Читать книгу The Big Book of Canadian Hauntings - John Robert Colombo - Страница 10
ОглавлениеThe fact that there are so many words in the English language for ghosts and spirits argues on behalf of their very existence! Elsewhere in this book I have gathered these words together and arranged them in alphabetical order. Here I have gathered some “ghost stories” of the traditional kind, as I found them in the columns of old newspapers and journals. Not all ghosts, when they appear, need to be swathed in white shrouds or cerements — but many were and still are. It is worth noting that we do not “see” ghosts so much as we do “sense” their presence. Yet these ghosts are as much phantasms or psychical experiences as they are creatures of folklore. Perhaps for that reason they have particular penetrative powers!
They haunt us still.
Nova Scotian, Halifax, Nova Scotia, November 7, 1859
Mr. Hector M’Donald, of Canada, was recently on a visit to Boston. When he left home his family were enjoying good health, and he anticipated a pleasant journey. The second morning after his arrival in Boston, when leaving his bed to dress for breakfast, he saw reflected in a mirror the corpse of a woman lying in the bed from which he had just risen. Spell-bound, he gazed with intense feeling, and tried to recognize the features of the corpse, but in vain; he could not even move his eyelids; he felt deprived of action, for how long he knew not. He was at last startled by the ringing of the bell for breakfast, and sprang to the bed to satisfy himself if what he had seen reflected in the mirror was real or an illusion. He found the bed as he left it, he looked again into the mirror, but only saw the bed truly reflected. During the day he thought much upon the illusion, and determined next morning to rub his eyes and feel perfectly sure that he was wide awake before he left bed. But, notwithstanding these precautions, the vision was repeated with this addition, that he thought he recognized in the corpse some resemblance to the features of his wife.
In the course of the second day he received a letter from his wife, in which she stated that she was quite well, and hoped he was enjoying himself among his friends. As he was devotedly attached to her, and always anxious for her safety, he supposed that his morbid fears had conjured up the vision he had seen reflected in the glass; and went about his business as cheerfully as usual. — On the morning of the third day, after he had dressed, he found himself in thought in his own house, leaning over the coffin of his wife. His friends were assembled, the minister was performing the funeral services, his children wept — he was in the house of death. He followed the corpse to the grave; he heard the earth rumble upon the coffin, he saw the grave filled and the green sods covered over it; yet, by some strange power, he could see through the ground the entire form of his wife as she lay in her coffin.
He looked in the face of those around him, but no one seemed to notice him; he tried to weep, but the tears refused to flow, his very heart felt as hard as a rock. Enraged at his own want of feeling, he determined to throw himself upon the grave and lie there till his heart should break, when he was recalled to consciousness by a friend, who entered the room to inform him that breakfast was ready. He started as if awoke from a profound sleep, though he was standing before the mirror with a hairbrush in his hand.
After composing himself, he related to his friend what he had seen, and both concluded that a good breakfast only was wanting to dissipate his unpleasant impressions.
A few days afterwards, however, he received the melancholy intelligence that his wife had died suddenly, and the time corresponded with the day he had been startled by the first vision in the mirror. When he returned home he described minutely all the details of the funeral he had seen in his vision, and they corresponded with the facts. This is probably one of the most vivid instances of clairvoyance on record. Mr. M’Donald knows nothing of modern spiritualism or clairvoyance, as most of his life has been passed upon a farm and among forests. It may not be amiss to state that his father, who was a Scotch Highlander, had the gift of “second sight.” — Boston Traveller.
Collingwood is located on Georgian Bay in Northern Ontario. Today it is an affluent year-round resort community; in the past it had a profitable ship-building yard. This news story is reprinted from the Quebec Daily News, Quebec City, December 22, 1862.
A Collingwood Ghost Spiritually Inclined
A few months ago an old man fell over the railway wharf at Collingwood, and was drowned. — Ever since, the more simple folks of the town have been under the impression that his spirit walks the wharf when churchyards yawn. On Tuesday night, one of the railway officials had occasion to walk along the wharf on business. He carried in his hand a lantern, and to his astonishment he observed what he supposed to be the ghost of the drowned man. In the outstretched hand of his ghostship was a tumbler containing what appeared to be liquor, the deceased having been rather fond of a drop, while an inhabitant of this lower world. While the official stood gazing at the spectre, a voice exclaimed, in deep sepulchral tones, the word “Beware,” and the spirit vanished into thin air. He returned to the office and acquainted the other officials with what he had seen, who tried to laugh him out of it, but without effect. He still declares that he saw the ghost of the old man.
