sir. I have never confused the spectre's ring with the man's. The
ghost's ring is a strange vibration in the bell that it derives
from nothing else, and I have not asserted that the bell stirs to
the eye. I don't wonder that you failed to hear it. But _I_ heard
it."
"And did the spectre seem to be there, when you looked out?"
"It WAS there."
"Both times?"
He repeated firmly: "Both times."
"Will you come to the door with me, and look for it now?"
He bit his under-lip as though he were somewhat unwilling, but
arose. I opened the door, and stood on the step, while he stood
in the doorway. There was the Danger-light. There was the dismal
mouth of the tunnel. There were the high wet stone walls of the
cutting. There were the stars above them.
"Do you see it?" I asked him, taking particular note of his face.
His eyes were prominent and strained; but not very much more so,
perhaps, than my own had been when I had directed them earnestly
towards the same point.
"No," he answered. "It is not there."
"Agreed," said I.
We went in again, shut the door, and resumed our seats. I was thinking
how best to improve this advantage, if it might be called one, when
he took up the conversation in such a matter-of-course way, so
assuming that there could be no serious question of fact between
us, that I felt myself placed in the weakest of positions.
"By this time you will fully understand, sir," he said, "that what
troubles me so dreadfully is the question, What does the spectre
mean?"
I was not sure, I told him, that I did fully understand.
"What is its warning against?" he said, ruminating, with his eyes
on the fire, and only by times turning them on me. "What is the
danger? Where is the danger? There is danger overhanging, somewhere
on the Line. Some dreadful calamity will happen. It is not to be
doubted this third time, after what has gone before. But surely
this is a cruel haunting of _me_. What can _I_ do?"
He pulled out his handkerchief, and wiped the drops from his heated
forehead.
"If I telegraph Danger on either side of me, or on both, I can
give no reason for it," he went on, wiping the palms of his hands.
"I should get into trouble, and do no good. They would think I
was mad. This is the way it would work:--Message: 'Danger! Take
care!' Answer: 'What Danger? Where?' Message: 'Don't know. But
for God's sake take care!' They would displace me. What else could
they do?"
His pain of mind was most pitiable to see. It was the mental torture
of a conscientious man, oppressed beyond endurance by an unintelligible
responsibility involving life.
"When it first stood under the Danger-light," he went on, putting
his dark hair back from his head, and drawing his hands outward
across and across his temples in an extremity of feverish distress,
"why not tell me where that accident was to happen,--if it must
happen? Why not tell me how it could be averted,--if it could have
been averted? When on its second coming it hid its face, why not
tell me instead: 'She is going to die. Let them keep her at home'?
If it came, on those two occasions, only to show me that its warnings
were true, and so to prepare me for the third, why not warn me
plainly now? And I, Lord help me! A mere poor signal-man on this
solitary station! Why not go to somebody with credit to be believed,
and power to act?"
When I saw him in this state, I saw that for the poor man's sake,
as well as for the public safety, what I had to do for the time
was to compose his mind. Therefore, setting aside all question of
reality or unreality between us, I represented to him that whoever
thoroughly discharged his duty must do well, and that at least it
was his comfort that he understood his duty, though he did not
understand these confounding Appearances. In this effort I succeeded
far better than in the attempt to reason him out of his conviction.
He became calm; the occupations incidental to his post, as the
night advanced, began to make larger demands on his attention; and
I left him at two in the morning. I had offered to stay through
the night, but he would not hear of it.
That I more than once looked back at the red light as I ascended
the pathway, that I did not like the red light, and that I should
have slept but poorly if my bed had been under it, I see no reason
to conceal. Nor did I like the two sequences of the accident and
the dead girl. I see no reason to conceal that, either.
But what ran most in my thoughts was the consideration, how ought
I to act, having become the recipient of this disclosure? I had
proved the man to be intelligent, vigilant, painstaking, and exact;
but how long might he remain so, in his state of mind? Though in
a subordinate position, still he held a most important trust, and
would I (for instance) like to stake my own life on the chances
of his continuing to execute it with precision?
