pathway,—sounds that I felt might send the notice of my approach
to whatever was waiting for me by the cross and the immortelle on
the murder-rock. Though the broken branches were sentinelling my
advent, I kept on, with a cold shiver now and then quivering all over
me, but never for a moment going deeper than the skin. Brain and
heart as yet were true to their purpose of folly, that seemed like
madness to me then. It did not take me long to reach the objective
point of my journey. I have described the spot in another part of
this narrative, and therefore will not repeat its topographical
characteristics; suffice to say that it was somewhat different in
sentiment than when I had looked upon it in the sunshine. Then I had
seen a visitor sitting quietly and unconcerned on the ridge of the
rock, looking down, with a cigar between his lips, at the spot—always
a thrilling sight—where the girl had fallen; and I had seen young
girls munching sandwiches around the scene, and jabbering of the
massacre of one of their mates; but now, with nothing there but the
night and the spirit of the event, the weird-looking trees with their
limbs reaching hither and thither in such a way as to make me feel
that I was beneath the dome of an iron-barred prison-room. I hold it
to be utterly impossible for any man, unless he is brutalized and of
a sympathetic nature no higher than a quadruped, to be alone in such
a place, with such a preface as it had been my fate to meet with,
and not experience an accelerated throb of his pulse. I do not say
that he is necessarily bound to be frightened, but something so near
akin to it that only our self-conceit prompts us to draw the line of
difference.
I was there to submit myself to one test, and apply the other to
what I had previously seen. The one I was already undergoing; for it
may readily be believed that an immense amount of subtle pressure
was placed upon me. The accumulated proofs of a lifetime, as to the
existence of unearthly presences and imperfectly disproved legends
of ghostly visitations and adventures, bore down upon me with the
wizard night and spectral forms of trees. And when I placed myself
exactly on the blood-stained spot, I looked around with the certainty
of being confronted by the apparition whose existence I was there to
determine. Now, thought I, is the opportunity,—this the place for a
revelation. What other man will ever come again with so foolhardy a
brain and give the witnesses or the victim a chance so appropriate
and so melodramatic? If any one does venture upon the trial, to a
scene so fresh with gory associations, from my soul I pity him, and
would blame; but this species of curiosity is not generally diffused
throughout society. But I was there and awaited whatever issue might
transpire. I was doubtless in a sublimated condition of rapport,
as the mediumistic philosophers term it; a human instrument of a
thousand strings, that the feeblest ghost might play upon with ever
so withered a hand. But none came to inform or frighten me, and not
a sound other than the low clicking of the wood insects broke the
magic ring of silence that closed in with such profundity of pathos
this terrible situation. To attempt to go away, I found required more
nerve than to get there; for now I must turn my back and place myself
in the traditional position in which cowardice is said to place its
victims; but, with the cold creepings renewed with double energy, I
turned and walked with an excited composure away from the spot, down
the hill, through the gateway that opens eastward into the Dedham
road, and then, with half a dozen sighs of relief, straight home.
“Can you recognize that man again?” from the chief, is always
sounding in my ear. What man? Did I not go to the place where he
should have met me, if he was in any way witness to that murder?
Sometimes I think it was the man himself, but not in the flesh. If in
the flesh, he never would have come so near the scene of his hideous
mischief; if in the spirit, then he had committed suicide, or died
of the disease of terror, and was wandering in the accomplishment
of a curse and an expiation. Who knows but what it may be so, and
who can say it is not so, any more than I can assert it is so? Or
was it the father, who, since I wrote the description above, I have
heard was no longer living? If it was the father’s spirit, then I
have something to say about that matter; and when I said that I
could recognize the man, I meant I might be able to do so if there
is a photograph of him that I could get at. Close and open your
eyes quickly while looking at a person passing by your window, and
you will have some idea of the view I had of the profile of this
vision. I have seen in official possession, filed away among the
other papers appertaining to this case, something that evinced that
this dead father was taking active interest in the search after the
murderer. I am not at liberty to recite the mode of that interest,
nor am I called upon by any logical process to affirm that he does
take an interest, or to deny that he does. I only know that there
are similar circumstances connected with this phase of the subject,
that a very large class of the community would attach importance to,
but all involved in such a labyrinth of mystery as to defy positive
recognition and the ordinary tests of evidence.