A spirit is often believed to be the guardian of a person or the warden of a specific site. “A Ghost in Thorold” appeared in the St. Catharines Journal, October 23, 1863.
A Ghost in Thorold
Last week the bridge-tender at the bridge over the Canal entering the village from the North resigned his position, and a gentleman of the Irish persuasion from the town took his place. It seems that at some indefinite period a man was drowned near the bridge, whose shade remained perfectly invisible until Thursday night last, when Andy was on duty. On that night Andy saw a man with a lantern, or a lantern without a man, approach the bridge, and apparently inspect it very closely. Andy went toward the object, and said, “It’s a fine night then,” but received no answer. This incivility on the part of a stranger irritated Andy, who raised his foot and made a kick at the lantern, hitting a shabbing post. He repeated this operation several times, and with a like result each time. Before he would kick, the lantern would seem to be between him and the post, and after doing so, it would appear on the other side. This puzzled him, and caused his toes and conscience both to become sore, and he retired to his shanty, locking himself in. — On Friday night the same interesting programme was performed. On Saturday night Andy swore he would not stop alone, and when three boys came along, he impressed them and detained them until two a.m., and then let them depart, the “Witching hour of night, When church-yards yawn, And graves give forth their dead” being over. On Monday he resigned, and refuses to go near the bridge.
P.S. — Since the above was written, a new version of the ghost has appeared. It now comes in the shape of a dog, with six legs and six lights, one being in its mouth. The story has thoroughly alarmed the boys and women of the village, and they will not pass that bridge alone on any consideration. In our opinion, it is the duty of the Canal Superintendent to suppress this ghost, as it may interfere with navigation. If he would inquire very closely of the remaining bridge tender a solution might be obtained. It may be that somebody is anxious for the situation.
Weekly News, St. Catharines, Ontario, March 6, 1873
Everybody, or nearly everybody, young or old, loves a ghost story. It is not necessary to believe in its truth to derive enjoyment from it. The more inexplicable it appears to our ordinary reason, the greater the charm that it exercises. Incredulity itself is pleased by a flight into the regions of the wonderful and the supernatural, as is evident from the satisfaction derived by people of all ages and nations from fairy tales which nobody accepts for truth. But the fairy tale only appeals to the imagination. The ghost story goes deeper into the mysterious fountains of human nature and touches on the confines of the great undiscovered land of spirits, whose secrets are not to be divulged on this side of the grave. Hence its charm and fascination, and hence everybody who reads or hears a ghost story experiences a satisfaction, either in believing it implicitly, or in explaining it away by natural causes.
A few years ago I travelled in a British colony in America. The governor was absent in England on his holiday visit, and the duties of his office were temporarily performed by the chief justice aided by the prime minister, or secretary of state. I was a frequent guest at Government House, and there became acquainted with an old soldier, one Sergeant Monaghan, who performed the part of orderly or messenger, and sometimes waited at table when the governor had company. The manners of a colony are free and easy, and learning that the old soldier was a thorough believer in ghosts, and one ghost story which he was fond of telling, I invited him to my room, treated him to a cigar and a glass of grog, gave him a seat by the blazing wood fire, and prevailed on him to evolve the story once again out of the coils of memory. I will repeat it as nearly as I can, in his own words.
“You see,” said Sergeant Monaghan, “Tom O’Loghlin was a delicate and weak sort of a boy. He had a love affair in Ireland that weighed on his mind. He was a kind of cousin of mine, and served in my regiment as a private. Perhaps he would have risen to be a sergeant if he had lived, but, as he said, he was not strong. You may have noticed that from the gate of Government House, where the sentry box stands, you can see into the burial ground, on the opposite side of the road. Not a cheerful situation for Government House. But, however, all the best rooms look into the garden at the back and the governor need not see much of the burial ground, except when he goes in and out. One foggy night, Tom O’Loghlin was stationed as sentry at Government House. It was full moon at the time, but the light upon the white warm mist that lay like an immense blanket over the earth, shone weak and watery lake. It was not a very thick fog, and did not hide objects at a distance of a hundred yards but only revealed them to make them look larger than they really were. I was in the guard-room smoking my pipe, comfortably as I am now (either a pipe or a cigar, it’s all the same to Sergeant Monaghan, if the ’bacey’s good.) when who should walk in but Tom O’Loghlin, with a face of such wild, blank, dismal terror, as I never saw before or since on a human being. It was fully an hour before his time to be relieved of duty, and in leaving his post he had committed a very serious offence. I ordered him back to his post, but he sat down by the fire, and doggedly refused to stir.
“What’s the matter with you, Tim?” said I. “Are you unwell? And why did you come off duty? And it’s I myself that’ll have to report you.”
