moment, sure enough, her eyes, which were small, grey, and in no way remarkable, twinkled with a light so severe that the effect was un- pleasant in the extreme : ' 'Tis well for you and them,' she continued, ' that ye cannot count the cost. Time was when hospitality could be kept in England, and the guest not ruin the master of the feast — but that 's all vanished now : pride and poverty — pride and poverty, young lady, are an ill-matched pair, Heaven kens ! ' My tongue, which had at first almost faltered in its office,

DENTON HALL. 423

riow found utterance. Bv a kind of instinct, I addressed my strange visitant in her own manner and humour. 1 And are we, then, so much poorer than in days of yore? ' were the words that I spoke. My visitor seemed half startled at the sound of my voice, as at something unac- customed, and went on, rather answering my question by implication than directly : ' 'Twas not all hollowness then,' she exclaimed, ceasing somewhat her hollow whisper; ' the land was then the lord's, and that which seemed, was. The child, young lady, was not then mortgaged in the cradle, and, mark ye, the bride, when she kneeled at the altar, gave not herself up, body and soul, to be the bondswoman of the Jew, but to be the help-mate of the spouse.'' ' The Jew ! ' I exclaimed in surprise, for then I understood not the allusion. * Ay, young lady ! the Jew,' was the rejoinder. * 'Tis plain ye know not who rules. 'Tis all hollow yonder ! all hollow, all hollow ! to the very glitter of the side-board all false ! all false ! all hollow ! Away with such make- believe finery ! ' And here again the hollow voice rose a little, and the dim grey eye glistened. * Ye mortgage the very oaks of your ancestors — I saw the planting of them ; and now 'tis all painting, gilding, varnishing and veneering. Houses call ye them ? Whited sepul- chres, young lady, whited sepulchres. Trust not all that seems to glisten. Fair though it seems, 'tis but the product of disease — even as is that pearl in your hair, young lady, that glitters in the mirror yonder, — not more specious than is all, — ay, all ye have seen to-night/

424 HAUNTED HOMES*

" As my strange visitor pronounced these words, I instinctively turned my gaze to a large old-fashioned mirror that leaned from the wall of the chamber, 'Twas but for a moment. But when I again turned my head, my visitant was no longer there ! I heard plainly, as I turned, the distinct rustle of the silk, as if she had risen and was leaving the room. I seemed dis- tinctly to hear this, together with the quick, short, easy footstep with which females of rank at that period were taught to glide rather than to walk ; this I seemed to hear, but of what appeared the antique old lady I saw no more. The suddenness and strangeness of thi3 event for a moment sent the blood back to my heart. Could I have found voice I should, I think, have screamed, but that was, for a moment, beyond my power. A few seconds recovered me. By a sort of impulse I rushed to the door, outside which I now heard the footsteps of some of the family, when, to my utter astonishment, I found it was — locked ! I now recollected that I myself locked it before sitting down.

" Though somewhat ashamed to give utterance to what I really believed as to this matter, the strange adventure of the night was made a subject of conversa- tion at the breakfast-table next morning. On the words leaving my lips, I saw my host and hostess exchange looks with each other, and soon found that the tale I had to tell was not received with the air which generally meets such relations. I was not repelled by an angry or ill-bred incredulity, or treated as one of diseased fancy, to whom silence is indirectly recommended as the

DENTON HALL. 425

alternative of being laughed at. In short, it was not attempted to be concealed or denied that I was not the first who had been alarmed in a manner, if not exactly similar, yet just as mysterious ; that visitors, like my- self, had actually given way to these terrors so far as to quit the house in consequence ; and that servants were sometimes not to be prevented from sharing in the same contagion. At the same time they told me this, my host and hostess declared that custom and continued residence had long exempted all regular inmates of the mansion from any alarms or terrors. The visitations, whatever they were, seemed to be confined to new-comers, and to them it was by no means a matter of frequent occurrence.

" In the neighbourhood, I found, this strange story was well known ; that the house was regularly set down as ' haunted,' all the country round, and that the spirit, or goblin, or whatever it was that was embodied in these appearances, was familiarly known by the name of « Silky.'

" At a distance, those to whom I have related my night's adventure have one and all been sceptical, and accounted for the whole by supposing me to have been half asleep, or in a state resembling somnambulism. All I can say is, that my own impressions are directly con- trary to this supposition ; and that I feel as sure that I saw the figure that sat before me with my bodily eyes, as I am sure I now see you with them. Without affect- ing to deny that I was somewhat shocked by the adven- ture, I must repeat that I suffered no unreasonable

426 HAUNTED HOMES.

alarm, nor suffered my fancy to overcome my better spirit of womanhood.

" I certaiDly slept no more in that room, and in that to which I removed I had one of the daughters of my hostess as a companion ; but I have never, from that hour to this, been convinced that I did not actually encounter something more than is natural — if not an actual being in some other state of existence. My ears have not been deceived, if my eyes were — which, I repeat, I cannot believe.

" The warnings so strongly shadowed forth have been too true. The gentleman at whose house I that night was a guest has long since filled an untimely grave ! In that splendid hall, since that time, strangers have lorded it — and I myself have long ceased to think of such scenes as I partook of that evening — the envied object of the attention of one whose virtues have sur- vived the splendid inheritance to which he seemed destined.

" Whether this be a tale of delusion and superstition, or something more than that, it is, at all events, not without a legend for its foundation. There is some obscure and dark rumour of secrets strangely obtained and enviously betrayed by a rival sister, ending in de- privation of reason, and death; and that the betrayer still walks by times in the deserted Hall which she ren- dered tenantless, always prophetic of disaster to those she encounters. So has it been with me, certainly ; and more than me, if those who say it say true. It is many, many years since I saw the scene of this adventure ; but

DOBB PARK LODGE. 427

I have heard that since that time the same mysterious visitings have been more than once renewed ; that mid- night curtains have been drawn by an arm clothed in rustling silks ; and the same form, clad in dark brocade, has been seen gliding along the dark corridors of that ancient, grey, and time-worn mansion, ever prophetic of death or misfortune."

DOBB PARK LODGE.

On the southern slope of a picturesque valley, through which the Washburn pours its waters, stands the ruins of Dobb Park Lodge ; a lofty, four-storied mansion of the Tudor period. About half of the original building is supposed to have been pulled down, not to have been destroyed by the slow processes of time, and the remainder to have been left standiDg> though uninhabitable. In its pristine state the lodge must have been an elegant and spacious pile, and even now, ruined and deserted as it is, it is a picturesque feature in the romantic scenery around. There are some singular traits in the building, as, for instance, the fact that, apparently, the only means of access to its interior was by a winding stair in a projecting turret in the rear. Of the southern front of the residence one half remains, and contains square windows of two lights each, divided by a transom. Over the lower, relates a correspondent, is a cornice

428 HAUNTED HOMES.

embracing both, supported by brackets, ornamented with armorial shields, charged with quoits or circular discs. In the centre are the remains of a projecting semi-circular window. Who lived in this strange and romantically situated abode history tells not. Shaw, the historian of Wharfedale, says : " There was a court held in it long after it was dilapidated, called Dog Court, belonging to the Duchy of Lancaster/' and that appears to be all that is known of it; although this same authority supposes, omitting all account of its Tudor architecture, that it was erected about the same time as Barden Lodge, a building in existence in 1311.

But if history has neglected Dobb Park Lodge, tradition has not overlooked it; and, amongst other remarkable stories of it, records that the place is haunted by a strange being known as " The Talking Dog." The tale of this marvellous spectre bears a likeness to a well-known Manx, and some other equally famous legends ; it has been related to us by Mr. William Grainge, of Harrogate, who obtained it from " a lover of forest lore, a collector and preserver of all that belongs thereto " ; but it was taken down in the dialect of the neighbourhood, and to render it compre- hensible to the general reader it will be necessary to translate it into the ordinary vernacular. The legend is as follows.

At the foot of the winding stair already alluded to is a doorway (now choked with rubbish) leading into a dungeon. The country folks thereabouts believe this doorway to be the entrance to one of those mysterious

DOBB PARK LODGE. 429

passages, so generally ascribed to old ruins, which lead to some strangely terrible cavern, or other abode of horror. Such unearthly noises were heard to issue from this subterranean place that no one ventured to explore its mysteries; until at length a countryman, one of those ne'er-do-wells who are ever ready to risk what respectable people prudently shrink from, determined to examine it thoroughly, and, in order to fortify him- self for the arduous task, he imbibed a no small quantum of potent stimulant.

Thus invigorated, the local Columbus seized his lanthorn, bravely entered the passage, and instantly disappeared in its gloomy recesses. His neighbours and admirers lingered about the place in expectation of his speedy return, but his absence was so prolonged that they became seriously alarmed. At length, when they had all given him up for lost, he reappeared, but in a most wretched, abject, and terrified condition. Some long time afterwards, when he had recovered from his fright, he was induced to give a recital of his adven- tures, and his account was this : —

" Aiter leaving the doorway, I went for a long dis- tance, rambling and scrambling, turning and twisting about the crooked passages, until I thought I should get to no place at all. So I began to feel rather dazed and tired like, and had some thoughts of turning back again, when, suddenly, the sweetest music that ever I had heard, in all my born days, struck up right before me. I couldn't have turned back then if I had wanted to ever so much, for the sound charmed me completely.

480 HAUNTED HOMES.

I had never felt so lightsome before, and feared nothing, and could have gone anywhere. I followed up where the music seemed to come from, thinking I should come to it at last, but I was wrong ; I have never seen the players to this very day. I kept following the sound until at last I came to what seemed to be a great, long, high, wide room, as big as any church, and bigger than some. At one side of it was a great lire blazing away as bright as the sunshine; and either it, or something else, made everything glitter like gold.

"Thinks I to myself, this is a grand place, and no mistake ! But what struck me more than all was a great, black, rough dog, as big as any two or three mastiffs, which stood before the fire, and appeared to be the master of the place, for not another living creature beside it could I see. I was troubled to make him out; I had heard tell of ' barguests,'* but had never seen one, and thought this might be one of them. At last, by all that is true, if the thing did not open its mouth and speak ! Not bark like a dog, as it ought to have done, but talked just like one of ourselves. Didn't I feel queer now ! I think I just did. That did for me more than all the rest. I wished myself safe out again, and over the mile bridge. It said: * Now, my man, as you 've come here, you must do one of three things, or you '11 never see daylight again. You must either drink all the liquor there is in that glass ; open that chest ; or draw that sword.'

• A provincial name for spectres.

DOBB PARK LODGE. 431

'•'I looked, and there I saw a strange, great chest, seemingly bound with iron bands, and with two or three great iron locks on it. At the top of that chest was placed a fine great glass, with a long stem, full of the nicest-looking drinking-stuff that ever I saw. Above that, on a peg, or something of the sort, against the wall was hung what he called the sword — a great, long, broad, heavy, ugly thing, nearly as long as myself.

" I looked them all over and over, and over again, considering which job to do, for I dursn't, for the life of me, think of not doing what that dog bade me. The chest looked much too strong for me to open — besides, T had no tools with me that would be likely to open it with ; and, as for the sword, I knew nought about sword work, I had never held one in mv life, and should be quite as likely to cut myself as anyone else with it, so I thought I would let it alone. Then there was naught but the drink left for me, and I began to feel rather dryish, what with rambling about the place so long, and what with the drop of drink I had before I started ; so, says I to myself, ' Here goes at the drink ! ' I took hold of the glass with my hand, the dog all the time glowering at me with all the eves he had ; and, I assure you, he bad two woppers — saucers are not so big ; thev were more like pewter plates, and gleamed and glittered like fire.

"I lifted the glass up to my mouth and just touched my lips with the stuff, to taste before I gave a big swig ; when, would you believe it? it scalded just like boiling

432 HAUNTED HOMES.

water, or burnt like fire itself. All the skin 's cff my lips and tongue-end with it yet. If I 'd swallowed all the lot it would have burned my inside clean out, and I should have been as hollow as a drum ; but I stopped short of that, or else I should have made a bonnie mess of it. I just tasted the stuff, but what it was I cannot tell ; it was not the colour of aquafortis, but it was quite as hot. As soon as ever I tasted it, up flew the lid of the chest with a bonnie bang ; and I do declare if it didn't seem to be as full of gold as ever it could cram : I 'd be bound to say there were thousands upon thousands of pounds in that very chest. But I 'm no better for that, nor ever shall be, for I '11 never go there any more. The sword, at the same time, was drawn by somebody's hand that I didn't see, and it glittered and flashed like lightning. I banged the glass down, and don't know whether it broke or not, but all the stuff was spilt. In a minute after all was dark as pitch ; the fire went out; my lantern had gone out before; the music gave over playing, and instead of it such a howl- ing and yelling struck up and filled the place as I 'd never heard in my time ; it seemed as if hundreds of dogs were all getting walloped at once ; and something besides screamed and yelled as if it were frightened out of its wits. Oh, it was awful ! I fell down flat on the floor, I think in a swoon, and I could not have done better, How long I lay I cannot tell, but for a goodish bit, I think. At last I came to myself, rubbed my eyes, and glowered about me, and wondered where I was. At last I bethought myself, and scrambled up, and after a

DOSMERY POOL. 4$3

great deal of ups and downs, I got my carcase dragged out ; and now, you may depend upon it, you '11 not eaten me going in there any more of a sudden."

Such, says Mr. Grainge, was the result of the search for hidden treasure in the ruined vaults of Dobb Park Lodge. Since that time no one appears to have ven- tured into those subterranean recesses, so that the chest full of gold still remains, waiting for some explorer to brave the terrors of " The Talking Dog" and his sur- roundings.

DOSMERY POOL.

Who, knowing anything of Cornwall, but is acquainted with Tregeagle, the Demon of Dosmery Pool, on Bodmin Downs ? How long he has haunted " Old Cornwall" is difficult to sav: but his terrible howling, when the wintry blast rushes over the Downs, is pro- verbial, and "to roar like Tregeagle" is a time-honoured saying. Mr. R. Hunt, in his interesting Popular Romances of the West of England, recounts many exploits of this famous spirit, whose voice is still heard, and whose shadowy form is even still seen, when the winds are at their highest and the nights are the most stormy.

"Who has not heard of the wild spirit of Tregeagle ? ' asks Mr. Hunt. " He haunts equally the moor, the

434 HAUNTED HOMES.

rocky coasts, and the blown sand-hills of Cornwall. From north to south, from east to west, this doomed spirit is heard of, and to the Day of Judgment he is doomed to wander, pursued by avenging fiends. For ever endeavouring to perform some task by which he hopes to secure repose, and being for ever defeated. Who has not heard of the howling of Tregeagle ? When the storms come with all their strength from the Atlantic, and urge themselves upon the rocks around Land's End, the howls of the spirit are louder than the roaring of the winds. When calm rests upon the ocean, and the waves can scarcely form upon the resting waters, low wailings creep along the coast. These are the wailings of« this wandering soul.

"When midnight is on the moor, or on the moun- tains, and the night winds whistle amidst the rugged cairns, the shrieks of Tregeagle are distinctly heard. We know that he is pursued by the demon dogs, and that till day-break he must fly with all speed before them."

This Tregeagle, whose attributes are so mysterious and, according to the district where related, so varied, is traditionally reported to be the spirit of a " tyrannical magistrate," a "rapacious and unscrupulous landlord/* who was " one of the Tregeagles who once owned Tre- vorcler, near Bodmin." At the demise of this hardened sinner, who had committed more crimes than the deca- logue contained, the foul fiend wished to at once obtain possession of what he deemed rightly his, to wit, the criminal's soul ; but the wretched man, in the agony of

DOSMEKY POOL. 435

despair, consigned his -wealth to the priesthood, that they might fight with the evil spirits, and save his soui from its just doom.

The power of the priesthood so far prevailed, that as long as Tregeagle's spirit had "some task difficult beyond the power of human nature " to perform, demo- niac agency should be unable to carry him away. His tasks were to extend into eternity, so that repentance might have time to gradually work out his sin. His only chance of ultimate salvation was in perpetual toil: as long as he continued his labour the demons could do him no real harm. Frequent were the tussles he had with the fiends : on one occasion his restless spirit is said to have even given evidence in a court of law, when his relentless pursuers vainly endeavoured to carry him off.

Tregeagle's first and most famous task was the empty- ing of Dosmery Pool, a mountain tarn, some miles in circumference; and local lore would have he is still engaged upon this endless operation. The difficulty of this gigantic labour was increased by the supposed fact that the lonely pool was bottomless ; and yet one learned ecclesiastic was not convinced of the hopeless- ness of the work, and, to decrease the prospect of it ever coming to an end, he proposed that the wretched sinner should only be provided with a limpet shell, with a large hole in it, for the purpose of baling out the water. The Evil One did not lose sight of the doomed Tregeagle, but kept a careful eye on him, and tried ivery possible means to divert his attention from his

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436 HAUNTED HOMES.

task, in order that he might make him his prey. Still the hapless spirit continued to toil, although on one occasion the fiends almost overcame him. Mr. Hunt's graphic account of the terrific struggle is as follows : —

"Lightnings flashed and coiled like fiery snakes around the rocks of Houghton. Fire-balls fell on the desert moors and hissed in the accursed lake. Thun- ders pealed through the heavens, and echoed from hill to hill ; an earthquake shook the solid earth, and terror was on all living. The winds rose and raged with a fury which was irresistible, and hail beat so mercilessly on all things that it spread death around. Long did Tregeagle stand the ' pelting of the pitiless storm,' but at length he yielded to its force and fled. The demons in crowds were at his heels. He doubled, however, on his pursuers and returned to the lake ; but so rapid were they that he could not rest the required moment to clip his shell in the now seething waters. Three times he fled round the lake, and the evil ones pursued him. Then, feeling that there was no safety for him near Dosmery Pool, he sprang swifter than the wind across it, shrieking with agony, and thus — since the devils cannot cross water, and were obliged to go round the lake — he gair ed on them and fled over the moor. Away, away wen( Tregeagle, faster and faster, the dark spirits pursuing, and they had nearly overtaken him, when he saw Roach Rock and its chapel before him. He rushed up the rocks, with giant power clambered to the eastern window, and dashed his head through it, thus securing the shelter of its sanctity. The defeated

DOSMEKY POOL. 437

demons retired, and long and loud were their wild wail- ings in the air. The inhabitants of the moors and of the neighbouring towns slept not a wink that night."

But the baling out Dosmery Pool was by no means the only task assigned to Tregeagle's unresting spirit. One labour, on the shore near Padstow, was to make trusses of sand and ropes of sand with which to bind up the trusses. Each recurring tide swept away the result of his toil, and, according to the tradition, " the ravings of the baffled soul were louder than the roarings of the winter tempest." By priestly influence Tregeagle was emoved to the estuary of the Loo, and ordered to carry sand across to Porthleven, A malicious demon con- trived to trip him up, and the contents of his enormous sack supplied the material of the sand-bank out of which was formed the bar that destroyed the harbour.

Land's End was eventually assigned to Tregeagle as a place of labour, a place where, as Mr. Hunt says, " he would find no harbour to destroy, and few people to terrify. His task was to sweep the sands from Porth- curnow Cove round the headland called Tol-Peden- Penwith, into Nanjisal Cove. Those who know that rugged headland, with its cubical masses of granite piled in Titantic grandeur one upon another, will appre- ciate the task ; and when to all the difficulties are added the strong sweep of the Atlantic current, — that portion of the Gulf stream which washes our southern shores, — it will be evident that the melancholy spirit has. indeed, a task which must endure to the world's end. Even until to-day is Tregeagle labouring at his task. In

28*

438 HAUNTED HOMES.

calms his wailing is heard ; and those sounds which some call the ' soughing of the wind,' are known to be the moanings of Tregeagle ; while the coming storms are predicted by the fearful roarings of this condemned mortal."

But these excerpts from Mr. Hunt's account by no means exhaust the deeds or doings of this supernatural being, a thorough belief in whose continual existence is prevalent throughout the length and breadth of old Cornwall. Alluding to the widely diffused belief of a spectre huntsman, whose wild chase permeates the legends of so many lands, Mr. Hunt remarks, " The tradition of the Midnight Hunter and his headless hounds, always in Cornwall associated with Tregeagle, prevails everywhere. The Abbot's Way, on Dartmoor, an ancient road which extends into Cornwall, is said to be the favourite coursing ground of the ' wish hounds of Dartmoor,' called also the * yell hounds.' "

These "yell" or "yeth hounds" form the theme of the beautiful fragmentary "Legend of Dartmoor," bv the late Oliver Madox Brown, a legend which the highly talented youth left, unfortunately, unfinished.

EDINBURGH: MARY KING'S CLOSE,

Old Edinburgh was full of quaint, narrow, anti- quated passages, some of which still exist, and these ''Closes," as they are locally called, contained numerous

EDINBURGH : MAEY KING'S CLOSE. 439

houses bearing the reputation of being haunted. Mar) King's Close was noted for the many terrible appa- ritions which had found suitable quarters within its mouldering dwellings. Mary King's Close has dis- appeared to make way for modern erections; but just two centuries ago, that is to say, in 1685, it was a well-to-do thoroughfare, the residence of a respectable class of people. George Sinclair, Professor of Moral Philosophy in the University of Glasgow, and after- wards minister of Eastwood, in Renfrewshire, a con- temporary of the events he refers to, gives the following account, in Satan's Invisible World Discovered, of some terrible apparitions in Mary King's Close, in the house of Mr. Thomas Coltheart, a respectable law agent. Mr. Coltheart' s business having improved, he removed into a superior residence in the Close above-named. Having been warned by some kind neighbour that the house was haunted, the maid-servant decamped in haste, and left Mr. Coltheart and his wife to manage as they best could. On Sunday afternoon Mr. Coltheart, being unwell, retired to rest, whilst his wife seated herself at his bedside and read the Scriptures. Happening to raise her eves, she was intensely horrified to behold the head of an old man, with grey floating beard, suspended in the air but a short distance oft', gazing at her intently with weird, fixed glare. She swooned at the sight, and remained in an insensible condition until the neighbours came back from church. Her husband did his best to reason her out of her credulity, and the evening passed without anything further taking place.

440 HAUNTED HOMES.

They had not been in bed long, however, before Mr. Coltheart also beheld the phantom head, floating in mid-air, and surveying him with ghostly eyes. He got up and lit a candle, and then betook himself to prayer. An hour passed, when the spectre head was joined by that of a child, also suspended in the air, followed speedily by an arm naked from the elbow, which, despite the lawyer's pious ejaculations, seemed to wish to shake hands with him and his wife ! In vain did Mr. Colt- heart conjure the phantoms to entrust him with the story of their grievances, so that he might have their wrongs rectified : all was useless. They seemed to regard him and his wife as intruders, and to wish them away. Other phantoms joined them, including that of a dog, which curled itself up on a chair, and seemed to go to sleep ! Others — some of a most horrifying and monstrous form — appeared, until the whole room swarmed with them : and the unfortunate couple were compelled to take refuge on the bed. Suddenly, with a deep and awful groan, all the apparitions vanished, and the pious lawyer and his wife were left in peace.

After such a terrifying house-warming, one would suppose that Mr. and Mrs. Coltheart would have got out of the house as quickly as possible ; but such was not the case. The brave couple, if Professor Sinclair is to be relied on, continued to reside in the place for many years, and till the day of Mr. Coltheart's death, without anv further molestation from the spirits.

EASTBURY HOUSE. 441

About the time of Mr. Coltheart's death, a strange circumstance happened. A client of his who lived at Tranent, ten miles from Edinburgh, was aroused in the night by a nurse, who had been affrighted by " some- thing like a cloud moving about the room." Starting up, the gentleman instinctively seized his sword, when he was confronted by the face and form of his legal adviser and friend, Thomas Coltheart. " Are you dead ? " he demanded ; " what is your errand ? whereupon the apparition shook its head twice, and melted away. The gentleman started at once for Edin- burgh, and proceeded directly to his friend's house in Mary King's close, and on arriving there found Mrs. Coltheart bewailing her husband's recent death.

EASTBURT HOUSE.

Eastbury House, Tarrant Grrenville, near Blandford, owing to the galaxy of famous names surrounding its story, must take a prominent place among the haunted homes of the country. Its career as a residence was short but brilliant. It has been celebrated both in prose and verse by poets and prosateurs, and, for the space of three lustra or so, was the glory of Dorset. Thomp- son introduced it in his Seasons, in "Autumn." After alluding to its " green delightful walks," "where simple

442 HAUNTED HOMES.

nature reigns," he alluded to its more artificial beauties, and apostrophizes them thus,

The grandeur of thy lofty dome, Far-splendid, seizes on the ravished eye, New beauties rise with each revolving day ; New columns swell ; and still the fresh Spring finds New plants to quicken, and new groves to green. Full of thy genius all ! the Muses' seat : Where in the secret bower, and winding walk, For virtuous Young and thee they twine the bay.

George Bubb Dodington (afterwards Lord Melcombe) of Diary fame, whose seat it was, and in whose secret bowers and winding walks he and Night Thoughts Young were to be so pleasantly arrayed by the Muses, made Eastbury a meeting-place for the wit and literati of the day. Young, Thompson, and Fielding were among the crowd of notables, who enjoyed its pleasures. The last resided at Eastbury some time, and thence dated some of his works. In later days it was visited by Beck ford, and its ruins were celebrated in verse by Samuel Marsh Oram, a local writer, of some temporary if transient repute, who died at the early age of twenty-six.

Eastbury was begun by Bubb Dodington in 1718. The future Lord Melcombe had projected the house and grounds on a scale of great magnificence ; but when little beyond some less important out-houses had been completed, the work was discontinued, and for six years everything remained at a standstill. Eventually the building was resumed and carried on at an enor- mous expenditure — the total outlay up to 1738, when

EASTBUKY HOUSE, 443

the house was completed, being stated as one hundred and forty thousand pounds, a far higher sum at that time than now-a-days. The park and grounds were laid out on the same magnificent scale as the house, no expense being spared; trees half a century old, and some tons in weight, were transported bodily from dis- tant woods and replanted at Eastbury.

In 1763, a change came over the scene, and Eastbury House was destroyed even more rapidly than it had been created; all the rooms were dismantled, and the splendid furniture scattered to the winds. Twelve years later the ruin was consummated, the house being pulled down, and the beautiful and costly materials disposed of; one wing only was left in naked grandeur, and that still exists, but let in tenements to the day-labourers of the Farquh arson estate.

It is little to be wondered at, says Miss Billington, to whom we are chiefly indebted for this account of Eastbury, that a place possessing so chequered a his- tory should bear the reputation of being haunted. The ghostly legend attached to the house is said to be firmly believed in by the inhabitants of Grenville and its neighbourhood, and is to the following effect. Lord Melcombe advanced considerable sums of money, vaguely spoken of now, says Miss Billington, as " many thou- sands," to his steward William Doggett. The greater part of this loan Doggett is said to have parted with to a brother, who got into " difficulties/' and was utterly powerless to repay it. In course of time Lord Melcombe required repayments of his money, and Doggett, unable

444 HAUNTED HOMES.

to comply with the demand, was reduced to great ex- tremity.

" I am not aware of the exact date at which this took place," says Miss Billington, ""but it must have been during the destruction of the house, as the only expe- dient Doggett could find to meet his liabilities was to appropriate some of the building materials and sell them on his own account. Shortly before Lord Mel- combe came down to receive his money, Doggett's courage failed ; probably he had a much smaller sum with which to repay his master than he owed ; he could not pay him, and, therefore, shot himself.

" It was in a marble-floored room that Doggett com- mitted suicide, and it is said the stains of his blood are still visible. I was told a propos of this," says our correspondent, "that the blood-stains of murder or suicide are ineffaceable.

" Since this tragedy, Doggett's ghost has lingered about Eastbury, and the tradition is that, headless, he drove about the park in a spectral coach and four driven by a coachman in livery. No doubt," is the lady's reflection, " the troubled spirit derived a bitter satisfaction from contemplation of the decayed grandeur of the once proud house, now reduced to scarcely a shadow of its former grandeur. But it is many years now since the apparition has made itself visible, though the taint of ghostly inhabitation still clings to the remaining wing of the house. On dark nights, when all else is still, mysterious movements are heard, the doors open and shut unaccountably, pointing to the

EASTBURY HOUSE. 445

inference that the troubled spirit has not yet served its term of earthly wanderings.

" It may not be inappropriate to add," remarks Miss Billington, " that about forty years ago, the old church at Grenville was pulled down, and a new one erected on the same spot : the contractors, wishing to fulfil their undertaking as cheaply as possible, caused the old vaults to be destroyed and their brickwork utilized. The old man who told me much of this story, said it ell to his share to pull Doggett's vault to pieces. They found the self-murdered man's body in fair preservation, and the course of the bullet from the jaw through the head was distinctly visible. The old man described him as ' a short ginger-haired man.' His legs had been tied together with a broad yellow ribbon, which was as fresh and brightly coloured as when it was buried. My informant added that he had abstracted a piece of the ribbon, and a lock of the hair, which he had kept as curiosities for many years, and much regretted that he had not got them still to show to me."

And thus Eastbury, with all its much-vaunted magni- ficence, the palatial home of the vivacious Bubb Dod- ington, and the erstwhile staying-place of Fielding and Thompson, of Young and his famous contemporaries, is known only now as having been the house where a fraudulent servant committed suicide !

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EWSHOTT HOUSE.

Major Edward Moor, the author, among other works, of the Hindu Pantheon, in its day a valued authority upon Indian antiquities, in 1841 published a brochure on the " Bealing Bells." This little hook not only furnished a full account of the disturbances ascribed to supernatural agency at Bealing, but also gave par- ticulars, derived from various correspondents, of similar manifestations that had occurred in different parts of the country. There is no need of referring to the acrimonious controversy between the believers and sceptics which the publication of Major Moor's little book aroused, our present purpose being merely to cite from the Appendix to it the following account of the hauntinffs at Ewshott House.

o

In "Bealing Bells," it may be mentioned, the names of the persons and places hereafter referred to, are left blank ; but by means of a copy annotated, probably, by Major Moor, and assisted by private inquiry, they are now, for the first time, filled in. The local topo- graphical and historical data, it should be mentioned, are the result of independent research, and are not derived from Major Moor's suggestive little work.

Ewshott House, or Itchell, as it was formerly called, is in the parish of Crondall, in Hampshire. It is a respectable old manor-house, and in very early times was the principal residence of the GifTords, one of the most ancient and eminent families in Hampshire ; some

EWSHOTT HOUSE. 447

of them filled the office of sheriff of the coimtv in a period ranging from the reign of Henry VI. to that of Elizabeth. It was afterwards a seat of the Bathursts, and was in their possession for several generations. About the year 1680 the chief part of the ancient mansion seems to have been pulled down, and the pre- sent house erected in its place. The remaining portion of the old house was allowed to stand, separated only by a party wall, and was let as a farm-house to the tenant of the adjoining property.

The estate came into the possession of Mr. Lefroy in the year 1818 ; by which time Ewshott had already acquired the reputation of being "haunted." The writer of the account which Major Moor gives, and whom he describes as a gentleman of unimpeachable veracity, and as deservedly held in high estimation, says: "Many tales were told among the neighbouring villagers of uncouth sights and sounds, from which it gained that ill repute. It was not until 1823 that Mr. Lefroy's family resided constantly at Ewshott. During their occasional visits there the peculiar noises of which I am about to speak were often heard ; but from the circumstances above related of the old house, which joined the back part of the new, being occupied by a farm establishment, they were thought nothing of; being attributed by the family in the mansion to their neigh- bours in the farm, and by the inhabitants of the farm to their neighbours in the mansion ; each party wonder- ing exceedingly what the other could be doing at so late au hour as that at which the sounds were heard.

448 HAUNTED HOMES.

" About fifteen years ago," said this correspondent, " the old farm-house was taken down, to be rebuilt at a greater distance from the mansion. During the pro- gress of this work a man was constantly employed in watching round the premises, to guard the timber. This man has often solemnly declared that as he went his rounds he saw . . . . ! But this may have been fancy, and I believe it was ; the poor man's ears having inspired his eyes with an unnatural susceptibility of vision. But what he heard was not to be mistaken. It was the same the family had heard for years ; and have heard, almost nightly, ever since. He described it, 'as a great thumping noise, as if someone was beat- ing heavy blows with a great mallet in the hall/ The hall is exactly in the centre of the house, over against the spot where the old farm-house stood, and there- fore very near to the place where he watched. This is as good a description as can be given of the peculiar sound, which is known familiarly as the ghost. In the dead of night, when every member of the family has gone to bed, and there is no imaginable cause to be assigned for them, a succession of distinct and heavy blows are heard, as of some massive instru- ment upon a hollow wall or floor. These sounds are seldom heard more that once in the night; and gene- rally between the hours of twelve and two. They are sometimes so loud as to awaken one from sleep, and startle even those who are the most familiar with them ; at other times almost inaudible ; sometimes struck with great rapidity, at other times more slowly and leisurely;

EWSHOTT HOUSE, 449

varying in duration also in about the same degree. But whether in his noisier or more gentle movements, the ghost is so peculiar in his sound, as not to be easUy mistaken bv those who have once heard him. No one has been able to determine from what part the sound proceeds; nor, indeed, to say with certainty that it is within the house at all. But in whatever part you may be listening, it seems to come from some remoter corner. Thus, if you hear it, being in the drawing- room, at one extremity of the house, the ghost appears to come from the library at the other end ; if you are in the library, it sounds as if proceeding from the drawing-room. At another time, it seems to come from underneath the stable-yard, or lawn, or in the cellar.

