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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Animal Ghosts, by Elliott O'Donnell
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Animal Ghosts
+       Or, Animal Hauntings and the Hereafter
+
+Author: Elliott O'Donnell
+
+Release Date: April 23, 2006 [EBook #18233]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ANIMAL GHOSTS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Barbara Tozier, Graeme Mackreth and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+ANIMAL GHOSTS
+
+OR,
+
+ANIMAL HAUNTINGS AND THE HEREAFTER
+
+BY ELLIOTT O'DONNELL
+
+AUTHOR OF
+
+"THE SORCERY CLUB," "WERWOLVES," "BYWAYS OF GHOSTLAND," "SCOTTISH
+GHOSTS," "HAUNTED HOUSES OF LONDON," "HAUNTED HOUSES OF ENGLAND AND
+WALES," "DREAMS AND THEIR MEANINGS," "FOR SATAN'S SAKE," "THE UNKNOWN
+DEPTHS," "DINEVAH THE BEAUTIFUL," "JENNIE BARLOWE," "GHOSTLY PHENOMENA,"
+"MRS. E.M. WARD'S REMINISCENCES," ETC. ETC.
+
+LONDON
+
+WILLIAM RIDER & SON, LTD.
+CATHEDRAL HOUSE, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.
+1913
+
+_First Published November, 1913._
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+If human beings, with all their vices, have a future life, assuredly
+animals, who in character so often equal, nay, excel human beings, have
+a future life also.
+
+Those who in the Scriptures find a key to all things, can find nothing
+in them to confute this argument. There is no saying of Christ that
+justifies one in supposing that man is the only being, whose existence
+extends beyond the grave.
+
+Granted, however, merely for the sake of argument, that we have some
+ground for the denial of a future existence for animals, consider the
+injustice such a denial would involve. Take, for example, the case of
+the horse. Harming no one, and without thought of reward, it toils for
+man all its life, and when too old to work it is put to death without
+even the compensation of a well-earned rest. But if compensation be
+God's law,--as I, for one, believe it to be--and also the _raison
+d'être_ of a hereafter, then surely the Creator, whose chief claim to
+our respect and veneration lies in the fact that He is just and
+merciful, will take good care that the horse--the gentle, patient,
+never-complaining horse--is well compensated--compensated in a golden
+hereafter.
+
+Consider again, the case of another of our four-footed friends--the dog;
+the faithful, affectionate, obedient and forgiving dog, the dog who is
+so often called upon to stand all sorts of rough treatment, and is shot
+or poisoned, if, provoked beyond endurance, he at last rounds on his
+persecutors, and bites. And the cat--the timid, peaceful cat who is
+mauled, and all but pulled in two by cruel children, and beaten to a
+jelly when in sheer agony and fright it scratches. Reflect again, on the
+cow and the sheep, fed only to supply our wants; shouted at and kicked,
+if, when nearly scared out of their senses, they wander off the track;
+and pole-axed, or done to death in some equally atrocious manner when
+the sickening demand for flesh food is at its height.
+
+And yet, you say, these innocent, unoffending--and, I say,
+martyred--animals are to have no future, no compensation. Monstrous!
+Absurd! It is an effrontery to common sense, philosophy--anything,
+everything. It is a damned lie, damned bigotry, damned nonsense. The
+whole animal world will live again; and it will be man--spoilt,
+presumptuous, degenerate man--who will not participate in another life,
+unless he very much improves.
+
+Think well over this,--you who preach the gospel of man's
+pre-eminence;--you who prate of God and know nothing whatsoever about
+Him! The horse, dog, cat,--even the wild animals, whose vices,
+perchance, pale beside your own, may go to Heaven before you. The
+Supreme Architect is neither a Nero, nor a Stuart, nor a clown. He will
+recompense all who deserve recompense, be they great or small--biped or
+quadruped.
+
+It is to testify to a future existence for animals and to create a wider
+interest in it that I have undertaken to compile this book; and my
+object, I think, can best be achieved in my own way, the way of the
+investigator of haunted places. The mere fact that there are
+manifestations of "dead" people (pardon the paradox) proves some kind of
+life after death for human beings; and happily the same proof is
+available with regard a future life for animals; indeed there are as
+many animal phantasms as human--perhaps more; hence, if the human being
+lives again, so do his dumb friends.
+
+Be comforted then, you who love your pets, and have been kind to them.
+You will see them all again, on the soft undying pasture lands of your
+Elysium and theirs.
+
+Be warned, you--you who have despised animals, and have been cruel to
+them. Who knows but that, in your future life, you may be as they are
+now--in subjection?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+My task in writing this book has been considerably lightened by the
+extreme courtesy and kindness of Mr. Shirley, Mr. Eveleigh Nash, and the
+Proprietors of the _Review of Reviews_, in allowing me to make use of
+extracts and quotations from their most valuable works.
+
+ELLIOTT O'DONNELL.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+PART I
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+CATS
+
+PAGE
+
+The Black Cat of the Old Manor House, Oxenby--Correspondence _re_ Cat
+Phantasms--The Headless Cat of No. ----, Lower Seedley Road, Seedley,
+Manchester--The Cat on the Post--Mystic Properties of Cats      3
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+DOGS
+
+The Case of James Durham--The Grey Dog of ---- House, Birmingham--The
+Dog in the Cupboard--How the Ghost of a Dog saved Life--A Precentor's
+Adventure--Phantom Dog seen on Souter Fell--The Jumping Ghost--Dogs seen
+before a Death--A Dog scared by a Canine Ghost--The Phantom Dachshund of
+W---- Street, London, W.--An ALL Hallow Eve Ghost--The Strange
+Disappearance of Mr. Jeremiah Dance--Phantasms of Living Dogs--The
+Yellow Dog of K---- University--National Ghosts in the form of Dogs--The
+Mauthe Doog--Spectral Hounds      57
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+HORSES AND THE UNKNOWN
+
+A Phantom Cavalcade--The Miller on the Grey Horse--A Phantom Horse
+and Rider--The White Horse of Eastover--The Afrikander's Story--Heralds
+of Death--Phantom Coach in U.S.A.--A Story from Marseilles--Summary of
+Horses--Phantasms of Living Horses--Horses and the Psychic Faculty of
+Scent--Phantom Policeman and Horse--Phantom Huntsmen and Horses      139
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+BULLS, COWS, PIGS, ETC.
+
+The Kirk-grim--Phantasm of a Goat--Phantom Hogs of the Moat
+Grange--Sheep--Spectre Flock of Sheep in Germany      212
+
+
+PART II
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+WILD ANIMALS AND THE UNKNOWN
+
+Animal Phantasms and the Moon--The Case of Martin Tristram--Phantasms of
+Cat and Ape--Hauntings by a White Rabbit--John Wesley's Ghost--Psychic
+Faculty in Hares and Rabbits      223
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+INHABITANTS OF THE JUNGLE
+
+Elephants, Lions, Tigers, etc.--The White Tiger--Jungle Animals and
+Psychic Faculties      254
+
+
+PART III
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+BIRDS AND THE UNKNOWN
+
+
+Case from _Occult Review_--Bird Hauntings in Russia--Hauntings in
+the Country Church--Capt. Morgan's Experiences--Addenda--Old Authorities
+on Bird Omens      273
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+A BRIEF RETROSPECT      300
+
+
+PART I
+
+DOMESTIC ANIMALS AND THEIR ASSOCIATIONS WITH THE UNKNOWN
+
+
+
+
+ANIMAL GHOSTS
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+CATS
+
+
+In opening this volume on Animals and their associations with the
+unknown, I will commence with a case of hauntings in the Old Manor
+House, at Oxenby.
+
+My informant was a Mrs. Hartnoll, whom I can see in my mind's eye, as
+distinctly as if I were looking at her now. Hers was a personality that
+no lapse of time, nothing could efface; a personality that made itself
+felt on boys of all temperaments, most of all, of course, on those
+who--like myself--were highly strung and sensitive.
+
+She was classical mistress at L.'s, the then well-known dame school in
+Clifton, where for three years--prior to migrating to a Public School--I
+was well grounded in all the mysticisms of Kennedy's Latin Primer and
+Smith's First Greek Principia.
+
+I doubt if she got anything more than a very small salary--governesses
+in those days were shockingly remunerated--and I know,--poor soul, she
+had to work monstrously hard. Drumming Latin and Greek into heads as
+thick as ours was no easy task.
+
+But there were times, when the excessive tension on the nerves proving
+too much, Mrs. Hartnoll stole a little relaxation; when she allowed
+herself to chat with us, and even to smile--Heavens! those smiles! And
+when--I can feel the tingling of my pulses at the bare mention of
+it--she spoke about herself, stated she had once been young--a
+declaration so astounding, so utterly beyond our comprehension, that we
+were rendered quite speechless--and told us anecdotes.
+
+Of many of her narratives I have no recollection, but one or two, which
+interested me more than the rest, are almost as fresh in my mind as when
+recounted. The one that appealed to me most, and which I have every
+reason to believe is absolutely true,[1] is as follows:--I give it as
+nearly as I can in her own somewhat stilted style:--
+
+"Up to the age of nineteen, I resided with my parents in the Manor
+House, Oxenby. It was an old building, dating back, I believe, to the
+reign of Edward VI, and had originally served as the residence of noble
+families. Built, or, rather, faced with split flints, and edged and
+buttressed with cut grey stone, it had a majestic though very gloomy
+appearance, and seen from afar resembled nothing so much as a huge and
+grotesquely decorated sarcophagus. In the centre of its frowning and
+menacing front was the device of a cat, constructed out of black
+shingles, and having white shingles for the eyes; the effect being
+curiously realistic, especially on moonlight nights, when anything more
+lifelike and sinister could scarcely have been conceived. The artist,
+whoever he was, had a more than human knowledge of cats--he portrayed
+not merely their bodies but their souls.
+
+[Footnote 1: I have subsequently met several people who experienced the
+same phenomena in the house, which was standing a short time ago.]
+
+"In style the front of the house was somewhat castellated. Two
+semicircular bows, or half towers, placed at a suitable distance from
+each other, rose from the base to the summit of the edifice, to the
+height of four or five stairs; and were pierced, at every floor, with
+rows of stone-mullioned windows. The flat wall between had larger
+windows, lighting the great hall, gallery, and upper apartments. These
+windows were wholly composed of stained glass, engraved with every
+imaginable fantastic design--imps, satyrs, dragons, witches,
+queer-shaped trees, hands, eyes, circles, triangles and cats.
+
+"The towers, half included in the building, were completely circular
+within, and contained the winding stairs of the mansion; and whoever
+ascended them when a storm was raging seemed rising by a whirlwind to
+the clouds.
+
+"In the upper rooms even the wildest screams of the hurricane were
+drowned in the rattling clamour of the assaulted casements. When a gale
+of wind took the building in front, it rocked it to the foundations,
+and, at such times, threatened its instant demolition.
+
+"Midway between the towers there stood forth a heavy stone porch with a
+Gothic gateway, surmounted by a battlemented parapet, made gable
+fashion, the apex of which was garnished by a pair of dolphins, rampant
+and antagonistic, whose corkscrew tails seemed contorted--especially at
+night--by the last agonies of rage convulsed. The porch doors stood
+open, except in tremendous weather; the inner ones were regularly shut
+and barred after all who entered. They led into a wide vaulted and lofty
+hall, the walls of which were decorated with faded tapestry, that rose,
+and fell, and rustled in the most mysterious fashion every time there
+was the suspicion--and often barely the suspicion--of a breeze.
+
+"Interspersed with the tapestry--and in great contrast to its
+antiquity--were quite modern and very ordinary portraits of my family.
+The general fittings and furniture, both of the hall and house, were
+sombre and handsome--truss-beams, corbels, girders and panels were of
+the blackest oak; and the general effect of all this, augmented, if
+anything, by the windows, which were too high and narrow to admit of
+much light, was much the same as that produced by the interior of a
+subterranean chapel or charnel house.
+
+"From the hall proceeded doorways and passages, more than my memory can
+now particularize. Of these portals, one at each end conducted to the
+tower stairs, others to reception rooms and domestic offices.
+
+"The whole of the house being too large for us, only one wing--the right
+and newer of the two--was occupied, the other was unfurnished, and
+generally shut up. I say generally because there were times when either
+my mother or father--the servants never ventured there--forgot to lock
+the doors, and the handles yielding to my daring fingers, I
+surreptitiously crept in.
+
+"Everywhere--even in daylight, even on the sunniest of mornings--were
+dark shadows that hung around the ingles and recesses of the rooms, the
+deep cupboards, the passages, and silent, winding staircases.
+
+"There was one corridor--long, low, vaulted--where these shadows
+assembled in particular. I can see them now, as I saw them then, as they
+have come to me many times in my dreams, grouped about the doorways,
+flitting to and fro on the bare, dismal boards, and congregated in
+menacing clusters at the head of the sepulchral staircase leading to the
+cellars. Generally, and excepting at times when the weather was
+particularly violent, the silence here was so emphatic that I could
+never feel it was altogether natural, but rather that it was assumed
+especially for my benefit--to intimidate me. If I moved, if I coughed,
+almost if I breathed, the whole passage was filled with hoarse
+reverberating echoes, that, in my affrighted ears, appeared to terminate
+in a series of mirthless, malevolent chuckles. Once, when fascinated
+beyond control, I stole on tiptoe along the passage, momentarily
+expecting a door to fly open and something grim and horrible to pounce
+out on me, I was brought to a standstill by a loud, clanging noise, as
+if a pail or some such utensil were set down very roughly on a stone
+floor. Then there was the sound of rushing footsteps and of someone
+hastily ascending the cellar staircase. In fearful anticipation as to
+what I should see--for there was something in the sounds that told me
+they were not made by anything human--I stood in the middle of the
+passage and stared. Up, up, up they came, until I saw the dark,
+indefinite shape of something very horrid, but which I could not--I dare
+not--define. It was accompanied by the clanging of a pail. I tried to
+scream, but my tongue cleaving to the roof of my mouth prevented my
+uttering a syllable, and when I essayed to move, I found I was
+temporarily paralysed. The thing came rushing down on me. I grew icy
+cold all over, and when it was within a few feet of me, my horror was so
+great, I fainted.
+
+"On recovering consciousness, it was some minutes before I summoned up
+courage to open my eyes, but when I did so, they alighted on nothing but
+the empty passage--the thing had disappeared.
+
+"On another occasion, when I was clandestinely paying a visit to the
+unused wing, and was in the act of mounting one of the staircases
+leading from the corridor, I have just described, to the first floor,
+there was the sound of a furious scuffle overhead, and something dashed
+down the stairs past me. I instinctively looked up, and there, glaring
+down at me from over the balustrade, was a very white face. It was that
+of a man, but very badly proportioned--the forehead being low and
+receding, and the rest of the face too long and narrow. The crown rose
+to a kind of peak, the ears were pointed and set very low down and far
+back. The mouth was very cruel and thin-lipped; the teeth were yellow
+and uneven. There was no hair on the face, but that on the head was red
+and matted. The eyes were obliquely set, pale blue, and full of an
+expression so absolutely malignant that every atom of blood in my veins
+seemed to congeal as I met their gaze. I could not clearly see the body
+of the thing, as it was hazy and indistinct, but the impression I got of
+it was that it was clad in some sort of tight-fitting, fantastic
+garment. As the landing was in semi-darkness, and the face at all events
+was most startlingly visible, I concluded it brought with it a light of
+its own, though there was none of that lurid glow attached to it, which
+I subsequently learned is almost inseparable from spirit phenomena seen
+under similar conditions.
+
+"For some seconds, I was too overcome with terror to move, but my
+faculties at length reasserting themselves, I turned round and flew to
+the other wing of the house with the utmost precipitation.
+
+"One would have thought that after these experiences nothing would have
+induced me to have run the risk of another such encounter, yet only a
+few days after the incident of the head, I was again impelled by a
+fascination I could not withstand to visit the same quarters. In sickly
+anticipation of what my eyes would alight on, I stole to the foot of the
+staircase and peeped cautiously up. To my infinite joy there was nothing
+there but a bright patch of sunshine, that, in the most unusual fashion,
+had forced its way through from one of the slits of windows near at
+hand.
+
+"After gazing at it long enough to assure myself it was only sunshine, I
+quitted the spot, and proceeded on my way down the vaulted corridor.
+Just as I was passing one of the doors, it opened. I stopped--terrified.
+What could it be? Bit by bit, inch by inch, I watched the gap slowly
+widen. At last, just as I felt I must either go mad or die, something
+appeared--and, to my utter astonishment, it was a big, black cat!
+Limping painfully, it came towards me with a curious, gliding motion,
+and I perceived with a thrill of horror that it had been very cruelly
+maltreated. One of its eyes looked as if it had been gouged out--its
+ears were lacerated, whilst the paw of one of its hind-legs had either
+been torn or hacked off. As I drew back from it, it made a feeble and
+pathetic effort to reach me and rub itself against my legs, as is the
+way with cats, but in so doing it fell down, and uttering a half purr,
+half gurgle, vanished--seeming to sink through the hard oak boards.
+
+"That evening my youngest brother met with an accident in the barn at
+the back of the house, and died. Though I did not then associate his
+death with the apparition of the cat, the latter shocked me much, for I
+was extremely fond of animals. I did not dare venture in the wing again
+for nearly two years.
+
+"When next I did so, it was early one June morning--between five and
+six, and none of the family, saving my father, who was out in the fields
+looking after his men, were as yet up. I explored the dreaded corridor
+and staircase, and was crossing the floor of one of the rooms I had
+hitherto regarded as immune from ghostly influences, when there was an
+icy rush of wind, the door behind me slammed to violently, and a heavy
+object struck me with great force in the hollow of my back. With a cry
+of surprise and agony I turned sharply round, and there, lying on the
+floor, stretched out in the last convulsions of death, was the big black
+cat, maimed and bleeding as it had been on the previous occasion. How I
+got out of the room I don't recollect. I was too horror-stricken to know
+exactly what I was doing, but I distinctly remember that, as I tugged
+the door open, there was a low, gleeful chuckle, and something slipped
+by me and disappeared in the direction of the corridor. At noon that day
+my mother had a seizure of apoplexy, and died at midnight.
+
+"Again there was a lapse of years--this time nearly four--when, sent on
+an errand for my father, I turned the key of one of the doors leading
+into the empty wing, and once again found myself within the haunted
+precincts. All was just as it had been on the occasion of my last
+visit--gloom, stillness and cobwebs reigned everywhere, whilst
+permeating the atmosphere was a feeling of intense sadness and
+depression.
+
+"I did what was required of me as quickly as possible, and was crossing
+one of the rooms to make my exit, when a dark shadow fell athwart the
+threshold of the door, and I saw the cat.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"That evening my father dropped dead as he was hastening home through
+the fields. He had long suffered from heart disease.
+
+"After his death we--that is to say, my brother, sisters and self--were
+obliged to leave the house and go out into the world to earn our living.
+We never went there again, and never heard if any of the subsequent
+tenants experienced similar manifestations."
+
+This is as nearly as I can recollect Mrs. Hartnoll's story. But as it is
+a good many years since I heard it, there is just a possibility of some
+of the details--the smaller ones at all events--having escaped my
+memory.
+
+When I was grown up, I stayed for a few weeks near Oxenby, and met, at a
+garden party, a Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler, the then occupants of the Manor
+House.
+
+I asked if they believed in ghosts, and told them I had always heard
+their house was haunted.
+
+"Well," they said, "we never believed in ghosts till we came to Oxenby,
+but we have seen and heard such strange things since we have been in the
+Manor House that we are now prepared to believe anything."
+
+They then went on to tell me that they--and many of their visitors and
+servants--had seen the phantasms of a very hideous and malignant old
+man, clad in tight-fitting hosiery of mediæval days, and a maimed and
+bleeding big, black cat, that seemed sometimes to drop from the ceiling,
+and sometimes to be thrown at them. In one of the passages all sorts of
+queer sounds, such as whinings, meanings, screeches, clangings of pails
+and rattlings of chains, were heard, whilst something, no one could ever
+see distinctly, but which they all felt to be indescribably nasty,
+rushed up the cellar steps and flew past, as if engaged in a desperate
+chase. Indeed, the disturbances were of so constant and harrowing a
+nature, that the wing had to be vacated and was eventually locked up.
+
+The Wheelers excavated in different parts of the haunted wing and found,
+in the cellar, at a depth of some eight or nine feet, the skeletons of
+three men and two women; whilst in the wainscoting of the passage they
+discovered the bones of a boy, all of which remains they had properly
+interred in the churchyard. According to local tradition, handed down
+through many centuries by word of mouth, the house originally belonged
+to a knight, who, with his wife, was killed out hunting. He had only one
+child, a boy of about ten, who became a ward in chancery. The man
+appointed by the Crown as guardian to this child proved an inhuman
+monster, and after ill-treating the lad in every conceivable manner,
+eventually murdered him and tried to substitute a bastard boy of his own
+in his place. For a time the fraud succeeded, but on its being
+eventually found out, the murderer and his offspring were both brought
+to trial and hanged.
+
+During his occupation of the house, many people were seen to enter the
+premises, but never leave them, and the place got the most sinister
+reputation. Among other deeds credited to the murderer and his
+offspring was the mutilation and boiling of a cat--the particular pet of
+the young heir, who was compelled to witness the whole revolting
+process. Years later, a subsequent owner of the property had a monument
+erected in the churchyard to the memory of this poor, abused child, and
+on the front of the house constructed the device of the cat.
+
+Though it is impossible to determine what amount of truth there may be
+in this tradition, it certainly seems to accord with the hauntings, and
+to supply some sort of explanation to them. The ghostly head on the
+banisters might well be that of the low and brutal guardian, whose
+spirit would be the exact counterpart of his mind. The figure seen, and
+noises heard in the passage, point to the re-enaction of some tragedy,
+possibly the murder of the heir, or the slaughter of his cat, in either
+of which a bucket might easily have played a grimly significant part.
+And if human murderers and their victims have phantasms, why should not
+animals have phantasms too? Why should not the phenomenon of the cat
+seen by Mrs. Hartnoll and the Wheelers have been the actual phantasm of
+an earthbound cat?
+
+No amount of reasoning--religious or otherwise--has as yet annihilated
+the possibility of all forms of earthly life possessing spirits.
+
+LETTER FROM MY WIFE
+
+I heard the foregoing account from my husband when first I met him years
+ago, and I know it to be true. I have seen the rooms, etc. in the Old
+Manor House, Oxenby, where the incidents Mrs. Hartnoll mentions took
+place.
+
+                    ADA B. O'DONNELL.
+
+_July_ 2, 1913.
+
+To further substantiate my views with regard to a future existence for
+animals, I reproduce (by permission of the Editor) the following letters
+and articles that have appeared from time to time in the _Occult
+Review_:--
+
+
+Letter 1
+
+_That other Cat_
+
+One evening about four years ago I was in my drawing-room with two
+friends; we were all standing up on the point of going to bed, and only
+waiting till the old cook had succeeded in inducing the grey Persian cat
+to come in for the night. This was sometimes difficult, and then cook
+came up as on this occasion and called him from the balcony, and the
+French window was wide open, when a cat rushed in at the window and
+through the door.
+
+"What was that?" we said, looking at one another. It was not Kitty, the
+grey Persian, but darker, and was it really a cat, or what? My friend
+"Rügen" has written the account of what she saw before seeing what I
+have said. "Iona" confirms our description. What I saw seemed dark and
+shadowy and yet unmistakably a cat. It seemed to me like the predecessor
+of Kitty, which was a black Persian; he had the same habit of coming in
+at night by this window, and he constantly rushed through the room, and
+downstairs, being in a hurry for his supper. A moment or two afterwards
+the grey cat walked slowly in, and though we searched the house, we
+could find no other.
+
+                    "THANET."
+
+
+Letter 2
+
+
+_Fräulein Mullet's Story_
+
+Three or four years ago, Iona and I were sitting in the drawing-room on
+a Sunday evening, when cook came in to ask for Kitty (a silver-grey
+Persian cat) to settle him in the kitchen for the night. Kitty was still
+in the garden, and cook went to the balcony calling him.
+
+Suddenly I saw a black cat flying in and disappearing behind or under a
+seat. First, I did not take much notice of this. But when a minute after
+Kitty slowly and solemnly stepped in, followed by cook, it struck me
+that the dark something could not have been Kitty, and Thanet and Iona
+made the remark simultaneously. Now we began to look for the dark one
+all over the place without any result. Cook had not seen any cat passing
+her on the balcony, but Kitty the grey one. Thanet had had a black
+Persian cat, which died before Kitty came.
+
+                    "RÜGEN."
+
+
+Letter 3
+
+
+I can entirely corroborate the accounts written by "Thanet" and "Rügen."
+
+I remember that I saw something like a dark shadow move very quickly and
+disappear in front of a cottage piano. I exclaimed simultaneously with
+my friends "What was that?" and shared their surprise when no black cat
+was found, and the grey Persian walked in unconcernedly through the open
+window.
+
+                    "IONA."
+
+
+Letter 4
+
+
+_What Kitty saw_
+
+Cook said, "I wish you would come downstairs and see how strangely Kitty
+behaves as soon as I open the cupboard. There is nothing in it but the
+wood; I turned it all out to see what might be the reason--not even a
+mousehole can I find." Some days previously cook had told me that
+nothing could induce Kitty to sleep in his basket, and one day he would
+not eat any food in the kitchen, and his meals had to be given him
+outside. So I went down to please cook. Kitty was picked up, and while
+cook petted and stroked him, she knelt down and opened the cupboard.
+Kitty, stretching his neck and looking with big, frightened eyes into
+the cupboard's corner, suddenly turned round; struggling out of cook's
+hold and rushing over her shoulder, he flew out of the kitchen. Getting
+up, Cook said: "That's always what he does, just as if he was seeing
+something horrible!"
+
+Next day I encouraged cook to talk of Ruff, the former black cat, which
+had been a great favourite of hers, and which she had been nursing when
+he was dying. "Oh, poor thing, when he was ill, he would creep into dark
+corners, so I put him in his basket into the cupboard, making it very
+comfortable for him, and there he died"--pointing to the very corner
+which caused such horror to Kitty.
+
+
+                   "RÜGEN."
+
+
+Letter 5
+
+
+_Captain Humphries's Story--A Materialized Cat_
+
+My son had the following experience at the age of four years in our
+Worcestershire home.
+
+He was an only child and spent much of his time in the company of a cat
+who shared his tastes and pursuits even to the extent of fishing in the
+River Weir with him, the cat being far more proficient at the sport than
+the boy. When the cat died we none of us dared to break the news to the
+child, and were much surprised when he asked us to say why his cat only
+came to play with him at nights nowadays. When we questioned him about
+it, he stoutly maintained that his cat was there in bodily form every
+night after he went to bed, looking much the same but a little thinner.
+
+At about the same age, one evening after being in bed one hour, I heard
+him cry out, and going upstairs (his maid also heard and ran up) and
+asking him what was the matter, he said that an old gentleman with a
+long grey beard like his grandfather came into his room, and stood at
+the front of his bed. At the very moment, the former had a seizure in
+his carriage while driving through the streets of Birmingham, from which
+he died without regaining consciousness; later on he recognized a
+photograph of his grandfather as being the person he saw at the foot of
+his bed. My wife, the maid, and myself can vouch for the accuracy of
+these statements, also friends to whom we have related these facts.
+
+                    "MUNSTER."
+
+
+Letter 6
+
+
+_Mrs. E.J. Ellis's Story--"The Old Woman's Cat"_
+
+My wife, writes Mr. Ellis, who was brought up in Germany, and who is not
+sufficiently confident about her English to attempt to put down anything
+for publication in that language, tells me the following story for the
+_Occult Review_:--
+
+"When I was a little girl living with my family near Michelstadt in the
+Odenwald, I remember an old woman like an old witch, whose name was
+Louise, and who was called 'Pfeiffe Louise,' because she exhibited pipes
+for sale in her cottage window, along with the cheap dress-stuffs,
+needles and threads, and simple toys for children which were her
+stock-in-trade. She had a favourite cat which was devoted to her, but
+its attachment doesn't seem to have been enough to make her happy, for
+she married a young sergeant named Lautenschlager, who might have been
+her son--or indeed her grandson--and who, as everyone said, courted her
+for her money. She died as long ago as 1869, and during her last illness
+the devoted cat was always with her. It kept watch beside the body when
+she was dead, and refused to be driven away. In a fit of exasperation
+Lautenschlager seized it, carried it off, and drowned it in the little
+River Mumling, at a place where the road from Michelstadt to the
+neighbouring village Steinbach runs near the water's edge. It was
+bordered with poplars then, but chestnut trees shade it now.
+
+"Soon after his first wife was buried Lautenschlager married again, and
+opened an eating-house in Steinbach, where he established his second
+wife. He had a sister whom he placed in the cottage of poor 'Pfeiffe
+Louise.' She carried on the business, and every day Lautenschlager used
+to walk over from Steinbach to see how she was getting on, returning in
+the evening to his wife, who used to relate to my mother that he
+frequently came home terrified and bathed in perspiration, for as he
+passed the place where he had drowned the cat, its ghost used to come
+out of the river and run beside him along the dark road, sometimes
+terrifying him still more by jumping in front of him.
+
+"After a few years of married life the second wife died, and
+Lautenschlager married a third. The little cottage business had
+prospered, and in its place he now had a considerable draper's shop in
+Michelstadt. He continued to walk over from Steinbach, where now the
+third wife lived in the eating-house, and the ghost of the cat continued
+to frighten him by appearing at nightfall as he walked beside the river.
+
+"I can remember hearing his third wife describe his dread of it, and my
+mother has told me how both the sister and the second wife used to say
+the same thing, though I was too young then for them to tell me about
+it. Lautenschlager used also to complain to the country people who came
+to dine at his eating-house. He considered himself an ill-used man, and
+felt that the supernatural powers were treating him very hardly, and
+subjecting him to a real persecution. I have only the conversation of
+his wife and the gossip of the village to vouch for his sincerity, and
+the genuineness of the apparition is supported only by Lautenschlager's
+word, but his evident anger and agitation were accepted as genuine, and
+no one dreamed of doubting his word. He was not at all a dreamy or
+imaginative man, and did not drink. His passion was merely momentary. He
+was not only a draper and caterer but a usurer, and realized something
+of a fortune by lending money on good security to peasants and farmers
+who, it was said, did not consider how they bound themselves when they
+signed the papers he put before them.
+
+"Lautenschlager continued to be haunted by the cat-ghost at irregular
+intervals for more than twenty years, and it made a marked change in his
+character. He became serious, and during the latter part of his life
+would only talk about religion and read sacred literature. He died about
+ten years ago."
+
+                    "FELINE."
+
+
+Letter 7
+
+
+_A Spectral Fox-terrier_
+
+Two or three years ago I visited a medium (Mrs. Davies of 44 Laburnum
+Grove, Portsmouth). I had been seated only a few minutes when a little
+pug-dog of hers looked up in the direction of my knees and down towards
+my feet, growling and howling in a most strange manner.
+
+"What on earth is he looking at?" I exclaimed.
+
+"Oh," said the medium, "there is a little fox-terrier lying across your
+feet; one half of his face is quite dark and the other half white, but
+he has such a peculiar black patch over the eye that one would almost
+think it was a black bruise." Now, sir, I had such a little dog in
+India, but this lady did not know of him, and would never have known had
+he not, as I afterwards found, died out there. This is not only a case
+of the appearance of an animal after death, but also a case in which it
+was seen by another animal, as also by the medium. I am also told that
+the pug-dog who had this vision of my dog was once seen to pounce upon
+what seemed to the medium to be several cats, near the copper in the
+scullery of the same house. The medium asked a neighbour if the previous
+occupants had had any cats. "Oh, yes," replied the neighbour, "and badly
+the poor things were served, for they were cruelly thrown into the
+copper, which was full of boiling water."
+
+                    "SIMLA" (M. Conder).
+
+
+Letter 8
+
+
+_Killed by a Street Car, but walks in at the Front Door_
+
+Some five years ago we had a little puppy about six months old. I used
+to train him to always go round the back way to come into the house. One
+day he got hurt and run over, being instantly killed by a street car. A
+day or two after the accident I was going in my front door and I saw the
+dog go up the steps in front of me, as plain as I ever saw him in my
+life. It seemed he knew that I had taught him he must not go in the
+front way, because he would go a few steps and then turn round and look
+at me, as though he wanted to see how I was taking it, and I positively
+saw him go to the full length of the hall into the house, a distance of
+about twenty feet, before he disappeared. I saw him do this at least
+three times in two months that we stayed in that flat. I told at least a
+half-dozen people of the incident at the time it happened, and I can
+vouch for its authenticity.
+
+     I remain, yours truly,
+
+                    "MAJILTON"
+    (Chas. A. Thompson, Chicago, Ill., U.S.A.).
+
+
+Letter 9
+
+
+_Mrs. Vincent Taylor's Experience. A Spirit Purr_
+
+One evening in February, 1906, my son and I were quietly reading, in
+full gaslight, our small grey cat lying on the sofa a short distance
+from where I sat. Suddenly I saw on my knee a large red and white cat
+which belonged to us in India, which was a very dear family friend and
+as fond of us as a child.
+
+On leaving India we were obliged to give him to a friend, and in the end
+he shared the usual fate of pets in that country, making a meal for some
+wild animal.
+
+"Rufie-Oofie," in his spirit shape, purred vigorously, rubbing his head
+against me and giving every sign of delight at seeing us again. I did
+not speak, but in a few minutes my son looked up and said, "Mother,
+Rufie-Oofie is on your knee," when the spirit cat jumped down and went
+to him to be petted. Then he returned to me, and walked along the sofa
+to where our present cat, "Kim," was asleep. The spirit cat, with a look
+of almost human fun, patted Kim's head, the latter awaking with a start.
+Rufie-Oofie continued to make playful dabs at Kim's ears, Kim following
+each movement with glaring eyes, distinctly seeing and realizing that
+another cat was invading his sofa, but not in the least angry with him
+and quite ready to play. After a few minutes the spirit cat came back to
+my knee, whereupon the earth cat displayed jealousy which Rufie-Oofie
+resented, but before they came to actual "words" the spirit cat retired
+behind the veil.
+
+                    "ARJÜNA."
+
+
+Letter 10
+
+
+SIR,
+
+The following notes of psychological experiences with animals may be of
+interest:--
+
+I had a collie who lived to a good old age. She was deaf and infirm, and
+one hind-leg was paralysed, so that it dragged as she walked. I was
+taken ill, not seriously, nor so as in any way to affect my brain, but
+as my poor old dog would insist on coming and lying in my room the
+doctor insisted on her being destroyed. I felt that her life was no
+pleasure to her, and she was killed with chloroform. Three days
+afterwards in the afternoon I heard her come upstairs with her dragging
+hind-leg. I heard her steps come along the long passage which had my
+room at the end, and lost them about half-way up. On the third day I
+called her and spoke to her, putting out my hand as if she would come
+and put her head under it, and told her all was right. I never heard her
+any more.
+
+I believe that on one occasion she told me by thought transference that
+she had no water in her pan. The pan was always filled, and I knew that
+she wanted something, but thought of all other wants but water. She made
+her eyes protrude, and looked at me intently, and "water" flashed into
+my mind. I looked and found the pan empty. It is, of course, possible
+that the suggestion came from my own subconscious mind. I never saw the
+aura of a human being, but I once had a kind of vision of this dog,
+which experts have told me was her aura. I was sitting by the fire,
+somewhat somnolent, and he was lying on the hearthrug. All at once his
+golden brown coat disappeared, and I saw a mass of reddish brown or
+perhaps I should say brownish red, and on one side of it was an
+irregular patch of fleecy white, bordered with sapphire blue. I was told
+that the brownish red represented the dog's animal instincts, the pearly
+white his animal innocence, and the sapphire blue his devotional
+instinct, in his case directed to me as his deity. Whether any of your
+readers have had similar experiences and explain them similarly, I do
+not know.
+
+I had to go abroad one summer and my dog was ill with eczema, and as I
+did not very much trust the maid I was leaving in charge, I sent him to
+the vet's to be treated. As soon as I reached my destination I wrote to
+a friend to go and inquire how he was. She replied that the dog was
+perfectly miserable, and that he had an enormous wound on his back, that
+he had eaten nothing for a week, that he was too weak to stand, and that
+if he were hers, she would have him put out of his misery at once. I
+wrote at once to the vet, telling him to telegraph "Curable" or
+"Hopeless," and to act accordingly. Meanwhile, I sat that afternoon in
+the Bürgerpark by myself and imagined the dog upon my lap, and myself
+stroking and healing him. After this I found myself fully believing that
+he would get better. The telegram I received was "Curable," and my
+friend wrote a second letter and said it was a miracle, for the dog was
+quite convalescent. He recovered perfectly. Here, again, however, it may
+have been that he was breaking his heart for a friend, and that my
+friend's visit cheered him. Or may not both causes have had their
+effect?
+
+                    "AMBROSE ZAIL MARTYN."
+
+Here is another case in the veracity of which I have every confidence. I
+will call it
+
+
+_The Headless Cat of No. ---- Lower Seedley Road, Seedley, Manchester_
+
+It was related to me by Mr. Robert Dane, who was at one time a tenant of
+No. ---- Lower Seedley Road, Seedley. I quote it as nearly as possible
+in his words, thus:--
+
+"When we--my wife and I--took No. ---- Lower Seedley Road, no
+possibility of the place being haunted crossed our minds. Indeed ghosts
+were the very last things we reckoned on, as neither of us had the
+slightest belief in them. Like the generality of solicitors, I am stodgy
+and unimaginative, whilst my wife is the most practical and
+matter-of-fact little woman you would meet in a day's march. Nor was
+there anything about the house that in any way suggested the
+superphysical. It was airy and light--no dark corners nor sinister
+staircases--and equipped throughout with all modern conveniences. We
+began our lease in June--the hottest June I remember--and nothing
+occurred to disturb us till October.
+
+"It happened then in this wise. I will quote from my diary:--
+
+"_Monday, October 11th_.--Dick--that is my brother-in-law--and I, at 11
+p.m., were sitting smoking and chatting together in the study. All the
+rest of the household had gone to bed. We had no light in the room--as
+Dick had a headache--save the fire, and that had burned so low that its
+feeble glimmering scarcely enabled us to see each other's face. After a
+space of sudden and thoughtful silence, Dick took the stump of a cigar
+from his lips and threw it in the grate, where for a few moments it lay
+glowing in the gloom.
+
+"'Jack,' he said, 'you will think me mad, but there is something deuced
+queer about this room to-night--something in the atmosphere I cannot
+define, but which I have never felt here--or indeed anywhere--before.
+Look at that cigar-end--look!'
+
+"I did so, and received a shock. What I saw was certainly not the stump
+Dick had had in his mouth, but an eye--a large, red and lurid eye--that
+looked up at us with an expression of the utmost hate.
+
+"Dick raised the shovel and struck at it, but without effect--it still
+glared at us. A great horror then seized us, and unable to remove our
+gaze from the hellish thing, we sat glued to our chairs staring at it.
+This state of affairs lasted till the clock in the hall outside struck
+twelve, when the eye suddenly vanished, and we both felt as if some
+intensely evil influence had been suddenly removed.
+
+"Dick did not like the idea of sleeping alone, and asked if he might
+keep the electric light on in his room all night. Tremendous
+extravagance, but under the circumstances excusable. I confess I
+devoutly wished it was morning.
+
+"_Tuesday, October 12th._--I was awakened at 11.30 p.m. by Delia saying
+to me, 'Oh, Edward, there have been such dreadful noises on the landing,
+just as if a cat were being worried to death by dogs. Hark! there it is
+again.' And as she spoke, from apparently just outside the door, came a
+series of loud screeches, accompanied by savage growls and snarls.
+
+"Not knowing what to make of it, as we had no animals of our own in the
+house, but concluding that a door or window having been left open, a dog
+and cat had got in from outside, I lit a candle, and opened the bedroom
+door. Instantly the sounds ceased and there was dead silence, and
+although I searched everywhere, not a vestige of any animal was to be
+seen. Moreover all the doors leading into the garden were shut and
+locked, and the windows closed. Not wishing to frighten Delia, I
+laughingly assured her the cat--a black Tom--was all right, that it was
+sitting on the roof of the summer-house, looking none the worse for its
+treatment, and that I had sent the dog--a terrier--flying out of the
+gate with a well-deserved kick. I explained it was my fault about the
+front door being left open--my brain had been a bit overstrained through
+excessive work--and asked her on no account to blame the servants. I
+grow alarmed at times when I realize how easy lawyering makes lying.
+
+"_Friday, October 21st._--On my way to bed last night I encountered a
+rush of icy cold air at the first bend of the staircase. The candle
+flared up, a bright blue flame, and went out. Something--an animal of
+sorts--came tearing down the stairs past me, and on peering over the
+banisters, I saw, looking up at me from the well of darkness beneath,
+two big red eyes, the counterparts of the one Dick and I had seen on
+October 11th. I threw a matchbox at them, but without effect. It was
+only when I switched on the electric light that they disappeared. I
+searched the house most carefully, but there were no signs of any
+animal. Joined Delia, feeling nervous and henpecky.