“You may report — you must report; but I will not go back again, though I be shot for it. I have seen him.”
“Him — and who is him?”
“Him! Why Captain Percival. He came close up to me, and pointed to a man in the burial-ground next to his own.”
The Captain had died about a month previously, and Tim, who was very much attached to him — and indeed everybody in the regiment was — had grieved very much about his death. He had acted as the Captain’s servant, and had received many favors at his hand, and poor Tim was a grateful creature.
“It’s all nonsense, Tim,” said I. “Go back to your post, and in reporting you I’ll make the best case out that I can for you.”
“Never!” said Tim, “if I be shot for it.”
To break the ice as luck would have it, the doctor happened to drop in at this moment, and learning the circumstances that had induced Tim to leave his post, questioned him fully on the subject. But he felt Tim’s pulse first, and there came over his face an expression that I noticed, but that Tim did not, which said very plainly to me that he did not like the beat of it. Tim was confident that he had seen Captain Percival, and that the Captain pointed out the grave which a man was digging alongside of his own, and had distinctly told him that he was to be buried there as soon as the grave was quite ready.
“And you saw the man digging the grave?” asked the doctor.
“Distinctly,” replied Tim; “and you can see him too, if you go immediately.”
“Do, you go, sergeant,” said the doctor to me, “and I’ll sit with O’Loghlin till you return. I think you had better detail another sentry in his place. Is there any brandy to be got? But stay; it does not matter. I have a flask. And O’Loghlin, my man, you must have a pull at it; it is medicine, you know, and I order it.”
Tim was taking a pull at the flask as I went out. I thought it possible enough that the grave-digger might be at work, but I did not know what to say about the Captain, except to think, perhaps, that Tim had been dreaming, and fancied he saw things that had no existence. I got into the burial-ground without difficulty — the gate was not fastened — and went straight to the grave of Captain Percival. There stood the gravestone, sure enough, with the Captain’s name, age and date of death upon it, and a short story besides, setting forth what a good and brave fellow he was, which was true as the gospel. — But there was no grave-digger there, nor no open grave, as Tim had fancied. I went back, and found Tim and the doctor together, Tim not looking quite so wild and white as before, but bad and ill, all the same.
“Well,” inquired the doctor.
“Well,” I replied. “There’s nothing to be seen. It’s just as I thought. Poor Tim’s fancy has cheated him, and it’s my opinion the poor boy is not well at all. And what am I to do about reporting him?”
“You must report him, of course,” said the doctor; “but I don’t think much harm will come to him of that.
O’Loghlin, you must go into the hospital for a day or two, and I will give you some stuff that will bring you out again right as a trivet, and you will see no more ghosts.”
Tim shook his head, and was taken quietly to the hospital, and put to bed. The brandy had done him good; whether it was all brandy, or whether there wasn’t a drop of sleeping stuff in it, I can’t say, but it’s very likely there was, for the doctor told me the longer he slept in reason the better it would be for him. And Tim had a long sleep, but not a very quiet one, for all that same, and tossed about for the matter of a dozen hours or so. But he never got out of bed again. When I saw him at noon the next day he was wide awake, and very feverish and excitable.
“How are you, Tim, my poor fellow?” said I, taking his hand, which was very hot and moist.
“I’ve seen him again,” he replied. “I see him now. He is sitting at the foot of the bed, and pointing to the graveyard. I know what he means.”
“Tim, it’s crazy that ye are,” said I.
He shook his head mournfully.
“Monaghan,” he sighed, rather than said, “ye’ve been a kind friend to me. Give that to the little girl in Ireland — you know.” And he drew a photographic portrait of himself from under his pillow, tied round with a blue ribbon, from which depended a crooked six pence with a hole in it. “In a few days ye’ll be laying me in the ground alongside of the Captain. Do ye see him now! He is leaving the room smiling upon me, and still pointing to the graveyard. I am no longer afraid of him. He means me no harm, and it is no blame to him if he is sent to tell me to get ready.”
“Tim, you are cheating yourself. What you are telling me is all a walking dream. I can see no ghost.”
“Of course, you can’t,” said Tim. “The spirits never appear to two persons at once. But Patrick Monaghan,” he added, “let us talk no more on the subject, but send Father Riley to me, that I may unburden me soul, and die in peace.”