" Considerable pains have been taken, at different times, to ascertain whence the sounds proceed, with a hope of finding some sufficient cause of them ; but entirely without success ; and, after about twenty years, we are as entirely in the dark as ever. The length of time it has been heard, the fact of everv domestic of the family having been often changed during the time, and the pains that have been taken to investigate the matter, while every member of the family, except the watcher, has been in bed, have put the possibility of any trick out of the question ; and have no less convinced the inmates that it cannot be accounted for, on any of the usual suppositions, v of horses in the stable kick- ing,' or ' dogs rapping with their tails,' or * rats jumping in the tanks and drains beneath the house.' Horses stamp, and dogs rap, and rats gallop ; but they do not

450 HAUNTED HOMES.

make such sounds as that one startling and peculiar noise with which our ears are so familiar.

" To convey a notion of the nature of the ghost, and of the force and violence with which it sometimes bursts out, I will describe the way it has repeatedly been heard, by different members of the family. On one occasion it burst forth with so much violence that the writer of this, accustomed as he was to hear and disre- gard it, sprang out of bed and ran to the landing at the head of the stairs, under a conviction that the outer door of the house had been burst in with violence. After a few moments the sounds ceased, and he retired to bed again ; it was the ghost. On another occasion, when he was going up to bed, the ghost began to thump violently, in the direction of the brew-house; and continued so long that he had time to go to the back door of the house and sally forth in quest. On his arrival, nothing was to be heard or seen.

" On another occasion, the sound having for a con- siderable time appeared to come from a direction that suggested it to spring from some loose vessels in the brew-house, or from the cellar, which was close adjoin- ing ; the writer, with two of his brothers, sat up, one in the cellar, and the others in the brew-house. He in the cellar did not hear it. The two who had watched exactly where it had appeared to be for a good while before, heard it, loudly and distinctly as ever ; but it sounded underneath the lawn, fifty yards away from where they were.

" About a month ago," says this correspondent of

EWSHOTT HOUSE. 45 1

Major Moor, " the owner of the house, and a friend who happened to be staying on a visit, occupied adjoin- ing apartments. One morning, at the breakfast table, each demanded of the other an explanation of his movements on the previous night; each having been astonished at hearing, as he thought, his neighbour moving about and making a great noise among his books or the furniture of his apartment. ' I expected/ said one, ' to see you open my door and walk in.' * I thought you must have been ill, and had almost gone in to see,' said the other. Each had been quiet in bed ; and the sound was nothing but the ghost.

" The usual sound is that described as a succession of deep thumps ; but other sounds, almost more curious and unaccountable, are often heard, of which I will relate a few particulars.

"Some time ago a gentleman, a relation of the family, was on a visit to Ewshott House. One morning, at the breakfast table, he related the following curious and unaccountable circumstance : — He had been awakened in the night by hearing, as he thought, a cart drawn along on the gravel road, immediately under his win- dows ; it appeared to be heavy-laden, and rattled as if with a load of iron rods. Wondering what could be about at that hour of the night, he got up and opened his window to investigate ; there was neither sight nor sound of anything to cause the noise. He got into bed again, and thought it possible he had been dreaming ; but half an hour after, as he lay awake, he heard the very same again — the rattling of a loaded cart upon the

29

452 HAUNTED HOMES.

drive beneath his windows. ' Now/ thought our Mend, 'I'll find the cause.' So up he got again, opened his windows, and looked out ; but all was still. He went to bed again, and heard no more. He told the story in the morning, and inquired if anything had taken place to cause the sound he had heard; but nothing could be thought of to account for it, and he tells the story to this day.

" To this it may be well to add two other anecdotes of our nocturnal friend. Four or five years ago, the writer of this ghost story was in the habit of sitting up at night to a very late hour, reading in the library; and though the family are all much too familiar with our ghost to be disturbed by any of his gambols, the sounds that used to strike his ears were often most remarkable and startling. On one occasion, in parti- cular, it seemed as if a flock of sheep from the adjoining paddock had rushed by the windows on the gravel drive. It was not a windy night ; and so convinced was he, after attentive listening, that it was the rapid rushing of a flock he heard, that he considered with himself the propriety of going out to drive them back again. But idleness prevailed : it was cold ; he was busy; so he voted it the ghost, and sat still at his books. But when he came down in the morning, fully expecting to find marks of sheep and damage done, to his surprise there was no sign at all of any such inva- sion. The lawn was smooth, and the gravel was un- trodden ; and it was indeed the ghost.

"At another time it happened, that when the whole

EWSHOTT HOUSE. 458

family were in one room, at prayers — not one member of the family absent but a young child in the nursery — a noise was heard, as of someone walking across the hall, next to the room in which they were assembled© The lady who was reading prayers rose from her knees directly, and went into the hall with the servants at her heels, before it was possible a person could have got away ; but there was no one to be seen, nor anything to lead to the supposal of a visitor of any more substantial kind than our old friend the ghost.

" It should be mentioned here that there is, running underneath the house, a very large old drain, which has been thought to be connected with the sounds above described. A few years ago this drain was thoroughly examined, with a view to ascertaining whether some loose brick or timber might be lying on it, which might create such sounds on being trod upon by rats, etc. A man was sent up through it, from one end to the other; but nothing of the kind appeared. The whole was thoroughly and carefully cleared out, but the noise proceeded as ever. How long the ghost had been observed before the present family resided is not known, but the popular belief attaches all the unblest circum- stances here related to the unquiet spirit of one Squire

, a man of but indifferent repute, as it would seem,

and one whose grave might not be found an easy resting-place. The old Squire has been dead three hundred years. He appears to have been the person who pulled down the old house and built up the present one in its stead."

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454 HAUNTED HOMES.

Thus far Major Moor gave the words of his principal informant; but being anxious to obtain further testi- mony, he applied to several visitors at Ewshott House, and published the letters of three of them, all testifying to their personal experience of the phenomena. He published, also, a letter from his own nephew, Captain A. H. Frazer, R.A., which is as follows : —

" Carlisle, 19th July 1841.

" With regard to the Haunted House affair at Ewshott House, I will give as full and minute an account as I can. I wrote an account at the time, which has been unfor- tunately destroyed ; but as the facts are well impressed on my memory, the loss of it is of less consequence.

" Soon after my intimacy with Lefroy began, he invited me to stay a few days at his mother's house in Hamp- shire. 'You must know,' he laughingly added, 'that ours is a haunted house, and has been so for many years. The inconvenience of this reputation has been very great, as, at times, we have had difficulty in getting servants to stay with us, especially maid-servants ; and we have by common consent dropped all allusion to the subject, and I now mention it to you that you may not, during your visit, transgress this rule.'

" ' About twenty years ago ' (I think he said twenty), ' when we first came to Ewshott House, there was an old house adjoining it, in which a bailiff, who had charge of the estate, lived with his family. Very strange noises used to be heard after eleven o'clock almost every night, which we attributed at first to the people in the other house, and did not, in consequence,

EWSHOTT HOUSE. 455

pay so much attention to them as we afterwards did. But when the bailiff left this house (which we intended pulling down) we asked him why he had every night made such a noise ? To our great surprise, he informed us that he was not the occasion of it ; and we found, both from him and from other inquiries we set on foot, that the house had enjoyed the reputation of being haunted for many years. It appeared from some of the oldest inhabitants of the village in the parish, that Ewshott House had formerly been occupied by an

eccentric and dubious character yclept Squire .

This gentleman had, in his younger days, travelled much on the Continent, and had, amongst other countries, visited Italy, and brought home with him, on his return to England, an Italian valet — also a character. The two lived in seclusion at Ewshott House; and in pro- cess of time many reports and suspicions got abroad respecting them and the doings at the Hall; though

nothing definite could be brought against Squire ,

except his being a great miser. At last he died, or disappeared' (I forget which Lefroy said), 'and shortly afterwards noises began to be heard in the house ; and the common legend was, that he had been bricked up by his Italian servant, between the walls in some room or vault, and so left to perish ; and that the noise was occasioned by his rapping the walls with the butt end of his hunting-whip in trying to get out.'

" Such was Lefroy's account. He added other par- ticulars, which, as you have probably had them from some of the family in a more authentic form than I

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could give, I omit. Now for ray own part in the mys- tery. As I had never before been in a haunted house my curiosity was greatly excited ; and I persuaded Lefroy to come up and sit up with me in my bed-room. He did so. The noise began much later than usual that evening — at least, we did not hear it till about half past twelve p.m. or a quarter before one a.m. It was as if someone was striking the walls with a hammer, or mallet, muffled in flannel. It began at first slowly, with a distinct interval between the blows, then became more rapid ; but afterwards followed no rule, but was slow or rapid as caprice dictated. The noise did not appear to come always from the same part of the house. Sometimes it was heard faintly, as if at a distance ; at others it became startlingly near, but seemed always heloiv the room we were in. It was much louder than I expected. I think if I had been outside the house I should have heard it. I passed three other days at Ewshott House, and heard the same noise two nights out of the three. When all was still and asleep, there was something uncomfortable — not to say fearful — in hearing this hollow muffled noise, moving about the house, and coming at times so near that I expected to see the door open and some person come in, though no footsteps were ever heard. It usually began about eleven and half-past eleven p.m. But one evening I heard it a quarter before ten p.m., before any of the family had gone upstairs. The noise generally con- tinued, with intervals, for about two hours ; and I think there was a slight interval between every./^v? blows, but

EWSHOTT HOUSE. 457

am not quite sure on this point. I never heard it during the day, though when every member of the family was out, and all was quiet, I would listen ; nor did I ever hear it, except in one instance above named, before ten p.m.

" A slight interval between every five blows has been mentioned, but it is not mentioned that you should infer from this that there was any regularity in the striking of those five blows ; on the contrary, the time was very uncertain and irregular. It was when the blows followed each other most rapidly that the noise was loudest. It was only at first that there was any regularity in the interval between the blows. I tried in vain to form a probable conjecture as to the cause of the noise" — after suggesting possible causes Capt. Frazer proceeds — "but the want of regularity in the sound, and its locomotive powers, render it improbable that any of these should be the real cause. And besides which they would all be heard in the daytime, if listened for ; but the mysterious sound never has been, I believe.

" Although always much interested in anything par- taking of the marvellous, I have no faith in superhuman agency in these matters. Still, it was impossible at night to hear this unaccountable sound without a slight feeling of depression, and I think it would have an (ill) effect upon a person of weak nerves or mind.

" Such is all I can recollect of what I heard myself, but the stories were numerous. One night, about twelve, the lady of the house was sitting in the drawing-room reading, all the family had retired to rest, when the

458 HAUNTED HOMES.

noise was heard close to a glass door (leading to another room) so loudly that she got up and went to the spot that it seemed to proceed from ; but nothing, of course, was seen. There was a strange story connected with the room I slept in ; it was told me by my friend Lefroy.

" Many years ago he came home for the holidays from school, and slept the first night there. About the middle of the night, he was awaked by a very loud noise, as if a cart, heavily laden with iron bars, was passing slowly along the path under the windows, which were in the front of the house, and looked towards the park. He threw open the shutters and window ; it was a bright moonlight night ; but he could see nothing, though the noise continued for a short time after. When he mentioned all this next morning he was laughed at foi his pains. Some years after this, however (I think Lefroy said eleven), an uncle of his slept the first night of his arrival in this very room. When he came to breakfast next morning, in reply to hopes that he had slept well, &c, he said, c It is a curious thing, but I was awaked by a cart, laden as if with iron, rattling under my windows ; but it was so pitch dark I could not see anything.'

" One more observation about the mysterious sounds : there are some noises which, though very loud, the ear, from a long habit of judging of and weighing them, knows to be at a great distance ; but this noise seemed to me (as a general rule) to become loud or faint, not so much from any change in the intensity of the blows

GLAMIS CASTLE. 459

as from a change of distance and position. And I am borne out in this remark by Lefroy, who mentioned that when several members of the family were stationed at different parts of the house, their accounts as to the loudness of the sound and its distance from them gene- rally differed.

"I have now told you, in a somewhat lengthy style, all I can call to mind on the subject. I thought it better to put down facts as they occurred to me, and leave you, should you deem them suited to your pur- pose, to condense and arrange them as you pleased."

Thus ends Captain Frazer's account of this mysterious affair. Ewshott House, we are given to understood, is still inhabited ; but whether still troubled by these un- accountable noises we are unable to learn.

GLAMIS CASTLE.

In the First Series of these stories and traditions some allusions were made to the mystery, or rather many mysteries, attached to Glamis Castle, the Forfarshire seat of the Earl of Strathmore. But the legends invest- ing this immense and ancient palace are inexhaustible. In point of antiquity and historical interest the Castle is one of the most remarkable edifices in the kingdom. u Although dilapidated and dimmed in its original

460 HAUNTED HOMES.

splendour," writes Dr. Beattie, "its feudal air of strength and haughty defiance, and its sullen gloom of seclusion in an antique forest, is a subject peculiarly adapted for the pencil, and for exciting the imagination of the poet."

Glamis Castle, or rather some portions of the mag- nificent old edifice, is of immense antiquity ; indeed, it claims to be the most ancient inhabited castle in Scot- land ; but it has undergone, save in the central tower, manifold repairings and rebuildings. The first legend which lends historic importance to the place is that Duncan was there murdered by Macbeth, " Thane of Glamis," even the very room in which the deed was done having been pointed out formerly, whilst in the armoury of the Castle the sword and the shirt of mail worn by Macbeth are still shown. Local tradition points to the Hunter's Hill, an eminence overlooking the Castle, as the spot where Malcolm the Second was attacked by the assassins.

The Glamis estates first came into possession of the Lyon family in 1371-2, when Sir John Lyon, feudal Baron of Fortevist, secretary and son-in-law to Robert the Second, received the grant of the lordship from that monarch. A long series of tragedies, we are informed, overgloomed the Lyons "from the moment they brought to Glamis their lion cup/' the original of Scott's Blessed Bear of Bradwardine, and a kind of family palladium, like the Luck of Edenhall. Sir John Lyon, who was Great Chamberlain of Scotland, fell in a duel in 1383. His son, the grandson of King Robert the Second,

GLAMIS CASTLE. 461

married his cousin, another grandchild of the same monarch, and, unlike many inheritors of the estate, died a natural death. His son was raised to the dignity of the peerage, in 1445, as Lord Glamis, and for some generations the Lyons lived and died in peace. The widow of the sixth Lord, Janet Douglas, a daughter of the Earl of Angus, together with her son Lord Glamis, and other relatives, was indicted for attempting the life of King James the Fifth by witchcraft. Lady Glamis was found guilty on evidence afterwards confessed to have been fabricated, and, horrible to relate, was burned to death on the Castle Hill, Edinburgh, in 1537. The son of this unfortunate lady, having been respited till of age, was, ultimately, released and restored to his honours and estates. In 1578 John, eighth Lord Glamis, was slain in an accidental encounter with the Lindsays, the hereditary enemies of his race.

In the following century an earldom, first of King- home, and then of Strathmore and Kinghorne, was conferred upon the ruler of Glamis. The grandson of the first Earl was slain at Sheriffmuir, in 1715, and his brother and successor, Charles, died on the 11th of May, 1728, "in consequence,''' say the peerages, "of an acci- dental wound received in a scuffle.'' According to the common story, however, his death was brought about in a duel over the gaming-table. One authority relates it thus, in All the Year Round,

" The old feud between Lindsays and Lyons had so far healed over that the members of the two families dined, and drank, and diced together, like fine

462 HAUNTED HOMES.

old Scottish gentlemen as they were. According to local tradition, the play one night at Glamis was very high, and when its owner had lost all his money, he staked his estates, one after the other, against the victorious player. At last Glamis itself was set on the turn of a card — and lost. Then the head of the house, maddened by his losses, accused his guest of cheating. The reply was a blow, swords were drawn, and after a few passes the victorious guest ran Lord Strathmore through the body, and thus sacrificed all his winnings." The Earl was really slain by James Carnegy, of Finhaven. Thus far the tradition is clear and comprehensible enough ; but other legends put a very different complexion on it. There is a secret room in Glamis Castle, as everybody knows; a room no mortal eye may behold, and the locality of which is known only to the possessor of the Castle, his heir and his factor. This room is believed to have been the scene of a hideous gambling affair, and the hero of it was an Earl of Strathmore, said by William Howitt, in his account of Glamis, to have been " Earl Beardie," whose portrait is at Abbottsford. Whoever the nobleman was his name has been corrupted into that of " Earl Patie," by the Forfarshire peasantry, who, we are informed by Mr. Hugh Maclauchlan, tell the following story of his misdeeds.

"Many, many years ago, when gentlemen got regu- larly drunk at dinner-time, and had to be carried to bed by their servants, there reigned supreme at Glamis one Patie, known to fame as the wild Earl of* Strath-

GLAM1S CASTLE. 463

more. Earl Patie was notoriously good at all the vices, but his favourite vice was that of gambling. He would play Lord's Day or week day, whatever day it was ; and if he could find no one else to humour him in his fancy, he would hob and nob with the humblest menial within the castle walls.

" It happened once, on a dark and stormy November night, that Earl Patie had been wearied by his forced inactivity from horse and hound — for it was the Lord's Day, and that means complete abstinence from all worldly pursuits in bonnie Scotland — and, at last, with oaths and curses, he called for a pack of cards, and comforted himself with the anticipation of a pleasant game. The ladies were at their devotions, so he called the servants to him, one by one ; but never since the days of the feast in the New Testament were so many excuses invented to cover disinclination. Of all those who had humoured him so often, not one could be found, from the steward to the scullion, to take a hand with the wicked Earl. In desperation the chaplain was attacked ; but he, too, proved temptation proof, and strengthened the rebellion among the menials by brand- ing the pack of cards as * deevil's bricks,' and hurling terrible anathemas at the head of any wight who should venture on so terrible a desecration of the Sabbath. For a time there was dire confusion and alarm in the Castle ; and at last Earl Patie, swearing tremendously, and consigning everybody around him to an unmen- tionable locality, seized a pack of cards and went growling away up the old oak stairs to his chamber,

464 HAUNTED HOMES.

saying he would play with the ' deil himsel,' sooner tli an be thwarted in his desire.

" He had not sat long in the room before a knock came at the door, and a deep voice sounded from the corridor, asking the Earl if he wished a partner. ' Yes,' roared the Earl ; ' enter, in the foul fiend's name, whoever you are/ And with that there entered a tall, dark stranger, wholly wrapped up in a cloak, who nodded in a familiar manner to the Earl, and took his seat on a vacant chair on the opposite side of the table. The Earl stared at his strange guest, and doubtless felt a momentary uneasiness as he remembered whom he had invited to play with him ; but a look at the cards on the table reassured him, and they commenced the game in real earnest. The stranger, who did not remove his bonnet and cloak, proposed a high stake ; and in reply the Earl said, if he were the loser, and had not wherewith to discharge his debt, he would sign a bond for whatever his guest might choose to ask. Fast and furious became the game, loud oaths resounded through the chamber, and the terrified menials crept up the corridor, wondering what brave man dared to bandy words with the wicked Earl, and who was sinful enough \o hold his hand at the ' deevil's bricks ' on the Lord's Day. As they fearfully listened they could hear the fierce utterances of the Earl, and the fiercer and more unearthly utterances of the stranger, whose presence they were quite unable to account for.

" At last the old butler, who had served the family for two generations, ventured close to the chamber-door

GLAMIS CASTLE. 465

and peeped through the key-hole; but no sooner had he done so than he fell back and rolled on the floor with a yell of agony that resounded to the remotest part of the Castle. In an instant the door was rudely torn open and the Earl came out with fury in his face, and told them to slay anyone who passed, while he went back to settle with his guest. But his guest was nowhere to be found. They searched the chamber through and through, but in vain. He was gone, and he had taken with him Earl Patie's bond, but what for the confused and startled Earl did not exactly know. Keturning by the old butler, Earl Patie found him stunned and bruised, with a yellow circle round the erring eye ; and then he told the terror-stricken menials that, as he sat at play, the stranger suddenly threw down his cards and said, with an oath, 'Smite that eye!'' whereupon a sheet of flame darted directly to the key-hole, and the mysterious stranger disappeared.

" Earl Patie lived five years before he paid his bond, but afterwards, on every Sabbath evening, the old chamber was filled with strange noises that echoed through the passages, as if the wicked Earl and the dark strranger were again wrangling and swearing over the ' deevil's bricks/ For a time the unearthly noises were put up with, but at last the room was built up, and nothing now remains to tell where the chamber was where Earl Patie and his fiery guest played their stormy game of cards/' Such is the story, according to local tradition, of the secret room of Glamis Castle.

William Howitt's version of this tradition is, that the

466 HAUNTED HOMES.

famous " Earl Beardie," Earl of Crawford, of whom there is a portrait at Abbotsford, famous for his re- bellion against James IT. of Scotland, and popularly known as "the wicked laird," was playing at cards in the Castle, and, being warned to give oyer, as he was losing dreadfully, swore an oath that he would play till the Day of Judgment; whereupon the Devil suddenly made his appearance, and as sudden disappearance with old " Beardie ° and all his company. The room has never been found again, but the people believe firmly that old " Beardie" and his company are playing on, ind will play till the Day of Judgment ; and that on stormy nights the players are heard stamping and swearing in their rage over their play.

But other, and deeper mysteries than that told of Earl Patie, or "Beardie," hover about that ancient and majestic castle. Those frowning towers, grey with age, and sombre with time, hold within their strong walls tales of almost unspeakable terror, and within their gloomy rooms, if rumour speak true, terrible tragedies have been enacted. Glamis, which a well-known tra- veller describes as one of the finest specimens of feudal architecture now existing, and as combining in a striking manner the gloom of prison security with the grandeur of a palace, is not so supremely interesting to outsiders for its magnitude or magnificence, its his- torical connexions or its melancholy associations, as for the seemingly impenetrable mystery that belongs to it. The local legend of Earl "Patie" or " Beardie M will not account for what has been seen and heard

GLAMIS CASTLE. 467

In 1880, a contributor to All the Year Round, whilst disclaiming all sympathy with ghost stories, or mys- teries of any kind, and declaring himself to be " an utter sceptic as to all assumed supernatural manifesta- tions," gave two strange incidents, as given to him on " good authority." The first narrative is told thus : —

" A lady, very well known in London society, an artistic and social celebrity, wealthy beyond all doubts of the future, and what is called a very cultivated and instructed, but clear-headed, and perhaps slightly matter- of-fact woman, went to stay at Glamis Castle for the first time. She was allotted very handsome apartments, just on the point of junction between the new buildings — perhaps a hundred or two hundred years old — and the very ancient part of the castle. The rooms were handsomely furnished ; no gaunt carvings grinned from the walls ; no grim tapestry swung to and fro, making strange figures look still stranger by the flickering fire- light ; all was smooth, cosy, and modern, and the guest retired to bed without a thought of the mysteries of Glamis.

" In the morning she appeared at the breakfast-table quite cheerful and self-possessed. To the inquiry how she had slept, she replied: 'Well, thanks, very well, up to four o'clock in the morning. But your Scottish carpenters seem to come to work very early. I suppose they put up their scaffolding quickly, though, for they are quiet now." This speech produced a dead silence, and the speaker saw with astonishment thai, the faces of -members of the family were very pale-

30

468 HAUNTED HOMES.

<e She was asked, as she valued the friendship of all there, never to speak to them on that subject again; there had been no carpenters at Glamis Castle for months past. This fact, whatever it may be worth, is absolutely established, so far as the testimony of a single witness can establish anything. The lady was awakened by a loud knocking and hammering, as if somebody were putting up a scaffold, and the noise did not alarm her in the least. On the contrary, she took it for an accident, due to the presumed matutinal habits of the people. She knew, of course, that there were stories about Glamis, but had not the remotest idea that the hammering she had heard was connected with any story. She had regarded it simply as an annoyance, and was glad to get to sleep after an un- restful time ; but had no notion of the noise being supernatural until informed of it at the breakfast- table.

" To what particular event in the stormy annals of the Lyon family the hammering is connected is quite unknown, except to members of the family, but there is no lack of legends, possible and impossible, to account for any sights or sounds in the magnificent old feudal edifice."

This same writer, after alluding to many of the tragic stories connected with Glamis, including the romantic episode of the renowned " Bowes " abduction case, proceeds to step into the dim borderland which separates tradition from fiction. " It is said," remarks this authority, " that once a visitor stayed at Glamis

GLAMIS CASTLE. 469

Castle for a few days, and, sitting up late one moon- light night, saw a face appear at the window opposite to him. The owner of the face — it was very pale, with great sorrowful eyes — appeared to wish to attract at- tention ; but vanished suddenly from the window, as if plucked suddenly away by superior strength. For a long while the horror-stricken guest gazed at the window, in the hope that the pale face and great sad eyes would appear again. Nothing was seen at the window, but presently horrible shrieks penetrated even the thick walls of the castle, aud rent the night air. An hour later, a dark huddled figure, like that of an old decrepit woman, carrying something in a bundle^ came into the waning moonlight, and presently van- ished."

This writer hints at a very dreadful deed to explain the cause of the apparition, but, for some reason or the other, evades connecting the two tales by any intelli- gible method. He adds, however, that there is a more modern story of a stonemason, having been engaged at Glamis Castle on an important occasion, and having discovered, or been suspected of discovering, more than he should have done, was supplied with a handsome competency, upon the conditions that he emigrated, and preserved inviolable secrecy as to what he had learned. This writer continues : —

" The employment of a stonemason is explained by the conditions under which the mystery is revealed to successive heirs and factors. The abode of the dread secret is in a part of the castle, also haunted by the

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470 HAUNTED HOMES.

apparition of a bearded man, who flits about at night, but without committing any other objectionable actiou. What connection, if any, the bearded spectre may have with the mystery is not even guessed. He hovers at night over the couches of children for an instant, and then vanishes. The secret itself abides in a room — a secret chamber — the very situation of which, beyond a general idea that it is in the most ancient part of the castle, is unknown. Where walls are fifteen feet thick it is not impossible to have a chamber so concealed, that none but the initiated can guess its position. It was once attempted by a madcap party of guests to discover the locality of the secret chamber, by hanging their towels out of window, and thus deciding in favour of any window from which no spotless banner waved ; but this escapade, which is said to have been ill-received by those most interested, ended in nothing but a vague conclusion that the old square tower must be the spot sought.

"It seems to have been forgotten by these harum- scarum mystery-hunters that a secret chamber might well be like the curious places of concealment called ' priests' holes,' so common in old English country- houses, and the only mystery whereof is how the unfor- tunate hidden tenants could breathe in them.

" It is in the secret chamber of Glamis Castle that the mystery is revealed to the next heir, and to the new factor, when one is appointed ; this much is known beyond all possible doubt. It is also assumed, from the stonemason story, and the mysterious sounds fre-

GLAMIS CASTLE. 471

quently heard, that the secret chamber is approached by a passage duly closed with masonry after every visit.

" This latter conclusion mayor may not be correct, but the existence of a mystery of some kind concealed within a secret chamber is fairly well made out."

No wonder that this writer asks, and many others repeat the question, " What is this mystery?" Of all the many attempted hypotheses not one may be deemed conclusive ; but few probable, or even possible. It has been suggested, contrary to the proven facts [if proof were needed], that the beautiful and unfortunate Lady Glamis, the supposed witch, the victim of acknowledged perjury, who perished amid the flames on Castle Hill, at Edinburgh, " was actually in commerce with the Evil One, and that her familiar demon, an embodied and visible fiend, endures unto this day, shut from the light, in Glamis Castle ! "

Another wild suggestion is, that owing to some here- ditary curse, like those believed to rest on many well- known families, at certain intervals a kind of vampire is born into the family of the Strathmore Lyons. It is scarcely possible to destroy this monstrosity; it is, there- fore, kept concealed till its term of life is run. But, it might be remembered, even monsters need nourishment, and this secret chamber at Glamis is only visited once in a generation. Other theories and suggestions are equally unfortunate, and no probable solution of the mystery has yet been given.

Thus far we have shown that strange sights and stranger sounds are reported upon good authority to

472 HAUNTED HOMES.

have been seen and heard at Glamis. Moreover, it may be assumed that there is a family secret, concealed within the depths of the old castle, and that the facts about it are never known to more than three persons. The three persons who have to hide within their bosoms this grim secret are the Earl of Strathmore for the time being, the heir-apparent, if he have attained his majority, and the " factor," or, as he might be termed in England, the house steward. On the night before he attains his twenty-first birthday, the heir, who bears the courtesy title of Lord Glamis, is solemnly initiated in the terrible mystery by the reigning Earl and his factor, and this secret he has to preserve until the majority of his own son, or, if he remain sonless, till the coming of age of his heir presumptive, and till the appointment of another factor to the property.

" Why the factor should be instructed in this terrible matter/' says one of our authorities, " is a question which has excited, and continues to excite, the Caledo- nian mind to a remarkable degree. If the office of factor were hereditary, there would be an apparent reason for taking such an important functionary into the family confidence. But this is not the case in Scotland as a rule. In fact, the balance of experience is very greatly on the other side. The factor is sometimes a poor relation of a great house, but frequently a retired officer or a country gentleman unconnected with his employers by ties of blood. There is nothing in the occupation of a factor greatly in excess of that of an agent, saving that he is resident on the property instead of living in

GUILDFORD GRAMMAR SCHOOL. 473

the nearest large town. There is no reason why the connection between employer and factor should not be brought to an end at any time by individual or mutual dissatisfaction. There is, however, no record of any factor having disclosed any inkling of the Mystery of Glamis. As a Strathmore a Strathmore succeeds, there is generally much talk of the old story being exploded at last. Gay gallants in lace ruffles, beaus, bucks, bloods, and dandies have, until their twenty-first birth- day, made light of the family mystery, and some have gone so far as to make after-dinner promises to ' hoist the old ghost with his own petard,' and tell the whole stupid old story in the smoking-room at night, after the Doming of age humbug was all over. This promise has been made more than once. . . But it has never bee?i kept. No heir to the Strathmore peerage has revealed the secret. On the morrow, when all looked for an explanation of the terrible mystery, they were met by a courteous but cold refusal ; a simple statement that the fulfilment of the rash promise was impossible, a request to say no more about it, and thus the matter has ended," and so the Mystery of Glamis Castle remains a mystery still.

GUILDFOED GBAMMAK SCHOOL.

At the conclusion of an entertaining paper entitled "A Winter's Night with my Old Books," the late Albert Smith gives a short account of an apparition which appeared at Guildford Grammar School ; and it is

474 HAUNTED HOMES.

the more interesting from the fact that, having thrown discredit upon all the ghostly legends of the old writers, Lilly, Aubrey, Glanvil, and the rest, its writer adduces this as a story for which he can personally -vouch. It originally appeared in Bentleifs Miscellany, vol. xxv. p. 100, and was reprinted in " Dead Leaves," a post- humous publication of the well-known popular enter- tainer and author. It should be pointed out, however, that in this latter work, the initial of the youth who saw the spirit of the deceased huntsman is given as

" Young M ," instead of as "Young K 9" as

given in the present narrative.

I mentioned, remarks Albert Smith, that I had a ghost story, hitherto unpublished, to tell of Guildford. " About ten years ago my brother was a pupil at the Grammar School in that town. The boys had been sitting up all ni^ht in their bed-room for a frolic, and,

in the early morning, one of them, young K , of

Godalming, cried out, * Why, I '11 swear there 's the likeness of our old huntsman on his grey horse going across the white-washed wall ! ' The rest of the boys told him he was a fool, and that all had better think about going to sleep. After breakfast a servant came over

from K 's family to say that ' their old huntsman

had been thrown from his horse and killed, early that morning, whilst airing the hounds.' "

Albert Smith adds : " Leaving the reader to explain this strange story, which may be relied upon, I put my old books back on their shelves, and lay aside my pen."

475

m

HAMPTON COURT.

In the week's issue of All the \'ear Hound for 22nd June 1867, was published a paper entitled " Is it Pos- sible ? " This communication is supposed to have been made by Dr. Phillimore. Whoever the author was, he refers to his mother as a daughter of "Sir G(eorge) P(rescott), of Theobald's Park, Herts," and in a note subjoined to the story by Dickens is alluded to as " the esteemed writer." The story is in every way so curious, so startling, and so strongly vouched for, that it should be given in the narrator's own words, which are to this effect : —

" Several years ago the brother of Colonel C was

killed in battle, leaving a widow and one little girl. The widow subsequently married a German baron, and the little girl, Maud, was brought up entirely in Germany. The latter was about twelve years old when her mother, being attacked with an illness that threatened to prove fatal, became very uneasy about the probable future of her child; and feeling, one evening, more depressed than usual, called the little Maud to her bed-side, warned her that their parting was near, and enjoined the weep- ing girl to write immediately to Mrs. B (a friend

of many years' standing), entreating her to come at once to receive her last embrace, and take charge of her orphan child.

