that she was acquainted with some of the family and several of the
friends of the Rev. Henry A., who, she continued, "is still alive,
though now an old man; and I can most positively assert that his own
conviction with regard to the nature of this appearance has remained
ever unshaken. The circumstance made a lasting impression upon his mind,
and he never willingly speaks of it; but when he does, it is always with
the greatest seriousness, and he never shrinks from avowing his belief
that what he saw admits of no other interpretation than the one he then
put upon it."
XXIV
CLERK SAUNDERS
"Border Minstrelsy"
Clerk Saunders and May Margaret
Walked owre yon garden green;
And sad and heavy was the love
That fell them twa between.
And thro' the dark, and thro' the mirk,
And thro' the leaves o' green,
He cam that night to Margaret's door,
And tirléd at the pin.
"O wha is that at my bower door,
Sae weel my name does ken?"
"'Tis I, Clerk Saunders, your true love;
You'll open and let me in?"
"But in may come my seven bauld brithers,
Wi' torches burning bright;
They'll say--'We hae but ae sister,
And behold she's wi' a knight!'"
"Ye'll tak my brand I bear in hand,
And wi' the same ye'll lift the pin;
Then ye may swear, and save your aith,
That ye ne'er let Clerk Saunders in.
"Ye'll tak the kerchief in your hand,
And wi' the same tie up your een;
Then ye may swear and save your aith,
Ye saw me na since yestere'en."
It was about the midnight hour,
When they asleep were laid,
When in and cam her seven brothers,
Wi' torches burning red.
When in and cam her seven brothers,
Wi' torches burning bright;
They said, "We hae but ae sister,
And behold she's wi' a knight."
Then out and spak the first o' them,
"We'll awa' and lat them be."
And out and spak the second o' them,
"His father has nae mair than he!"
And out and spak the third o' them,
"I wot they are lovers dear!"
And out and spak the fourth o' them,
"They hae lo'ed this mony a year!"
Then out and spak the fifth o' them,
"It were sin true love to twain!"
"'Twere shame," out spak the sixth o' them,
"To slay a sleeping man!"
Then up and gat the seventh o' them,
And never a word spak he;
But he has striped his bright brown brand
Through Saunders' fair bodie.
Clerk Saunders started, and Margaret she turned,
Into his arms as asleep she lay;
And sad and silent was the night,
That was atween thir twae.
And they lay still and sleepit sound,
Till the day began to daw;
And kindly to him she did say,
"It is time, love, you were awa'."
But he lay still, and sleepit sound,
Till the sun began to sheen;
She looked atween her and the wa',
And dull, dull were his een.
She turned the blankets to the foot,
The sheets unto the wa',
And there she saw his bloody wound,
And her tears fast doun did fa'.
Then in and cam her father dear,
Said, "Let a' your mournin' be;
I'll carry the dead corpse to the clay
And then come back and comfort thee.
"Hold your tongue, my daughter dear,
And let your mourning be;
I'll wed you to a higher match
Than his father's son could be."
"Gae comfort weel your seven sons, father,
For man sall ne'er comfort me;
Ye'll marry me wi' the Queen o' Heaven,
For wedded I ne'er sall be!"
The clinking bell gaed through the toun,
To carry the dead corse to the clay;
And Clerk Saunders stood at Margaret's window,
'Twas an hour before the day.
"O'are ye sleeping, Margaret?" he says,
"Or are ye waking presentlie?
Gie me my faith and troth again,
I wot, true love, I gied to thee.
"I canna rest, Margaret," he says,
"Doun in the grave where I must be,
Till ye gie me my faith and troth again,
I wot, true love, I gied to thee."
"Your faith and troth ye sall never get,
Nor our true love sall never twin,
Until ye come within my bower,
And kiss me cheek and chin."
"My mouth it is full cold, Margaret,
It has the smell, now, of the ground;
And if I kiss thy comely mouth,
To the grave thou will be bound.
"O, cocks are crawing a merry midnight,
I wot the wild-fowls are boding day;
Gie me my faith and troth again,
And let me fare me on my way."
"Thy faith and troth thou sall na get,
And our true love shall never twin,
Until ye tell what comes of women,
I wot, who die in strong travailing."
"Their beds are made in the heavens high,
Down at the foot of our good Lord's knee,
Weel set about wi' gillyflowers;
I wot sweet company for to see.