Unable to overcome a feeling that there would be something treacherous
in my communicating what he had told me to his superiors in the
Company, without first being plain with himself and proposing a
middle course to him, I ultimately resolved to offer to accompany
him (otherwise keeping his secret for the present) to the wisest
medical practitioner we could hear of in those parts, and to take
his opinion. A change in his time of duty would come round next
night, he had apprised me, and he would be off an hour or two after
sunrise, and on again soon after sunset. I had appointed to return
accordingly.
Next evening was a lovely evening, and I walked out early to enjoy
it. The sun was not yet quite down when I traversed the field-path
near the top of the deep cutting. I would extend my walk for an
hour, I said to myself, half an hour on and half an hour back,
and it would then be time to go to my signal-man's box.
Before pursuing my stroll I stepped to the brink, and mechanically
looked down, from the point from which I had first seen him. I
cannot describe the thrill that seized upon me, when, close at
the mouth of the tunnel, I saw the appearance of a man, with his
left sleeve across his eyes, passionately waving his right arm.
The nameless horror that oppressed me passed in a moment, for in
a moment I saw that this appearance of a man was a man indeed,
and that there was a little group of other men standing at a short
distance, to whom he seemed to be rehearsing the gesture he made.
The Danger-light was not yet lighted. Against its shaft, a little
low hut, entirely new to me, had been made of some wooden supports
and tarpaulin. It looked no bigger than a bed.
With an irresistible sense that something was wrong, with a flashing
self-reproachful fear that fatal mischief had come of my leaving
the man there, and causing no one to be sent to overlook or correct
what he did,--I descended the notched path with all the speed I
could make.
"What is the matter?" I asked the men.
"Signal-man killed this morning, sir."
"Not the man belonging to that box?"
"Yes, sir."
"Not the man I know?"
"You will recognize him, sir, if you knew him," said the man who
spoke for the others, solemnly uncovering his own head and raising
an end of the tarpaulin, "for his face is quite composed."
"O, how did this happen, how did this happen?" I asked, turning
from one to another as the hut closed in again.
"He was cut down by an engine, sir. No man in England knew his
work better. But somehow he was not clear of the outer rail. It
was just at broad day. He had struck the light, and had the lamp
in his hand. As the engine came out of the tunnel, his back was
towards her, and she cut him down. That man drove her, and was
showing how it happened. Show the gentleman, Tom."
The man, who wore a rough, dark dress, stepped back to his former
place at the mouth of the tunnel.
"Coming round the curve in the tunnel, sir," he said, "I saw him
at the end, like as if I saw him down a perspective-glass. There
was no time to check speed, and I knew him to be very careful. As
he didn't seem to take heed of the whistle, I shut it off when
we were running down upon him, and called to him as loud as I could
call."
"What did you say?"
"I said, Below there! Look out! Look out! For God's sake, clear
the way!"
I started.
"Ah! it was a dreadful time, sir. I never left off calling to him.
I put this arm before my eyes, not to see, and I waved this arm
to the last; but it was no use."
Without prolonging the narrative to dwell on any one of its curious
circumstances more than on any other, I may, in closing it, point
out the coincidence that the warning of the Engine-Driver included,
not only the words which the unfortunate signal-man had repeated to
me as haunting him, but also the words which I myself--not he--had
attached, and that only in my own mind, to the gesticulation he
had imitated.
THE HAUNTED SHIPS.
BY ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.
Along the sea of Solway, romantic on the Scottish side, with its
woodlands, its bays, its cliffs, and headlands,--and interesting on
the English side, with its many beautiful towns with their shadows
on the water, rich pastures, safe harbors, and numerous ships,--there
still linger many traditional stories of a maritime nature, most of
them connected with superstitions singularly wild and unusual. To
the curious these tales afford a rich fund of entertainment, from
the many diversities of the same story; some dry and barren, and
stripped of all the embellishments of poetry; others dressed out in
all the riches of a superstitious belief and haunted imagination. In
this they resemble the inland traditions of the peasants; but many
of the oral treasures of the Galwegian or the Cumbrian coast have
the stamp of the Dane and the Norseman upon them, and claim but a
remote or faint affinity with the legitimate legends of Caledonia.