“It would have been cruel to me to have argued the matter with the poor afflicted creature, and him such a friend of my own, too, so I left him to go in search of the doctor first, and of Father Riley afterwards. They both came. What passed between Tim and the Holy Father, of course, I never knew; but the doctor told me distinctly. Tim was in a very bad way — stomach was wrong, the nerves wrong, the brain was wrong; in fact, he was wrong altogether, and had a fever which the doctor called by a very grand and night-sounding name, which I did not hear very plainly, and which if I did, I am unable to remember. Tim survived three days after this, sleeping and dozing, and talking in his sleep, and every now and then saying amid words which I could not well put together into any meaning, “I am coming, I am coming.” Just before he died, he grew more collected, and made me promise that he should be buried in the grave that had been dug for him by the side of the Captain. I knew that no such grave had been dug as he said, and that it was all a delusion; but what was the use of arguing with a dying man? So I promised, of course, by my honor and by my soul, to do all I could to have his last wish gratified. The doctor promised also and so did Father Riley, and I think poor Tim died happy. His last words were something about the ribbon and the crooked six pence, and the Captain, the very last syllable being, “I come.”
“We buried the poor lad in the place assigned by himself, and I was so affected altogether by the sadness of the thing that I could have persuaded myself, in fact I did persuade myself, that I saw Captain Percival in undress or fatigue uniform, just as he had appeared to poor Tim walking past the sentry-fox before the door of the Government House, and stopping every now and then to point at the grave; and the more I closed my eyes to avoid seeing him, the more permanently and clearly he stood before me.”
“And are you in any doubt on the subject now?” I inquired.
“And indeed I am,” replied the sergeant, shaking the ashes from his cigar with the tip of his little finger. “Tim must have seen the ghost, and must have believed in him, and if I only saw it, after Tim’s death, it is but another proof of what almost everybody knows, that two people never saw the same ghost at the same time. And ghost or no ghost, it is quite clear that Tim died of him, and might have been alive at this moment, but for the ghost’s extraordinary behavior. But it’s one of the questions that all the talk in the world can’t settle.”
“Do you think Tim would have seen the ghost of Captain Percival, or anybody else, if he had been sound in mind and limb, if he had been a strong hearty man with a good appetite, and an undisordered stomach?”
“Can’t say,” replied the sergeant, taking a sip of his liquor. “The doctor thought not; but doctors don’t know everything; and if there were no ghosts, why I should like to ask should the spirit of Samuel appear to Saul, and answer his questions?”
“Well, sergeant,” said I, “if you are going to the Bible for arguments, I shall shut up. Finish your glass, my man, and let us say good night.”
He finished his glass, he said good night, and walked away with the air of a man who thought he had the best of the argument.
In the Western Part of Cumberland — Romantic Traditions of Old Time Tragedies — Along the Parrsboro Shore — A Very Racy Story — By S.D. Scott — (Written for the Christmas Herald)
Halifax Morning Herald, December 24, 1887
The person who led the Editor of the Herald’s Christmas supplement to suppose that Parrsboro and the regions adjoining are richly supplied with interesting ghosts, should have been called upon to write a paper on that subject — rather than the writer. The western section of the good old county is, indeed, not without its romantic traditions. In several settlements there remained a few years ago a saving remnant of believers, survivors of those richer times, when local tragedies, acted upon the unskepticized minds of men, as seed falling on good ground, brought forth a fruitful harvest of good old-fashioned ghosts. During those fine times, not more than two generations ago in this region, little information came by way of the post office, and few were the travelers who brought accounts of the business of distant climes. Messages from other countries came so seldom that the people naturally turned for society to residents of that Undiscovered Country, from whose bourne they had been led to believe occasional travelers returned. The other world was nearer than the greater part of this, and the affairs of the nation, the strife of political factions, the war of creeds, the new discoveries of science, or the latest inventions in fashions never diverted their attention from supernatural visitors. The early families read few books in those original days. They rather sought light in evening consultation before the big fireplace, and in that solitary meditation from which minds naturally receptive and unbiased by the methodical training of modern school life, come out well stored with theories of natural and spiritual life. Few are the localities where the well authenticated facts of fifty years ago are now received with that faith which alone makes a ghost story prosperous. These things pertaining to the supernatural are in a sense spiritually discerned, and if historian and audience are not for the time in a believing mood the most stirring narratives become in the language of the late Mr. Lennie’s “things without life, as milk.”
The Cumberland ghosts are of two classes, one of which we may call Real Estate Ghosts, and the other Portable Ghosts. The first class are so designated because they are attached to the realty. They remain near the scene of the tragedy to which they owe their existence, and show themselves to suitable travelers without respect to the connection or want of connection the spectator may have had with the original event. The Portable Ghosts are the personal property of the murderers or other parties connected with the crime. They usually act in lieu of conscience and keep dark deeds from escaping the mind. Several haunted men have lived and died in Parrsboro. Their ghosts have departed with them. The permanent apparitions, as the age degenerates, are the less disposed to be visible, finding the people fewer and fewer to whom a self-respecting ghost would care to appear.