Assume as a fact that a spirit, taking to itself the form of a man,
had appeared to me, there at once grows out of that admission this
other question: Why should so extraordinary a circumstance, such a
miracle, in fact, have been developed? For what purpose was that
spirit there? Denying, as I do, that it would have been a miracle, I
take up the question and attempt my reply. In the first place, I am
no sectarian; least of all am I a spiritualist; and if I am anything
of a creed man,—which the Lord grant I am!—I am of a church that
is founded on the system of marvels, as indeed, for that matter,
are all churches, Christian or Pagan. The Saviour of mankind, let
me with all reverence say, is admitted to have been duplex in
character,—mortal for our sympathies, divine for our worship. If
he suffered death,—which some doubt he did, but only the semblance
of death,—his spirit was no more existent after his execution than
before it, and consequently he had power to rise from the sepulchre
where they had laid him and appear to the soldiers and to the holy
women. That he did appear we have the evidence of the great apostles
and the contemporary legends of the Roman narrators. Indeed, it is
not only asserted that he was manifest after death, but that ghosts
walked the streets of Jerusalem, and when the veil of the temple
was rent, the graves gave up their dead. These were the phenomena
of a sublime epoch,—an epoch that in the death of a God was grander
and more inexplicable than the incident of the earth’s formation,
and that of the stars and skies that are over it. All events have
their purposes, and I can see the purpose here that should evoke
these wonders. His mission had reached the point where the spiritual
manifestations must overshadow the recollections of his corporeal
existence, and prove to the world, by tangible exhibition, that
beyond the grave there was a life. The Scriptures teem with the
legends of spirits,—of ghosts, if you like that word better,—and
men of all the known wisdom of those days believed in them, because
they seemed to have seen them. Why should they have been prevalent
then, and not now? Who can dare answer that question, or dare deny,
with proof to back the denial, that such things never did exist,
or, existing, appear to human vision? As well tell me that the same
vegetables did not have life then as now, the same qualities of sand
and superficial soil and rocks; and indeed have not certain plants,
that were for centuries lost to human cultivation, been revived?
Nothing is lost, nothing changes, though we call reproduction change,
and flatter ourselves that we have spoken a great philosophy. Why is
the world full of ghost-stories outside of the Scriptures? Because
ghost-stories have been veritable facts,—these lay ghost-stories
travelling alongside of the clerical ghost-stories of the Inspired
Book, and substantiating to the common appreciation of all mankind
the veritableness of the Bible. Who knows but that they are the
vehicles by which Supreme Wisdom conveys to the intelligence of
the unwise and the unlettered, the solemn truth of a hereafter? Who
so arrogant in his wisdom as to be able to rise to the proof that
it may not be so? The atrocity of self-conceit is more terrible
than the atrocity of ignorance; the one is an active crime, the
other a passive submission. The impossible means the possible. It
is a favorite dogma with the utilitarian doctors, that nothing is
impossible to the genius of man. Is there anything impossible to our
Creator, other than the impossibility of making a mistake? If man
invents a machine which defies all the previous laws, or theories
supposed to be laws because nothing had happened to prove that they
were not laws, are we to reject it on that account, and because it
happens to be beyond our uneducated and unprepared capacity? Is
the Creator of all to be limited and only his creature unlimited?