+
+"_Monday, November 7th._--Tom and Mable came running into Delia's room
+in a great state of excitement after tea to-day. 'Mother!' they cried,
+'Mother! Do come! Some horrid dog has got a cat in the spare room and is
+tearing it to pieces.' Delia, who was mending my socks at the time,
+flung them anywhere, and springing to her feet, flew to the spare room.
+The door was shut, but proceeding from within was the most appalling
+pandemonium of screeches and snarls, just as if some dog had got hold of
+a cat by the neck and was shaking it to death. Delia swung open the door
+and rushed in. The room was empty--not a trace of a cat or dog
+anywhere--and the sounds ceased! On my return home Delia met me in the
+garden. 'Jack!' she said, 'I have probed the mystery at last. The house
+is haunted! We must leave.'
+
+"_Saturday, November 12th._--Sublet house to James Barstow, retired oil
+merchant, to-day. He comes in on the 30th. Hope he'll like it!
+
+"_Tuesday, November 15th._--Cook left to-day. 'I've no fault to find
+with you, mum,' she condescendingly explained to Delia. 'It's not you,
+nor the children, nor the food. It's the noises at night--screeches
+outside my door, which sound like a cat, but which I know can't be a
+cat, as there is no cat in the house. This morning, mum, shortly after
+the clock struck two, things came to a climax. Hearing something in the
+corner and wondering if it was a mouse--I ain't a bit afraid of mice,
+mum--I sat up in bed and was getting ready to strike a light--the
+matchbox was in my hand--when something heavy sprang right on the top of
+me and gave a loud growl in my ear. That finished me, mum--I fainted.
+When I came to myself, I was too frightened to stir, but lay with my
+head under the blankets till it was time to get up. I then searched
+everywhere, but there was no sign of any dog, and as the door was locked
+there was no possibility of any dog having got in during the night. Mum,
+I wouldn't go through what I suffered again for fifty pounds; I've got
+palpitations even now; and I would rather go without my month's wages
+than sleep in that room another night.' Delia paid her up to date, and
+she went directly after tea.
+
+"_Friday, November 18th._--As I was coming out of the bathroom at 11
+p.m. something fell into the bath with a loud splash. I turned to see
+what it was--there was nothing there. I ran up the stairs to bed, three
+steps at a time!
+
+"_Sunday, November 20th._--Went to church in the morning and heard the
+usual Oxford drawl. On the way back I was pondering over the sermon and
+wishing I could contort the Law as successfully as parsons contort the
+Scriptures, when Dot--she is six to-day--came running up to me with a
+very scared expression in her eyes. 'Father,' she cried, plucking me by
+the sleeve, 'do hurry up. Mother is very ill.' Full of dreadful
+anticipations, I tore home, and on arriving found Delia lying on the
+sofa in a violent fit of hysterics. It was fully an hour before she
+recovered sufficiently to tell me what had happened. Her account runs
+thus:--
+
+"'After you went to church,' she began, 'I made the custard pudding,
+jelly and blancmange for dinner, heard the children their collects, and
+had just sat down with the intention of writing a letter to mother, when
+I heard a very pathetic mew coming, so I thought, from under the sofa.
+Thinking it was some stray cat that had got in through one of the
+windows, I tried to entice it out, by calling "Puss, puss," and making
+the usual silly noise people do on such occasions. No cat coming out and
+the mewing still continuing, I knelt down and peered under the sofa.
+There was no cat there. Had it been night I should have been very much
+afraid, but I could scarcely reconcile myself to the idea of ghosts
+with the room filled with sunshine. Resuming my seat I went on with my
+writing, but not for long. The mewing grew nearer. I distinctly heard
+something crawl out from under the sofa; there was then a pause, during
+which you could have heard the proverbial pin fall, and then something
+sprang upon me and dug its claws in my knees. I looked down, and to my
+horror and distress, perceived, standing on its hind-legs, pawing my
+clothes, a large, tabby cat, without a head--the neck terminating in a
+mangled stump. The sight so appalled me that I don't know what happened,
+but nurse and the children came in and found me lying on the floor in
+hysterics. Can't we leave the house at once?'
+
+"_Wednesday, November 30th._--Left No. ---- Lower Seedley Road at 2 p.m.
+Had an awful scurry to get things packed in time, and dread opening
+certain of the packing-cases lest we shall find all the crockery
+smashed. Just as we were starting Delia cried out that she had left her
+reticule behind, and I was despatched in search of it. I searched
+everywhere--till I was worn out, for I know what Delia is--and was
+leaving the premises in full anticipation of being sent back again, when
+there was a loud commotion in the hall, just as if a dog had suddenly
+pounced on a cat, and the next moment a large tabby, with the head hewn
+away as Delia had described, rushed up to me and tried to spring on to
+my shoulders. At this juncture one of the servants cautiously opened the
+hall door from without, and informed me I was wanted. The cat instantly
+vanished, and, on my reaching the carriage in a state of breathless
+haste and trepidation, Delia told me she had found her reticule--she had
+been sitting on it all the time!"
+
+In a subsequent note in his diary a year or so later Mr. Dane says:
+"After innumerable enquiries _re_ the history of No. ---- Lower Seedley
+Road prior to our inhabiting it, I have at length elicited the fact that
+twelve years ago a Mr. and Mrs. Barlowe lived there. They had one son,
+Arthur, whom they spoilt in the most outrageous fashion, even to the
+extent of encouraging him in acts of cruelty. To afford him amusement
+they used to buy rats for his dog--a fox-terrier--to worry, and on one
+occasion procured a stray cat, which the servants afterwards declared
+was mangled in the most shocking manner before being finally destroyed
+by Arthur. Here, then, in my opinion, is a very feasible explanation for
+the hauntings--the phenomenon seen was the phantasm of the poor,
+tortured cat. For if human tragedies are re-enacted by ghosts, why not
+animal tragedies too? It is absurd to suppose man has the monopoly of
+soul or spirit."
+
+
+_The Cat on the Post_
+
+In her _Ghosts and Family Legends_ Mrs. Crowe narrates the following
+case of a haunting by the phantom of a cat:--
+
+"After the doctor's story, I fear mine will appear too trifling," said
+Mrs. M., "but as it is the only circumstance of the kind that ever
+happened to myself, I prefer giving it you to any of the many stories I
+have heard.
+
+"About fifteen years ago I was staying with some friends at a
+magnificent old seat in Yorkshire, and our host being very much crippled
+with the gout, was in the habit of driving about the park and
+neighbourhood in a low pony phaeton, on which occasions I often
+accompanied him. One of our favourite excursions was to the ruins of an
+old abbey just beyond the park, and we generally returned by a
+remarkably pretty rural lane leading to the village, or rather small
+town, of C----.
+
+"One fine summer's evening we had just entered this lane when, seeing
+the hedges full of wild flowers, I asked my friend to let me alight and
+gather some. I walked before the carriage picking honeysuckles and roses
+as I went along, till I came to a gate that led into a field. It was a
+common country gate with a post on each side, and on one of these posts
+sat a large white cat, the finest animal of the kind I had ever seen;
+and as I have a weakness for cats I stopped to admire this sleek, fat
+puss, looking so wonderfully comfortable in a very uncomfortable
+position, the top of the post, on which it was sitting with its feet
+doubled up under it, being out of all proportion to its body, for no
+Angola ever rivalled it in size.
+
+"'Come on gently,' I called to my friend; 'here's such a magnificent
+cat!' for I feared the approach of the phaeton would startle it away
+before he had seen it.
+
+"'Where?' said he, pulling up his horse opposite the gate.
+
+"'There,' said I, pointing to the post. 'Isn't he a beauty? I wonder if
+it would let me stroke it?'
+
+"'I see no cat,' said he.
+
+"'There on the post,' said I, but he declared he saw nothing, though
+puss sat there in perfect composure during this colloquy.
+
+"'Don't you see the cat, James?' said I in great perplexity to the
+groom.
+
+"'Yes, ma'am; a large white cat on that post.'
+
+"I thought my friend must be joking, or losing his eyesight, and I
+approached the cat, intending to take it in my arms and carry it to the
+carriage; but as I drew near she jumped off the post, which was natural
+enough, but to my surprise she jumped into nothing--as she jumped she
+disappeared! No cat in the field--none in the lane--none in the ditch!
+
+"'Where did she go, James?'
+
+"'I don't know, ma'am. I can't see her,' said the groom, standing up in
+his seat and looking all round.
+
+"I was quite bewildered; but still I had no glimmering of the truth; and
+when I got into the carriage again my friend said he thought I and James
+were dreaming, and I retorted that I thought he must be going blind.
+
+"I had a commission to execute as we passed through the town, and I
+alighted for that purpose at the little haberdasher's; and while they
+were serving me I mentioned that I had seen a remarkably beautiful cat
+sitting on a gate in the lane, and asked if they could tell me who it
+belonged to, adding it was the largest cat I ever saw.
+
+"The owners of the shop, and two women who were making purchases,
+suspended their proceedings, looked at each other and then looked at me,
+evidently very much surprised.
+
+"'Was it a white cat, ma'am?' said the mistress.
+
+"'Yes, a white cat; a beautiful creature and----'
+
+"'Bless me!' cried two or three, 'the lady's seen the white cat of
+C----. It hasn't been seen these twenty years.'
+
+"'Master wishes to know if you'll soon be done, ma'am. The pony is
+getting restless,' said James.
+
+"Of course I hurried out, and got into the carriage, telling my friend
+that the cat was well known to the people at C----, and that it was
+twenty years old.
+
+"In those days, I believe, I never thought of ghosts, and least of all
+should have thought of the ghost of a cat; but two evenings afterwards,
+as we were driving down the lane, I again saw the cat in the same
+position and again my companion could not see it, though the groom did.
+I alighted immediately, and went up to it. As I approached it turned its
+head and looked full towards me with its soft mild eyes, and a friendly
+expression, like that of a loving dog; and then, without moving from the
+post, it began to fade gradually away, as if it were a vapour, till it
+had quite disappeared. All this the groom saw as well as myself; and now
+there could be no mistake as to what it was. A third time I saw it in
+broad daylight, and my curiosity greatly awakened, I resolved to make
+further enquiries amongst the inhabitants of C----, but before I had an
+opportunity of doing so, I was summoned away by the death of my eldest
+child, and I have never been in that part of the world since.
+
+"However, I once mentioned the circumstance to a lady who was acquainted
+with that neighbourhood, and she said she had heard of the white cat of
+C----, but had never seen it."
+
+This is Mrs. M.'s account as related by Mrs. Crowe, and after perusing
+the authoress's preface to the work, I am inclined to give it full
+credence.
+
+
+_The Mystic Properties of Cats_
+
+The most common forms of animal phenomena seen in haunted houses are
+undoubtedly those of cats. The number of places reported to me as being
+haunted by cats is almost incredible--in one street in Whitechapel there
+are no less than four. This state of affairs may possibly be accounted
+for by the fact that cats, more than any other animals that live in
+houses, meet with sudden and unnatural ends, especially in the poorer
+districts, where the doctrine of kindness to animals has not as yet made
+itself thoroughly felt. Now I am touching on the subject of cat ghosts,
+it may not be out of place to reproduce the following article of mine,
+entitled "Cats and the Unknown," which appeared in the _Occult Review_
+for December, 1912:--
+
+"Since, from all ages, the cat has been closely associated with the
+supernatural, it is not surprising to learn that images and symbols of
+that animal figured in the temples of the sun and moon, respectively, in
+ancient Egypt. According to Horapollo, the cat was worshipped in the
+Temple of Heliopolis, sacred to the sun, because the size of the pupil
+of the cat's eye is regulated by the height of the sun above the
+horizon.
+
+"Other authorities suggest a rather more subtle--and, in my opinion,
+more probable--reason, namely, that the link between the sun and the cat
+is not merely physical but superphysical, that the cat is attracted to
+the sun not only because it loves warmth, but because the sun keeps off
+terrifying and antagonistic occult forces, to the influences of which
+the cat, above all other animals, is specially susceptible; a fact fully
+recognized by the Egyptians, who, to show their understanding and
+appreciation of this feline attachment, took care that whenever a temple
+was dedicated to the sun an image or symbol of the cat was placed
+somewhere, well in evidence, within the precincts.
+
+"To make this theory all the more probable, images and symbols of the
+cat were dedicated to the moon, the moon being universally regarded as
+the quintessence of everything supernatural, the very cockpit, in fact,
+of mystery and spookism. The nocturnal habits of the cat, its love of
+prowling about during moonlight hours, and the spectacle of its two
+round, gleaming eyes, may, of course, as Plutarch seems to have thought,
+have suggested to the Egyptians human influence and analogy, and thus
+the presence of its effigy in temples to Isis would be partially, at all
+events, accounted for; though, as before, I am inclined to think there
+is another and rather more subtle reason.
+
+"From endless experiments made in haunted houses, I have proved to my
+own satisfaction, at least, that the cat acts as a thoroughly reliable
+psychic barometer.
+
+"The dog is sometimes unaware of the proximity of the Unknown. When the
+ghost materializes or in some other way demonstrates its advent, the
+dog, occasionally, is wholly undisturbed--the cat never. I have never
+yet had a cat with me that has not shown the most obvious signs of
+terror and uneasiness both before and during a superphysical
+manifestation.
+
+"Now, although I won't go so far as to say that ghostly demonstrations
+are actually dependent on the moon--that they occur only on nights when
+the moon is visible--experience has led me to believe that the moon most
+certainly does influence them--that moonlight nights are much more
+favourable to ghostly appearances than other nights. Hence--there is
+this much in common between the moon and cats--the one influences and
+the other is influenced by psychic phenomena--a fact that could scarcely
+have failed to be recognized by so keen observers of the occult as the
+Ancient Egyptians.
+
+"The presence of the cat's effigy in the temples of Isis might thus be
+explained. Over and over again we come across the cat in the land of the
+Pharaohs. It seems to be inseparable from the esoteric side of Egyptian
+life. The goddess Bast is depicted with a cat's head, holding the
+sistrum, i.e. the symbol of the world's harmony, in her hand.
+
+"One of the most ancient symbols of the cat is to be found in the
+Necropolis of Thebes, which contains the tomb of Hana (who probably
+belonged to the Eleventh Dynasty). There, Hana is depicted standing
+erect, proud and kingly, with his favourite cat Borehaki--Borehaki, the
+picture of all things strange and psychic, and from whom one cannot help
+supposing he may have chosen his occult inspiration--at his feet. So
+sure were the Egyptians that the cat possessed a soul that they deemed
+it worthy of the same funeral rites they bestowed on man. Cats were
+embalmed, and innumerable cat mummies have been discovered in wooden
+coffins at Bubastis, Speos, Artemidos and Thebes. When a cat died the
+Egyptians shaved their eyebrows, not only to show grief at the loss of
+their loved one, but to avert subsequent misfortune.
+
+"So long as a cat was in his house the Egyptian felt safe from inimical
+supernatural influences, but if there was no cat in the house at night,
+then any undesirable from the occult world might visit him. Indeed, in
+such high esteem did the Egyptians hold the cat, that they voluntarily
+incurred the gravest risks when its life was in peril. No one of them
+appreciated the cat and set a higher value on its mystic properties than
+the Sultan El-Daher-Beybas, who reigned in A.D. 1260, and has been
+compared with William of Tripoli for his courage, and with Nero for his
+cruelty. El-Daher-Beybas kept his palace swarming with cats, and--if we
+may give credence to tradition--was seldom to be seen unaccompanied by
+one of these animals. When he died, he left the proceeds from the
+product of a garden to support his feline friends--an example that found
+many subsequent imitators. Indeed, until comparatively recently in
+Cairo, cats were regularly fed, between noon and sunset, in the outer
+court of the Mehkemeh.
+
+"In Geneva, Rome and Constantinople, though cats were generally deemed
+to have souls and to possess psychic properties, they were thought to
+derive them from evil sources, and so strong was the prejudice against
+these unfortunate animals on this account, that all through the Middle
+Ages we find them suffering such barbaric torture as only the perverted
+minds of a fanatical, priest-ridden people could devise (which
+treatment, no doubt, partly, at all events, accounts for the many
+palaces, houses, etc., in those particular countries, stated to have
+been haunted by the spirits of cats).
+
+"The devil was popularly supposed to appear in the shape of a black Tom
+in preference to assuming any other guise, and the bare fact of an old
+woman being seen, once or twice, with a black cat by her side was quite
+sufficient to earn for her the reputation of a witch. It would be idle,
+of course, to expect people in these unmeditative times to believe there
+was ever the remotest truth underlying these so-called phantastic
+suppositions of the past; yet, according to reliable testimony, there
+are, at the present moment, many houses in England haunted by phantasms
+in the form of black cats, of so sinister and hostile an appearance,
+that one can only assume that unless they are the actual spirits of
+cats, earthbound through cruel and vicious propensities, they must be
+vice-elementals, i.e. spirits that have never inhabited any material
+body, and which have either been generated by vicious thoughts, or else
+have been attracted elsewhere to a spot by some crime or vicious act
+once perpetrated there. Vice-elemental is merely the modern name for
+fiend or demon.
+
+"Apart from his luciferan qualities, the cat was awarded all sorts of
+other qualities, not the least important of which was its prophetic
+capability. If a cat washed its face, rainy weather was regarded as
+inevitable; if a cat frolicked on the deck of a ship, it was a sure sign
+of a storm; whilst if a live ember fell on a cat, an earthquake shock
+would speedily be felt. Cats, too, were reputed the harbingers of good
+and bad fortune. Not a person in Normandy but believed, at one time,
+that the spectacle of a tortoiseshell cat, climbing a tree, foretold
+death from accident, and that a black cat crossing one's path, in the
+moonlight, presaged death from an epidemic. Two black cats viewed in the
+open between 4 and 7 a.m. were generally believed to predict a death;
+whereas a strange white cat, heard mewing on a doorstep, was loudly
+welcomed as the indication of an approaching marriage. According to
+tradition, one learns that cats were occasionally made use of in
+medicine; to cure peasants of skin diseases, French sorcerers sprinkling
+the afflicted parts with three drops of blood drawn from the vein under
+a cat's tail; whilst blindness was treated by blowing into the
+patient's eyes, three times a day, the dust made from ashes of the head
+of a black cat that had been burned alive.
+
+"Talking of burning cats reminds me of a horrible practice that was
+prevalent in the Hebrides as late as 1750. It was firmly believed there
+that cats were extraordinarily psychic, and that a sure means of getting
+in close touch with occult powers, and of obtaining from them the
+faculty of second sight--such as the cat possessed--was to offer up as
+sacrifices innumerable black cats. The process was very simple. A black
+cat was fastened to a spit before a slow fire, and as soon as the
+wretched animal was well roasted, another took its place; victims being
+supplied without intermission, until their vociferous screams brought to
+the scene a number of ghostly cats who joined in the chorus. The desired
+climax was reached, when an enormous phantom cat suddenly appeared, and
+informed the operator that it was willing to grant him any one request
+if he would only refrain from his cruel persecution. The operator at
+once demanded the faculty of second sight--a power more highly prized in
+the Hebrides than any other--and the moment it was bestowed on him, set
+free the remaining cats. Had all races been as barbarously disposed as
+these occult-hungering Westerners, cats would soon have become extinct;
+but it is comforting to think that in some parts of the world a very
+different value was set on their psychic properties.
+
+"In various parts of Europe (some districts of England included) white
+cats were thought to attract benevolently disposed fairies, and a
+peasant would as soon have thought of cutting off his fingers, or
+otherwise maltreating himself, as being unkind to an animal of this
+species. In the fairy lore of half Europe we have instances of
+luck-bringing cats--each country producing its own version of Puss in
+Boots, Dame Mitchell and her cat, the White Cat, Dick Whittington and
+his cat, etc. It is the same in Asia, too; for nowhere are such stories
+more prolific than in China and Persia.
+
+"To sum up--in all climes and in all periods of past history, the cat
+was credited with many propensities that brought it into affinity and
+sympathy with the supernatural--or to quote the up-to-date
+term--superphysical world. Let us review the cat to-day, and see to what
+extent this past regard of it is justified.
+
+"Firstly, with respect to it as the harbinger of fortune. Has a cat
+insight into the future? Can it presage wealth or death? I am inclined
+to believe that certain cats can at all events foresee the advent of the
+latter; and that they do this in the same manner as the shark, crow,
+owl, jackal, hyena, etc., viz. by their abnormally developed sense of
+smell. My own and other people's experience has led me to believe that
+when a person is about to die, some kind of phantom, maybe, a spirit
+whose special function it is to be present on such occasions, is in
+close proximity to the sick or injured one, waiting to escort his or her
+soul into the world of shadows--and that certain cats scent its
+approach.
+
+"Therein then--in this wonderful property of smell--lies one of the
+secrets to the cat's mysterious powers, it has the psychic faculty of
+scent--of scenting ghosts. Some people, too, have this faculty. In a
+recent murder case, in the North of England, a rustic witness gave it in
+her evidence that she was sure a tragedy was about to happen because she
+"smelt death in the house," and it made her very uneasy. Cats possessing
+this peculiarity are affected in a similar manner--they are uneasy.
+
+"Before a death in a house I have watched a cat show gradually
+increasing signs of uneasiness. It has moved from place to place, unable
+to settle in any one spot for any length of time, had frequent fits of
+shivering, gone to the door, sniffed the atmosphere, thrown back its
+head and mewed in a low, plaintive key, and shown the greatest
+reluctance to being alone in the dark.
+
+"This faculty--possessed by certain cats--may in some measure explain
+certain of the superstitions respecting them. Take, for example, that of
+cats crossing one's path predicting death.
+
+"The cat is drawn to the spot because it scents the phantom of death,
+and cannot resist its magnetic attraction.
+
+"From this, it does not follow that the person who sees the cat is going
+to die, but that death is overtaking someone associated with that
+person; and it is in connection with the latter that the spirit of the
+grave is present, employing, as a medium of prognostication, the cat,
+which has been given the psychic faculty of smell that it might be so
+used.
+
+"But although I regard this theory as very feasible, I do not attribute
+to cats, with the same degree of certainty, the power to presage good
+fortune, simply because I have had no experience of it myself. Yet,
+adopting the same lines of argument, I see no reason why cats should not
+prognosticate good as well as evil.
+
+"There may be phantoms representative of prosperity, in just the same
+manner as there are those representative of death; they, too, may also
+have some distinguishing scent (flowers have various odours, so why not
+spirits?) and certain cats, i.e. white cats in particular, may be
+attracted by it.
+
+"This becomes all the more probable when one considers how very
+impressionable the cat is--how very sensitive to kindness. There are
+some strangers with whom the cat will at once make friends, and others
+whom it will studiously avoid. Why? The explanation, I fancy, lies once
+more in the occult--in the cat's psychic faculty of smell. Kind people
+attract benevolently disposed phantoms, which bring with them an
+agreeably scented atmosphere, that, in turn, attracts cats. The cat
+comes to one person because it knows by the smell of the atmosphere
+surrounding him, or her, that it has nothing to fear--that the person is
+essentially gentle and benignant. On the contrary, cruel people attract
+malevolent phantoms, distinguishable also to the cat by their smell, a
+smell typical of cruelty--often of homicidal lunacy (I have particularly
+noticed how cats have shrunk from people who have afterwards become
+dangerously insane). Is this sense of smell, then, the keynote to the
+halo of mystery that has for all times surrounded the cat--that has led
+to its bitter persecution--that has made it the hero of fairy lore, the
+pet of old maids? I believe it is--I believe that in this psychic
+faculty of smell lies, in degree, the solution to the oft-asked
+riddle--why is the cat uncanny? Having then satisfied oneself on this
+point, namely, that cats are in the possession of rare psychic
+properties, is it likely that the Unknown Powers which have so endowed
+them, should withhold from them either souls or spirits? Is it not
+contrary to reason, instinct, and observation to suppose that the many
+thoroughly material and grossly minded people--people whose whole beings
+are steeped in money worship--we see around us every day should have
+spirits, and that pretty, refined and artistic-looking cats, whose
+occult powers place them in the very closest connection with the
+superphysical, should not? Monstrous--the bare conception of such
+incongruity in the one case, and such an omission in the other, is
+inconceivable, wholly irreconcilable with the notion of any other than a
+mummer of a creator--a mere court fool of a God."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+APPARITIONS OF DOGS
+
+
+One of the most extraordinary cases of hauntings by the phantasms of
+dogs is related in an old Christmas number of the _Review of Reviews_,
+edited by the late Mr. W.T. Stead, and entitled "Real Ghost Stories."
+
+"The most remarkable," writes Mr. Stead, "of all the stories which I
+have heard concerning ghosts which touch is one that reaches me from
+Darlington. I owe this, as I owe so many of the other narratives in this
+collection, to the Rev. Harry Kendall, of Darlington, whose painstaking
+perseverance in the collection of all matters of this kind cannot be too
+highly praised. Mr. Kendall is a Congregational minister of old
+standing. He was my pastor when I was editing the _Northern Echo_, and
+he is the author of a remarkable book, entitled _All the World's Akin_.
+The following narrative is quite unique in its way, and fortunately he
+was able to get it at first hand from the only living person present.
+Here we have a ghost which not only strikes the first blow, hitting a
+man fair in the eye, but afterwards sets a ghostly dog upon his victim
+and then disappears. The narrative was signed by Mr. James Durham as
+lately as December 5th, 1890." Mr. Stead then proceeds to quote the
+account which he had from Mr. Kendall, and which I append _ad verbum_
+from the _Review of Reviews_. It is as follows: "I was night watchman at
+the old Darlington and Stockton Station at the town of Darlington, a few
+yards from the first station that ever existed. I was there fifteen
+years. I used to go on duty about 8 p.m. and come off at 6 a.m. I had
+been there a little while--perhaps two or three years--and about forty
+years ago. One night during winter at about 12 o'clock or 12.30 I was
+feeling rather cold with standing here and there; I said to myself, 'I
+will away down and get something to eat.' There was a porter's cellar
+where a fire was kept on and a coal-house was connected with it. So I
+went down the steps, took off my overcoat, and had just sat down on the
+bench opposite the fire and turned up the gas when a strange man came
+out of the coal-house, followed by a big black retriever. As soon as he
+entered my eye was upon him, and his eye upon me, and we were intently
+watching each other as he moved on to the front of the fire. There he
+stood looking at me, and a curious smile came over his countenance. He
+had a stand-up collar and a cut-away coat with gilt buttons and a Scotch
+cap. All at once he struck at me, and I had the impression that he hit
+me. I up with my fist and struck back at him. My fist seemed to go
+through him and struck against the stone above the fireplace, and
+knocked the skin off my knuckles. The man seemed to be struck back into
+the fire, and uttered a strange, unearthly squeak. Immediately the dog
+gripped me by the calf of my leg, and seemed to cause me pain. The man
+recovered his position, called off the dog with a sort of click of the
+tongue, then went back into the coal-house, followed by the dog. I
+lighted my dark lantern and looked into the coal-house, but there was
+neither dog nor man, and no outlet for them except the one by which they
+had entered.
+
+"I was satisfied that what I had seen was ghostly, and it accounted for
+the fact that when the man had first come into the place where he sat I
+had not challenged him with any enquiry. Next day, and for several
+weeks, my account caused quite a commotion, and a host of people spoke
+to me about it; among the rest old Edward Pease, father of railways, and
+his three sons, John, Joseph, and Henry. Old Edward sent for me to his
+house and asked me all particulars. He and others put this question to
+me: "Are you sure you were not asleep and had the nightmare?" My answer
+was quite sure, for I had not been a minute in the cellar, and was just
+going to get something to eat. I was certainly not under the influence
+of strong drink, for I was then, as I have been for forty-nine years, a
+teetotaler. My mind at the time was perfectly free from trouble. What
+increased the excitement was the fact that a man a number of years
+before, who was employed in the office of the station, had committed
+suicide, and his body had been carried into this very cellar. I knew
+nothing of this circumstance, nor of the body of the man, but Mr. Pease
+and others who had known him, told me my description exactly
+corresponded to his appearance and the way he dressed, and also that he
+had a black retriever just like the one which gripped me. I should add
+that no mark or effect remained on the spot where I seemed to be seized.
+
+                    "(Signed) JAMES DURHAM.
+"_Dec. 9th, 1890._"
+
+Following the above statement Mr. Stead appends Mr. Kendall's reasons
+for believing that what James Durham experienced was objective psychic
+phenomena, and neither produced during sleep nor by hallucination.
+
+The arguments used strike me as being so concise and sensible that I
+think it will not be out of place to reproduce them.
+
+"First," Mr. Kendall says, "he (James Durham) was accustomed as watchman
+to be up all night, and therefore not likely from that cause to feel
+sleepy. Secondly, he had scarcely been a minute in the cellar, and,
+feeling hungry, was just going to get something to eat. Thirdly, if he
+was asleep at the beginning of the vision, he must have been awake
+enough during the latter part of it when he had knocked the skin off his
+knuckles. Fourthly, there was his own confident testimony. I strongly
+incline to the opinion that there was an objective cause for the vision,
+and that it was genuinely apparitional."
+
+So interested was Mr. Kendall in the case that he visited the spot some
+short time later. He was taken into the cellar where the manifestations
+took place, and his guide, an old official of the North Road Station,
+informed him he well remembered the clerk--a man of the name of
+Winter--who committed suicide there, and showed him the exact spot where
+he had shot himself with a pistol. In dress and appearance Mr. Winter
+corresponded minutely with the phenomenon described by James Durham, and
+he had had a black retriever.
+
+Mr. Kendal came away more convinced than ever of the veracity of James
+Durham's story, though he admits it was not evidential after the high
+standard of the S.P.R. I do not know whether the S.P.R. published the
+case, and I certainly do not think Mr. Kendall need have minded if they
+did not--for after all there is no reason to suppose the judgment of the
+S.P.R. is always infallible.
+
+Mr. Stead does not comment on the apparition of the dog, which leads one
+to suppose cases of animal phantasms were by no means uncommon to him.
+
+
+_The Grey Dog of ---- House, Birmingham_
+
+According to a story current in the Midlands, a house in Birmingham,
+near the Roman Catholic Cathedral, was once very badly haunted. A family
+who took up their abode in it in the 'eighties complained of hearing all
+sorts of uncanny sounds--such as screams and sighs--coming from a room
+behind the kitchen. On one occasion the tenant's wife, on entering the
+sitting-room, was almost startled out of her senses at seeing, standing
+before the fireplace, the figure of a tall, stout man with a large, grey
+dog by his side. What was so alarming about the man was his face--it was
+apparently a mere blob of flesh without any features in it. The lady
+screamed out, whereupon there was a terrific crash, as if all the
+crockery in the house had been suddenly clashed on the stone floor; and
+a friend of the lady's, attracted to the spot by the noise, saw two
+clouds of vapour, one resembling a man and the other a dog, which, after
+hovering over the hearth for several seconds, finally dispersed
+altogether.
+
+A gasfitter, when working in the house, saw the same figures no less
+than nine times, and so distinctly that he was able to give a detailed
+description of both the man and dog.
+
+The house seems to have been well known in Birmingham, and was certainly
+standing as recently as 1885. Many theories were advanced as to its
+history, the one gaining most credence being that it was occupied, in
+1829, by a man who supplied the medical students with human bodies.
+
+It was noticed at the time that many people who were seen to enter the
+house in the company of the owner were never seen to leave it, which
+accords well with the theory of resurrection men.
+
+No suggestion has been offered to account for the animal, which may very
+easily have been the phantom of the murderer's dog, or, what is rather
+less likely, the dog of one of his numerous victims.
+
+Anyhow, explanation or no explanation, the fact remains the house was
+haunted in the manner described, and F. Grey, a Warwickshire Chief
+Constable, in his _Recollections_, published 1821, alludes to it.
+
+
+_The Dog in the Cupboard_
+
+Miss Prettyman, whom I met some years ago in Cornwall, told me she once
+lived in a house in Westmorland that was haunted by the apparition of a
+large dog, enveloped in a blueish glow, which apparently emanated from
+within it. The dog, whilst appearing in all parts of the house,
+invariably vanished in a big cupboard at the back of the hall staircase.
+Miss Prettyman, her family, several of their visitors, and the servants
+all saw the same phantasm, and were, perhaps, more frightened by the
+suddenness of its advent than by its actual appearance.
+
+The theory was that it was the ghost of some dog that had been cruelly
+done to death--possibly by starvation--in the cupboard.
+
+
+_How the Ghost of a Dog saved Life_
+
+When I was a boy, an elderly friend of mine, Miss Lefanu, narrated to me
+an anecdote which impressed me much. It was to this effect.
+
+Miss Lefanu was walking one day along a very lonely country lane, when
+she suddenly observed an enormous Newfoundland dog following in her wake
+a few yards behind. Being very fond of dogs, she called out to it in a
+caressing voice and endeavoured to stroke it. To her disappointment,
+however, it dodged aside, and repeated the manoeuvre every time she
+tried to touch it. At length, losing patience, she desisted, and resumed
+her walk, the dog still following her. In this fashion they went on,
+until they came to a particularly dark part of the road, where the
+branches of the trees almost met overhead, and there was a pool of
+stagnant, slimy water, suggestive of great depth. On the one side the
+hedge was high, but on the other there was a slight gap leading into a
+thick spinney. Miss Lefanu never visited the spot alone after dusk, and
+had been warned against it even in the daytime. As she drew near to it,
+everything that she had ever heard about it flashed across her mind, and
+she was more than once on the verge of turning back, when the sight of
+the big, friendly-looking dog plodding behind, reassuring her, she
+pressed on. Just as she came to the gap, there was a loud snapping of
+twigs, and, to her horror, two tramps, with singularly sinister faces,
+sprang out, and were about to strike her with their bludgeons, when the
+dog, uttering a low, ominous growl, dashed at them. In an instant the
+expression of murderous joy in their eyes died out, one of abject terror
+took its place, and, dropping their weapons, they fled, as if the very
+salvation of their souls depended on it. As may be imagined, Miss Lefanu
+lost no time in getting home, and the first thing she did on arriving
+there was to go into the kitchen and order the cook to prepare, at once,
+a thoroughly good meal for her gallant rescuer--the Newfoundland dog,
+which she had shut up securely in the back yard, with the laughing
+remark, "There--you can't escape me now." Judge of her astonishment,
+however, when, on her return, the dog had gone. As the walls of the back
+yard were twelve feet high, and the doors had been shut all the
+while--no one having passed through them--it was impossible for the
+animal to have escaped, and the only interpretation that could possibly
+be put on the matter was that the dog was superphysical--a conclusion
+that was subsequently confirmed by the experiences of various other
+people. As the result of exhaustive enquiries Miss Lefanu eventually
+learned that many years before, on the very spot where the tramps had
+leaped out on her, a pedlar and his Newfoundland dog had been discovered
+murdered.
+
+This story being true, then, there is one more link in the chain of
+evidence to show that dogs, as well as men, have spirits, and spirits
+that can, on occasion, at least, perform deeds of practical service.
+
+
+_A Precentor's Story_
+
+The late Mr. W.T. Stead, in his volume of _Real Ghost Stories_, narrates
+the following, which by reason of its being witnessed by three people
+simultaneously, may be regarded as highly evidential.
+
+In reply to Mr. Stead's request to hear the anecdote the precentor says
+(I quote him _ad verbum_):
+
+"I was walking, about nine years ago, one night in August, about ten
+o'clock, and about half a mile from the house where we are now sitting.
+I was going along the public road between the hamlets of Mill of Haldane
+and Ballock. I had with me two young women, and we were leisurely
+walking along, when suddenly we were startled by seeing a woman, a child
+about seven years old, and a Newfoundland dog jump over the stone wall
+which was on one side of the road, and walk on rapidly in front of us. I
+was not in the least frightened, but my two companions were very much
+startled. What bothered me was that the woman, the child, and the dog,
+instead of coming over the wall naturally one after the other, as would
+have been necessary for them to do, had come over with a bound,
+simultaneously leaping the wall, lighting on the road, and then hurrying
+on without a word. Leaving my two companions, who were too frightened to
+move, I walked rapidly after the trio. They walked on so quickly that it
+was with difficulty that I got up to them. I spoke to the woman, she
+never answered. I walked beside her for some little distance, and then
+suddenly the woman, the child, and the Newfoundland dog disappeared. I
+did not see them go anywhere, they simply were no longer there. I
+examined the road minutely, at the spot where they had disappeared, to
+see if it was possible for them to have gone through a hole in the wall
+on either side; but it was quite impossible for a woman and a child to
+get over a high dyke on either side. They had disappeared, and I only
+regret that I did not try to pass my stick right through their bodies,
+to see whether or not they had any resistance. Finding they had gone, I
+returned to my lady friends, who were quite unnerved, and who, with
+difficulty, were induced to go on to the end of their journey."
+
+One of his companions, Mr. Stead goes on to explain, who heard him tell
+the story at the time, corroborated the fact that it had made a great
+impression on those who had seen it. Nothing was ever ascertained as to
+any woman, child, or Newfoundland dog that had ever been in the district
+before. When they got to Ballock they enquired of the keeper of the
+bridge whether a woman, a child, and a dog had passed that way, but he
+had seen nothing. The apparition had disappeared as suddenly as it had
+appeared. Mr. Stead's article ends here. Of course, one can only surmise
+as to the nature of the phenomena. No member of the Psychical Research
+Society could do more--and in the absence of any authentic history of
+the spot where the manifestations occurred, such a surmise can be of
+little value. Since the phenomena were seen by three people at the same
+time, it is quite safe to assume they were objective, but it is
+impossible to lay down the law as to whether they were actual phantasms
+of the dead--of a woman, child, and Newfoundland dog who had all three
+met with some violent end--or phantasms of three living beings, who,
+happening to think of that locality at the same time, had projected
+their immaterial bodies there simultaneously. But whichever of these
+alternatives be true, the same thing holds good in either case, viz.
+that the Newfoundland dog had a spirit--and what applies to one dog
+should assuredly apply to the generality, if not, indeed, to all.
+
+
+_Phantom Dog seen on Souter Fell_
+
+Miss Harriet Martineau, in her _English Lakes_, refers to certain
+strange phenomena seen from time to time on Souter Fell.
+
+In 1745, for example, a Mr. Wren and his servant saw, simultaneously, a
+man and dog pursuing some horses along a razor-like ridge of rocks, on
+which it was obviously impossible for any ordinary being to gain a bare
+foothold, let alone walk. They watched the figures until the latter
+suddenly vanished, when Mr. Wren and his servant, thinking, perhaps, the
+man, dog, and horses had really fallen over the cliff, went to look for
+them. They searched elsewhere, but despite their vigilance, nothing was
+to be found, and convinced at last that what they had seen was something
+superphysical, they came away mystified, and no doubt somewhat
+frightened.
+
+There is no suggestion to make here other than the manifestations may
+have been the phantasms of a man, dog, and horses that at some former
+date had been killed, either accidentally or purposely, in or near that
+spot.
+
+
+_The Jumping Ghost_
+
+Mr. George Sinclair, in his work _Satan's Invisible World Discovered_,
+gives a detailed account of hauntings in a house in Mary King's Close,
+Edinburgh.
+
+The house, at the time Mr. Sinclair writes, was occupied by Mr. Thomas
+Coltheart, a law agent. Seated one afternoon at home reading, Mrs.
+Coltheart was immeasurably startled at seeing, suspended in mid-air
+gazing at her, the head of an old man. She uttered some sort of
+exclamation, most probably a cry, and the apparition at once vanished.
+Some nights later, when in bed, both she and her husband saw the same
+head, which was presently joined by the head of a child, and a long,
+naked arm, which tried to catch hold of them.
+
+On another occasion, a member of the Coltheart family was greatly
+alarmed by the sudden appearance of a large dog, which leaped on the
+chair by her side, and as suddenly disappeared.
+
+Every effort was made to lay the ghosts. Ministers--and one knows how
+pious Scotch clergymen are--were called in, but their exhortations,
+instead of dispelling or even minimizing the phenomena, only increased
+them. It was a case of more prayers, more spooks; which state of
+affairs, however complimentary to the ministers' powers of address, was
+scarcely as comforting to the Colthearts, who, unable to bear the
+strange sights and noises any longer, evacuated the premises. As no
+other tenants could be found, the house was eventually pulled down, and
+a row of fine modern buildings now occupy the site. As the history of
+the place could never be traced with any degree of authenticity, one can
+do no more than speculate as to the cause of the disturbances, which, I
+am inclined to think, were due to the phantoms of people and animals
+that had once actually lived and died there.
+
+
+_Dogs seen before a Death_
+
+Mrs. Crowe, in her _Night Side of Nature_, mentions the case of a young
+lady named P----, who saw a big black dog twice suddenly appear and
+disappear by her side, immediately before the death of her mother.
+
+In _The Unseen World_ a story is also told of the phantasm of a big
+black dog appearing on the bed of a Cornish child, doomed to die shortly
+afterwards, the same dog invariably manifesting itself before the death
+of any member of the child's family.
+
+There are so many cases of a similar kind--one hears of them nearly
+everywhere one goes--that one is led to believe some of them, at least,
+must be true. There is no more reason to believe all ghost-story tellers
+are liars, than there is to believe all parsons are liars--and this
+being so, additional proof is afforded of the continuation of the dog's
+life after death; for these family canine ghosts are more than probably
+the phantasms of dogs that once belonged to families--maybe centuries
+ago--and met their fate in some cruel and unnatural manner.
