There need be no difficulty about getting a ghost laid. We have just
heard of a local preacher, living in the district between Camborne and
Helston, who, according to his own account, has put many troublesome
spirits to rest, generally by settling for them their mundane affairs,
about which they were troubled, by reasoning with and advising them to
stay below, bear their punishment with a good heart, make the best of a
bad matter, and hope for better times. He allowed that sometimes he was
merely deluding the ghosts; yet, no matter, the end sought was
attained—anything to get rid of them!
As he had a rather uncommon adventure in laying one ghost, we give an
account, somewhat abridged, of this enterprise.
From some trifling cause the spirit got back again to its late abode,
before the mourners had quitted the public-house, in Churchtown, where,
as is customary, they stopped awhile to treat and take leave of their
friends, who had come to the funeral from a distance.
The ghost became, at once, so annoying, that none could rest in the
house with it, and, a few nights after the burial, the family of the
deceased, not knowing what to do to obtain any rest, fetched the
preacher, who was believed to possess extraordinary knowledge of
spiritual matters and power over the ghostly world and its inhabitants.
He entered the haunted house alone. After many hours passed in prayer
and expostulation with the obstinate spirit, it at last consented to
return to its grave and stay there, if the exorcist and preacher would
accompany it to the churchyard to see it landed there.
And now happened the most remarkable part of this affair. About
midnight, the ghost layer bound the spirit with a piece of new rope,
and fastened the other end of it round his own waist, that the spirit
mightn’t give him the slip. The spirit, gentle as a lamb, was then led
out of the house; but it had no sooner crossed the door-sill than the
dwelling was surrounded by a pack of yelping hounds, of which the
town-place was full, and the old one riding up the lane in a blaze of
fire.
The spirit, to save itself from being caught by hounds and huntsman,
mounted high up in the air, taking the man (hanging by the middle) with
it. Away they went, over trees, hills, and water. In less than a minute
they passed over some miles, and alighted in the churchyard, close by
the spirit’s grave, which the man saw open, and blue sulphurous flames
issuing therefrom, and he heard, coming from below, most horrid shrieks
and moans.
The ghost, knowing it was no use to contend with the man of faith, only
stopped to say farewell, and then descended into its grave, which
immediately closed. The man—overcome, by being borne, with lightning
speed, through the air, or by the infernal fumes rising from the open
grave,—fell down in a fit, from which he didn’t recover till daybreak,
and then he was scarcely able to leave the churchyard. When near the
town-place, which he had left with the spirit, in the branch of a tree
he found his hat, that must have fallen from his head on first mounting
through the air.
The most probable solution of this story (told in good faith and firmly
believed) is that the ghost-layer, after taking too much spirit in the
public-house, rambled into the churchyard, there fell asleep, and
dreamed the rest.