Something like a rude prosaic outline of several of the most noted
of the Northern ballads, the adventures and depredations of the
old ocean kings, still lends life to the evening tale; and among
others, the story of the Haunted Ships is still popular among the
maritime peasantry.
One fine harvest evening I went on board the shallop of Richard
Faulder, of Allanbay; and, committing ourselves to the waters,
we allowed a gentle wind from the east to waft us at its pleasure
toward the Scottish coast. We passed the sharp promontory of Siddick;
and skirting the land within a stone-cast, glided along the shore
till we came within sight of the ruined Abbey of Sweetheart. The
green mountain of Criffell ascended beside us; and the bleat of the
flocks from its summit, together with the winding of the evening
horn of the reapers, came softened into something like music over
land and sea. We pushed our shallop into a deep and wooded bay,
and sat silently looking on the serene beauty of the place. The
moon glimmered in her rising through the tall shafts of the pines
of Caerlaverock; and the sky, with scarce a cloud, showered down
on wood, and headland, and bay, the twinkling beams of a thousand
stars, rendering every object visible. The tide, too, was coming
with that swift and silent swell observable when the wind is gentle;
the woody curves along the land were filling with the flood, till
it touched the green branches of the drooping trees; while in the
centre current the roll and the plunge of a thousand pellocks told
to the experienced fisherman that salmon were abundant.
As we looked, we saw an old man emerging from a path that winded to
the shore through a grove of doddered hazel; he carried a halve-net
on his back, while behind him came a girl, bearing a small harpoon with
which the fishers are remarkably dexterous in striking their prey.
The senior seated himself on a large gray stone, which overlooked the
bay, laid aside his bonnet, and submitted his bosom and neck to the
refreshing sea-breeze; and taking his harpoon from his attendant,
sat with the gravity and composure of a spirit of the flood, with
his ministering nymph behind him. We pushed our shallop to the
shore, and soon stood at their side.
"This is old Mark Macmoran, the mariner, with his grand-daughter
Barbara," said Richard Faulder, in a whisper that had something
of fear in it; "he knows every creek and cavern and quicksand in
Solway,--has seen the Spectre Hound that haunts the Isle of Man;
has heard him bark, and at every bark has seen a ship sink; and he
has seen, too, the Haunted Ships in full sail; and, if all tales
be true, he has sailed in them himself: he's an awful person."
Though I perceived in the communication of my friend something
of the superstition of the sailor, I could not help thinking that
common rumor had made a happy choice in singling out old Mark to
maintain her intercourse with the invisible world. His hair, which
seemed to have refused all intercourse with the comb, hung matted
upon his shoulders; a kind of mantle, or rather blanket, pinned
with a wooden skewer round his neck, fell mid-leg down, concealing
all his nether garments as far as a pair of hose, darned with yarn
of all conceivable colors, and a pair of shoes, patched and repaired
till nothing of the original structure remained, and clasped on
his feet with two massy silver buckles. If the dress of the old
man was rude and sordid, that of his grand-daughter was gay, and
even rich. She wore a bodice of fine wool, wrought round the bosom
with alternate leaf and lily, and a kirtle of the same fabric,
which, almost touching her white and delicate ankle, showed her
snowy feet, so fairy-light and round that they scarcely seemed
to touch the grass where she stood. Her hair, a natural ornament
which woman seeks much to improve, was of bright glossy brown,
and encumbered rather than adorned with a snood, set thick with
marine productions, among which the small clear pearl found in
the Solway was conspicuous. Nature had not trusted to a handsome
shape, and a sylph-like air, for young Barbara's influence over
the heart of man; but had bestowed a pair of large bright blue
eyes, swimming in liquid light, so full of love and gentleness
and joy, that all the sailors from Annanwater to far Saint Bees
acknowledged their power, and sung songs about the bonnie lass
of Mark Macmoran. She stood holding a small gaff-hook of polished
steel in her hand, and seemed not dissatisfied with the glances
I bestowed on her from time to time, and which I held more than
requited by a single glance of those eyes which retained so many
capricious hearts in subjection.