+
+
+_A Dog scared by a Canine Ghost_
+
+A friend of mine, Edward Morgan, had a terrier that was found one
+morning, poisoned in a big stone kennel. Soon afterwards this friend
+came to me and said, "I have got a new dog--a spaniel--but nothing will
+induce it to enter the kennel in which poor Zack was poisoned. Come and
+see!"
+
+I did so, and what he said was true. Mack (Morgan gave all his dogs
+names that rhymed--Zack, Mack, Jack, Tack, and even Whack and Smack),
+when carried to the entrance of the kennel, resolutely refused to cross
+the threshold, barking, whining, and exhibiting unmistakable symptoms of
+fear. I knelt down, and peering into the kennel saw two luminous eyes
+and the distinct outlines of a dog's head.
+
+"Morgan!" I exclaimed, "the mystery is easily solved; there's a dog in
+here."
+
+"Nonsense!" Morgan cried, speaking very excitedly.
+
+"But there is," I retorted, "see for yourself."
+
+Morgan immediately bent down and poked his head into the kennel.
+
+"What rot," he said. "You're having me on, there's nothing here."
+
+"What!" I cried, "do you mean to say you can see no dog?"
+
+"No!" he replied, "there is none!"
+
+"Let me look again!" I said, and kneeling down, I peeped in.
+
+"Do you mean to say you can't see a dog's face and eyes looking straight
+at us?" I asked.
+
+"No," he answered, "I can see nothing." And to prove to me the truth of
+what he said, he fetched a pole and raked about the kennel vigorously
+with it. We both, then, tried to make Mack enter, and Morgan at last
+caught hold of him and placed him forcibly inside. Mack's terror knew no
+limit. He gave one loud howl, and flying out of the kennel with his ears
+hanging back, tore past into the front garden, where we left him in
+peace. Morgan was still sceptical as to there being anything wrong with
+the kennel, but two days later wrote to me as follows:--
+
+"I must apologize for doubting you the other day. I have just had, what
+you declared you saw, corroborated. A friend of my wife's was calling
+here this afternoon, and, on hearing of Mack's refusal to sleep in the
+kennel, at once said, 'I know what's the matter. It's the smell. Mack
+scents the poison which was used to destroy Zack. Have the kennel
+thoroughly fumigated, and you'll have no more trouble.' At my wife's
+request she went into the yard to have a look at it, and the moment she
+bent down, she cried out like you did, 'Why, there's a dog inside--a
+terrier!' My wife and I both looked and could see nothing. The lady,
+however, persisted, and, on my handing her a stick, struck at the figure
+she saw. To her amazement the stick went right through it. Then, and not
+till then, did we tell her of your experience. 'Well!' she exclaimed,
+'I have never believed in ghosts, but I do so now. I am quite certain
+that what I see is the phantom of Zack! How glad I am, because I am at
+last assured animals have spirits and can come back to us.'"
+
+In concluding the accounts of phantasms of dead dogs, let me quote two
+cases taken from my work entitled _The Haunted Houses of London_,
+published by Mr. Eveleigh Nash, of Fawside House, King Street, Covent
+Garden, London, W.C., in 1909. The cases are these:--
+
+
+_The Phantom Dachshund of W---- St., London, W._
+
+In letter No. 1 my correspondent writes:--
+
+"Though I am by no means over-indulgent to dogs, the latter generally
+greet me very effusively, and it would seem that there is something in
+my individuality that is peculiarly attractive to them. This being so, I
+was not greatly surprised one day, when in the immediate neighbourhood
+of X---- Street, to find myself persistently followed by a rough-haired
+dachshund wearing a gaudy yellow collar. I tried to scare it away by
+shaking my sunshade at it, but all to no purpose--it came resolutely on;
+and I was beginning to despair of getting rid of it, when I came to
+X---- Street, where my husband once practised as an oculist. There it
+suddenly altered its tactics, and instead of keeping at my heels,
+became my conductor, forging slowly ahead with a gliding motion that
+both puzzled and fascinated me. I furthermore observed that
+notwithstanding the temperature--it was not a whit less than ninety
+degrees in the shade--the legs and stomach of the dachshund were covered
+with mud and dripping with water. When it came to No. 90 it halted, and
+veering swiftly round, eyed me in the strangest manner, just as if it
+had some secret it was bursting to disclose. It remained in this
+attitude until I was within two or three feet of it--certainly not
+more--when, to my unlimited amazement, it absolutely vanished--melted
+away into thin air.
+
+"The iron gate leading to the area was closed, so that there was nowhere
+for it to have hidden, and, besides, I was almost bending over it at the
+time, as I wanted to read the name on its collar. There being no one
+near at hand, I could not obtain a second opinion, and so came away
+wondering whether what I had seen was actually a phantasm or a mere
+hallucination. No. 90, I might add, judging by the brass plate on the
+door, was inhabited by a doctor with an unpronounceable foreign name,"
+etc. etc.
+
+I think one cannot help attaching a great deal of importance to what
+this lady says, as her language is strictly moderate throughout, and
+because she does not seem to have been biassed by any special views on
+the subject of animal futurity.
+
+Correspondent No. 2 (who, by the way, is a total stranger to the writer
+whose letter I have just quoted) is candidly devoted to dogs, regarding
+them as in every way on a par with, if not actually superior to, most
+human beings. Still, notwithstanding this partiality, and consequent
+profusion of terms of endearment, which will doubtless prove somewhat
+nauseating to many, her letter is, in my opinion, valuable, because it
+not only refers to the phenomenon I have mentioned, but to a certain
+extent furnishes a reason for its occurrence. The lady writes as
+follows:--
+
+"I once had a rough-haired dachshund, Robert, whom I loved devotedly. We
+were living at the time near H---- Street, which always had a peculiar
+attraction for dear Robert, who, I am now obliged to confess, had rather
+too much liberty--more, indeed, than eventually proved good for him. The
+servants complained that Robert ruled the house, and I believe what they
+said was true, for my sister and I idolized him, giving him the very
+best of everything and never having the heart to refuse him anything he
+wanted. You will probably scarcely credit it, but I have sat up all
+night nursing him when he had a cold and was otherwise indisposed. Can
+you therefore imagine my feelings when my darling was absent one day
+from dinner? Such a thing had never happened before, for, fond of
+morning 'constitutionals' as poor Robert was, he was always the soul of
+punctuality at meal times.
+
+"Neither my sister nor I would hear of eating anything. Whilst he was
+missing, not a morsel did we touch, but slipping on our hats, and
+bidding the servants do the same, we scoured the neighbourhood instead.
+The afternoon passed without any sign of Robert, and when bedtime came
+(he always slept in our room) and still no signs of our pet, I thought
+we should both have gone mad. Of course, we advertised, selecting the
+most popular and, accordingly, the most likely papers, and we resorted
+to other mediums, too, but, alas! it was hopeless. Our darling little
+Robert was irrevocably, irredeemably lost. For days we were utterly
+inconsolable, doing nothing but mope morning, noon, and night. I cannot
+tell you how forlorn we felt, nor how long we should have remained in
+that state but for an incident which, although revealing the terrible
+manner of his death, gave us every reason to feel sure we were not
+parted from him for all time, but would meet again in the great
+hereafter. It happened in this wise: I was walking along W---- Street
+one evening when, to my intense joy and surprise, I suddenly saw my
+darling standing on the pavement a few feet ahead of me, regarding me
+intently from out of his pathetic brown eyes. A sensation of extreme
+coldness now stole over me, and I noticed with something akin to a shock
+that, in spite of the hot, dry weather, Robert looked as if he had been
+in the rain for hours. He wore the bright yellow collar I had bought him
+shortly before his disappearance, so that had there been any doubt as to
+his identity that would have removed it instantly. On my calling to him,
+he turned quickly round and, with a slight gesture of the head as if
+bidding me to follow, he glided forward. My natural impulse was to run
+after him, pick him up and smother him with kisses; but try as hard as I
+could, I could not diminish the distance between us, although he never
+appeared to alter his pace. I was quite out of breath by the time we
+reached H---- Street, where, to my surprise, he stopped at No. 90 and,
+turning round again, gazed at me in the most beseeching manner. I can't
+describe that look; suffice it to say that no human eyes could have been
+more expressive, but of what beyond the most profound love and sorrow I
+cannot, I dare not, attempt to state. I have pondered upon it through
+the whole of a mid-summer night, but not even the severest of my mental
+efforts have enabled me to solve it to my satisfaction. Could I but do
+that, I feel I should have fathomed the greatest of all mysteries--the
+mystery of life and death.
+
+"I do not know for how long we stood there looking at one another, it
+may have been minutes or hours, or, again, but a few paltry seconds. He
+took the initiative from me, for, as I leaped forward to raise him in my
+arms, he glided through the stone steps into the area.
+
+"Convinced now that what I beheld was Robert's apparition, I determined
+to see the strange affair through to the bitter end, and entering the
+gate, I also went down into the area. The phantom had come to an abrupt
+halt by the side of a low wooden box, and as I foolishly made an
+abortive attempt to reach it with my hand, it vanished instantaneously.
+I searched the area thoroughly, and was assured that there was no
+outlet, save by the steps I had just descended, and no hole, nor nook,
+nor cranny where anything the size of Robert could be completely hidden
+from sight. What did it all mean? Ah! I knew Robert had always had a
+weakness for exploring areas, especially in H---- Street, and in the box
+where his wraith disappeared I espied a piece of raw meat!
+
+"Now there are ways in which a piece of raw meat may lie without
+arousing suspicion, but the position of this morsel strangely suggested
+that it had been placed there carefully, and for assuredly no other
+purpose than to entice stray animals. Resolving to interrogate the owner
+of the house on the subject, I rapped at the front door, but was
+informed by the manservant, obviously a German, that his master never
+saw anyone without an appointment. I then did a very unwise thing--I
+explained the purpose of my visit to this man, who not only denied any
+knowledge of my dog, but declared the meat must have been thrown into
+the area by some passer-by.
+
+"'No one in dis house trow away gut meat like dat,' he explained, 'we
+eat all we can git here, we have nutting for de animals. Please go away
+at once, or de master will be very angry. He stand no nonsense from
+anyone.'
+
+"And as I had no alternative--for, after all, who would regard a ghost
+in the light of evidence?--I had to obey. I found out, however, from a
+medical friend that No. 90 was tenanted by Mr. K----, an Anglo-German
+who was deemed a very clever fellow at a certain London hospital, where
+he was often occupied in vivisection.
+
+"'I dare say,' my friend went on to remark, 'K---- does a little
+vivisecting in his private surgery, by way of practice, and--well, you
+see, these foreign chaps are not so squeamish in some respects as we
+are.'
+
+"'But can't he be stopped?' I asked. 'It is horrible, monstrous that he
+should be allowed to murder our pets.'
+
+"'You don't know for certain that he has,' was the reply, 'you only
+suppose so from what you say you saw, and evidence of that immaterial
+nature is no evidence at all. No, you can do nothing except to be extra
+careful in future, and if you have another dog make him steer clear of
+No. 90 H---- Street.'
+
+"I was sensible enough to see that he was right, and the matter dropped.
+I soon noticed one thing, however, namely, that there were no more
+pieces of meat temptingly displayed in the box, so it is just possible
+K---- got wind of my enquiries, and thought it policy to desist from his
+nefarious practices.
+
+"Poor Robert! To think of him suffering such a cruel and ignominious
+death, and my being powerless to avenge it. Surely if vivisection is
+really necessary, and the welfare of mankind cannot be advanced by any
+less barbarous system, why not operate on creatures less deserving of
+our love and pity than dogs? On creatures which whilst being nearer
+allied to man in physiology and anatomy, are at the same time far below
+the level of brute creation in character and disposition.
+
+"For example, why not experiment on wife-beaters and cowardly street
+ruffians, and, one might reasonably add, on all those
+pseudo-humanitarians who, by their constant petitions to Parliament for
+the abolition of the lash, encourage every form of blackguardism and
+bestiality?"
+
+This concludes the letter of correspondent No. 2, and with the sentiment
+in the closing paragraphs I must say I heartily agree--only I should
+like to add a few more people to the list.
+
+One other case of haunting of this type is taken from my same work.
+
+"One All Hallow E'en," wrote a Mrs. Sebuim, "I was staying with some
+friends in Hampstead, and we amused ourselves by working spells, to
+commemorate the night. There is one spell in which one walks alone down
+a path sowing hempseed, and repeating some fantastic words; when one is
+supposed to see those that are destined to come into one's life in the
+near future. Eager to put this spell to the test, I went into the garden
+by myself and, walking boldly along a path, bordered on each side by
+evergreens, sprinkled hempseed lavishly.
+
+"Nothing happening, I was about to desist, when suddenly I heard a
+pattering on the gravel, and turning round I beheld an ugly little
+black-and-tan mongrel running towards me, wagging its stumpy tail. Not
+at all prepossessed with the creature, for my own dogs are pure-bred,
+and thinking it must have strayed into the grounds, I was about to
+drive it out, and had put down my hand to prevent it jumping on my
+dress, when, to my astonishment, it had vanished. It literally melted
+away into fine air beneath my very eyes. Not knowing what to make of the
+incident, but feeling inclined to attribute it to a trick of the
+imagination, I rejoined my friends. I did not tell them what had
+happened, although I made a memorandum of it in one of my innumerable
+notebooks. Within six months of this incident I was greatly astonished
+to find a dog, corresponding with the one I have just described, running
+about on the lawn of my house in Bath. How the animal got there was a
+complete mystery, and, what is stranger still, it seemed to recognize
+me, for it rushed towards me, frantically wagging its diminutive tail. I
+had not the heart to turn it away, as it seemed quite homeless, and so
+the forlorn little mongrel was permitted to make its home in my
+house--and a very happy home it proved to be. For three years all went
+well, and then the end came swiftly and unexpectedly. I was in
+Blackheath at the time, and the mongrel was in Bath. It was All Hallow
+E'en, but there was no hempseed sowing, for no one in the house but
+myself took the slightest interest in anything appertaining to the
+superphysical or mystic. Eleven o'clock came, and I retired to rest; my
+bed being one of those antique four-posters, hung with curtains that
+shine crimson in the ruddy glow of a cheerful fire. All my preparations
+complete, I had pulled back the hangings, and was about to slip in
+between the sheets, when, to my unbounded amazement, what should I see
+sitting on the counterpane but the black-and-tan mongrel. It was he
+right enough, there could not be another such ugly dog, though, unlike
+his usual self, he evinced no demonstrations of joy. On the contrary, he
+appeared downright miserable. His ears hung, his mouth dropped, and his
+bleared little eyes were watery and sad.
+
+"Greatly perplexed, if not alarmed, at so extraordinary a phenomenon, I
+nevertheless felt constrained to put out my hand to comfort him--when,
+as I had half anticipated, he immediately vanished. Two days later I
+received a letter from Bath, and in a postscript I read that 'the
+mongrel' (we never called it by any other name) 'had been run over and
+killed by a motor, the accident occurring on All Hallow E'en, about
+eleven o'clock.' 'Of course,' my sister wrote, 'you won't mind very
+much--it was so extremely ugly, and--well--we were only too glad it was
+none of the other dogs.' But my sister was wrong, for notwithstanding
+its unsightly appearance and hopeless lack of breed, I had grown to like
+that little black-and-tan more than any of my rare and choice pets."
+
+The following account, which concludes my notes on hauntings by dog
+phantasms, was sent me many years ago by a gentleman then living in
+Virginia, U.S.A. It runs thus:--
+
+
+_The Strange Disappearance of Mr. Jeremiah Dance_
+
+"Twenty pounds a year for a twelve-roomed house with large front lawn,
+good stabling and big kitchen gardens. That sounds all right," I
+commented. "But why so cheap?"
+
+"Well," the advertiser--Mr. Baldwin by name, a short, stout gentleman,
+with keen, glittering eyes--replied, "Well, you see, it's a bit of a
+distance from the town, and--er--most people prefer being nearer--like
+neighbours and all that sort of thing."
+
+"Like neighbours!" I exclaimed. "I don't. I've just seen about enough of
+them. Drains all right?"
+
+"Oh, yes! Perfect."
+
+"Water?"
+
+"Excellent."
+
+"Everything in good condition?"
+
+"First rate."
+
+"Loneliness the only thing people object to?"
+
+"That is so."
+
+"Then I'll oblige you to send someone to show me over the house, for I
+think it is just the sort of place we want. You see, after being bottled
+up in a theatre all the afternoon and evening, one likes to get away
+somewhere where it is quiet--somewhere where one can lie in bed in the
+morning inhaling pure air and undisturbed by street traffic."
+
+"I understand," Mr. Baldwin responded, "but--er--it is rather late now;
+wouldn't you prefer to see over it in the morning? Everything looks at
+its worst--its very worst--in the twilight."
+
+"Oh, I'll make allowances for the dusk," I said. "You haven't got any
+ghosts stowed away there, have you?" And he went off into a roar of
+laughter.
+
+"No, the house is not haunted," Mr. Baldwin replied. "Not that it would
+much matter to you if it were, for I can see you don't believe in
+spooks."
+
+"Believe in spooks!" I cried. "Not much. I would as soon believe in
+patent hair restorers. Let me see over it at once."
+
+"Very well, sir. I'll take you there myself," Mr. Baldwin replied,
+somewhat reluctantly. "Here, Tim--fetch the keys of the Crow's Nest and
+tell Higgins to bring the trap round."
+
+The boy he addressed flew, and in a few minutes the sound of wheels and
+the jingling of harness announced the vehicle was at the door.
+
+Ten minutes later and I and my escort were bowling merrily over the
+ground in the direction of the Crow's Nest. It was early autumn, and the
+cool evening air, fragrant with the mellowness of the luscious Virginian
+pippin, was tinged also with the sadness inseparable from the demise of
+a long and glorious summer. Evidences of decay and death were
+everywhere--in the brown fallen leaves of the oaks and elms; in the bare
+and denuded ditches. Here a giant mill-wheel, half immersed in a dark,
+still pool, stood idle and silent; there a hovel, but recently inhabited
+by hop-pickers, was now tenantless, its glassless windows boarded over,
+and a wealth of dead and rotting vegetable matter in thick profusion
+over the tiny path and the single stone doorstep.
+
+"Is it always as quiet and deserted as this?" I asked of my companion,
+who continually cracked his whip as if he liked to hear the
+reverberations of its echoes.
+
+"Always," was the reply, "and sometimes more so. You ain't used to the
+country?"
+
+"Not very. I want to try it by way of a change. Are you well versed in
+the cry of birds? What was that?"
+
+We were fast approaching an exceedingly gloomy bit of the road where
+there were plantations on each side, and the trees united their
+fantastically forked branches overhead. I thought I had never seen so
+dismal-looking a spot, and a sudden lowering of the temperature made me
+draw my overcoat tighter round me.
+
+"That--oh, a night bird of some sort," Mr. Baldwin replied. "An ugly
+sound, wasn't it? Beastly things, I can't imagine why they were created.
+Whoa--steady there, steady."
+
+The horse reared as he spoke, and taking a violent plunge forward, set
+off at a wild gallop. A moment later, and I uttered an exclamation of
+astonishment. Keeping pace with us, although apparently not moving at
+more than an ordinary walking pace, was a man of medium height, dressed
+in a panama hat and albert coat. He had a thin, aquiline nose, a rather
+pronounced chin, was clean-shaven, and had a startlingly white
+complexion. By the side of him trotted two poodles, whose close-cropped
+skins showed out with remarkable perspicuity.
+
+"Who the deuce is he?" I asked, raising my voice to a shout on account
+of the loud clatter made by the horse's hoofs and the wheels.
+
+"Who? what?" Mr. Baldwin shouted in return.
+
+"Why, the man walking along with us!"
+
+"Man! I can see no man!" Mr. Baldwin growled.
+
+I looked at him curiously. It may, of course, have been due to the
+terrific speed we were going, to the difficulty of holding in the horse,
+but his cheeks were ashy pale, and his teeth chattered.
+
+"Do you mean to say," I cried, "that you can see no figure walking on my
+side of the horse and actually keeping pace with it?"
+
+"Of course I can't," Mr. Baldwin snapped. "No more can you. It's an
+hallucination caused by the moonlight through the branches overhead.
+I've experienced it more than once."
+
+"Then why don't you have it now?" I queried.
+
+"Don't ask so many questions, please," Mr. Baldwin shouted. "Don't you
+see it is as much as I can do to hold the brute in? Heaven preserve us,
+we were nearly over that time."
+
+The trap rose high in the air as he spoke, and then dropped with such a
+jolt that I was nearly thrown off, and only saved myself by the skin of
+my teeth. A few yards more the spinney ceased, and we were away out in
+the open country, plunging and galloping as if our very souls depended
+on it. From all sides queer and fantastic shadows of objects, which
+certainly had no material counterparts in the moon-kissed sward of the
+rich, ripe meadows, rose to greet us, and filled the lane with their
+black-and-white wavering, ethereal forms. The evening was one of
+wonders for which I had no name--wonders associated with an iciness that
+was far from agreeable. I was not at all sure which I liked best--the
+black, Stygian, tree-lined part of the road we had just left, or the
+wide ocean of brilliant moonbeams and streaked suggestions.
+
+The figures of the man and the dogs were equally vivid in each. Though I
+could no longer doubt they were nothing mortal, they were altogether
+unlike what I had imagined ghosts. Like the generality of people who are
+psychic and who have never had an experience of the superphysical, my
+conception of a phantasm was a "thing" in white that made ridiculous
+groanings and still more ridiculous clankings of chains. But here was
+something different, something that looked--save, perhaps, for the
+excessive pallor of its cheeks--just like an ordinary man. I knew it was
+not a man, partly on account of its extraordinary performance--no man,
+even if running at full speed, could keep up with us like that; partly
+on account of the unusual nature of the atmosphere--which was altogether
+indefinable--it brought with it; and also because of my own
+sensations--my intense horror which could not, I felt certain, have been
+generated by anything physical.
+
+I cogitated all this in my mind as I gazed at the figure, and in order
+to make sure it was no hallucination, I shut first one eye and then the
+other, covering them alternately with the palm of my hand. The figure,
+however, was still there, still pacing along at our side with the
+regular swing, swing of the born walker. We kept on in this fashion till
+we arrived at a rusty iron gate leading, by means of a weed-covered
+path, to a low, two-storied white house. Here the figures left us, and
+as it seemed to me vanished at the foot of the garden wall.
+
+"This is the house," Mr. Baldwin panted, pulling up with the greatest
+difficulty, the horse evincing obvious antipathy to the iron gate. "And
+these are the keys. I'm afraid you must go in alone, as I dare not leave
+the animal even for a minute."
+
+"Oh, all right," I said. "I don't mind, now that the ghost, or whatever
+you like to call it, has gone; I'm myself again."
+
+I jumped down, and threading my way along the bramble-entangled path,
+reached the front door. On opening it, I hesitated. The big,
+old-fashioned hall, with the great, frowning staircase leading to the
+gallery overhead, the many open doors showing nought but bare, deserted
+boards within, the grim passages, all moonlit and peopled only with
+queer flickering shadows, suggested much that was terrifying. I fancied
+I heard noises, noises like stealthy footsteps moving from room to
+room, and tiptoeing along the passages and down the staircase. Once my
+heart almost stopped beating as I saw what, at first, I took to be a
+white face peering at me from a far recess, but which I eventually
+discovered was only a daub of whitewash; and, once again, my hair all
+but rose on end, when one of the doors at which I was looking swung open
+and something came forth. Oh, the horror of that moment, as long as I
+live I shall never forget it. The something was a cat, just a rather
+lean but otherwise material, black Tom; yet, in the state my nerves were
+then, it created almost as much horror as if it had been a ghost. Of
+course, it was the figure of the walking man that was the cause of all
+this nervousness; had it not appeared to me I should doubtless have
+entered the house with the utmost sang-froid, my mind set on nothing but
+the condition of the walls, drains, etc. As it was, I held back, and it
+was only after a severe mental struggle I summoned up the courage to
+leave the doorway and explore. Cautiously, very cautiously, with my
+heart in my mouth, I moved from room to room, halting every now and then
+in dreadful suspense as the wind, soughing through across the open land
+behind the house, blew down the chimneys and set the window-frames
+jarring. At the commencement of one of the passages I was immeasurably
+startled to see a dark shape poke forward, and then spring hurriedly
+back, and was so frightened that I dared not advance to see what it was.
+Moment after moment sped by, and I still stood there, the cold sweat
+oozing out all over me, and my eyes fixed in hideous expectation on the
+blank wall. What was it? What was hiding there? Would it spring out on
+me if I went to see? At last, urged on by a fascination I found
+impossible to resist, I crept down the passage, my heart throbbing
+painfully and my whole being overcome with the most sickly
+anticipations. As I drew nearer to the spot, it was as much as I could
+do to breathe, and my respiration came in quick jerks and gasps. Six,
+five, four, two feet and I was at the dreaded angle. Another step--taken
+after the most prodigious battle--and--NOTHING sprang out on me. I was
+confronted only with a large piece of paper that had come loose from the
+wall, and flapped backwards and forwards each time the breeze from
+without rustled past it. The reaction after such an agony of suspense
+was so great, that I leaned against the wall, and laughed till I cried.
+A noise, from somewhere away in the basement, calling me to myself, I
+went downstairs and investigated. Again a shock--this time more sudden,
+more acute. Pressed against the window-pane of one of the front
+reception-rooms was the face of a man--with corpse-like cheeks and pale,
+malevolent eyes. I was petrified--every drop of my blood was congealed.
+My tongue glued to my mouth, my arms hung helpless. I stood in the
+doorway and stared at it. This went on for what seemed to me an
+eternity. Then came a revelation. The face was not that of a ghost but
+of Mr. Baldwin, who, getting alarmed at my long absence, had come to
+look for me.
+
+We left the premises together. All the way back to the town I
+thought--should I, or should I not, take the house? Seen as I had seen
+it, it was a ghoulish-looking place--as weird as a Paris catacomb--but
+then daylight makes all the difference. Viewed in the sunshine, it would
+be just like any other house--plain bricks and mortar. I liked the
+situation; it was just far enough away from a town to enable me to
+escape all the smoke and traffic, and near enough to make shopping easy.
+The only obstacles were the shadows--the strange, enigmatical shadows I
+had seen in the hall and passages, and the figure of the walker. Dare I
+take a house that knew such visitors? At first I said no, and then yes.
+Something, I could not tell what, urged me to say yes. I felt that a
+very grave issue was at stake--that a great wrong connected in some
+manner with the mysterious figure awaited righting, and that the hand
+of Fate pointed at me as the one and only person who could do it.
+
+"Are you sure the house isn't haunted?" I demanded, as we slowly rolled
+away from the iron gate, and I leaned back in my seat to light my pipe.
+
+"Haunted!" Mr. Baldwin scoffed, "why, I thought you didn't believe in
+ghosts--laughed at them."
+
+"No more I do believe in them," I retorted, "but I have children, and we
+know how imaginative children are."
+
+"I can't undertake to stop their imaginations."
+
+"No, but you can tell me whether anyone else has imagined anything
+there. Imagination is sometimes very infectious."
+
+"As far as I know, then, no; leastways, I have not heard tell of it."
+
+"Who was the last tenant?"
+
+"Mr. Jeremiah Dance."
+
+"Why did he leave?"
+
+"How do I know? Got tired of being there, I suppose."
+
+"How long was he there?"
+
+"Nearly three years."
+
+"Where is he now?"
+
+"That's more than I can say. Why do you wish to know?"
+
+"Why!" I repeated. "Because it is more satisfactory to me to hear about
+the house from someone who has lived in it. Has he left no address?"
+
+"Not that I know of, and it's more than two years since he was here."
+
+"What! The house has been empty all that time?"
+
+"Two years is not very long. Houses--even town houses--are frequently
+unoccupied for longer than that. I think you'll like it."
+
+I did not speak again till the drive was over, and we drew up outside
+the landlord's house. I then said, "Let me have an agreement. I've made
+up my mind to take it. Three years and the option to stay on."
+
+That was just like me. Whatever I did, I did on the spur of the moment,
+a mode of procedure that often led me into difficulties.
+
+A month later and my wife, children, servants, and I were all ensconced
+in the Crow's Nest.
+
+That was in the beginning of October. Well, the month passed by, and
+November was fairly in before anything remarkable happened. It then came
+about in this fashion.
+
+Jennie, my eldest child, a self-willed and rather bad-tempered girl of
+about twelve, evading the vigilance of her mother, who had forbidden her
+to go out as she had a cold, ran to the gate one evening to see if I was
+anywhere in sight. Though barely five o'clock, the moon was high in the
+sky, and the shadows of the big trees had already commenced their
+gambols along the roadside.
+
+Jennie clambered up the gate as children do, and peering over, suddenly
+espied what she took to be me, striding towards the house, at a swinging
+pace, and followed by two poodles.
+
+"Poppa," she cried, "how cute of you! Only to think of you bringing home
+two doggies! Oh, Poppa, naughty Poppa, what will mum say?" and climbing
+over into the lane at imminent danger to life and limb, she tore
+frantically towards the figure. To her dismay, however, it was not me,
+but a stranger with a horribly white face and big glassy eyes which he
+turned down at her and stared. She was so frightened that she fainted,
+and some ten minutes later I found her lying out there on the road. From
+the description she gave me of the man and dogs, I felt quite certain
+they were the figures I had seen; though I pretended the man was a
+tramp, and assured her she would never see him again. A week passed, and
+I was beginning to hope nothing would happen, when one of the servants
+gave notice to leave.
+
+At first she would not say why she did not like the house, but when
+pressed made the following statement:--
+
+"It's haunted, Mrs. B----. I can put up with mice and beetles, but not
+with ghosts. I've had a queer sensation, as if water was falling down my
+spine, ever since I've been here, but never saw anything till last
+night. I was then in the kitchen getting ready to go to bed. Jane and
+Emma had already gone up, and I was preparing to follow them, when, all
+of a sudden, I heard footsteps, quick and heavy, cross the gravel and
+approach the window.
+
+"'The boss,' says I to myself; 'maybe he's forgot the key and can't get
+in at the front door.'
+
+"Well, I went to the window and was about to throw it open, when I got
+an awful shock. Pressed against the glass, looking in at me, was a
+face--not the boss's face, not the face of anyone living, but a horrid
+white thing with a drooping mouth and wide-open, glassy eyes, that had
+no more expression in them than a pig. As sure as I'm standing here,
+Mrs. B----, it was the face of a corpse--the face of a man that had died
+no natural death. And by its side, standing on their hind-legs, and
+staring in at me too were two dogs, both poodles--also no living things,
+but dead, horribly dead. Well, they stared at me, all three of them, for
+perhaps a minute, certainly not less, and then vanished. That's why I'm
+leaving, Mrs. B----. My heart was never overstrong. I always suffered
+with palpitations, and if I saw those heads again, it would kill me."
+
+After this my wife spoke to me seriously.
+
+"Jack," she said, "are you sure there's nothing in it? I don't think
+Mary would leave us without a good cause, and the description of what
+she saw tallies exactly with the figure that frightened Jennie. Jennie
+assures me she never said a word about it to the servants. They can't
+both have imagined it."
+
+I did not know what to say. My conscience pricked me. Without a doubt I
+ought to have told my wife of my own experience in the lane, and have
+consulted her before taking the house. Supposing she, or any of the
+children, should die of fright, it would be my fault. I should never
+forgive myself.
+
+"You've something on your mind! What is it?" my wife demanded.
+
+I hesitated a moment or two and then told her. The next quarter of an
+hour was one I do not care to recollect, but when it was over, and she
+had had her say, it was decided I should make enquiries and see if there
+was any possible way of getting rid of the ghosts. With this end in
+view, I drove to the town, and after several fruitless efforts was at
+length introduced to a Mr. Marsden, clerk of one of the banks, who, in
+reply to my questions, said:
+
+"Well, Mr. B----, it's just this way. I do know something, only--in a
+small place like this--one has to be so extra careful what one says.
+Some years ago a Mr. Jeremiah Dance occupied the Crow's Nest. He came
+here apparently a total stranger, and though often in the town, was only
+seen in the company of one person--his landlord, Mr. Baldwin, with
+whom--if local gossip is to be relied on--he appeared to be on terms of
+the greatest familiarity. Indeed, they were seldom apart, walked about
+the lanes arm-in-arm, visited each other's houses on alternate evenings,
+called each other "Teddy" and "Leslie." This state of things continued
+for nearly three years, and then people suddenly began to comment on the
+fact that Mr. Dance had gone, or at least was no longer visible. An
+errand-boy, returning back to town, late one evening, swore to being
+passed on the way by a trap containing Mr. Baldwin and Mr. Dance, who
+were speaking in very loud voices--just as if they were having a violent
+altercation. On reaching that part of the road where the trees are
+thickest overhead, the lad overtook them, or rather Mr. Baldwin,
+preparing to mount into the trap. Mr. Dance was nowhere to be seen. And
+from that day to this nothing has ever been heard of him. As none of his
+friends or relations came forward to raise enquiries, and all his bills
+were paid--several of them by Mr. Baldwin--no one took the matter up.
+Mr. Baldwin pooh-poohed the errand-boy's story, and declared that, on
+the night in question, he had been alone in an altogether different part
+of the county, and knew nothing whatever of Mr. Dance's movements,
+further than that he had recently announced his intention of leaving the
+Crow's Nest before the expiration of the three years' lease. He had not
+the remotest idea where he was. He claimed the furniture in payment of
+the rent due to him."
+
+"Did the matter end there?" I asked.
+
+"In one sense of the word, yes--in another, no. Within a few weeks of
+Dance's disappearance rumours got afloat that his ghost had been seen on
+the road, just where, you may say, you saw it. As a matter of fact, I've
+seen it myself--and so have crowds of other people."
+
+"Has anyone ever spoken to it?"
+
+"Yes--and it has vanished at once. I went there one night with the
+purpose of laying it, but, on its appearing suddenly, I confess I was so
+startled, that I not only forgot what I had rehearsed to say, but ran
+home, without uttering as much as a word."
+
+"And what are your deductions of the case?"
+
+"The same as everyone else's," Mr. Marsden whispered, "only, like
+everyone else, I dare not say."
+
+"Had Mr. Dance any dogs?"
+
+"Yes--two poodles, of which, much to Mr. Baldwin's annoyance (everyone
+noticed this), he used to make the most ridiculous fuss."
+
+"Humph!" I observed. "That settles it! Ghosts! And to think I never
+believed in them before! Well, I am going to try."
+
+"Try what?" Mr. Marsden said, a note of alarm in his voice.
+
+"Try laying it. I have an idea I may succeed."
+
+"I wish you luck, then. May I come with you?"
+
+"Thanks, no!" I rejoined. "I would rather go there alone."
+
+I said this in a well-lighted room, with the hum of a crowded
+thoroughfare in my ears. Twenty minutes later, when I had left all that
+behind, and was fast approaching the darkest part of an exceptionally
+dark road, I wished I had not. At the very spot, where I had previously
+seen the figures, I saw them now. They suddenly appeared by my side, and
+though I was going at a great rate--for the horse took fright--they kept
+easy pace with me. Twice I essayed to speak to them, but could not
+ejaculate a syllable through sheer horror, and it was only by nerving
+myself to the utmost, and forcing my eyes away from them, that I was
+able to stick to my seat and hold on to the reins. On and on we dashed,
+until trees, road, sky, universe were obliterated in one blinding
+whirlwind that got up my nostrils, choked my ears, and deadened me to
+everything, save the all-terrorizing, instinctive knowledge, that the
+figures by my side, were still there, stalking along as quietly and
+leisurely as if the horse had been going at a snail's pace.
+
+At last, to my intense relief--for never had the ride seemed longer--I
+reached the Crow's Nest, and as I hurriedly dismounted from the trap,
+the figures shot past me and vanished. Once inside the house, and in the
+bosom of my family, where all was light and laughter, courage returned,
+and I upbraided myself bitterly for this cowardice.
+
+I confessed to my wife, and she insisted on accompanying me the
+following afternoon, at twilight, to the spot where the ghost appeared
+to originate. To our intense dismay, we had not been there more than
+three or four minutes, before Dora, our youngest girl, a pretty,
+sweet-tempered child of eight, came running up to us with a telegram,
+which one of the servants had asked her to give us. My wife, snatching
+it from her, and reading it, was about to scold her severely, when she
+suddenly paused, and clutching hold of the child with one hand, pointed
+hysterically at something on one side of her with the other. I looked,
+and Dora looked, and we both saw, standing erect and staring at us, the
+spare figure of a man, with a ghastly white face and dull, lifeless
+eyes, clad in a panama hat, albert coat, and small, patent-leather
+boots; beside him were two glossy--abnormally glossy--poodles.
+
+I tried to speak, but, as before, was too frightened to articulate a
+sound, and my wife was in the same plight. With Dora, however, it was
+otherwise, and she electrified us by going up to the figure, and
+exclaiming:
+
+"Who are you? You must feel very ill to look so white. Tell me your
+name."
+
+The figure made no reply, but gliding slowly forward, moved up to a
+large, isolated oak, and pointing with the index finger of its left hand
+at the trunk of the tree, seemingly sank into the earth and vanished
+from view.
+
+For some seconds everyone was silent, and then my wife exclaimed:
+
+"Jack, I shouldn't wonder if Dora hasn't been the means of solving the
+mystery. Examine the tree closely."
+
+I did so. The tree was hollow, and inside it were three skeletons!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Here followed an extract from a local paper:
+
+
+"_Sensational Discovery in a Wood near Marytown_
+
+"Whilst exploring in a wood, near Marytown, the other evening, a party
+of the name of B---- discovered three skeletons--a human being and two
+dogs--in the trunk of an oak. From the remnant of clothes still
+adhering to the human remains, the latter were proved to be those of an
+individual known as Mr. Jeremiah Dance, whose strange disappearance from
+the Crow's Nest--the house he rented in the neighbourhood--some two
+years ago, was the occasion of much comment. On closer examination,
+extraordinary to relate, the remains have been proved to be those of a
+WOMAN; and from certain abrasions on the skull, there is little doubt
+she met with a violent end."
+
+A second extract taken from the same paper runs thus:--
+
+
+"_Suicide at Marytown_
+
+"Late last night Percy Baldwin, the man who is under arrest on suspicion
+of having caused the death of the unknown woman, whose skeleton was
+found on Monday in the trunk of a tree, committed suicide by hanging
+himself with his suspenders to the ceiling of his cell. Pinned on his
+coat was a slip of paper bearing these words: 'She was my wife--I loved
+her. She took to drink--I parted from her. She became a dog-worshipper.
+I killed her--and her dogs.'"
+
+
+_Phantasms of Living Dogs_
+
+I could quote innumerable cases of people who have either seen or heard
+the spirits of dead dogs. However, as space does not permit of this, I
+proceed to the oft-raised question, "Do animals as well as people
+project themselves?" My reply is--yes; according to my experience they
+do.
+
+Some friends of mine have a big tabby that has frequently been seen in
+two places at the same time; for example, it has been observed by
+several people to be sitting on a chair in the dining-room, and, at the
+same moment, it has been seen by two or more other persons extended at
+full length before the kitchen fire--the latter figure proving to be its
+immaterial, or what some designate its astral body, which vanishes the
+instant an attempt is made to touch it. The only explanation of this
+phenomenon seems to me to lie in projection--the cat possessing the
+faculty of separating--in this instance, unconsciously--its spiritual
+from its physical body--the former travelling anywhere, regardless of
+space, time and material obstacles. I have often had experiences similar
+to this with a friend's dog. I have been seated in a room, either
+reading or writing, and on looking up have distinctly seen the dog lying
+on the carpet in front of me. A few minutes later a scraping at the door
+or window--both of which have been shut all the while--and on my rising
+to see what was there, I have discovered the dog outside! Had I not been
+so positive I had seen the dog on the ground in front of me, I might
+have thought it was an hallucination; but hallucinations are never so
+vivid nor so lasting--moreover, other people have had similar
+experiences with the same dog. And why not? Dogs, on the whole, are
+every whit as reasoning and reflective as the bulk of human beings! And
+how much nobler! Compare, for a moment, the dogs you know--no matter
+whether mastiffs, retrievers, dachshunds, poodles, or even Pekinese,
+with your acquaintances--with the people you see everywhere around
+you--false, greedy, spiteful, scandal-loving women, money-grubbing
+attorneys, lying, swindling tradesmen, vulgar parvenus, finicky curates,
+brutal roughs, spoilt, cruel children, hypocrites of both sexes--compare
+them carefully--and the comparison is entirely in favour of the dog!
+And if the creating Power (or Powers) has favoured these wholly selfish
+and degenerate human beings with spirits, and has conferred on certain
+of them the faculty of projecting those spirits, can one imagine, for
+one moment, that similar gifts have been denied to dogs--their superiors
+in every respect? Pshaw! Out upon it! To think so would mean to think
+the unthinkable, to attribute to God qualities of partiality, injustice
+and whimsicality, which would render Him little, if anything, better
+than a James the Second of England, or a Louis the Fifteenth of France.
+
+Besides, from my own experience, and the experiences of those with whom
+I have been brought in contact, I can safely affirm that there are
+phantasms (and therefore spirits) of both living and dead dogs in just
+the same proportion as there are phantasms (and therefore spirits) of
+both living and dead human beings.