A chapter on Parrsboro ghosts would therefore read much like the famous treatise on snakes in Ireland. At last accounts, however, the Holy Way Brook ghost in the Fork Woods, near Athol, had not yet taken his final leave. The woods themselves, which before the railway was built, stretched without a break a mile each way from the rock whereon the fearful visitor was wont to sit in the quiet evening hour, are now destroyed. The spirit that dwells on the old Etter road has not yet entirely been withdrawn. The change of the name of Maccan mountain to Mapleton has not deprived the two or three disembodied inhabitants of their earthly home. Civilization has not so much as approached the Boar’s Back ghost, and though the Haunted Mill at Parrsboro is now no more there, the spot where it stood has still its horror.
Along the shore before reaching Advocate Harbor there are many spots to which the spirits of the departed were of late wont to return, and unless the telephone and other materialistic influences have wrought for evil, the same is true at present. A precipice by the highway down which a carriage rolled with its human freight, has its well known ghost. There is a shipyard where, perhaps twelve years ago, a woman’s form appeared almost every evening throughout the summer. Moving lightly and mysteriously about the frame work and stagings, passing securely over perilous places, she ever sang strange wild songs, which were heard by scores of the neighbors and by passers by. There is a spot on the beach where ghosts have been often seen hovering near the foot of the high-arched headland above Spencer’s Island, where strange deeds have perhaps been done, and it is said, though on shadowy authority, that the spirit of the sailor whose tomb on the island itself gives the place its name, has been met by the lone tourist. The ghost of one of Capt. Kidd’s murdered men, killed and stationed to guard buried treasure, is familiar to those who go to Cape d’Or or “Isle Haunt” to dig for pirate gold. These and a few others are all the ghosts that remain of the grand old company that formerly dwelt in Parrsboro and its neighborhood. Of the ghosts, who are personal attendants of bad men, who can write of them? Those who possess the best information are, for obvious reasons, the least communicative. It is not, perhaps, to the credit of human nature that the belief in witches survives the faith in ghosts. This truth not only reflects upon the spiritual faculties, as indicating the need of a material form wherewith to connect the supernatural manifestations, but it also tells against our disposition, since it leads to the suspicion that the refusal to abandon faith in witchcraft may be due to a lingering desire to believe ill of a neighbor. It is probably safe to say that in this country every rural township which has been long settled has at some time within the century contained a family skilled in witchcraft. Parrsboro and the adjoining region is certainly no exception. Fifty years hence, if we all live and do not change our minds, fuller historic details will be in order. One of the most prosperous communities in the neighborhood of which we are talking, was one day, within the recollection of all elderly, and of many middle-aged persons now living, thrown into great confusion by remarkable and dangerous flights of stones. Pebbles of all sizes were seen hurling through the air, journeying horizontally, perpendicularly, and in all manner of unnatural curves. They changed direction at right angles while moving, doubled back on their track as if thrown from a celestial boomerang. Never were the laws of projectiles so absurdly violated. It was absolutely impossible that the singular storm could be due to human agency. Many of the best citizens of the place saw this wonderful sight, and several had demonstration more painful than that of sight. It was a terrible day, one well remembered and often spoken of. You may believe that this rain of stones was caused by some natural process, but if so it will on the whole be better for you not to say so in the presence of the good people who were there at the time. They will assure you with dignity that they have the testimony of their eyes, ears and sense of feeling, and will regard your questioning as a reflection on their veracity. One thing is certain that the character of the witnesses forbids the assumption that the story is a fabrication. If you will pursue your inquiries you will learn that the ordeal or test known as “boiling for witches,” was solemnly applied, and with such success that the human associate of the Prince of Darkness was forced to the scene of inquest, so that any doubt, (not that there was any) must be set aside. Much may be learned of other dark doings of the above-mentioned workers of witchcraft. How domestic animals brought under the spell sometimes died, but more frequently acted in a most unaccountable fashion. The hitherto well-behaved ox no longer followed the furrow, the best of cows either went dry or gave red milk, the staidest of horse kind became coltish and exhibited evidences of terror. For these bewitchings the remedy was the boiling or burning test. The milk of the unfortunate cow thus treated, with the proper solemnities, brought the agent piteously begging, and in awful suffering, to the door — where pledges of total abstinence from witchcraft against the afflicted family were promptly administered. It is said that this remedy eventually reduced the offenders to general good behavior. There is no foundation whatever, for the report that Cumberland has had more than its share of witches. A few families, not more probably than half a dozen, would include all those who have wrought these mysteries west of Spring Hill and Amherst within the lifetime of any but the patriarchs. It is doubtful if there are now more than two or three survivors of the many who have seen the Evil One in any of the shapes which he is wont to assume. Not long ago there were those whose evidently genuine accounts of diabolical visits were calculated to keep small boys from going out at night. It is not necessary to explain these things. But we will understand them better if we keep in mind the fact that in New England over a century ago, when the Cumberland settlers came thence, ghosts and witches were plentiful enough, and that the Yorkshire colonists who located in the country had attended the meetings of John Wesley to whom, as he has himself recorded, the Devil in the form of a beast sometimes appeared. The secluded life of a settlement apart from the outside world, and the home training of the young in the shadows of the forest, by parents bringing their beliefs from over seas, would not be likely to induce scepticism in the second generation.