How often, in the midst of a great accident, has not some mind
suggested a redress totally at variance with the rules by which the
accident was produced, creating a surprise to usual circumstances,
and checking the catastrophe before it could recover its equanimity
and prearranged and understood mode of conduct! Cannot the Maker
interpose at his pleasure such surprises? But we will be told that he
never interrupts the harmonious action of his great rules. Where do
we find these rules so as to enable us to say when they are infringed
or deviated from? How long have we been in possession of the habits
of the beaver and the bee? and yet they were a part of his great
rules and system of order. Every day science is bringing new lights
to bear upon old ant-hills as well as upon old mountains, and the
shadow of a fern-leaf on a rock, the ghost of a fish-bone in a strata
are sufficient for a theory on the momentous and mysterious history
of our own illustrious race. If scattered bones of a mammoth, when
reunited by the wire-work of a naturalist, are evidences of Noah’s or
Deucalion’s flood, where are we to draw the line upon circumstantial
evidence and testimony in substantiation of other facts and
possibilities?
There are more tangible proofs of the existence of ghosts than there
are of the existence of Noah’s ark. The hush of the night, the
solitude of forests, the loneliness of limitless prairies suggest, to
the most unimaginative mind something more than the physical sense of
desertion and isolation; and yet that is no proof that a mystic band
of weird spirits are with you in those dreary hours and wanderings;
but whatever is suggested proceeds from a thing that is able to
suggest, and whatever the mind grapples with of the material or the
immaterial exists in some form or other, intangible, but no less
existent. The opponents of the theory of the existence of ghosts, and
their power to appear, use one word that conveys all their logic,
and that word is the contemptuous vulgarism, Bosh! And then they
will advance with weaker argument the logic of bold contradiction,
as if they had just returned from a trip into the regions of the
future and an examination of the powers and rules and intents of the
Providence, with an exact catalogue of his attributes and short-hand
notes to be written out at their leisure, of all he has done, is
doing, and is going to do. Faraday could analyze vapor, but, with
all his retorts and crucibles and chemicals, he never could weigh a
scintilla of a human thought. Such men grasp vapor in their hand,
and will tell you of what it is composed; and they tell you truly,
and we, though consciously ignorant, have no foothold for a doubt.
The preacher rises in his pulpit, and, from his sectarian books,
and more sectarian training, interprets to you the sublimest dogmas
of the Apocalypse; and woe to the member of his flock who raises an
impious question against his dictatorial assertions. But if your
neighbor,—near whom you have been living all your life, whose word
stands pre-eminent in all matters of business, into whose care you
would place your wife or your daughter, and to whose honor you would
leave it to execute your last will and testament, in behalf of the
loved ones,—was to tell you that he had seen a ghost, and calmly
relate the incident with the proofs and the tests, you would be very
likely to laugh in his face, and tell the next person you met that
you were afraid neighbor so-and-so was a little weak in the upper
story, or was telling what was not true.
The elegant dictators of theory speak of the belief in the existence
of ghosts as the “vulgar belief in ghosts and goblins,” and get rid
of it in that summary manner. But the very fact that it is vulgar,
as they term it, is a strong point against them. If we could get the
Scriptures pure and exempt from mixed and muddled interpretations,
free from the garbage of a host of foreign lingual transformations,
and in its original “Vulgate,” we should not have the world troubled
with more creeds than they can invent gods to preside over, or devils
to operate in. The word vulgar is not to be used always as inclusive
of the “low-born and the uneducated.” The vulgar in this country
believe in the imperialism of the ballot-box; in Russia and Prussia
and England, and elsewhere, of monarchies, in the divine right of
kings; and demagogues in all realms, like dogmatists of all creeds,
have no faith at all, but use the belief of the masses for their own
purposes. With the majority of mankind exists the supreme attribute
of common sense, and yet they all, more or less, believe in the
existence of ghosts. The hair-splitters of theology and other ethics,
for sake of discipline, would drive the old stage-coach where the
people would rush the locomotive; and as in the beginning, fishermen
and carpenters were the recipients of divine truths, or the media of
revelations, so now, while abstract and abstruse sciences occupy the
minds of the enlighteners, the plain truths of Christian doctrine are
held with other beliefs, relatively necessary to our nature, in the
legendary, gossiping, and enduring belief of the masses.
It will be asked, For what purpose do your ghosts appear? To
accomplish what end that human intelligence cannot effect? I say,
again turn back to your Bible, and you will have your questions
answered.