+
+
+_Psychic Properties of Dogs_
+
+Some, not all, dogs--like cats--possess the psychic property of scenting
+the advent of death, and they indicate their fear of it by the most
+dismal howling. In my opinion there is very little doubt that dogs
+actually see some kind of phantasm that, knowing when death is about to
+take place, visits the house of the doomed and stands beside his, or
+her, couch. I have had this phantasm described to me, by those who
+declare they have seen it, as a very tall, hooded figure, clad in a
+dark, loose, flowing costume--its face never discernible. It would, of
+course, be foolish to say that a dog howling in a house is invariably
+the sign of death; there are many other and obvious causes which produce
+something of a similar effect; but I think one may be pretty well
+assured that, when the howling is accompanied by unmistakable signs of
+terror, then someone, either in the house at the time, or connected
+with someone in the house, will shortly die.
+
+
+_Dogs in Haunted Houses_
+
+When I investigate a haunted house, I generally take a dog with me,
+because experience has taught me that a dog seldom fails to give notice,
+in some way or another--either by whining, or growling, or crouching
+shivering at one's feet, or springing on one's lap and trying to bury
+its head in one's coat--of the proximity of a ghost. I had a dog with
+me, when ghost-hunting, not so very long ago, in a well-known haunted
+house in Gloucestershire. The dog--my only companion--and I sat on the
+staircase leading from the hall to the first floor. Just about two
+o'clock the dog gave a loud growl. I put my hand out and found it was
+shivering from head to foot. Almost directly afterwards I heard the loud
+clatter of fire-irons from somewhere away in the basement, a door
+banged, and then something, or someone, began to ascend the stairs. Up,
+up, up came the footsteps, until I could see--first of all a bluish
+light, then the top of a head, then a face, white and luminous, staring
+up at me. A few more steps, and the whole thing was disclosed to view.
+It was the figure of a girl of about sixteen, with a shock head of red
+hair, on which was stuck, all awry, a dirty little, old-fashioned
+servant's cap. She was clad in a cotton dress, soiled and bedraggled,
+and had on her feet a pair of elastic-sided boots, that looked as if
+they would fall to pieces each step she took. But it was her face that
+riveted my attention most. It was startlingly white and full of an
+expression of the most hopeless misery. The eyes, wide open and glassy,
+were turned direct on mine. I was too appalled either to stir or utter a
+sound. The phantasm came right up to where I stood, paused for a second,
+and then slowly went on; up, up, up, until a sudden bend in the
+staircase hid it from view. For some seconds there was a continuation of
+the footsteps, then there came a loud splash from somewhere outside and
+below--and then silence--sepulchral and omnipotent.
+
+I did not wait to see if anything further would happen. I fled, and
+Dick, my dog friend, who was apparently even more frightened than I,
+fled with me. We arrived home--panic-stricken.
+
+Over and over again, on similar occasions, I have had a dog with me, and
+the same thing has occurred--the dog has made some noise indicative of
+great fear, remaining in a state of stupor during the actual presence of
+the apparition.
+
+
+_Psychic Propensities of Dogs compared with those of Cats_
+
+Though dogs are, perhaps, rather more alarmed at the Unknown than cats,
+I do not think they have a keener sense of its proximity. Still, for the
+very reason that they show greater--more unmistakable--indications of
+fear, they make surer psychic barometers. The psychic faculty of scent
+in dogs would seem to be more limited than that in cats; for, whereas
+cats can not only detect the advent and presence of pleasant and
+unpleasant phantoms by their smells, few dogs can do more than detect
+the approach of death. Dogs make friends nearly, if not quite, as
+readily with cruel and brutal people as with kind ones, simply because
+they cannot, so easily as cats, distinguish by their scent the
+unpleasant types of spirits cruel and brutal people attract; in all
+probability, they are not even aware of the presence of such spirits.
+
+It would seem, on the face of it, that since dogs are, on the whole, of
+a gentler disposition than cats, that is to say, not quite so cruel and
+savage, the phantasms of dogs would be less likely to be earth-bound
+than those of cats; but, then, one must take into consideration the
+other qualities of the two animals, and when these are put in the
+balance, one may find little to choose--morally--between the cat and
+the dog. Anyhow, after making allowance for the fact that many more cats
+die unnatural deaths than dogs, there would seem to be small numerical
+difference in their hauntings--cases of dog ghosts appearing to be just
+as common as cases of cat ghosts.
+
+Apropos of phantom dogs, my friend Dr. G. West writes to me thus:--
+
+"Of the older English Universities many stories are told of bizarre
+happenings,--of duels, raggings, suicides and such-like--in olden times;
+but of K., venerable, illustrious K. of Ireland, few and far between are
+the accounts of similar occurrences. This is one, however, and it deals
+with the phantom of a dog:--
+
+"One evening, towards the end of the eighteenth century, John Kelly, a
+Dean of the College (extremely unpopular on account of his supposed
+harsh treatment of some of the undergraduates), was about to commence
+his supper, when he heard a low whine, and looking down, saw a large
+yellow dog cross the floor in front of him, and disappear immediately
+under the full-length portrait that hung over the antique chimney-piece.
+Something prompting him, he glanced at the picture. The eyes that looked
+into his blinked.
+
+"'It must be the result of an overtaxed brain,' he said to himself.
+'Those rascally undergraduates have got on my nerves.'
+
+"He shut his eyes; and re-opening them, stared hard at the portrait. It
+was not a delusion. The eyes that gazed back at him were alive--alive
+with the spirit of mockery; they smiled, laughed, jeered; and, as they
+did so, the knowledge of his surroundings was brought forcibly home to
+him. The room in which he was seated was situated at the end of a long,
+cheerless, stone passage in the western wing of the College. Away from
+all the other rooms of the building, it was absolutely isolated; and had
+long borne the reputation of being haunted by a dog, which was said to
+appear only before some catastrophe. The Dean had hitherto committed the
+story to the category of fables. But now,--now, as he sat all alone in
+that big silent room, lit only with the reddish rays of a fast-setting
+August sun, and stared into the gleaming eyes before him--he was obliged
+to admit the extreme probability of spookdom. Never before had the
+College seemed so quiet. Not a sound--not even the creaking of a board
+or the far-away laugh of a student, common enough noises on most
+nights--fell on his ears. The hush was omnipotent, depressing,
+unnerving; he could only associate it with the supernatural. Though he
+was too fascinated to remove his gaze from the thing before him, he
+could feel the room fill with shadows, and feel them steal through the
+half-open windows, and, uniting with those already in the corners, glide
+noiselessly and surreptitiously towards him. He felt, too, that he was
+under the surveillance of countless invisible visages, all scanning him
+curiously, and delighted beyond measure at the sight of his terror.
+
+"The moments passed in a breathless state of tension. He stared at the
+eyes, and the eyes stared back at him. Once he endeavoured to rise, but
+a dead weight seemed to fall on his shoulders and hold him back; and
+twice, when he tried to speak--to make some sound, no matter what, to
+break the appalling silence--his throat closed as if under the pressure
+of cruel, relentless fingers.
+
+"But the _Ultima Thule_ of his emotions had yet to come. There was a
+slight stir behind the canvas, a thud, a hollow groan that echoed and
+re-echoed throughout the room like the muffled clap of distant thunder,
+and the eyes suddenly underwent a metamorphosis--they grew glazed and
+glassy like the eyes of a dead person. A cold shudder ran through the
+Dean, his hair stood on end, his blood turned to ice. Again he essayed
+to move, to summon help; again he failed. The strain on his nerves
+proved more than he could bear. A sudden sensation of nausea surged
+through him; his eyes swam; his brain reeled; there was a loud buzzing
+in his ears; he knew no more. Some moments later one of the College
+servants arrived at the door with a bundle of letters, and on receiving
+no reply to his raps, entered.
+
+"'Good heavens! What's the matter?' he cried, gazing at the figure of
+the Dean, lolling head downward on the table. 'Merciful Prudence, the
+gentleman is dead! No, he ain't--some of the young gents will be sorry
+enough for that--he's fainted.'
+
+"The good fellow poured out some water in a tumbler, and was proceeding
+to sprinkle the Dean's face with it, when, a noise attracting his
+attention, he peered round at the picture. It was bulging from the wall;
+it was falling! And, Good God, what was that that was falling with
+it--that huge black object? A coffin? No, not a coffin, but a corpse!
+The servant ran to the door shrieking, and, in less than a minute,
+passage and room were filled to overflowing with a scared crowd of
+enquiring officials and undergraduates.
+
+"'What has happened? What's the matter with the Dean? Has he had a fit,
+or what? And the picture? And--Anderson? Anderson lying on the floor!
+Hurt? No, not hurt, dead! Murdered!'
+
+"In an instant there was silence, and the white-faced throng closed in
+on one another as if for protection. In front of them, beside the fallen
+picture, lay the body of the most gay and popular student in the
+College--Bob Anderson--Bob Anderson with a stream of blood running from
+a deep incision in his back made with some sharp instrument, that had
+been driven home with tremendous force. He had, without doubt, been
+murdered. But by whom? Then one of the undergraduates, a bright, boyish,
+fair-haired giant, named O'Farroll, immensely popular both on account of
+his prowess in sport and an untold number of the most audacious
+escapades, spoke out:
+
+"'I saw Anderson, about an hour ago, crossing the quadrangle. I asked
+him where he was going, and he replied, "To old Kelly. I intend paying
+him out for 'gating' me last week." I enquired how, and he replied:
+"I've a glorious plan. You know that portrait stuck over his
+mantel-shelf? Well! In poking about the room the other day, when the old
+man was out, I had a great find. Directly behind the picture is the door
+of a secret room, so neatly covered by the designs on the wall that it
+is not discernible. It was only by the merest fluke I discovered it. I
+was taking down the picture with the idea of "touching up" the face,
+when my knuckles bumped against the panels of the wall, touched a
+spring, and the door flew open, revealing an apartment about six by
+eight feet large. I at once explored it, and found it could be entered
+by the chimney. An idea then struck me--I would play a trick upon the
+Dean by hiding in this secret chamber one evening while he was feeding,
+cutting out the eyes of the portrait, and peering through the cavities
+at him. And this,' O'Farroll continued, pointing at the fallen picture,
+'is what he evidently did after I left him. You can see the eyes of the
+portrait have been removed.'
+
+"'That is so, shure,' one of the other undergraduates, Mick Maguire--six
+feet two in his socks, every inch--exclaimed. 'And, what is more, I knew
+all about it. Anderson told me yesterday what he was going to do, and I
+wanted to join him, but he said I would never get up the chimney, I
+would stick there. And, bedad, I think he was right.'
+
+"At this remark, despite the grimness of the moment, several of those
+present laughed.
+
+"'Come, come, gentlemen!' one of the officials cried, 'this is no time
+for levity. Mr. Anderson has been murdered, and the question is--by
+whom?'
+
+"'Then, if that's the only thing that is troubling you,' O'Farroll put
+in, 'I fancy the solution is right here at hand,' and he looked
+significantly at the Dean.
+
+"An ominous silence followed, during which all eyes were fixed on John
+Kelly, some anxiously, some merely enquiringly, but not a few angrily,
+for Kelly, as I have said before, had made himself particularly
+obnoxious just then by his behaviour to the rowdier students; and, as
+has ever been the case at K., these formed no small portion of the
+community.
+
+"The Dean hardly seemed to realize the situation. The dignity of office
+blinded him to danger.
+
+"'What do you mean?' he spluttered. 'I know nothing of what happened to
+Mr. Anderson! Really, really, O'Farroll, your presumption is
+preposterous.'
+
+"'There was no one else in here but you and he, Mr. Kelly,' O'Farroll
+retorted coolly. 'It's only natural we should think you know something
+of what happened!'
+
+"On the arrival of the police who had been sent for somewhat
+reluctantly--for the prestige of the College at that date was very dear
+to all--the premises were thoroughly searched, and, no other culprit
+being found, first of all Dean Kelly was apprehended, and then, to make
+a good job of it, his accuser, Denis O'Farroll.
+
+"All the College was agog with excitement. No one could believe the Dean
+was a murderer; and it was just as inconceivable to think O'Farroll had
+committed the deed. And yet if neither of them had killed Anderson, who
+in God's name had killed him?
+
+"The night succeeding the affair, whilst the Dean and O'Farroll were
+still in jail awaiting the inquest, a party of undergraduates were
+discussing the situation in Maguire's rooms, when the door burst open,
+and into their midst, almost breathless with excitement, came a measly,
+bespectacled youth named Brady--Patrick Brady.
+
+"'I'm awfully sorry to disturb you fellows,' he stammered, 'but there
+have been odd noises just outside my room all the evening, and I've just
+seen a queer kind of dog, that vanished, God knows how. I--I--well, you
+will call me an ass, of course, but I'm afraid to stay there alone, and
+that's the long and short of it.'
+
+"'Begorra!' Maguire exclaimed, 'it can't be poor Bob's ghost already!
+What sort of noises were they?'
+
+"'Noises like laughter!' Brady said. 'Loud peals of horrid laughter.'
+
+"'Someone trying to frighten you,' one of the undergrads observed, 'and
+faith, he succeeded. You are twice as white as any sheet.'
+
+"'It's ill-timed mirth, anyhow,' someone else put in, 'with Anderson's
+dead body upstairs. I'm for making an example of the blackguard.'
+
+"'And I,'--'And I,' the others echoed.
+
+"A general movement followed, and headed by Brady the procession moved
+to the north wing of the College. At that time, be it remembered, a
+large proportion of K. undergrads were in residence--now it is
+otherwise. On reaching Brady's rooms the crowd halted outside and
+listened. For some time there was silence; and then a laugh--low,
+monotonous, unmirthful, metallic--coming as it were from some adjacent
+chamber, and so unnatural, so abhorring, that it held everyone
+spell-bound. It died away in the reverberations of the stone corridor,
+its echoes seeming to awake a chorus of other laughs hardly less
+dreadful. Again there was silence, no one daring to express his
+thoughts. Then, as if by common consent, all turned precipitately into
+Brady's room and slammed the door.
+
+"'That is what I heard,' Brady said. 'What does it mean?'
+
+"'Is it the meaning of it you're wanting to know?' Maguire observed.
+'Sure 'tis the devil, for no one but him could make such a noise. I've
+never heard the like of it before. Who has the rooms on either side of
+you?'
+
+"'These?' Brady replied, pointing to the right. 'No one. They were
+vacated at Easter, and are being repainted and decorated. These on the
+left--Dobson, who is, I happen to know, at the present moment in Co.
+Mayo. He won't be back till next week.'
+
+"'Then we can search them,' a student called Hartnoll intervened.
+
+"'To be sure we can,' Brady replied, 'but I doubt if you'll find
+anyone.'
+
+"A search was made, and Brady proved to be correct. Not a vestige of
+anyone was discovered.
+
+"Much mystified, Maguire's party was preparing to depart, when Hartnoll,
+who had taken the keenest interest in the proceedings, suddenly said,
+'Who has the rooms over yours, Brady? Sound, as you know, plays curious
+tricks, and it is just as likely as not that laugh came from above.'
+
+"'Oh, I don't think so,' Brady answered. 'The man overhead is Belton, a
+very decent sort. He is going in for his finals shortly, and is sweating
+fearfully hard at present. We might certainly ask him if he heard the
+noise.'
+
+"The students agreeing, Brady led the way upstairs, and in response to
+their summons Belton hastily opened the door. He was a typical
+book-worm--thin, pale and rather emaciated, but with a pleasant
+expression in his eyes and mouth, that all felt was assuring.
+
+"'Hulloa!' he exclaimed, 'it isn't often I'm favoured with a surprise
+party of this sort. Come in'; and he pressed them so hard that they felt
+constrained to accept his hospitality, and before long were all seated
+round the fire, quaffing whisky and puffing cigars as if they meant to
+make a night of it. At two o'clock someone suggested that it was high
+time they thought of bed, and Belton rose with them.
+
+"'Before we turn in, let's have another search,' he said. 'It's strange
+you should all hear that noise except me--unless, of course, it came
+from below.'
+
+"'But there's nothing under me,' Brady remarked, 'except the Dining
+Hall.'
+
+"'Then let's search that,' Belton went on. 'We ought to make a thorough
+job of it now we've once begun. Besides, I don't relish being in this
+lonely place with that laugh "knocking" around, any more than you do.'
+
+"He went with them, and they completely overhauled the ground
+floor--hall, dining-room, studies, passages, vestibules, everywhere that
+was not barred to them; but they were no wiser at the end of their
+search than at the beginning; there was not the slightest clue as to the
+author of the laugh.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"On the morrow there was a fresh shock. One of the College servants, on
+entering Mr. Maguire's rooms to call him, found that gentleman half
+dressed and lying on the floor.
+
+"Terrified beyond measure, the servant bent over him and discovered he
+was dead, obviously stabbed with the same weapon that had put an end to
+Bob Anderson.
+
+"The factotum at once gave the alarm. Everyone in the College came
+trooping to the room, and for the second time within three days a
+general hue and cry was raised. All, again, to no purpose--the murderer
+had left no traces as to his identity. However, one thing at least was
+established, and that was the innocence of Dean Kelly and Denis
+O'Farroll. They were both liberated.
+
+"Then Hartnoll, who seems to have been a regular Sherlock Holmes, got to
+work in grim earnest. On the floor in Maguire's room he picked up a
+diminutive silver-topped pencil, which had rolled under the fender and
+had so escaped observation. He asked several of Maguire's most intimate
+friends if they remembered seeing the pencil-case in Maguire's
+possession, but they shook their heads. He enquired in other quarters,
+too, but with no better result, and finally resolved to ask Brady, who
+belonged to quite a different set from himself. With that object in view
+he set off to Brady's room shortly after supper. As there was no
+response to his raps, he at length opened Brady's door. In front of the
+hearth in a big easy chair sat a figure.
+
+"'Brady, by all that's holy,' Hartnoll exclaimed. 'By Jupiter, the
+beggar's asleep. That's what comes of swotting too hard! Brady!'
+
+"Approaching the chair he called again, 'Brady!' and getting no reply,
+patted the figure gently on the back.
+
+"'Be jabbers, you sleep soundly, old fellow!' he said. 'How about that!'
+and he shook him heartily by the shoulder. The instant he let go the
+figure collapsed. In order to get a closer view Hartnoll then struck a
+light with the tinder box.
+
+"The flickering of the candle flame fell on Brady's face. It was
+white--ghastly white; there was no animation in it; the jaw dropped.
+
+"With a cry of horror Hartnoll sprang back, and as he did so a great
+yellow dog dashed across the hearth in front of him, whilst from
+somewhere close at hand came a laugh--long, low and satirical. A cold
+terror gripped Hartnoll, and for a moment or so he was on the verge of
+fainting. However, hearing voices in the quadrangle, he pulled himself
+together, approached the window on tiptoe, and, peering through the
+glass, perceived to his utmost joy two of his friends directly beneath
+him. 'I say, you fellows,' he called in low tones, 'come up here
+quickly--Brady's rooms. I've seen the phantom dog. There's been another
+tragedy, and the murderer is close at hand. Come quietly and we may
+catch him!'
+
+"He then retraced his steps to the centre of the room and listened.
+Again there came the laugh--subtle, protracted, hellish--and it seemed
+to him as if it must originate in the room overhead.
+
+"A noise in the direction of the hearth made him look round. Some loose
+plaster had fallen, and whilst he still gazed, more fell. The truth of
+the whole thing then dawned on him. The murderer was in the chimney.
+
+"Hartnoll was a creature of impulse. In the excitement of the moment he
+forgot danger, and the dastardly nature of the crimes gave him more than
+his usual amount of courage. He rushed at the chimney, and, regardless
+of soot and darkness, began an impromptu ascent.
+
+"Half-way up something struck him--once, twice, thrice,--sharply, and
+there was a soft, malevolent chuckle.
+
+"At this juncture the two undergraduates arrived in Brady's room. No one
+was there--nothing save a hunched-up figure on a chair.
+
+"'Hartnoll!' they whispered. 'Hartnoll!' No reply. They called
+again--still no reply. Again and again they called, until at length,
+through sheer fatigue, they desisted, and seized with a sudden panic
+fled precipitately downstairs and out into the quadrangle.
+
+"Once more the alarm was given, and once again the whole College, wild
+with excitement, hastened to the scene of the outrage.
+
+"This time there was a double mystery. Brady had been murdered--Hartnoll
+had disappeared. The police were summoned and the whole building
+ransacked; but no one thought of the chimney till the search was nearly
+over, and half the throng--overcome with fatigue--had retired. O'Farroll
+was the discoverer. Happening to glance at the hearth he saw something
+drop.
+
+"'For Heaven's sake, you fellows!' he shouted. 'Look! Blood! You may
+take it from me there's a corpse in the chimney.'
+
+"A dozen candles invaded the hearth, and a herculean policeman undertook
+the ascent. In breathless silence the crowd below waited, and, after a
+few seconds of intense suspense, two helpless legs appeared on the hob.
+Bit by bit, the rest of the body followed, until, at length, the whole
+figure of Hartnoll, black, bleeding, bloodstained, was disclosed to
+view.
+
+"At first it was thought that he was dead; but the surgeon who had
+hurried to the scene pronouncing him still alive, there arose a
+tremendous cheer. The murderer had at all events been foiled this time.
+
+"'Begorrah!' cried O'Farroll, 'Hartnoll was after the murderer when he
+was struck, and shure I'll be after him the same way myself.' And before
+anyone could prevent him O'Farroll was up the chimney. Up, up, up, until
+he found himself going down, down, down; and then--bedad--he stepped
+right out on to the floor of Belton's room.
+
+"'Hulloa!' the latter exclaimed, looking not a bit disconcerted, 'that's
+a curious mode of making your entrance into my domain! Why didn't you
+come by the door?'
+
+"'Because,' O'Farroll replied, pointing to a patch of soot near the
+washstand, 'I followed you. Own up, Dicky Belton. You're the
+culprit--you did for them all.' And Belton laughed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Yes, it was true; overwork had turned Belton's brain, and he was
+subsequently sent to a Criminal Lunatic Asylum for the rest of his life.
+But there were moments when he was comparatively sane, and in these
+interims he confessed everything. Anderson had told him that he was
+going to hoax the Dean, and filled with indignation at the idea of such
+a trick being played on a College official--for he, Belton, was a great
+favourite with the 'Beaks'--he had accompanied Anderson on the plea of
+helping him, intending, in reality, to frustrate him. It was not till he
+was in the chimney, crouching behind Anderson, that the thought of
+killing his fellow-students had entered his mind. The heat of his
+hiding-place, acting on an already overworked brain, hastened on the
+madness; and his fingers closing on a clasped knife in one of his
+pockets, inspired him with a desire to kill.
+
+"The work once begun, he had argued with himself, would have to be
+continued, and he had then and there decided that all unruly
+undergraduates should be exterminated.
+
+"With what measure of success this determination was carried out need
+not be recapitulated here; but with regard to the phantom dog a few
+words may be added. Since it appeared immediately before the committal
+of each of the three murders I have just recorded (it was seen by Mr.
+Kelly before the death of Bob Anderson; by Brady, before the murder of
+Maguire; and by Hartnoll, before Brady was murdered), I think there can
+neither be doubts as to its existence nor as to the purport of its
+visits.
+
+"Moreover, its latest appearance in the University, reported to me quite
+recently, preceded a serious outbreak of fire."
+
+
+_National Ghosts in the form of Dogs_
+
+One of the most notorious dog ghosts is the Gwyllgi in Wales. This
+apparition, which is of a particularly terrifying appearance, chiefly
+haunts the lane leading from Mousiad to Lisworney Crossways.
+
+Belief in a spectral dog, however, is common all over the British Isles.
+The apparition does not belong to any one breed, but appears equally
+often as a hound, setter, terrier, shepherd dog, Newfoundland and
+retriever. In Lancashire it is called the "Trash" or "Striker"; Trash,
+because the sound of its tread is thought to resemble a person walking
+along a miry, sloppy road, with heavy shoes; Striker, because it is said
+to utter a curious screech which may be taken as a warning of the
+approaching death of some relative or friend. When followed the phantom
+retreats, glaring at its pursuer, and either sinks into the ground with
+a harrowing shriek, or disappears in some equally mysterious manner.
+
+In Norfolk and Cambridgeshire this spectre is named the "Shuck," the
+local name for Shag--and is reported to haunt churchyards and other
+dreary spots.
+
+In the parish of Overstrand, there used to be a lane called "Shuck's
+Lane," named after this phantasm.
+
+Round about Leeds the spectre dog is called "Padfoot," and is about the
+size of a donkey, with shaggy hair and large eyes like saucers. My
+friend Mr. Barker tells me there was, at one time, a ghost in the
+Hebrides called the Lamper, which was like a very big, white dog with no
+tail. It ran sometimes straight ahead, but usually in circles, and to
+see it was a prognostication of death. Mr. Barker, going home by the
+sea-coast, saw the Lamper in the hedge. He struck at it, and his stick
+passed right through it. The Lamper rushed away, whining and howling
+alternately, and disappeared. Mr. Barker was so scared that he ran all
+the way home. On the morrow, he learned of his father's death.
+
+In Northumberland, Durham, and various parts of Yorkshire, the
+ghost-dog, which is firmly believed in, is styled Barguest, Bahrgeist,
+or Boguest; whilst in Lancashire it is termed the Boggart. Its most
+common form in these counties is a large, black dog with flaming eyes;
+and its appearance is a certain prognostication of death.
+
+According to tradition there was once a "Barguest" in a glen between
+Darlington and Houghton, near Throstlenest. Another haunted a piece of
+waste land above a spring called the Oxwells, between Wreghorn and
+Headingley Hill, near Leeds. On the death of any person of local
+importance in the neighbourhood the creature would come forth, followed
+by all the other dogs, barking and howling. (Henderson refers to these
+hauntings in his _Folk-lore of Northern Counties_.)
+
+Another form of this animal spectre is the Capelthwaite, which,
+according to common report, had the power of appearing in the form of
+any quadruped, but usually chose that of a large, black dog.
+
+
+"_The Mauthe Doog_"
+
+One of the most famous canine apparitions is that of the "Mauthe Doog,"
+once said--and, I believe, still said--to haunt Peel Castle, Isle of
+Man.
+
+Its favourite place, so I am told, was the guard-chamber, where it used
+to crouch by the fireside. The sentry, so the story runs, got so
+accustomed to seeing it, that they ceased to be afraid; but, as they
+believed it to be of evil origin, waiting for an opportunity to seize
+them, they were very particular what they said or did, and refrained
+from swearing in its presence. The Mauthe Doog used to come out and
+return by the passage through the church, by which the sentry on duty
+had to go to deliver the keys every night to the captain. These men,
+however, were far too nervous to go alone, and were invariably
+accompanied by one of the retainers. On one occasion, however, one of
+the sentinels, in a fit of drunken bravado, swore he was afraid of
+nothing, and insisted on going alone. His comrades tried to dissuade
+him, upon which he became abusive, cursed the Mauthe Doog, and said he
+would d----d well strike it. An hour later, he returned absolutely mad
+with horror, and speechless; nor could he even make signs, whereby his
+friends could understand what had happened to him. He died soon
+after--his features distorted--in violent agony. After this the
+apparition was never seen again.
+
+As to what class of spirits the spectre dog belongs, that is impossible
+to say. At the most we can only surmise, and I should think the chances
+of its being the actual phantasm of some dead dog or an elemental are
+about equal. It is probably sometimes the one and sometimes the other;
+and its origin is very possibly like that of the Banshee.
+
+
+_Spectral Hounds_
+
+As with the spectre dog, so with packs of hounds, stories of them come
+from all parts of the country.
+
+Gervase of Tilbury states that as long ago as the thirteenth century a
+pack of spectral hounds was frequently witnessed, on nights when the
+moon was full, scampering across forest and downs. In the twelfth
+century the pack was known as "the Herlething" and haunted, chiefly, the
+banks of the Wye.
+
+Roby, in his _Traditions of Lancashire_; Hardwick, in his _Traditions,
+Superstitions, and Folk-lore_; Homerton, in his _Isles of Loch Awe_;
+Wirt Sykes, in his _British Goblins_; Sir Walter Scott, and others, all
+refer to them. In the North of England they are known as "Gabriel's
+Hounds"; in Devon as the "Wisk," "Yesk," "Yeth," or "Heath Hounds"; in
+Wales as the "Cwn Annwn" or "Cyn y Wybr"; in Cornwall as the "Devil and
+his Dandy-Dogs"; and in the neighbourhood of Leeds as the "Gabble
+Retchets." They are common all over the Continent. In appearance they
+are usually described as monstrous, human-headed dogs, black, with fiery
+eyes and teeth, and sprinkled all over with blood. They make a great
+howling noise, which is very shrill and mournful, and appear to be in
+hot pursuit of some unseen quarry. When they approach a house, it may be
+taken as a certain sign someone in that house will die very shortly.
+
+According to Mr. Roby, a spectre huntsman known by the name Gabriel
+Ratchets, accompanied by a pack of phantom hounds, is said to hunt a
+milk-white doe round the Eagle's Crag in the Vale of Todmorden every All
+Hallows Eve.
+
+These hounds were also seen in Norfolk. A famous ecclesiast, when on his
+way to the coast, was forced to spend the night in the King's Lynn Inn,
+owing to a violent snowstorm. Retiring to bed directly after supper, he
+tried to forget his disappointment in reading a volume of sermons he had
+bought at a second-hand shop in Bury St. Edmunds.
+
+"I think I can use this one," he said to himself. "It will do nicely for
+the people of Aylesham. They are so steeped in hypocrisy that nothing
+short of violent denunciation will bring it home to them. This I think,
+however, will pierce even their skins."
+
+A sudden noise made him spring up.
+
+"Hounds!" he exclaimed. "And at this time of night! Good heavens!"
+
+He flew to the window, and there, careering through the yard, baying as
+they ran, were, at least, fifty luminous, white hounds. Instead of
+leaping the stone wall, they passed right through it, and the bishop
+then realized that they were Gabriel Hounds. The following evening he
+received tidings of his son's--his only son's--death.
+
+I have heard that the "Yeth Hounds" were seen, not so long ago, in a
+parish in Yorkshire by an old poacher called Barnes. Barnes was walking
+in the fields one night, when he suddenly heard the baying of the
+hounds, and the hoarse shouts of the huntsman. The next moment the whole
+pack hove in view and tore past him so close that he received a cut from
+"the whip" on his leg. To his surprise, however, it did not hurt him, it
+only felt icy cold. He then knew that he had seen the "Yeth Hounds."
+
+
+_A Spectral Pack of Hounds in Russia_
+
+A gentleman of the name of Rappaport whom I once met in Southampton told
+me of an experience he had once had with a spectral pack of hounds on
+the slope of the Urals. "It was about half-past eleven one winter's
+night," he said, "and I was driving through a thick forest, when my
+coachman suddenly leaned back in his seat and called out, 'Do you hear
+that?' I listened, and from afar came a plaintive, whining sound. 'It's
+not Volki, is it?' I asked. 'I'm afraid so, master,' the coachman
+replied, 'they're coming on after us.'
+
+"'But they are some way off still!' I said.
+
+"'That is so,' he responded, 'but wolves run quick, and our horses are
+tired. If we can reach the lake first we shall be all right, but should
+they overtake us before we get there--' and he shrugged his great
+shoulders suggestively. 'Not another word,' I cried. 'Drive--drive as if
+'twere the devil himself. I have my rifle ready, and will shoot the
+first wolf that shows itself.'
+
+"'Very good, master,' he answered. 'I will do everything that can be
+done to save your skin and mine.' He cracked his whip, and away flew the
+horses at a breakneck speed. But fast as they went, they could not
+outstrip the sound of the howling, which gradually drew nearer and
+nearer, until around the curve we had just passed shot into view a huge
+gaunt wolf. I raised my rifle and fired. The beast fell, but another
+instantly took its place, and then another and another, till the whole
+pack came into sight, and close behind us was an ocean of white,
+tossing, foam-flecked jaws and red gleaming eyes.
+
+"I emptied my rifle into them as fast as I could pull the trigger, but
+it only checked them momentarily. A few snaps, and of their wounded
+brethren there was nothing left but a pile of glistening bones. Then,
+hie away, and they were once again in red-hot pursuit. At last our pace
+slackened, and still I could see no signs of the lake. A great grey
+shape, followed by others, then rushed by us and tried to reach the
+horses' flanks with their sharp, gleaming teeth. A few more seconds,
+and I knew we should be both fighting, back to back, the last great
+fight for existence. Indeed I had ceased firing, and was already
+beginning to strike out furiously with the butt end of my rifle, when a
+new sound arrested my attention. The baying of dogs! 'Dogs!' I screamed,
+'Dogs, Ivan!' (that was the coachman's name) 'Dogs!' and, in my mad joy,
+I brained two wolves in as many blows. The next moment a large pack of
+enormous white hounds came racing down on us. The wolves did not wait to
+dispute the field; they all turned tail and, with loud howls of terror,
+rushed off in the direction they had come. On came the hounds--more
+beautiful dogs I had never seen; as they swept by, more than one brushed
+against my knees, though I could feel nothing save intense cold. When
+they were about twenty yards ahead of us, they slowed down, and
+maintained that distance in front of us till we arrived on the shores of
+the lake. There they halted, and throwing back their heads, bayed as if
+in farewell, and suddenly vanished. We knew then that they were no
+earthly hounds, but spirit ones, sent by a merciful Providence to save
+us from a cruel death."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+HORSES AND THE UNKNOWN
+
+
+As in my chapters on cats and dogs, I will preface this chapter on
+horses with instances of alleged haunted localities.
+
+I take my first case from Mr. W.T. Stead's _Real Ghost Stories_,
+published in 1891. It is called "A Weird Story from the Indian Hills,"
+and Mr. Stead preludes it thus: The "tale is told by General Barter,
+C.B., of Careystown, Whitegate, Co. Cork. At the time he witnessed the
+spectral cavalcade he was living on the hills in India, and when one
+evening he was returning home he caught sight of a rider and attendants
+coming towards him. The rest of the story, given in the General's own
+words, is as follows:--
+
+"At this time the two dogs came, and, crouching at my side, gave low,
+frightened whimpers. The moon was at the full--a tropical moon--so
+bright that you could see to read a newspaper by its light, and--I saw
+the party before me advance as plainly as it were noon day. They were
+above me some eight or ten feet on the bridle-road, the earth thrown
+down from which sloped to within a pace or two of my feet. On the party
+came, until almost in front of me, and now I had better describe them.
+The rider was in full dinner dress, with white waistcoat, and wearing a
+tall chimney-pot hat, and he sat a powerful hill pony (dark brown, with
+mane and tail) in a listless sort of way, the reins hanging loosely from
+both hands. A Syce led the pony on each side, but their faces I could
+not see, the one next to me having his back to me and the one farthest
+off being hidden by the pony's head. Each held the bridle close by the
+bit, the man next me with his right and the other with his left hand,
+and the hands were on the thighs of the rider, as if to steady him in
+his seat. As they approached, I knowing they could not get to any place
+other than my own, called out in Hindustani, 'Quon hai?' (Who is it?).
+There was no answer, and on they came until right in front of me, when I
+said, in English, 'Hullo, what the d----l do you want here?' Instantly
+the group came to a halt, the rider gathering the bridle reins up in
+both hands, turned his face, which had hitherto been looking away from
+me, towards me, and looked down upon me. The group was still as in a
+tableau, with the bright moon shining upon it, and I at once recognized
+the rider as Lieutenant B., whom I had formerly known. The face,
+however, was different from what it used to be; in the place of being
+clean-shaven, as when I used to know it, it was now surrounded by a
+fringe (what used to be known as a Newgate fringe), and it was the face
+of a dead man, the ghastly waxen pallor of it brought out more
+distinctly in the moonlight by the dark fringe of hair by which it was
+encircled; the body, too, was much stouter than when I had known it in
+life.
+
+"I marked this in a moment; and then resolved to lay hold of the thing,
+whatever it might be. I dashed up the bank, and the earth which had been
+thrown on the side giving under my feet, I fell forward up the bank on
+my hands, recovering myself instantly. I gained the road, and stood in
+the exact spot where the group had been, but which was now vacant, there
+was not the trace of anything; it was impossible for them to go on, the
+road stopped at a precipice about twenty yards further on, and it was
+impossible to turn and go back in a second. All this flashed through my
+mind, and I then ran along the road for about 100 yards, along which
+they had come, until I had to stop for want of breath, but there was no
+trace of anything, and not a sound to be heard. I then returned home,
+where I found my dogs, who, on all other occasions my most faithful
+companions, had not come with me along the road.
+
+"Next morning I went up to D., who belonged to the same regiment as B.,
+and gradually induced him to talk of him. I said, 'How very stout he had
+become lately, and what possessed him to allow his beard to grow with
+that horrid fringe?' D. replied, 'Yes, he became very bloated before his
+death. You know he led a very fast life, and while on the sick list he
+allowed the fringe to grow, in spite of all that we could say to him,
+and I believe he was buried with it.' I asked him where he got the pony
+I had seen, describing it minutely. 'Why,' said D., 'how do you know
+anything about all this? You hadn't seen B. for two or three years, and
+the pony you never saw. He bought him at Peshawur, and killed him one
+day riding in his reckless fashion down the hill to Trete.' I then told
+him what I had seen the night before.
+
+"Once, when the galloping sound was very distinct, I rushed to the door
+of my house. There I found my Hindoo bearer, standing with a tattie in
+his hand. I asked him what he was there for. He said that there came a
+sound of riding down the hill, and 'passed him like a typhoon,' and went
+round the corner of the house, and he was determined to waylay it,
+whatever it was."
+
+In commenting on the case, Mr. Stead remarks, "That such a story as
+this, gravely told by a British General in the present day, helps us to
+understand how our ancestors came to believe in the wonderful story of
+Herne the Hunter." I do not know about Herne the Hunter, but it is at
+all events good testimony that horses as well as men have spirits, for
+one of the ghosts the General saw was, undoubtedly, that of the pony
+murdered by B. Why it was still ridden by the phantom of its former
+master is another question.
+
+The next case I narrate is also taken from Mr. Stead's same work. It was
+sent him by one of the leading townsmen of Cowes, in the Isle of Wight,
+and runs thus:--
+
+"On a fine evening in April, 1859, the writer was riding with a friend
+on a country road. Twilight was closing down on us, when, after a
+silence of some minutes, my friend suddenly exclaimed:
+
+"'No man knows me better than you do, J. Do you think I am a nervous,
+easily frightened sort of man?'
+
+"'Far from it,' said I, 'among all the men I know in the wild country I
+have lived and worked in, I know none more fearless or of more
+unhesitating nerve.'
+
+"'Well,' said he, 'I think I am that, too, and though I have travelled
+these roads all sorts of hours, summer and winter, for twenty years, I
+never met anything to startle me, or that I could not account for, until
+last Monday evening. About this time it was. Riding old Fan' (a chestnut
+mare) 'here on this cross-' (a four-way cross) 'road, on my near side
+was a man on a grey horse, coming from this left-hand road. I had to
+pull my off-rein to give myself room to pass ahead of him; he was coming
+at a right angle to me. As I passed the head of the horse I called out
+"Good night." Hearing no reply, I turned in my saddle to the off-side,
+to see whether he appeared to be asleep as he rode, but to my surprise I
+saw neither man nor horse. So sure was I that I had seen such, that I
+wheeled old Fan round, and rode back to the middle of the cross, and on
+neither of the four roads could I see a man or horse, though there was
+light enough to see two hundred or three hundred yards, as we can now.
+Well, I then rode over that gate' (a gate at one corner opening into a
+grass field), 'thinking he might have gone that way; looking down by
+each hedge, I could see nothing of my man and horse; and then--and not
+until then--I felt myself thrill and start with a shuddering sense that
+I had seen something uncanny, and, Jove! I put the mare down this hill
+we are on now at her very best pace. But the strangest part of my story
+is to come,' said he, continuing.
+
+"'After I had done my business at the farmhouse here, at foot of this
+hill, I told the old farmer and his wife what I had seen, as I have now
+told you. The old man said:
+
+"'"For many years I have known thee, M----, on this road, and have you
+never seen the like before on that cross?"
+
+"'"Seen what before?" I said.
+
+"'"Why, a man in light-coloured clothes on a grey horse," said he.
+
+"'"No, never," said I, "but I swear I have this evening."
+
+"'The farmer asked, "Had I never heard of what happened to the Miller of
+L---- Mills about forty years ago?"
+
+"'"No, never a word," I told him.
+
+"'"Well," he said, "about forty years ago this miller, returning from
+market, was waylaid and murdered on that cross-road, pockets rifled of
+money and watch. The horse ran home, about a mile away. Two serving-men
+set out with lanterns and found their master dead. He was dressed, as
+millers often do in this part of the country, in light-coloured clothes,
+and the horse was a grey horse. The murderers were never found. These
+are facts," continued the farmer. "I took this farm soon after it all
+happened, and, though I have known all this, and have passed over that
+cross several thousands of times, I never knew anything unusual there
+myself, but there have been a number of people who tell the same story
+you have told mother and me, M----, and describe the appearance as you
+have done to us to-night."'"