A Strange Spectre Daily Haunting Niagara’s Lonely Places
Kingston Daily Whig, November 22, 1880
The town of Niagara is in a state of excitement over a ghastly apparition which has haunted the place of late. The experiences are growing more numerous, and even men are chary of going abroad after dark. A farmer leaving town the other night about eleven o’clock, the moon being bright, avers that he saw the thing rise from among the tombs, in the churchyard, and trail toward him. It had the semblance of a woman with long white garments and fair hair, apparently floating, or else with far more than the average length of limb. The farmer closed his eyes, and turning his horse drove back into town at a furious gallop, his animal seeming to share the fright. He never looked round until safely in the heart of the town. Another account states that at one of the lonely crossings in the outskirts of the place the woman was seen crouching beside a low fence. The spectators, two in number this time, did not at first recall the stories of the apparition, and went toward the thing under the impression that some vagrant was crouching there for shelter. As they went near, a peculiar sensation affected them both, and without speaking to each other or exactly knowing why they stopped involuntarily and turned away. As they did so a shuddering thrill went through them, as they say, and they broke into a wild run for the nearest lights.
Other tales have contradictory points, but all agree that the apparition has the form of a woman, and possesses a strange floating motion. There is much speculation in the place over the matter.
Five successful burglaries have been accomplished, and three unsuccessful ones attempted, and the evil deeds are still going on. It is possible that the burglaries have been committed by the ghost, although there is nothing to show this positively.
Professor De Morgan
Toronto News, April 19, 1883
Dr. Briggs, when quartered in the Hill Country, used to meet once a week with the officers and others; the custom being to breakfast at each other’s houses after the sport was over. On the day for Dr. B.’s turn to receive his friends, he awoke at dawn and saw a figure standing at his bedside. Having rubbed his eyes to make sure that he was awake, he got up, crossed the room, and washed his face in cold water. He then turned, and, seeing the same figure, approached it, and recognized a sister whom he had left in England. He uttered some exclamation and fell down in a swoon, in which state he was found by the servant who came to call him for the hunt. He was, of course, unable to join his hunting friends, who, when at breakfast on their return, rallied him as to the cause of his absence. In the midst of the talk he suddenly looked up aghast, and said in a trembling voice: — “Is it possible that none of you see the woman standing there?” They all declared there was no one. “I tell you there is; she is my sister. I beg of you all to make a note of this, for we shall hear of her death.”
All present, sixteen in number, of whom Sir John Malcolm was one, made an entry in their notebooks of the occurrence and exact date. Some months after this, by the first mail from England that could bring it, came the news that the sister had died at the very time of the vision, having on her deathbed expressed a strong wish to see her brother, and to leave two young children in his charge.
STRANGE PREMONITION OF IMPENDING FATE
We have been informed by a strange coincidence in the death of the late Alderman McPherson, which involves the mysterious to such a degree as to make it one of those unaccountable illusions which sometimes occur as a prescient to some impending fate. The facts abound so much in the marvellous, that, were they not given on the undoubted authority of the bereaved widow, who now is left to mourn the loss of him whose death was so strikingly revealed to her, we should not attempt to rehearse them. On the Thursday night previous to his death, the deceased gentleman was awakened by the continued sobbing of his wife, whose cries, though asleep, were distinctly audible to several of the inmates of the house. Awakening her he inquired the reason of her incessant moaning, when she informed him that she had had a dream, in which she saw the two gentlemen, who were afterwards the first to tell her the sad news, enter the house and actually inform her of his death. Every circumstance was so vivid, that she remarked it as something peculiar, and besought him on the Saturday morning, when he went away, to be careful of himself, as she felt confident that something unusual would shortly occur. True, in her premonition, he never returned alive, and on the Rev. Mr. Scott and his friend Mr. Lester, entering her house on the same evening, to inform her of his death, she did not wait for their announcement, but holding up her hands in despair, said, “Is he dead?” and without waiting for an answer, fell exhausted on the floor. The sad coincidence of the actual circumstances as they occurred, with the dream, marks it one of the strangest on record. — London C.W. Prototype.