"Maud obeyed without delay, but the dying woman's eyes were not gladdened by the appearance of her friend.

476 HAUNTED HOMES.

The summons had reached its destination, but the absence of her husband, without whom she felt un- willing to travel so far, had induced Mrs. B to

postpone her departure, consoling herself with the hope that her friend, being naturally of a nervous and de- sponding temperament, had somewhat magnified her own danger.

" Mrs. B resided at Hampton Court, and here

it was that, on the night of the 9th of November, a curious incident occurred. Retiring to her room be- tween eleven and twelve, she rang for her maid, and, the latter not appearing as promptly as usual, went to her still open door to listen if she were coming. Oppo- site to her was a wide staircase, and up this came,

noiselessly, a figure which the lamp held by Mrs. B

showed to be that of a lady dressed in black, with white gloves, A singular tremor seized her. She could neither stir nor speak. Slowly the figure approached her, reached the landing, made a step forward, and seemed to cast itself on her neck ; but no sensation accompanied the movement ! The light fell from her hand ; she uttered a shriek that alarmed the house, and fell senseless on the floor.

" On recovering, Mrs. B related minutely what

she had seen, her memory especially retaining the image of the white gloves ; but nothing more than the usual unsatisfactory solutions were propounded, nor does it appear that the occurrence was at all associated with the dying baroness in Germany.

" In a few days, however, came a letter from little

HEATH OLD HALL. 477

Maud, annouDcing that her mother was no more; that

her latest thoughts were directed to Mrs. B , and

her sole regret was the not being permitted to embrace her before her spirit passed away. She had died a little before midnight on the ninth of November.

" Mrs. B hastened to Germany to claim her

orphan charge, and then was added a noteworthy con- firmation of the vision. Little Maud, in one of their conversations, observed, ' Mamma had a curious fancy. On the night she died, she made the baron promise that she should be buried in her black satin dress — with white kid gloves? The request had been complied with."

HEATH OLD HALL.

There are three Halls at Heath, near Wakefield, but the one known as the Old Hall, at present occupied by Edward Green, Esquire, is that which bears the reputa- tion of being haunted. It is a truly magnificent and palatial pile of buildings, and has been well described to us as one of the finest specimens remaining in Yorkshire of the Elizabethan period of architecture. The Hall was built for John Kaye of Dalton. The windows were formerly emblazoned with the arms of many of the chief nobility of England, but these have disappeared, such painted glass as there is there now having been brought over by some nuns, with whom, it

47S HAUNTED HOMES.

is said, -was a Princess of Conde, who resided at the Hall during the Kevolutionary troubles abroad.

Mr. John Batty, to whom we are indebted for much of the following information, says, the Kayes were succeeded in possession of the Old Hall by William Witham, Esquire. This owner died in 1593, and it is not improbable that some peculiar circumstances which attended his disease and death first obtained for the place its curious reputation. His illness, and its fatal termination, were ascribed to demoniacal agency, and a poor woman of the neighbourhood, named Mary Pannal, who lay under the suspicion of being a witch, was arrested, and executed for the supposed crime at York.

William Witham's son, Henry, dying without issue, Heath Old Hall became the property of his sister Mary, wife of Thomas Jobson of Cudworth, whose family had grown rich upon the plunder of abbey lands, another very potent reason for an uncanny fame being acquired by the race. Her first husband dying, Mary took for a second, Thomas Bolles, of Osberton, Nottinghamshire. Mary Bolles, whether for her loyalty or wealth is not stated, was created a baronetess of Scotland, with remainder to her heirs whatever, by James the First, in 1635, if not a solitary, still a very rare instance of such a title having been conferred. Lady Bolles lived in great state at the Old Hall, and, after much wealth and prosperity, died there in 1662, when eighty-three. Her interment did not take place until six weeks after her decease, she having assigned .£120 — a very much larger sum then than now — for keeping open house for all

HEATH OLD HALL. 470

comers during that time. Her will, only signed the day before her death, besides containing a number of charitable bequests, legacies to relatives and friends, and £200 for the erection of her tomb, further provides for the funeral festivities as follows: " I give all my fat beeves and fat sheep to be disposed of at the discretion of my executors, whom I charge to perform it nobly, and really to bestow this, my gift in good provision ; two hogsheads of wine or more, as they shall see cause, and that several hogsheads of beer be taken care for (there being no convenience to brew). And, my bedding being plundered from me, I desire that the chambers may be well furnished with beds, borrowed for the time, for the entertaining of such as shall be thought fit lodgers." Besides these arrangements, Lady Bolles left £700 to be expended in mourning, and £400 for funeral expenses, and charged her executors most earnestly to see her will exactly performed, adding that if any person interested in it obstructed them in any degree, he or she should forfeit all claim to any benefit from it.

The Old Hall fell to the share of Sir William Dalston, in right of his wife Anne, daughter of Lady Bolles by her second husband, but, after changing hands more than once, passed by purchase to John Smyth, Esquire, of Heath, from whom it descended to Captain Smyth, of the Grenadier Guards, its present possessor.

The Hall and its environs, says Mr. John Batty, are beautifully described in " Emilia Monterio," a ballad by Mr. W. H. Leatham^ on a young Portuguese lady who

480 HAUNTED HOMES.

lived with the nuns when they inhabited the Hall, some sixty years ago.

But the grand feature about this magnificent old Hall is that it is haunted, and by the apparition of Lady Bolles. Her ladyship is said to walk and disturb the neighbourhood ; but her favourite resort is a fine banqueting-room, with a splendid carved stone chimney- piece, upon which are the Witham arms. Hunter, the Yorkshire antiquarian, deems that the lady's restless- ness in the grave may probably be connected with the romantic circumstances surrounding her father's death; whilst others think it clue to the non-observance by her executors of certain clauses in her will. According ta this latter account, the lady long " walked " in Heath Grove, till at length she was conjured down into a hole of the river, near the Hall, called to this day " Bolles Pit." " The spell, however, was not so powerful but that she still rises and makes a fuss now and then." A tradition, however, exists in Heath that a room in the edifice which she had had walled up for a certain period, because large sums of money had been gambled away in it, was opened before the stipulated time expired, hence the restlessness of Lady Bolles.

At any rate, even now-a-days she is reported to be seen sometimes gliding along the passages of the house she once inhabited in the flesh, whilst servants in a neighbouring residence have refused to go out after dark, as they have repeatedly seen at dusk a tall woman dressed in antiquated style in the coach-road of Heath Old Hall.

HINTON AMPNER MANOR HOUSE. 481

One correspondent, as evidence of the general feeling of the neighbourhood about this time-honoured appari- tion, informs us that when at Ledsham some time since, he was looking over the tomb in the north chancel, beneath which Lady Bolles lies buried, when two little lads whispered to him, rt Don't go there, maister, there's t'awd Lad ! " (Anglice, the Devil.)

HINTON AMPNER MANOR HOUSE.

In the Life of the Rev. Richard Barham, author of The Ingoldsby Legends, by his son, the Rev. R. H. Dalton Barham, some extraordinary particulars are given respecting the haunting of Hinton Ampner Manor House, in Hampshire. Mr. Barham, who had recorded the story in his note-book for 1836, obtained the details from a Mrs. Hughes, who derived them originally from Mrs. Gwynn, a personal witness of the wonders referred to. The latter lady's account was subsequently con- firmed by several persons, including the late Duchess of Buckingham, a resident in the neighbourhood.

" The story as told by Mrs. Hughes," says the Rev. Dalton Barham, " though substantially accurate as to incidents, contained some important errors in respect of the dramatis jtersonce. These were, I regret, repro- duced in the second edition of my father's Life. I have now, however, thanks to the kindness of certain mem-

482 HAUNTED HOMES.

bers of the family mainly interested, the means of correcting them, and of presenting an authentic account of the Haunted House in Hampshire." Mr. Barham then proceeds to narrate the events connected with the presumed supernatural manifestations at Hinton Ampner, and his account we shall chiefly follow, correcting and amplifying it where necessary from the voluminous notes and affidavits cited in the Gentleman' }s Magazine for November and December 1872, to which periodical the whole affair was communicated under the title of " A Hampshire Ghost Story."

Mrs. Ricketts, the lady chiefly concerned with the following narrative, was a woman of aristocratic con- nections ; her brother was the famous Admiral Jervis, afterwards Earl St. Vincent, and other members of her family held high positions in Church and State. Her husband, William Henry Ricketts, a Bencher of Gray's Inn, was a West Indian landowner ; and it was during a somewhat lengthy visit which he paid to his estates in Jamaica that Mrs. Ricketts resided, with her three infant children and servants, in the old Manor House of Hinton Ampner, near Alresford, in Hampshire.

Previous to recounting particulars of the series of strange sights and sounds, the effect of which rendered Mrs. Ricketts' continued occupation of the old manor house an impossibility, it should be premised that that lady, according to all accounts, was a woman of remark- able vigour, both physical and mental. The coolness and courage with which Mrs. Ricketts endured for so lon& «, neriod the disturbances at the old Hampshire

HINTON AMPNER MANOR HOUSE. 483

residence certainly speaks strongly in favour of her good sense, and her physical capacity may not inaptly be gauged by the fact that she preserved her intellectual powers unimpaired to the advanced age of ninety-one. Her second son, Edward Jervis, who succeeded his elder brother as Viscount St. Vincent, it may be men- tioned, was ninety-two when he died. He is said to have " inherited the fine and powerful intellect of his mother."

The mansion of Hinton Ampner, where, in 1771, Mrs. Ricketts took up her residence, had for many generations been in possession of the Stewkeley family, and on the death of Sir Hugh Stewkeley, the last male heir, passed, by right of his wife, to Edward, Lord Stawell. On the evening of April 2nd, 1755, this nobleman, whilst sitting in the little parlour at Hinton, died suddenly of apoplexy, after having articulated a few words. For the next ten years the house, now become the property of the Right Hon. Henry Bilson Legge, husband of Lord Stawell's daughter, was left chiefly in the occupation of servants, Mr. Legge only visiting it for a month or so during the shooting season. At his death, in 1764, his widow let it to Mr. Ricketts.

For some time prior to the arrival of the new tenants the house seems to have been gradually acquiring an evil reputation ; strange sounds were said to have been heard in it, and strange sights seen. In particular it was asserted that the figure of a gentleman in a drab- coioured coat, standing in the moonlight with his hands

31

484 HAUNTED HOMES.

behind him, after the manner of the late Lord Stawell, was seen by a groom, and recognised by him as that of his deceased master. These reports, however, do not seem to have reached the ears of either Mr. or Mrs. Ricketts, although they had not been long settled at Hinton before their attention was aroused bv certain noises which they themselves heard in the night, as of persons opening and shutting doors with violence. Mr. Ricketts frequently went round the house in the hope of detecting the offenders ; but, failing in his efforts to discover the cause of these disturbances, and suppos- ing some ill-disposed persons possessed keys which gave them admission to the house, he had all the locks ©hanged ; but with no better result. The noises were repeated from time to time, yet, apparently, without causing any great annoyance to the family. Towards the close of 1769 Mr. Ricketts was called awav to Jamaica, and his wife, who was not only a woman of remarkable vigour, both physical and mental, but whose good sense had acquired additional strength under the training of the learned Nicholas Tindal, determined to remain at home with her three infant children. There were also in the house eight servants, all of whom, it is to be observed, left it from various causes in the course of the following year, and were replaced by others. Soon after the departure of Mr. Ricketts the disturbances became more serious. The servants got frightened. Mrs. Ricketts herself, among other inex- plicable sounds, frequently heard the rustling of silk clothes and the steps of someone walking in the adjoin-

HINTON AMPNER MANOR HOUSE. 485

ing room or lobby. On one occasion sbe plainly distinguished the tread of a man walking heavily towards the foot of her bed. Here it will be as well to furnish some extracts from the account drawn up by Mrs. Kicketts herself of the extraordinary affair.

" About six months after we came thither," is Mrs. Kickett's personal record, " Elizabeth Brelsford, nurse to our eldest son, Henry, then about eight months old, was sitting by him when asleep, in the room over the pantry, appropriated for the nursery, and, being a hot summer's evening, the door was open that faces the entrance into the yellow bed-chamber, which, with the adjoining dressing-room, was the apartment usually occupied by the lady of the house. She was sitting directly opposite to this door, and plainly saw, as she afterwards related, a gentleman in a drab-coloured suit of clothes go into the yellow room. She was in no way surprised at the time, but on the housemaid, Molly New- man, coming up with her supper, she asked what strange gentleman was come. Upon the other answering there was no one, she related what is already described, and desired her fellow-servant to accompany her to search the room ; this they did immediately, without any appearance of what she had seen. She was much con- cerned and disturbed, and she was thoroughly assured she could no ways be deceived, the light being sufficient to distinguish any object clearly. In some time after it was mentioned to me. I treated it as the effect of fear or superstition, to which the lower class of people are so prone ; and it was entirely obliterated from my

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486 HAUNTED HOMES.

mind till the late astonishing disturbances brought to my recollection this and other previous circumstances.

" In the autumn of the same year George Turner, son of the gardener of that name, who was then groom, crossing the great hall to go to bed, saw at the other end a man in a drab-coloured coat, whom he concluded to be the butler, who wore such coloured clothes, he being lately come, and his livery not made. As he passed immediately upstairs to the room where all the men-servants lay, he was in great astonishment to find the butler and the other men-servants in bed. Thus the person he had seen in the hall remained unaccounted for, like the same person before described by the nurse ; and George Turner, now living, avers these particulars in the same manner he first related them.

" In the month of July, 1767, about seven in the evening, there were sitting in the kitchen, Thomas Wheeler, postilion ; Ann Hall, my own woman ; Sarah, waiting-woman to Mrs. Mary Poyntz ; and Dame Lacy ; the other servants were out, excepting the cook, then employed in washing up her things in the scullery.

"The persons in the kitchen heard a woman come down-stairs, and along the passage leading towards them, whose clothes rustled as of the stiffest silk ; and on their looking that way, the door standing open, a female figure rushed past, and out of the house door, as they conceived. Their view of her was imperfect ; but they plainly distinguished a tall figure in dark-coloured clothes. Dame Brown, the cook, instantly coming in, siiis figure passed close by her, and- instantly disap-

HINTON AMPNER MANOR HOUSE. 487

peared. She described the person and drapery as before mentioned, and they all united in astonishment who or what this appearance could be ; and their surprise was heightened when a man, coming directly through the yard and into the house the way she went out, on being asked who the woman was he met, declared he had seen no one.

" Some time after Mr. Ricketts left me," continues the lady, "I, then lying in the bed-room over the kitchen, heard frequently the noise of someone walking in the room within, and the rustling as of silk clothes against the door that opened into my room, sometimes so loud and of such continuance as to break my rest. Instant search being often made, we never could dis- cover any appearance of human or brute being.

" Repeatedly disturbed in the same manner, I made it my constant practice to search the room and closets within, and to secure the only door that led from that room on the inside in such manner as to be certain no one could gain entrance without passing through my own apartment, which was always made fast by a draw- bolt on the door. Yet this precaution did not preclude the disturbance, which continued with little interruption."

Mrs. Ricketts proceeds to furnish the names and various other particulars of the different domestics she had employed during her residence at the old Manor House, remarking : —

" I mention these changes among my domestics, though in themselves unimportant, to evince the im- possibility of a confederacy, for the course of nearly

488 HAUNTED HOMES.

seven years, and with a succession of different persons, so that at the time of my leaving Hinton I had not one servant that lived with me at my first going thither, nor for some time afterwards.

" In the summer of 1770, one night that I was lying in the yellow bed-chamber (the same I have mentioned that the person in drab-coloured clothes was seen to enter), I had been in bed half an hour, thoroughly awake, and without the least terror or apprehension on my spirits. I plainly heard the footsteps of a man, with plodding step, walking towards the foot of my bed. I thought the danger too near to ring my bell for assis- tance, but sprang out of bed, and in an instant was in the nursery opposite ; and with Hannah Streeter and a light I returned to search for what I had heard, but all in vain. There was a light burning in the dressing- room within, as usual, and there was no door or means of escape save at the one that opened to the nursery. This alarm perplexed me more than any preceding, being within my own room, the footsteps as distinct as ever I heard, myself perfectly awake and collected.

" I had, nevertheless, resolution to go to bed alone in the same room, and did not form any conclusion as to the cause of this very extraordinary disturbance. For some months afterwards I did not hear any noise that particularly struck my attention, till, in November of the same year, I then being removed to the chintz bed- room over the hall, as a warmer apartment, I once or twice heard sounds of harmony, and one night in par- ticular I heard three distinct and violent knocks as given

HINTON AMPNER MANOR HOUSE. 489

with a club, or something very ponderous, against a door below stairs ; it occurred to me that housebreakers must be forcing into some apartment, and I immediately rang my bell. No one hearing the summons, and the noise ceasing, I thought no further of it at that time. After this, and in the beginning of the year 1771, I was frequently sensible of a hollow murmuring that seemed to possess the whole house ; it was independent of wind, being equally heard on the calmest nights, and it was a sound I had never been accustomed to hear.

" On the morning of the 27th February, when Eliza- beth Godin came into my room, I inquired what weather. She replying in a very faint tone, I asked if she were ill. She said she was well, but had never in her life been so terrified as during the preceding night; that she had heard the most dismal groans and flutter- ing round her bed most part of the night, that she had got up to search the room and up the chimney, and though it was a bright moonlight she could not dis- cover anything. I did not pay much attention to her account, but it occurred to me that should anvone tell her it was the room formerly occupied by Mrs. Parfait, the old house-keeper, she would be afraid to lie there again. Mrs. Parfait dying a few days before at Kilm- ston, was brought and interred in Hinton churchyard the evening of the night this disturbance happened.

" That very day five weeks, being the 2nd of April, I waked between 1 and 2 o'clock, as I found by my watch, which, with a rushlight, was on a table close to my bedside. I lay thoroughly awake for aagae time,

490 HAUNTED HOMES.

and then heard one or more persons walking to and fro in the lobby adjoining. I got out of bed and listened at the door for the space of twenty minutes, in which time I distinctly heard the walking, with the addition of a loud noise like pushing strongly against a door. Being thus assured my senses were not deceived I deter- mined to ring my bell, to which I had before much reluctance on account of disturbing the nursery maid, who was very ill of a fever.

"Elizabeth Godin, during her illness, lay in the room with my sons, and came immediately on hearing my bell. Thoroughly convinced there were persons in the lobby, before I opened my door, I asked her if she saw no one there. On her replying in the nega- tive, I went out to her, examined the window, which was shut, looked under the couch, the only furniture of concealment there ; the chimney board was fastened, and, when removed, all was clear behind it. She found the door into the lobby shut, as it was every night. After this examination I stood in the middle of the room, pondering with much astonishment, when sud- denly the door that opened into the little recess leading to the yellow apartment sounded as if played to and fro by a person standing behind it. This was more than I could bear unmoved. I ran into the nursery and rang the bell there that goes into the men's apartments. Robert Camis came to the door at the landing place, which door was every night secured, so that no person could get to that floor unless through the windows. Upon opening the door to Robert I told him the reason

HINTON AMPKEK MANOR HOUSE. 491

I had to suppose that someone was entrenched behind the door 1 before mentioned, and, giving him a light and arming him with a billet of wood, myself and Eliza- beth Godin waited the event. Upon opening the door there was not any being whatever, and the yellow apartment was locked, the key hanging up, and a great bolt drawn across the outside door, as usual when not in use. There was then no further retreat or hiding place. After dismissing Robert and securing the door, I went to bed in my sons' room, and about half an hour after- wards heard three distinct knocks, as described before ; they seemed below, but I could not then or ever after ascertain the place. The next night I lay in my own room ; I now and then heard noises and frequently the hollow murmur,

" On the 7th of May, exactly the day five weeks from the 2nd of April, this murmur was uncommonly loud. I could not sleep, apprehending it the prelude to some greater noise. I got up and went to the nursery, stayed there till half an hour past three, and then, being daybreak, I thought I should get some sleep in my own apartment ; I returned and lay till ten minutes before four, and then the great hall door directly under me was slapped to with the utmost violence, so as to shake my room perceivably. I jumped out of bed to the window that commands the porch. There was a light to distinguish every object, but none to be seen that could account for what I had heard. Upon examining the door it was found fast locked and bolted as usual.

492 HAUNTED HOMES*

" From this time I determined to have my woman lie in a little bed in my room. The noises grew more frequent, and she was always sensible of the same sounds, and much in the same direction as they struck me. Harassed and perplexed, I was yet very unwilling to divulge my embarrassment. I had taken every method to investigate the cause, and could not discover the least appearance of trick ; on the contrary, I became convinced it was beyond the power of any mortal agent to perform ; but, knowing how exploded such opinions were, I kept them in my own bosom, and hoped my resolution would enable me to support what- ever misrht befall.

" After Midsummer the noises became every night more intolerable. They began before I went to bed, and with intermissions were heard till after broad day in the morning. I could frequently distinguish inar- ticulate sounds, and usuallv a shrill female voice would begin, and then two others with deeper and manlike tone seemed to join in the discourse; yet, though this conversation sounded as if close to me, I never could distinguish words. /

" I have often asked Elizabeth Godin if she heard any noise, and of what sort. She as often described the seeming conversation in the manner I have related, and other noises. One night in particular my bed-curtains rustled, and sounded as if dragged by a person walking against them. I then asked her if she heard any noise and of what kind. She spoke of it exactly in the manner I have done. Several times I heard .sounds of

HINTON AMPNER MANOR HOUSE. 493

harmony within the room — no distinct or regular notes, but a vibration of harmonious tones; walking, talking, knocking, opening and slapping of doors were repeated every night. My brother,* who had not long before returned from the Mediterranean, had been to stay with me, yet so great was my reluctance to relate anything beyond the bounds of probability that I could not bring myself to disclose my embarrassed situation to the friend and brother who could most essentially serve and comfort me. The noises continuing in the same manner when he was with me, I wished to learn if he heard them, and one morning I carelessly said : ' I was afraid last night the servants would disturb you, and rang my bell to order them to bed.' He replied he had not heard them. The morning after he left me to return to Portsmouth, about 3 o'clock and daylight, Elizabeth Godin and myself both awake — she had been sitting up in bed looking round her, expecting, as she always did, to see something terrible — I heard with infinite astonish- ment the most loud, deep, tremendous noise, which seemed to rush and fall with infinite velocity and force on the lobby floor adjoining to my room. I started up, and called to Godin, ' Good God ! did vou hear that noise ? ' She made no reply ; on repeating the ques- tion, she answered with a faltering voice, ' She was so frightened she scarce durst speak.' Just at that instant we heard a shrill and dreadful shriek, seeming to pro- ceed from under the spot where the rushing noise fell, and repeated three or four times, growing fainter as it

* Captain John Jervis, afterwards Earl St, Vincent.

494 HAUNTED HOMES.

seemed to descend, till it sank into earth. Hannah Streeter, who lay in the room with my children, heard the same noises, and was so appalled she lay for two hours almost deprived of sense and motion.

" Having heard little of the noises preceding, and that little she did not regard, she had rashly expressed a wish to hear more of them, and from that night till she quitted the house there was scarce a night passed that she did not hear the sound as if some person walked towards her door, and pushed against it, as though attempting to force it open. This alarm, so more than commonly horrible, determined me to impart the whole series to my brother on his return to Hinton, expected in a week. The frequency of the noises, harassing to my rest, and getting up often at unreason- able hours, fixed a slow fever and deep cough, my health was much impaired, but my resolution firm. I remained in anxious expectation of my brother, and he being detained a week longer at Portsmouth than he had foreseen, it occurred to me to endeavour, by changing my apartment, to obtain a little rest. I removed to that formerly occupied by Elizabeth Godin. I did not mention my intention till 10 at night, when the room was prepared, and I went to bed soon after. 1 had scarce lain down when the same noises surrounded me that I before have related, and I mention the cir- cumstance of changing my room without previous notice to prove the impossibility of a plan of operations being so suddenly conveyed to another part of the house, were they such as human agents could achieve. The week

HINTON AMPNEB MANOR HOUSE. 495

following I was comforted by the arrival of my brother. However desirous to impart the narrative, yet I forbore till the next morning; I wished him to enjoy a night's rest, and therefore contented myself with preparing him to hear on the morrow the most astonishing tale that ever assailed his ears, and that he must summon all his trust of my veracity to meet my relation. He replied it was scarce possible for me to relate any matter he could not believe, little divining the nature of what I had to offer to his faith.

" The next morning I began my narrative, to which he attended with mixed surprise and wonder. Just as I had finished, Captain Luttrell, our neighbour at Kilm- ston, chancing to call, induced my brother to impart the whole to him, who in a very friendly manner offered to unite his endeavours to investigate the cause. It was then agreed he should come late in the evening, and divide the night watch between them, keeping profoundly secret there was any such intention. My brother took the precaution, accompanied by his own servant, John Bolton, to go into every apartment, par- ticularly those on the first and attic story, examined every place of concealment, and saw each door fastened, save those to chambers occupied by the family. This done, he went to bed in the room over the servants' hall.

" Captain Luttrell and my brother's man, with arms, Bat up in the chintz room adjoining, and my brother was to be called on any alarm.

"I lay that night in Elizabeth Godin's room, atid

496 HAUNTED HOMES.

the children in the nurseries ; thus every chamber on that floor was occupied. I bolted and locked the door that opened to that floor from the back stairs, so that there was no entrance unless through the room where Captain Luttrell kept watch.

" So soon as I lay down, I heard a rustling as of a person close to the door. I ordered Elizabeth Godin to sit up a while, and, if the noise continued, to go and acquaint Mr. Luttrell.

" She heard it, and instantly Mr. Luttrell's room door was thrown open, and we heard him speak.

"I must now give his account, as related to my brother and myself the next morning.

"He said he heard the footsteps of a person walking across the lobby, that he instantly threw the door open, and called, ' Who goes there ? ' That something flitted past him, when my brother directly called out, ' Look against my door.' He was awake, and heard what Mr. Luttrell had said, and also the continuance of the same noise till it reached his door. He arose and joined Mr. Luttrell. Both astonished, they heard various other noises, examined everywhere, found the staircase door fast secured as I had left it. I lay so near, and had never closed my eyes ; no one could go to that door unheard. My brother and his man pro- ceeded up-stairs, and found the servants in their own rooms, and all doors closed as they had seen just before. They sat up together, my brother and Mr. Luttrell, till break of day, when my brother returned to his own chamber. About that time, as I imagined., I

HINTON AMPNER MANOR HOUSE. 497

heard the chintz room door opened and slammed to with the utmost violence, and immediately that of the hall chamber opened and shut in the same manner. I mentioned to Godin my surprise that my brother, who was ever attentive not to alarm or disturb the children, should hazard both by such vehement noise. An hour after I heard the house door open and slam in the same way, so as to shake the house. No one person was then up, for, as I had never slept, I heard the servants rise and go down about half an hour afterwards. When we were assembled at breakfast, I observed the noise my brother had made with the doors.

" Mr. Luttrell replied, ' I assure you Jervis made not the least noise ; it was your door and the next I heard opened and slapped in the way you describe.'

"My brother did not hear either. He afterwards acknowledged to me that when gone to bed, and Mr. Luttrell and I were sitting below, he heard dreadful groans and various noises that he was then and after unable to account for. His servant was at that time with mine below.

" Captain Luttrell declared the disturbances of the preceding night were of such a nature that the house was an unfit residence for any human being. My brother, though more guarded in his expressions, con- curred in that opinion, and the result of our delibera- tions was to send an express to Mr. Sainsbury, Lady Hillsborough's steward, to request he would come over immediately on a very particular occasion, with which he would be made acquainted on his arrival.

498 HAUNTED HOMES.

" Unluckily, Mr. Sainsbury was confined with tho gout, and sent over his clerk, a youth of fifteen, to whom we judged it useless and improper to divulge the circumstances.

"My brother sat up every night of the week he then passed at Hinton. In the middle of one of these nights I was surprised with the sound of a gun or pistol let off near me, immediately followed by groans, as of a person in agonies, or expiring, that seemed to proceed between my chamber and the next, the nursery. I sent Godin to Nurse Horner, to ask if she had heard any noise ; she had not. Upon my inquiry the next morning of my brother, he had (not?) heard it, though the report and groans were loud and deep.

" Several instances occurred where very loud noises were heard by one or two persons, when those equally near and in the same direction were not sensible of the least impression.

" As the watching every night made it necessary for my brother to gain rest in the day, he usually lay down after dinner. During one of these times he was gone to rest, I had sent the children and their attendants out to walk, the dairymaid gone to milk, the cook in the scullery, my own woman with my brother's man sitting together in the servant's hall ; I, reading in the parlour, heard my brothers bell ring with great quick- ness. I ran to his room, and he asked me if I had heard any noise; "because," said he, " as I was lying wide awake an immense weight seemed to fall through the ceiling to the floor just by that mahogany pre e£ an I

HINTON AMPNER MANOR HOUSE. 499

it is impossible I should be deceived.' His man was by this time come up, and said he was sitting under- neath the room, as I before mentioned, and heard not the least noise. The inquiry and attention my brother devoted to investigate this affair was such as from the reach of his capacity and ardent spirit might be expected; the result was his earnest request that I would quit the place, and, when obliged to return to Portsmouth, that I would permit him to send Mr. Nichols, his Lieutenant of Marines, and an old friend of the family, to continue till my removal with me. ^

" One circumstance is of a nature so singularly striking that I cannot omit to relate it. In one of our evening's conversations on this wonderful train of dis- turbances I mentioned a very extraordinary effect I had frequently observed in a favourite cat that was usually in the parlour with me, and when sitting on table or chair with accustomed unconcern she would suddenly slink down as if struck with the greatest terror, conceal herself under my chair, and put her head close to my feet. In a short space of time she would come forth quite unconcerned. I had not long given him this account before it was verified to him in a striking man- ner. We neither, then, nor I at other times, perceived the least noise that could give alarm to the animal, nor did I ever perceive the like effect before these disturb- ances, nor afterwards, when she was removed with me to another habitation. The servants gave the same account of a spaniel that lived in the house, but to that, as I did not witness, I cannot testify."

I 32

500 HAUNTED HOMES.

Various causes, as Mr. Barham records, were assigned in the neighbourhood for these supernatural visitations. The most popular reason was that which connected the late Lord Stawell, " a notorious evil liver," with the manifestations. He had had in his employment as a bailiff a certain Isaac Mackrel, a man with a remarkably hoarse, guttural voice, and one who was declared to have been well, or rather ill known as a pander to his master's vices. Although Mackrel had been detected in robbing his master, he was retained in his service, having evi- dently some private hold upon him.

There had resided in the Manor House with Lord Stawell a younger sister of his deceased wife, and, it was rumoured, a guilty intrigue had been carried on between these two. Although no child was known posi- tively to have been born, strong suspicions had been entertained on that score by the village gossips. The lady died at Hinton in 1754. In the year following Lord Stawell, as has been said, expired in a fit of apo- plexy, and sometime after the steward was killed by the fall of a fagot-stack.

Mrs. Eicketts and her friends endeavoured to trace out the origin of these rumours, but without much suc- cess. One day, indeed, an old man living in the poor- house at West Meon came to her, and said that his wife had often related to him that, in her younger days, a carpenter had told her that he was once sent for by Sir Hugh Stewkeley, and directed by him to take up some boards in the lobby, and that Sir Hugh had concealed something, which he (the carpenter) conceived was

HINTON AMPNER MANOR HOUSE. 501

treasure. Some investigation appears to have been made in consequence of this communication, but nothing came of it.

Sixtv pounds reward was offered bv Ladv Stawell for discovery of the cause of the disturbances, and this offer Mr. Ricketts, on his return to England, increased to one hundred, but no claim was ever made for the monev.

Meanwhile, Mrs. Kicketts removed to YVolvesey, the palace of the Bishop of Winchester, with whom she was connected by marriage. After her removal the people left in charge complained of some annoyances, but the manifestations do not appear to have been so frequent nor so terrifying.

Eventually the Manor House was let to a Mr. Law- rence, who forbade the servants saying a word about the disturbances, under penalty of losing their places. Not- withstanding this judicious rule, rumours were still pro- pagated, and it was stated that once, when the housemaid was standing in the lobby, a female figure rushed past and disappeared. Mr. Lawrence brought his family with him to Hinton, but, doubtless, the manifestations were too much for them ; he only stayed in the house for a year, and then left it suddenly.

After this, the Manor House was never occupied. In 1797 it was pulled down, and under the floor of the lobby there was found a box containing bones and what was said to be the skull of a monkey. No regular inquiry was made into the matter, and no professional opinion was ever sought as to the real character of the relic.