+
+Mr. Stead goes on to add: "Four evenings after all this occurred my
+friend related it to me as we were riding along the same road. He
+continued to pass there many times every year for ten years, but never a
+day saw anything of that sort."
+
+My next case, a reproduction of a letter in the _Occult Review_ of
+September, 1906, reads thus:--
+
+
+"_A Phantom Horse and Rider--Mrs. Gaskin Anderston's Story_
+
+"The following story is, I think, very remarkable, and I give it exactly
+as it was told to me, and written down at the time.
+
+"A number of members of a gentleman's club were talking and discussing,
+amongst other subjects, the possibility of there being a future state
+for animals. One of the members said:
+
+"'I firmly believe there is. In my early youth I had a practice as a
+medical man in one of the Midland Counties. One of my patients was a
+very wealthy man, who owned large tracts of land and had a stud
+composed entirely of bay horses with black points--this was a hobby of
+his, and he would never have any others. One day a messenger came
+summoning me to Mr. L----, as he had just met with a very bad accident,
+and was on the point of death. I mounted my horse and started off
+without delay. As I was riding through the front gates to the house, I
+heard a shot, and to my amazement the very man I was going to visit rode
+past at a furious pace, riding a wretched-looking chestnut with one
+white forefoot and a white star on its forehead. Arrived at the house
+the butler said:
+
+"'"He has gone, sir; they had to shoot the horse--you would hear the
+shot--and at the same moment my master died."
+
+"'He had had this horse sent on approval; whilst riding it, it backed
+over a precipice, injuring Mr. L---- fatally, and on being taken to the
+stables it was found necessary to shoot it.'--Alpha."
+
+The next case I append (I published it in a weekly journal some years
+ago) was related to me by a Captain Beauclerk.
+
+
+_The White Horse of Eastover_
+
+When I came down to breakfast one morning I found amongst several
+letters awaiting me one from Colonel Onslow, the Commanding Officer of
+my regiment when I first joined. He had always been rather partial to
+me, and the friendship between us continued after his retirement. I
+heard from him regularly at more or less prolonged intervals, and either
+at Christmas or Easter invariably received an invitation to spend a few
+days with him. On this occasion he was most anxious that I should
+accept.
+
+"Do come to us for Easter," he wrote. "I am sure this place will
+interest you--it is haunted."
+
+The cunning fellow! He knew I was very keen on Psychical Research work,
+and would go almost anywhere on the bare chance of seeing a ghost.
+
+At that time I was quite open-minded, I had arrived at no definite
+conclusion as to the existence or non-existence of ghosts. But to tell
+the truth, I doubted very much if the Colonel's word, in these
+circumstances, could be relied upon. I had grave suspicions that this
+"haunting" was but an invention for the purpose of getting me to
+Eastover. However, as it was just possible that I might be
+mistaken--that there really was a ghost, and as I had not seen Colonel
+Onslow for a long time, and indulged in feelings of the warmest regard
+both for him and his wife, I resolved to go.
+
+Accordingly I set out early in the afternoon of the Good Friday. The
+weather, which had been muggy in London, grew colder and colder the
+further we advanced along the line, and by the time we reached Eastover
+there was every prospect of a storm.
+
+As I expected, a closed carriage had been sent to meet me; for the
+Colonel, carrying conservatism--with more conservatism than sense,
+perhaps--to a fine point, cherished a deep-rooted aversion to
+innovations of any sort, and consequently abhorred motors. His house,
+Eastover Hall, is three miles from the station, and lies at the foot of
+a steep spine of the Chilterns.
+
+The grounds of Eastover Hall were extensive; but, in the ordinary sense,
+far from beautiful. To me, however, they were more than beautiful; there
+was a grandeur in them--a grandeur that appealed to me far more than
+mere beauty--the grandeur of desolation, the grandeur of the Unknown. As
+we passed through the massive iron gates of the lodge, I looked upon
+countless acres of withered, undulating grass; upon a few rank sedges;
+upon a score or so of decayed trees; upon a house--huge, bare, grey and
+massive; upon bleak walls; upon vacant, eye-like windows; upon crude,
+scenic inhospitality, the very magnitude of which overpowered me. I have
+said it was cold; but there hung over the estate of Eastover an iciness
+that brought with it a quickening, a sickening of the heart, and a
+dreariness that, whilst being depressing in the extreme, was, withal,
+sublime. Sublime and mysterious; mysterious and insoluble. A thousand
+fancies swarmed through my mind; yet I could grapple with none; and I
+was loth to acknowledge that, although there are combinations of very
+simple material objects which might have had the power of affecting me
+thus, yet any attempt to analyse that power was beyond--far beyond--my
+mental capability.
+
+The house, though old--and its black oak panellings, silent staircases,
+dark corridors, and general air of gloom were certainly suggestive of
+ghosts--did not affect me in the same degree. The fear it inspired was
+the ordinary fear inspired by the ordinary superphysical, but the fear I
+felt in the grounds was a fear created by something out of the
+way--something far more bizarre than a mere phantom of the dead.
+
+The Colonel asked me if I had experienced any unusual sensations the
+moment I entered the house, and I told him, "Yes."
+
+"Nearly everyone does," he replied, "and yet, so far as I know, no one
+has ever seen anything. The noises we hear all round the house have
+lately been more frequent. I won't describe them; I want to learn your
+unbiassed opinion of them first."
+
+We then had tea, and whilst the rest--there was a large
+house-party--indulged in music and cards, the Colonel and I had a
+delightful chat about old times. I went to bed in the firm resolution of
+keeping awake till at least two; but I was very tired, and the excessive
+cold had made me extremely sleepy; consequently, despite my heroic
+efforts, I gradually dozed off, and knew no more till it was broad
+daylight and the butler entered my room with a cup of tea. When I came
+down to breakfast I found everyone in the best of spirits. The Onslows
+are "great hands" at original entertainments, and the announcement that
+there would be a masked ball that evening was received with tremendous
+enthusiasm.
+
+"To-night we dance, to-morrow we feed on Easter eggs and fancy cakes,"
+one of the guests laughingly whispered. "What a nicely ordered
+programme! I hear, too, we are to have a real old-fashioned Easter
+Day--heaving and lifting, and stool-ball. Egad! The Colonel deserves
+knighthood!"
+
+Soon after breakfast there was a general stampede to Seeton and
+Dinstable to buy gifts; for in that respect again the Onslows stuck to
+old customs, and there was a general interchange of presents on Easter
+morning. My purchases made, I joined one or two of the house-party at
+lunch in Seeton, cycled back alone to Eastover in time for tea; and, at
+five o'clock, commenced my first explorations of the grounds. The sky
+having become clouded my progress was somewhat slow. I did the Park
+first, and I had not gone very far before I detected the same presence I
+had so acutely felt the previous afternoon. Like the scent of a wild
+beast, it had a certain defined track which I followed astutely,
+eventually coming to a full stop in front of a wall of rock. I then
+perceived by the aid of a few fitful rays of suppressed light, which at
+intervals struggled successfully through a black bank of clouds, the
+yawning mouth of a big cavern, from the roof of which hung innumerable
+stalactites. I now suddenly realized that I was in a very lonely,
+isolated spot, and became immeasurably perturbed. The Unknown Something
+in the atmosphere which had inspired me with so much fear was here
+conglomerated--it was no longer the mere essence--it was the whole
+Thing. The whole Thing, but what was that Thing? A hideous fascination
+made me keep my gaze riveted on the gaping hole opposite me. At first I
+could make out nothing--nothing but jagged walls and roof, and empty
+darkness; then there suddenly appeared in the very innermost recesses of
+the cave a faint glow of crimson light which grew and grew, until with
+startling abruptness it resolved itself into two huge eyes, red and
+menacing. The sight was so unexpected, and, by reason of its intense
+malignity, so appalling, that I was simply dumbfounded. I could do
+nothing but stare at the Thing--paralysed and speechless. I made a
+desperate effort to get back my self-possession; I strove with all my
+might to reason with myself, to assure myself that this was the supreme
+moment of my life, the moment I had so long and earnestly desired. But
+it was in vain; I was terrified--helplessly, hopelessly terrified. The
+eyes moved, they drew nearer and nearer to me, and as they did so they
+became more and more hostile. I opened my mouth to shout for help, I
+could feel my lungs bursting under the tension; not a sound came; and
+then--then, as the eyes closed on me, and I could feel the cold, clammy
+weight pressing me down, there rang out, loud and clear, in the keen and
+cutting air of the spring evening, a whole choir of voices--the village
+choral society.
+
+I am not particularly fond of music--certainly not of village music,
+however well trained it may be; but I can honestly affirm that, at that
+moment, no sounds could have been more welcome to me than those old
+folk-songs piped by the rustics, for the instant they commenced the
+spell that so closely held me prisoner was broken, my faculties
+returned, and reeling back out of the clutches of the hateful Thing, I
+joyfully turned and fled.
+
+I related my adventure to the Colonel, and he told me that the cave was
+generally deemed to be the most haunted spot in the grounds, that no one
+cared to venture there alone after dark.
+
+"I have myself many times visited the cave at night--in the company of
+others," he said, "and we have invariably experienced sensations of the
+utmost horror and repulsion, though we have seen nothing. It must be a
+devil."
+
+I thought so, too, and exclaimed with some vehemence that the proper
+course for him to pursue was to have the cave filled in or blasted. That
+night I awoke at about one o'clock with the feeling very strong on me
+that something was prowling about under my window. For some time I
+fought against the impulse to get out of bed and look, but at last I
+yielded. It was bright moonlight--every obstacle in the grounds stood
+out with wonderful clearness--and directly beneath the window, peering
+up at me, were the eyes--red, lurid, satanical. A dog barked, and they
+vanished. I did not sleep again that night, not until the daylight
+broke, when I had barely shut my eyes before I was aroused by decidedly
+material bangings on the doors and hyper-boisterous Easter greetings.
+
+After breakfast a few of the party went to church, a few into the
+nursery to romp with the children, whilst the rest dispersed in
+different directions. At luncheon all met again, and there was much
+merry-making over the tansy cakes--very foolish, no doubt, but to me at
+least very delightful, and perhaps a wise practice, at times, even for
+the most prosaic. In the afternoon the Colonel took me for a drive to a
+charmingly picturesque village in the Chilterns, whence we did not set
+out on our way back till it was twilight.
+
+The Colonel was a good whip, and the horse, though young and rather
+high-spirited, was, he said, very dependable on the whole, and had never
+caused him any trouble. We spun along at a brisk trot--the last village
+separating us from the Hall was past, and we were on a high eminence,
+almost within sight of home, when a startling change in the atmosphere
+suddenly became apparent--it turned icy cold. I made some sort of
+comment to the Colonel, and as I did so the horse shied.
+
+"Hulloa!" I exclaimed. "Does she often do this?"
+
+"No, not often, only when we are on this road about this time," was the
+grim rejoinder. "Keep your eyes open and sit tight."
+
+We were now amid scenery of the same desolate type that had so impressed
+me the day of my arrival. Gaunt, barren hills, wild, uncultivated
+levels, sombre valleys, inhabited only by grotesque enigmatical shadows
+that came from Heaven knows where, and hemmed us in on all sides.
+
+A large quarry, half full of water and partly overgrown with brambles,
+riveted my attention, and as I gazed fixedly at it I saw, or fancied I
+saw, the shape of something large and white--vividly white--rise from
+the bottom.
+
+The glimpse I caught of it was, however, only momentary, for we were
+moving along at a great pace, and I had hardly seen the last of it
+before the quarry was left behind and we were descending a long and
+gradual declivity. There was but little wind, but the cold was
+benumbing; neither of us spoke, and the silence was unbroken save by the
+monotonous patter, patter of the horse's hoofs on the hard road.
+
+We were, I should say, about half-way down the hill, when away in our
+rear, from the direction of the quarry, came a loud protracted neigh. I
+at once looked round, and saw standing on the crest of the eminence we
+had just quitted, and most vividly outlined against the enveloping
+darkness, a gigantic horse, white and luminous.
+
+At that moment our own mare took fright; we were abruptly swung forward,
+and, had I not--mindful of the Colonel's warning--been "sitting tight,"
+I should undoubtedly have been thrown out. We dashed downhill at a
+terrific rate, our mare mad with terror, and on peering over my shoulder
+I saw, to my horror, the white steed tearing along not fifty yards
+behind us. I was now able to get a vivid impression of the monstrous
+beast. Although the night was dark, a strong, lurid glow, which seemed
+to emanate from all over it, enabled me to see distinctly its broad,
+muscular breast; its panting, steaming flanks; its long, graceful legs
+with their hairy fetlocks and shoeless, shining hoofs; its powerful but
+arched back; its lofty, colossal head with waving forelock and broad,
+massive forehead; its snorting nostrils; its distended, foaming jaws;
+its huge, glistening teeth; and its lips, wreathed in a savage grin. On
+and on it raced, its strides prodigious, its mighty mane rising and
+falling, and blowing all around it in unrestrained confusion.
+
+A slip--a single slip, and we should be entirely at its mercy.
+
+Our own horse was now out of control. A series of violent plunges, which
+nearly succeeded in unseating me, had enabled her to get the check of
+the bit between her teeth so as to render it utterly useless; and she
+had then started off at a speed I can only liken to flying. Fortunately
+we were now on a more or less level ground, and the road, every inch of
+which our horse knew, was smooth and broad.
+
+I glanced at the Colonel convulsively clutching the reins; he was
+clinging to his seat for dear life, his hat gone. I wanted to speak, but
+I knew it was useless--the shrieking of the air as it roared past us
+deadened all sounds. Once or twice I glanced over the side of the trap.
+The rapidity with which we were moving caused a hideous delusion--the
+ground appeared to be gliding from beneath us; and I experienced the
+sensation of resting on nothing. Despite our danger, however, from
+natural causes--a danger which, I knew, could not have been more
+acute--my fears were wholly of the superphysical. It was not the horror
+of being dashed to pieces I dreaded--it was the horror of the phantom
+horse--of its sinister, hostile appearance--of its unknown powers. What
+would it do if it overtook us? With each successive breath I drew I
+felt sure the fateful event--the long-anticipated crisis--had come.
+
+At last my expectations were realized. The teeth of the gigantic steed
+closed down on me, its nostrils hissed resistance out of me--I swerved,
+tottered, fell; and as I sank on the ground my senses left me.
+
+On coming to I found myself in a propped-up position on the floor of a
+tiny room with someone pouring brandy down my throat. Happily, beyond a
+severe shock, I had sustained no injury--a sufficiently miraculous
+circumstance, as the trap had come to grief in failing to clear the
+lodge gates, the horse had skinned its knees, and the Colonel had
+fractured his shoulder. Of the phantom horse not a glimpse had been
+seen. Even the Colonel, strange to relate, though he had managed to peep
+round, had not seen it. He had heard and felt a Presence, that was all;
+and after listening to my experience, he owned he was truly thankful he
+was only clair-audient.
+
+"A gift like yours," he said, with more candour than kindness, "is a
+curse, not a blessing. And now I have your corroboration, I might as
+well tell you that we have long suspected the ghost to be a horse, and
+have attributed its hauntings to the fact that, some time ago, when
+exploring in the cave, several prehistoric remains of horses were
+found, one of which we kept, whilst we presented the others to a
+neighbouring museum. I dare say there are heaps more."
+
+"Undoubtedly there are," I said, "but take my advice and leave them
+alone--re-inter the remains you have already unearthed--and thus put a
+stop to the hauntings. If you go on excavating and keep the bones you
+find, the disturbances will, in all probability, increase, and the
+hauntings will become not only many but multiform."
+
+Needless to say the Colonel carried out my injunctions to the letter.
+Far from continuing his work of excavation he lost no time in restoring
+the bones he had kept to their original resting-place; after which, as I
+predicted, the hauntings ceased.
+
+This case, to me, is very satisfactory, as it testifies to what was
+unquestionably an actual phantasm of the dead--of a dead horse--albeit
+that horse was prehistoric; and such horses are all the more likely to
+be earth-bound on account of their wild, untamed natures.
+
+Here is another account of a phantom horse taken from Mr. Stead's _Real
+Ghost Stories_. It is written by an Afrikander who, in a letter to Mr.
+Stead, says:
+
+"I am not a believer in ghosts, nor never was; but seeing you wanted a
+census of them, I can't help giving you a remarkable experience of
+mine. It was some three summers back, and I was out with a party of Boer
+hunters. We had crossed the Northern boundary of the Transvaal, and were
+camped on the ridges of the Sembombo. I had been out from sunrise, and
+was returning about dusk with the skin of a fine black ostrich thrown
+across the saddle in front of me, in the best of spirits at my good
+luck. Making straight for the camp, I had hardly entered a thick bush
+when I thought that I heard somebody behind me. Looking behind, I saw a
+man mounted on a white horse. You can imagine my surprise, for my horse
+was the only one in camp, and we were the only party in the country.
+Without considering I quickened my pace into a canter, and on doing so
+my follower appeared to do the same. At this I lost all confidence, and
+made a run for it, with my follower in hot pursuit, as it appeared to my
+imagination; and I did race for it (the skin went flying in about two
+minutes, and my rifle would have done the same had it not been strapped
+over my shoulders). This I kept up until I rode into camp right among
+the pals cooking the evening meal. The Boers about the camp were quick
+in their enquiries as to my distressed condition, and regaining
+confidence, I was putting them off as best I could, when the old boss
+(an old Boer of some sixty-eight or seventy years), looking up from the
+fire, said:
+
+"'The white horse! The Englishman has seen the white horse.'
+
+"This I denied, but to no purpose. And that night round the camp fire I
+took the trouble to make enquiries as to the antecedents of the white
+horse. And the old Boer, after he had commanded silence, began. He said:
+
+"'The English are not brave, but foolish. We beat them at Majuba, some
+twenty-five seasons back. There was an Englishman here like you; he had
+brought a horse with him, against our advice, to be killed with the fly,
+the same as yours will be in a day or two. And he, like you, would go
+where he was told not to go; and one day he went into a bush (that very
+bush you rode through to-night), and he shot seven elephants, and the
+next day he went in to fetch the ivory, and about night his horse came
+into camp riderless, and was dead from the fly before the sun went down.
+The Englishman is in that bush now; anyway, he never came back. And now
+anybody who ventures into that bush is chased by the white horse. I
+wouldn't go into that bush for all the ivory in the land. The English
+are not brave, but foolish; we beat them at Majuba.'
+
+"Here he ran into a torrent of abuse of all Englishmen in general, and
+in particular. And I took the opportunity of rolling myself up in my
+blankets for the night, sleeping all the better for my adventure.
+
+"Now, Mr. Stead, I don't believe in ghosts, but I was firmly convinced
+during that run of mine, and can vouch for the accuracy of it, not
+having heard a word of the Englishman or his white horse before my
+headlong return to the camp that night. I shortly hope to be near that
+bush again, but, like the old Boer, I can say I wouldn't go into that
+bush again for all the ivory in the land.
+
+"P.S.--A few days after we dropped across a troop of elephants without
+entering the fatal bush, and managed to bag seven, photographs of which
+I took, and shall be pleased to send for your inspection, if desired."
+
+There can be very little doubt that the phantom the Afrikander saw was
+the actual spirit of a dead horse.
+
+Another experience of haunting by the same animal was told me by a
+Chelsea artist who assured me it was absolutely true. I append it as
+nearly as possible in his own words.
+
+
+_Heralds of Death_
+
+"It is many years ago," he began, "since I came into my property,
+Heatherleigh Hall, near Carlisle, Cumberland. It was left me by my
+great-uncle, General Wimpole, whom I had never seen, but who had made me
+his heir in preference to his other nephews, owing to my reputed
+likeness to an aunt, to whom he was greatly attached. Of course I was
+much envied, and I dare say a good many unkind things were said about
+me, but I did not care--Heatherleigh Hall was mine, and I had as much
+right to it as anyone else. I came there all alone--my two brothers,
+Dick and Hal, the one a soldier and the other a sailor, were both away
+on foreign service, whilst Beryl, my one and only sister, was staying
+with her fiancé's family in Bath. Never shall I forget my first
+impressions. Depict the day--an October afternoon. The air mellow, the
+leaves yellow, and the sun a golden red. Not a trace of clouds or wind
+anywhere. Everything serene and still. A broad highway; a wood; a lodge
+in the midst of the wood; large iron gates; a broad carriage drive,
+planted on either side with lofty pines and elms, whose gnarled and
+forked branches threw grotesque and not altogether pleasing shadows on
+the pale gravel.
+
+"At the end of the avenue, at least a quarter of a mile long, wide
+expanses of soft, velvety grass, interspersed at regular intervals with
+plots of flowers--dahlias, michaelmas daisies--no longer in their first
+bloom--chrysanthemums, etc. Beyond the lawn, the house, and beyond that
+again, and on either side, big, old-fashioned gardens full of
+fruit--fruit of all kinds, some, such as grapes and peaches, in monster
+green-houses, and others--luscious pears, blenheim oranges, golden
+pippins, etc.--in rich profusion in the open, the whole encompassed by a
+high and solid brick wall, topped with a bed of mortar and broken glass.
+The house, which was built, or, rather, faced with split flints, and
+edged and buttressed with cut grey stone, had a majestic but gloomy
+appearance. Its front, lofty and handsome, was somewhat castellated in
+style, two semicircular bows, or half-moons, placed at a suitable
+distance from each other, rising from the base to the summit of the
+edifice; these were pierced, at every floor, with rows of
+stone-mullioned windows, rising to the height of four or five stories.
+The flat wall between had larger windows, lighting the great hall,
+gallery, and upper apartments. These windows were abundantly ornamented
+with stained glass, representing the arms, honours, and alms-deeds of
+the Wimpole family.
+
+"The towers, half included in the building, were completely circular
+within, and contained the winding stair of the mansion; and whoso
+ascended them, when the winter wind was blowing, seemed rising by a
+tornado to the clouds. Midway between the towers was a heavy stone
+porch, with a Gothic gateway, surmounted by a battlemented parapet, made
+gable fashion, the apex of which was garnished by a pair of dolphins,
+rampant and antagonistic, whose corkscrew tails seemed contorted by the
+last agonies of rage convulsed.
+
+"The porch doors thrown open to receive me, led into a hall, wide,
+vaulted and lofty, and decorated here and there with remnants of
+tapestry and grim portraits of the Wimpoles. One picture in particular
+riveted my attention. Hung in an obscure corner, where the light rarely
+penetrated, it represented the head and shoulders of a young man with a
+strikingly beautiful face--the features small and regular like those of
+a woman--the hair yellow and curly. It was the eyes that struck me
+most--they followed me everywhere I went with a persistency that was
+positively alarming. There was something in them I had never seen in
+canvas eyes before, something deeper and infinitely more intricate than
+could be produced by mere paint--something human and yet not human,
+friendly and yet not friendly; something baffling, enigmatical,
+haunting. I enquired of my deceased relative's aged housekeeper, Mrs.
+Grimstone--whom I had retained--whose portrait it was, and she replied
+with a scared look, 'Horace, youngest son of Sir Algernon Wimpole, who
+died here in 1745.'
+
+"'The face fascinates me,' I said. 'Is there any history attached to
+it?'
+
+"'Why, yes, sir!' she responded, her eyes fixed on the floor, 'but the
+late master never liked referring to it.'
+
+"'Is it as bad as that?' I said, laughing. 'Tell me!'
+
+"'Well, sir,' she began, 'they do say as how Sir Algernon, who was a
+thorough country squire--very fond of hunting and shooting and all sorts
+of manly exercises--never liked Mr. Horace, who was delicate and
+dandified--what the folk in those days used to style a macaroni. The
+climax came when Mr. Horace took up with the Jacobites. Sir Algernon
+would have nothing more to do with him then and turned him adrift. One
+day there was a great commotion in the neighbourhood, the Government
+troops were hunting the place in search of rebels, and who should come
+galloping up the avenue with a couple of troopers in hot pursuit but Mr.
+Horace. The noise brought out Sir Algernon, and he was so infuriated to
+think that his son was the cause of the disturbance, a "disgraceful
+young cub," he called him, that despite Mr. Horace's entreaties for
+protection, he ran him through with his sword. It was a dreadful thing
+for a father to do, and Sir Algernon bitterly repented it. His wife,
+who had been devoted to Mr. Horace, left him, and at last, in a fit of
+despondency, he hanged himself--out there, on one of the elms lining the
+avenue. It is still standing. Ever since then they do say that the wood
+is haunted, and that before the death of any member of the family Mr.
+Horace is seen galloping along the old carriage drive.'
+
+"'Pleasant,' I grunted. 'And how about the house--is it haunted too?'
+
+"'I daresn't say,' she murmured. 'Some will tell you it is, and some
+will tell you it isn't.'
+
+"'In which category are you included?' I asked.
+
+"'Well!' she said 'I have lived here happy and comfortable forty-five
+years the day after to-morrow, and that speaks for itself, don't it?'
+And with that she hobbled off and showed me the way to the dining-room.
+
+"What a house it was! From the hall proceeded doorways and passages,
+more than the ordinary memory could retain. Of these portals, one at
+each end conducted to the tower stairs, others, to the reception-rooms
+and domestic offices. In the right wing, besides bedrooms galore, was a
+lofty and spacious picture gallery; in the left--a chapel; for the
+Wimpoles were, formerly, Roman Catholics. The general fittings and
+furniture, both of the hall and house in general, were substantial,
+venerable and strongly corroborative of what Mrs. Grimstone hinted
+at--they suggested ghosts.
+
+"The walls, lined with black oak panels, or dark hangings that fluttered
+mysteriously each time the wind blew, were funereal indeed; and so high
+and narrow were the windows, that little was to be discerned through
+them but cross-barred portions of the sky. One spot in particular
+appealed to my nerves--and that, a long, vaulted stone passage leading
+from a morning room to the foot of the back staircase. Here the voice
+and even the footsteps echoed with a hollow, low response, and often
+when I have been hurrying along it--I never dared walk slowly--I have
+fancied--and maybe it was more than fancy--I have been pursued.
+
+"Time passed, and from being merely used to my new environments, I grew
+to take a pride in them, to love them. I made the acquaintance of
+several of my neighbours, those I deemed the most desirable, and on
+returning from wintering abroad, brought home a bride, a young Polish
+girl, who added lustre to the surroundings, and in no small degree
+helped to dissipate the gloom. Indeed, had it not been for the picture
+in the hall, and for the twilight shadows and twilight footsteps in the
+stone passage, I should soon have ceased to think of ghosts. Ghosts,
+forsooth! When all around me vibrated with the sounds of girlish
+laughter, and the summer sunshine, sparkling on the golden curls of my
+child-wife, saw itself reflected a millionfold in the alluring depths of
+her azure eyes. In halcyon days like these who thinks of ghosts and
+death?
+
+"And yet! It is in just such times as these that hell is nearest. There
+came a night in August when the air was so hot and sultry that I could
+scarcely breathe, and unable to bear the atmosphere of the house and
+gardens any longer, I sought the coolness of the wood. Olga--my
+wife--did not accompany me, as she was suffering from a slight--thank
+God, it was only slight--sunstroke. It was close on midnight, and there
+was a dead stillness abroad that seemed as if it must be universal--as
+if it enveloped the whole of nature. I tried to realize London--to
+depict the Strand and Piccadilly, aglow with artificial light and
+reverberating with the roll of countless traffic and the tread of
+millions of feet.
+
+"I failed. The incongruity of such imaginings here--here amidst
+omnipotent silence--rendered such thoughts impossible. A leaf rustled,
+and its rustling sounded to my ears like the gentle closing of some
+giant door. A twig fell, and I turned sharply round, convinced I should
+see a pile of broken debris. I love all trees, but I love them best by
+day--to me it seems that night utterly metamorphizes them--brings out in
+them a subtler, darker side one would little suspect. Here, in this oak,
+for instance, was an example. In the morning one sees in it nought but
+quiet dignity, venerable old age, benevolence, and, by reason of the
+ample protection its branches afford from the sun, charity and
+philanthropy. Its leaves are bright, dainty, pretty; its trunk suggests
+nothing but a cosy and soothing retreat for students and lovers. But
+now--see how different! These great spreading, gnarled branches are
+hands, claws--monstrous and menacing; those leaves no longer bright
+remind me of a hearse's plumes; their rustling--of the rustling and
+switching of a pall or winding-sheet. The trunk, black, sinuous,
+towering, is assuredly no piece of timber, but something pulpy,
+something intangible, something antagonistic, mystic, devilish. I turn
+from it and shudder. Then my mind reverts to the elm--the elm on which
+Sir Algernon hanged himself. I remember it is not more than twenty yards
+from where I stand. I stare down at the soil, at the clumps of crested
+dog's-tail and stray blades of succulent darnel; I force my attention on
+a toadstool, whose soft and lowly head gleams sickly white in the
+moonbeams. I glance from it to a sleeping close-capped dandelion, from
+it to a thistle, from it again to a late bush vetch, and then,
+willy-nilly, to the accursed elm. My God! What a change. It wasn't like
+that when I passed it at noon. It was just an ordinary tree then, but
+now, now--and what is that--that sinister bundle--suspended from one
+of its curling branches? A cold sweat bursts out on me, my knees
+tremble, my hair begins to rise on end. Swinging round, I am about to
+rush away--blindly rush away--hither, thither, anywhere--anywhere out of
+sight of that tree and of all the hideous possibilities it promises to
+materialize for me. I have not taken five strides, however, before I am
+pulled sharply up by the sounds of horse's hoofs--of hoofs on the hard
+gravel, away in the distance. They speedily grow nearer. A horse is
+galloping, galloping towards me along the broad carriage drive. Nearer,
+nearer and nearer it comes! Who is it? WHAT is it? A deadly nausea
+seizes me, I swerve, totter, reel, and am only prevented from falling by
+the timely interference of a pine. The concussion with its leviathan
+trunk clears my senses. All my faculties become wonderfully and
+painfully alert. I would give my very soul if it were not so--if I could
+but fall asleep or faint. The sound of the hoofs is very much nearer
+now, so near indeed that I may see the man--Heaven grant it may be only
+a man after all--any moment. Ah! my heart gives a great sickly jerk.
+Something has shot into view. There, not fifty yards from me, where the
+road curves, and the break in the foliage overhead admits a great flood
+of moonlight. I recognize the "thing" at once; it's not a man, it's
+nothing human, it's the picture I know so well and dread so much, the
+portrait of Horace Wimpole, that hangs in the main hall--and it's
+mounted on a coal-black horse with wildly flying mane and foaming mouth.
+On and on they come, thud, thud, thud! The man is not dressed as a
+rider, but is wearing the costume in the picture--i.e. that of a
+macaroni! A nut! More fit for a lady's seminary than a fine, old English
+mansion.
+
+"Something beside me rustles--rustles angrily, and I know, I can feel,
+it is the bundle on the branch--the ghastly, groaning, creaking,
+croaking caricature of Sir Algernon. The horseman comes up to me--our
+eyes meet--I am looking in those of a dead--of a long since dead man--my
+blood freezes.
+
+"He flashes past me--thud, thud, thud! A bend in the road, and he
+vanishes from sight. But I can still hear him, still hear the mad patter
+of his horse's hoofs as they bear him onward, lifeless, fleshless,
+weightless, to his ancient home. God pity the souls that know no rest.
+
+"How I got back to the house I hardly know. I believe it was with my
+eyes shut, and I am certain I ran all the way.
+
+"About four o'clock the following afternoon I received a cablegram from
+Malta. Intuition warned me to prepare for the worst. Its contents were
+unpleasantly short and pithy--'Hal drowned at two o'clock this
+morning.--Dick.'
+
+"Two years passed--again an August night, hot and oppressive as before,
+and again--though surely against my will, my better judgment, if you
+like--I visited the wood. Horse's hoofs just the same as before. The
+same galloping, the same figure, the same EYES! the same mad,
+panic-stricken flight home, and, early in the succeeding afternoon, a
+similar cablegram--this time from Sicily. 'Dick died at midnight.
+Dysentery.--Andrews.'
+
+"Jack Andrews was Dick's pal--his bosom friend. So once again the
+phantom rider had brought its grisly message--played its ghoulish rôle.
+My brothers were both dead now, and only Beryl remained. Another year
+sped by and the last night in October--a Monday--saw me, impelled by a
+fascination I could not resist, once again in the wood. Up to a point
+everything happened as before. As the monotonous church clock struck
+twelve, from afar came the sound of hoofs. Nearer, nearer, nearer, and
+then with startling abruptness the rider shot into view. And now, mixed
+with the awful, indescribable terror the figure always conveyed with it,
+came a feeling of intense rage and indignation. Should Beryl--Beryl whom
+I loved next best to my wife--be torn from me even as Dick and Hal had
+been? No! Ten thousand times no! Sooner than that I would risk anything.
+A sudden inspiration, coming maybe from the whispering leaves, or from
+the elm, or from the mysterious flickering moonbeams, flashed through
+me. Could I not intercept the figures, drive them back? By doing so
+something told me Beryl might be saved. A terrible struggle at once took
+place within me, and it was only after the most desperate efforts that I
+at length succeeded in fighting back my terror and flung myself out into
+the middle of the drive. No words of mine can describe all I went
+through as I stood there anticipating the arrival of the phantoms. At
+length they came, right up to me; and as, with frantic resolution, I
+screwed up courage to plant myself directly in their path, and stared up
+into the rider's eyes, the huge steed halted, gave one shrill neigh, and
+turning round, galloped back again, disappearing whither it had
+emerged.
+
+"Two days afterwards I received a letter from my brother-in-law.
+
+"'I have been having an awful time,' he wrote. 'My darling Beryl has
+been frightfully ill. On Monday night we gave up all hope of her
+recovery, but at twelve o'clock, when the doctor bid us prepare for the
+end, the most extraordinary thing happened. Turning over in bed, she
+distinctly called out your name, and rallied. And now, thank God, she is
+completely out of danger. The doctor says it is the most astonishing
+recovery he has ever known.'
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"That is twenty years ago, and I've not seen the phantom rider since.
+Nor do I fancy he will appear again, for when I look into the eyes of
+the picture in the hall, they are no longer wandering, but at rest."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Perhaps, one of the most interesting accounts of the phantasm of a horse
+in my possession is that recorded by C.E. G----, a friend of my boyhood.
+Writing to me from the United States some months ago, he says:
+
+"Knowing how interested you are in all cases of hauntings, and in those
+relating to animal ghosts especially, I am sending you an account of an
+'experience' that happened to my uncle, Mr. John Dale, about six months
+ago. He was returning to his home in Bishopstone, near Helena, Montana,
+shortly after dark, and had arrived at a particularly lonely part of the
+road where the trees almost meet overhead, when his horse showed signs
+of restlessness. It slackened down, halted, shivered, whinnied, and kept
+up such a series of antics, that my uncle descended from the trap to see
+if anything was wrong with it. He thought that, perhaps, it was going to
+have some kind of fit, or an attack of ague, which is not an uncommon
+complaint among animals in his part of the country, and he was preparing
+to give it a dose of quinine, when suddenly it reared up violently, and
+before he could stop it, was careering along the road at lightning
+speed. My uncle was now in a pretty mess. He was stranded in a forest
+without a lantern, ten miles, at least, from home. Feeling too depressed
+to do anything, he sat down by the roadside, and seriously thought of
+remaining there till daybreak. A twinge of rheumatism, however, reminded
+him the ground was little warmer than ice, and made him realize that
+lying on it would be courting death. Consequently, he got up, and
+setting his lips grimly, struck out in the direction of Bishopstone. At
+every step he took the track grew darker. Shadows of trees and
+countless other things, for which he could see no counterpart, crept out
+and rendered it almost impossible for him to tell where to tread. A
+peculiar, indefinable dread also began to make itself felt, and the
+darkness seemed to him to assume an entirely new character. He plodded
+on, breaking into a jog-trot every now and then, and whistling by way of
+companionship. The stillness was sepulchral--he strained his ears, but
+could not even catch the sound of those tiny animals that are usually
+heard in the thickets and furze-bushes at night; and all his movements
+were exaggerated, until their echoes seemed to reverberate through the
+whole forest. A turn of the road brought him into view of something that
+made his heart throb with delight. Standing by the wayside was an
+enormous coach with four huge horses pawing the ground impatiently. My
+uncle rushed up to the driver, who was so enveloped in wraps, he could
+not see his face, and in a voice trembling with emotion begged for the
+favour of a lift--if not to Helena itself, as far in that direction as
+the coach was going. The driver made no reply, but with his hand
+motioned my uncle to get in. The latter did not need a second bidding,
+and the moment he was seated, the vehicle started off. It was a large,
+roomy conveyance, but had a stifling atmosphere about it that struck my
+uncle as most unpleasant; and although he could see no one, he
+intuitively felt he was not alone, and that more than one pair of eyes
+were watching him.
+
+"The coach did not go as fast as my uncle expected, but moved with a
+curious gliding motion, and the wheels made no noise whatever. This
+added to my uncle's apprehensions, and he almost made up his mind to
+open the carriage door and jump out. Something, however, which he could
+not account for restrained him, and he maintained his seat. Outside, all
+was still profoundly dark. The trees were scarcely distinguishable as
+deeper masses of shadow, and were recognizable only by the resinous
+odour, that, from time to time, sluggishly flowed in at the open window
+as the coach rolled on.
+
+"At length they overtook some other vehicle, and for the first time for
+some hours my uncle heard the sound of solid wheels, which were as
+welcome to him as any joy bells. Just as they were passing the
+conveyance--a small wagonette drawn by a pair of horses, the latter took
+fright; there were loud shouts and a great stampede, and my uncle, who
+leaned out of the coach window, caught a glimpse of the vehicle dashing
+along ahead of them at a frightful speed. The driver of the coach,
+apparently totally unconcerned, continued his journey at the same
+regular, mechanical pace.
+
+"Presently my uncle heard the sound of rushing water, and knew they must
+be nearing the Usk, a tributary of the Battle, which was only five miles
+from his house.
+
+"The forest now ceased, and they crossed the road over the bridge in a
+brilliant burst of moonlight. About a mile or so further on the coach
+halted, and, to my uncle's surprise, he found himself in front of a
+house he had no recollection of seeing before. He got out, and to his
+horror saw that instead of riding in a coach he had been riding in a
+hearse, and that the horses had on their heads gigantic sable plumes.
+
+"While he was standing gazing at the extraordinary equipage, the door of
+the house slowly opened, and two figures came out carrying a small
+coffin, which they placed inside the vehicle. He then heard loud peals
+of mad, hilarious laughter, and coach and horses immediately vanished.
+My uncle arrived home safely, but the shock of what he had experienced
+kept him in bed for some days. He learned that a phantom coach similar
+to the one he had ridden in had been seen in the forest twenty years
+previously, and that it was supposed to be a prognostication of some
+great misfortune, which supposition, in my uncle's case at least, proved
+true, as his wife died of apoplexy a few days after this adventure."
+
+Yet another case of haunting by the phantasms of a horse comes to me
+from a gentleman in Marseilles, who told it me thus:--
+
+"It was 9 p.m. when I left my friend Maitland's hotel in Châteauborne,
+and, facing north, set out on my way to Liffre, where my headquarters
+had been for the past fortnight. Liffre is in the hills, and the road
+which separated it from Châteauborne, wild and lonely enough in daylight
+and when the weather is fair, is almost untraversable in winter. The
+night in question was Christmas Eve; the snow had fallen heavily during
+the day, and with the wind blowing in icy draughts from the north-east,
+there was every prospect of another downfall. Maitland pressed me to
+stay in his hotel. 'It is sheer folly,' he said, 'for you to attempt to
+get home in weather like this. It is pitch dark, you are not familiar
+with the route, and if you don't wander off the track and tumble over a
+precipice, you will walk into a snowdrift. Be sensible--sleep here!'
+
+"Much, however, as I should have liked to follow his counsel, I did not
+feel justified in doing so, as I had a lot of correspondence to attend
+to, and I realized it was most necessary for me to get back to Liffre
+without any further delay.
+
+"It was true the night was inky black; but, with the aid of a lamp, I
+hadn't the slightest doubt I could find my way. Maitland bartered for a
+candle lantern with his host, and armed with this, a flagon of brandy
+and water and a thick stick, I said good-bye to Châteauborne.
+
+"A couple of hundred yards saw me beyond the outskirts of the town,
+wherein I was the sole pedestrian, and silence reigned supreme. On and
+on I plodded, the feeble, yellow light of my lantern just preventing
+me--but only just--from wandering from the track. The road, which for
+the first mile or so was tolerably level, gradually began to rise, and,
+as it did so, I noticed for the first time indistinct images of
+gigantic, naked trees that becoming more and more numerous, and closer
+and closer together, at length united their long and grotesquely shaped
+branches overhead, and I found myself in the depths of a vast forest.
+The snow, which had up to the present held off, now recommenced to fall,
+and presently the wind, which had for some time been slowly acquiring
+strength, came howling through the trees with the utmost fury, the first
+blast swishing the lantern out of my hands and hurling me with
+considerable force into an undergrowth of thorns and brambles, out of
+which I extricated myself with no little difficulty.