Moose Jaw Times, October 4, 1895
Not many years ago, people used to sneer at ghosts and ghost stories much more than they do now, and one would constantly hear people whisper to one another (while some individual was relating his or her experience): “Ah! it is very odd that these ghost stories should always be related at second or third hand. Now, I want to see a person who personally has seen the ghost, and then I will believe!”
Yes! People are more accustomed to hearing about ghosts now; and yet, even now, should it be a wife, daughter, or sister who ventures to narrate some supernatural experience, she is pooh-poohed, or laughed at, or told to “take a pill.”
Now, I have seen a ghost — and am prepared to attest most solemnly to the fact, as well as to the truth of every word here set down. I have, of course, avoided names, but nothing else; so, without further preamble, I will state my case.
Some years ago I became the object of the infatuated adoration of a person of my own age and sex; and I use the word infatuated advisedly, because I feel now, as I did at the time, that neither I nor any mortal that ever lived could possibly be worthy of the overwhelming affection which my poor friend lavished upon me. I, on the other side, was not ungrateful towards her, for I loved her in return very dearly; but when I explain that I was a wife and the mother of young children, and that she was unmarried, it will easily be understood that our devotion to each other must of necessity be rather one-sided; and this fact caused some dispeace between us at times.
For many years my friend held a post at Court, which she resigned soon after she began to know me; and although her Royal Mistress, in her gracious kindness, assigned two houses to her, she gave them both up, to be free to live near me in B ---- ; indeed, she gave up relatives, old servants and comforts in order that she might come and live (and die, alas!) in lodgings, over a shop, near me. But she was not happy. She “gloomed” over the inevitable fact that, in consequence of the difference in her home-circumstances and mine, I could not be with her every day, and all day long. I think she was naturally of an unhappy disposition, being deeply, passionately, and unjustifiably jealous, and also painfully incapable of taking things and people as they were. All this gave me often much annoyance; but we were all the same, sometimes very cheerful and happy together, and sometimes — the reverse.
Later on, she, poor soul, was taken ill, and during months of fluctuating health I nursed her — sometimes in hope, sometimes without — and at moments during her illness she found strange comfort in foretelling to me, after the most “uncanny” fashion, things which she declared would happen to me after her death. They were mostly trivialities — little episodes concerning people and things over whom and which we had talked and laughed together for she was gifted with a keen sense of the ridiculous.
Amongst other things, she said to me one afternoon: — “This bazaar for which we are working” (she had been helping me for weeks for a charity bazaar, and I can now see her dainty little hands, as she manipulated the delicate muslin and lace. Poor, poor L ... !) “I shall be dead before it takes place, and I shall see you at your stall, and on one of the days of the bazaar, an old lady will come up to you and say: ‘Have you any of poor Miss L ... ’s work?’ (mentioning me). And you will answer, ‘Yes! here is some!’ and you will show her this which I am working, and she’ll say, ‘Have you any more?’ and you’ll say, ‘Yes’ again; and she’ll carry it all off, and say she buys it for ‘poor Miss L ... ’s sake.’ And I shall know and see it all!”
I remember repeating, wonderingly, “What lady?”
She answered dreamily, “Oh! I don’t know — but — some old lady! You’ll see!”
And I am bound to say, this is exactly what occurred at the bazaar, months after her death; an old lady, with whom I was not acquainted, did buy all her work, having asked for it, and carrying it away “for her sake!” An old lady, too, whom I had never seen.
One other curious circumstance which attended her death was that, after looking forward with more than usual pleasure to my coming birthday (which she said would be “a more than commonly happy anniversary”), that was the very day on which she died!
I think that one of the sharpest regrets which I ever experienced in my life consisted in the fact that I was not with my dearest friend at the moment that she passed away. She had made me promise that I would be with her at the time, and, God knows, I had the fullest intention of fulfilling her wish, but on that very evening, of all others I was called away, and she died in my absence. I had been sitting by her bed-side all the afternoon, and all that evening I had held her dear hand, and had kept whispering comforting words in her ear; but latterly she had made no response, and was, seemingly, unconscious.
Suddenly a messenger came from my house (not a hundred yards, it was, away), saying my husband wanted me at once, as one of my children was ill. I looked at the nurse, who assured me there was “nothing immediate” impending; so, stooping over my poor friend, I whispered — at the same time pressing a kiss on her forehead — that “half an hour should see me at her side again.” But she took no notice, and much against my will I hastily, and noiselessly, left the room.