"O, cocks are crawing a merry midnight,
I wot the wild-fowl are boding day;
The psalms of heaven will soon be sung,
And I, ere now, will be missed away."
Then she has ta'en a crystal wand,
And she has stroken her troth thereon,
She has given it him out at the shot-window,
Wi' mony a sigh and heavy groan.
"I thank ye, Margaret; I thank ye, Margaret;
And aye I thank ye heartilie;
Gin ever the dead come for the quick,
Be sure, Margaret, I'll come for thee."
It's hosen, and shoon, and gown, alane,
She clam the wa' and after him;
Until she cam to the green forest,
And there she lost the sight o' him.
"Is there ony room at your head, Saunders,
Is there ony room at your feet?
Or ony room at your side, Saunders,
Where fain, fain, I wad sleep?"
"There's nae room at my head, Margaret,
There's nae room at my feet;
My bed it is full lowly now:
'Mang the hungry worms I sleep.
"Cauld mould is my covering now,
But and my winding-sheet;
The dew it falls nae sooner down,
Than my resting-place is weet.
"But plait a wand o' the bonnie birk
And lay it on my breast;
And shed a tear upon my grave,
And wish my saul gude rest.
"And fair Margaret, and rare Margaret,
And Margaret o' veritie,
Gin e'er ye love anither man,
Ne'er love him as ye did me."
Then up and crew the milk-white cock,
And up and crew the gray;
Her lover vanished in the air,
And she gaed weeping away.
XXV
DOROTHY DURANT
By Mrs CROWE
A schoolboy named Bligh, who went to Launceston Grammar School, of which
the Rev. John Ruddle was headmaster, from being a lad of bright parts
and no common attainments, became on a sudden moody, dejected, and
melancholy. His friends, seeing the change without being able to find
the cause, attributed it to laziness, an aversion to school, or to some
other motive which he was ashamed to avow. He was led, however, to tell
his brother, after some time, that in a field through which he passed to
and from school, he invariably met the apparition of a woman, whom he
personally knew while living, and who had been dead about eight years.
Ridicule, threats, persuasions, were alike used in vain by the family to
induce him to dismiss these absurd ideas. Finally, Mr Ruddle was sent
for, and to him the boy ingenuously told the time, manner, and frequency
of this appearance. It was in a field called Higher Broomfield. The
apparition, he said, appeared dressed in female attire, met him two or
three times while he passed through the field, glided hastily by him,
but never spoke. He had thus been occasionally met about two months
before he took any particular notice of it; at length the appearance
became more frequent, meeting him both morning and evening, but always
in the same field, yet invariably moving out of the path when it came
close to him. He often spoke, but could never get any reply. To avoid
this unwelcome visitor he forsook the field, and went to school and
returned from it through a lane, in which place, between the quarry pack
and nursery, it always met him. Unable to disbelieve the evidence of his
own senses, or to obtain credit with any of his family, he prevailed
upon Mr Ruddle to accompany him to the place.
"I arose," says this clergyman, "the next morning, and went with him.
The field to which he led me I guessed to be about twenty acres, in an
open country, and about three furlongs from any house. We went into the
field, and had not gone a third part before the spectrum in the shape of
a woman, with all the circumstances he had described the day before, so
far as the suddenness of its appearance and transition would permit me
to discover, passed by.
"I was a little surprised at it, and though I had taken up a firm
resolution to speak to it, I had not the power, nor durst I look back;
yet I took care not to show any fear to my pupil and guide, and
therefore, telling him I was satisfied of the truth of his statement, we
walked to the end of the field and returned--nor did the ghost meet us
that time but once.
"On the 27th July, 1665, I went to the haunted field by myself, and
walked the breadth of it without any encounter. I then returned and took
the other walk, and then the spectre appeared to me, much about the same
place in which I saw it when the young gentleman was with me. It
appeared to move swifter than before, and seemed to be about ten feet
from me on my right hand, insomuch that I had not time to speak to it,
as I had determined with myself beforehand. The evening of this day, the
parents, the son, and myself, being in the chamber where I lay, I
proposed to them our going altogether to the place next morning. We
accordingly met at the stile we had appointed; thence we all four walked
into the field together. We had not gone more than half the field before
the ghost made its appearance. It then came over the stile just before
us, and moved with such rapidity that by the time we had gone six or
seven steps it passed by. I immediately turned my head and ran after it,
with the young man by my side. We saw it pass over the stile at which we
entered, and no farther. I stepped upon the hedge at one place and the
young man at another, but we could discern nothing; whereas I do aver
that the swiftest horse in England could not have conveyed himself out
of sight in that short space of time. Two things I observed in this
day's appearance: first, a spaniel dog, which had followed the company
unregarded, barked and ran away as the spectrum passed by; whence it is
easy to conclude that it was not our fear or fancy which made the
apparition. Secondly, the motion of the spectrum was not _gradatim_ or
by steps, or moving of the feet, but by a kind of gliding, as children
upon ice, or as a boat down a river, which punctually answers the
description the ancients give of the motion of these Lamures. This
ocular evidence clearly convinced, but withal strangely affrighted, the
old gentleman and his wife. They well knew this woman, Dorothy Durant,
in her life-time; were at her burial, and now plainly saw her features
in this apparition.