+
+"I was now in the sorriest of plights--enveloped on all sides in Stygian
+darkness I was unable to discover my lantern, and was thus totally at
+the mercy of the ruthless elements. There were only two courses before
+me--either I must remain where I was and be frozen to death, or, making
+a guess at the route, I must push on ahead and run the risk of ending my
+life at the bottom of a ravine. I chose the latter. Groping about with
+my feet, until I at length discovered what I thought must be the right
+track, I pushed ahead, and, staggering and stumbling forward, managed to
+make some sort of progress, terribly slow though it was. The blinding
+darkness of the snowy night, the intense silence and utter solitude of
+the place, combined with the knowledge that on all sides of me lay holes
+and chasms, dampened my spirits and raised strange phantoms in my
+imagination. The wind now rose, and the dismal sighing of the trees
+speedily grew into a series of the most perturbing screeches, as the
+branches and trunks swayed to and fro like reeds before the violence of
+the hurricane.
+
+"At this juncture I gave myself up for lost, and, coming to a standstill
+up to my knees in snow, was preparing to lie down and die, when, to my
+great joy, a light suddenly appeared ahead of me, and the next moment a
+man, mounted on a big white horse, rode noiselessly up to me. He was
+wrapped in a shaggy great-coat, and a slouch hat worn low over his eyes
+completely hid his face from me. In his disengaged hand he carried a
+lantern.
+
+"'By Jove!' I exclaimed, 'I am glad to see you, for I've lost the track
+to Liffre. Can you tell me, or, better still, show me, the way to some
+house where I can put up for the remainder of the night?'
+
+"The stranger made no reply, but bidding me follow with a wave of his
+hand, rode silently in front of me, and although I tried to keep up with
+him, I could not; and the odd thing was, that without apparently
+increasing his pace, he always maintained his distance. After proceeding
+in this manner for possibly ten minutes, we suddenly turned to the left,
+and I found myself in a big clearing in the wood, with a long, low-built
+house opposite me.
+
+"My guide then paused, and indicating the front door of the house with
+an emphatic gesture of his hand, seemed suddenly to melt away into thin
+air, for although I peered about me on all sides to try to find some
+indications of him, neither he nor his horse was anywhere to be seen.
+Thinking this was rather queer, but quite ready to attribute it to
+natural causes, I approached the building, and, making use of my
+knuckles in lieu of a knocker, beat a loud tattoo on the woodwork. There
+was no response. Again I rapped, and the door slowly opening revealed a
+pair of gleaming, dark eyes. 'What do you want?' enquired a harsh voice
+in barbarous accents. 'A night's lodging,' I replied; 'and I'm willing
+to pay a good price for it, for I'm more than half frozen.'
+
+"At this the door opened wider, and I found myself confronted by a woman
+with a candle. She had not the most prepossessing of expressions, though
+her hair, eyes and features were decidedly good. She was dressed with
+tawdry smartness--earrings, necklace, and rings, and very high-heeled
+buckle shoes. Indeed, her costume was so out of keeping with the
+rusticity of her surroundings as to be quite extraordinary. This fact
+struck me at once, as did her fingers, which, though spatulate and ugly,
+had been manicured, and of course very much over-manicured, for effect.
+Had this not been the case, I probably should not have noticed them. But
+the unnatural gloss on them, exaggerated by the candlelight, made me
+look, and I was at once impressed with the criminal formation of the
+fingers--the club-shaped ends denoted something very bad--something
+homicidal--and as my eyes wandered from the hands to the face, I saw
+with a thrill of horror that the ears were set low down and far back on
+the head, and that the eyes gleamed with the sinister glitter of the
+wolf.
+
+"Still, I must take my chance--the woman or the wood--it had to be one
+of the two. 'If you'll step inside, monsieur,' she said, 'I'll see what
+can be done for you. We have only recently come here, and the house is
+anyhow at present. Still, if you don't mind roughing it a little, we can
+let you have a bed, and you can rely upon me that it is clean and
+well-aired.' I followed her eagerly, and she led me down a narrow
+passage into a big room with a low ceiling, traversed with a ponderous
+oak beam, blackened with the smoke of endless peat fires.
+
+"Before the blazing faggots on the hearth sat a burly-looking individual
+in a blue blouse. On our arrival he arose, and as his huge form towered
+above me, I thought I had never seen anyone quite so hideous, nor so
+utterly unlike the orthodox Frenchman. Obeying his injunction--for I can
+scarcely call it an invitation--to sit down, I took a seat by the fire,
+and warming my half-frozen limbs, waited impatiently whilst the woman
+made up my bed and prepared supper.
+
+"The storm had now reached cyclonic dimensions, and under its stupendous
+fury the whole house--stoutly built though it was--swayed on its
+foundations. The howling of the wind in the rude, old-fashioned chimney
+and along the passage, and the frenzied beating of the snow against the
+diamond window-panes, deadened all other noises, and rendered any
+attempt at conversation absolutely abortive. So I ate my meal in
+silence, pretending not to notice the subtle interchange of glances that
+constantly took place between the strangely assorted pair. Whether they
+were husband and wife, what the man did for a living, were questions
+that continually occurred to me, and I found my eyes incessantly
+wandering to the numerous packing-cases, piles of carpets, casks and
+other articles, which corroborated the woman's statement that they had
+but recently 'moved in.' Once I attempted to empty the coffee (which was
+black and peculiarly bitter) under the table, but had to desist, as I
+saw the man's devilish eyes fixed searchingly on me. I then pushed aside
+the cup, and on the woman asking if it was not to my liking, I shouted
+out that I was not in the least thirsty. After this incident the covert
+looks became more numerous, and my suspicions increased accordingly.
+
+"At the first opportunity I got up, and signalling my intention to go to
+bed, was preparing to leave my seat, when my host, walking to a
+cupboard, fetched out a bottle of cognac, and pouring out a tumbler,
+handed it me with a mien that I dare not refuse.
+
+"The woman then led me up a flight of rickety, wooden steps and into a
+sepulchral-looking chamber with no other furniture in it save a long,
+narrow, iron bedstead, a dilapidated washstand, a very unsteady, common
+deal table, on which was a looking-glass and a collar stud, and a
+rush-bottomed chair. Setting the candlestick on the dressing-table, and
+assuring me again that the bed was well aired, my hostess withdrew,
+observing as she left the room that she would get me a nice breakfast
+and call me at seven. At seven! How I wished it was seven now! As I
+stood in the midst of the floor shivering--for the room was icy cold, I
+suddenly saw a dark shadow emerge from a remote corner of the room and
+slide surreptitiously towards the door, where it halted. My eyes then
+fell on the lock, and I perceived that there was no key. No key! And
+that evil-looking pair below! I must barricade the door somehow. Yet
+with what? There was nothing of any weight in the room! Nothing! I began
+to feel horribly tired and sleepy--so sleepy that it was only with
+supreme effort I could prevent my eyelids closing. Ah! I had it--a
+wedge! I had a knife. Of wood there was plenty--a piece off the
+washstand, table, or chair. Anything would suffice. I essayed to
+struggle to the chair, my limbs tottered, my eyelids closed. Then the
+shadow from the doorway moved towards and THROUGH me, and with the
+coldness of its passage I revived! With desperate energy I cut a couple
+of chunks off the washstand, and paring them down, eventually succeeded
+in slipping them in the crack of the door, and rendering it impossible
+to open from the outside. That done, I staggered to the bed, and
+falling, dressed as I was, on the counterpane, sank into a deep sleep.
+How long I slept I cannot say. I suddenly heard the loud neighing of a
+horse which seemed to come from just under my window, and, as in a
+vision, saw by my side in the bed a something which gradually developed
+into the figure of a man, the counterpart of the mysterious being in the
+shaggy coat who had guided me to the house. He was fully dressed, sound
+asleep and breathing heavily. As I was looking a dark shadow fell across
+the sleeper's face, and on glancing up I perceived, to my horror, a
+black something crawling on the floor. Nearer and nearer it came, until
+it reached the side of the bed, when I immediately recognized the evil,
+smirking face of my hostess. In one hand she held a lamp and in the
+other a horn-handled knife. Setting the lamp on the floor, she coolly
+undid the collar of the sleeping man, and I saw a stud, the counterpart
+of the one on the dressing-table, fall on the bare boards with a sharp
+tap, and disappear in the surrounding darkness. Then the woman felt the
+edge of the knife with her repulsive thumb, and calmly cut the helpless
+man's throat. I screamed--and the murderess and her victim instantly
+vanished--and I realized I was alone in the room and very much awake.
+Whether all that had occurred was a dream, I cannot say with certainty,
+though I am inclined to think not.
+
+"For some minutes my heart pulsated painfully, and then as the sound of
+its throbbing grew fainter and fainter, I heard a curious noise outside
+my room--someone was ascending the stairs. I endeavoured to rise, but
+could not--fear, an awful, ungovernable fear, held me spellbound. The
+steps paused outside the door, the handle of which was gently turned.
+Then there was a suggestive silence, then whispering, then another
+turning of the handle, and then--my state of coma abruptly ended, and I
+stepped noiselessly out of bed and crept to the window. I was heard.
+'Stop him,' the woman cried out, 'he's trying to escape. Use the gun.'
+She hurled herself against the door as she spoke, whilst the man tore
+downstairs.
+
+"It was now a matter of seconds, the slightest accident, a hesitation,
+and I was lost. Swinging open the window, I scrambled on the ledge, and
+without the slightest idea of the distance--dropped! There was a brief
+rushing through air and I alighted--safe and sound--on the snow.
+Blessed snow! Had it not been for the snow I should in all probability
+have hurt myself! I alighted not an instant too soon, for hardly had I
+touched the ground before my gigantic host came tearing round the angle
+of the wall with a lantern in one hand and gun in the other. I
+immediately dashed away, and, thanks to the intense darkness of the
+morning--for it must have been two o'clock--had no difficulty in evading
+my pursuer, who fired twice in rapid succession.
+
+"On and on I went, sometimes falling up to my armpits in the snowdrift,
+and sometimes stunning myself against a low-hanging branch of a tree.
+With the first rays of sunlight, however, my troubles came to an end.
+The snow had ceased falling, and I quickly alighted on a track, which
+brought me to a village, whence I obtained a conveyance into Liffre.
+
+"I reported the affair to the local police, and a party of gendarmes at
+once set off to arrest the miscreants. But, alas, they had fled. The
+house was pulled down, and, on the soil being excavated, a dozen or more
+skeletons of men and women--all showing unmistakable signs of foul
+play--together with the remains of a horse, were found in various parts
+of the premises. The place was a veritable Golgotha. I suppose the
+phantom horse and rider had appeared to me with the sole purpose of
+making their fate known. If so, they at all events partly achieved their
+end, though the mystery surrounding their identity was never solved. All
+the remains, both human and animal, were removed elsewhere, and accorded
+a decent burial. The site of their original interment, however, is, I
+believe, still haunted, and maybe will remain so till the miscreants are
+brought to book."
+
+
+_Brief Summary_
+
+After a little consideration I am inclined to think there are quite as
+many authentic cases of hauntings by the phantasms of horses as by the
+phantasms of cats and dogs. Innumerable horses die unnatural deaths.
+Apart from those killed in war, many,--more particularly, it is true, in
+the olden times,--have been murdered in the highways along with their
+masters; whilst all but the comparative few, when no longer of use to
+their owners, are butchered in the slaughter-house, and subsequently
+despatched to the Zoological Gardens, to be eaten by lions and tigers.
+So much for Christianity, and for man's gratitude. How much better would
+the promoters of the White Slave Traffic Act be employed, if,--instead
+of trying to pass a bill which obviously cannot cure the evil it aims
+at, but can only, by diverting the course of that evil, drive from
+pillar to post thousands of defenceless, albeit erring women,--they were
+to labour to secure a peaceful ending for our four-footed toilers, who
+work for us all their lives, never strike, never think of a pension for
+old age, and never even dream of a vote. Alas! If only our poor horses
+could vote, what a different attitude would our pharisaical politicians
+at once adopt towards them!
+
+
+_Phantasms of Living Horses_
+
+From what I have experienced and have been told, I am of the opinion
+that horses possess the same faculty of separating their immaterial from
+their material bodies, as cats and dogs. I knew a Virginian lady who had
+a piebald horse that frequently appeared simultaneously in two places.
+She lived in an old country house near Winchfield, and one morning when
+she went into the breakfast-room, she was surprised to see the piebald
+horse standing on the gravel path, outside the window, looking in at
+her. When she called it by name, it immediately melted into fine air.
+Going round to the stables she found the horse in its stall, and on
+enquiry was informed that it had been there all the time.
+
+The same thing frequently occurred, other members of the household
+besides herself witnessing it, and so like, in all its details, was the
+immaterial horse to the material, that they were often at a loss to tell
+which was which. The phenomenon sometimes occurring when the real horse
+was awake, and sometimes when it was asleep, proves that the animal
+possessed the faculty of projecting its spiritual ego--astral body, or
+whatever you like to call it--both consciously and unconsciously. I know
+of many similar instances.
+
+
+_Horses and the Psychic Faculty of Scent_
+
+Horses, in a rather less degree than cats, and in much the same degree
+as dogs, possess the property of scenting the advent and presence of
+spirits. On more than one occasion, when I have been riding after dusk,
+my horse has suddenly come to an abrupt halt and shown unmistakable
+signs of terror. I have not been able to see anything to account for its
+conduct, but on subsequent enquiry have learned, either that a tragedy
+was actually known to have taken place there, or that the spot had long
+borne a reputation for being haunted. And my experiences are the
+experiences of countless other people.
+
+Before a death a horse will often neigh repeatedly outside the house of
+the doomed person, and not infrequently show evidences of terror in
+passing close to it, from which I deduce the horse can at all events
+scent the proximity of the phantom of death. Like the dog, however, I
+think it only possesses this peculiar psychic property in a limited
+degree. It can, for example, readily detect the whereabouts of phantasms
+haunting localities, but not so easily those haunting people.
+
+It shows little or no discrimination on sight, between cruel and brutal
+people and those who are kind, giving the same amount of passing space
+to the one as it does to the other. Yet, on the other hand, I have
+watched horses at night, standing in the fields, their heads thrown
+back, a transfixed, far-off expression in their eyes, sniffing the
+atmosphere--and snuffling it in a manner that strongly suggested to me
+they were carrying on, by means of some silent, secret code, a
+conversation with some superphysical presence, which they either saw or
+scented, very likely both.
+
+Scent, I am convinced, is the medium of conversation, not only between
+superphysical animals, but between material animals, and if we ever wish
+to converse with spirits we must employ cats, dogs, and horses to teach
+us.
+
+
+_Phantom Coaches_
+
+There are few parts of the British Isles--few countries in Europe--which
+have not their phantom coaches. Perhaps the most famous are those that
+haunt a road near Newport, South Wales, and an old highway in Devon.
+
+
+_A Spectre Coach and Horses in Pembrokeshire_
+
+Miss Mary L. Lewes, in an article called "Some More Welsh Ghosts," that
+appeared in the _Occult Review_ for December, 1907, writes thus:--
+
+"In common with several other districts in Great Britain and Ireland,
+Pembrokeshire possesses a good 'phantom coach' legend, localized in the
+southern part of the county, at a place where four roads meet, called
+Sampson Cross. In old days the belated farmer driving home in his gig
+from market was apt to cast a nervous glance over his shoulder as his
+pony slowly climbed the last pitch leading up to the Cross. For
+tradition says that every night a certain Lady Z. (who lived in the
+seventeenth century, and whose monument is in the church close by)
+drives over from Tenby, ten miles distant, in a coach drawn by headless
+horses, guided by a headless coachman. She also has no head, and
+arriving by midnight at Sampson Cross, the whole equipage is said to
+disappear in a flame of fire, with a loud noise of explosion."
+
+Miss Mary L. Lewes goes on to add:--
+
+"A clergyman living in the immediate neighbourhood, who told the writer
+the story, said that some people believed the ghostly traveller had been
+safely 'laid' many years ago in the waters of the lake not far off. He
+added, however that might be, it was an odd fact that his sedate and
+elderly cob, when driven home past the Cross after nightfall, would
+invariably start as if frightened there, a thing which never happened by
+daylight."
+
+What these kinds of spectral horses are no one can say. At the
+most--despite what theosophists and occultists may declare to the
+contrary--one can only theorize--and the speculations of one person, be
+he who he may, seem to me to be of no more consequence than those of
+another.
+
+For my own part I am inclined to think that whereas, in some cases, the
+ghostly coach horses are the phantoms of horses that were killed on the
+highways, in others they are either Vice-Elementals, or Elementals whose
+particular function it is to prognosticate death,--either the death of
+those who see them, or the death of someone connected with those who see
+them.
+
+
+_A Phantom Horse and Policeman_
+
+According to one of my correspondents, Mr. T---- P----, a comparatively
+modern phantom rider has been seen in Canada. Writing to me from C----,
+where he lives, he says: "It is stated that this town is periodically
+haunted by the phantom of a tall, fair policeman mounted on a white
+horse and clothed in the uniform of the 'forties--namely, tail coat,
+tight trousers, and tall hat. His 'phantom' beat extends from a gateway
+at the commencement of Cod Hill, along the Park side of Pablo Street to
+Sutton Street, and Adam Street, down Dane Street, and back, through
+Pablo Street, to the gateway on Cod Hill."
+
+A gentleman well known in the art world, who, in order to avoid
+publicity, wishes to be designated Mr. Bates, gave me his experience of
+the phenomena as follows:--
+
+"Yes, I have seen the ghostly policeman and his milk-white horse. I was
+walking along Pablo Street on the Park side, one grey afternoon in
+November, with the express intention of meeting a friend at my Club in
+Royal Street, when to my surprise, just as I was about a hundred yards
+from the gateway on Cod Hill, I was overtaken by a tall, fair-haired
+man, riding a white horse. He was so dressed that I stared in
+astonishment. He was wearing the costume of seventy or eighty years ago,
+and reminded me of the policemen in Cruikshank's illustrations of
+Dickens. I was not frightened, because I thought he must be someone
+masquerading; and, in my curiosity to see his face, I hastened my steps
+to overtake him. I failed; for although he appeared to be riding slowly,
+hardly moving at all, I could not draw an inch nearer to him. This made
+me think, and I examined him more critically. Then I noticed several
+things about him, that, at first, had escaped my notice. They were
+these: (one) that although he was mounted he was wearing walking
+clothes--he had on long trousers and thick, clumsy boots; (two) that his
+ears and neck were perfectly colourless, of an unnatural and startling
+white; (three) that despite the incongruity of his attire, no one but
+myself seemed to see him. On he rode, neither looking to the left nor to
+the right, until he came to Sutton Street, when, without paying the
+slightest attention to the traffic, he began to cross over. There were
+crowds of vehicles passing at the time, and one of them rushed right on
+him. Making sure he would be killed, I uttered an ejaculation of
+horror. Judge, then, of my amazement, when, instead of seeing him lying
+on the ground, crushed out of all shape, I saw him still riding on, as
+leisurely and unconcernedly as if he had been on a country road. THE
+VEHICLE HAD PASSED RIGHT THROUGH HIM. Though I had hitherto scoffed at
+ghosts, I was now certain I had seen one, and suddenly becoming
+conscious how very cold it was, I tore on, not feeling at all
+comfortable till I had reached the warm, cheery, and thoroughly material
+quarters of my Club."
+
+To corroborate the evidence of "Mr. Bates," I append a narrative given
+me verbally by Miss Hartly, who, like Mr. Bates, had, up to the time of
+her experience, posed as a pronounced and somewhat bitter sceptic. She
+was an emphatic freethinker, and had then no belief whatsoever in a
+future life. Now she believes "a sight" more than most people.
+
+"One afternoon, in February, 1911," she stated, "just as twilight was
+commencing, I left the Park, where I had been exercising my dog, and
+turning into Pablo Street, made for Bright Street. At the corner of Wolf
+Street I saw something so strange that I involuntarily halted. Riding
+slowly along on a big white horse, a few paces ahead of me, was an
+enormous policeman in the quaint attire of the 'forties--top hat, tail
+coat, tight trousers, just as I had so often seen portrayed in old
+books. He was riding stiffly, as if unaccustomed to the saddle, and kept
+looking rigidly in front of him. Thinking it was someone doing it either
+for a joke or a wager, I was greatly tickled, and kept saying to myself,
+'Well, you are a sport, an A1 sport.' I tried to catch him up, to see
+how he made up his face, but could not, for although the horse never
+seemed to quicken its pace--a mere crawl--and I ran, it nevertheless
+maintained precisely the same distance in front of me. When we had
+progressed in this fashion some hundred or so yards, I perceived a City
+policeman advancing towards us.
+
+"'Come, now,' I said to myself, 'we shall see some fun--the 1911 copper
+meeting the peeler of 1840. I wonder what he will think of him.'
+
+"To my intense astonishment, however, neither even as much as gave the
+other a fleeting glance, but passed by unmoved, and, to all appearance,
+wholly unconscious of each other.
+
+"A few yards further, I espied a negro looking intently in a store
+window. Just as the strange policeman came up to him, he gave a violent
+start, turned round and stared at him, gasped, his cheeks ashy pale, his
+eyes bulging, made some exclamation I could not catch, and, dashing past
+me, fled. Then, and not till then, did I begin to feel funny. Further
+on still we came to a crossing. A carriage and pair with a coronet on
+the panels of the door was standing waiting. Directly the policeman
+approached, both the horses reared so violently, they all but threw the
+coachman off the box. One of the men cried out, 'Heavens, Bill, what's
+that?' But the other and older of the two, who was clinging to the reins
+with all his might, merely swore.
+
+"Convinced now that I was on the trail of something not human--something
+in all probability superphysical, and, impelled by a fascination I could
+not resist, I followed.
+
+"At the top of Wolf Street the policeman paused, then crossing slowly
+over, turned into Dane Street, down which he continued to ride with the
+same mechanical and automatic tread. At length, when within a few feet
+of a certain shop, over which is a flat that has long borne a reputation
+for being haunted, the horse came to a dead halt, and horse and rider,
+veering slowly round, looked at me. What I saw I shall never forget. I
+saw the faces of the DEAD--the LONG SINCE dead. For some moments they
+confronted me, and then--vanished, vanished where they stood. I saw them
+again, under precisely the same conditions, two days later, and I have
+seen them once since. I am not an imaginative or highly-strung person,
+but am, on the contrary, exceedingly practical and matter-of-fact, no
+better proof of which I can give than this fact--I am engaged to be
+married to a Quebec solicitor!"
+
+
+_An Irish Haunting_
+
+Mr. Reginald B. Span, in a most interesting article called "Some
+Glimpses of the Unseen," that appeared in the _Occult Review_ for
+February, 1906, writes as follows:--
+
+"Another strange incident, which also occurred in Ireland, was told me
+by a coachman in my cousin's employ at Kilpeacon, near Limerick. This
+man had previously been a park-keeper to Lord Doneraile in Co. Cork. One
+bright moonlight night, he was coming across Lord Doneraile's park,
+having been round to see that the gates were shut, when his attention
+was drawn to the distant baying of hounds, and he stopped to listen, as
+the sounds seemed to proceed from within the park walls, and he knew
+there were no hounds kept on the estate. His young son was with him, and
+also heard the noise, which was getting louder and clearer, and was
+evidently moving rapidly in their direction. His first idea was that a
+pack of hounds which were kept in the hunting kennels a few miles away,
+had escaped and had somehow got into the park, although he had seen that
+the gates were closed, and there was really no way by which they could
+have entered. The baying of hounds, as if in 'full cry,' sounded closer
+and closer, and suddenly, out of the shadow of some trees, a number of
+foxhounds, running at full speed, appeared in the clear light of the
+moon. They raced past the amazed spectators (a whole pack of them),
+followed closely by an elderly man on a large horse. Although they came
+very near, no sound could be heard but the baying of one or two of the
+hounds. The galloping of the horse was not heard at all. They swung
+across the grass at a tremendous pace, and were lost to view round the
+end of a plantation. The park-keeper knew that all the gates were shut,
+and that it would be impossible for a pack of hounds to pass out, and he
+thought the mystery might be solved the next day. However, it never was
+explained--by any natural cause. No hounds or horseman had been in the
+park. The mansion was closed, Lord Doneraile being away, and no one had
+the right of entering the grounds within the park walls. He heard later
+that there was a story in the neighbourhood about 'the ghost' of a
+former Lord Doneraile 'haunting' the park--and possibly the spectral
+horseman was he. I questioned the man and his son closely about it, and
+am convinced they were not deceived by hallucination, and that their
+account is perfectly true."
+
+To this account Mr. Span adds this note:--
+
+"The apparition of hounds and huntsman was witnessed on an estate
+belonging to Lord Doneraile, in the South of Ireland (Doneraile Park);
+the man who told me the incident was coachman in the service of my
+cousin, near Limerick. His young son confirmed his father's account, as
+he also saw it.
+
+          "Yours faithfully,
+
+                    "REGINALD B. SPAN."
+
+To throw additional light on the matter Mr. Ralph Shirley, editor of the
+_Occult Review_, published the following letter, written to him by Lord
+Doneraile:--
+
+"DEAR SHIRLEY,
+
+"It is rather a curious thing that neither Lady Castletown nor Lady
+Doneraile has ever heard of the story of the moonlight vision of Lord
+Doneraile and the pack of hounds. However, there is a man at Doneraile
+called Jones, a chemist, who is a most enthusiastic antiquarian and a
+dabbler in the occult sciences, and he takes the greatest interest in
+all that concerns the St. Legers. Lady Castletown wrote to him, and the
+reply comes from his brother (I suppose he is away), and that I send
+you.
+
+"Lady Doneraile says it must refer to the third Lord Doneraile of the
+first creation, who was killed in a duel afterwards; and there appear to
+be a lot of stories which Jones has ferreted out or been told. Of
+course, I don't know how far you could say Jones was authentic. All I
+can say is that he believes the things himself.
+
+          "Yours sincerely,
+
+                    "DONERAILE."
+
+"_Dec. 27, 1905._"
+
+"I should explain," adds Mr. Shirley, "that Lady Castletown is daughter
+to the late Lord Doneraile, and present owner of Doneraile House. Here
+follows the enclosure, i.e. the extract made by Walter A. Jones,
+Doneraile, from his MS. notes on the Legends of Peasantry in connection
+with Doneraile branch of the St. Leger family. Dated December 21, 1905.
+
+"I have heard," so it runs, "the following story respecting the Lord
+Doneraile, who pursues the chase from Ballydineen through Gloun-na-goth
+Wilkinson's Lawn, through Byblox, across the ford of Shanagh aha
+Keel-ahboobleen into Waskin's Glen into the old Deer Park at Old Court,
+thence into the Horse Close, and from thence into the park. He appears
+to take particular delight in Wilkinson's Lawn according to tradition,
+for it was there that the noble stag was lost sight of, and of course it
+was there he was most searched for. It was only last autumn that two
+gentlemen were going to a fair, as I heard, and leading a very fine
+horse behind the trap. The night being fine and moonlight, they stopped
+at the iron gate there to light their pipes, when a gentleman dressed in
+old style, with buckskin leggings, walked through the iron gate, though
+closed, and patted the led horse on the neck. They both agreed that he
+was most like to gentlemen of the St. Leger family whom they had known.
+The Radiant Boy also appears here, and for years in the early part of
+last century no one would pass there after nightfall. The Lord
+Doneraile, who is believed by the peasantry to stand under Lord
+Doneraile's Oak, it has been told me positively, was third Viscount.
+
+"There is an old man called Reardon here now who saw a gentleman riding
+a powerful black horse along Lord Doneraile's route in the middle of the
+day, and his sister who was with him failed to see the horseman, though
+her brother had to pull her out of his way.
+
+"I went up to Saffron Hill last winter to see the ostrich-like ghost
+which is there, and I heard a great sweep as of hounds and horses going
+past me. Paddy Shea, late herd to Lord Doneraile, also would swear he
+saw the phantom Lord Doneraile pursuing the chase often. I have heard
+that James Mullaine also saw him in Wilkinson's Lawn, but have not any
+further proof.
+
+"It is very few people will admit having seen these things. George
+Buckley, present keeper of the Doneraile Park, got a great fright one
+night which might have been from the same cause."
+
+In this case it seems more than likely the huntsman, horse and hounds
+were all _bona fide_ phantasms of the dead.
+
+
+_Wild Darrell_
+
+Littlecote, as everyone knows, is haunted by the spirits of the
+notorious "Wild Will Darrell" and the horse he invariably rode, and
+which eventually broke his neck.
+
+But there are many Wild Darrells; all Europe is overrun by them. They
+nightly tear, on their phantom horses, over the German and Norwegian
+forests and moor-lands that echo and re-echo with their hoarse shouts
+and the mournful baying of their grisly hounds.
+
+Many travellers in Russia and Germany journeying through the forests at
+night have caught the sound of wails,--of moans that, starting from the
+far distance, have gradually come nearer and nearer. Then they have
+heard the winding of a horn, the shouting and cursing of the huntsman,
+and in a biting cold wind have seen the whole cavalcade sweep by.
+
+According to various authorities on the subject this spectral chase goes
+by different names. In Thuringia and elsewhere, it is "Hakelnberg" or
+"Hackelnbarend,"--the story being that Hakelnberg, a German knight, who
+had devoted his whole life to the chase, on his death-bed had told the
+officiating priest that he cared not a jot for heaven, but only for
+hunting; the priest losing patience and exclaiming, "Then hunt till
+Doomsday."
+
+So, in all weathers, in snow and ice, Hakelnberg, his horse and hounds,
+are seen careering after imaginary game.
+
+There are similar stories current in the Netherlands, Denmark, Russia,
+and practically all over Europe, and not only Europe, but in many of the
+states and departments of the New World. This being so, I think there
+must be a substantial substratum of truth underlying the beliefs,
+phantastic as they may appear, and yet, are no more phantastic than many
+of the stories we are asked to give absolute credence to in the Bible.
+
+In Old Castile the spirit of a Moorish leader who won many victories
+over the Spaniards, and was drowned by reason of his heavy armour in a
+swamp of the River Duero, still haunts his burial-place, a piece of
+marshy ground, near Burgos. There, weird noises, such as the winding of
+a huntsman's horn and the neighing of a horse, are heard, and the
+phantasm of the dead Moor is seen mounted on a white horse followed by
+twelve huge, black hounds.
+
+In Sweden many of the peasants say, when a noise like that of a coach
+and horses is heard rumbling past in the dead of night, "It is the White
+Rider," whilst in Norway they say of the same sounds, "It is the hunt of
+the Devil and his four horses." In Saxony the rider is believed to be
+Barbarossa, the celebrated hero of olden days. Near Fontainebleau, Hugh
+Capet is stated to ride a gigantic sable horse to the palace, where he
+hunted before the assassination of Henry IV; and in the Landes the rider
+is thought to be Judas Iscariot. In other parts of France the wild
+huntsman is known as Harlequin or Henequin, and in some parts of
+Brittany he is "Herod in pursuit of the Holy Innocents." (Alas, that no
+such Herod visits London! How welcome would he be, were he only to flout
+a few of the brawling brats who, allowed to go anywhere they please,
+make an inferno of every road they choose to play in.)
+
+Here my notes on horses end; and although the evidence I have offered
+may have failed to convince many, I myself am fully satisfied that these
+noble and indispensable animals do not terminate their existence in this
+world, but pass on to another, and, let us all sincerely hope, far
+happier, plane.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+BULLS, COWS, PIGS, ETC.
+
+
+From the Hebrides there comes to me a case of the phantasm of a black
+bull, that, on certain nights in the year, is heard bellowing inside the
+shed where it was killed.
+
+There are many accounts of ghostly cows heard "mooing" in the moors and
+bog-lands of Scotland and Ireland respectively, and not a few cases of
+whole herds of phantom cattle seen, gliding along, one behind the other,
+with silent, noiseless tread. Though I have never had the opportunity of
+experimenting with cows to see if they are sensitive to the
+superphysical, I see no reason why they should not be, and I feel quite
+certain they will participate in "the future life."
+
+Apropos of pigs, Mr. Dyer, in his _Ghost World_, says, "Another form of
+spectre animal is the kirk-grim, which is believed to haunt many
+churches. Sometimes it is a pig, sometimes a horse, the haunting spectre
+being the spirit of an animal buried alive in the churchyard for the
+purpose of scaring away the sacrilegious."
+
+Mr. Dyer goes on to say that it was the custom of the old Christian
+churches to bury a lamb under the altar; and that if anyone entered a
+church out of service time and happened to see a little lamb spring
+across the choir and vanish, it was a sure prognostication of the death
+of some child; and if this apparition was seen by the grave-digger the
+death would take place immediately. Mr. Dyer also tells us that the
+Danish kirk-grim was thought to hide itself in the tower of a church in
+preference to any other place, and that it was thought to protect the
+sacred buildings. According to the same writer, in the streets of
+Kroskjoberg, a grave sow, or, as it was called, a "gray-sow," was
+frequently seen, and it was said to be the apparition of a sow formerly
+buried alive; its appearance foretelling death or calamity.
+
+
+_Phantasm of a Goat_
+
+Mrs. Crowe, in her _Night Side of Nature_, relates one case of a house
+near Philadelphia, U.S.A., that was haunted by a variety of phenomena,
+among others that of a spectre resembling a goat.
+
+"Other extraordinary things happened in the house," she writes, "which
+had the reputation of being haunted, although the son had not believed
+it, and had thereupon not mentioned the report to the father.
+
+"One day the children said they had been running after 'such a queer
+thing in the cellar; it was like a goat, and not like a goat, but it
+seemed to be like a shadow.'"
+
+This explanation does not appear to be very satisfactory, but as I have
+heard of one or two other cases of premises being haunted by what,
+undoubtedly, were the phantasms of goats, I think it highly probable it
+was the ghost of a goat in this instance, too.
+
+
+_The Phantom Pigs of the Chiltern Hills_
+
+A good many years ago there was a story current of an extraordinary
+haunting by a herd of pigs. The chief authority on the subject was a
+farmer, who was an eye-witness of the phenomena. I will call him Mr. B.
+
+Mr. B., as a boy, lived in a small house called the Moat Grange, which
+was situated in a very lonely spot near four cross-roads, connecting
+four towns.
+
+The house, deriving its name from the fact that a moat surrounded it,
+stood near the meeting point of the four roads, which was the site of a
+gibbet, the bodies of the criminals being buried in the moat.
+
+Well, the B----s had not been living long on the farm, before they were
+awakened one night by hearing the most dreadful noises, partly human and
+partly animal, seemingly proceeding from a neighbouring spinney, and on
+going to a long front window overlooking the cross-roads, they saw a
+number of spotted creatures like pigs, screaming, fighting and tearing
+up the soil on the site of the criminals' cemetery.
+
+The sight was so unexpected and alarming that the B----s were appalled,
+and Mr. B. was about to strike a light on the tinder-box, when the most
+diabolical white face was pressed against the outside of the window-pane
+and stared in at them.
+
+This was the climax, the children shrieked with terror, and Mrs. B.,
+falling on her knees, began to pray, whereupon the face at the window
+vanished, and the herd of pigs, ceasing their disturbance, tore
+frantically down one of the high roads, and disappeared from view.
+
+Similar phenomena were seen and heard so frequently afterwards, that the
+B----s eventually had to leave the farm, and subsequent enquiries led
+to their learning that the place had long borne the reputation of being
+haunted, the ghosts being supposed to be the earth-bound spirits of the
+executed criminals. Whether this was so or not must, of course, be a
+matter of conjecture--the herd of hogs may well have been the phantasms
+of actual earth-bound pigs--attracted to the spot by a sort of
+fellow-feeling for the criminals, whose gross and carnal natures would
+no doubt appeal to them.
+
+A lane in Hertfordshire was--and, perhaps, still is--haunted by the
+phantasm of a big white sow which had accidentally been run over and
+killed. It was occasionally heard grunting, and had the unpleasant knack
+of approaching one noiselessly from the rear, and of making the most
+unearthly noise just behind one's back.
+
+
+_Sheep_
+
+Lambs and sheep, possessing finer natures than goats and pigs, would
+appear to be less earth-bound, and, in all probability, only temporarily
+haunt the spots that witnessed their usually barbarous ends.
+
+Most slaughter-houses are haunted by them--as, indeed, by many other
+animals. A Scottish moor long bore the reputation for being haunted by a
+phantom flock of sheep, which were always heard "baaing" plaintively
+before a big storm.
+
+It was supposed they were the ghosts of a flock that had perished in
+the memorable severe weather of Christmas, 1880. Here is a case that may
+be regarded as typical of hauntings by sheep, presumably the earth-bound
+spirits of sheep, overwhelmed in some great storm or unexpected
+catastrophe.
+
+
+"_The Spectre Flock of Sheep in Germany_"
+
+"During the seven years' war in Germany," writes Mrs. Crowe, in her
+_Night Side of Nature_, "a drover lost his life in a drunken squabble on
+the high road.
+
+"For some time there was a sort of rude tombstone, with a cross on it,
+to mark the spot where his body was interred, but this has long fallen,
+and a milestone now fills its place. Nevertheless, it continues to be
+commonly asserted by the country people, and also by various travellers,
+that they have been deluded on that spot by seeing, as they imagine,
+herds of beasts, which on investigation prove to be merely visionary. Of
+course, many people look upon this as a superstition; but a very regular
+confirmation of the story occurred in the year 1826, when two gentlemen
+and two ladies were passing the spot in a post-carriage. One of these
+was a clergyman, and none of them had ever heard of the phenomenon said
+to be attached to the place. They had been discussing the prospects of
+the minister, who was on his way to a vicarage, to which he had just
+been appointed, when they saw a large flock of sheep, which stretched
+quite across the road, and was accompanied by a shepherd and a
+long-haired black dog. As to meet cattle on that road was nothing
+uncommon, and indeed they had met several droves in the course of one
+day, no remark was made at the moment, till suddenly each looked at the
+other, and said, 'What's become of the sheep?' Quite perplexed at their
+sudden disappearance, they called to the postilion to stop, and all got
+out, in order to mount the little elevation and look around, but still
+unable to discover them, they now bethought themselves of asking the
+postilion where they were; when, to their infinite surprise, they
+learned that he had not seen them. Upon this, they bade him quicken his
+pace, that they might overtake a carriage that had passed them shortly
+before, and enquire if that party had seen the sheep; but they had not.
+
+"Four years later a postmaster, named J., was on the same road, driving
+a carriage, in which were a clergyman and his wife, when he saw a large
+flock of sheep near the same spot. Seeing they were very fine wethers,
+and supposing them to have been bought at a sheep-fair that was then
+taking place a few miles off, J. drew up his reins and stopped his
+horses, turning at the same time to the clergyman to say that he wanted
+to enquire the price of the sheep, as he intended going next day to the
+fair himself. Whilst the minister was asking him what sheep he meant, J.
+got down and found himself in the midst of the animals, the size and
+beauty of which astonished him. They passed him at an unusual rate,
+whilst he made his way through them to find the shepherd; when, on
+getting to the end of the flock, they suddenly disappeared. He then
+first learnt that his fellow-travellers had not seen them at all."
+
+So writes Mrs. Crowe, and I quote the case in support of my argument
+that sheep, like horses, cats, dogs and all other kinds of animals,
+possess spirits, and consequently have a future state of existence.
+
+I have not yet experimented with sheep, goats, or pigs, but I do not
+doubt but that they are more or less sensitive to superphysical
+influences, and possess the psychic faculty of scenting the
+Unknown--though not, perhaps, in so great a degree as any of the other
+animals I have enumerated.
+
+
+
+
+PART II
+
+WILD ANIMALS AND THE UNKNOWN
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+WILD ANIMALS AND THE UNKNOWN
+
+
+_Apes_
+
+The following case of animal hauntings was recorded in automatic
+writing:--
+
+"I sank wearily into my easy chair before the fire, which burned with a
+fitful and sullen glow in the tiny grate of my one room--bare and
+desolate as only the room of an unsuccessful author can be.
+
+"My condition was pitiable. For the past twelve months I had not earned
+a cent, and of my small capital there now remained but two pounds to
+ward the hound of starvation from my door. In the moonlight I could
+perceive all the bareness of the apartment. Would to God Fancy would
+ride to me on this moonbeam and give me inspiration! 'Twas indeed
+weird--this silver ethereal path connecting the moon with the earth, and
+the more I gazed along it, the more I wished to leave my body and escape
+to the star-lighted vaults. Certainly, from a conversation I had once
+had with a member of the New Occult Society, I believed it possible by
+concentrating all the mental activities in one channel, so to overcome
+the barriers which prevent the soul visiting scenes of the ethereal
+world, as to pass materialized to the spot upon which the ideas are
+fixed. But although I had essayed--how many times I do not like to
+confess--to gain that amount of concentration necessary for the
+separation of the soul from the body, up to the present all my attempts
+had been fruitless. Doubtless there had been a something--too minute
+even for definition--that had interrupted my self-abstraction--a
+something that had wrecked my venture, just when I felt it to be on the
+verge of completion. And was it likely that now, when my ideas were
+misty and vague, I should be more successful? I wanted to quit the cruel
+bonds of nature and be free--free to roam and ramble. But where?