32*

502 HAUNTED HOMES.

The only person thought able to throw any light upon the mystery was an old woman who had been housekeeper in Lord Stawell's time : on her death-bed she expressed a desire to make a confession to a member of the Jervis family, but unfortunately she expired before the lady summoned could arrive.

It is declared that the subject was always a very sore one with the first Lord St. Vincent, and that any allu- sion to it commonly brought down a rebuke upon anyone who ventured to make it.

INCE HALL.

Ince Hall, famous as being connected with one of the most curious beliefs in existence, is an ancient Lanca- shire dwelling. In Koby and Wilkinson's popular Lancashire Lege?ids this old Hall is described as " one of those curious half-timbered mansions which are now becoming rare in this country. Its six sharply-pointed gables, and its long ranges of mullioned pointed win- dows, give it an imposing appearance from a distance ; and on a nearer approach the remains of a moat are visible, which proves that it had once possessed means of defence. The estate connected with the Hall be- longed to the Gerards for upwards of seven hundred years; the owners being descended from Walter Fitzothe, Castellan of Windsor., at the time when

p>. •-<

life

INCE HALL. 503

Domesday Book was compiled * His son William adopted the surname of de Windsor, but another son, Gerard, was contented to bear his ordinary patronymic, and became the ancestor of the Gerards of Bryn, now represented by Sir Robert Gerard, of Garswood Hall.

About the year 1368, John, the third son of Sir Peter Gerard, of Bryn, married Ellen, daughter and sole heiress of Richard de Ince, the representative of a very ancient family, dating very nearly, if not quite, from the Conquest. In consequence of this marriage, the town- ship of Ince passed to the Gerards, who, for many suc- ceeding generations, resided at the old Hall.

The tradition connected with the building now known as Ince Hall, which mansion was not erected till the reign of James the First, is thus related in the Lanca- shire Legends : " There is a story of wrong attaching to Ince Hall, which has given rise to the legend of * the Dead Hand.' One of its early possessors lay on his death-bed, and a lawyer was sent for at the last moment to make his will ; but before he reached him the man was dead. In this dilemma it was determined to try the effect of a dead man's hand on the corpse, and the attorney's clerk was sent for one to Bryn Hall in all haste. The body of the dead man was rubbed with the holy hand, and it was asserted that he revived suffi- ciently to sign his will. After the funeral a daughter of the deceased produced a will which was not signed, leaving the property to his son and daughter ; but the lawyer soon produced another will, signed by the dead hand, which conveyed all the property to himself. The

504 HAUNTED HOMES,

son quarrelled with the attorney, and after wounding him, as he supposed mortally, he left the country, and was never heard of more. The daughter also dis- appeared, but no one knew how or when. After many years the gardener turned up a skull in the garden with his spade, and the secret was revealed. When this took place the Hall had long been uninhabited ; for the mur- dered daughter's ghost hung suspended in the air before the dishonest lawyer wherever he went. It is said that he spent the remainder of his days in Wigan, the victim of remorse and despair. There is a room in the Hall which is said to be haunted by the ghost of a young lady, and her shadowy form is frequently seen by the passers-by hovering over the spot where her remains were buried."

The Dead Hand.

The " Dead Hand," or the " Holy Hand," as it is sometimes styled, alluded to in the foregoing tradition, is the centre around which quite a galaxy of marvellous tales have gathered. It is known to have belonged to Father Edmund Arrowsmith, a Jesuit, who suffered the extreme penalty of the law at Lancaster, on the 28th August 1628.

The cause of Father Arrowsmith's trial and execution has been variously stated, certain sceptical persons alleging that he had been found guilty of some foul crime, and that the tale of his martvrdom for the sake of his faith, and the miracles which attest his sanctity, have been invented for the purpose of preventing scandal

INCE HALL. 505

in the Church. The onus probandi lies, of course, with them, and until these unbelievers in miraculous intervention can adduce any evidence on behalf of their allegations, there does not appear to be any reason for refusing to accept the testimony of the Catholics, which is to the following effect.

Arrowsmith was born at Haydock, in the parish of Winwick, Lancashire, in 1585. In 1605 he entered the Jesuit College at Douay, and in 1612 was ordained priest. The next year he was sent on a mission to England ; and in 1623 was apprehended and taken to Lancaster on a charge of being a Eomish priest, con- trary to the laws " in that case made and provided." He was tried for this offence, found guilty, sentenced to death, and executed. After his body was cut down one of his friends or, as other accounts say, his spiritual attendant, cut off his right hand, in compliance with his dying injunctions, and to fulfil his dying promise that he should work miraculous cures on those who had faith in its efficacy.

For many years the hand was kept at Bryn Hall, and when that ancient edifice was demolished it was removed to Garswood Hall, Sir Kobert Gerard's residence. Ultimately it was placed in the Catholic Chapel at Ashton-in-Maskerfield, where it now is in custody of the priest. This holy relic, by which so many marvel- lous cures have been wrought, is most carefully preserved in a white silk bag. We have before us an account of a case which occurred in August 1872 : a woman named Catherine Collins, was sent to the Wigan Workhouse a

506 HAUNTED HOMES.

wholly destitute. She had been sitting all day on a door-step, after having come out of the workhouse at Salford on leave, and walked all the way from that town to Mackerfield, in order to have the " Holy Hand " applied to her side, which was paralyzed. When her case came before the Wigan Board of Guardians, Mr. Clarke, one of the guardians for Ashton, informed the Board that hundreds of persons visited the township on a similar errand to that of this paralytic woman.

JEDBURGH CASTLE.

Even the ruins of this ancient border-fortress have disappeared, and its site is, or was recently, occupied by a large prison. But time was in Scottish history that Jedburgh boasted of an important and even magnificent castle, that was the favourite residence of royalty. William the Lion and Alexander the Second often graced it with their regal presence, but it was left to Alexander the Third to still further enhance its glory and carry its splendour to its highest pitch. The childless monarch, having determined upon marrying again, ordered the wedding festival to be kept at Jed- burgh, and there, in October 1285, he was united in marriage to Jolande, or, as some style her, Joleta, daughter of the Count of Dreux.

Notwithstanding the high character borne by King

JEDBURGH CASTLE. 507

Alexander, and the universal festivity and jollification, melancholy forebodings were not wanting on the occa- sion of this wedding. The hilarity, indeed, of the royal host and his guests was destroyed, or at all events overshadowed, by a circumstance by many deemed supernatural, and of which no explanation has ever yet been afforded. The occurrence appears to have given Edgar Poe a hint which he expanded into the tale, if such it may be termed, of The Masque of the Red Death. Whilst the wedding revelry was at its height, a figure was suddenly observed by the startled guests, gliding through their midst. In the poet's imaginative words, the figure is described as "tall and gaunt, and shrouded from head to foot in the habiliments of the grave. The mask which concealed the visage was made so nearly to resemble the countenance of a stiffened corpse that the closest scrutiny must have had difficulty in detecting the cheat."

" * Who dares ? ' " he makes the royal host demand, ' insult us with this blasphemous mockery ? Seize him and unmask him, that we may know whom we have to hang at sunrise from the battlements ! ' . . .

" At first, as he spoke, there was a slight rushing movement of the group of pale courtiers in the direction of the intruder . . . but, from a certain nameless awe with which the mad assumption of the mummer had inspired the whole party, there was found none who put forth hand to seize him, so that . . . while the vast assembly, as if with one impulse, shrank from the centre of the room to the walls, he made his way uninter-

508 HAUNTED HOMES.

ruptedly, but with the same solemn and measured step which had distinguished him from the first." Ultimately, the revellers take courage, and, " seizing the mummer, whose tall figure stood erect and motionless," they " gasped in unutterable horror at finding the grave cerements and corpse-like mask which they handled with so violent a rudeness, untenanted by any tangible form ! "

Less terrifying, yet not the less suggestive, are the lines of Heywood, Hierarchie of the Blessed Angels, when recounting the ill-omened tale : —

In the mid revels, the first ominous night

Of their espousals, when the moon shone bright

With lighted tapers — the King and Queen leading

The curious measures, lords and ladies treading

The self-same strains — the King looks hack by chance,

And spies a strange intruder fill the dance ;

Namely, a mere anatomy, quite bare ;

His naked limbs both without flesh and hair,

(As we decipher Death), who stalks about,

Keeping true measure till the dance be out.

Nothing further is known of this spectral appearance, which had glided so suddenly into the midst of the startled revellers, and had as suddenly and as mys- teriously vanished. But everyone felt that it was the portent of some great approaching calamity. Thomas the Eymer, the famous seer and prophet, informed the Earl of March, in the presence of several persons, that the 16th of March should be " the stormiest day that ever was witnessed in Scotland." The day came clear and mild, and the scoffers laughed the prophecy to

LONDON I BROOK STEEET. 509

scorn, when suddenly came the news that the King was dead. "That is the storm which I meant," said Thomas, " and there was never tempest which will hring more ill luck to Scotland." The seer was right.

Alexander the Third, riding in the dusk, between Burntisland and Kinghorn, was thrown from his horse over a precipice, and killed, in his forty-fifth year, a few months after his marriage. When the sad news spread, causing distraction among the people, and civil war between the claimants to the vacant throne, manv thought of the dire omen which had appeared at the King's wedding, and deemed that it had been sent to betoken his speedy and premature death.

LONDON : BEOOK STEEET.

In a work by Mr. H. Spicer, entitled Strange Things Among Us, is related the story we are about to narrate, but with the names of all the persons and places sug- gested by initial letters only. After no little trouble, we have succeeded in identifying the names implied, and now give the tale in a completed condition. It is stated to have been communicated to the writer by a friend of Lady Clark, from whose own lips the story had been received : —

" One morning, some years since, the wife of a di«-

510 HAUNTED HOMES.

tinguished London physician was in bed, at her house in Brook Street. It was daylight, and she was broad awake. The door opened ; but Lady Clark, concluding that it was her maid entering, did not raise her head, until a remarkable-looking figure, passing between hei bed and .the window, walked up to the fire-place, when, reflected in the mirror which hung above, Lady Clark recognized the features of her step-son, Dr. John Forbes Clark, then attached to a foreign embassy. He wore a long night-dress, and carried something on his arm.

" ' Good Heavens ! Is that yoa, John, and in that dress ? ' cried Lady Clark, in the first surprise.

" The figure turned slowly round, and she then became aware that the object he carried was a dead child, the body being swathed round and round in a large Indian scarf of remarkable workmanship, which Lady Clark had presented to Mrs. John Clark on the eve of her departure.

"As she gazed, the outlines of the figure became indistinct, invisible, vanishing in the grey light, or blending with the familiar objects in the room.

" Lady Clark neither fainted nor shrieked, nor even rang the bell. She lay back and thought the matter over, resolving to mention it to no one until the return of her husband, then absent in attendance on an illustrious household. His experience would* decide whether her physical health offered any solution of the phenomenon. As for its being a dream, it may be taken as an accepted fact that, though nobody is con-

LONDON : BKOOK STEEET. 511

scious of the act of going to sleep, everybody knows by the sudden change of scenery, by the snapping of the chain of thought, and so forth, when he has been sleeping.

" Very shortly after, Sir James returned home. On hearing the story, he immediately looked at the tongue that related such wonders, and likewise felt the lady's pulse. Both organs perfect. Of her nerves he had seen proof. Touching veracity, she was truth itself. All his skill could devise nothing better than a recom- mendation to patience, and to see what came of it. In the meantime, the day and hour were noted down,

and the next advices from T awaited with more

than usual interest.

" At length they came. Dr. John Forbes Clark informed his father that their child, an only one, had died on such a day (that of the apparition), and that his wife, anxious that it should be laid to rest in the land of its birth, had begged that it might be forwarded by the next homeward ship. In due course it arrived, embalmed, but enclosed in a coffin so much larger than was required for the tiny occupant, that the intervening spaces had to be filled up with clothes, &c, while the Indian scarf had been wound, in many folds, around the child's body."

,512 HAUNTED HOMES.

LONDON: THE HUMMUMS.

In the thirteenth chapter of Boswell's Life of Johnson, will be found a sigular account of an apparition which appeared in Covent Garden, at a place called the " Old Hummunis." The story is slight, but it is famous ; and should, therefore, find a place in this collection. Some description of the place where the apparition appeared is necessary, in order to comprehend the full force of the impression which the account of its being seen there made upon the public mind.

In the south-east corner of Covent Garden market- place were quite recently two hotels known by the strange names of the " Old Hummums " and the " New Hummums." The name is said to be a corruption of the Turkish name " Hamam," a bath. These buildings were originally devoted to the use of what is now known as " the Turkish Bath/' an institution introduced into England many years ago, the so-called "Turkish Bath" of the present day being only a revival of what was once very fashionable, but which, for a long time, had grown obsolete and been forgotten. These Hummums, how- ever, when first established in London, seem to have been mostly frequented by characters of ill reputation, and became, as in the East, a favourite rendezvous for gossip. They speedily grew to be useful for the purposes of intrigue, and this circumstance gradually led to their suppression as baths. Both the Old Hummums and the New Hummums were changed into respectable hotels,

LONDON : THE HUMMUMS. 513

which character they have retained until their recent demolition, the original signification of their former titles being almost forgotten.

The " Old Hummums " was the scene of what the great Dr. Johnson pronounced " the best accredited ghost story that he had ever heard/' The individual whose apparition was said to have appeared there was a Mr. Ford, a relation or connection of the learned doctor himself, and is said to have been the riotous parson of Hogarth's " Midnight Modern Conversation." Boswell, relating a conversation which took place at Mr. Thrale's house, at Streatham, between himself and Dr. Johnson, savs : —

" Amongst the numerous prints pasted on the walls of the dining-room of Streatham was Hogarth's 'Modern Midnight Conversation.' I asked him what he knew of Parson Ford, who makes a conspicuous figure in the riotous group. Johnson said : ' Sir, he was my acquain- tance and relation ; my mother's nephew. He had pur- chased a living in the country, but not simoniacally. I never saw him but in the country. I have been told he was a man of great parts ; very profligate, but I never heard he was impious/ Boswell asked, ' Was there not a story of his ghost having appeared ? ' Johnson said, ' Sir, it was believed. A waiter at the Hummums, in which house Ford died, had been absent for some time, and returned, not knowing that Ford wras dead. Going down to the cellar, according to the story, he met him ; going down again, he met him a second time. When he came up, he asked some of the people of

514 HAUNTED HOMES.

the house what Ford could be doing there. They told him Ford was dead. The waiter took a fever, in which he lay for some time. When he recovered he said he had a message to deliver to some women from Ford ; but he was not to tell what, or to whom. He walked out; he was followed, but somewhere about St. Paul's they lost him. He came back, and said he had delivered the message, and the women exclaimed, " Then we are all undone ! ' Dr. Pellet, who was not a credulous man, inquired into the truth of this story, and he said the evidence was irresistible. My wife went to the Hummums (it is a place where people get themselves cupped). I believe she went with the intention to hear about this story of Ford. At first they were unwilling to tell her ; but after they had talked to her she came away satisfied that it was true. To be sure the man had a fever, and this vision may have been the begin ning of it. But if the message to the women, and their behaviour upon it, were true as related, there was some- thing supernatural. That rests upon his word, and there it remains. ' "

LONDON: SOUTHAMPTON FIELDS.

A very curious, but not an unparalleled, tradition is that referring to the so-called " Field of the Forty Foot- steps." The story, as generally told, and as adapted by Jane and Anna Maria Potter, in their romance on

London: Southampton fields. 5lo

the subject, is that two brothers, having taken different sides in the Duke of Monmouth's rebellion, met, and, having engaged each other in fight, were both killed. Where they fought was in a field at the back of the British Museum, at the extreme north-east of Upper Montague Street, formerly known as Southampton Fields. Where the steps of the two desperate men pressed the ground no grass, according to tradition, would ever grow, and for many years the impressions, said to have been forty, of their feet, remained bare and ungrown over.

Many other accounts of this popular tradition exist, however, and from them may be selected the following, the substance of which appeared in the Arminian Magazine for 1781. The Brothers Steps, as they are styled, are stated to be discoverable in a field about the third of a mile northward from Montague House, now replaced by the British Museum. Their origin is, according to this version, due to the footprints of two brothers who quarrelled about a worthless woman, and fought out their quarrel at this place. u The prints of their feet," says this authority, " are about the depth of three inches, and nothing will vegetate, so much as to disfigure them. The number is only eighty-three " {forty may have been adopted for its alliterative sound), "but probably some at present are filled up. For I think there were formerly more in the centre, where each unhappy combatant wounded the other to death. And a bank on which the first fell retains the form of his agonizing couch by the curse of barrenness, while

33

516 HAUNTED HOMES*

grass flourishes all about it. Mr. George Hall, who was the librarian of Lincoln's Inn, first showed me those steps twenty-eight years ago, when, I think, they were not quite so deep as now. He remembered them about thirty years, and the man who first showed them him about thirty more, which goes back to the year 1692 ; but I suppose they originated in the reign of King Charles the Second.* My mother well remembered their being ploughed up, and corn sown to deface them, about fifty years ago. But all was labour in vain, for the prints returned, in a while, to their pristine form, as probably will those that are now filled up.'-'

The above account of the The Brothers' Footsteps appeared so extraordinary to the Editor of the Arminian Magazine that, as he says, he did not know what to think of it. He knew his informant to be a person of good understanding and real piety, and yet " he testified what he had seen with his own eyes/' To satisfy him- self about the strange recital, the Editor determined to seek out more evidence, and he soon found it.

"Awhile ago," runs his narrative, "being at Mr. Cary's, in Copthall Buildings, I occasionally mentioned The Brothers' Footsteps, and asked the company if they had heard anything of them. ' Sir,' said Mr. Cary, ' sixteen years agu I saw and counted them myself.' Another added, ' And I saw them four years ago.' I could no longer doubt but they had been seen. And, a week or two after, I went with Mr. Cary and another person to seek them.

* The Duke of Monmouth's rebellion took place in 1685. — Ed.

LOSTOCK TOWEB. 517

w We sought for nearly half an hour in vain. We could find no steps at all within a quarter of a mile, no, nor half a mile, north of Montague House. We were almost out of hope, when an honest man, who was at work, directed us to the next ground, adjoining to a pond. There we found what we sought for, about three-quarters of a mile north of Montague House, and about five hundred vards east of Tottenham Court Eoad.

The steps answer Mr. W 's description. They are

of the size of a large human foot, about three inches deep, and lie nearly from north-east to south-west. We counted only seventy-six ; but we were not exact in counting. The place where one, or both, the brothers are supposed to have fallen is still bare of grass. The labourer showed us also the bank where (the tradition is) the wretched woman sat to see the combat."

LOSTOCK TOWEE.

Lostock Tower, about four miles to the west of Bolton, is one of the numerous haunted homes of Lancashire. It figures in Roby's well-known Lancashire Legends as the locality of a cruel wrong, aud proves that appari- tions have more regard for moral than legal rights. The Tower was formerly an imposing structure, built chiefly of wood and plaster, and surrounded by a moat. The gateway, which occupies the site of a much more

33*

518 HAUNTED HOMES.

ancient building, is now almost all that is left of the Anderton's old homestead. It is chiefly " built of brick and stone, interspersed with string courses and mould- ings. The windows are very large, and are divided into compartments by strong mullions."

" Over one of the upper windows," writes Mr. Wil- kinson, " there is a deep panel containing a coat of arms, now almost obliterated. On the front of the house there is the date ' a.d. 1591 ' ; and a panel over the doorway, on which is the inscription ' S. F. A. 1702,' obviously marks the period when this portion of the Hall was either enlarged or repaired. This cha- racteristic residence was not very judiciously situated, according to modern ideas. There is much low ground in the neighbourhood, which contains several rather picturesque sheets of water, and it is, besides, in the immediate vicinity of the boggy tract known as Red Moss. The river Croal rises from this marshy ground, which, after passing through Bolton, falls into the Irwell ; the far-famed Douglas, also, has its origin in the same Moss, and, after flowing through Wigan, falls into the Kibble near Hesketh.

" Lostock Tower formerly belonged to the Andertons, but has since merged into the hands of the Blundells of Ince. There is a story of wrong connected with one of the early Andertons, which has passed into a tradi- tion, and is even yet a source of heart-burning to a family named Heaton, resident in a neighbouring town- ship of the same name. This tradition states that one of the Heatons was an improvident man, and wasted

LOSTOCK TOWER. 519

much of his patrimony. He became deeply involved in debt, and mortgaged his township to Anderton of the Tower. The day for payment duly arrived, but the Heatons had not raised the money. The evening passed on, and at a somewhat early hour the Andertons retired to bed. They had not lain long before the Heatons were thundering at the doors ; for they had raised the amount at the last moment, and were ready to pay. The owner of the Tower, however, coveted the property, and refused to let them in, because they ought to have been ready before the going down of the sun. On the morrow he said they were too late, and declared that the mortgage was foreclosed.

" The wrong done to the Heatons was never for- given, for the family was utterly ruined; and it is stated that the soul of the wrongdoer is doomed to re- visit the scene of his crime until the property is restored. It is also affirmed that no horse from the Tower, so long as it was occupied by an Anderton, could ever be forced to cross the stream into the manor of Heaton. Sir Francis Anderton took part in the Rebellion of 1745, and soon after lost his estates. In 1750 he was reported to be over sixty years of age, and childless ; his property was held by the Crown under trustees, and eventually passed to the Blundells, he living in retire- ment until his death. This gentleman's fate is con- sidered to be an act of retributive justice for the wrong done to the Heaton family by his ancestor of the Tower.

520 HAUNTED HOMES.

MONTGOMERY.

In 1852 the Rev. R. Mostyn Pryce published an account of certain circumstances of a singular charac- ter which had occurred in Montgomery. In the Intro- duction to his narrative, he refers to a solitary grave in a remote corner of the churchyard, known as " The Robber's Grave." It is not a raised mound, but is a bare space, level with the surrounding ground, and is of the shape and size of a coffin. The story con- nected with this grassless grave is to the following effect : —

At Chirbury, in the vicinity of Montgomery, was Oakfield, a house (that in better days had been a manor house) which, with the surrounding farm, was possessed by a widow named Morris. Her husband, a dissolute, indolent man, had left her and their only child, a daughter, in distressed circumstances, and, for some time, it was supposed that Mrs. Morris would have to part with the property, in which case it was to be let to a Thomas Pearce, to whose ancestors it had formerly belonged. Pearce had long waited and watched in hopes of one day becoming a tenant of the property his ancestors had squandered away; but just at the time when his expectations appeared to be on the point of realization, they were utterly frustrated. A young man styled " John Newton " in the story,* from Stafford-

* His real name was John Da vies.

MONTGOMEBY. 521

shire, having been introduced to Mrs. Morris by her brother, was taken into her service as bailiff, and managed the farm for her with such assiduity and skill, that in a little while it became prosperous and flourish- ing, and all thoughts of resigning it to Pearce were relinquished.

Newton, to whose able management and industry this improvement was due, was an utter stranger to the neighbourhood. Nor did he appear willing to make any acquaintances beyond what business arrangements necessitated. He was obliged to attend the neighbour- ing fairs and markets, and he was a regular attendant at Chirbury Church ; but he kept only his own com- pany and his own counsel, even all the efforts of the clergyman of the parish failing to draw him out of his secluded habits and reserved manner. " He was, in- deed," says Mr. Pryce, "for the most part, a melancholy grief-haunted man. Yet, in the pursuit of his occupa- tions at Oakfield, he appeared contented and happy. His manner and behaviour towards the widow and her daughter were, at all times, marked with respect and even cheerfulness. He seemed to consider it a part of his duty to alleviate, by every means in his power, their cares and troubles, and to lighten their domestic soli- tude. Occasionally, when the day had closed upon his toils, he would read to them."

For more than two years this state of affairs lasted, and Mrs. Morris was by no means displeased to notice that her daughter's sentiments towards Newton were of a very friendly nature. " She watched with a mother's

522 HAUNTED HOMES.

anxiety and a mother's approbation," says our autho- rity, " the growing affection of her child towards the stranger: for he was a stranger still. Studiously avoid- ing all reference to himself, his kindred, or his former life, he shrank sensitively from any allusion to the past, and felt grateful to them both when, with instinctive delicacy, they seemed content that his early history should remain unknown to them."

The stranger's skilful management of Oakfield, and the continually increasing interest which he appeared to obtain in its household, had excited anything but pleasurable feelings in more breasts than one. Thomas Pearce had naturally felt jealous with Newton, and was intensely disappointed " when baffled in his hopes of sheltering himself again beneath the roof-tree of his forefathers," yet he had apparently lived down his regrets. But Robert Parker, a young farmer and neigh- bour of Pearce, hated Newton with a still keener hate, for in him he beheld a successful rival for the affections of Jane Morris, of whom he had long been a fond but, as yet, unprofessed lover.

These two disappointed and vengeance-seeking men met frequently to discuss matters, and, at last, devised a plan for getting rid of the obnoxious stranger. Their proceedings are thus detailed by Mr. Pryce : —

" It was at length resolved to charge Newton with s ome offence which should banish him the country.

" An opportunity of accomplishing their purpose at length occurred. Newton had been attending a fair in the neighbourhood, and was detained on business till a

MONTGOMERY. 523

late hour, It was six o'clock on a dark November evening, when he left Welshpool to walk home. Parker, who had been stealthily watching his proceedings, fol- lowed, with Pearce, at a little distance. In a short time Newton was brought back to town by the two men, taken before a magistrate, charged with high-way robbery, and committed."

The charge brought against him by the two confede- rates, men of known respectability, was that of '* High- way robbery with violence," a crime, at that time, punishable with death. The prisoner employed no counsel, asked the witnesses no questions, and merely protested his innocence of the charge.

He was pronounced "Guilty." When the judge asked him if he had anything to say why sentence of death should not be passed upon him, he responded in a firm voice, that he forgave those men upon whose false testimony he had been convicted, "But, my Lord,'' he exclaimed, " I protest most solemnly, before that God in whose presence I must shortly appear, I am entirely guiltless of the crime for which I am about to suffer. . . . I do not say that I am an innocent man. I have committed a crime, but it is known only to my Creator and myself. I have endeavoured to atone for it by all the means in my power . . . and I humbly believe I have been forgiven. ... I protest once more, I am entirely innocent of this charge. ... It is my devout and earnest desire that the stain of this crime may not rest upon my name. ... I have, therefore, in humble devotion, offered a prayer to heaven, and believe it has

524 HAUNTED HOMES.

been heard and accepted. ... I venture to assert that if I am innocent of the crime for which I suffer, the grass, for one generation, at least, will not cover my grave"

The unfortunate man was condemned and executed, and his remains were buried in Montgomery Church- yard. It was noticed that no sooner did the bell begin to toll for the execution than the sky became overcast ; •' no sooner had he placed his foot upon the scaffold than a fearful darkness spread around; and the moment the fatal bolt was withdrawn, the lightnings flashed with terrific vividness, the thunders rolled in awful majesty, until the town hill seemed shaken to its base ; the rain poured down in torrents; the multitude dis- persed horror-stricken and appalled, some crying out, ' The end of all things is come ! '" This was in 1821.

Of the two witnesses against the unfortunate man, Parker became a dissolute drunkard and was killed at the blasting of some rocks in the lime-works in Llany- mynech, whilst the other, Pearce, became dispirited and, as our informant remarks, " wasted away from the earth." Mrs. Morris and her daughter left Oak- field for ever.

Writing in 1852, Mr. Pryce says : " Thirty years have passed away and the grass has not covered his grave!" And again : "Numerous attempts have, from time to time, been made by some who are still alive, and others who have passed away, to bring grass upon that bare spot. Fresh soil has been frequently spread

MONTGOMERY. 525

upon it, and seeds of various kinds have been sown ; but not a blade has ever been known to spring from them, and the soil has soon become a smooth, and cold, and stubborn clay."

In 1852, soon after Mr. Pryce's narrative had been written, " some sacrilegious hand " covered the grave with turf, and so tended it, that it grew all over it, save at the head, which remained bare, with the turf withered " as if blasted by the lightning's stroke." A month or so, and the grass again died away, leaving the grave once more bare !

The Rev. Fred. W. Parker, Rector of Montgomery, informs us that there is still a bare spot over the grave, which he has known for thirty-eight years, but that it is not so large as it has been in his memory. Mr. Parker has, also, kindly forwarded us a copy of a statement made some years ago by William Weeks, the then Parish Clerk, confirming some of the particulars above given, and stating that he made the grave (in 1821), and buried John Davies, and that " attempts have been made by different persons to cause the grass to grow on the grave by putting fresh soil and sowing seeds, &c, but hitherto without success. The grave has always returned, in a short time after each experiment, to the state in which it now is."

526 HAUNTED HOMES.

OKEHAMPTON.

In January 1884, Mr. James Spry sent an account to The Western Antiquary, of a supernatural being, popu- larly known as " Benjie Gear," which long troubled Okehampton and the neighbourhood with its pranks, and even now-a-days occasionally disturbs the good folks thereabouts. There is little in the legend connected with this apparition to distinguish it from many similar bits of folk-lore which crop up in most parts of England, but as a specimen of its class it is worth citation.

On the high gable end of an ancient house in Oke- hampton may be seen two gigantic iron letters, the initials of Benjamin Gayer, a former inhabitant. The house may readily be discovered, as it abuts on an irregular triangle formed by the houses behind the chantry. These initials, in italic capitals, are alluded to, in a local metrical version of the legend they com- memorate, thus : —

Behind the chantry mote be yred,

The initial scroll of the burgher dead.

Stout of heart they esteem the wight

"Who reads these letters at dead of night ;

Though the moon be glinted back the while

From the oriel light of the chantry aisle :

Never pass but breathe a prayer

For the soul's best peace on Master Gayer,

Tcedio vitoz quo confectus

Nunc ad ozthera transvectus,

Socius fuit qui sanctorum,

Ccelu gaudeat angelorum !

Where life's troubled waters rest,

In the haven of the blest.

OKEHAMPTON. 52?

Mr. Spry suggests that the citizen thus commemorated may have been almoner of the money collected from the charitable of his time for the ransom of captives in Mohammedan lands, and that he may have appropriated such alms to his own use; hence his unsettled condition in the spirit "world. His reason for this opinion would appear to be this extract u from a note on the history of Okehampton " : —

" Mr. B. Gayer, with the philanthropy of a good burgess, as shown in his collections for the relief of poor Protestant prisoners in Turkey, would have been, but for these researches, a dead letter in the book of his little history : but tradition has preserved an ugly report of his own unquiet and imprisoned spirit. What child, or eke man or woman of our town, but has, some time or other, been terrified or amused at the story of Gayer the revenant ? "

Notwithstanding the statement that this old citizen Btill haunts his native place, he is declared to have been laid some years ago. Mr. Spry's account is that Benjie Gear troubled the inhabitants of Okehampton to such an extent that " the aid of the Archdeacon was called in, and the clergy were assembled in order that the troubled spirit might be laid and cease to trouble them. There were twenty-three of the clergy who invoked him in various classic languages, but the insubordinate spirit refused to listen to their request. At length one, more learned than the rest, addressed him in Arabic, to which he was forced to succumb, saying, ' Now thou art come, I must be gone ! ' He

528 HAUNTED HOMES*

was then compelled to take the form of a colt ; a new bridle and bit, which had never been used, were pro- cured, with a rider, to whom the Sacrament was admini- stered. The man was directed to ride the colt to Cranmere Pool on Dartmoor, the following instructions being given him. He was to prevent the colt from turning its head towards the town until they were out of the Park, and then make straight for the Pool, and when he got to the slope, to slip from the colt's back, pull the bridle off, and let him go. All this was dexterously performed, and the impetus thus gained by the animal with the intention of throwing the rider over its head into the Pool, accomplished its own fate."

As the citizens of Okehampton are still somewhat nervous on the score of meeting old " Benjie Gear's " apparition, the " laying," after all, was, probably, only temporary, or not so well carried out as it should have been.

PERTH.

A frequent objection to ghostly visitants is that they trouble folks for no apparent purpose : they come and go, without seeming to accomplish anything more than the disarrangement of the spectator's nervous system. Such an objection cannot be raised against the follow*

PEKTH. 529

ing curious account, related by the Earl of Shrewsbury to Dr. Binns, and published by the latter in his Anatomy of Sleep, with the remark that " perhaps there is not a better authenticated case on record." The apparently trivial nature of the spectral communication, so different from the deadly or important presage commonly accorded to the appearance of ghosts, only renders this case more noteworthy. The story was originally told to the Countess of Shrewsbury by the Kev. Charles McKay, a Catholic priest, in the following letter, dated Perth, October 21, 1842 :—

"In July 1838 I left Edinburgh, to take charge of the Perthshire missions. On my arrival in Perth, the principal station, I was called upon by a Presbyterian woman (Anne Simpson by name), who for more than a week had been in the utmost anxiety to see a priest. On asking her what she wanted with me, she answered, 1 Oh, Sir, I have been terribly troubled for several nights by a person appearing to me during the night.' ' Are you a Catholic, my good woman ? ' 'No, Sir; I am a Presbyterian.' ' Why, then, do you come to me ? I am a Catholic priest.' ' But, Sir, she (meaning the person that had appeared to her) desired me to go to the priest, and I have been inquiring for a priest during the last week.' ' Why did she wish you to go to the priest ? ' ' She said she owed a sum of money, and the priest would pay it.' 'What was the sum of money she owed?' 'Three and tenpence, Sir.' 'To whom did she owe it?' ' I do not know, Sir.' 'Are you sure you have not been dreaming ? ' ' Oh, God forgive you !