There are other needs now that did not then exist. Society is not the
same; the ordinary laws of justice, of health, of life itself, are
not the same. There are a thousand more appliances now, than there
were, by which human life can be destroyed or preserved,—gunpowder,
steam, machinery, with their countless adjuncts of power, on one
side, and chemistry, with ether, and other discoveries, on the other.
And as science becomes the assistant to the conveniences of mankind,
in the same ratio it becomes his slayer. Events transpire now that
were not dreamed of in former days, because of the increased forces
that act upon latent ideas. Sixty, fifty, forty years ago, though
Death had his ample harvest, he had not the immense scythes of
steamboats and railroads with which to do his work of destruction;
and now and then we have isolated facts published, with all the
details of authenticity, of dreams that warned a voyager from the
water or a traveller from the cars, when afterwards it has proved
that disaster befell both modes of travel. The remedy is to the need,
and who can say that there have not been innumerable warnings, by
visitations and dreams, of which the public never has any account,
owing to the seclusion of the parties, or their natural reticence and
unwillingness to have their stories made the subject of a paragraph
and a sneer?
There are purposes in the Almighty wisdom which we cannot fathom,
and religion herself, speaking from the misty summits of theological
controversy, cries to her votaries to have faith where they
cannot have comprehension; or, in other words, to believe without
understanding. Do I, a ghost-seer, ask for more?
You ask, for what purpose did this ghost—if ghost it was—cross your
path? I could retort, and ask why that man—if it was a man—crossed
my path? But I affirm that there was a purpose, and though I did not
see it then, I may see it soon. Who can tell but what this revival
of that mysterious horror may not lead to renewed activity in the
police department? Who knows but it may be read by the murderer, and,
awakening in his breast the smouldering embers of remorse, make him
do those eccentric things which lead vigilance to observe and assist
in the detection of the guilty? I never would have written this
narrative if that misty figure had not confronted me on that night,
and perhaps it may have been his intention to excite in me the idea
of writing out these transactions, and thus awakening the slumbering
or pausing authorities to a more active investigation.
Why did he select me, if I was not appropriate to his purpose? And
I will say now, and with all truth, that, from that time to this
moment, I have been haunted with a vague urging to write this work,
and give it to the public; and now that I have done so, it may so
happen that I will see that thing once more coming to assure me,
in some way consistent with his condition, that his intention, so
far as I was concerned as an agent, is accomplished. I shall not be
surprised if it should occur.
XIII.
THE DOCTOR’S STORY.
Let me relate, as briefly as I can, a very singular incident that
happened some years ago in Baltimore. The narrator was a man with
whom I had been brought up from youth to manhood. His father was my
father’s family physician, a doctor of high standing; and the son who
told and acted a part in the story was then a practising physician
in Washington, where he still practises. A party of us were together
at the house of his father, and the ghost subject was introduced. My
friend argued against their existence, as most doctors do; but in the
midst of our conversation he said that, notwithstanding his theory,
he must tell us of a remarkable occurrence that happened within his
own personal experience.
Two years previously he had occupied the professor’s chair of
Practical Anatomy (I believe that is the phrase) in the Medical
College of Baltimore, though then not more than twenty-three or four
years of age. His remarkable skill, systematized by study in the
famous medical schools of Paris, had justified his selection for the
important post. During this period, or some time before my friend
accepted the professorship, the mob had broken into the medical
college, actuated by a sentiment of horror at the idea of the bodies
of their dead friends being stolen from the grave and placed under
the knife, and subjected the faculty and students to great personal
peril. The riot being quelled, it was determined to make such
arrangements as would entirely elude the suspicions of the people.
For this purpose the upper portion of the building was converted into
a large dissecting-room, with the windows hermetically sealed, so
that no light could be perceived from the outside, and consequently
lead to a renewal of an attack. Thus at night the faculty was secure
from observation, and whatever of light was needed during the day
came through glass inserted in the roof. To add to the security,
a private stairway was arranged, so that if the mob did break in
by the only publicly known entrance, the students and professors
would be enabled to escape. The egress to this private stairway from
the lecture-room was by a door, the bolt of which, shooting into a
socket, was within the room, and could not be moved from without.