+
+"At length, as I gazed into the moonlight, I lost all cognizance of the
+objects around me, and my eyes became fixed on the mountains of the
+moon, which I discovered, with a start, were no longer specks. I found,
+to my amazement, I had left my body and was careering swiftly through
+space--infinite space. The range opened up in front of me, spreading out
+far and wide, winding, black and awful--their solemn grandeur lost in
+that terrible desolation which makes the moon appear like a hideous
+nightmare. I could see with amazing clearness the sides of the
+mountains; there were enormous black fissures, some of them hundreds of
+feet in width--and the more I gazed the more impressed I grew with the
+silence. There was no life. There were no seas, no lakes, no trees, no
+grass, no sighing nor moaning of the wind, nothing to remind me of the
+earth I now found to my terror I had actually quitted. Everything around
+me was black--the sky, the mountains, the vast pits, the dried-up mouths
+of which gaped dismally.
+
+"With the movements of a man in a fit, I essayed to hinder the finis of
+my mad plunge. I waved my limbs violently, kicking out and shrieking in
+the agonies of fear. I cursed and prayed, wept and laughed alternately,
+did everything, yet nothing, that could save me from contact with the
+lone desert so horribly close. Nearer and nearer I approached, until at
+last my feet rested on the hard caked soil. For the first few minutes
+after my arrival I was too overwhelmed with fear to do other than remain
+stationary. The ground beneath my feet swarmed with myriads of foul and
+long-legged insects, things with unwieldy pincers and protruding eyes;
+things covered with scaly armour; hybrids of beetles and scorpions. I
+have a distinct recollection of one huge-jointed centipede making a
+vicious grab at my leg; he failed to make his teeth meet in anything
+tangible, and emitting a venomous hiss disappeared in a circular pit.
+
+"Whilst I was the victim of this insect's ferocity the horizon had
+become darkened by the shadowy outline of an enormous apish form. I
+wanted to run away, but could not, and was compelled, sorely against my
+will, to witness its approach. Never shall I forget the agonies of doubt
+I endured during its advance. No man in a tiger's den, nor deer tied to
+a tree awaiting its destroyer, could have suffered more than I did then,
+and my terror increased tenfold when I recognized in the
+monster--Neppon--a young gorilla that had been under my charge and had
+given me no end of trouble when I was head keeper in the Zoological
+Gardens at Berne.
+
+"I never hated anything so much as I had hated that baboon. At my hands
+it had undergone a thousand subtle torments. I had pinched it, poked it,
+pulled its hair, frightened it by putting on masks and making all sorts
+of queer noises, and finally I had secretly poisoned it. And now we
+stood face to face without any bars between us. Never shall I forget the
+look of intense satisfaction in its hideous eyes, as its gaze
+encountered mine.
+
+"In that strange forlorn world we faced each other; I, the tyrant once,
+now the quarry. In the wildness of its glee it capered about like a mad
+thing, executing the most exaggerated antics that augmented my terror.
+Every second I anticipated an assault, and the knowledge of my fears
+lent additional fierceness to its gambols. A sudden change in my
+attitude at length made it cease. The use had returned to my limbs; my
+muscles were quivering, and before it could stop me I had fled! The
+wildest of chases then ensued. I ran with a speed that would have shamed
+a record-beater on earth. With extraordinary nimbleness I vaulted over
+titanic boulders of rocks; jumped across dykes of infinite depth,
+scurried like lightning over tracts of rough, lacerating ground, and
+never for one instant felt like flagging.
+
+"Suddenly, to my horror, I came to an abrupt standstill, and the cry of
+some hunted animal burst from my lips. Unwittingly I had run against a
+huge wall of granite, and escape was now impossible. Again and again I
+clawed the hard rock, until the skin hung in shreds from my fingers, and
+the blood pattered on the dark soil, that in all probability had never
+tasted moisture before. All this amused my pursuer vastly; it watched
+with the leisure of one who knows its fish will be landed in safety, and
+there suddenly came to me, through my olfactory nerves, a knowledge that
+it was speaking to me in the language of scents--the language I never
+understood till now was the language of all animals.
+
+"'Reach, a little higher,' it said; 'there are niches up there, and you
+must stretch your limbs. Ha! ha! Do you remember how you used to make me
+stretch mine? You do! Well, you needn't shiver. Explain to me how it is
+I find you here.'
+
+"'I cannot comprehend,' I gasped with a gesticulation that was
+grotesque.
+
+"The great beast laughed in my face. 'How so?' it queried. 'You used to
+quibble me upon my dull wits; must I now return the compliment? Ha!
+There's blood on your hands. Blood! I will lick it up.' And with a
+mocking grin it advanced.
+
+"'Keep off! Keep off!' I shouted. 'My God, will this dream never cease?'
+
+"'The dream, as you call it,' the gorilla jeered, 'has only just begun;
+the climax of your horrors has yet to come. If you cannot tell me the
+purport of your visit I will tell you mine. Can your lordship spare the
+time to listen?'
+
+"I gave no answer. I clutched the wall and uttered incoherent cries like
+some frightened madman.
+
+"The gorilla felt the muscles in its hairy fingers, and showed its huge
+teeth. I looked eagerly at my enemy.
+
+"'Come, you haven't yet guessed my riddle; you are dull to-night,' it
+said lightly. 'That old wine of yours made you sleep too soundly. Don't
+let me disturb you. I will explain. This moon is now my home--I share it
+with the spirits of all the animals and insects that were once on your
+earth. And now that we are free from such as you--free to wander
+anywhere we like without fear of being shot, or caught and caged--we are
+happy. And what makes us still happier is the knowledge that the
+majority of men and women will never have a joyous after-state like
+ours. They will be earth-bound in that miserable world of theirs, and
+compelled to keep to their old haunts, scaring to death with their ugly
+faces all who have the misfortune to see them. There is another fate in
+store for you, however. Do you know what it is?'
+
+"It paused. No sound other than that occasioned by his bumping on the
+soil broke the impressive hush.
+
+"'Do you know?' it said again. 'Well, I will tell you. I'm going to kill
+you right away, so that your spirit--it's all nonsense to talk about
+souls, such as you have no soul--will be earth-bound here--here for
+ever--and will be a perpetual source of amusement to all of us animal
+ghosts.'
+
+"It then began to jabber ferociously, and, crouching down, prepared to
+spring.
+
+"'For Heaven's sake,' I shrieked, 'for Heaven's sake.'
+
+"But I might as well have appealed to the wind. It had no sense of
+mercy.
+
+"'He, he!' it screamed. 'What a joke--what a splendid joke. Your wit
+never seems to degenerate, Hugesson! I'm wondering if you will be as
+funny when you're a ghost. Get ready. I'm coming, coming,' and as the
+sky deepened to an awe-inspiring black, and the stars grew larger,
+brighter, fiercer; and the great lone deserts appealed to me with a
+force unequalled before, it sprang through the air.
+
+"A singing in my ears and a great bloody mist rose before my eyes. The
+wailing and screeching of a million souls was borne in loud protracted
+echoings through the drum of my ears. Men and women with evil faces rose
+up from crag and boulder to spit and tear at me. I saw creatures of such
+damning ugliness that my soul screamed aloud with terror. And then from
+the mountain tops the bolt of heaven was let loose. Every spirit was
+swept away like chaff before the burst of wind that, hurling and
+shrieking, bore down upon me. I gave myself up for lost. I felt all the
+agonies of suffocation, my lungs were torn from my palpitating body; my
+legs wrenched round in their sockets; my feet whirled upwards in that
+gust of devilish air. All--excruciating, damning pain--and _pro
+tempore_--I knew no more."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+N.B.--It was subsequently ascertained, by my friend the late Mr. Supton,
+that a man named Hugesson, who had been for a short time head keeper at
+the Zoological Gardens, had been found dead, in bed, by his landlady,
+with a look on his face so awful that she had fled shrieking from the
+room. The death was, of course, attributed to syncope, but my
+friend--who, by the way, had never heard of Hugesson before he received
+the foregoing account through the medium of planchette--told me, and I
+agreed with him, that from similar cases that had come within his
+experience, it was most probable that Hugesson had in reality projected
+himself, and had perished in the manner described.
+
+No more improbable than the above story is that sent me by my old school
+friend Martin Tristram, who died last year.
+
+I style it "The Case of Martin Tristram." It is reproduced from a
+magazine published some three years ago.
+
+After Martin Tristram once took up spiritualism his visits to me became
+most erratic, and I not only never knew when to expect him, but I was
+not always sure, when he did come, that it was he.
+
+This sounds extraordinary--to see a man is assuredly to recognize him!
+Not always--by no means always!
+
+There are circumstances in which a man loses his identity, when his
+"ego" is supplanted by another ego, when he ceases to be himself, and
+assumes an individuality which is entirely different from himself.
+
+This is undoubtedly the case in madness, imbecility, epilepsy, so-called
+total loss of memory through cerebral injury, hypnotism, sometimes in
+projection when the astral body gets detained, and also not infrequently
+in investigating peculiar instances of psychic phenomena.
+
+But if the astral body has been evicted from its carnal home, whither
+has it gone? and what is the nature of the thing that has taken its
+place?
+
+Ah! These are indeed puzzles--puzzles I am devoting a lifetime to solve.
+
+There have been moments when unseen hands have gradually begun to pull
+aside the obscuring veil, when the identity of the usurping spirit has
+seemed on the verge of being disclosed to me, and I have been about to
+be initiated into the greatest and most zealously guarded of all
+secrets.
+
+There have been times, I say, when my occult researches have actually
+brought me to this climax; but up to the present I have invariably been
+disappointed--the curtain has suddenly fallen, the esoteric ego has
+shrunk into its shell, and the mystery surrounding it has remained
+impenetrable.
+
+This is but one, albeit perhaps the most striking, of the many methods
+through which the superphysical endeavours to get in immediate contact
+with the physical.
+
+I was unpleasantly reminded of it when Martin Tristram's carnal body
+came to visit me one night several years ago. I was aware that it was
+not Tristram. His mannerisms were the same, his voice had not altered;
+but there was an expression in his eyes that told of a very different
+spirit from Martin's dwelling within that body.
+
+The night being cold, he closed the door carefully, and crossing the
+room to where I sat by the fire, threw himself in an easy chair, and
+gazed meditatively at me.
+
+My rooms in Bloomsbury were not lonely. They had more than their share
+of "brawling brats" on either side; there were no gloomy recesses or
+ghost-suggestive cupboards, and I never once experienced in them the
+slightest apprehension of sudden superphysical manifestations, yet I
+cannot help saying that as I met that glance from the pseudo-Tristram's
+eyes I felt my flesh begin to creep.
+
+He sat for so long in silence that I began to wonder if he ever meant to
+speak.
+
+"The secret of success in seeing certain classes of apparitions," he
+said at length, "to a very great extent lies in sympathy. Sympathy! And
+now for my story. I will tell it to you in the 'third person.'"
+
+I looked at Tristram's face in dismay. "The third person!"
+
+"Yes, the third person," he gravely rejoined, "and under the
+circumstances the only person. You see it is now close on midnight."
+
+I looked at the clock. Great heavens! What he said was correct. A whole
+evening had slipped by without my knowledge. He would, of course, have
+to stay the night. I suggested it to him.
+
+"My dear fellow," he replied, with an odd smile, "don't worry about me.
+I am not dependent on any trains. I shall be home by two o'clock."
+
+I shivered--a draught of cold air had in all probability stolen through
+the cracks of the ill-fitting window-frames.
+
+"You have on one of your queer moods, Martin," I expostulated. "To be
+home by two o'clock you must fly! But proceed--at all costs, the story."
+
+Tristram raised an eyebrow, a true sign that something of special
+interest would follow.
+
+"You know Bruges?" he began.
+
+I nodded.
+
+"Very well, then," he went on. "Exactly a week ago Martin Tristram
+arrived there from Antwerp. The hour was late, the weather boisterous,
+Tristram was tired, and any lodging was better than none.
+
+"Hailing a four-wheeler, he asked the Jehu to drive him to some decent
+hostel where the sheets were clean and the tariff moderate; and the
+fellow, gathering up the reins, took him at a snail's pace to a
+mediæval-looking tavern in La Rue Croissante. You remember that street?
+Perhaps not! It is quite a back street, extremely narrow, very tortuous,
+and miserably lighted with a few gas-lamps of the usual antique Belgian
+order.
+
+"Tristram was too tired, however, to be fastidious; he felt he could lie
+down and go to sleep anywhere, and what scruples he might have had were
+entirely dissipated by the appearance of the charming girl who answered
+the door.
+
+"It is not expedient to dwell upon her--she plays a very minor part, if,
+indeed, any, in the story. Martin Tristram merely thought her pretty,
+and that, as I have said, fully reconciled him to taking up his quarters
+in the house.
+
+"He has, as you are doubtless aware, a weakness for vivid colouring, and
+her bright yellow hair, carmine lips, and scarlet stockings struck him
+impressively as she led the way to his bed-chamber, where she somewhat
+reluctantly parted from him with a subtly attractive smile.
+
+"Left to himself, Martin sleepily examined his surroundings. The room,
+oak-panelled throughout, was long, low, and gloomy; an enormous,
+old-fashioned, empty fireplace occupied the centre of one of the walls;
+on the one side of it was an oak settee, on the other an equally
+ponderous black oak chest.
+
+"Heavy oaken beams traversed the ceiling, and the sombre, funereal
+character of the room was further increased by a colossal and antique
+four-poster which, placed in the exact middle of the chamber, faced a
+gigantic mirror attached to grotesquely carved and excessively lofty
+sable supports.
+
+"Viewed in the feeble, fluctuating candlelight, the latter seemed
+endowed with some peculiar and emphatically weird life--their
+glistening, polished surfaces threw a dozen and one fantastic but oddly
+human shadows on the boards, as at the same time they appeared in
+bewildering alternation to increase and diminish in stature.
+
+"Tristram hastily undressed, and stretching himself between the
+blankets, prepared to go to sleep. Like yourself, and for a similar
+reason, he never sleeps on his left side. Accordingly he occupied the
+right portion only of the enormous bed.
+
+"Why he did not fall asleep at once he could not explain; he fancied
+that it might be because he was overtired. This undoubtedly had
+something to do with it, as also had the remarkable noises--footfalls,
+creaks, and sighs--that came from every corner of the apartment the
+moment the light was out.
+
+"He listened to these inexplicable sounds with increasing alarm until
+the sonorous clock from somewhere outside boomed 'one,' when, quite
+unaccountably, he fell asleep, awaking on the stroke of two from a
+dreadful nightmare.
+
+"To his intense astonishment and consternation he was no longer alone in
+the bed--someone, or something, was lying by his side on the left-hand
+side of the bed.
+
+"At first his thoughts reverted to the young lady with the scarlet
+stockings; then, a sensation of icy coldness, whilst speedily reassuring
+him with regard to her, struck him with the utmost terror. Who or what
+could it be?
+
+"For some seconds he lay in breathless silence, too frightened even to
+stir, and panic-stricken lest the violent beating of his heart should
+arouse the mysterious visitor. But at length, impelled by an
+irresistible impulse, he sat up in bed and opened his eyes. The room
+was aglow with a phosphorescent light, and in the depths of the
+glittering mirror he saw a startling reproduction of the phantasmagoric
+four-poster.
+
+"He instinctively felt that there was some extraordinary change in the
+supports, and that the suspicions he had at first entertained as to
+their semi-human properties had become verified; but, mercifully for his
+sanity, he found it impossible to look. His attention was immediately
+riveted on the object by his side, which he recognized with a thrill of
+surprise was a bronzed and bearded man of rather more than middle age,
+who appeared to be buried in the most profound sleep.
+
+"The picture was so vividly portrayed in the glass that Tristram could
+see the gentle heaving of the bedclothes each time the sleeper breathed.
+
+"Fascinated beyond measure at such an unlooked-for spectacle, and
+desirous of a closer inspection, Tristram, with a supreme effort,
+managed to tear away his eyes from the mirror and to glance at the bed,
+where, to his unmitigated astonishment, he saw no one.
+
+"Quite unable to know what to make of the phenomenon, he again directed
+his gaze to the glass, and there right enough lay the sleeper.
+
+"A cold shudder now ran through Tristram--he could no longer disguise
+from himself what he had in reality thought all along, that the room was
+haunted!
+
+"The usual symptoms accompanying occult manifestations rapidly made
+themselves known. Tristram was constrained to stare at the luminous
+glitter before him in helpless expectation; to save his soul he could
+neither have stirred nor uttered the faintest ejaculation. He saw in the
+mirror the door of the bedroom slowly open, and a hideous, apish face
+peep stealthily in, not at him, but at the sleeper.
+
+"Next he watched a figure, brown, hairy and lurid--the figure of some
+huge monkey--come crawling into the room on all-fours, and followed each
+of its tell-tale movements as, sidling up to its sleeping victim, it
+suddenly hurled itself at him, choking him to death with its long
+fingers.
+
+"This was the climax--Tristram saw no more. The phosphorescent light
+died out, the mirror darkened, and on sinking back on his pillow, he
+realized with the wildest delight he was once again alone--his bedfellow
+had gone!
+
+"Tristram was so unnerved by all that had happened that he made up his
+mind to leave the house at daybreak, a decision which, however, was
+altered on the appearance of the sun and the charming little girl in
+the red stockings.
+
+"After breakfasting, Tristram strolled about the town, chancing to meet
+an old school-fellow, named Heriot, in the Rue de Mermadotte.
+
+"Heriot had only recently come to Bruges; he was dissatisfied with his
+lodgings, and readily fell in with Tristram's suggestion that they
+should 'dig' together.
+
+"The maid with the yellow hair was more pleasing than ever, Heriot fell
+desperately in love with her, and it was close on midnight before he
+could be persuaded to bid her good night and accompany Tristram to the
+bed-chamber.
+
+"'I wonder why she told me not to sleep on the left side of the bed?' he
+said to Martin, as they began to undress.
+
+"Tristram glanced guiltily at the mirror. For reasons of his own he
+hadn't as much as hinted to Heriot what he had seen there the previous
+night, and he was not at all sure now that it might not have been a
+nightmare or an hallucination; anyhow, he would like to put it to the
+test before mentioning it to anyone, and Heriot, whom he knew to be a
+sceptic with regard to ghosts, was so strong and hale a man physically
+that, happen what might, he had no apprehensions whatever concerning
+him.
+
+"Regretting that he was obliged to disobey the wishes of a lady, Heriot
+declared his preference for the left side of the bed, adding that if the
+maiden was so highly enamoured of him, she must put herself to the
+inconvenience of a few extra yards. 'Infatuation like hers,' he
+maintained, 'should surely overcome all obstacles.'
+
+"Nothing loth, Tristram gave in to him, and before many minutes had
+elapsed both men had fallen into a deep sleep.
+
+"On the stroke of two Tristram awoke, perspiring horribly. The room was
+once again aglow with a phosphorescent light, and he felt the presence
+next to him of something cold and clammy.
+
+"Unable to look elsewhere, he was again compelled to gaze in the mirror,
+where he saw, to his consternation and horror, no Heriot, but in his
+place the man with the bronzed face and bushy beard.
+
+"He had hardly recovered from the shock occasioned by this discovery
+when the door surreptitiously opened, and the figure of the ape glided
+noiselessly in.
+
+"Again he was temporarily paralysed, his limbs losing all their power of
+action and his tongue cleaving to the roof of his mouth.
+
+"The movements of the phantasm were entirely repetitionary of the
+previous night. Approaching the bed on 'all-fours,' it leapt on its
+victim, the tragedy being accompanied this time by the most realistic
+chokings and gurgles, to all of which Tristram was obliged to listen in
+an agony of doubt and terror. The drama ended, Tristram was overcome by
+a sudden fit of drowsiness, and sinking back on to his pillow, slept
+till broad daylight.
+
+"Anxious to question Heriot as to whether he, too, had been a witness of
+the ghostly transaction he touched him lightly on the shoulder. There
+was no reply. He touched him again, and still no answer. He touched him
+yet a third time, and as there was still no response, he leaned over his
+shoulder and peered into his face.
+
+"Heriot was dead!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"'This is the fourth death in that bed within the last twelve months
+that I can swear to,' the English doctor remarked to Tristram, as they
+walked down the street together, 'and always from the same cause,
+failure of the heart due to a sudden shock. If you take my advice,
+you'll clear out of the place at once.'
+
+"Tristram thought so too, but before he went he had a talk with the
+girl in the red stockings.
+
+"'I can't tell you all I know,' she said to him, as he kissed her; 'but
+I wouldn't sleep a night in that room for a fortune, though I believe
+it's quite safe if you keep on the right side of the bed. I wish your
+friend had done so, he was so handsome,' and Tristram, not a little
+hurt, let go her hand, and made arrangements for the funeral."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"And is that all?" I asked, as Tristram's material body paused.
+
+"It may be," was the reply, "but that is why I've come to you. Don't be
+gulled by Tristram into any investigations in that house. Enthusiasm for
+his research work makes him unconsciously callous, and if he once got
+you there he might, even against your better judgment, persuade you to
+sleep on the left side! Good night!"
+
+I shook hands with him and he departed. The following evening I heard it
+all again from Tristram himself--the real Tristram.
+
+Needless to say, his concluding remarks differed essentially. With
+unbounded cordiality he urged me to accompany him back again to Bruges,
+and I--declined!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+He wrote to me afterwards to say that he had discovered the history of
+the house--a man, a music-hall artist, answering to the description of
+the figure in the bed--had once lived there with a performing ape, an
+orang-outang, and happening to annoy the animal one day, the latter had
+killed him. The brute was eventually shot!
+
+"This experience of mine," Tristram added, "is of the greatest value,
+for it has thoroughly convinced me of one thing at least--and that--that
+apes have spirits! And if that be so, so must all other kinds of
+animals. Of course they must."
+
+
+_Phantasms of Cat and Baboon_
+
+A sister of a well-known author tells me there used to be a house called
+"The Swallows," standing in two acres of land, close to a village near
+Basingstoke.
+
+In 1840 a Mr. Bishop of Tring bought the house, which had long stood
+empty, and went to live there in 1841. After being there a fortnight two
+servants gave notice to leave, stating that the place was haunted by a
+large cat and a big baboon, which they constantly saw stealing down the
+staircases and passages. They also testified to hearing sounds as of
+somebody being strangled, proceeding from an empty attic near where
+they slept, and of the screams and groans of a number of people being
+horribly tortured in the cellars just underneath the dairy. On going to
+see what was the cause of the disturbances, nothing was ever visible. By
+and by other members of the household began to be harassed by similar
+manifestations. The news spread through the village, and crowds of
+people came to the house with lights and sticks, to see if they could
+witness anything.
+
+One night, at about twelve o'clock, when several of the watchers were
+stationed on guard in the empty courtyard, they all saw the forms of a
+huge cat and a baboon rise from the closed grating of the large cellar
+under the old dairy, rush past them, and disappear in a dark angle of
+the walls. The same figures were repeatedly seen afterwards by many
+other persons. Early in December, 1841, Mr. Bishop, hearing fearful
+screams, accompanied by deep and hoarse jabberings, apparently coming
+from the top of the house, rushed upstairs, whereupon all was instantly
+silent, and he could discover nothing. After that, Mr. Bishop set to
+work to get rid of the house, and was fortunate enough to find as a
+purchaser a retired colonel, who was soon, however, scared out of it.
+This was in 1842; it was soon after pulled down. The ground was used
+for the erection of cottages; but the hauntings being transferred to
+them, they were speedily vacated, and no one ever daring to inhabit
+them, they were eventually demolished, the site on which they stood
+being converted into allotments.
+
+There were many theories as to the history of "The Swallows"; one being
+that a highwayman, known as Steeplechase Jock, the son of a Scottish
+chieftain, had once plied his trade there and murdered many people,
+whose bodies were supposed to be buried somewhere on or near the
+premises. He was said to have had a terrible though decidedly unorthodox
+ending--falling into a vat of boiling tar, a raving madman. But what
+were the phantasms of the ape and cat? Were they the earth-bound spirits
+of the highwayman and his horse, or simply the spirits of two animals?
+Though either theory is possible, I am inclined to favour the former.
+
+
+_Psychic Bears_
+
+Edmund Lenthal Swifte, appointed in 1814 Keeper of the Crown Jewels in
+the Tower of London, refers in an article in _Notes and Queries_, 1860,
+to various unaccountable phenomena happening in the Tower during his
+residence there. He says that one night in the Jewel Office, one of the
+sentries was alarmed by a figure like a huge bear issuing from
+underneath the Jewel Room door. He thrust at it with his bayonet, which,
+going right through it, stuck in the doorway, whereupon he dropped in a
+fit, and was carried senseless to the guard-room. When on the morrow Mr.
+Swifte saw the soldier in the guard-room, his fellow-sentinel was also
+there, and the latter testified to having seen his comrade, before the
+alarm, quiet and active, and in full possession of his faculties. He was
+now, so Mr. Swifte added, changed almost beyond recognition, and died
+the following day.
+
+Mr. George Offer, in referring to this incident, alludes to queer noises
+having been heard at the time the figure appeared. Presuming that the
+sentinel was not the victim of an hallucination, the question arises as
+to the kind of spirit that he saw. The bear, judging by cases that have
+been told me, is by no means an uncommon occult phenomenon. The
+difficulty is how to classify it, since, upon no question appertaining
+to the psychic, can one dogmatize. To quote from a clever poem that
+appeared in the January number of the _Occult Review_, to pretend one
+knows anything definite about the immaterial world is all "swank". At
+the most we--Parsons, Priests, Theosophists, Christian Scientists,
+Psychical Research Professors,--at the most can only speculate.
+Nothing--nothing whatsoever, beyond the bare fact that there are
+phenomena, unaccountable by physical laws, has as yet been discovered.
+All the time and energy and space that have been devoted by scientists
+to the investigation of spiritualism and to making tests in automatic
+writing are, in my opinion--and, I believe, I speak for the man in the
+street--hopelessly futile. No one, who has ever really experienced
+spontaneous ghostly manifestations, could for one moment believe in the
+genuineness of the phenomena produced at séances. They have never
+deceived me, and I am of the opinion spirits cannot be convoked to
+order, either through a so-called medium falling into a so-called
+trance, through table-turning, automatic writing, or anything else. If a
+spirit comes, it will come either voluntarily, or in obedience to some
+Unknown Power--and certainly neither to satisfy the curiosity of a crowd
+of sensation-loving men and women, nor to be analysed by some cold,
+calculating, presumptuous Professor of Physics whose proper sphere is
+the laboratory.
+
+But to proceed. The phenomenon of the big bear, provided again it was
+really objective, may have been the phantasm of some prehistoric
+creature whose bones lie interred beneath the Tower; for we know the
+Valley of the Thames was infested with giant reptiles and quadrupeds of
+all kinds (I incline to this theory); or it may have been a
+Vice-Elemental, or--the phantasm of a human being who lived a purely
+animal life, and whose spirit would naturally take the form most closely
+resembling it.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Judging by the number of experiences related to me, hauntings by phantom
+hares and rabbits would appear to be far from uncommon. There is this
+difference, however, between the hauntings by the two species of
+animal--phantom hares usually portend death or some grave catastrophe,
+either to the witness himself, or to someone immediately associated with
+him; whereas phantom rabbits are seldom prophetic, and may generally be
+looked upon merely as the earth-bound spirits of some poor rabbits that
+have met with untimely ends.
+
+
+_Hauntings by a White Rabbit_
+
+Mr. W.T. Stead, in his _Real Ghost Stories_, gives an account of the
+hauntings by a phantom rabbit in a house in ---- Road. He does not,
+however, mention any locality. After describing several of the phenomena
+which disturbed various occupants of the place, he goes on to say, in
+the language of Mrs. A., who narrates the incident:--
+
+"A dog which lay on the rug also heard the sounds, for he pricked up his
+ears and barked. Without a moment's delay she flew to the door, calling
+the dog to follow her, intending as she did so to open the hall door and
+call for assistance, but the dog, though an excellent house dog,
+crouched at her feet and whined, but would not follow her up the stairs,
+so she carried him up in her arms, and reaching the door, called for
+assistance; when, however, the dining-room doors were opened, the rooms
+were in perfect quiet and destitute of any signs of life."
+
+The behaviour of the dog here accords exactly with the behaviour of dogs
+I have had in haunted houses, and substantiates my theory that dogs are
+excellent psychic barometers.
+
+"After the family had been in the house a few weeks, a white rabbit made
+its appearance. This uncanny animal would suddenly appear in a room in
+which members of the family were seated, and after gliding round and
+slipping under chairs and tables, would disappear through a brick wall
+as easily as through an open door."
+
+This is the invariable trick of ghosts; they seldom, however, open
+doors. Mrs. A. adds:--
+
+"Some years have now elapsed since the incident I have now related took
+place, and again, in response to orders given by the enterprising
+landlord of the property, long-closed doors and windows have been thrown
+open, and painters and paperhangers have brought their skill to bear
+upon gruesome rooms and halls; the house is once more inhabited, this
+time by a widow lady and some grown-up sons. These tenants come from a
+distance, and are entirely strangers both to the neighbourhood and the
+former history of the house, but, to use her own words, the mistress
+'cannot understand what ails the house,' her sons insist on sleeping
+together in one room, and the quiet of the house is constantly being
+broken by the erratic appearances of a large white rabbit, which the
+inmates are frequently engaged chasing, but are never able to find."
+
+Mr. Stead offers no explanation. I can see no other conclusion, however,
+than that this ghost was the actual phantasm of some rabbit that had
+been done to death in the house, probably by the boy whose apparition
+was among the other manifestations seen there.
+
+
+_John Wesley's Ghost_
+
+In his article "More Glimpses of the Unseen" (_Occult Review_, October,
+1906), Mr. Reginald B. Span writes:--
+
+"During the extraordinary manifestations which occurred in the house of
+John Wesley at Epworth, the phantom forms of two animals appeared, one
+being a large white rabbit, and the other an animal like a badger, which
+used to appear in the bedrooms and run about and then disappear, whilst
+the various bangings and rappings were at their loudest."
+
+This is the only case I have ever come across of the ghost of a badger.
+I think it must be unique. Mr. Span adds: "Many strange and inexplicable
+things occurred in that house which were not due to any natural cause or
+reason. I remember that loud rappings used to sound round my room at
+nights, even when I had a light burning. I was often awakened by
+rappings on the floor of my bedroom, which would then sound on the walls
+and furniture, and were heard by others occupying rooms some distance
+off." This, again, is most interesting, as ghosts seldom visit lighted
+rooms. Mr. Span continues:--
+
+"It was in the afternoon in broad daylight when my brother saw this
+mysterious animal.
+
+"He was in the drawing-room alone, and as he was standing at one side of
+the room looking at a picture on the walls, he heard a noise behind him,
+and found, on looking round, that a sofa which generally lay against
+one of the walls had been lifted by some unknown power into the middle
+of the room, at the same time he saw an animal like a rabbit run from
+under the sofa across the room and disappear into the wall. He searched
+everywhere for the animal, which could not have escaped from the room,
+as the doors and window were closed, but was unable to find any sign of
+one or any hole whereby one might have passed out."
+
+
+_The Psychic Faculty in Hares and Rabbits_
+
+Hares and rabbits are very susceptible to the superphysical, the
+presence of which they scent in the same manner as do horses and dogs.
+
+I have known them to evince the greatest symptoms of terror when brought
+into a haunted house.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+INHABITANTS OF THE JUNGLE
+
+
+_Elephants, Lions, Tigers, etc._
+
+Elephants undoubtedly possess the faculty of scenting spirits in a very
+marked degree. It is most difficult to get an elephant to pass a spot
+where any phantasm is known to appear. The big beast at once comes to a
+halt, trembles, trumpets, and turning round, can only be urged forward
+by the gentlest coaxing.
+
+Jungles are full of the ghosts of slain men and animals, and afford more
+variety in hauntings than any other localities. The spirits of such
+cruel creatures as lions, tigers, leopards, are very much earth-bound,
+and may be seen or heard night after night haunting the sites of their
+former depredations.
+
+The following case of a tiger ghost was narrated to me years ago by a
+gentleman whom I will style Mr. De Silva, P.W.D. I published his account
+in a popular weekly journal, as follows:--
+
+
+_The White Tiger_
+
+"Tap! tap! tap. Someone was coming behind me. I halted, and in the
+brilliant moonlight saw a figure hobbling along--first one thin leg,
+then the other, always with the same measured stride--accompanied with
+the same tapping of the stick. I had no wish for his company, though the
+road was lonely, and I feared the presence of tigers, so I hurried on,
+and the faster I went, the nearer he seemed to come. Tap! tap! tap! The
+man was blind and a leper, and so repulsively ugly that the niggers on
+the settlement regarded him with superstitious awe. I had a horror of
+tigers, but of lepers even greater. And I loved my wife with no ordinary
+love. So I hurried on, and he followed quickly after me.
+
+"The night was brilliant, even more so, I thought, than was ordinary,
+and the very brilliancy made me fear, for my shadow, the shadow of the
+trees, shadows for which I had no name, flickered across the road, were
+lost to sight to return again, and the jungle was getting nearer. The
+open country on either side ceased, one by one tall blades of jungle
+grass shook their heads in the gentle breeze, and the silence of the
+darkness beyond began to make itself felt. A night bird whizzed past me,
+croaking out a dismal incantation from its black throat; something at
+which I did not care to look clattered from under a stone I loosened
+with my foot, and sped into the shade, and I hastened on.
+
+"Tap! tap! tap! Faster and faster, and faster came the blind man. I
+could smell the oil on his body, hear his breathing.
+
+"'Whoever you are, sahib, stop!'
+
+"There was fear in his voice as he whined out these words, a fear which
+increased my own; but I pretended not to hear, and pressed on faster.
+
+"The darkness grew; high over my head at either side of the road waved
+the grass, rustling to and fro, and singing to sleep the insects
+nestling on its green stalks with its old-time song of the jungle.
+
+"The grass ahead of me slowly parted; my heart beat quicker, the tapping
+behind me ceased--it was only some small animal. What was it? A small
+hyaena? No. A jackal, a lame jackal, and it looked at me from out of
+eyes that for some reason or other made me shiver. I did not know what
+there was about the jackal that was different from what I had seen in
+any other jackal, but there was a something. And as I looked at it in
+awe, it vanished--melted into thin air.
+
+"The moment after a second jackal appeared just where the other one had
+been standing, but there was nothing remarkable about this one, and on
+my bending down, pretending to look for a stone to throw at it, it slunk
+back silently and stealthily whence it had come, and I hurried on
+faster than ever, knowing a tiger was near at hand.
+
+"Tap! tap! tap! I blessed the presence of the blind man.
+
+"'For God's sake, sahib, stop! For the love of Allah, sahib, stop!' (You
+know how they talk, O'Donnell.) 'The jackals, did you see them? I knew
+them by their smell, the smell of the living and of the dead. Walk with
+me, sahib, for Allah's sake.'
+
+"Presently, O'Donnell, I heard a heavier rustling in the grass than the
+wind makes; a rustling that kept pace with me and went along by my side,
+never halting, but faster and faster, and faster.
+
+"A short distance ahead of me was a patch of bright light, where the
+cross-roads met. A few yards more and the jungle grass would end.
+
+"I thought of this, O'Donnell--the beggar might not know the road so
+well as I. He had no wife, no child; he was a leper, only a leper--and
+my teeth chattered.
+
+"Here the Colonel paused and wiped his forehead.
+
+"I slackened my speed, the rustling by my side slowing down, and the
+tapping grew faster. I was close to the whitened road.
+
+"'Sahib, the blessing of Allah be on you for stopping. Sahib, let me
+walk by your side.'
+
+"(To the end of my days, O'Donnell, I shall never forgive myself, and
+yet I want you to understand it was for my wife--and child.) I slunk
+into the shade. Two steps more and the tapping would pass me. The stick
+struck the ground within one inch of my foot; my heart almost ceased to
+beat; I gazed in fascination at the spot in the jungle opposite. The
+heavy rustling had stopped; only the gentle sighing of the wind went on.
+The two steps were taken, the blind man paused on the cross-roads. He
+was ghastly in the moonlight. I shuddered. His eyes peered enquiringly
+round on all sides; he was looking for me; he had lost his way; he
+feared the tiger.
+
+"Suddenly something huge shot like an arrow from the darkness opposite
+me. I bowed my head, O'Donnell, and muttered a prayer, for I thought my
+end had come.
+
+"A terrible scream rang out in the clear night air. I was saved.
+
+"'Allah curse you and yours, sahib.'
+
+"I opened my eyes; an enormous tiger was bending over the leper,
+searching for the most convenient spot in his body to afford a tight
+grip.
+
+"The man's sightless eyes were turned towards the moon, his teeth shone
+white and even; with the striped horror purring in his face, he thought
+of vengeance on me.
+
+"I dared not move. I could not pass, O'Donnell. I had no gun. The big
+brute found a nice place to catch hold. It opened its mouth so that I
+could see its glistening teeth. It looked down at its paws, where the
+cruel claws glittered, and they seemed to afford it keen
+satisfaction--it was a tigress and vain--then it lowered its head, and
+the leper shrieked. I watched it pick him up as if he were one of its
+cubs; saw the blood trickle down its soft white throat into the dusty
+road, and then it trotted gracefully away, and was lost in the darkness
+of the jungle. There was a deathlike silence after this. I waited a few
+minutes, and then I got up.
+
+"I had only a short distance to go, and I no longer feared the presence
+of man-eaters--there was not likely to be another. Hours afterwards,
+O'Donnell, when I lay in my hammock as safe as a fortress, I fancied I
+heard the dead man's cry, fancied I heard his curse. No one was more
+devoted to a wife than I was to mine. Ours had been purely a love match,
+and it was against my wish that she had accompanied me to such an
+out-of-the-way place as Seconee. I told her about my adventure,
+suppressing the leper's curse; and I was glad I did so, as she was
+greatly distressed.
+
+"'Thank goodness you escaped, Charlie,' she said. 'I am so sorry for the
+poor leper. I suppose you couldn't have helped him.'
+
+"'I might have fetched my rifle,' I replied, 'and tried to rescue him,
+of course. But I fear it wouldn't have been of much avail, as he would
+have been badly mauled by then.'
+
+"My wife sighed. 'Ah, well,' she said, 'love is selfish! It makes one
+forget others. Still, I wouldn't have it otherwise.'
+
+"'I wish this railway job here was over,' I murmured, sitting with my
+elbows on my knees and looking over the flat ground, sun-baked and
+barren, away towards the dark jungles and the still darker mountains
+towering above them; and as I gazed a shadow seemed to blur my vision
+and a voice to whisper in my ears, 'Beware of my curse.'
+
+"I took Cushai, one of the native servants, into confidence.
+
+"'Now, Cushai,' I said, 'you know all the superstitions of the
+country--the evil eye and the rest of them. Tell me, what can the dying
+curse of a leper do?'
+
+"Cushai turned pale under his skin.
+
+"'Not of Nahra!' he stuttered, swinging the knife with which he had been
+cutting maize in his hand, 'not of Nahra, the leper of Futtebah. Sahib,
+if you were cursed by him, beware. He was learned in the black arts; he
+could heal ulcers by repeating a prayer, he could bring on fever.'
+
+"At this, O'Donnell, I turned cold. I had lived long in India. I had
+seen their so-called juggling, had experienced also strange cases of
+telepathy, and knew quite sufficient of their intimacy with the
+supernatural elements to be afraid.
+
+"'You must keep the young sahib safe,' Cushai said, 'and the white lady.
+I wish it hadn't been Nahra.'
+
+"I took his advice. My boy, Eric, was more closely supervised than ever,
+and as to my wife, I begged and entreated her not to move from the house
+until the tiger was dead, and I searched for it everywhere.
+
+"The dry season passed, the wet came, and my work still kept me in
+Seconee. At times there came to us rumours of the man-eater--of another
+victim--but it never visited our bungalow, where the bright rifle leaned
+against the wall waiting for it.
+
+"I certainly did meet with slight misfortunes, which the more timid
+might have put down to the working of the curse.
+
+"My little finger was squashed in the laying down of a rail, and Eric
+had several bouts of sickness.
+
+"It was nearly a year after the leper's death that alarming rumours of a
+man-eater having been at work again were spread about us. Several
+niggers were carried off or badly bitten, and the wounded showed
+symptoms of the loathsome disease so well known and feared by us
+all--leprosy.
+
+"I knew from that it must be the same tiger.
+
+"'The tiger is near,' someone would cry out, and a stampede among the
+native workmen would ensue.
+
+"'Why the white tiger?' I asked Cushai.
+
+"'Because, sahib,' he replied, 'the leprosy has made it so! Tigers, like
+men, and all other animals, go white even to their hair. I have not told
+them the story, sahib; they only know it must have caught the leprosy.
+To them Nahra is still living.'
+
+"Then, O'Donnell, when I thought of what was at stake, and of all the
+hideous possibilities the presence of this brute created, I took my
+rifle and went out to search for it. In the evenings, when the dark
+clouds from the mountains descended and the wind hissed through the
+jungle grass, I plodded along with no other companion than my Winchester
+repeater--searching, always searching for the damned tiger. I found it,
+O'Donnell, came upon it just as it was in the midst of a meal--dining
+off a native--and I shot it twice before it recovered from its
+astonishment at seeing me. The second shot took effect--I can swear to
+that, for I took particular note of the red splash of blood on its
+forehead where the bullet entered, and I went right up to it to make
+sure. As God is above us, no animal was more dead.