530 HAUNTED HOMES.

for she oppears to me every night. I can get no rest.' * Lhd you know the woman you say appears to you ? ' ' I was poorly lodged, Sir, near the barracks, and I often saw and spoke to her as she went in and out to the barracks, and she called herself Maloy.'

" I made inquiry, and found that a woman of that name had died, who had acted as washerwoman and followed the regiment. Following up the inquiry, I found a grocer with whom she had dealt, and, on asking him if a person, a female, named Maloy, owed him any- thing, he turned up his books, and told me she did owe him three and tenpence. I paid the sum. The grocer knew nothing of her death, nor, indeed, of her character, but that she was attached to the barracks. Subsequently the Presbyterian woman came to me, saying that she was no more troubled."

PORTSMOUTH.

The Life of the Rev. R. H. Barham, as these pages will show, contains more than one singular narration of the supernatural. One of the most popular is that related by Mrs. Hughes, of an apparition seen at Ports- mouth ; and although the exact house in that seaport is not mentioned by name, the story itself is so frequently alluded to, that, despite this want of authenticated locality, it should be included in our collection. It

PORTSMOUTH. 531

was narrated to Mrs. Hughes by Mrs. Hastings, wife of Captain Hastings, R.N., and is to the following effect :

Captain and Mrs. Hastings were driving into Ports- mouth one afternoon, when a Mr. Hamilton, who had recently been appointed to a situation in the dockyard there, made a third in their chaise, being on his way to take possession of his post. As the vehicle passed the end of one of the narrow lanes which abound in the town, the latter gentleman, who had for some little time been more grave and silent than usual, broke through the reserve which had drawn a remark from the lady, and gave the following reason for his taciturnity :

"It was," said he, "the recollection of the lane we have just passed, and of a very singular circumstance which occurred to me at a house in it some eighteen years ago, which occupied my thoughts at the moment, and which, as we are old friends, and I know you will not laugh at me, I will repeat to you.

" At the period alluded to, I had arrived in the town for the purpose of joining a ship in which I was about to proceed abroad. On inquiry, I found that the vessel had not come round from the Downs, but was expected every hour. The most unpleasant part of the business was, that two or three King's ships had just been paid off in the harbour, a county election was going on, and the town was filled with people waiting to occupy berths in an outward-bound fleet which a contrary wind had for some days prevented from sailing. This com- bination of p-vents, of course, made Portsmouth very

34

532 HAUNTED HOMES.

full and very disagreeable. After wandering half over the town without success, I at length happened to inquire at a decent-looking public-house, situate in the lane alluded to, where a very civil, though a very cross- looking landlady at length made me happy by the intelligence that she would take me in, if I did not mind sleeping in a double-bedded room. I certainly did object to a fellow-lodger, and so I told her; but as I coupled the objection with an offer to pay handsomely for both beds, though I should occupy only one of them, our bargain was settled, and I took possession of my apartment.

" Having retired for the night, and having, as I thought, carefully locked the door to keep out intruders, I undressed, jumped beneath the clothes, and fell fast asleep.

" I had slept, I suppose, an hour or more, when I was awakened by a noise in the lane below. I was turning round to recompose myself, when I peroeived, by the light of the moon which shone brightly into the room, that the bed opposite was occupied by a man, having the appearance of a sailor. He was only partially undressed, having his trousers on, and what appeared to be a belcher handkerchief tied round his head by way of a nightcap. His position was half sitting, half reclining on the outside of the bed, and he seemed to be fast asleep.

" I was, of course, very angry that the landlady should have broken her covenant with me, and at first felt half disposed to desire the intruder to withdraw;

PORTSMOUTH. 533

but, as the man was quiet, and I had no particular wish to spend the rest of the night in an altercation, I thought it wiser to let things alone till the morning, when I determined to give my worthy hostess a good jobation for her want of faith. After watching him for some time, and seeing that my chum maintained the same posture, though he could not be aware that I was awake, I reclosed my eyes, and once more fell asleep.

" It was broad daylight when I awoke in the morning, and the sun was shining full in through the window. My slumbering friend apparently had never moved, and I had a fair opportunity of observing his features, which, though of a dark complexion, were not ill- favoured, and were set off by a pair of bushy black whiskers that would have done honour to a rabbi. What surprised me most, however, was that I could now plainly perceive that what I had taken in the moonlight for a red handkerchief on his forehead was in reality a white one, but quite saturated in parts with a crimson fluid, which trickled down his left cheek, and seemed to have run upon the pillow.

"At the moment the question occurred to me, how could the strauger have procured admission to the room ? as I saw but one door, and that I felt confident I had locked, while I was quite positive my gentleman had not been in the chamber when I retired to bed.

"I got out and walked to the door, which was in the centre of one side of the room, nearly half-way between the two beds ; and as I approached it, one of the

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534 HAUNTED HOMES.

curtains interposed for a moment so as to conceal my unknown companion from my view. I found the door fastened, with the key in the lock, just as I had left it. Not a little surprised at the circumstance, I now walked across to the further bed to get an explanation from my comrade, when, to my astonishment, he was nowhere to be seen ! Scarcely an instant before I had observed him stretched in the same position which he had all along maintained ; and it was difficult to conceive how he had managed to make his exit so instantaneously, as it were, without my having perceived or heard him. I, in consequence, commenced a close examination of the wainscot near the head of the bed, having first satisfied myself that he was concealed neither under it nor by the curtain. No door nor aperture of any kind was to be discovered.

" I was the first person up in the house ; a slipshod being, however, soon made its appearance, and began to place a few cinders, &c, in a grate not much cleaner than its own face and hands. From this individual I endeavoured to extract some information respecting my nocturnal visitor, but in vain ; it ' knowed nothing of no sailors,' and I was compelled to postpone my inquiries till the appearance of the mistress, who de- scended in due time.

"After greeting her with all the civility I could muster, I proceeded to inquire for my bill, telling her that I certainly should not take breakfast, nor do anything more for the good of the house, after her breach of promise respecting the privacy of my sleeping-room. The good

POBTSMOUTH. 535

lady met me at once with a * Marry come up ! ' a faint flush came over her cheeks, her little grey eyes twinkled, and her whole countenance gained in animation what it lost in placidity.

" ' What did I mean ? I had bespoke the whole room, and I had had the whole room ; and, though she said it, there was not a more comfortable room in all Portsmouth ; she might have let the spare bed five times over, and had refused because of my fancy. Did I think to bilk her ? and called myself a gentleman, she sup- posed ! '

" I easily stopped the torrent of her eloquence by depositing a guinea (about a fourth more than her whole demand) upon the bar, and was glad to relin- quish the offensive for the defensive. It was, therefore, with a most quaker-like mildness that I rejoined that certainly I had not to complain of any actual incon- venience from the vicinity of my fellow-lodger, but that, having agreed to pay double for the indulgence of my whim, if such she was pleased to call it, I, of course, expected the conditions to be observed on the other side; but I was now convinced that they had been violated without her privity, and that some of her people had doubtless introduced the man into the room, in igno- rance, probably, of our understanding.

" ' What man ? ' retorted she, briskly. * There was nobody in your room, unless you let him in yourself; had you not the key, and did not I hear you lock the door after you ? "

"That I admitted to be true. * Nevertheless,' added

536 HAUNTED HOMES.

I, taking up my portmanteau and half turning to depart, 1 there certainly was a man, a sailor, in my room last night ; though I know no more how he got in or out than I do where he got his hroken head or his uncon- scionable whiskers.'

" My foot was on the threshold as I ended, that I might escape the discharge of a reply which I foreboded would not be couched in the politest of terms. But it did not come; and, as I threw back a parting glance at my fair foe, I could not help being struck with the very different expression of her features from that which I had anticipated.

" I hesitated, and at length a single word, uttered distinctly but slowly, and as if breathlessly spoken, fell upon my ear ; it was ' Whiskers ! '

" ' Ay, whiskers,* I replied ; ' I never saw so splendid a pair in my life.'

" ' And a broken ! For Heaven's sake come back

one moment,' said the lady ; ' let me entreat you, Sir, to tell me, without disguise, who and what you saw in your bedroom last night.'

" 'No one, madam,' was my answer, 'but the sailor of whose intrusion I before complained, and who, I presume, took refuge there from some drunken fray to sleep off the effects of his liquor ; as, though evidently a good deal knocked about, he did not appear to be very sensible of his condition/

" An earnest request to describe his person followed, which I did to the best of my recollection, dwelling par- ticularly on the wounded temple and the remarkable

PORTSMOUTH. 537

whiskers, which formed, as it were, a perfect fringe to his face.

" ' Then, Lord have mercy upon me ! ' said the woman in accents of mingled terror and distress ; * it 's all true, and the house is ruined for ever ! '

"So singular a declaration only whetted my curiosity; and the landlady, who now seemed anxious to make a friend of me, soon satisfied my inquiries in a few words.

" After obtaining a promise of secrecy she informed me that, on the third evening previous to my arrival, a party of sailors were drinking in her house, when a quarrel ensued between them and some marines. The dispute at length rose to a great height. The landlady in vain endeavoured to interfere, till at length a heavy blow, struck with the edge of a pewter pot, lighting upon the temple of a stout young fellow of five-and- twenty, one of the most active of the sailors, brought him to the ground senseless and covered with blood. He never spoke again ; but, although his friends imme- diately conveyed him upstairs and placed him on the bed, endeavouring to staunch the blood, and doing all in their power to save him, he breathed his last in a few minutes.

" In order to hush up the affair, the woman admitted that she had consented to the body being buried in the garden, where it was interred the same night by two of his comrades. The man having been just dis- charged, it was calculated that no inquiry after him was likely to take place.

538 HAUNTED HOMES.

'"But then, Sir,' cried the landlady, wringing her hands, ' it 's all of no use ! Foul deeds will rise ; and I shall never dare to put anybody into your room again, for there it was he was carried; they took off his jacket and waistcoat, and tied up his wound with a handkerchief, but they never could stop the bleeding till all was over; and, as sure as you are standing there a living man, he is come back to trouble us, for if he had been sitting to you for his picture you could not have painted him more accurately than you have done.'

" Startling as this hypothesis of the old woman was, I could substitute no better ; and, as the prosecution of the inquiry must have necessarily operated to delay my voyage, without answering, as far as I could see, any good end, I walked quietly down to the Point, and, my ship arriving in the course of the afternoon, I went im- mediately on board, set sail the following morning for the Mediterranean, and have never again set foot in Portsmouth from that hour to this."

Thus ended Mr. Hamilton's narrative.

The next day the whole party set out to reconnoitrs the present appearance of the house, but some difficulty was experienced in identifying it, the building having been converted into a greengrocer's shop about five years before. A dissenting chapel had been built on the site of the garden, but nothing was said by their informant of any skeleton having been found while digging for the foundation, nor did Mr. Hamilton think it advisable to push any inquiries on the subject.

Why Mr. Hamilton should not have deemed it advi-

POKTSMOUTH. 539

sable to investigate the matter fully is difficult to divine. The house, however, would appear to have in some respects resembled one referred to by a Mr. Sam well in the following narrative, and was, probably, the same. In the year 1792, according to the account given, Mr. Samwell, a medical officer of the Royal Navy, was travelling from London to Portsmouth by the coach, in order to join the man-of-war to which he had been appointed. He was a man of some little literary and scientific attainment, and had published various works in both prose and verse. Among the former was a nar- rative of the death of Captain Cook, whom he had sailed with on his last voyage, and which was believed to be thoroughly accurate, as well as well-written. It was quoted verbatim by Dr. Kippis in his life of the cele- brated circumnavigator. With such acquirements, re- marks our informant, Mr. Samwell was not likely to harbour any notions bordering on the superstitious.

An accident which had befallen the coach near Lewes, in Sussex, caused a delay of several hours, insomuch that the passengers, on reaching Portsmouth, found the inns and other houses of entertainment shut. After wandering for a considerable time, Mr. Samwell per- ceived a light in an obscure quarter leading to Portsea, and, entering the house, inquired if he could repose there for the night. Being conducted to a bed-room, he was scarcely in bed, taken up with reflections about joining his ship in the morning, when he distinctly heard several taps at the door. Piising in his bed, he saw, at the bed-side, a figure of a tall man, wrapped in

540 HAUNTED HOMES.

a shaggy great-coat, and wearing a slouched hat, with a lantern in his hand. Not being able to procure any reply to the question he propounded as to the drift of this intrusion, Mr. Samwell sprang forward and made a grasp at the intruder, when, to his immense surprise, he only grasped the air !

The light suddenly disappeared ; not a footstep was to be heard, and everything was wrapped in silence. From his bed he crept to the door, which was bolted inside, and alarmed the house.

On the arrival of the inmates, whom he was careful not to admit into the apartment, he provided himself with a light, and searched everywhere within, to dis- cover, if possible, a trap-door by which the intruder might have silently escaped ; but his search was without success.

The woman of the house, when he explained matters, treated his story as a dream, and solicited him to go to bed again ; but, having dressed himself, he left the house, preferring to pass the night on the ramparts rather than endure any more such interruptions. In the morning he related what had happened to him to several persons, describing the house and its position ; when he was told that a mystery was hanging about it, which Sir John Carter, the mayor, had for some time anxiously endeavoured to clear up. Not one, but several strangers, who had resorted thither, had, from time to time, unaccountably disappeared; and what seemed to prove how easily their bodies might have been disposed of after they had been robbed and murdered,

Pi <

o

o

BOSLIN CHAPEL, 541

was shown from the fact that the back part of the house hung over a mud ditch, into which the bodies might have been cast without causing any alarm to the vicinity. Mr. Samwell's loquacity does not, however, appear to have drawn forth any more definite information than did Mr. Hamilton's reticence.

KOSLIN CHAPEL.

Seven miles to the south of Edinburgh is the village of Roslin, celebrated for its chapel and castle. Roslin Chapel, about which traditions still flourish, is as much noted for its legendary lore as for its unique architec- tural beauty. The building is small, but is particularly rich in Gothic decorative stonework ; its chief attraction, however, in that way being a very fine carved column known as the " Prentice's Pillar.*' This pillar, in marked contrast with the severe simplicity of the other columns, is wreathed about, from base to capital, with richly carved bands, and, according to tradition, was executed by an inspired apprentice.

This charming architectural gem, the ancient and romantic chapel of Roslin, was founded, in the %ear 1446, by William St. Clair, Prince of Orkney, Duke ot Oldenburgh, and of enough other titles, as an old authority observes, even to weary a Spaniard. The original design for the chapel was never carried out, the

542 HAUNTED HOMES.

chancel only being completed, and the transept begun. About two centuries ago, the edifice was much defaced by a mob, and at one time was in danger of becoming quite ruinous, when, happily, General St. Clair had it repaired, and his successors have continued the work of preservation.

The family vault of the St. Clairs is beneath the pavement of the chapel, and there the barons were anciently buried in their armour, without any " useless coffin.'-' A manuscript history, quoted by Sir Walter Scott, thus alludes to a family interment in the vault at .Roslin : — " When my good father was buried, his (a long deceased Baron of Roslin) corpse seemed to be entire at the opening of the cave ; but when they came to touch his body, it fell into dust. He was laying in his armour, with a red velvet cap on his head, on a flat stone ; nothing was spoiled, except a piece of the white furring that went round the cap, and answered to the hinder part of the head. All his predecessors were buried after the same manner, in their armour ; late Kosline, my good father, was the first that was buried in a coffin, against the sentiments of King James the Seventh, who was then in Scotland, and several other persons well versed in antiquity, to whom my mother would not hearken, thinking it beggarly to be buried after that manner."

But the wierd and curious superstition which lends so much romantic interest to Roslin, and which has caused it to be a favourite theme for poets, is the belief that whenever any of the founder's descendents are

ROSLIN CHAPEL. 543

about to die the chapel appears to be on fire. Not- thstanding the fact that the last " Roslin," as he was called, died in 1778, and the estates passed into the possession of the Erskines, Earls of Rosslyn, the old tradition has not been extinguished. The manner and matter of the time-honoured legend are so well portrayed by Harold's song in The Lay of the Last Minstrel, that it had better be quoted from here : —

O'er Roslin all that dreary night A •wondrous blaze was seen to gleam ;

'Twas broader than the watch-fire liffht. And redder than the bright moon-beam.

It glared on Roslin's castled rock,

It ruddied all the copse-wood glen ; 'T was seen from Dryden's groves of oak,

And seen from caverned Hawthornden.

Seemed all on fire that chapel proud, Where Roslin's chiefs uncoffin'd lie ;

Each baron, for a sable shroud, Sheathed in his iron panoply.

Seemed all on fire, within, around,

L)eep sacristy and altars pale ; Shone every pillar, foliage bound,

And glimmered all the dead men's maiL

Blazed battlement and pinnet high,

Blazed every rose-carved buttress fair- So still they blaze when fate is nigh The lordly line of Hugh St. Clair.

There are twenty of Roslin's barons bold Lie buried within that proud chapelle I

Each one that holy vault doth hold — But the sea holds lovely Rosabella I

544 HAUNTED HOMES.

SAMLESBURY HALL.

The famous old Samlesbury Hall stands about half-way between Preston and Blackburn. It is placed in a broad plain, looking southwards towards the woody heights of Hoghton ; eastwards towards the lofty ridges which run through Mellor and Billington to Pendle ; Preston and the broad estuary of the Ribble occupy the western prospect, whilst northwards, Longridge, leading towards the heights of Bowland, fills the scene : " enclosing a landscape," remarks Mr. T. T. Wilkinson, " which for picturesque beauty and historic interest has few equals in the country."

Samlesbury is famed in occult lore as the place whence Grace Sowerbutts and other notorious witches came. They were tried for witchcraft early in the seventeenth century, but escaped the fate generally meted out in those days to supposed members of the sisterhood, because, notwithstanding the fact that some of them had confessed their guilt, they were acquitted as impostors. Whilst their neighbours, from Tendle, Demdike, ChafFox, &c, were condemned and hanged as genuine sorcerers, the Samlesbury witches were let off as counterfeits. The eerie reputation acquired by Samlesbury may have partially arisen in consequence of these alleged dealings in the black art by its weird daughters, but that the haunting of the old Hall arose from quite a different cause local tradition guarantees.

Harland's Lancashire Legends traces the history of

SAMLESBUKY HALL. 545

the famous old building back to the early part of the reign of Henry the Second, when Gospatric de Samles- bury was residing in an ancestral home occupying the site now covered by the present Hall. His dwelling was surrounded by rich pastures and was shut in by the prima? val forests of oak from which the massive timbers were obtained out of which was formed the framework of the structure still standing. This magni- ficent building was erected during the reign of Edward the Third.

11 The family pedigrees tell us," says Harland, " that Cicely de Salmesbury married John de Ewyas about the middle of the thirteenth century ; but, dying without male heir, his daughter was united to Sir Gilbert de Southworth, and the property thus acquired remained in the possession of his family for upwards of three hundred and fifty years. It was then sold to the Braddylls, and ultimately passed into the hands of Joseph Harrison, Esq., of Galligreaves, Blackburn; whose eldest son, William Harrison, Esq., now resides at the Hall.

" After the disposal of the property by John South- worth, Esq., in 1677, the house was suffered to fall into decay. For many years it was occupied by a number of cottagers ; it was afterwards converted into a farm- house, and passed through various stages of degradation from neglect. Mr. Harrison, however, determined that this fine old structure should be no longer thus dese- crated. With a wise and just appreciation he restored both the exterior and the interior of the house in

546 HAUNTED HOMES.

accordance with their original design ; and under his hands the Old Hall atSamlesbury has become one of the most interesting and instructive mansions in the county.

" Sir John Southworth was the most distinguished personage of his race. He was high in military com- mand during the early years of the reign of Elizabeth — he mustered three hundred men at Berwick; and served the office of Sheriff of Lancashire in 1562. His posses- sions included Southworth, Samlesbury, Mellor, besides lands in eighteen other townships ; but he was illiterate, bigoted, and self-willed. His rigid devotion to the faith of his ancestors led him to speak rashly of the changes introduced into the national religion; he also acted unwisely in contravening the laws, for which he was ultimately cast into prison, and otherwise treated with much severity until his death in 1595.

" Tradition states that during his later years one of his daughters had formed an acquaintance with the heir of a neighbouring knightly house. The attachment was mutual, and nothing was wanting to complete their happiness except the consent of the lady's father. Sir John was thereupon consulted ; but the tale of their devoted attachment only served to increase his rage, and he dismissed the supplicants with the most bitter denunciations. * No daughter of his should ever be united to the son of a family which had deserted its ancestral faith,' and he forbade the youth his presence for ever. Difficulty, however, only served to increase the ardour of the devoted lovers ; and after many secret interviews among the wooded slopes of the Kibble, an

SAMLESBURY HALL. 547

elopement was agreed upon, in the hope that time would bring her father's pardon. The day and place were un- fortunately overheard by one of the lady's brothers, who was hiding in a thicket close by, and he determined to prevent what he considered to be his sister's disgrace.

" On the evening agreed upon both parties met at the hour appointed ; and as the young knight moved away with his betrothed, her brother rushed from his hiding-place, and slew both him and two friends by whom he was accompanied. The bodies were secretly buried within the precincts of the domestic chapel at the Hall; and Lady Dorothy was sent abroad to a convent where she was kept under strict surveillance. Her mind at last gave way — the name of her murdered lover was ever on her lips, and she died a raving maniac. Some years ago three human skeletons were found near the walls of the Hall, and popular opinion has connected them with the tradition. The legend also states that on certain clear, still evenings, a lady in white can be seen passing along the gallery and the corridors, and then from the Hall into the grounds : that she then meets a handsome knight who receives her on his bended knees, and he then accompanies her along the walks. On arriving at a certain spot, most probably the lover's grave, both the phantoms stand still, and as they seem to utter soft wailings of despair, they embrace each other, and then their forms rise slowly from the earth and melt away into the clear blue of the surrounding sky."

35

548 HAUNTED HOMES.

SAMPFORD PEVERELL.

The well-known " Sampford Peverell Ghost" is one of those notorious cases of continuous haunting with which local history in England is rife. Again and again has it been asserted that the whole matter has been found out, the fraud has been discovered, the per- petrators have confessed, and so forth ; and yet, as in so many other cases, when these allegations have been investigated they have been found to be baseless, and the mystery remains as much a mystery as ever. As far as we have been enabled to learn, the Sampford Peverell Ghost has never been discovered to be the work of human agency.

The Kev. Caleb C. Colton, the well-known and un- fortunate author of Lacon, decidedly gave a much wider notoriety, and more important character, to the manifestations about to be chronicled than they would otherwise have acquired, by the publication, iu 1810, of his Narrative of the Sampford Ghost. From this scarce pamphlet, supplemented by some particulars in a subsequent work by the same author, and a few additional data from other sources, the following account is compiled.

The fact that so many of the circumstances connected with this curious case of supposed supernatural mani- festation were vouched for by the Vicar of Kew and Petersham, at the time a resident in Sampford, as having taken place under his own personal observation, natu-

SAMPFOKD PEVERELL. 549

rally created considerable excitement, not only in the immediate neighbourhood, but, indeed, all over the country ; and the fact that the affair differed in many respects from the ordinary accounts of haunted houses, as, for instance, in the manifestations taking place in the day as well as in the night, and in physical results following blows received from invisible agents, made it all the more marvellous and sensational.

The village of Sampford Peverell, where all these wonders came to pass, is about five miles from Tiver- ton, in the county of Devon ; and the events to be re- corded occurred in 1810 and the following years, in the house of a Mr. John Chave. According to the accounts published by the Kev. C. C. Colton, some very un- accountable things had occasionally happened in this said house previous to the manifestations he makes special record of. An apprentice boy had been greatly terrified by the apparition of a woman, and had de- clared that he had heard some extraordinary sounds in the night ; but little or no attention was paid to his statements. About April 1810, however, the inhabi- tants of the house were alarmed by terrific noises being heard in every apartment, even in the daytime. Upon anyone going up-stairs and stamping on the floor in any of the rooms, say five or six times, the sounds would be repeated instantly, but louder, and generally more in number, and the vibrations of the boards caused by these repeated sounds could be sensibly felt through the soles of one's boots, whilst dust was thrown up with such velocity, and in such quantity, as to affect the eyes.

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550 HAUNTED HOMES.

At mid-day the cause of these effects would announce its approach by loud knockings in some apartment or other of the house, above or below, as the case might be. At times more than a dozen persons have witnessed these mid-day knockings at once. The noises would very often, and in repeated instances, follow the persons through any of the upper apartments, and faithfully answer the stamping of their feet wherever they went. If persons were in different rooms, and one stamped with his foot in one room, the sound was instantly re- peated in the other. These phenomena continued day by day, almost incessantly, for about five weeks, when they gradually gave place to others still more curious and alarming.

There were two apartments in the house in which the females who slept in them were dreadfully beaten by invisible agency. Mr. Colton stated that he himself heard more than two hundred blows given in the course of a night, and he could compare them to nothing but a strong man striking with all his force, with a closed fist, on the bed. These blows left great soreness, and visible marks. Mr. Colton saw a swelling, at least as big as a turkey's egg, on the cheek of Ann Mills, who voluntarily made oath that she was alone in the bed when she received the blows from an invisible hand. Mrs. Dennis, and Mary Woodbury, also, both swore voluntarily before Mr. Colton, Mr. Sully, an exciseman, and Mr. Govett, a surgeon, that they were so beaten as to experience a peculiar kind of numbness, and were sore for many days after. Their shrieks while being

SAMPEOBD PEVEBELL. 551

beaten were too terrible, it is averred, to have been counterfeited.

Mr. Chave, the occupier of the house, deposed that one night the two servants were so much agitated that they refused to sleep any longer in their apartment, and he therefore permitted them, in the dead of the night, to bring their bed and bed-clothes into the room where he and Mrs. Chave slept. After the light had been put out, and they had been quiet about half an hour, a large iron candlestick began to move rapidly about the room. Mr. Chave could hear no footsteps, but while in the act of attempting to ring the bell the candlestick was violently thrown at his head, which it narrowly missed.

Another night Mr. Searle, keeper of the county gaol, and a friend, kept watch, and they saw a sword, which they had placed near them on the foot of a bed, with a large folio Testament placed on it, thrown violently against the wall, seven feet away. Mr. Taylor deposed that, upon going into the room, in consequence of the shrieks of the women, he saw the sword, which had been previously lying on the floor, clearly suspended in the middle of the room with its point towards him. About a minute after it fell to the ground with a loud noise.

Ann Mills deposed on oath that one night, while striking a light, she received a very severe blow on the back, and the tinder-box was forcibly wrenched out of her hands and thrown into the centre of the room.

The Rev. C. C. Colton said that the names of the women who were thus afflicted were Mary Dennis senior, Mary Dennis junior, Martha Woodbury, Ann Mills,

552 HAUNTED HOMES,

Mrs. Pitts, and Sally Case. He himself had witnessed most of the phenomena recorded above, whilst the women were in bed. Mr. Colton was sure thev never moved, and he administered an oath to them upon the subject next morning, in presence of several gentlemen, whose names he gave. He adds : " I have often heard the curtains of the bed violently agitated, accompanied with a loud and almost indescribable motion of the rings. These curtains, four in number, to prevent their motion, were often tied up, each in one large knot. Every cur- tain in that bed was agitated, and the knots thrown and whirled about with such rapidity that it would have been unpleasant to be within the sphere of their action. This lasted about two minutes, and concluded with a noise resembling the tearing of linen ; Mr. Taylor and Mr. Chave, of Mere, being also witnesses. Upon ex- amination, a rent was found across the grain of a strong new cotton curtain."

Also Mr. Colton heard, in the presence of other wit- nesses, footsteps walking by him and round him. He was, also, conscious of candles burning near him, but could see nothing. Mr. Quick heard it come down-stairs like a man's foot in a slipper, and seem to pass through the wall. "I have been," he says, "in the act of opening a door which was already half open, when a violent rapping was produced on the opposite side of the same door; I paused a moment, and the rapping continued; I suddenly opened the door, with a candle in my hand, yet I can swear I could see nothing. I have been in one of the rooms that has a large modern window, when,

SAMPFORD PEVERELL, 553

from the noises, knockings, blows on the bed, and rat tling of the curtains, I did really begin to think th<3 whole chamber was falling in. Mr. Taylor was sitting in the chair the whole time ; the females were so terrified that large drops stood on their foreheads. When the act of beating has appeared, from the sound of the blows, near the foot of one bed, I have rushed to the spot, but it has been instantly heard near the head of the other bed."

Mr. Colton emphasised his own statement by a voluntary affidavit, which he made in the presence of Mr. B. Wood, Master-in-Chancery, Tiverton, in the course of which he declared that, after an attendance of six nights at Mr. Chave's house, during which time he had used every endeavour to discover the cause of these disturbances, and placed a seal with a crest to every door, cavity, &c, in the house through which any communication might be carried on, and having re- peatedly sworn the domestics as to the truth of the phenomena, and their own ignorance of the means whereby they were produced, he was still utterly unable to account for the things which he had seen and heard.

Mr. Talley, the landlord of the house, whose interest it certainly was to rid his property of such visitations, when he brought it into the market for sale, pretended to have found out the whole mystery, and alleged that the noises were produced by a cooper with a broomstick and a bludgeon. This pretended exposure was not however, acknowledged by any of the parties who had made the previous statements. Nevertheless, it served

554 HAUNTED HOMES.

to draw down the vengeance of the populace of Tiverton on Mr. Chave, and he narrowly escaped with his life.

Two years afterwards, however, Mr. Colton published the following remarks upon the subject, in notes to Hypocrisy, a Satire : — " An affair is still going on in this neighbourhood, and known to the public by the title of the Sampford Ghost, which might puzzle the materialism of Hume, or the immaterialism of Berkeley. Here we have an invisible and incomprehensible agent produciug visible and sensible effects. The real truth is that the slightest shadow of an explanation has not yet been given, and that there exist no good grounds even for suspecting anyone. The public were given to understand that the disturbances had ceased, whereas it is well known to all in this neighbourhood that they continue, with unabating influence, to this hour. We were told, by way of explanation, that the whole affair was a trick of the tenant, who wished to purchase the house cheap — the stale solution of all haunted houses. "But such an idea never entered his thoughts, even if the present proprietors were able to sell the house; but it happens to be entailed. And at the very time when this was said, all the neighbourhood knew that Mr. Chave was unremitting in his exertions to procure another habitation in Sampford on any terms. And, to confirm this, these disturbances have at length obliged the whole family to make up their minds to quit the premises, at a very great loss and inconvenience. If these nocturnal and diurnal visitations are the effects of a plot, the agents are marvellously secret and indefatig-

SKIPSEA CASTLE. 555

able. It has been going on more than three years; and if it be the result of human machination, there must be more than sixty persons concerned in it. Now I cannot but think it rather strange, that a secret by which no one can possibly get anything, should be so well kept ; particularly when I inform the public, what the newspapers would not, or could not, acquaint them with; namely, that a reward of two hundred and fifty pounds has been offered for anyone who can give such infor- mation as may lead to a discovery. Nearly two years have elapsed, and no claimant has appeared. I myself, who have been abused as the dupe at onetime, and the promoter of this affair at another, was the first to come forward with one hundred pounds, and the late mayor of Tiverton has now an instrument in his hands em- powering him to call on me for the payment of that sum to anyone who can explain the cause of the phenomena."

When the manifestations ceased, if they even have now, we cannot learn ; but it certainly would appear to be the case that no sure and unqualified exposure of the affair has ever yet been given.

SKIPSEA CASTLE.

