(Vol. viii., pp. 512. 632.; Vol. ix., pp. 39. 88. 135.)
"There is a curious criminal process on record, manuscript 1770,
noticed by Voltaire as in the library of the King of France, which was
founded upon a remarkable set of visions said to have occurred to the
monks of Orleans.
"The illustrious house of St. Memin had been very liberal to the
convent, and had their family vault under the church. The wife of a
Lord of St. Memin, Provost of Orleans, died, and was buried. The
husband, thinking that his ancestors had given more than enough to the
convent, sent the monks a present, which they thought too small. They
formed a plan to have her body disinterred, and to force the widower to
pay a second fee for depositing it again in holy ground.
"The soul of the lady first appeared to two of the brethren, and said
to them, 'I am damned, like Judas, because my husband has not given
sufficient.' They hoped to extort money for the repose of her soul. But
the husband said, 'If she is really damned, all the money in the world
won't save her,' and gave them nothing. Perceiving their mistake, they
declared she appeared again, saying she was in _Purgatory_, and {201}
demanding to be disinterred. But this seemed a curious request, and
excited suspicion, for it was not likely that a soul in purgatory would
ask to have the body removed from holy ground, neither had any in
purgatory ever been known to desire to be exhumed.
"The soul after this did not try _speaking_ any more, but haunted
everybody in the convent and church. Brother Peter of Arras adopted a
very awkward manner of conjuring it. He said to it, 'If thou art the
soul of the late Madame de St. Memin, strike four knocks,' and the four
knocks were struck. 'If thou art damned, strike six knocks,' and the
six knocks were struck. 'If thou art still tormented in hell, because
thy body is buried in holy ground, knock six more times,' and the six
knocks were heard still more distinctly. 'If we disinter thy body, wilt
thou be less damned, certify to us by five knocks,' and the soul so
certified. This statement was signed by twenty-two cordeliers. The
father provincial asked the same questions and received the same
answers. The Lord of St. Memin prosecuted the father cordeliers. Judges
were appointed. The general of the commission required that they should
be burned; but the sentence only condemned them to make the 'amende
honorable,' with a torch in their bosom, and to be banished."
This sentence is of the 18th of February, 1535. Vide Abbé Langlet's
_History of Apparitions_.
From the above extract, and from what your correspondents MR. JARDINE and
R. I. R. have written, it is satisfactorily shown that rapping is no
novelty, having been known in England and France some centuries ago. MR.
JARDINE has given us an instance in 1584, and leads us to suppose that it
was the earliest on record. I now give one as early as 1534; and it would
be interesting to know if the monks of Orleans were the first to have
practised this imposition, and to have been banished for their deception
and fraud.