The tide, though rapidly augmenting, had not yet filled the bay at
our feet. The moon now streamed fairly over the tops of Caerlaverock
pines, and showed the expanse of ocean dimpling and swelling, on
which sloops and shallops came dancing, and displaying at every
turn their extent of white sail against the beam of the moon. I
looked on old Mark the Mariner, who, seated motionless on his gray
stone, kept his eye fixed on the increasing waters with a look of
seriousness and sorrow in which I saw little of the calculating
spirit of a mere fisherman. Though he looked on the coming tide,
his eyes seemed to dwell particularly on the black and decayed
hulls of two vessels, which, half immersed in the quicksand, still
addressed to every heart a tale of shipwreck and desolation. The
tide wheeled and foamed around them; and creeping inch by inch
up the side, at last fairly threw its waters over the top, and a
long and hollow eddy showed the resistance which the liquid element
received.
The moment they were fairly buried in the water, the old man clasped
his hands together, and said, "Blessed be the tide that will break
over and bury ye forever! Sad to mariners, and sorrowful to maids
and mothers, has the time been you have choked up this deep and
bonnie bay. For evil were you sent, and for evil have you continued.
Every season finds from you its song of sorrow and wail, its funeral
processions, and its shrouded corses. Woe to the land where the
wood grew that made ye! Cursed be the axe that hewed ye on the
mountains, the hands that joined ye together, the bay that ye first
swam in, and the wind that wafted ye here! Seven times have ye put
my life in peril, three fair sons have you swept from my side,
and two bonnie grand-bairns; and now, even now, your waters foam
and flash for my destruction, did I venture my infirm limbs in
quest of food in your deadly bay. I see by that ripple and that
foam, and hear by the sound and singing of your surge, that ye
yearn for another victim; but it shall not be me nor mine."
Even as the old mariner addressed himself to the wrecked ships, a
young man appeared at the southern extremity of the bay, holding
his halve-net in his hand, and hastening into the current. Mark
rose, and shouted, and waved him back from a place which, to a person
unacquainted with the dangers of the bay, real and superstitious,
seemed sufficiently perilous: his grand-daughter, too, added her
voice to his, and waved her white hands; but the more they strove,
the faster advanced the peasant, till he stood to his middle in the
water, while the tide increased every moment in depth and strength.
"Andrew, Andrew," cried the young woman, in a voice quavering with
emotion, "turn, turn, I tell you: O the ships, the Haunted Ships!"
But the appearance of a fine run of fish had more influence with
the peasant than the voice of bonnie Barbara, and forward he dashed,
net in hand. In a moment he was borne off his feet, and mingled
like foam with the water, and hurried toward the fatal eddies which
whirled and roared round the sunken ships. But he was a powerful
young man, and an expert swimmer: he seized on one of the projecting
ribs of the nearest hulk, and clinging to it with the grasp of
despair, uttered yell after yell, sustaining himself against the
prodigious rush of the current.
From a shealing of turf and straw, within the pitch of a bar from
the spot where we stood, came out an old woman bent with age, and
leaning on a crutch. "I heard the voice of that lad Andrew Lammie;
can the chield be drowning, that he skirls sae uncannilie?" said
the old woman, seating herself on the ground, and looking earnestly
at the water. "Ou aye," she continued, "he's doomed, he's doomed;
heart and hand can never save him; boats, ropes, and man's strength,
and wit, all vain! vain! he's doomed, he's doomed!"
By this time I had thrown myself into the shallop, followed reluctantly
by Richard Faulder, over whose courage and kindness of heart
superstition had great power; and with one push from the shore,
and some exertion in sculling, we came within a quoitcast of the
unfortunate fisherman. He stayed not to profit by our aid; for
when he perceived us near, he uttered a piercing shriek of joy,
and bounded toward us through the agitated element the full length
of an oar. I saw him for a second on the surface of the water;
but the eddying current sucked him down; and all I ever beheld
of him again was his hand held above the flood, and clutching in
agony at some imaginary aid. I sat gazing in horror on the vacant
sea before us: but a breathing time before, a human being, full
of youth and strength and hope, was there: his cries were still
ringing in my ears and echoing in the woods; and now nothing was
seen or heard save the turbulent expanse of water, and the sound of
its chafing on the shores. We pushed back our shallop, and resumed
our station on the cliff beside the old mariner and his descendant.