Skipsea, an out of the way Yorkshire village, on the sea-coast between Bridlington and Hornsea, is cele-

556 HAUNTED HOMES.

brated for one of the most enduring apparitions on record. " The White Lady of Skipsea," as this phan- tom is styled, has haunted the old castle, of which, now-a-days, little more than the foundations remain, ever since the days of William the Conqueror. This Skipsea ghost, whose local habitation no native of the place would venture near after nightfall, is described as haunting the Castle mound, and its vicinity, in the form of a beautiful young woman, of mournful aspect, at- tired in long white drapery. Occasionally she may be seen flitting about the intrenchments or slopes of the Castle mound, and at times, even in the daylight, she is seen wandering about the precincts of what was formerly her home. No ill effects are reported to follow the appearance of this apparition, whose story is detailed by Mr. F. Ross in his interesting " Yorkshire Legends and Traditions,'-' now appearing in the Leeds Mercury, in these words : —

" The White Lady was the wife of Drogo de Bevere, a Flemish soldier of fortune, who took up arms under the banner of the Norman Duke William, in the army he assembled together for the conquest of England. He was a good and valiant soldier, and fought with great bravery at the battle of Hastings, for which he was rewarded by Duke William, when he had subdued Northumbria, with a grant of the district of Holderness, which he constituted a Seigniory, and made Drogo the first Lord, who went to reside there, and erected a castle at Skipsea, as a defence against the Danes, who were wont to land at Flam- borough, and to serve as his caput baronium, where he

SKIPSEA CASTLE. 557

exercised a semi-regal rule over the district. Although a brave warrior, he was tyrannical and oppressive to the Angles and Banes of Holderness, whose lands had been reft from them in his behoof, and whom he reduced to complete serfdom. He was subject to ungovernable bursts of passion, and, when in this mood, would per- petrate the grossest acts of cruelty and injustice. He was also exceedingly covetous and avaricious, as was evidenced by his seizure, by forcible means, of the lands in Holderness belonging to St. John's Church, at Beverley, which had been specially confirmed to the Canons, by King William; but these he was compelled to disgorge.

M As a further proof of his favour the Conqueror gave him one of his nieces in marriage, whose identity has not been clearly ascertained, but who, possibly, from the obscurity in which she is enveloped, may have been a grand- daughter of William's mother, Herteva, by her second marriage. However this may be, they were married, and he carried her down to his Yorkshire domain, where they resided together in Skipsea Castle. The marriage does not appear to have been a happy one; their tempers were incompatible. He was brutal in his tastes and manners, delighting only in war, the chase, and tyrannising over his menials and tenants ; she, gentle and refined, as were the Norman ladies of the period. He always treated her with churlishness, often with savage barbarity, frequently threatened her with death, and, at length, in a fit of fierce passion, caused her to be poisoned.

558 HAUNTED HOMES.

rt The deed was no sooner perpetrated than Drogo per- ceived his folly, feeling assured that her uncle would take vengeance upon him for it, and that the result would be a confiscation of the Seigniory, and his execution as a murderer. His craft and subtlety, however, served him well in this crisis. His victim was scarcely cold when he mounted the fleetest horse in his stable and rode south- wards, bating neither whip nor spur until he reached the Court of the King. He represented to the latter that he was very desirous of taking his wife across sea to Flanders, to show her the land of his birth, and intro- duce her to his family. The King applauded the idea, nnd granted his permission for them to leave England, upon which Drogo represented that the domain which had been given him was of so poor a nature that it would grow nothing but oats, and that a great portion of it consisted but of woodland and morass, so that he was utterly destitute of the means of taking shipping to cross the sea. ' If that be all,' said the King, ' you shall not be baulked of your pleasure trip, for want of money,' and he gave him an order on his exchequer for a sum sufficient for the purpose. As soon as he got the money he took leave of the King, hastened to the sea-side, and set sail for Flanders. He had not been long gone, when a messenger arrived from Skipsea, who informed the King of the death of his niece and the manner of it. Upon receipt of this intelligence the King sent a body of horsemen after the murderer, with instructions to bring him back, alive or dead. But Drogo had got too much start, and eluded the pursuit,

SKIPSEA CASTLE. 559

arriving in due course in Flanders, but what was bis after fate records tell not.

"We have no account of the place of burial of the unfortunate lady. There was no church at Skipsea at the time of the Domesday survey, but we find that Stephen, Earle of Albemarle, Lord of the Seigniory in the time of Rufus, gave his church of the Castle of Skipsea to the Monastery of Albemarle, and it is pro- bable that within its walls her body was deposited. Her spirit, however, seems not to have found a resting- place, but for the past eight hundred years has been wandering about the scene of her unhappy wifehood. The phantom has not appeared in recent years, but in the Hid! Advertiser, early in the present century, we have an account of the apparition having been seen. The editor prefaces the account by saying — 'In in- troducing the following singular article, it may be necessary to state that the writer as well as the two persons upon whose testimony the circumstances rest, are well known to us, and above all suspicion of having thus related anything save what they believed to be strictly correct.'

" The writer states that he was visiting a lady in Holderness, when the conversation of the party then assembled turned upon supernatural appearances, the lady expressing the opinion that they ' were owing to some misapprehension of the senses,' upon which a gentleman of the party, of unimpeachable character, said that he was under the necessity of differing from the lady. ' For/ said he, ' about ten years ago I was

560 HAUNTED HOMES.

travelling on horseback one afternoon from Bridlington to Hornsea, and just as I was descending the brow of a hill, on the south of Skipsea, I observed a woman, apparently young, dressed in white, walking a little before me on my left hand, between the hedge and the road. Supposing that she had been visiting at a house on the top of the hill, I turned my head to see if there were any persons in attendance at the door, but the door was shut and none to be seen. My curiosity being now greater than before to know who this genteel person was, I followed her at the distance of twenty or thirty yards down the hill, which was 100 or 150 yards long, and expected when she got to the bottom, where there was a small brook, that I should meet her in attempting to gain the carriage bridge, but to my great astonish- ment, when she approached the brook, instead of turning to the right to gain the bridge, she vanished from my sight, at the very time that my eyes were fixed upon her. As soon as I got home, I related the strange affair to my family ; and as it was light, and I had not previously been thinking about apparitions, nor was I ever in the habit of speculating on such subjects, I am firmly persuaded that what I saw was one.*

" The lady of the house said that the recital had made ' a greater impression on her than anything she had ever heard before.' ' For,' continued she, ' about five years ago I had a servant, who was a young man of good character and of a bold, active disposition, one who professed a disregard for any extraordinary appear- ances. In the month of November, about Martinmas

SMITHILLS HALL. 561

time, he requested leave to go to Bridlington and also to be accommodated with a horse, which was granted him. Being very desirous to make a long holiday of it, he rose early in the morning and set off two hours before daybreak ; but, to our very great surprise, returned home early in the afternoon, before it was dark. On being questioned if anything was the matter with him, he rep-lied that he had been so much alarmed that he was resolved never to travel alone in the dark if he could avoid it. ' For, as I was cantering along Skipsea-lane in the morning, bending forward with my face downwards, the horse suddenly bolted from the road to such a distance that I was very nearly dis- mounted. On recovering myself and looking about to discover what had frightened my horse, I saw a fine lady, dressed in white, with something like a black veil over her head, standing close by. How I got to Skipsea I cannot tell, but I was so frightened that I durst go no farther, but walked up and down the hill till it was light, when I found some persons going the same road, whom I accompanied to Bridlington.' "

SMITHILLS HALL.

Smithills Hall, Halliwell, Lancashire, the seat of Richard Henry Ainsworth, Esq., is one of those lovely and picturesque ancestral abodes for which England is

562 HAUNTED HOMES.

famous. It is replete with the subdued charms which only antiquity can generate, and which no amount of expenditure, however lavish, can create. The origin of this splendid old mansion is lost in the proverbial " mist of ages " ; historians retrace its story to the time of the so-called Saxon ''Heptarchy," and, as if in con- firmation of this remote ancestry, an ancient gateway bears the date of 680. Less mythical records of the place and its various owners are carried back to the early part of the fourteenth century, when the Lord of the Manor of Smithills was a William Radcliffe. Subsequently, an heiress by marriage carried this manor and the estates into the Barton family, and from that family it passed by purchase, in 1801, into the possession of the Ainsworths, by whom it is still held.

In a description of this ancient mansion, recently given in the Bolton Journal, it is said : " Smithills Hall requires to be sought for. It lies far from the road, which curves in its course, thus effectually hiding it from the public gaze. . . . When reached, the full beauty of the building is not at once seen. But passing through an arched gateway the south front is dis- closed to view. Emerging by the gateway with the '680' inscribed above it, the visitor finds himself in the antique court-yard, at the head of a beautiful lawn, reached by a flight of steps. Turning from the view before us to admire the architecture and appearance of the old building, one is impressed with the air of calm repose which seems to rest over all. The old Lancashire lath-and-plaster style of building is everywhere apparent.

SMITHILLS HALL. 563

Black beams placed obliquely on a ground of dazzling whiteness, with ornamentations of quatrefoil standing out in charming relief, present a pleasing picture of the taste of our ancestors in matters architectural. The ivy clusters lovingly over porch and walls, the effect on the ' 680 ' gateway being especially lovely. The old- fashioned domestic chapel forms a wing to the east of the block, and around this, too, clusters the loving parasite, the healthy hue of green blending charmingly with the stained windows, rich in design, and com- memorative of the heraldry of past and present of Smithills."

The writer then proceeds to speak of the interior of this fine old place, of its rich wainscottings, its oaken mouldings, and of its other relics of the past, but then recurs, as must all who mention Smithills Hall, to the mysterious footprint, to the far-famed Bloody Footstep seen on the stone in the passage leading to the chapel. Above this indelible footstep is a plate bearing the inscription, "Footprint of the Keverend George Marsh, of Deane, martyr, who was examined at Smithills, and burnt at Chester, in the reign of Queen Mary."

The legend connected with this marvellous relic of the past is thus given in the local journal: — Robert Barton, at one time owner of Smithills, was " the famous magistrate before whom George Marsh, the Martyr of Deane, appeared in 1555, to answer for his Protestant faith. Tradition described Mr. Barton as a zealous bigot, and alleges rude treatment on his part

36

564 HAUNTED HOMES.

towards the martyr. It was after the examination before this worthy that, it is stated, Marsh, descending the stairs leading from the court-room, stamped his foot on the stones, and ' looking up to heaven, appealed to God for the justness of his cause ; and prayed that there might in that place remain a constant memorial of the wickedness and injustice of his enemies,' the print of a man's foot remaining to the present day as such ' constant memorial/ "

A tradition in the place, a resident of Smithills Hall informs us, says the stone bearing the imprint of the mysterious footprint was once removed and cast into a neighbouring wood, but ghostly noises became so troublesome in consequence that the stone had to be restored to its original position.

Nathaniel Hawthorne, the famous American novelist, at one time enjoyed the hospitality of Smithills Hall. The legend of the " Bloody Footstep " made an intense and lasting impression upon his mind, and in three separate instances he founded fictions upon it. He saw the " Bloody Footstep/' as he says himself, with his own eyes, and from the lips of his hostess heard the particulars of its origin. Either from what he heard, or imagined, about this weird symbol of a bygone crime, he gave in his romance of Septimius the following story as that of the Bloody Footstep : —

" On the threshold of one of the doors of Smithills Hall there is a bloody footstep impressed into the door- step, and ruddy as if the bloody foot had just trodden there ; anfl it is averred that, on a certain night of the

SMITHILLS HALL. 565

year, and at a certain hour of the night, if you go and look at the door-step you will see the mark wet with fresh hlood. Some have pretended to say that this appearance of blood was hut dew; but can dew redden a cambric handkerchief? Will it crimson the finger- tips when you touch it ? And that is what the bloody footstep will surely do when the appointed night and hour come round. . . .

" It is needless to tell you all the strange stories that have survived to this day about the old Hall, and how it is believed that the master of it, owing to his ancient science, has still a sort of residence there and control of the place, and how in one of the chambers there is still his antique table, and his chair, and some rude old instruments and machinery, and a book, and everything in readiness, just as if he might still come back to finish some experiment. . . . One of the chief things to which the old lord applied himself was to discover the means of prolonging his own life, so that its duration should be indefinite, if not infinite; and such was his science that he was believed to have attained this magnificent and awful purpose. . . .

" The object of the lord of Smithills Hall was to take a life from the course of Nature, and Nature did not choose to be defrauded ; so that, great as was the power of this scientific man over her, she would not consent that he should escape the necessity of dying at i his proper time, except upon condition of sacrificing some other life for his ; and this was to be done once for every thirty years that he chose to live, thirty years

36*"

566 HAtJKTED HOMES.

being the account of a generation of man ; and if in any way, in that time, this lord could be the death of a human being, that satisfied the requisition, and he might live on. . . .

" There was but one human being whom he cared for — that was a beautiful kinswoman, an orphan, whom his father had brought up, and dying, left to his care. • . . He saw that she, if anyone, was to be the person whom the sacrifice demanded, and that he might kill twenty others without effect, but if he took the life of this one it would make the charm strong and good. . . . He did slay this pure young girl ; he took her into the wood near the house, an old wood that is standing yet, with some of its magnificent oaks, and there he plunged a dagger into her heart. . . .

" He buried her in the wood, and returned to the house ; and, as it happened, he had set his right foot in her blood, and his shoe was wet in it, and by some miraculous fate it left a track all along the wood-path, and into the house, and on the stone steps of the threshold, and up into his chamber. The servants saw it the next day, and wondered, and whispered, and missed the fair young girl, and looked askance at their lord's right foot, and turned pale, all of them. . . .

" Next, the legend says, that Sir Forrester was struck with horror at what he had done . . . and fled from his old Hall, and was gone full many a day. But all the while he was gone there was the mark of a bloody footstep impressed upon the stone door-step of the Hall. . . . The legend says that wherever Sir Forrester went,

SMITHILLS HALL. 567

in his wanderings about the world, he left a bloody track behind him. . . . Once he went to the King's Court, and, there being a track up to the very throne, the King frowned upon him, so that he never came there any more. Nobody could tell how it happened; his foot was not seen to bleed, only there was the bloody track behind him. . . .

"At last this unfortunate lord deemed it best to go back to his own Hall, where, living among faithful old servants born in the family, he could hush the matter up better than elsewhere. ... So home he came, and there he saw the bloody track on the door-step, and dolefully went into the Hall, and up the stairs, an old servant ushering him into his chamber, and half a dozen others following behind, gazing, shuddering, pointing with quivering fingers, looking horror-stricken in one another's pale faces. . . .

u By-and-by he vanished from the old Hall, but not by death ; for, from generation to generation, they say that a bloody track is seen around that house, and sometimes it is traced up into the chambers, so fresh that you see he must have passed a short time before."

" And this is the legend," says Hawthorne, " of the Bloody Footstep, which I myself have seen at the Hall door."

It will be seen, however, how widely different is the story told by the great American romancist from that given by the owner of Smithills Hall, and believed in by the tenants around. Whether the author of Septi-

568 HAUNTED HOMES.

mius really had any traditional authority for his version, or whether he evolved the whole recital from the depth of his imagination, it would he difficult to say.

SOUTER FELL.

Harriet Martineau, in her description of The English Lakes, writes : " The ascent of Saddleback mav beenn behind Threlkeld, up a path which the villagers will point out; but an easier way is to diverge from the main road some way farther on, by the road to Hesket, near the village of Scales. The hill-side path is to be taken which leads along Souter Fell, by the side of the stream which descends from Scales Tarn.

" This part is the very home of superstition and romance. This Souter or Soutra Fell is the mountain on which ghosts appeared in myriads, at intervals dur- ing ten years of the last century ; presenting the same appearances to twenty-six chosen witnesses, and to all the inhabitants of all the cottages within view of the mountain, and for a space of two hours and a half at one time — the spectral show being closed by darkness ! The mountain, be it remembered, is full of precipices, which defy all marching of bodies of men ; and the north and west sides present a sheer perpendicular of 900 feet.

" On Midsummer-eve, 1735, a farm servant of Mr.

SOUTEB FELL. 569

Lancaster, half a mile from the mountain, saw the eastern side of its summit covered with troops, which pursued their onward march for an hour. They came, in distinct bodies, from an eminence on the north end, and disappeared in a niche in the summit. When the poor fellow told his tale, he was insulted on all hands; as original observers usually are when they see anything wonderful. Two years after, also on a Midsummer- eve, Mr. Lancaster saw some men there, apparently following their horses, as if they had returned from hunting. He thought nothing of this ; but he happened to look up again ten minutes after, and taw the figures, now mounted, and followed by an interminable array of troops, five abreast, marching from the eminence and over the cleft as before. All the family saw this, and the manoeuvres of the force, as each company was kept in order by a mounted officer, who galloped this way and that. As the shades of twilight came on, the disci- pline appeared to relax, and the troops intermingled, and rode at unequal paces, till all was lost in darkness. Now, of course all the Lancasters were insulted, as their servant had been; but their justification was not long delayed.

" On the Midsummer-eve of the fearful 1745, twenty- six persons, expressly summoned by the family, saw all that had been seen before, and more. Carriages were now interspersed with the troops ; and everybody knew that no carriages had been, or could be, on the summit of Souter Fell. The multitude was beyond imagination ; for the troops filled a space of half a mile, and marched

570 HAUNTED HOMES*

quickly till night hid them — still marching. There was nothing vaporous or indistinct about the appearance of these spectres. So real did they seem, that some of the people went up, the next morning, to look for the hoof- marks of the horses; and awful it was to them to find not one foot-print on heather or grass. The witnesses attested the whole story on oath before a magistrate; and fearful were the expectations held by the whole country-side about the coming events of the Scotch rebellion.

"It now came out that two other persons had seen something of the sort in the interval — viz. in 1743 — but had concealed it, to escape the insults to which their neighbours were subjected. Mr. Wren, of Wilton Hall, and his farm-servant, saw, one summer evening, a man and a dog on the mountain, pursuing some horses along a place so steep that a horse could hardly by any possibility keep a footing on it. Their speed was pro- digious, and their disappearance at the south end of the fell so rapid, that Mr. Wren and the servant went up, the next morning, to find the body of the man who must have been killed. Of man, horse, or dog, they found not a trace ; and they came down and held their tongues. When they did speak, they fared not much the better for having twenty- six sworn comrades in their disgrace.

" As for the explanation, the editor of the Lonsdale Magazine declared (vol. ii., p. 313) that it was dis- covered that on the Midsummer-eve of 1745 the rebels were 'exercising on the western coast of Scotland,

SWINSTY HALL. 571

whose movements had been reflected by some trans- parent vapour, similar to the Fata Morgana.' This is not much in the "way of explanation ; but it is, as far as we know, all that can be had at present. These facts, however, brought out a good many more; as the spec- tral march of the same kind seen in Leicestershire in 1707; and the tradition of the tramp of armies over Helvellyn, on the eve of the battle of Marston Moor."

We have allowed Harriet Martineau to tell her tale in her own words, without comment; but on reference to our chapter on "Edge Hill," in the First Series of this work, something pertinent to the theme will be found.

SWINSTY HALL.

In the picturesque valley of the Washburn, high up on the right bank, in the parish of Otley, stands Swinsty Hall. It is a large building, in a kind of Elizabethan architecture, says Mr. William Grainge, and " on its first creation would, doubtless, be considered a great, grand, and glorious mansion, with its many gables and multitudinous windows. The greatest wonder is to see it here at all, in such a lonely place. It has been built in a substantial manner, and at a heavy cost. The ©round plan is that of an irregular quadrangle, with a projecting wing on the north-west. The south front is the most interesting portion, three stories in height ;

572 HAUNTED HOMES.

the central rooms, the fronts of which project some distance from the main line on the first and second floors, are each lighted by a window of twenty lights, divided by a transom, which gives forty openings in all ; indeed, that side has much the appearance of an enormous lanthorn."

" Swinsty Hall/' continues Mr. Grainge, " has fallen somewhat from its high estate in modern times, stripped of its antique furniture, and now {i.e. 1864) occupied by the families of four farmers (a giant or enchanter, with a rambling ghost or two, would be a much more appropriate tenantry), the barns and outhouses clus- tered around give it quite a singular and unique appearance :

" A kind of old hobgoblin ball,

Now somewhat fallen to decay, With weather-stains upon the wall,

And stairways worn, and crazy doors,

And creaking and uneven floors, And chimneys huge and tall.

" A region of repose it seems, A place of slumber and of dreams, Remote among the wooded hills, For there no noisy railway speeds, In torch-race, scattering smoke and gleeda ; But, noon and night, the parting teams Stop under the great oaks, that throw Tangles of light and shade below,

On roofs, and doors, and window-sills. .

<<

Singular to relate," continues Mr. Grainge, " there is no road to this house deserving of the name, the principal carriage-road beiag a mere random trackway across the unenclosed common, so tkafc it may be said

SWINSTY HALL. 573

to be isolated from the world, or, rather, to form a little old-fashioned world of its own."

There is, as might be guessed, a strange weird legend connected with this old out-of-the-way dwelling, and it is generally told, says Mr. Grainge, in the following way: —

m

" The builder of the Hall was a man of the name of Robinson, who, in his youth, was a poor weaver, and resided in a humble cottage near where the Hall now stands. This cottage, now doing duty as a cow-house, yet remains to vouch for the truth of the story. This young man left his humble home, travelled to London at a time when the plague was raging in that city ; when death had left many houses totally uninhabited and desolate, wherein no survivors were left to bury the dead, and no heirs to claim their wealth. Our north country adventurer seeing this state of things, not for- getting himself amid the general mourning and con- fusion, took possession of the gold thus left without an owner, to such an extent, that he loaded a waggon and team of horses with the wealth thus acquired ; with which he returned homeward, and, in due time, again reached the place of his birth. But the story of the plague had reached the place as soon as himself and his gold, and none of his former neighbours would admit him into their dwellings, for fear of contagion ; so he took up his abode in a barn, which still remains. In order to cleanse his gold from any infectious taint which might possibly cling to it, Robinson washed the whole carefully in the Greenwell Spring, which well yet

574 HAUNTED HOMES.

i)

remains, bearing the same name. With the wealth thus acquired he purchased the estate and built the Hall at Swinsty."

For a considerable period, many generations of .Robinsons enjoyed the property, until, at last, it passed by marriage to the Bramleys, who still enjoy it, or did quite recently.

But, according to popular faith, the founder of the family, the original possessor of the Hall, cannot cleanse himself, so readily as he did his gold, from its con- tamination : his troubled spirit still haunts the old spot. At certain times, those who are gifted with the faculty of seeing apparitions, may behold that of Robinson bending over the Greenwell Spring, and striving to cleanse his strangely acquired coin — coin even more spectral than himself. There he bends, and rubs, and rubs, and rubs away at his ghastly spoil, and never seems satisfied that it is freed from its taint, or, perhaps, from its stains : who knows ?

SYKES LUMB FAEM.

" In a secluded dell, on the banks of Mellor Brook/' says Mr. T. T. Wilkinson, " not far from the famous old Hall of Samlesbury, near Blackburn " (a haunted old Hall whereof an account will be found in these pages), " stands a lonely farm-house, which was occu-

SYKES LUMB FARM. 575

pied for many generations by a family named Sykes. They gave their name to the homestead, or vice versa, on its being cleared from the forest ; and, from the fact of the pastures lying at a short distance from a broad and deep portion of the brook, it became generally known by the name of Sykes Lumb Farm."

This Sykes family, however, as Mr. Wilkinson re- cords, have long since passed to dust, and many gene- rations of strangers have dwelt on their lands, but the doings of one particular member of the race have been handed down, from year to year, by tradition, and still exercise a potent influence upon the minds of the sur- rounding population. Before referring to the especial tradition for which Sykes Lumb Farm is noted, it may be as well to point out that it possesses an uncanny reputation for a supernatural inhabitant other than the apparition from which its fame is chiefly derived. In one work by Mr. Wilkinson it is referred to as the resi- dence of a noted boggart, or domestic familiar, in these terms : —

" When in a good humour, this noted goblin will milk the cows, pull the hay, fodder the cattle, harness the horses, load the carts, and stack the crops. When irritated by the utterance of some unguarded expression or marked disrespect, either from the farmer or his servants, the cream-mugs are then smashed to atoms, no butter can be obtained by churning, the horses and other cattle are turned loose, or driven into the woods, two cows will sometimes be found fastened in the same stall, no hay can be pulled from the mow ; and all the

576 HAUNTED HOMES.

i while the wicked imp sits grinning with delight upon one of the cross-beams in the barn. At other times the horses are unable to draw the empty carts across the farm-yard ; if loaded, they are upset, whilst the cattle tremble with fear without any visible cause. IS or do the inmates of the house experience any better or gentler usage. During the night the clothes are said to be violently torn from off the beds of the offending parties, whilst, by invisible hands, they themselves are dragged down the stone stairs by the legs, one step at a time, after a most uncomfortable manner."

The way in which this boggart is described as haunting Sykes Lumb Farm is in no way out of the common, especially in Lancashire and the neighbouring counties, but it is of interest in this case, as showing the popular belief that the place is troubled in some way. In what way the house and grounds are really believed to be, or, until recently, to have been, haunted is thus described in Eoby and Wilkinson's "Lancashire Legends, and William Dobson's Rambles by the Ribble.

In the days when the farm was owned by old Sykes and his wife, careful living and more than ordinary thrift enabled the old couple to gather together a fair amount of wealth, which, added to the continual hoard- ing of the farmer's ancestors, caused the pair to be re- garded as wonderfully rich, in those days. Whatever the facts as to their wealth may have been, they saw its possession ultimately jeopardized by civil troubles and national famine. It was their chief, if not their only object of affection, as they had neither son nor daughter,

SYKES LUMB FAEM. 57?

nor any other object upon which to expend their love ; therefore, the risk of losing it gave them more than ordinary anxiety. Old Sykes does not appear to have clung to their darling hoard with half the affection dis- played by his worthy consort ; her dread of losing it was intense. Besides, says our chief authority, she had no " notion of becoming dependeDt upon the bounty of the Southworths of the Hall, nor did she relish the idea oi soliciting charity at the gates of the lordly Abbot of "Whalley. The treasure was therefore carefully secured in earthenware jars, and was then buried deep beneath the roots of an apple-tree in the orchard. Years passed away, and the troubles of the country did not cease. The Yorkists at length lost the ascendancy, and the reins of government passed into the hands of the Lan- castrians ; until at last the northern feud was healed by the mingling of the White Rose with the Red. Henry VII. sat upon the throne with Elizabeth of York as Queen ; but, ere peace thus blessed the land, old Sykes had paid the debt of nature, and left his widow the sole possessor of their buried wealth. She, too, soon passed away ; and, as the legend asserts, so sud- denly that she had no opportunity to disclose the place where she had deposited her treasure. Rumour had not failed to give her the credit of being possessed of considerable wealth ; but, although her relatives made diligent search, they were unsuccessful in discovering the place of the hidden jars.

" The farm passed into other hands, and old Sykes' s wife might have been forgotten had not her ghost, un-

578 HAUNTED HOMES.

able to find rest, continued occasionally to visit the old farm-house. Many a time, in the dusk of the evening, have the neighbouring peasants met an old wrinkled woman, dressed in ancient garb, passing along the gloomy road which leads across the Lumb, but fear always prevented them from speaking. She never lifted her head, hut helped herself noiselessly along by means of a crooked stick, which bore no resemblance to those then in use. At times she was seen in the old barn, on other occasions in the house, but more frequently in the orchard, standing by an apple-tree which still flou- rished over the place where the buried treasure was afterwards said to have been found. Generations passed away, and still her visits continued. One informant minutely described her withered visage, her short quaintly-cut gown, her striped petticoat, and her stick. He was so much alarmed that he ran away from the place, notwithstanding that he had engaged to perform some urgent work. * She was not there/ he gravely said, ' when I went to pluck an apple, but no sooner did I raise my hand towards the fruit, than she made her appearance just before me/ At last, it is said, an occupier of the farm, when somewhat elated by liquor, ventured to question her as to the reasons of her visits. She returned no answer, but, after moving slowly to- wards the stump of an old apple-tree, she pointed signi- ficantly towards a portion of the orchard which had never been disturbed. On search being made, the treasure was found deep down in the earth, and as the soil was being removed, the venerable-looking shade was

TUNSTEAD FAKM. 579

seen standing on the edge of the trench. When the iastjarwas lifted out, an unearthly smile passed over her withered features ; her bodily form became less and less distinct, until at last it disappeared altogether.

" Since then the old farm-house has ceased to be haunted. Old Sykes's wife is believed to have found eternal rest; but there are yet many, both old and young, who walk with quickened pace past the Lurnb whenever they are belated, fearful lest they should be once more confronted with the dreaded form of its unearthly visitor."

TUNSTEAD FAEM.

Tunstead Farm-house is about a mile and a half from Chapel-en-le-Frith, in Derbyshire, and is only distin- guished from numberless other English farm-houses by the fact that it is the possessor of a most eccentric skull. John Hutchinson, in his Tour through the High Peak, published in 1809, remarks that this skull, al- though popularly known by the not very reverent male cognomen of " Dickie," has " always been said to be that of a female. Why it should have been baptized with a name belonging to the male sex seems/' as Hutchinson says, " somewhat anomalous ; still, not more wonderful than a many, if not all, of its very singular pranks and services. To enumerate all the

37

580 HAUNTED HOMES.

particulars of the incalculably serviceable acts and deeds done by ' Dickie,' would form a wonder; but not a wonder past belief, for hundreds of the inhabitants of the locality for miles around have full and firm faith in its mystical performances. How long it has been located at the present house is not known ; of whose body in the flesh it was a member is equally as mys- terious, save that it is said (but what has not been said about it that is not pure fiction \) that one of two co- heiresses residing here was murdered, and who declared, in her dying moments, that her bones should remain in the place for ever. Tt is further said that the skull did not, some years u&,ek, appear the least decayed."

Hutchinson's account is supplemented by Mr. William Andrews, in his Historic Romance, with these re. marks : — " It is believed that if the skull be removed everything on the farm will go wrong — the cows will be dry and barren, the sheep have the rot, and the horses fall down, breaking their knees and otherwise injuring themselves. The most amusing part of the superstition connected with * Dickie ' is the following : — When the London and North-Western Kailway to Manchester was being made, the foundations of a bridge gave way in the yielding sand and bog on the side of the reservoir, and, after several attempts to build the bridge had failed, it was found necessary to divert the highway, and pass it under the railway on higher ground. These engineering failures were attributed to the malevolent influence of ' Dickie,' . . . but when the road was

tJLLSWATEE. 581

diverted, it was bridged successfully, because no longer on ' Dickie's ' territory.''

The influence thus exercised by the Tunstead skuil against the construction of so unghostly a work as a railroad, inspired Samuel Laycock, the Lancashire bard, to publish, in a local paper, a poetic Address to Dickie.

ULLSWA.T1R.

In a volume styled News from the Invisible World, the following story is related, as given from an account drawn up by the lady herself, " who was most literally exact and faithful to the truth." Miss Elizabeth Smith, the lady referred to, was the daughter of Colonel Smith, of Piercefield, on the river Wye, and the marvellous incident is said to have happened to her during her residence at Ullswater, in the winter of 1800. The version of the story given in the above volume is as follows : —

There is, on the western side of Ullswater, a fine cataract (or, in the language of the country, a force) , known by the name of " Aira Force," and it is of im- portance enough, especially in rainy seasons, to attract numerous visitors from among the " Lakers." Thither with some purpose of sketching, not the whole scene, but some picturesque feature of it, Miss Smith was

37*

582 HAUNTED HOMES.

*

gone, quite unaccompanied. The road to it lies through Gobarrow Park; and it was usual, at that time, to take a guide from the family of the Duke of Norfolk's keeper, who lived in Lyulph's Tower, a solitary hunting-lodge, built by His Grace for the pur- pose of an annual visit which he used to pay to his estates in that part of England. She, however, think- ing herself sufficiently familiar with the localities, had declined to encumber her movements with such an attendant ; consequently, she was alone. For half an hour or more, she continued to ascend ; and, being a good " cragswoman," from the experience she had won in ^Wales as well as in northern England, she had reached an altitude much beyond what would generally be thought corresponding to the time occupied. The path had vanished altogether ; but she continued to trace out one for herself amongst the stones which had fallen from the u force," sometimes approaching much nearer to the openings allowed by the broken nature of the rock. Pressing forward in this manner, and still never looking back, all at once she found herself in a little stony chamber, from which there was no egress possible in advance. She stopped and looked up. There was a frightful silence in the air. She felt a sudden palpitation at her heart, and a panic from she knew not what. Turning, however, hastily, she soon wound herself out of this aerial dungeon ; but by steps so rapid and agitated that, at length, on looking round she found herself standing at the brink of a chasm, frightful to look down. That way, it was clear enough,

ULLSWATER. 583

all retreat was impossible ; but, on turning round, retreat seemed in every direction alike quite impos- sible.

Down the chasm, at least, she might have leaped, though with little or no chance of escaping with life ; but in all other quarters it seemed to her eye that at no price could she effect an exit, since the rocks stood round her in a semicircle, all lofty, all perpendicular, all glazed with trickling water, or smooth as polished porpyhry. Yet how, then, had she reached the point ? The same track, if she could discover it, would surely secure her escape. Round and round she walked; gazed with almost despairing eyes ; her breath came thicker and thicker ; for path she could not trace by which it was possible for her to have entered. Finding herself grow more and more confused, and every instant nearer to sinking into some fainting fit or convulsion, she resolved to sit down and turn her thoughts quietly into some less exciting channel. This she did ; gra- dually recovered some self-possession ; and then suddenly a thought rose up to her, that she was in the hands of God, and that He would not forsake her. . . .