"The next morning, being Thursday, I went very early by myself, and
walked for about an hour's space in meditation and prayer in the field
next adjoining. Soon after five I stepped over the stile into the
haunted field, and had not gone above thirty or forty paces before the
ghost appeared at the further stile. I spoke to it in some short
sentences with a loud voice; whereupon it approached me, but slowly, and
when I came near it moved not. I spoke again, and it answered in a voice
neither audible nor very intelligible. I was not in the least terrified,
and therefore persisted until it spoke again and gave me satisfaction;
but the work could not be finished at this time. Whereupon the same
evening, an hour after sunset, it met me again near the same place, and
after a few words on each side it quietly vanished, and neither doth
appear now, nor hath appeared since, nor ever will more to any man's
disturbance. The discourse in the morning lasted about a quarter of an
hour.
"These things are true," concludes the Rev. John Ruddle, "and I know
them to be so, with as much certainty as eyes and ears can give me; and
until I can be persuaded that my senses all deceive me about their
proper objects, and by that persuasion deprive me of the strongest
inducement to believe the Christian religion, I must and will assert
that the things contained in this paper are true."
XXVI
PEARLIN JEAN
By CHARLES KIRKPATRICK SHARPE
It was Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, the antiquary, who furnished this
account of Pearlin Jean's hauntings at Allanbank.
"In my youth," he says, "Pearlin Jean was the most remarkable ghost in
Scotland, and my terror when a child. Our old nurse, Jenny Blackadder,
had been a servant at Allanbank, and often heard her rustling in silks
up and down stairs, and along the passages. She never saw her; but her
husband did.
"She was a French woman, whom the first baronet of Allanbank, then Mr
Stuart, met with at Paris, during his tour to finish his education as a
gentleman. Some people said she was a nun; in which case she must have
been a Sister of Charity, as she appears not to have been confined to a
cloister. After some time, young Stuart either became faithless to the
lady or was suddenly recalled to Scotland by his parents, and had got
into his carriage at the door of the hotel, when his Dido unexpectedly
made her appearance, and stepping on the forewheel of the coach to
address her lover, he ordered the postilion to drive on; the consequence
of which was that the lady fell, and one of the wheels going over her
forehead, killed her.
"In a dusky autumnal evening, when Mr Stuart drove under the arched
gateway of Allanbank, he perceived Pearlin Jean sitting on the top, her
head and shoulders covered with blood.
"After this, for many years, the house was haunted; doors shut and
opened with great noise at midnight; the rustling of silks and pattering
of high-heeled shoes were heard in bedrooms and passages. Nurse Jenny
said there were seven ministers called in together at one time to _lay_
the spirit; 'but they did no mickle good, my dear.'
"The picture of the ghost was hung between those of her lover and his
lady, and kept her comparatively quiet; but when taken away, she became
worse-natured than ever. This portrait was in the present Sir J.G.'s
possession. I am unwilling to record its fate.
"The ghost was designated Pearlin, from always wearing a great quantity
of that sort of lace.
"Nurse Jenny told me that when Thomas Blackadder was her lover (I
remember Thomas very well), they made an assignation to meet one
moonlight night in the orchard at Allanbank. True Thomas, of course, was
the first comer; and seeing a female figure in a light-coloured dress,
at some distance, he ran forward with open arms to embrace his Jenny;
when lo and behold! as he neared the spot where the figure stood, it
vanished; and presently he saw it again at the very end of the orchard,
a considerable way off. Thomas went home in a fright; but Jenny, who
came last, and saw nothing, forgave him, and they were married.
"Many years after this, about the year 1790, two ladies paid a visit at
Allanbank--I think the house was then let--and passed the night there.