"Wherefore sought ye to peril your own lives fruitlessly," said
Mark, "in attempting to save the doomed? Whoso touches those infernal
ships, never survives to tell the tale. Woe to the man who is found
nigh them at midnight when the tide has subsided, and they arise
in their former beauty, with forecastle, and deck, and sail, and
pennon, and shroud! Then is seen the streaming of lights along
the water from their cabin windows, and then is heard the sound
of mirth and the clamor of tongues, and the infernal whoop and
halloo, and song, ringing far and wide. Woe to the man who comes
nigh them!"
To all this my Allanbay companion listened with a breathless attention.
I felt something touched with a superstition to which I partly
believed I had seen one victim offered up; and I inquired of the
old mariner, "How and when came these haunted ships there? To me
they seem but the melancholy relics of some unhappy voyagers, and
much more likely to warn people to shun destruction, than entice
and delude them to it."
"And so," said the old man with a smile, which had more of sorrow
in it than of mirth,--"and so, young man, these black and shattered
hulks seem to the eye of the multitude. But things are not what
they seem: that water, a kind and convenient servant to the wants
of man, which seems so smooth, and so dimpling, and so gentle,
has swallowed up a human soul even now; and the place which it
covers, so fair and so level, is a faithless quicksand, out of
which none escape. Things are otherwise than they seem. Had you
lived as long as I have had the sorrow to live; had you seen the
storms, and braved the perils, and endured the distresses which
have befallen me; had you sat gazing out on the dreary ocean at
midnight on a haunted coast; had you seen comrade after comrade,
brother after brother, and son after son, swept away by the merciless
ocean from your very side; had you seen the shapes of friends,
doomed to the wave and the quicksand, appearing to you in the dreams
and visions of the night,--then would your mind have been prepared
for crediting the maritime legends of mariners; and the two haunted
Danish ships would have had their terrors for you, as they have
for all who sojourn on this coast.
"Of the time and the cause of their destruction," continued the
old man, "I know nothing certain: they have stood as you have seen
them for uncounted time; and while all other ships wrecked on this
unhappy coast have gone to pieces, and rotted, and sunk away in a few
years, these two haunted hulks have neither sunk in the quicksand,
nor has a single spar or board been displaced. Maritime legend says,
that two ships of Denmark having had permission, for a time, to work
deeds of darkness and dolor on the deep, were at last condemned to
the whirlpool and the sunken rock, and were wrecked in this bonnie
bay, as a sign to seamen to be gentle and devout. The night when they
were lost was a harvest evening of uncommon mildness and beauty:
the sun had newly set; the moon came brighter and brighter out;
and the reapers, laying their sickles at the root of the standing
corn, stood on rock and bank, looking at the increasing magnitude
of the waters, for sea and land were visible from Saint Bees to
Barnhourie. The sails of two vessels were soon seen bent for the
Scottish coast; and with a speed outrunning the swiftest ship, they
approached the dangerous quicksands and headland of Borranpoint.
On the deck of the foremost ship not a living soul was seen, or
shape, unless something in darkness and form resembling a human
shadow could be called a shape, which flitted from extremity to
extremity of the ship, with the appearance of trimming the sails,
and directing the vessel's course. But the decks of its companion
were crowded with human shapes: the captain, and mate, and sailor,
and cabin-boy, all seemed there; and from them the sound of mirth
and minstrelsy echoed over land and water. The coast which they
skirted along was one of extreme danger; and the reapers shouted
to warn them to beware of sandbank and rock; but of this friendly
counsel no notice was taken, except that a large and famished dog,
which sat on the prow, answered every shout with a long, loud, and
melancholy howl. The deep sandbank of Carsethorn was expected to
arrest the career of these desperate navigators; but they passed,
with the celerity of waterfowl, over an obstruction which had wrecked
many pretty ships.