+
+"'The curse won't come now, Cushai,' I said, laughing. 'I've killed the
+white tiger.'
+
+"'Killed the white tiger, sahib! Allah bless you for that!' Cushai
+replied.
+
+"'But don't laugh too soon. Nahra was a clever man, wonderfully clever;
+he did not speak empty words,' and as his eyes wandered to the dark
+hills again I fancied a shadow darted along the sky, and the curse came
+back to my ears.
+
+"I was superintending the line one afternoon; the backs of the niggers
+were bending double under the burden of the great iron rods when I heard
+a terrible cry.
+
+"'The white tiger! the white tiger!' Rods fell with a crash, spades
+followed suit, a chorus of shrieks filled the air, and legs scampered
+off in all directions. I was fifty yards from my rifle, and a huge
+creature was slowly approaching between it and me.
+
+"I could hardly believe my eyes--the white tiger, the tiger I knew I had
+killed! Here it was! Here before me! The same in every detail, and yet
+in some strange, indefinable manner not the same. On it came, a huge
+patch of luminous white, noiselessly, stealthily--the mark of the bullet
+plainly visible on its big, flat forehead. Step by step it approached
+me, its paws no longer with the colouring of health, but dull and worn.
+And as it came, the cold shadow of desolation seemed to fall around it.
+Nothing stirred; there was no noise whatever, not even the sound of its
+feet crushing the loosened soil. On, on, on nearer, nearer and nearer.
+
+"Shunned by all, avoided by its fellow-creatures of the jungle, a blight
+to all and everything, it drew in a line with me. Not once did its eyes
+meet mine, O'Donnell; not once did it glare at the natives who were
+hiding on the banks of the cutting; but it stole silently on its way
+with a something in its movements that left no doubt but that it was
+engaged in no casual venture. I remembered, O'Donnell, that my wife had
+promised to come with Eric to meet me along the cutting, as she was sure
+no tiger would be there. I ran as fast as I could, and yet somehow my
+feet seemed weighted down. I cursed my folly for not forbidding my wife
+to come.
+
+"It was uphill till I got to the bend, and it might have been a
+mountain, it seemed so steep. I knew if the thing I had seen met them a
+little farther on, they would be cornered, as the cutting narrowed very
+much, leaving not more than twenty yards, and that was a generous
+estimate. At last, after what seemed an eternity, I reached the summit
+of the slope; the tiger was a mere speck along the line. I rushed after
+it as fast as I could go, stumbling, half falling, pulling myself
+together, and tearing on, and the faster I went the quicker moved the
+great white figure. A feeling of despair seized me; all my fondness for
+my wife became intensified tenfold, and was revealed to me then in its
+true nature; she was the one great tie that made life dear to me. Even
+my love for Eric paled away before the blinding affection I bore her. I
+tore madly on, shouting at the same time, anything to make the white
+tiger aware of my presence, to keep it from seeing her. Another bend in
+the road hid it from view. The same hideous fears gripped me hard and
+fast, as I strained every muscle in the mad pursuit. At last I ran round
+the curve, and saw before me the tableau I had dreaded. The tiger was
+crouching, ready to spring on the group of three--Eva, Eric and the
+ayah. They were paralysed with fear, and stood on the rails staring at
+it, unable to move or utter a sound. I well understood their feelings,
+and knew they were labouring in their minds as to whether the thing that
+confronted them was a creature of flesh and blood, or what it was. They
+could not take their eyes off it, and, as a consequence, did not see me.
+The white tiger now went through a series of actions, so lifelike that I
+could not but believe it was real, and that I had been deceived in
+thinking I had killed it. Its haunches quivered, it got ready to spring,
+and my rifle flew to my shoulder. I saw it mark Eric, and read the
+increased agony in my wife's eyes. The critical moment came. Another
+second, and the thing, be it material or supernatural, would jump. I
+must fire at all costs. If mortal, I must kill it, if ghostly, the noise
+of my rifle might dematerialize it. And, as God is my judge, O'Donnell,
+at that moment I had not the least idea which of it was--tiger or
+phantom. It sprang--my brain reeled--my fingers grew numb, and as my
+wife suddenly bounded forward, the shadowy form of Nahra seemed to rise
+from the ground and mock me. With a supreme effort I jerked my finger
+back and fired. Bang! The sound of the explosion acted like a
+safety-valve to the pent-up feelings of all, and there was a chorus of
+shrieks. I rushed forward--the ayah lay on the ground, face downward and
+motionless. My wife had hold of Eric, who was shaking all over. Of the
+tiger there were no signs. It had completely vanished.
+
+"'Thank God,' I exclaimed, kissing my wife feverishly. 'Thank God! It
+was only a ghost! but it was very alarming, wasn't it?'
+
+"'Alarming!' my wife gasped, 'it was awful! I quite thought it was real!
+so did Eric, and so did ---- '--then her eyes fell on the ayah, and she
+gave a great start. 'Charlie!' she cried, 'for mercy's sake look at her!
+I dare not! Is she all right?'
+
+"I turned the ayah over--she was dead! Fright had killed her!
+
+"I then told my wife of the curse of Nahra, and of the phantom I thought
+I had seen of him, when the white tiger was springing. When I had
+finished, my wife hid her face in my shoulder.
+
+"'Charlie!' she said, 'I did something awful. I saw what I then took to
+be the real white tiger single out Eric, and in my anxiety to save him
+from the brute, I pushed the ayah in front of him. And the thing sprang
+on her instead. It was nothing short of murder! And yet--well, there
+were extenuating circumstances, weren't there?'
+
+"'Of course there were,' I said--for I verily believed, O'Donnell, fear
+had, for the time being, turned her brain.
+
+"On our way home she suddenly called my attention to Eric.
+
+"'Charlie,' she cried, 'what's that mark on his cheek? He's hurt!'
+
+"I looked--and my heart turned sick within me. On the boy's cheek was a
+faint red scratch, just as might have been caused by a slight, very
+slight contact with some animal's claw.
+
+"'Sahib!' Cushai whispered to me, when he saw it and heard of our
+adventure. 'Sahib! Beware! Nahra was a clever man. He must have used the
+spirit of the white tiger as his tool. Let the medicine man examine the
+scar.'
+
+"I did so. I took Eric to a Dr. Nicholson, who lived close by.
+
+"He looked at the wound curiously for a few moments, and then said to
+me--he was renowned for his plain speaking--'Mr. De Silva, there's no
+use beating about the bush, and prolonging the agony unnecessarily for
+you and your wife. The boy's got leprosy--God alone knows how! At the
+most he may live six weeks.'
+
+"The shock, of course, was terrible. Eric had to be isolated from
+everyone--even from those who loved him best--and died within a month.
+
+"'Sahib, I knew!' Cushai said to me the day of the funeral, 'I knew some
+disaster would befall you. Nahra was a wonderful man, and his curse had
+to be fulfilled. You may rest assured, however, nothing further will
+befall you, for I saw Nahra in a vision this morning, and he told me
+both his and the white tiger's spirit were now on friendly terms, and
+would trouble you no more.'
+
+"My wife and I left the place at once, and for a long time I lived in a
+hell of suspense lest she should develop the infernal disease. By a
+merciful providence, however, she did no such thing, but, on the
+contrary, picked up in health in the most marvellous fashion; indeed,
+she only told me yesterday, she felt better than she had done for years.
+I've told you the story, O'Donnell--and it is true in every
+detail--because it goes a long way to substantiate your theory that
+animals, as well as human beings, have a future life."
+
+"I am absolutely sure they have!" I replied.
+
+
+_Jungle Animals and Psychic Faculties_
+
+It is, of course, impossible to say whether animals of the jungle
+possess psychic faculties, without putting them to the test, and this,
+for obvious reasons, is extremely difficult. But since I have found that
+such properties are possessed--in varying degree--by all animals I have
+tested, it seems only too probable that bears and tigers, and all beasts
+of prey, are similarly endowed.
+
+It would be interesting to experiment with a beast of prey in a haunted
+locality; to observe to what extent it would be aware of the advent of
+the Unknown, and to note its behaviour in the actual presence of the
+phenomena.
+
+
+
+
+PART III
+
+BIRDS AND THE UNKNOWN
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+BIRDS AND THE UNKNOWN
+
+
+As Edgar Allan Poe has suggested in his immortal poem of "The Raven,"
+there is a strong link between certain species of birds and the Unknown.
+
+We all know that vultures, kites and crows scent dead bodies from a
+great way off, but we don't all know that these and other kinds of birds
+possess, in addition, the psychic property of scenting the advent not
+only of the phantom of death, but of many, if not, indeed, all other
+spirits. Within my knowledge there have been cases when, before a death
+in the house, ravens, jackdaws, canaries, magpies, and even parrots,
+have shown unmistakable signs of uneasiness and distress. The raven has
+croaked in a high-pitched, abnormal key; the jackdaw and canary have
+become silent and dejected, from time to time shivering; the magpie even
+has feigned death; the parrot has shrieked incessantly. Owls, too, are
+sure predictors of death, and may be heard hooting in the most doleful
+manner outside the house of anyone doomed to die shortly.
+
+In an article entitled "Psychic Records," the editor of the _Occult
+Review_ (in the August number, 1905) supplies the following anecdotes of
+ghosts of birds furnished him by his correspondents.
+
+"In the autumn of 1877 my husband was lying seriously ill with rheumatic
+fever, and I had sat up several nights. At last the doctors insisted on
+my going to bed; and very unwillingly I retired to a spare room. While
+undressing I was surprised to see a very large white bird come from the
+fireplace, make a hovering circle round me, and finally go to the top of
+a large double chest of drawers. I was too tired to trouble about it,
+and thought I would let it remain until morning. The next morning I said
+to the housemaid:
+
+"'There was a large bird in the spare room last night, which flew to the
+top of the drawers. See that it is put out.'
+
+"The nurse, who was present, said:
+
+"'Oh, dear, ma'am, I am afraid that is an omen, and means the master
+won't live,' and she was confirmed in her opinion by the maid saying she
+had searched, and there was no trace of any bird.
+
+"I was quite angry, as my husband was decidedly better, had slept
+through the night, and we thought the crisis had passed. I went to his
+bedside and found him quietly sleeping, but he never woke, and in about
+an hour passed quietly away.
+
+"I thought no more of the bird, fancying I must have been mistaken from
+being overtired.
+
+"Some months after my husband's death my youngest little one was born;
+he lived for twelve months, and then had an attack of bronchitis. He
+slept in a cot in my room, and I was undressing one night, when this
+same large white bird came from his cot, floated round me, and
+disappeared in the fireplace. At the time I did not for a moment think
+of it as anything but a strange coincidence, and in no way connected it
+with baby's illness.
+
+"The next morning I was sitting by the drawing-room fire with baby on my
+lap. The doctor came in, looked at him, sounded his chest, and
+pronounced him much better. As he was a friend of the family, he sat
+down on the other side of the fireplace and was chatting in an ordinary
+way, when he suddenly jumped up with an exclamation, 'Why, what does
+this mean?' and took the child from my arms quite dead!
+
+"For two years we saw nothing more of the white bird, and we had moved
+to another place.
+
+"One day I was in my room, and my two little girls, aged six and eight,
+were standing at the window watching a kitten in the garden, when
+suddenly the youngest cried out:
+
+"'Oh, mamma! Look at that great white bird,' putting her hands as if to
+catch it, exactly in the way it flies round one.
+
+"I saw nothing, and the elder child said, 'Don't be silly, Jessie; there
+is no bird.'
+
+"'But there is,' said the child. 'Don't you see? There, look! There it
+is!'
+
+"I looked at my watch. It was twenty minutes past three.
+
+"Two days after we received the news that a niece of mine had died at
+twenty minutes past three. The children had never known anything of the
+former appearances, as we had never talked about it before them. We have
+seen nothing since of the bird, but have for some years had no death in
+the family."
+
+So runs the article in the _Occult Review_, and I can corroborate it
+with similar experiences that have happened to my friends and to me.
+
+Some years ago, for instance, a great friend of my wife's died, and on
+the day of the funeral a large bird tried to fly in at the window of the
+room where the corpse lay; while, shortly afterwards, an exactly similar
+bird visited the window of my wife's and my room in a house, several
+hundreds of miles away. If it was only a coincidence, it was a very
+extraordinary one.
+
+Then again, this spring, just before the death of one of my wife's
+relatives, a large bird flew violently against the window-pane behind
+which my wife was sitting--an incident that had never happened to her in
+that house before.
+
+Undoubtedly, spirits in the guise of birds--most probably they are the
+phantasms of birds that have actually once lived on the material
+plane--are the messengers of death.
+
+
+_A Case of Bird haunting in East Russia_
+
+Some years ago the neighbourhood of Orskaia, in East Russia, was roused
+by an affair of a very remarkable nature. The body of a handsome young
+peasant woman, called Marthe Popenkoff, was found in a lonely part of
+the road, between Orskaia and Orenburg, with the skin of her face and
+body shockingly torn and lacerated, but without there being any wounds
+deep enough to cause her death, which the doctor attributed to syncope.
+
+The people of Orskaia, not satisfied with this verdict, declared Marthe
+had been murdered, and made such a loud clamour that the editor of the
+local paper at last voiced their sentiments in the _East Russia
+Chronicle_. It was then that M. Durant, a smart young French engineer,
+temporarily residing in those parts, became interested in the case, and
+decided to investigate it thoroughly. With this end in view he wrote to
+his friend M. Hersant--a keen student of the Occult--in Saratova, to
+join him, and three days after the despatch of his letter met the latter
+at the Orskaia railway station. M. Durant retailed the case as they
+drove to his house.
+
+"It is a remarkable affair, in every way," he said. "The woman was
+leading a perfectly respectable married life; she was hard-working and
+industrious, and beyond the fact that she was over-indulgent to her
+children, does not seem to have had any serious faults. As far as I can
+ascertain she had no enemies."
+
+"Nor secret lovers?" M. Hersant asked.
+
+"No; she was quite straight."
+
+"And you feel sure she was murdered?"
+
+"I do. Public opinion so strongly favours that view."
+
+"Did you see the marks on the woman?"
+
+"I did, and could make nothing of them. After supper I will take you to
+see her, in the morgue."
+
+"What--she is still unburied?"
+
+"Yes--but there is nothing unusual about that. In these parts bodies
+are often kept for ten days--sometimes even longer."
+
+M. Durant was as good as his word; after they had partaken of a somewhat
+hasty meal, they set out to the morgue, where they made a careful
+inspection of the poor woman's remains.
+
+M. Hersant examined the marks on the woman's body very closely with his
+magnifying-glass.
+
+"Ah!" he suddenly exclaimed, bending down and almost touching the corpse
+with his nose, "Ah!"
+
+"Have you made a discovery?" M. Durant enquired.
+
+"I prefer not to say at present," M. Hersant replied. "I should like to
+see the spot where this body was found--now."
+
+"We will go there at once," M. Durant rejoined.
+
+The scene of the tragedy was the Orenburg road, at the foot of two
+little hills; and on either side were the sloping fields, yellow with
+the nodding corn.
+
+"That is the exact place where she lay," M. Durant said, indicating with
+his finger a dark patch on a little wooden bridge spanning a stream,
+within a stone's throw of a tumbledown mill-house, all overgrown with
+ivy and lichens. M. Hersant looked round and sniffed the air with his
+nostrils.
+
+"There is an air of loneliness about this spot," he remarked, "that in
+itself suggests crime. If this were an ordinary murder, one could well
+imagine the assassin was aided in his diabolical work by the
+configuration of the land which, shelving as it does, slips down into
+the narrow valley, so as to preclude any possibility of escape on the
+part of the victim. The place seems especially designed by Providence as
+a death-trap. Let us have a look at the interior of this building."
+
+"The police have searched it thoroughly," M. Durant said.
+
+"I've no doubt," M. Hersant replied drily. "No one knows better than I
+what the thoroughness of the police means."
+
+They entered the premises cautiously, since the roof was in a rickety
+condition, and any slight concussion might dislodge an avalanche of
+stones and plaster. While M. Durant stood glancing round him rather
+impatiently, M. Hersant made a careful scrutiny of the walls.
+
+"Humph," he said at last. "As you so rightly observed, Henri, this is a
+remarkable case. I have finished my investigation for to-night. Let us
+be going home. To-morrow I should like to visit Marthe's home."
+
+This conversation took place shortly before midnight; some six hours
+later all Orskaia was ringing with the news that Marthe Popenkoff's
+three children had all been found dead in their beds, their faces and
+bodies lacerated in exactly the same manner as their mother's. There
+seemed to be no doubt now that Marthe had been murdered, and the
+populace cried shame on the police; for the assassin was still at large.
+They agreed that the murderer could be no other than Peter Popenkoff,
+and the editor of the local paper repeating these statements, Peter
+Popenkoff was duly charged with the crimes, and arrested. He was
+pronounced guilty by all excepting M. Hersant; and of course M. Hersant
+thought him guilty, too; only he liked to think differently from anyone
+else.
+
+"I don't want to commit myself," was all they could get out of him. "I
+may have something to say later on."
+
+M. Durant laughed and shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"It, undoubtedly, is Peter Popenkoff," he observed. "I had an idea that
+he was the culprit all along."
+
+But a day or two later, Peter Popenkoff was found dead in prison with
+the skin on his face and hands all torn to shreds.
+
+"There! Didn't we say so?" cried the inconsequent mob. "Peter Popenkoff
+was innocent. One of the police themselves is the murderer."
+
+"Come, you must acknowledge that we are on the right track now--it is
+one of the police," M. Durant said to his friend.
+
+But M. Hersant only shook his head.
+
+"I acknowledge nothing of the sort," he said. "Come with me to the
+mill-house to-night, and I will then tell you what I think."
+
+To this proposition M. Durant willingly agreed, and, accompanied by his
+friend and the village priest, set off. On their arrival, M. Hersant
+produced a big compass, and on the earth floor of the mill-house drew a
+large circle, in which he made with white chalk various signs and
+symbols. He then sat in the middle of it, and bade his two companions
+stand in the doorway and watch. The night grew darker and darker, and
+presently into the air stole a something that all three men at once
+realized was supernatural. M. Hersant coughed nervously, the priest
+crossed himself, and M. Durant called out, "This is getting ridiculous.
+These mediæval proceedings are too absurd. Let us go home." The next
+moment, from the far distance, a church clock began to strike. It was
+midnight, and an impressive silence fell on the trio. Then there came a
+noise like the flutterings of wings, a loud, blood-curdling scream, half
+human and half animal, and a huge black owl, whirling down from the roof
+of the building, perched in the circle directly in front of M. Hersant.
+
+"Pray, Father! Pray quickly," M. Hersant whispered. "Pray for the dead,
+and sprinkle the circle with holy water."
+
+The priest, as well as his trembling limbs would allow, obeyed;
+whereupon the bird instantly vanished.
+
+"For Heaven's sake," M. Durant gasped, "tell us what it all means."
+
+"Only this," M. Hersant said solemnly, "the phantasm we saw caused the
+death of the Popenkoff family. It is the spirit of an owl that the
+children, encouraged by their parents, killed in a most cruel manner. As
+soon as I examined Marthe's body, I perceived the mutilations were due
+to a bird; and when I visited this mill on the eve of my arrival, I knew
+that a bird had once lived here; that it had been captured with lime and
+murdered, and that it haunted the place."
+
+"How could you know that?" the priest exclaimed in astonishment.
+
+"I am clairvoyant. I saw the bird's ghost as it appeared to us just now.
+Afterwards I enquired of the Popenkoffs' neighbours, and the information
+I gathered fully confirmed my suspicions--that the unfortunate bird had
+been put to death in a most barbarous manner. The deaths of the three
+children laid to rest any doubt I may have had with regard to the
+superphysical playing a part in the death of Marthe. Then when her
+better-half had been served likewise, I was certain that all five
+pseudo-murders were wholly and solely acts of retribution, and that they
+were perpetrated--I am inclined to think involuntarily--by the spirit of
+the owl itself. Accordingly, I decided to hold a séance here--here in
+its old haunt, and if possible to put an end to the earth-bound
+condition and wanderings of the soul of the unhappy bird. Thanks to
+Father Mickledoff we have done so, and there will be no more so-called
+murders near Orskaia."
+
+
+_Hauntings by the Phantasms of Birds_
+
+One of the most curious cases of hauntings by the phantasms of birds
+happened towards the end of the eighteenth century in a church not
+twenty miles from London. The sexton started the rumours, declaring that
+he had heard strange noises, apparently proceeding from certain vaults
+containing the tombs of two old and distinguished families. The noises,
+which generally occurred on Friday nights, most often took the form of
+mockings, suggesting to some of the listeners--the enaction of a murder,
+and to others merely the flapping of wings.
+
+The case soon attracted considerable attention, people flocking to the
+church from all over the country-side, and it was not long before
+certain persons came forward and declared they had ascertained the cause
+of the disturbance. The churchwarden, sexton, and his wife and others
+all swore to seeing a huge crow pecking and clawing at the coffins in
+the vaults, and flying about the chancel of the church, and perching on
+the communion rails. When they tried to seize it, it immediately
+vanished.
+
+An old lady, who came of a family of well-to-do yeomen, and who lived
+near the church about that time, said that the people in the town had
+for many years been convinced the church there was haunted by the
+phantom of a bird, which they believed to be the earth-bound soul of a
+murderer, who, owing to his wealth, was interred in the churchyard,
+instead of being buried at the cross-roads with the customary wooden
+stake driven through the middle of his body. This belief of the yokels
+received some corroboration from a neighbouring squire, who said he had
+seen the phantasm, and was quite positive it was the earth-bound soul of
+a criminal whose family history was known to him, and whose remains lay
+in the churchyard.
+
+This is all the information that I have been able to gather on the
+subject, but it is enough to, at least, suggest the church was, at one
+time, haunted by the phantom of a bird, but whether the earth-bound soul
+of a murderer taking that guise, or the spirit of an actual dead bird,
+it is impossible to say.
+
+
+_The Ghost of an Evil Bird_
+
+Henry Spicer, in his _Strange Things Amongst Us_, tells the story of a
+Captain Morgan, an honourable and vivacious gentleman, who, arriving in
+London in 18--, puts up for the night in a large, old-fashioned hotel.
+The room in which he slept was full of heavy, antique furniture,
+reminiscent of the days of King George I, one of the worst periods in
+modern English history for crime. Despite, however, his grimly
+suggestive surroundings, Captain Morgan quickly got into bed and was
+soon asleep. He was abruptly awakened by the sound of flapping, and, on
+looking up, he saw a huge black bird with outstretched wings and fiery
+red eyes perched on the rail at the foot of the four-poster bed.
+
+The creature flew at him and endeavoured to peck his eyes. Captain
+Morgan resisted, and after a desperate struggle succeeded in driving it
+to a sofa in the corner of the room, where it settled down and regarded
+him with great fear in its eyes. Determined to destroy it, he flung
+himself on the top of it, when, to his surprise and terror, it
+immediately crumbled into nothingness. He left the house early next
+morning, convinced that what he had seen was a ghost, but Mr. Spicer
+offers no explanation as to how one should classify the phenomenon.
+
+It may have been the earth-bound spirit of the criminal or viciously
+inclined person who had once lived there, or it may have been the
+phantom of an actual bird. Either alternative is feasible.
+
+I have heard there is an old house near Poole, in Dorset, and another in
+Essex, which were formerly haunted by spectral birds, and that as late
+as 1860 the phantasm of a bird, many times the size of a raven, was so
+frequently seen by the inmates of a house in Dean Street, Soho, that
+they eventually grew quite accustomed to it. But bird hauntings are not
+confined to houses, and are far more often to be met with out of doors;
+indeed there are very few woods, and moors, and commons that are not
+subjected to them. I have constantly seen the spirits of all manner of
+birds in the parks in Dublin and London. Greenwich Park, in particular,
+is full of them.
+
+
+_Addendum to Birds and the Unknown_
+
+Though their unlovely aspect and solitary mode of life may in some
+measure account for the prejudice and suspicion with which the owl,
+crow, raven, and one or two other birds have always been regarded, there
+are undoubtedly other and more subtle reasons for their unpopularity.
+
+The ancients without exception credited these birds with psychic
+properties.
+
+"Ignarres bubo dirum mortalibus omen," said Ovid; whilst speaking of the
+fatal prognostications of the crow Virgil wrote:
+
+     "Saepe sinistra cava praedixit ab ilice cornix."
+
+A number of crows are stated to have fluttered about Cicero's head on
+the day he was murdered.
+
+Pliny says, "These birds, crows and rooks, all of them keep much
+prattling, and are full of chat, which most men take for an unlucky sign
+and presage of ill-fortune."
+
+Ramesay, in his work _Elminthologia_ (1688), writes:
+
+"If a crow fly over the house and croak thrice, how do they fear they,
+or someone else in the family, shall die."
+
+The bittern is also a bird of ill omen. Alluding to this bird, Bishop
+Hall once said:
+
+"If a bittern flies over this man's head by night, he will make his
+will"; whilst Sir Humphry Davy wrote:
+
+"I know a man of very high dignity who was exceedingly moved by omens,
+and who never went out shooting without a bittern's claw fastened to his
+button-hole by a riband, which he thought ensured him 'good luck.'"
+
+Ravens and swallows both, at times, prognosticate death. In Lloyd's
+_Stratagems of Jerusalem_ (1602) he says:
+
+"By swallows lighting upon Pirrhus' tents, and lighting upon the mast of
+Mar. Antonius' ship, sailing after Cleopatra to Egypt, the soothsayers
+did prognosticate that Pirrhus should be slaine at Argos in Greece, and
+Mar. Antonius in Egypt."
+
+He alludes to swallows following Cyrus from Persia to Scythia, from
+which the "wise men" foretold his death. Ravens followed Alexander the
+Great from India to Babylon, which was regarded by all who saw them as a
+fatal sign.
+
+"'Tis not for nought that the raven sings now on my left and, croaking,
+has once scraped the earth with his feet," wrote Plautus.
+
+Other references to the same bird are as follows:
+
+     "The raven himself is hoarse
+     That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan
+     Under my battlements."--(_Macbeth._)
+
+     "It comes o'er my memory
+     As doth the raven o'er the infected house,
+     Boding to all."--(_Othello._)
+
+     "That tolls
+     The sick man's passport in her hollow beak,
+     And in the shadow of the silent night
+     Doth shake contagion from her sable wings."
+     (_Jew of Malta._)
+
+  "Is it not ominous in all countries where crows
+  and ravens croak upon trees?"--(_Hudibras._)
+
+     "The boding raven on her cottage sat,
+     And with hoarse croakings warned us of our fate."
+     (_The Dirge._)
+
+"In Cornwall," writes Mr. Hunt, in his work on popular beliefs, etc., of
+the West of England, "it is believed that the croaking of a raven over
+the house bodes evil to some of the family. The following incident,
+given to me by a really intelligent man, illustrates the feeling:
+
+"'One day our family were much annoyed by the continual croaking of a
+raven over the house. Some of us believed it to be a token; others
+derided the idea. But one good lady, our next-door neighbour, said:
+
+"'"Just mark the day, and see if something does not come of it."
+
+"'The day and hour were carefully noted. Months passed away, and
+unbelievers were loud in their boastings and enquiries after the token.
+The fifth month arrived, and with it a black-edged letter from
+Australia, announcing the death of one of the members of the family in
+that country. On comparing the dates of the death and the raven's croak,
+they were found to have occurred on the same day.'"
+
+In an old number of _Notes and Queries_ a correspondent relates that in
+Somersetshire the appearance of a single jackdaw is regarded as a sure
+prognostication of evil. He goes on to add that the men employed in the
+quarries in the Avon Gorge, Clifton, Bristol, had more than once noticed
+a jackdaw perched on the chain that spanned the river, prior to some
+catastrophe among them.
+
+Dead magpies were once hung over the doorways of haunted houses to keep
+away ghosts; it being almost universally believed that all phantasms
+shared the same dread of this bird. Ghosts of magpies themselves are,
+however, far from uncommon; on Dartmoor and Exmoor, for example, I have
+seen several of them, generally in the immediate vicinity of bogs or
+deep holes.
+
+Witches were much attached to this bird, and were said to often assume
+its shape after death.
+
+"Magpies," says Mr. William Jones, in his _Credulities, Past and
+Present_, "are mysterious everywhere. A lady living near Carlstad, in
+Sweden, grievously offended a farm woman who came into the court of her
+house asking for food. The woman was told 'to take that magpie hanging
+upon the wall and eat it.' She took the bird and disappeared, with an
+evil glance at the lady, who had been so ill-advised as to insult a
+Finn, whose magical powers, it is well known, far exceed those of the
+gipsies." (Other authorities corroborate this statement; and I have
+heard it said that the Finns can surpass even the famous tricks of the
+Indians.) Mr. Jones, in the same story, says: "Presently the number
+increased, and the lady, who at first had been amused, became troubled,
+and tried to drive them away by various devices. All was to no purpose.
+She could not move without a large company of magpies; and they became
+at length so daring as to hop on her shoulder." (This reads like
+hallucination. However, as I have heard of similar cases, in which there
+has been no doubt as to the objectivity of the phenomena, I see no
+reason why these magpies should not have been objective too.) "Then she
+took to her bed in a room with closed shutters, although even this was
+not an effectual protection, for the magpies kept tapping at the
+shutters day and night." Mr. Jones adds: "The lady's death is not
+recorded; but it is fully expected that, die when she may, all the
+magpies of Wermland will be present at her funeral."
+
+There is a house in Great Russell Street, W.C., where the hauntings take
+the form of a magpie that taps at one of the windows every morning
+between two and three, and then appears inside the room, perched on what
+looks like a huge alpine stick, suspended horizontally in the air, about
+seven feet from the floor. The moment a sound is made the apparition
+vanishes. It is thought to be the spirit of a magpie that was done to
+death in a very cruel manner in that room many years ago. There is a
+story current to the effect that a lady, when visiting the British
+Museum one day, happened to pass some slighting remark about one of the
+Egyptian mummy cases (not the notorious one), and that on quitting the
+building she felt a sharp peck on her neck. She put up her hand to the
+injured part, and felt the distinct impression of a bird's claw on it.
+She could see nothing, however. That night--and for every succeeding
+night for six weeks--she was awakened at two o'clock by the phantom of
+an enormous magpie that fluttered over the bed, and was clearly visible
+to herself and her sister. The phenomenon worried her so that she became
+ill, and was eventually ordered abroad. She went to Cairo and enjoyed a
+brief respite; the hauntings, however, began again, and this time became
+so persistent that she at last lost her reason, and had to be brought
+home and confined in a private asylum, where she shortly afterwards
+died. Though I cannot vouch for the truth of this story, I do think it
+is somewhat risky to make fun of certain of the Egyptian relics in the
+Museum. They may be haunted by something infinitely more alarming than
+the ghosts of magpies. There are many sayings respecting the magpie as a
+harbinger of ill luck. In Lancashire, for example, there is this rhyme:
+
+     "One for anger, two for mirth,
+     Three for a wedding, four for a birth,
+     Five for rich, six for poor,
+     Seven for a witch, I dare tell you no more."
+
+From further north comes this couplet:
+
+     "Magpie, magpie, chatter and flee,
+     Turn up thy tail, and good luck fall me."
+
+Rooks, again, are very psychic birds; they always leave their haunts
+near an old house shortly before a death takes place in it, because
+their highly developed psychic faculty of scent enables them to detect
+the advent of the phantom of death, of which they have the greatest
+horror. A rook is of great service, when investigating haunted houses,
+as it nearly always gives warning of the appearance of the Unknown by
+violent flappings of the wings, loud croaking, and other unmistakable
+symptoms of terror.
+
+Owls, though no less sensitive to superphysical influence, are not
+scared by it; they and bats, alone among the many kinds of animals I
+have tested, take up their abode in haunted localities, and with the
+utmost sang-froid appear to enjoy the presence of the Unknown, even in
+its most terrifying form.
+
+The owl has been associated with the darker side of the Unknown longer
+than any other bird.
+
+"Solaque, culminibus ferali carmine bubo. Saepe queri et longas in
+fletum ducere voces," writes Virgil.
+
+Pliny, in describing this bird, says, "bubo funebris et maxime
+abominatus"; whilst Chaucer writes: "The owl eke that of death the bode
+ybringeth."
+
+In the Arundel family a white owl is said to be a sure indication of
+death.
+
+That Shakespeare attached no little importance to the fatal crying of
+the bird may be gathered from the scene in _Macbeth_, when the murderer
+asks:
+
+"Didst thou not hear a noise?" and Lady Macbeth answers:
+
+"I heard the owl scream and the crickets cry"; and the scene in _Richard
+III_, where Richard interrupts a messenger of evil news with the words:
+
+"Out on ye, owls! Nothing but songs of death?"
+
+Gray speaks of "moping" owls; Chatterton exclaims, "Harke! the dethe
+owle loude dothe synge"; whilst Hogarth introduces the same bird in the
+murder scene of his _Four Stages of Cruelty_.
+
+Nor is the belief in the sinister prophetic properties of the owl
+confined to the white races; we find it everywhere--among the Red
+Indians. West Africans, Siamese, and Aborigines of Australia.
+
+In Cornwall, and in other corners of the country, the crowing of a cock
+at midnight was formerly regarded as indicating the passage of death
+over the house; also if a cock crew at a certain hour for two or three
+nights in succession, it was thought to be a sure sign of early death to
+some member of the household. In _Notes and Queries_ a correspondent
+remarks that crowing hens are not uncommon, that their crow is very
+similar to the crow of a very young cock, and must be taken as a certain
+presagement of some dire calamity.
+
+It was generally held that in all haunted localities the ghosts would at
+once vanish--not to appear again till the following night--at the first
+crowing of the cock after midnight. I believe there is a certain amount
+of truth in this--at all events cocks, as I myself have proved, are
+invariably sensitive to the presence of the superphysical.
+
+The whistler is also a very psychic bird. Spenser, in his _Faerie
+Queene_ (Book II, canto xii, st. 31), alludes to it thus:--
+
+     "The whistler shrill, that whoso hears doth die";
+
+whilst Sir Walter Scott refers to it in a similar sense in his _Lady of
+the Lake_.
+
+The yellow-hammer was formerly the object of much persecution, since it
+was believed that it received three drops of the devil's blood on its
+feather every May morning, and never appeared without presaging ill
+luck. Parrots do not appear to be very susceptible to the influence of
+the Unknown, and indicate little or no dread of superphysical
+demonstrations.
+
+Doves, wrens, and robins are birds of good omen, and the many
+superstitions regarding them are all associated with good luck. Doves, I
+have found in particular, are very safe psychic barometers in haunted
+houses.
+
+It is almost universally held to be unlucky to kill a robin. A
+correspondent of _Notes and Queries_ (Fourth Series, vol. viii, p. 505)
+remarks:
+
+"I took the following down from the mouth of a young miner:
+
+"'My father killed a robin and had terrible bad luck after it. He had at
+that time a pig which was ready for pipping; she had a litter of seven,
+and they all died. When the pig was killed the two hams went bad;
+presently three of the family had a fever, and my father himself died of
+it. The neighbours said it was all through killing the robin.'"
+
+George Smith, in his _Six Pastorals_ (1770), says:
+
+     "I found a robin's nest within our shed,
+     And in the barn a wren has young ones bred;
+     I never take away their nest, nor try
+     To catch the old ones, lest a friend should die.
+     Dick took a wren's nest from the cottage side,
+     And ere a twelvemonth pass'd his mother dy'd!"
+
+In Yorkshire it was once firmly believed that if a robin were killed,
+the cows belonging to the family of the destroyer of the bird would,
+for some time, only give bloody milk. At one time--and, perhaps, even
+now--the robin and wren, out of sheer pity, used to cover the bodies of
+those that died in the woods with leaves.
+
+Webster, in his _Tragedy of Vittoria Corombona_ (1612), refers to this
+touching habit of these birds thus:
+
+     "Call for the robin redbreast and the wren,
+     Since o'er the shady groves they hover,
+     And with leaves and flowers do cover
+     The friendless bodies of unburied men."
+
+Not so harmless is the stormy petrel, whose advent is looked upon by
+sailors as a sure sign of an impending storm, accompanied by much loss
+of life.
+
+The vulture and eagle, obviously on account of their ferocious
+dispositions, often remain earth-bound after death, and usually select
+as their haunts, spots little frequented by man. From what I have heard
+they are by far the most malignant of all bird ghosts, and have even
+been known to inflict physical injury on those who have had the
+misfortune to pass the night within their allotted precincts.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+A BRIEF RETROSPECT
+
+
+If I have failed to convince my readers as to the reality of a future
+existence for all species of mammalia, I trust I have at least suggested
+to them the idea of probability in such a theory; for did the belief
+that all animals possess imperishable spirits similar to mankind only
+become general, I feel quite sure that a marked improvement in our
+treatment of all the so-called "brute" creation--and God alone knows how
+much such an improvement is needed--would speedily result. It is still
+only the comparative few who are kind to animals--the majority are
+either wholly indifferent or absolutely cruel. But if children were made
+to realize that even insects have spirits, they, at least, let us hope,
+would cease to take delight in pulling off the wings and legs of flies.
+
+Man has hitherto entertained the ridiculously unjustifiable idea that
+all the animal and insect world has been created solely for his benefit,
+to be killed or to be kept alive entirely at his discretion. Such an
+absurd and presumptuous belief ought to be exploded once and for all.
+The animal world, so all sane people must agree, was undoubtedly created
+to lead the same, free, untrammelled life as does man himself. Man--save
+in cunning--is nothing superior either to the dog, horse, or other
+mammalia; indeed, he is not infrequently so inferior that one cannot
+help thinking that possibly the higher spiritual planes are not for him
+at all, but for those who--misnamed the lower creation--have surpassed
+man in spirituality. Let those who doubt this study the superphysical
+all around them. Let them carefully watch animals, and observe their
+propensities, their psychic faculties of scent, sight, and hearing. They
+can easily test them in any house or locality which has a
+well-established reputation for being haunted. They will then see how
+close a relationship there really is between the animal and
+superphysical worlds. And if they want further proof,--proof of a more
+material nature,--let them search around for some spot stated to be
+haunted by a ghostly phenomenon in the form of a dog, horse, cat, or
+other animal,--and investigate there themselves.
+
+Such investigations have convinced me, and surely, by using these same
+methods with patience and perseverance, other people might also be
+convinced. At all events, let them try. For, a conviction like mine--a
+conviction that an eternity exists for our canine pets and dumb
+friends--is certainly worth a lot of striving after. At least so I
+think.
+
+
+
+PRINTED BY
+
+WILLIAM BRENDON AND SON, LTD.
+
+PLYMOUTH
+
+
+
+
+STRANGER THAN FICTION
+
+Being Tales from the Byways of Ghost and Folk-lore
+
+By MARY L. LEWES
+
+Crown 8vo, cloth gilt, 234 pp., 3s. 6d. net.
+
+"There is much curious matter in the volume well narrated."--_The
+Times._
+
+"Has a thrill on every page."--_Pall Mall Gazette._
+
+"Everybody ... likes a good ghost story, and in the volume before us the
+author has many an entertaining one to tell."--_The Globe._
+
+"An interesting collection ... quite worth adding to one's library of
+the marvellous and mysterious."--_T.P.S. Book Notes._
+
+"We have not, for a very long time, come across a book that interested
+us so much as this did."--_Sheffield Daily Telegraph._
+
+
+SHADOWS CAST BEFORE
+
+An Anthology of Prophecies and Presentiments
+
+Collected and Edited by CLAUD FIELD
+
+Author of "A Dictionary of Oriental Quotations," "Tales of the Caliphs."
+
+Crown 8vo, xii + 223 pp., cloth gilt, 2s. 6d. net.
+
+The present collection of anticipations fulfilled seems by its
+cumulative weight to supply a strong _prima facie_ case for the view
+that in some men, at any rate, there is a sixth sense to which on
+occasions the future is revealed.
+
+"Stories which range from Cicero to Mlle Louisette the tight-rope
+dancer. If you like to read about wonderful and uncanny warnings,
+'Shadows Cast Before' is full of them."--_The Tatler._
+
+
+RE-INCARNATION: A Study of Forgotten Truth
+
+By E.D. WALKER
+
+Crown 8vo, cloth gilt, 3s. 6d. net.
+
+CONTENTS.--Introduction--What is Re-incarnation?--Western Evidences of
+Re-incarnation--Western Poets upon Re-incarnation--Re-incarnation among
+the Ancients--Re-incarnation in the Bible--Re-incarnation in the East
+To-day--Eastern Poetry of Re-incarnation--Esoteric Oriental
+Re-incarnation--Transmigration through Animals--Death, Heaven,
+and Hell: What then of?--Karma, the Companion Truth of
+Re-incarnation--Conclusion--Appendix--Bibliography of Re-incarnation.
+
+"Metempsychosis is the only anti-materialistic theory that philosophy
+can hearken to."--DAVID HUME.
+
+"Scarcely less interesting as an anthology of prose and verse extracts
+about Re-incarnation from ancient and modern writers, than as a detailed
+exposition of the theory itself."--_Athenæum._
+
+
+WILLIAM RIDER AND SON, LTD.
+
+8-11 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON, E.C.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Animal Ghosts, by Elliott O'Donnell
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