They had never heard a word about the ghost; but they were disturbed the
whole night with something walking backwards and forwards in their
bed-chamber. This I had from the best authority."
To this account may be added that a housekeeper, called Betty Norrie,
who, in more recent times, lived many years at Allanbank, positively
averred that she, and many other persons, had frequently seen Pearlin
Jean; and, moreover, stated that they were so used to her as to be no
longer alarmed at the noises she made.
XXVII
THE DENTON HALL GHOST
Local Records
A day or two after my arrival at Denton Hall, when all around was yet
new to me, I had accompanied my friends to a ball given in the
neighbourhood, and returned heartily fatigued. At this time I need not
blush, nor you smile, when I say that on that evening I had met, for the
second time, one with whose destinies my own were doomed to become
connected.
I think I was sitting upon an antique carved chair, near to the fire, in
the room where I slept, busied in arranging my hair, and thinking over
some of the events of the day. Whether I had dropped into a
half-slumber, I cannot say; but on looking up--for I had my face bent
toward the fire--there seemed sitting on a similar highbacked chair, on
the other side of the ancient tiled fireplace, an old lady, whose air
and dress were so remarkable that to this hour they seem as fresh in my
memory as they were the day after the vision. She appeared to be dressed
in a flowered satin gown, of a cut then out of date. It was peaked and
long-waisted. The fabric of the satin had that extreme of glossy
stiffness which old fabrics of this kind exhibit. She wore a stomacher.
On her wrinkled fingers appeared some rings of great size and seeming
value; but, what was most remarkable, she wore also a satin hood of a
peculiar shape. It was glossy like the gown, but seemed to be stiffened
either by whalebone or some other material. Her age seemed considerable,
and the face, though not unpleasant, was somewhat hard and severe and
indented with minute wrinkles. I confess that so entirely was my
attention engrossed by what was passing in my mind, that, though I felt
mightily confused, I was not startled (in the emphatic sense) by the
apparition. In fact, I deemed it to be some old lady, perhaps a
housekeeper, or dependent in the family, and, therefore, though rather
astonished, was by no means frightened by my visitant, supposing me to
be awake, which I am convinced was the case, though few persons believe
me on this point.
My own impression is that I stared somewhat rudely, in the wonder of the
moment, at the hard, but lady-like features of my aged visitor. But she
left me small time to think, addressing me in a familiar half-whisper
and with a constant restless motion of the hand which aged persons, when
excited, often exhibit in addressing the young. "Well, young lady," said
my mysterious companion, "and so you've been at yon hall to-night! and
highly ye've been delighted there! Yet if you could see as I can see, or
could know as I can know, troth! I guess your pleasure would abate. 'Tis
well for you, young lady, peradventure, ye see not with my eyes"--and at
the moment, sure enough, her eyes, which were small, grey, and in no way
remarkable, twinkled with a light so severe that the effect was
unpleasant in the extreme. "'Tis well for you and them," she continued,
"that ye cannot count the cost. Time was when hospitality could be kept
in England, and the guest not ruin the master of the feast--but that's
all vanished now: pride and poverty--pride and poverty, young lady, are
an ill-matched pair, Heaven kens!" My tongue, which had at first almost
faltered in its office, now found utterance. By a kind of instinct, I
addressed my strange visitant in her own manner and humour. "And are we,
then, so much poorer than in days of yore?" were the words that I spoke.
My visitor seemed half startled at the sound of my voice, as at
something unaccustomed, and went on, rather answering my question by
implication than directly: "'Twas not all hollowness then," she
exclaimed, ceasing somewhat her hollow whisper; "the land was then the
lord's, and that which _seemed, was_. The child, young lady, was not
then mortgaged in the cradle, and, mark ye, the bride, when she kneeled
at the altar, gave not herself up, body and soul, to be the bondswoman
of the Jew, but to be the helpmate of the spouse." "The Jew!" I
exclaimed in surprise, for then I understood not the allusion. "Ay,
young lady! the Jew," was the rejoinder. "'Tis plain ye know not who
rules. 'Tis all hollow yonder! all hollow, all hollow! to the very
glitter of the side-board, all false! all false! all hollow! Away with
such make-believe finery!" And here again the hollow voice rose a
little, and the dim grey eye glistened. "Ye mortgage the very oaks of
your ancestors--I saw the planting of them; and now 'tis all painting,
gilding, varnishing and veneering. Houses call ye them? Whited
sepulchres, young lady, whited sepulchres. Trust not all that seems to
glisten. Fair though it seems, 'tis but the product of disease--even as
is the pearl in your hair, young lady, that glitters in the mirror
yonder,--not more specious than is all,--ay, _all_ ye have seen
to-night."