This private escape-door was at the other end of the dissecting-room.
And this is my friend’s story:—
He had made arrangements with the janitor of the medical college,
who was also a sexton, to have the body of a female on the
dissecting-table on a certain night, as he wanted to make some
specific studies for his lecture of the next day. On the evening when
the body was to be ready for him, he had accepted an invitation to
a small party, at the house of one of the professors, and thither
he went, pre-arranging with one of the students to leave at eleven
o’clock, and go together to accomplish his examination. At the
appointed hour he made a sign to his companion, and they withdrew.
Arriving at the college, he entered by his pass-key, found a couple
of candles on the table in the lower hall, ascended the usual
stairway, and, arriving at the door of the lecture-room at the top of
the building, stopped for a moment to hang up their cloaks and hats.
Then he applied the key to the lock, and entered with the candles
lit, of course. A deep gloom pervaded the dissecting-room,—a gloom
that was increased by the feeble light of the two candles, and upon
the table lay, under the fearful cloth, the subject for the night’s
work.
Without any other thought in their minds save the plain
matter-of-fact idea of work, they advanced to the
dissecting-board,—the doctor towards the head of the corpse, the
student passing round to the other side. As the latter was in the
act of turning, he lifted his candle and exclaimed, “Doctor, who is
that?” pointing at the same time toward the centre of the room.
“I do not know,” replied the doctor, thinking the question applied to
the body before him; but no sooner had he raised his eyes than he
was struck by the attitude of his friend. He was holding the candle
above his head and looking away from the table, and the doctor,
following the direction of his gaze, discovered the figure of a man
standing some twelve or fifteen feet distant. My friend said that
his only impression was that they were in for a row; concluding that
the mob had found out the secret stairway, and got into the hall for
the purpose of breaking up the dissecting operations. With this idea
he turned round the table, and, as he advanced toward the figure,
exclaimed, “Who are you? What do you want here?” In his advance
movement he was joined by the student, neither for an instant having
the idea of a supernatural visitation in their minds. As quickly
as they pushed forward, as rapidly did the figure retreat until
it reached the door leading to the head of the stairway, when it
disappeared. Supposing that the man had passed out as he had come in,
they rushed to the door to follow, but they found the door fastened
and the bolt shot within the staple. With difficulty they forced it
back, for it had never been used since it was put on,—no occasion
requiring it,—and then they descended the steps to the outer doorway,
which they found closed, and from _within_.
Puzzled by these mysteries, they reascended to the room, passed
through, and immediately descended to arouse the janitor, and see if
he could give any clue to the adventure. The janitor inquired of them
if they could describe the appearance. Yes; and they did so; for they
had had a full and accurate view of his face, of his dress, and of
his height. “Then,” said the janitor, “it was a ghost. That man was
the husband of the woman you had upon the table. I buried them both,
and knew them well, and he answers exactly to your description.”
The doctor, when questioned by us, said the figure was that of a tall
man, dressed in ordinary clothes (I forget, now, whether he gave us
a full description or not, but rather think he did not), with a very
severe and stern face, and kept his eyes fixed upon the corpse, one
hand upraised and pointing to it, conveying the impression to his
mind of an order not to touch it,—a gesture of rebuke, or a motion to
forbid.
The doctor and his friend went back to the vestibule of the
dissecting-room, resumed their outer-garments, and retired. The
janitor fulfilled the doctor’s order, which was to remove and rebury
the body, and find him the body of a woman whose husband would not
interfere with his professional occupations.
Now, here is a true ghost story, if there ever was one. _Two persons_
saw the apparition, and a third party verified it. The moral is plain
enough. The husband was there to prevent the disgusting mutilation
of his wife’s body, and his purpose was accomplished.