Throwing a shawl over my head I hurried across the square, and as I passed the church the clock struck twelve, and I suddenly remembered that — to-day was my birthday!
I got back in less than half an hour, and on my return heard, to my everlasting sorrow, that I had not been gone ten minutes before my dear L--- became restless and uneasy, then suddenly starting up in her bed, she looked hastily around the room, gave a cry, then there came a rush of blood to her mouth, and after a few painful struggles, she sank back, gasped once or twice, and never moved again.
Of course, I thought then, and do to this day, that she was looking round the room for me, and that she had died feeling I had broken my faith with her. A bitter, never-failing regret!
I have given this slight sketch of the feelings which existed between me and my poor friend (before narrating the circumstances of her supernatural visit to me), just to emphasize the facts of the alluring fascination, the intense affection, which existed between us during her life-time, and which, I firmly believe, have lasted beyond her grave.
Quite a year and a half after her death, my poor L... , with what motive I know not (unless it may have been, as I sometimes fondly hope, to assure me that she understood and sympathized with my sorrow at my having failed her at the moment of her extremity), appeared to me the same once — but never again. It occurred thus: — I had been suffering all day from brow ague, and had gone early to bed — but not to sleep. All the evening I had been kept painfully awake by that same church clock which I have mentioned above. It seemed to strike oftener, louder, and more slowly than any clock I had ever had the misfortune to come across. Of course, my ailment of the moment caused the clock’s vagaries to appear peculiarly painful, and I bore the annoyance very restlessly, with my face turned pettishly to the wall; but when the midnight hour began to chime, I felt as though I could bear it no longer. Muttering an impatient exclamation, I turned in my bed, so as to face the room, and looking across it, I saw my poor ..., standing close to a screen between me and the door, looking at me.
She was in her usual dress, wearing (what was then called) a “cross-over,” which was tied behind; while her bonnet (which she was always in the habit of taking off as she came upstairs) was, as usual, hanging by the ribbon, on her arm. She had a smile on her face, and I distinctly noticed her lovely little white ears, which were always my admiration, and which were only half covered by her soft brown hair.
She stood — a minute it seemed — looking at me, then she glided towards me, and I, half-apprehensive that she was about to throw herself on my bed, exclaimed, jumping up in a sitting posture: — “Dearest! what brings you here so late?”
With deep reverence be it spoken; but as soon as these words were out of my mouth I was irresistibly reminded of those spoken (Holy Writ tell us) by Saint Peter at the awful moment of the Transfiguration! Awed and dazed at the sight of the spiritual visitants, we are told he uttered words “not knowing what he said.” These words of mine also seemed to leap to my lips, but with little meaning in them — if any.
As soon, however, as my voice had ceased, the apparition disappeared, and I remained some moments motionless.
One of the most curious features of the case is that, although I was very especially restless and awake at the moment of the appearance, I recognized my friend so completely, that I forgot also to recognize the fact that she had died; or, rather, it happened too quickly for me to bring that fact to mind. Indeed, it all took place in such a flash — in such a moment of time — so much quicker than I can tell it — and she looked so exactly like her well-known self, and that till she had disappeared, I really believed I was seeing her in the flesh! Of course, as soon as I had time to reflect, I remembered, and realized what it was I had seen!
I was not frightened, but I felt colder than I had ever felt in my life, and I have never felt so cold since, but the moisture seemed to pour off my body. I called no one to my assistance; all I realized was that God had permitted me to see her once more, and that perhaps He might send her to me again. But He has not done so, and, probably, now, He never will.
I lay awake all night afterwards, hoping for — and, I think, almost expecting — her again, and after the day had dawned I fell asleep.
Before telling my story to anyone, and dreading unspeakably all the doubting and sarcastic speeches which such a narration would inevitably call forth, I sent for my doctor, an old and trusted friend, and after making him talk rationally to me for some time, I asked him whether he considered me in an exalted state, or whether I had ever betrayed any hysterical tendencies. He reassured me heartily on these points, and then asked my reasons for such questionings. I thereupon opened my heart to him, and he neither ridiculed nor disbelieved, but, on the contrary, told me another case of the same kind which had lately happened to a friend of his; but he strongly advised me to keep my own council at present (which I did for some time), and kindly added that he did not look upon me as a lunatic, but simply as a woman for whom one corner of the curtain which guarded the unseen had been lifted.
In conclusion, I repeat I am ready to vouch for the truth of every word here set down, and also, should it be required, to give names — in private — to satisfy those who doubt.