Once again she rose, and supporting herself upon a little sketching-stool that folded up into a stick, she looked upwards in the hope that some shepherd might, by chance, be wandering in those aerial regions ; but nothing could she see, except the tall birches growing at the brink of the highest summits, and the clouds sailing overhead. Suddenly, however, as she swept the whole circuit of her station with her alarmed eye, she

584 HAUNTED HOMES.

saw clearly, about two hundred yards beyond her own position, a lady in a white muslin morning-robe, such as were then universally worn by young ladies until dinner-time. The lady beckoned with a gesture, and in a manner that, in a moment, gave her confidence to advance — how., she could not guess, but in some way that baffled all power to retrace it, she found instan- taneously the outlet which previously had escaped her. She continued to advance towards the lady, whom now, in the same moment, she found to be standing upon the other side of the " force," and, also, to be her own sister. How or why that young lady, whom she had left at home earnestly occupied with her own studies, should have followed and overtaken her, filled her with per- plexity. But this was no situation for putting questions; for the guiding sister began to descend, and by a few simple gestures, just serving to indicate when Miss Elizabeth was to approach, and when to leave, the brink of the torrent, she gradually led her down to a platform of rock, from which the further descent was safe and conspicuous. There Miss Smith paused, in order to take breath from her panic, as well as to exchange greetings and questions with her sister. But sister was none ! All trace of her had vanished ; and when, two hours after, she reached her home, Miss Smith found her sister in the same situation and employment in which she had left her; and the whole] family assured Elizabeth that her sister had never stirred from the house I

585

WADDOW HALL.

Mr. William Dobson's interesting Rambles by the Bibble, furnish one or two accounts of local dwellings labouring under the uncanny odour of beinsf haunted. Mr. Dobson, although evidently no believer in ghosts, and unable to resist the temptation of having a fling at their erratic courses, tells of their doings with a chroni- cler's exactitude.

Writing in 1864, our authority says that Waddow Hall, in the township of Waddington, Yorkshire, was then in the occupation of James Garnett, Esquire, Mayor of Clitheroe. The property of the Ramsden family, Waddow Hall is situated in a pleasant park, which, though not of great extent, is of great beauty.

The house stands on a knoll, with pleasant wood- lands about it. At the foot of a gentle slope flows the Eibble ; the castle and church of Clitheroe are seen to advantage, the smoke only indicating where the town of Clitheroe lies, an intervening hill hiding the town itself from view. The mansion contains many portraits of its former owners and various members of their family, but the main interest of Waddow appears to arise from its being the scene of an old legend, which the folks of Clitheroe and the neighbouring Yorkshire villages are never weary of repeating, and for the truth of which they are perfectly willing to vouch. Many of the older inhabitants of Clitheroe and Waddington would as soon

586 HAUNTED HOMES.

i

doubt the Scriptures as they would a single iota of the following tradition.

In the grounds of Waddow and near the banks of the Kibble, there is a spring called Peg o' Nell's Well, and good water the spring sendeth forth in plenty. Near the spring is a headless, now almost shapeless figure, said to be a representation of the famous Peg herself.

Peg o' Nell, as I learned, says Mr. Dobson, was a young woman who, in days of yore, was a servant at Waddow Hall. On one occasion she was going to the well for water, the very well that to this day supplies the Hall with water for culinary purposes. She had had a quarrel with the lord or lady of Waddow, who, in a spirit of anger, not common, it is to be hoped, with masters and mistresses, wished that she might fall and break her neck. It was winter, and the ground was coated with ice; her pattens tripped in some way or other, Peggy fell, and the sad malediction was fully realised. To be revenged on her evil wisher, Peggy was wont to revisit her former home in the spirit, and torment her master and mistress by " making night hideous." Every disagreeable noise that was heard at Waddow was attributed to Peggy; every accident that occurred in the neighbourhood was through Peggy. No chicken was stolen, no cow died, no sheep strayed, no child was ill, no youth " took bad ways," but Peg was the evil genius. "When a Waddow farmer had stopped too long at the ' Dule ups' Dun,' and going home late had slipped off the hipping-stones at Brun- £»erley into the river, or a Clitheroe burgess, when in

WADDOW HALL. 587

Borland, had, like 'Tarn o' Shanter' sat too long ' fast by an ingle bleezing finely/ while ' the ale was growing better/ and had fallen off his horse in going home, and broken a limb, it was not the host's liquor that was charged with the mishap, but on Peggy's shoulders that the blame was laid."

What was worse, in addition to these perpetual annoyances, every seven years Peg required a life ; and the story is that " Peg's Night," as the time of sacrifice at each anniversary was called, was duly observed ; and if no living animal were ready as a septennial offering to her manes, a human being became inexorably the victim. Consequently it grew to be the custom on " Peg's Night " to drown a bird, or a cat, or a dog in the river, and, a life being thus given, for another seven years Peggy was appeased.

One night, at an inn in the neighbourhood, as the wind blew and the rattling showers rose on the blast, " and as the swollen Kibble roared over the hipping- stones, a young man, not in the soberest mood, had to go from Waddington to Clitheroe. No bridge then spanned the Bibble at Bungerley ; the only means of crossing the river was by the stones, which Henry the Sixth, in his last struggle for liberty, had tripped over towards ' Clitherwood.' He was told he must not venture over the water, it was not safe. He must be at Clitheroe that night, was his response, and go he would. j But,' said the young woman of the inn, by way of climax to the other arguments used to induce him not to go onward, * it 's Peg o' N^l's night, and she has

588 HAUNTED HOMES.

not had her life.' He cared not for Peg o' Nell ; he laughed at her alleged requirement, gave loose to his horse's rein, and was soon at Bungerley. The following morning horse and rider had alike perished, and, of course, many believed the calamity was through Peg's malevolence."

Peg, it is averred, is still as insatiable as ever, and many would dread to dare her wrath.

WATTON ABBEY.

Mr. F. Eoss is contributing a most interesting series of antiquarian, historical, and folk-lore sketches to the Leeds Mercury, entitled, " Yorkshire Legends and Traditions." Some of these sketches have already been made use of for this volume, and from one on Watton Abbey, which appeared in the Mercury for June 1884, the following particulars are derived.

The Tudor style of building which goes by the name of Watton Abbey, never was an Abbey, Mr. Ross informs us, but was a Gilbertine Priory. It is situated between the towns of Driffield and Beverley, in a charm- ing sequestered spot, surrounded by patriarchal trees. It has been occupied for some years past as a private residence, after having served for several years as an educational establishment. The present residence appears to bare been erected since the Reformation,

WATTON ABBEY. 589

and for its erection nearly the whole of the original conventual buildings appear to have been destroyed. Two hundred years ago the somewhat extensive remains of the old Priory were removed and made use of to repair Bolton Minster.

The original nunnery is supposed to have been founded in the earliest period of Anglo-Saxon Chris- tianity. In the ninth century the establishment is believed to have been destroyed by the Danes, and to have been refounded in the twelfth century by Lord Eustace Fitz-John of Knaresborough, at the instigation of Murdac, Archbishop of York, and in atonement for his manifold crimes. He endowed it with the Lordship of Watton and its appurtenances, for the benefit of his own soul, and the souls of his parents, relatives, friends, and servants. It was to provide for thirteen canons, and thirty-six nuns of the new Gilbertine Order, who were to reside in the same block of buildings, but with a party-wall for the separation of sexes; the canons " to serve the nuns perpetually in terrene, as well as in divine matters. "

Murdac had obtained preferment from Thurstan, Archbishop of York, and when that dignitary died, Murdac headed the Cistercians against William Fitz- herbert, the nephew and nominee of King Stephen for the vacant Archbishopric. Appeal was made to Pope Eugenius, and His Holiness suspended Fitzherbert, the Archbishop elect. Out of revenge for this, Fitzherbert went, with his supporters, to Fountains, of which place Murdac was now Abbot, and after an ineffectual search

590 HAUNTED HOMES.

for his rival, set fire to the abbey, and retired. The deed caused an immense sensation. Fitzherbert's triumph was short ; he was deposed from his Arch- bishopric, and, in 1147, Murdac elected in his stead.

Murdac went to Rome and had his election confirmed by the Pope, but on returning to England found York barred against his entry. He retired to Beverley, but the King refused to recognise him, sequestered the stalls of York, and fined Beverley for harbouring him. Murdac, however, appears to have continued to perform all the functions of his exalted office, even excommuni- cating certain Church dignitaries, and laying the northern metropolis under an interdict. He died at Beverley in 1153, and was interred at York Cathedral.

Soon after Murdac's return from Borne he greatly promoted the welfare of the re-established Watton, and placed within its walls for education, with a view of her ultimately taking the veil, a child of about four years old. Of this little girl Mr. Ross furnishes the following story : —

" Elfrida, the child whom Murdac had placed in the convent, was a merry, vivacious little creature; and whilst but a child was a source of amusement to the sisterhood, who, although prim and demure in bearing, and some of them sour-tempered and acid in their tem- pers, were wont to smile at her youthful frolics and ringing laugh ; but as she grew older, her outbursts of merriment, and the sallies of wit that began to animate her conversation, were checked, as being inconsistent with the character of a voting ladvwhowas now enrolled

WATTON ABBEY. 591

as novice, preparatory to taking the veil. As she advanced towards womanhood her form gradually de- veloped into a most symmetrical figure ; and her features became the perfection of beauty, set off with a trans- parent delicacy of complexion, such as would have rendered her a centre of attraction even among the beauties of a Koyal Court. This excited the jealousy of the sisters, who were chiefly elderly and middle-aged spinsters, whose homely and somewhat coarse features had proved detrimental to their hopes of obtaining hus- bands. They began to treat her with scornful looks, chilling neglect, and petty persecutions ; but when she, later on, evinced a manifest repugnance to convent life, ridiculed the ways of the holy sisters, and even satirised them, they charged her with entertaining rebellious and ungodly sentiments, and subjected her to penances and other modes of wholesome correction, such as they con- sidered would subdue her worldly spirit.

" Sprightly and light-hearted as she was, Elfrida was not happy, immured as she was within these detested walls, and condemned to assist in wearisome services, such as she thought might perhaps be congenial to the souls of her elder sisters, whose hopes of worldly happi- ness and conjugal endearment had been blighted, but which were altogether unsuited for one so beautiful (for she knew that she was fair, and was vain of her looks) and so cheerful-minded as herself; and she longed with intense desire to escape, mingle with the outer world, and have free intercourse with the other sex.

" According to the charter of endowment, the lav

592 HAUNTED HOMEg.

brethren of the monastery were entrusted with the management of the secular affairs of the nunnery, which necessitated their admission within its portals on certain occasions for conference with the prioress. On these occasions Elfrida would cast furtive and very un-nunlike glances upon their persons. She was particularly attracted by one of them, a young man of prepossessing mien and seductive style of speech, and she felt her heart beat wildly whenever he came with the other visitors. He noticed her surreptitious glances, and saw that she was exceedingly beautiful, and his heart re- sponded to the sentiment he felt that he had inspired in hers. They maintained this silent but eloquent lan- guage of love for some time, and soon found means of having stolen interviews under the darkness of night, when vows of everlasting love were interchanged, and led, eventually, to consequences which, at the outset, were not dreamt of by the erring pair.

" Suspicion having been excited by her altered form, she was summoned before her superiors on a charge of ' transgressing the conventual rules and violating one of the most stringent laws of monastic life/ and as con- cealment was impossible she boldly confessed her fault, adding that she had no vocation for a convent life, and desired to be banished from the community. This re- quest could not be listened to for a moment. The culprit had brought a scandal and indelible stain upon the fair fame of the house, which must, at any cost, be con- cealed from the world; and her open avowal of her guilt raised in the breasts of the pious sisterhood a

WATTON ABBEY. 593

perfect fury of indignation, and a determination to in- flict immediate and condign punishment on her. It was variously suggested that she should be burnt to death, that she should be walled up alive, that she should be flayed, that her flesh should be torn from her bones with red-hot pincers, that she should be roasted to death before a fire, &c. ; but the more prudent and aged averted these extreme measures, and suggested some milder forms of punishment, which were at once carried out. The miserable object of their vengeance was stripped of her clothing, stretched on the floor, and scourged with rods until the blood trickled down pro- fusely from her lacerated back. She was then cast into a noisome dungeon, without light, fettered by iron chains to the floor, and supplied with only bread and water, ' which was administered with bitter taunts and reproaches.'

" Meanwhile the young man, her paramour, had left the monastery, and as the nuns were desirous of inflict- ing some terrible punishment upon him for his horrible crime, they extorted from Elfrida, under promise that she should be released and given up to him, the confes- sion that he was still in the neighbourhood in disguise, and that, not knowing of the discovery that had been made, he would come to visit her, and make the usual signal of throwing a stone on the roof over her sleeping cell. The Prioress made this known to the brethren of the monastery, and arranged with them for his capture. The following night he came, looked cautiously round, and then threw the stone, when the monks rushed out of

594 HAUNTED HOMES.

ambush, cudgelled him soundly, and then took him a prisoner into the house. The younger part of the nuns, inflamed with a pious zeal, demanded the custody of the prisoner, on pretence of gaining further information. Their request was granted, and taking him to an un- frequented part of the convent, they committed on his person such brutal atrocities as cannot be translated with- out polluting the page on which they are written ; and, to increase the horror, the lady was brought forth to be witness of the abominable scene.'

Whilst lying in her dungeon, Elfrida became penitent and conscious of having committed a gross crime, and one night, whilst sleeping in her fetters, Archbishop Murdac appeared to her and charged her with having cursed him. She replied that she certainly had cursed him for having placed her »n so uncongenial a sphere. ' Rather curse yourself,' said he, ' for having given way to temptation.' ' So I do,' she answered, ' and I regret having imputed the bl^me to you.' He then exhorted her to repentance aud the daily repetition of certain psalms, and then vanished, — a vision which afforded her much consolation.

" The holy sisters were now much troubled on the question of what should be done with the infant which was expected daily, and preparations were made for its reception; when Elfrida was again visited by the Arch- bishop, accompanied by two women, who, * with the holy aid of the Archbishop, safely delivered her of the infant, which they bore away in their arms, covered with a fair white cloth.' When the nuns came the next morn-

WATTON ABBEY. 595

ing tliey found her in perfect health and restored to her youthful appearance, without any signs of the accouche- ment, and charged her with murdering'the infant — a very improbable idea, seeing that she was still chained to the floor. She narrated what had occurred, but was not believed. The next night all her fetters were miraculously removed, and when her cell was entered the following morniug she was found standing free, and the chains not to be found.

" The Father Superior of the convent was then called in, and he invited Alured, Abbot of Rievaulx, to assist him in the investigation of the case, who decided that it was a miraculous intervention, and the Abbot de- parted, saying, ' What God hath cleansed call not thou common or unclean, and whom He hath loosed thou mavest not bind/

■J

" What afterwards became of Elfrida is not stated, but we may presume that after these miraculous events she frould be admitted as a thrice holy member of the sister- hood, despite her little peccadillo."

Now there is a haunted room in Watton Abbey, and the spectre which frequents it is popularly known as "The Headless Nun of Watton." The belief of the learned is, however, that the apparition which haunts Watton is not that of the transgressing nun of the twelfth, but a brutally beheaded lady of the seventeenth, century. Mr. Ross opines that the story-tellers have confused the two traditions, and have treated them as one story, regarding the two heroines as identical. No one would appear to have seen the possibility of the

38

596 HAUNTED HOMES.

old place being haunted by two ghosts — by rival appa- ritions !

The stories of both the heroines are narrated by Mr. Koss ; that of the frail nun being derived from Alured of Rievaulx's account. The old monkish chronicler vouches for the truth of his narration, saying, " Let no one doubt the truth of this account, for I was an eye- witness to many of the facts, and the remainder were related to me by persons of such mature age and dis- tinguished position that I cannot doubt the accuracy of their statements."

So much for the account of the fair nun ; that of her more unfortunate sister is of comparatively recent date. According to the later tradition, as related to us by Mr. Ross, " a lady of distinction who then occupied the house (at Watton), was a devoted Royalist in the great Civil War which resulted in the death of King Charles. It was after the battle of Marston Moor, which was a death-blow to the Royalists north of the Humber, and when the Parliamentarians dominated the broad lands of Yorkshire, that a party of fanatical Roundheads came into the neighbourhood of Watton, ' breathing out threatenings and slaughter,' against the ' Malignants/ and especially against such as still clung to the * vile rags of the whore of Babylon/ vowing to put all such to the sword. The lady of Watton, who was a devout Catho- lic, heard of this band of Puritan soldiers, who were ' rampaging ' over the Wolds, and of the barbarous murders of which they had been guilty. Her husband was away, fighting in the ranks of the King, down

WATTON ABBEY. 597

Oxford way, and she was left without any protector ex- cepting a handful of servants, male and female, who would be of no use against a hand of armed soldiers, and it was with great fear and trembling that she heard of their arrival at Driffield, some three or four miles distant, where they had been plundering and maltreating ' the Philistines,' fearing more for her infant than her- self, as she believed the prevalent exaggerated rumour, that it was a favourite amusement with them to toss babies up in the air, and catch them on the points of their pikes.

" At length news was brought that the marauders were on the march to Watton, for the purpose of plundering it, as the home of a ' malignant/ and the lady, for better security, shut herself, with her child and her jewels, in the wainscotted room, hoping in case of extremity to escape by means of the secret stair, and in the mean- while, committed herself and her child to the care of the Virgin Mother. It was not long ere the band of soldiers arrived and hammered at the door, calling aloud for ad- mittance, but met with no response. They were about breaking down the door, and went in search of imple- ments for the purpose, when they caught sight of a low archway opening upon the moat, which they guessed to be a side entrance to the house, and, crossing the moat, they found the stair, which they ascended, and came to the panel, which they concluded was a disguised door. A few blows sufficed to dash it open, and they came into the presence of the lady, who was prostrate before a crucifix. Rising up, she demanded what they wanted,

38*

598 HAUNTED HOMES.

and wherefore this rude intrusion. They replied tha\, they had come to despoil the ' Egyptian ' who owned the mansion, and, if he had been present, to smite him to death as a worshipper of idols and an abomination in the eyes of God.

"An angry altercation ensued, the lady, who possessed a high spirit, making a free use of her tongue in up- braidings and reproaches for their dastardly conduct on the Wolds, of which she had heard, to which they lis- tened very impatiently, and replied in coarse language, not fit for a lady's ears, at the same time demanding the plate and other valuables of the house. She scorn- fully refused to give them up, and told them that if they wanted them they must find them for them- selves, and, at length, so provoked them by her taunta that they cried, ' Hew down with the sword the woman of Belial and the spawn of the malignant/ and suit- ing the action to the word, they caught her child from her arms, dashed its brains out against the wall, and then cut her down and ' hewed ' off her head, after which they plundered the house and departed with their spoil.

" It must not be supposed that these ruffians were a fair specimen of the brave, God-fearing men v/ho fought under Fairfax, and put Newcastle and Kupert to flight at Marston Moor, who fought with the sword in one hand and the Bible in the other, who laid the axe at the root of Royal arbitrary prerogative, and were the real authors of the civil and religious liberty which we now enjoy. But, as in all times of civil commotion, there

Watton abbey, 599

were evil-minded wretches who, for purposes of plunder, assumed the garb and adopted the phraseology of the noble-minded soldiers of Fairfax and Hampden and the Ironsides of Cromwell, out-Puritaned them in their hypocritical cant, bringing disgrace and scandal upon the armies with which they associated themselves. And such were the villains who despoiled Watton, and slew so barbarously the poor lady and her infant ; and from that time the ghost of the lady has haunted the room in which the deed was perpetrated."

In the present house at Watton, says our authority, " there is a chamber wainscotted throughout with panelled oak, one of the panels forming a door, so accurately fitted that it cannot be distinguished from the other panels. It is opened by a secret spring, and communicates with a stone stair that goes down to the moat; and it may be that the room was a hiding-place for the Jesuits or priests of the Catholic Church when they were so ruth- lessly hunted down and barbarously executed in the Elizabethan and Jacobean reigns. The room is re- puted to be haunted by the ghost of a headless lady with an infant in her arms, who comes, or came thither formerly, to sleep there nightly, the bed-clothes being found the following morning in a disordered state, as they would be after a person had been sleeping in them. If by chance any person had daring enough to occupy the room, the ghost would come, minus the head, dressed in blood-stained garments, with her infant in her arms, and would stand motionless at the foot of the bed for a while, and then vanish. A

600 HAUNTED HOMES.

visitor on one occasion, who knew nothing of the legend, was put to sleep in the chamber, who, in the morning, stated that his slumbers had been disturbed by a spectral visitant, in the form of a lady with bloody raiment and an infant, and that her features bore a strange resem- blance to those of a lady whose portrait hung in the room ; from which it would appear that on that special occasion she had donned her head."

Does not the appearance of this last-seen apparition seem to favour the theory, despite our authority's ironical remark, that Watton may be haunted by the apparitions of both the unfortunate women whose stories have just been narrated ?

WYECOLLEE HALL.

Spectre Horsemen and Wild Huntsmen throng the tra- ditionary lore of all European nations. Those who wish to trace the theme to its earliest origin, should consult Mr. Charles Hardwick's work on the Traditions, Su- perstitions, and Folk-lore of the north of England. A typical legend is related by Sam Bamford, in his poem of The Wild Rider, of a Sir Ashton Lever of whom it was asserted that he performed such wonderful feats of horsemanship, " that no horse could have carried him save one of more than earthlv breed." Other writers, both British and foreign, have celebrated in prose and

WYECOLLEB HALL. 601

verse the deeds of spectre riders and their ghostly steeds, but the following account is the one most closely allied to the theme set before us : it is in Harland's Lancashire Legends, and is of contemporary belief.

" Wyecoller Hall, near Colne, was long the seat of the Cunliffes of Billington. They were noted persons in their day, and the names of successive members of the family are attached to documents relating to the property of the Abbots of Whalley. But evil days came, and their ancestral estates passed out of their hands In the days of the Commonwealth their loyalty cost them dear ; and ultimately they retired to Wyecoller with a remnant only of their once extensive estates. About 1819 the last of the family passed away, and the Hall is now a mass of ruins. Little but the antique fire-place remains entire ; and even the room alluded to in the following legend cannot now be identified.

" Tradition says that once every year a spectre horseman visits Wyecoller Hall. He is attired in the costume of the early Stuart period, and the trappings of his horse are of a most uncouth description. On the evening of his visit the weather is always wild and tempestuous. There is no moon to light the lonely roads, and the residents of the district do not venture out of their cottages. When the wind howls the loudest the horseman can be heard dashing up the road at full speed, and after crossing the narrow bridge, he suddenly stops at the door of the Hall. The rider then dismounts and makes his way up the broad oaken stairs into one of the rooms of the house. Dreadful screams,

602 HAUNTED HOMES.

as from a woman, are then heard, which soon subside into groans. The horseman then makes his appearance at the door — at once mounts his steed — and gallops off the road he came. His body can be seen through by those who may chance to be present ; his horse appears to be wild with rage, and its nostrils stream with fire.

" The tradition is that one of the Cunliffes murdered his wife in that room, and that the spectre horseman is the ghost of the murderer, who is doomed to pay an annual visit to the home of his victim. She is said to have predicted the extinction of the family, which (pre- diction) has literally been fulfilled."

WARDLEY HALL.

Many a curious chapter has been written about the human cranium, but, probably, none more singular than that titled " Skull Superstitions," by Mr. William Andrews, in his work on Historic Romance. Among other instances of the belief prevalent in certain locali- ties of the way in which skulls influence the fortunes of families, or at any of their residences,, he cites the sin- gular and oft-referred-to case of the empty head-piece kept at Wardley Hall. This ancient pile of buildings, erected in the reign of the sixth Edward, is about seven miles from Manchester, and is historically noted for its possession of an unburied human skull.

The old Hall is situated in the midst of a small

Wakdley hall. 603

woody glade, and was originally surrounded by a moat, except on the east side, which was protected by natural defences. In Lancashire Legends, Mr. T. T. Wilkin- son says : " This black and white half-timbered edifice

m

is of a quadrangular form, consisting of ornamented wood and plaster frames, interlined with bricks (plas- tered and white-washed, the woodwork being painted black), and entered by a covered archway, opening into a court-yard in the centre, like so many of the manor- houses of the same age in Lancashire. About 1830 it was in a ruinous condition, one part being occupied as a farm-house, and the other formed into a cluster of nine cottages. The Hall has since been thoroughly renovated, and has been occupied ^or many years by a gentleman farmer &m\ collie^ owner.'

Wardley Hall, and the surrounding property, after having been in the possession of various gentle fami- lies, in the early part of the seventeenth century passed into the hands of the Downes, and the Hall became the residence of Roger Downe. Roger, the grandson of this gentleman, and the heir to the property, is de- scribed as one of the most dissolute courtiers of Charles the Second's Court. After a reckless career of crime, this young man, the last male representative of his family, was slain in a drunken brawl, and, says tradi- tion, his head having been severed from his body, was sent as a memento mori to his sister. That head, ac- cording to popular faith, has been kept at the Hall ever since, none of the tenants having ever been enabled to get rid of it.

604 HAUNTED HOMES.

Mr. Andrews refers to various accounts relating to this noted relic, but quotes, as the most curious, one found in the manuscripts of Thomas Barritt, the Man- chester antiquary, describing his own visit to Wardley Hall about the end of the last century. That account it will be well to follow.

" A human skull which, time out of mind, hath had a superstitious veneration paid to it by [the occupiers of the Hall] not permitting it to be removed from its situ- ation, which is on the topmost step of a staircase. There is a tradition that, if removed or ill-used, some uncommon noise and disturbance always follows, to the terror of the whole house ; yet I cannot persuade my- self this is always the case. But, some years ago, I and three of my acquaintances went to view this sur- prising piece of household furniture, and found it as above mentioned, and bleached white with weather, that beats in upon it from a four-square window in the hall, which the tenants never permit to be glazed or filled up, thus to oblige the skull, which, they say, is unruly and disturbed at the hole not being always open.

" However, one of us, who was last in company with the skull, removed it from its place into a dark part of the room, and then left, and returned home ; but the night but one following, such a storm arose about the house, of wind and lightning, as tore down some trees, and unthatched out-housing. We hearing of this, my father went over in a few days after to see his mother, who lived near the Hall, and was witness to the wreck the storm had made. Yet ail this might have hap-

WARDLEY HALL. 605

pened had the skull never been removed; but, withal, it keeps alive the credibility of its believers.

" What I can learn of the above affair from old people in the neighbourhood is, that a young man of the Downes family, being in London, one night in his frolics vowed to his companions that he would kill the first man he met ; and accordingly he ran his sword through a man immediately, a tailor by trade. How- ever, justice overtook him in his career of wickedness ; for, in some while after, he being in a riot upon London Bridge, a watchman made a stroke at him with his bill, and severed his head from his body, which head was enclosed in a box, and sent to his sister, who then lived at Wardley, where it hath continued ever since."

Roby, in his Traditions of Lancashire, refers to this Wardley legend. After relating the fate of young Downes, and the sending home of his decapitated head, he says : " The skull was removed, secretly at first, but invariably it returned to the Hall, and no human power could drive it thence. It hath been riven to pieces, burnt, and otherwise destroyed; but on the subsequent day it was seen filling its wonted place."

Elsewhere he relates that at Wardley " a human skull is still shown here, which is usually kept in a little locked recess in the staircase wall, and which the occu- piers of the Hall would never permit to be removed. This grim caput mortuum being, it is said, much averse to any change of place or position, never failed to punish the individual severely which should dare to lay hands upon it with any such purpose. If removed, drowned

606 HAUNTED HOMES.

in the neighbouring pond (which is, in fact, a part of the old moat which formerly surrounded the house), or buried, it was sure to return ; so that, in the end, each succeeding tenant was fain to endure its presence rather than be subject to the terrors and annoyances conse- quent upon its removal. Even the square aperture in the wall was not permitted to be glazed without the skull or its long-defunct owner creating some distur- bance. It was almost bleached white by exposure to the weather, and many curious persons have made a pilgrimage there, even of late years."

In Harland and Wilkinson's Lancashire Legends, a quite recent work, the Editor says that when he visited the Hall, some years ago, he found that a locked door concealed at once the square aperture and its fearful tenant. At that time two keys were provided for this tl place of a skull," one being kept by the tenant of the Hall, and the other by the Countess of Ellesmere, the owner of the property. Occasionally the Countess would accompany visitors from the neighbouring Worsley Hall, and would unlock the door and show to her friends the Wardley Hall skull. Mr. Wilkinson revisited the quaint old residence in 1861, and again personally inspected this strange relic of mortality. An account of this re-inspection is given in the volume above referred to.

APPENDIX.

809

BATH.

Bath is veritably honeycombed, even in these realistic days, with inexplicable mysteries. Haunted houses are of common occurrence in Bladud's city, and there are now before us several cases of ghostly doings therein which, for reasons pecuniary or personal, the owners or tenants deprecate direct allusion to. One of the best- known of these troubled homes is in Lansdowne Cres- cent, and upon the story connected with this building, the number of which we cannot furnish, an interesting romance has been founded by Miss Mary C. Kowsell. The story current in Bath is that every Sunday night, at eleven o'clock, the sound of clashing swords and of angry mutterings is heard outside the doors of the first-floor rooms, and that everyone who has ventured within those rooms at such a time has heard the noises ; yet when the doors are opened nothing is seen, nothing is heard.

Another of these haunted houses is in the Villa Fields ; but the mysteries connected with it, although alleged to have been detailed at length in a London magazine, we have been unable to fathom. Other tales, more or less

610 HAUNTED HOMES.

circumstantial, have been related to us of houses in Bath, including one in Henrietta Street, Great Pulteney Street. In this house, some years ago, a man murdered his wife, and left her bleeding corse on the hearth-stone in the kitchen. With foresight rarely displayed by murderers, he locked the front door previous to escaping by the back, which he pulled-to after him. Getting into Great Pulteney Street, he made his way to his residence in Henrietta Street, and attempted to open the front door, or rather pretended to. The door was, of course, locked, so he called a policeman, who forced his way in and found the dead body of the wife. Not- withstanding the man's cunning, the crime was ulti- mately brought home to him, and, doubtless, he suffered the punishment awarded by law for his crime. The fact, however, which causes us to allude to this con- ventional story of assassination is, that the tragedy left ineffaceable traces ; ever since the ghastly body of the murdered wife was flung upon that hearth the stone there has had stains which cannot be got out. Even new hearth-stones have been put down, but the blood- stains force their way through, and cannot be eradicated ! In All the Year Round for January 1868, attention is drawn to the fact that Bath is " a perfect nest of ghosts/' Amongst its haunted houses is Jervis House, described as a handsome country seat, possessed of a traditional ghost, and as a building about two centuries old, standing in extensive grounds, within which is a large ornamental lake, with a treeless island in the centre of it. " A gentleman who was on a visit for the

BATH. 611

first time at Jervis House, a year or two ago/' says this writer, " observed to his host at breakfast, * I see there is no bridge accommodation with your little island.'

" ' None.1

" ' I thought, too, you told me you had at present no boat on the lake ? '

" ' Nor have I,' replied his friend. ' Why ? '

° ' How, then, do ladies effect the passage?'

" The host hesitated.

" * Ladies ? ' he repeated ; ' do you mean '

" ' I mean, my good friend, that I noticed a lady walking on the island this morning, so early that I won- dered at her fancy. She passed entirely round, and crossed it twice, so that I could not possibly be mis- taken/

" ' You have seen the Jervis ghost,' said his friend curtly.

" And the subject was dismissed."

Of course, this is a very tantalizing" finale, but all our efforts to obtain any further information for the benefit of our readers about Jervis House, orits ghostly tenant, have proved fruitless.

Another narrative told in the same number of the periodical cited refers to another haunted residence in the vicinity of Bath, and is, if equally inexplicable, certainly more blood-curdling. It relates to Barton Hall, and the circumstances are asserted bv its narrator to be " oerfectlv true/' and to have occurred but a verv short time since (1868) to two young ladies, sisters,

39

612 HAUNTED HOMES.

from whom the facts were derived, on the occasion of their visit to the Hall.

" They had retired/' says the account, " to the cham- ber occupied by both, and the elder sister was already in bed. The younger was kneeling before the fire. The door opened softly, and a woman, entering, crossed the apartment, and bent down before a chest of drawers, as if intending to open the lower one. Thinking it was one of the maids, the young lady who was in bed accosted her. * Is that you, Mary ? What are you looking for there ? '

"Her sister, who was before the fire, had risen to her feet, and turned towards the woman. In the act she uttered a loud shriek, and, staggering back, fell haif-fainting on the bed. The other sprang up, and followed the intruder, who seemed to retreat quickly into an adjoining dressing-room. The young lady entered. It was empty.

'* Returning to her sister, the latter, who had re- covered from her consternation, explained the cause of her outcry. The woman, in turning to meet her, dis- played a human countenance, but devoid of eyes."