As my strange visitor pronounced these words, I instinctively turned my
gaze to a large old-fashioned mirror that leaned from the wall of the
chamber. 'Twas but for a moment. But when I again turned my head, my
visitant was no longer there! I heard plainly, as I turned, the distinct
rustle of the silk, as if she had risen and was leaving the room. I
seemed distinctly to hear this, together with the quick, short, easy
footstep with which females of rank of that period were taught to glide
rather than to walk; this I seemed to hear, but of what appeared the
antique old lady I saw no more. The suddenness and strangeness of this
event for a moment sent the blood back to my heart. Could I have found
voice, I should, I think, have screamed, but that was, for a moment,
beyond my power. A few seconds recovered me. By a sort of impulse I
rushed to the door, outside which I now heard the footsteps of some of
the family, when, to my utter astonishment, I found it was--locked! I
now recollected that I myself locked it before sitting down.
Though somewhat ashamed to give utterance to what I really believed as
to this matter, the strange adventure of the night was made a subject of
conversation at the breakfast-table next morning. On the words leaving
my lips, I saw my host and hostess exchange looks with each other, and
soon found that the tale I had to tell was not received with the air
which generally meets such relations. I was not repelled by an angry or
ill-bred incredulity, or treated as one of diseased fancy, to whom
silence is indirectly recommended as the alternative of being laughed
at. In short, it was not attempted to be denied or concealed that I was
not the first who had been alarmed in a manner, if not exactly similar,
yet just as mysterious; that visitors, like myself, had actually given
way to these terrors so far as to quit the house in consequence; and
that servants were sometimes not to be prevented from sharing in the
same contagion. At the same time they told me this, my host and hostess
declared that custom and continued residence had long exempted all
regular inmates of the mansion from any alarms or terrors. The
visitations, whatever they were, seemed to be confined to newcomers, and
to them it was by no means a matter of frequent occurrence.
In the neighbourhood, I found, this strange story was well known; that
the house was regularly set down as "haunted" all the country round, and
that the spirit, or goblin, or whatever it was that was embodied in
these appearances, was familiarly known by the name of "Silky."
At a distance, those to whom I have related my night's adventure have
one and all been sceptical, and accounted for the whole by supposing me
to have been half asleep, or in a state resembling somnambulism. All I
can say is, that my own impressions are directly contrary to this
supposition; and that I feel as sure that I saw the figure that sat
before me with my bodily eyes, as I am sure I now see you with them.
Without affecting to deny that I was somewhat shocked by the adventure,
I must repeat that I suffered no unreasonable alarm, nor suffered my
fancy to overcome my better spirit of womanhood.
I certainly slept no more in that room, and in that to which I removed I
had one of the daughters of my hostess as a companion; but I have never,
from that hour to this, been convinced that I did not actually encounter
something more than is natural--if not an actual being in some other
state of existence. My ears have not been deceived, if my eyes
were--which, I repeat, I cannot believe.
The warnings so strongly shadowed forth have been too true. The
gentleman at whose house I that night was a guest has long since filled
an untimely grave! In that splendid hall, since that time, strangers
have lorded it--and I myself have long since ceased to think of such
scenes as I partook of that evening--the envied object of the attention
of one whose virtues have survived the splendid inheritance to which he
seemed destined.
Whether this be a tale of delusion and superstition, or something more
than that, it is, at all events, not without a legend for its
foundation. There is some obscure and dark rumour of secrets strangely
obtained and enviously betrayed by a rival sister, ending in deprivation
of reason and death; and that the betrayer still walks by times in the
deserted Hall which she rendered tenantless, always prophetic of
disaster to those she encounters. So has it been with me, certainly; and
more than me, if those who say it say true. It is many, many years
since I saw the scene of this adventure; but I have heard that since
that time the same mysterious visitings have more than once been
renewed; that midnight curtains have been drawn by an arm clothed in
rustling silks; and the same form, clad in dark brocade, has been seen
gliding along the dark corridors of that ancient, grey, and time-worn
mansion, ever prophetic of death or misfortune.
XXVIII
THE GOODWOOD GHOST STORY
(Doubtfully attributed to CHARLES DICKENS)