BOWLAND.

One of those singular dreams, which have attained to historic importance as much by their recorder's position.

BOWL AND, 613

as their own inexplicable nature, is given in a note to The Antiquary by Sir Walter Scott himself. In vouch- ing for the entire authenticity of the story, Sir Walter states that it was told to him " by persons who had the best access to know the facts, who were not likely themselves to be deceived, and who were certainly in- capable of deception." He was, therefore, as he remarks of the story, unable " to refuse to give it credit, however extraordinary the circumstances may appear."

Sir Walter's version of the story, with the names, of which he gives only the initials and final letters, duly filled in, is : —

" Mr. Kutherford, of Bowland, a gentleman of landed property in the Vale of Gala, was prosecuted for a very considerable sum, the accumulated arrears of teind (or tithe), for which he was said to be indebted to a noble family, the titulars (lay impropriators of the tithes). Mr. Kutherford was strongly impressed with the belief that his father had, by a form of process peculiar to the law of Scotland, purchased these teinds from the titular, and, therefore, that the present prosecution was ground- less. But, after an industrious search among his father's papers, an investigation among the public records, and a careful inquiry among all persons who had transacted law business for his father, no evidence could be recovered to support his defence. The period was now near at hand, when he conceived the loss of his law-suit to be inevitable ; and he had formed the determination to ride to Edinburgh next day, and make

39*

614 HAUNTED HOMES.

the best bargain he could in the way of compromise. He went to bed with this resolution ; and, with all the circumstances of the case floating upon his mind, had a dream to the following purpose. His father, who had been dead many years, appeared to him, he thought, and asked him why he was disturbed in his mind. In dreams men are not surprised at such apparitions. Mr. Rutherford thought that he informed his father of the cause of his distress, adding that the payment of a con- siderable sum of money was the more unpleasant to him because he had a strong consciousness that it was not due, though he was unable to recover any evidence in support of his belief. * You are right, my son,' replied the paternal shade : 'I did acquire right to these leitids, for payment of which you are now prosecuted. The papers relating to the transaction are in the hands

of Mr. , a writer (or attorney), who is now retired

from professional business, and resides at Inveresk, near Edinburgh. He was a person whom I employed on that occasion for a particular reason, but who never, on any other occasion, transacted business on my account. It is very possible,' pursued the vision, ' that

Mr. may have forgotten a matter which is now of

a very old date ; but you may call it to his recollection by this token, that, when I came to pay his account, there was difficulty in getting change for a Portugal piece of gold, and we were forced to drink out the balance at a tavern.

" Mr. Rutherford awoke, in the morning, with all the words of the vision imprinted on his mind, and thought

CLIFTON PAKK 615

it worth while to walk across the country to Inveresk, instead of going straight to Edinburgh- When he came there he waited on the gentleman mentioned in the dream — a very old man. Without saying anything of the vision, he inquired whether he ever remembered having conducted such a matter for his deceased father. The old gentleman could not, at first, bring the circum- stance to his recollection ; but, on mention of the Portugal piece of gold, the whole returned upon his memory. He made an immediate search for the papers, and recovered them; so that Mr. Rutherford carried to Edinburgh the documents necessary to gain the cause which he was on the verge of losing.'

CLIFTON PARK.

In Horace Welby's Sig?is before Death, a work to which we have elsewhere had occasion to refer, the following narrative is given, and in these words : —

" One morning in the summer of 1745, Mrs. Jane Lowe, housekeeper to Mr. Pringle, of Clifton Park, in the south of Scotland,, beheld the apparition of a lady walking in the avenue, on the margin of a rivulet, which runs into Kale water. The form resembled a daughter of her master who had long been absent from the family, at the distance of about a hundred miles south of Paris. As Mrs. Lowe walked down the avenue and

616 HAUNTED HOMES.

approached the rivulet, this resemblance impressed her so strongly that, seeing her master in an enclosure adjoining, she went and told him what she had seen. Mr. Pringle laughed, and said, ' You simple woman ! that lady is Miss Chattow, of Morebattle.' However, Mrs. Lowe prevailed upon him to accompany her to the place, which they had nearly reached, when the appari- tion sprang into the water and instantly disappeared.

" Mr. Pringle and Mrs. Lowe, on returning to the hall, apprized the family of the vision, and for their pains were heartily laughed at. The Kev. Mr. Turnbull, minister of Linton, happened to breakfast that morning with Mr. Pringle, his lady, and two young daughters, who joined in the laugh. About three months after- wards, the same reverend gentleman honoured the family with his company ; when, standing at a window in the lower room, he observed a poor, ragged, lame, lean man slowly approaching the house. ' Here comes another apparition/ cried Mr. Turnbull, with a kind of contemptuous smile. This drew the immediate atten- tion of all present, and Mr. Pringle quickly recognised the person to be his second son, whom he had not seen for above ten years.

" On his arrival, he soon convinced them that he was not an apparition, declaring that he had narrowly escaped with his life from Tunis, in the vicinity of which he had been a slave to the Algerines seven years, but had happily been ransomed at the critical moment when he was ordered to be put to death for mutiny. He added, that on his return home through France, he

EDINBURGH. 617

called at the place where he had heard that his sister resided, and to his unspeakable grief found that she died on the 25th of May, the same summer, about five o'clock in the morning, which he recollected to have been the precise time when he was saved from the jaws of death, and when he thought he beheld his sister. Mrs. Lowe, who was present in the room, on hearing his declaration, added her testimony by affirming that the day alluded to was that on which she had shown Mr. Pringle the apparition ; and this was confirmed by the Reverend Mr. Turnbull, in whose study this narrative was found after his death/'

EDINBURGH.

m

Under the title of Aunt Margaret's Mirror, Sir Walter Scott published a tale, the incidents of which were de- rived from some circumstances in the early life of the Countess of Stair, wife of John, the second Earl. The author of Waverley only related the remarkable events alluded to in a condensed manner, but from various Scottish writers, especially Robert Chambers, we are enabled to furnish the story in a more ample form.

Lady Eleanor Campbell was youngest daughter of James, second Earl of Loudon, and, therefore, grand- daughter to that stern old Earl who played so important a part in the affairs of the Covenant, and who was Lord

618 HAUNTED HOMES.

Chancellor of Scotland during the Civil War. Whilst very young, in the beginning of the last century, Lady Mary was married to James, the first Viscount Primrose. Her husband is described as a nobleman of bad temper and dissolute habits, and is averred to have treated his young wife with great brutality. Eventually his con- duot became so outrageous that the unfortunate lady went in fear of her life. One morning, it is stated, whilst she was labouring under this dreadful anticipa- tion, she was dressing herself in her chamber, near an open window, when she saw her husband enter the room with a drawn sword in his hand. He had opened the door softly, and approached his wife with stealthy steps, but she had caught a glimpse, in the mirror, of his face, upon which his horrible resolution was depicted, and before he had time to do her any injury, she leapt through an open window into the street. She does not appear to have sustained any important injury by her dangerous leap, and was enabled, half-dressed as she was, to gejt to the house of her husband's mother and claim her protection, which was, of course, accorded.

After such proceedings, it was impossible to think of a reconciliation, and, in future, the ill-assorted couple lived apart. Soon after this escapade, Lord Primrose went abroad, and for a very long while Lady Primrose heard nothing whatever about him. During this lengthy separation a foreign fortune-teller, or necromancer, came to Edinburgh, and, among other accomplishments, professed to be able to inform anyone of the present condition or position of any other person in whom the

EDINBURGH. 619

applicant was interested, irrespective of their distance. Hearing of the marvels performed by this foreigner, and incited by curiosity, Lady Primrose went, with a lady friend, to his lodgings in the Canongate for the purpose of inquiring about her absent husband.

The two ladies, escorted by their servants, duly reached the place of their quest. Lady Primrose having described the individual in whose fate she was interested, and having expressed her desire to know how he was occupied, was led by the conjuror to a large mirror. Upon looking into it, she perceived distinctly the inside of a church, within which, grouped about the altar, a marriage ceremony appeared to be pro- ceeding. What, however, was Lady Primrose's astonish- ment when, in the shadowy bridegroom, she recognised her own husband, although the bride's face was entirely strange to her ! The magical scene thus wonderfully displayed before her bewildered gaze, she described as not so much like a picture, or the delineation of the pencil, as a living, moving tableau of real life. Whilst Lady Primrose gazed, the whole ceremonial of the marriage appeared to be taking place before her. The necessary arrangements had been made; the priest appeared about to pronounce the preliminary service ; he was, apparently, on the point of bidding the bride and bride- groom join hands, when, suddenly, a gentleman, whom the party seemed to have been waiting for some time, and in whom Lady Primrose recognised a brother of her own, then abroad, entered the church, and hurried towards the bridal group. At first the aspect of this

620 HAUNTED HOMES.

person was only that of a friend, who had been invited to the ceremony, and who had arrived late ; but when he arrived near the party, the expression of his counte- nance suddenly altered. He stopped short; his face assumed a wrathful expression ; he drew his sword and rushed at the bridegroom, who also drew his weapon. The whole scene then became quite tumultuous and indistinct, and speedily vanished away.

Upon her return home, Lady Primrose wrote out a minute account of the whole affair, and appended to her narrative the day of the month on which she had seen the mysterious vision. This account she sealed up in the presence of a witness and then deposited it in a place of security.

Eventually the absent brother returned home, and naturally went to visit his sister. Lady Primrose inquired if, in the course of his wanderings, he had happened to see or hear anything of her husband. The young man only responded that he wished never to hear that detestable person's name mentioned. Pressed closely by his sister, however, he confessed at last that he had met Lord Primrose and under very strange circumstances. Whilst he was making a stay in Amster- dam he became acquainted with a very wealthy merchant whose only child, a beautiful girl, was the heiress of his enormous fortune. This merchant informed him that his daughter was engaged to a Scotchman of good position who had recently come to reside in Holland, and asked him, as a fellow-countryman of the bride- groom, to the forthcoming wedding. He went, but was

EDINBUKGH. 621.

a little late for the commencement of the ceremony, yet arrived, fortunately, just in time to prevent the marriage of the beautiful and amiable young Dutch girl to his own brother-in-law, Lord Primrose !

Lady Primrose had so far succumbed to the prevalent superstition of her time as to write down a full account of the vision she had beheld in the magic mirror, but she was so confounded and overcome when this wonder- ful confirmation of its truth was revealed to her that she almost fainted away. But one important fact had still to be ascertained. When did Lord Primrose's attempted marriage take place ? Her brother was fully enabled to answer this. Upon receiving his reply she took out a key, opened the drawer containing the account of her vision in the mirror, and, handing the manuscript to her brother, desired him to read it. He did so, and found that Lady Primrose's narrative not only tallied in every important particular with the scene he had taken part in, but, also, that it was dated on the day that her husband's attempted nuptials were interrupted in the way he had described !

A few words about Lady Primrose's career will not be out of place here. In 1709 her husband died, leaving her still young and beautiful. She had many good offers, but, more than dissatisfied with her experi- ence of the married state, she formed a resolution never to remarry. Among her suitors was the famous Earl of Stair, who for twenty years had made Edinburgh his place of residence. Lady Primrose preferred him to all her wooers, but even on his behalf could not be per-

622 HAUNTED HOMES.

suaded to relinquish the comforts of widowhood. In order to change her resolution the Earl hit upon an expedient which, as one authority remarks, " certainly marks the age as one of little delicacy."' He bribed one of her servants to admit him into her dressing-room, the window of which looked out upon the High Street. At this window, when the morning was somewhat advanced, the Earl showed himself en dishabille to the passers-by. The fatal effect which this exhibition threatened to have upon the lady's reputation, induced her to accept Lord Stair for her second husband. As Countess of Stair the lady is said to have had a fairly happy life, especially after she had succeeded in weaning the Earl from over fondness for the bottle. In 1747 she was left a widow for the second time, and in November 1759, after having long exercised sway over the first coteries of the Scottish capital, died there, at a very advanced age.

EDINBURGH CASTLE.

A singular prophetic, or warning dream, is related and vouched for as " entirely authentic," by Dr. Abercrombie, in his work on Inquiries Concerning the Intellectual Powers. The Doctor, however, only gives the skeleton of the story and omits the names of the persons concerned. Lady Clerk, of Pennicuik, daughter of the Mr. D'Acre of the dream, communicated

EDINBURGH CASTLE, 623

the tale more fully to Blackwood's Magazine, in a letter dated May 1, 1826, and beginning, " Being in company the other day when the conversation turned upon dreams, I related one, of which, as it happened to my own father, I can answer for the perfect truth.'"

Even Lady Clerk's printed narrative, however, is in- complete, as it, also, gives the initials only of the names, but Mr. Dale Owen was successful in obtaining these names in full from a manuscript account of the whole affair by her ladyship, and he succeeded, also, in unearthing, from a contemporary newspaper, The Caledonian Mercury, the date of the accident referred to, and particulars of the whole occurrence.

The anecdote is related by Mr. Dale Owen in the following terms :

Major and Mrs. Griffith, of Edinburgh, then residing in the Castle, had received into their house their nephew, Mr. Joseph D'Acre, of Kirklinton, in the county of Cumberland — a young gentleman who had come to the Scottish capital for the purpose of attending college, and had been specially recommended to his relatives' care. One afternoon Mr. D'Acre communi- cated to them his intention of joining some of his young companions on the morrow in a fishing-party to Inch-Keith; and to this no objection was made. During the ensuing night, however, Mrs. Griffith started from a troubled dream, exclaiming, in accents of terror, " The boat is sinking ! Oh, save them ! "

Her husband ascribed this to apprehension on her part ; but she declared she had no uneasiness whatever

624 HAUNTED HOMES.

about the fishing-party, and, indeed, had not thought about it. So she again composed herself to sleep. When, however, a similar dream was thrice repeated in the course of the night (and the last time presenting the image of the boat lost and the whole party drowned), she became seriously alarmed, threw on her dressing- gown, and, without waiting for morning, proceeded to her nephew's room. With some difficulty she persuaded him to relinquish his design, and to send his servant to Leith with an excuse.

The morning was fine, and the fishing- party embarked. It consisted of Mr. Patrick Cumming, a merchant, Colin Campbell, shipmate, a boy named Cleland, nephew to Campbell, and two sailors. About 3 o'clock a sudden squall arose from the south-west, the boat upset and foundered, and all were drowned except Campbell, who was picked up after being five hours in the water, almost dead with fatigue. This happened on the 7th of August, 1734, and the affair is narrated, so far as concerns the accident, in the Caledonian Mercury for the 12th of the same month.

GLENSHIEAY.

In the First Series of this collection of supernatural stones is given an account of the wonderful appa- ritional armies seen at Edge Hill some few months after the battle there between the King's forces and those of the Parliament. As then remarked, several

GLENSHIRAY. 625

well-authenticated instances are on record of such phantasmal appearances, but as yet no lucid or con- vincing explanation of the phenomenon has been given.* vn some cases these apparitions might be deemed a wonderfully realistic reproduction of real human beings at some distant place, a mirage produced by some natural law that we are not conversant with; but as regards the case of Edge Hill, such an explanation is valueless, the faces and figures of many of the com- batants killed in that engagement having been recognised by several spectators.

In the following narrative, related in Ottway's col- lection of supernatural stories, and in several similar works, the events detailed are not so marvellous, nor so inexplicable as those of Edge Hill ; but, nevertheless, are worthy citation in an epitome of this kind. The tale is told thus :

" As you wish to have an account of the vision which my father and grandfather saw in the neighbour- hood of this place, I will endeavour to comply with your request. I have heard it, with all its circum- stances, so often related by them both, when together, as well as by my father separately, since my grandfather's decease, that I am as fully convinced that they saw this vision, as if I had seen it myself. At the same time I must acknowledge that, however desirous I am to oblige

Lady and you, I commit this account to writing

with some degree of reluetance, well knowing how little credit is generally given, by the more intelligent classes

* Vide, also, " Souter Fell," pp. 246-249. of this volume.

626 HAUNTED HOMES.

of mankind, to a narrative of that kind, and how little it corresponds with the ordinary course of causes and events.

" This vision was seen bv them about 3 o'clock in the afternoon of a very warm, clear sunshiny day, in the month of June or July, between the years 1746 and 1753. I cannot go nearer to ascertain the year. My grandfather was then a farmer in Glenary (which you know is within four miles of this place), and my father, who was at that time a young unmarried man, resided in the family with him.

" On the morning of the day above-mentioned, my grandfather having occasion to transact some business in Glenshiray, took my father along with him. They went there by crossing the hill which separates it from Glenary ; and their business in Glenshiray having been finished a little after mid-day, they came round by Inverary, in order to return home.

" As soon as they came to Gairan Bridge, and had turned towards Inverness, they were very much surprised to behold a great number of men under arms, marching on foot towards them. At this time the foremost ranks were only advanced as far as Kilm alien. They were marching in regular order, and as closely as they could move, from that point of the new town near the Quay, where Captain Gillie's house now stands, along the shore and high road, and crossing the river Avay near the town, at or about the spot where the new bridge has been since built ; of the rear there appeared to be no end. The ground upon which the town now stands was

GLENSHIRAY. 627

then surrounded by a park wall. From the nature of the ground my father and grandfather could see no further than this wall ; and as the army was advancing in front, the rear as regularly succeeded, and advanced from the furthest verge of their view.

" They stood a considerable time to observe this ex- traordinary sight, then walked slowly on, but stopped now and then, with their eyes constantly fixed on the objects before them. Meantime, the army continuing regularly to advance, they counted that it had fifteen or sixteen pairs of colours ; and they observed that the men nearest to them were marching upon the road, six or seven abreast, or in each line, attended by a number of women and children, both below and above the road, some of whom were carrvim ua cans and other imple ments or cookery, which, I am told, is customary on a march. They were clothed in red (but as to that par- ticular circumstance I do not recollect whether my grandfather mentioned it or not, though I know my father did), and the sun shone so bright that the gleam of their arms, which consisted of muskets and bayonets, sometimes dazzled their sight. They also observed between Kilmalien and the Salmon Draught, an animal resembling a deer or a horse, in the middle of a crowd of soldiers, who were, as they conjectured, stabbing and pushing it forward with their bayonets.

"My father, who had never seen an army before, naturally put a number of questions to my grandfather (who had served in the Argyleshire Highlanders in assisting to suppress the rebellion of 1745) concerning

40

628 HAUNTED HOMES.

the probable route and destination of the army which was now advancing towards them, and of the number of men it seemed to consist of. My grandfather replied that ' he supposed it had come from Ireland, and had ]anded at Kyntyre, and that it was proceeding to Eng- land ; and that, in his opinion, it was more numerous than the army on both sides at the battle of Culloden., My father, having particularly remarked that the rear ranks were continually running forward in order to overtake those who were before them, and inquiring into the reason, my grandfather told him that was always the case with the rear ; that the least obstacle stopped and threw them behind, which necessarily, and in a still greater degree, retarded the march of those who were behind them, and obliged them to come forward until they had recovered their own places again. And he therefore advised my father, if he went into the army, to endeavour, if possible, to get into the front rank, which always marched with leisure and ease, while those in the rear were generally kept running in the manner he had seen.

" My father and grandfather were now come to the Thorn Bush, between the Gairan Bridge and the gate of the Deer Park, and at the same time the rear of the army had advanced very near to the gate. And as the road forms a right angle at that gate, and the front of the army was then directly opposite to them, they had, of course, a better opportunity of observing it minutely. The van-guard, they then observed, consisted of a party of forty or fifty men, preceded by an officer on foot.

GLENSHIRAY. 629

At a little distance behind them another officer ap- peared, riding upon a grey dragoon-horse. He was the only person they observed on horseback, and from his appearance and station in the march they considered him as the commander-in-chief. He had on a gold- laced hat, and a blue hussar-cloak, with wide, open, loose sleeves, all lined with red. He also wore boots and spurs ; the rest of his dress they could not see. My father took such particular notice of him, that he often declared he would know him perfectly well if he ever saw him again. Behind this officer the rear of the army marched all in one body, so far as they observed, but attended by women and children, as I mentioned above.

" My father's curiosity being now sufficiently gratified, he represented to my grandfather that these men, who were advancing towards them, would force them to go along with them, or use them otherwise ill ; and he therefore proposed that they should both go out of their way by climbing over a stone dyke which fences the Deer Park from the high-road. To this my grand- father objected, saying that as he was a middle-aged man, and had seen some service, he believed they would not give any trouble to him, but at the same time he told my father, that as he was a young man, and they might possibly take him along with them, he might go out of the way or not, as he thought fit. Upon this my father instantly leaped over the dyke. He then walked behind it for a little time ; but when he arrived near the clumps, he looked back to observe the motions of the

40*

630 HAUNTED HOMES.

army, and found, to his utter astonishment, that they were all vanished, not a soul of them was to be seen.

" As soon as he had recovered from his surprise, he returned to my grandfather, and cried out, 'What has become of the men ? ' My grandfather, who did not seem to have paid them much attention after my father left him, then observed also that they had dis- appeared, and answered with an equal degree of aston ishment, ' that he could not tell.'

"As they proceeded on their way to Inverary, he recommended my father to keep what they had seen secret, lest they should make themselves ridiculous, for that no person would believe they had seen a vision so extraordinary ; at the same time he told him that though he (my grandfather) might not live to see it, my father might possibly live to see the vision realised.

" This conversation was scarcely ended, when they met one Stewart, an old man who then resided in Glenshiray, going home, and driving a horse before him. This, as they believed, was the same animal they had before observed surrounded by a crowd. My father, notwith- standing the admonition he had just received, asked Stewart what had become of the people who were travelling with him. Stewart, not understanding the drift of the question, answered that nobody had been in company with him since he left Inverary, but that he never travelled in so warm a day, that the air was so close and sultry that he was scarcely able to breathe, and that his horse had become so weak and feeble, that he was obliged to alight and drive it before him.

NEWARK. 631

" The account of this vision was communicated by my father and grandfather, not only to me, but to many others in this place and neighbourhood, it being scarcely possible that so extraordinary an occurrence could long be concealed. It is no doubt extremely difficult to account for it, but no person acquainted with my father or grandfather ever supposed that either of them was capable of inventing such a story; and, accordingly, as far as I can understand, no person to whom they told it ever doubted that they told the truth. My grandfather died several years ago ; my father died within these two years ; but neither of them saw their vision realised, although, indeed, my father had strong expectations of seeing it realised a few years before his death, particularly at the time of the Irish rebellion, and of the last threatened invasion of the French."

NEWARK.

Many quaint old customs linger in the towns as well as in the country districts of England, and some of them are so ancient that their origin is lost in obscurity. A singular instance of such customs as are alluded to is discoverable at Newark-on -Trent, but, unlike some others, tradition, or rather history, is well able to account for its existence. On the 11th of March every year, penny loaves are given away in this place, at the

632 HAUNTED HOMES.

Town Hall, to all such poor persons as choose to apply for them. This custom originated in the follow- ing way.

During the bombardment of Newark by the Parlia- mentarian troops under Oliver Cromwell, a certain Alderman Clay dreamed on three successive nights that his house had taken fire. Impressed by the persistence and vividness of these dreams, the worthy magistrate removed with his family to another residence, and a few days later, on the 11th of March, sure enough his vacated house was burnt down by the besiegers' fire. In gratitude for what he considered his miraculous pre- servation, Alderman Clay, by his will, dated the 11th of December 1694, left two hundred pounds in trust to the Mayor and Aldermen of Newark for the time being. The interest of half this money has to be paid to the vicar annually, conditionally upon his preaching an appropriate sermon, and the interest of the other half has to be expended in bread for distribution among the poor in the way specified above.

WADEBEIDGE.

In the pages of this work, as is seen, are some ex- amples of very wonderful dreams: prophetic dreams, warning dreams, double dreams, or dreams simul- taneously occurring to two persons, and dreams of clis-

WADEBIUDGE. 633

covery. To the last-named species may be assigned the strange and oft-alluded-to story of the Wad eb ridge murder. The murder was one replete with common- place horrors, and would not stand out from the usual category of such crimes but for the marvellous manner in which it was, according to the evidence before us, supernaturally displayed before a person some hundreds of miles away. As the account of this curious cause celebre is given very circumstantially by Dr. Clement Carlyon (in his Early Years and Late Reflections) , and as, after sifting the case thoroughly, he avers " its unquestionable authenticity," it is better to quote it in his exact words. Dr. Carlyon's account is as fol- lows : —

On the evening of the 8th of February 1840, Mr. Nevell Norway, a Cornish gentleman, was cruelly mur- dered by two brothers, of the name of Lightfoot, on his way from Bodmin to Wadebridge, the place of his resi- dence. At that time his brother, Mr. Edmund Norway, was in the command of a merchant vessel, the Orient, on her voyage from Manilla to Cadiz ; and the following is his own account of a dream which he had on the night when his brother was murdered : —

" Ship Orient, from Manilla to Cadiz.

"February 8, 1840.

"About 7.30 p.m., the island of St. Helena N.N.W., distant about seven miles; shortened sail and rounded to with the ship's head to the eastward ; at eight, set the watch and went below; wrote a letter to my brother,

634 HAUNTED HOMES.

Nevell Norway. About twenty minutes or a quarter before ten o'clock, went to bed ; fell asleep, and dreamt I saw two men attack my brother and murder him. One caught the horse by the bridle, and snapped a pistol twice, but I heard no report ; lie then struck him a blow, and he fell off the horse. They struck him several blows, and dragged him by the shoulders across the road and left him. In my dream, there was a house on the left-hand side of the road. At four o'clock I was called, and went on deck to take charge of the ship. I told the second officer, Mr. Henry Wren, that I had had a dreadful dream — namely, that my brother Nevell, was murdered by two men on the road from St. Columb to Wadebridge, but that I felt sure it could not be there, as the house there would be on the right- hand side of the road ; so that it must have been some- where else. He replied : * Don't think anything about it ; you west-country people are so superstitious. You will make yoursen miseraoie tne remainder of the voyage.' He then left the general orders and went below. It was one continued dream, from the time I fell asleep until I was called, at four o'clock in the morning.

" Edmund Norway, " Chief Officer, Ship Orient."

Thus ends the Captain's account of his dream.

The confession of William Lightfoot, one of the assassins who did really murder Mr. Norway, and who was executed, together with his brother, for the

WADEBRIDGE. G35

crime, at Bodmin, on the 13th of April 1840, is as follows : —

" I went to Bodmin last Saturday week, the 8th instant (February 8, 1840), and in returning I met my brother James at the head of Dummer Hill. It was dim like. We came on the turnpike-road all the way till we came to the house near the spot where the murder was committed. We did not go into the house, but hid ourselves in a field. My brother knocked Mr. Norway down ; he snapped a pistol at him twice, and it did not go off. He then knocked him down with the pistol. I was there along with him. Mr. Norway was struck while on horseback. It was on the turnpike-road between Pencarron Mill and the directing-post towards Wadebridge. I cannot say at what time of the night it was. We left the body in the water, on the left side of the road coming to Wadebridge. We took some money in a purse, but I did not know how much. My brother drew the body across the road to the watering."

The evidence of various witnesses called at the trial of the assassins proved that the murder must have been committed between ten and eleven at night.

Dr. Carlyon, in concluding his account of this dream, remarks, " It will be seen that Mr. Edmund Norway, in relating his dream the following morning to his ship- mate, observed that the murder could not have been committed on the St. Columb road, because the house, in going thence to Wadebridge, is on the right hand, whereas the house was, in his dream, on the left. Now,

636 HAUNTED HOMES.

this circumstance, however apparently trivial, tends somewhat to enhance the interest of the dream, without in the least impugning its fidelity ; for such fissures are characteristic of these sensorial impressions, which are altogether involuntary, and bear a much nearer relation to the productions of the daguerreotype than to those of the portrait-painter, whose lines are at his command.'1

63 7

MISCELLANEOUS.

CAPTAIN BLOMBERG' S APPARITION.

In the following extraordinary account of an apparition heard, if not seen, by two persons at once, the exact locality where the appearance took place is not stated, but the story is well known and often alluded to, and, therefore, deserves publication here. The Dr. Blomberg, to whom the tale refers, is said to have been a celebrated metropolitan clergyman, in the early part of this cen- tury. When Blomberg was a boy, his father, Captain Blomberg, was stationed with his regiment in Mar- tinique.

One day the Captain was ordered to a distant part of the island with some important dispatches. The bar- racks at head-quarters, where the absent man had been residing, were just then very crowded, and, in con- sequence, the officers had to share their apartments with one another, in order that all might be housed within the barracks. One night, shortly after Blomberg's de- parture, the door of one of these apartments was heard

638 HAUNTED HOMES.

to open, and the noise awakened the two occupants. One of them, a friend of the absent Captain, raised himself in bed, and, to his intense astonishment, beheld Blomberg approach the bedside, and draw back the mos- quito curtain.

" Why, Blomberg," said he, " what on earth has brought you back ? "

Blomberg looked at him for a few seconds, with a melancholy and abstracted air, but at last said dis- tinctly—

"I died this night, and I have come to ask you to take charge of my little orphan boy."

He then gave his friend the address of the child's re- latives in London, and asked him to have the boy sent to them at once, adding that the papers necessary to establish the boy's claims to some property would be found in a certain drawer which he designated. This communication made, the visitant departed, closing the door after him with an audible sound, and leaving the friend deeply perplexed. Calling out to the occupant of the other bed, he asked him if he had heard anyone in the room.

" Yes/' was the reply, " was it not Blomberg ? What did he want?"

The first officer then asked his companion if he had not heard what Blomberg had said, but he answered that he had merely heard the sound of his voice. At breakfast next day the two officers recounted the extra- ordinary affair to their companions, and were, of course, heartily laughed at for their pains. In the evening,

CAPTAIN blombebg's apparition. 639

however, a message arrived that put a speedy stop to their merriment. Captain Blomberg, so they were in- formed, having given way to depression of spirits in his solitude, had fallen into a fever, and, on the very night and at the very hour in which the apparition had appeared to his friends, had succumbed to the disorder.

The friend to whom the apparition appeared was deeply impressed, and noted down the strange communi- cation which he had received. He sent the boy over to London, to the stated address, which proved to be that of the relatives ; and had search made in the drawer designated by Blomberg's apparition, and there, sure enough, were found the deeds which proved the child's title to the property.

This wonderful affair acquired a widespread notoriety and at last reached the ears of Queen Charlotte. Her Majesty was greatly interested, and at once ordered the child to be received into the royal nursery, where, indeed, he was brought up under the direct care and superintendence of his royal benefactress.

Dr. Blomberg, it is stated, was remarkably lax in his ideas of the Sabbath, being so devoted, according to report, to his fiddling, that he kept a greased bow for Sunday playing. But it generally follows, whenever anyone has acquired a reputation for some " uncanny " connection or the other, rumour attributes all kinds of unconventional things to him or her.

640 HAUNTED HOMES.

SMELLIE AND GKEENLAW.

Post-mortem assignations are among the most frequent and best-known form of ghostly visitations. The in- stances recorded of dead men keeping appointments made with living friends are so numerous that it is eas'1 to select from them many unimpeachable cases. Sue a case is that given in the biography of William Smellie, author of the Philosophy of Natural History. Smellie's most intimate acquaintance was William Greenlaw, a man of great probity, and who, after having gone through the usual theological studies, and taken orders in the Church of Scotland, for certain conscientious reasons refused a living when it was offered to him, and sought his subsistence by teaching the learned languages.

In the course of their long and close friendship Smellie and Greenlaw entered into a solemn compact in writing, and even formally sealed it, and signed it with their blood, whereby both mutually engaged, that whoever died first should return, if possible, and give the survivor an account of the spiritual world. A pro- viso was made that if the deceased did not return within the expiration of twelve months, it was to be concluded that he was unable, or not permitted, to come back.

Greenlaw died on the 26th of June 1774. When the anniversary of his death drew near Smellie became exceed- ingly anxious about the expected visit, and lost several

SMELLIE AND GBEENLAW. 641

successive nights' sleep, in watching for his deceased friend's reappearance. At last, one evening, worn out with fatigue. Smellie would appear to have fallen asleep in his easy chair. The apparition of Greenlaw, clad all in spectral white, now appeared to him, and in a solemn tone informed him, " That he had experienced great •difficulties in procuring permission to return to this arth, according to their agreement ; that he was now in a much better world thau the one he had left; and yet that the hopes and wishes of its inhabitants were by no means satisfied, as, like those of the lower world, they still looked forward in the hope of eventually reaching a still happier state of existence."

This spiritual communication is said to have com- pletely satisfied William Smellie, and to have quite removed from his mind all further anxiety on the subject of the agreement. He related the whole story, and showed the blood-signed agreement, to the eccentric but learned Lord Monboddo ; that nobleman observed there could not be the slightest reasonable doubt or hesi- tation in believing that Greenlaw did actually appear.

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BF 1475 . 15 1897

Ingram, John Henry, 1842 1916.

The haunted homes and family traditions of Great Britain

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