overgrown favourites, was inclined to cherish astrology, was in 1640
pulled to pieces in the city of London by the enraged populace, and his
maid-servant, thirteen years afterwards, hanged as a witch at Salisbury.
In the villanous transaction of the poisoning of Sir Thomas Overbury, in
King James's time, much mention was made of the art and skill of Dr.
Forman, another professor of the same sort with Lamb, who was consulted
by the Countess of Essex on the best mode of conducting her guilty
intrigue with the Earl of Somerset. He was dead before the affair broke
out, which might otherwise have cost him the gibbet, as it did all
others concerned, with the exception only of the principal parties, the
atrocious authors of the crime. When the cause was tried, some little
puppets were produced in court, which were viewed by one party with
horror, as representing the most horrid spells. It was even said that
the devil was about to pull down the court-house on their being
discovered. Others of the audience only saw in them the baby figures on
which the dressmakers then, as now, were accustomed to expose new
fashions.
The erection of the Royal Society, dedicated to far different purposes
than the pursuits of astrology, had a natural operation in bringing the
latter into discredit; and although the credulity of the ignorant and
uninformed continued to support some pretenders to that science, the
name of Philomath, assumed by these persons and their clients, began to
sink under ridicule and contempt. When Sir Richard Steele set up the
paper called the _Guardian_, he chose, under the title of Nestor
Ironside, to assume the character of an astrologer, and issued
predictions accordingly, one of which, announcing the death of a person
called Partridge, once a shoemaker, but at the time the conductor of an
Astrological Almanack, led to a controversy, which was supported with
great humour by Swift and other wags. I believe you will find that this,
with Swift's Elegy on the same person, is one of the last occasions in
which astrology has afforded even a jest to the good people of England.
This dishonoured science has some right to be mentioned in a "Treatise
on Demonology," because the earlier astrologers, though denying the use
of all necromancy--that is, unlawful or black magic--pretended always to
a correspondence with the various spirits of the elements, on the
principles of the Rosicrucian philosophy. They affirmed they could bind
to their service, and imprison in a ring, a mirror, or a stone, some
fairy, sylph, or salamander, and compel it to appear when called, and
render answers to such questions as the viewer should propose. It is
remarkable that the sage himself did not pretend to see the spirit; but
the task of viewer, or reader, was entrusted to a third party, a boy or
girl usually under the years of puberty. Dr. Dee, an excellent
mathematician, had a stone of this kind, and is said to have been
imposed upon concerning the spirits attached to it, their actions and
answers, by the report of one Kelly who acted as his viewer. The
unfortunate Dee was ruined by his associates both in fortune and
reputation. His show-stone or mirror is still preserved among other
curiosities in the British Museum. Some superstition of the same kind
was introduced by the celebrated Count Cagliostro, during the course of
the intrigue respecting the diamond necklace in which the late Marie
Antoinette was so unfortunately implicated.
Dismissing this general class of impostors, who are now seldom heard of,
we come now briefly to mention some leading superstitions once, perhaps,
common to all the countries of Europe, but now restricted to those which
continue to be inhabited by an undisturbed and native race. Of these,
one of the most beautiful is the Irish fiction which assigns to certain
families of ancient descent and distinguished rank the privilege of a
Banshie, as she is called, or household fairy, whose office it is to
appear, seemingly mourning, while she announces the approaching death of
some one of the destined race. The subject has been so lately and
beautifully investigated and illustrated by Mr. Crofton Croker and
others, that I may dispense with being very particular regarding it. If
I am rightly informed, the distinction of a banshie is only allowed to
families of the pure Milesian stock, and is never ascribed to any
descendant of the proudest Norman or boldest Saxon who followed the
banner of Earl Strongbow, much less to adventurers of later date who
have obtained settlements in the Green Isle.
Several families of the Highlands of Scotland anciently laid claim to
the distinction of an attendant spirit who performed the office of the
Irish banshie. Amongst them, however, the functions of this attendant
genius, whose form and appearance differed in different cases, were not
limited to announcing the dissolution of those whose days were numbered.
The Highlanders contrived to exact from them other points of service,
sometimes as warding off dangers of battle; at others, as guarding and
protecting the infant heir through the dangers of childhood; and
sometimes as condescending to interfere even in the sports of the
chieftain, and point out the fittest move to be made at chess, or the
best card to be played at any other game. Among those spirits who have
deigned to vouch their existence by appearance of late years, is that of
an ancestor of the family of MacLean of Lochbuy. Before the death of any
of his race the phantom-chief gallops along the sea-beach near to the
castle, announcing the event by cries and lamentations. The spectre is
said to have rode his rounds and uttered his death-cries within these
few years, in consequence of which the family and clan, though much
shocked, were in no way surprised to hear by next accounts that their
gallant chief was dead at Lisbon, where he served under Lord Wellington.
Of a meaner origin and occupation was the Scottish Brownie, already
mentioned as somewhat resembling Robin Goodfellow in the frolicsome days
of Old England. This spirit was easily banished, or, as it was styled,
hired away, by the offer of clothes or food; but many of the simple
inhabitants could little see the prudence of parting with such a useful
domestic drudge, who served faithfully, without fee and reward, food or
raiment. Neither was it all times safe to reject Brownie's assistance.
Thus, we are informed by Brand, that a young man in the Orkneys "used to
brew, and sometimes read upon his Bible; to whom an old woman in the
house said, that Brownie was displeased with that book he read upon,
which, if he continued to do, they would get no more service of Brownie;
but he, being better instructed from that book, which was Brownie's
eyesore and the object of his wrath, when he brewed, would not suffer
any sacrifice to be given to Brownie; whereupon the first and second
brewings were spoilt, and for no use; for though the wort wrought well,
yet in a little time it left off working, and grew cold; but of the
third broust, or brewing, he had ale very good, though he would not give
any sacrifice to Brownie, with whom afterwards they were no more
troubled." Another story of the same kind is told of a lady in Uist, who
refused, on religious grounds, the usual sacrifice to this domestic
spirit. The first and second brewings failed, but the third succeeded;
and thus, when Brownie lost the perquisite to which he had been so long
accustomed, he abandoned the inhospitable house, where his services had
so long been faithfully rendered. The last place in the south of
Scotland supposed to have been honoured, or benefited, by the residence
of a Brownie, was Bodsbeck in Moffatdale, which has been the subject of
an entertaining tale by Mr. James Hogg, the self-instructed genius of
Ettrick Forest.
These particular superstitions, however, are too limited, and too much
obliterated from recollection, to call for special discussion. The
general faith in fairies has already undergone our consideration; but
something remains to be said upon another species of superstition, so
general that it may be called proper to mankind in every climate; so
deeply rooted also in human belief, that it is found to survive in
states of society during which all other fictions of the same order are
entirely dismissed from influence. Mr. Crabbe, with his usual felicity,
has called the belief in ghosts "the last lingering fiction of the
brain."
Nothing appears more simple at the first view of the subject, than that
human memory should recall and bring back to the eye of the imagination,
in perfect similitude, even the very form and features of a person with
whom we have been long conversant, or which have been imprinted in our
minds with indelible strength by some striking circumstances touching
our meeting in life. The son does not easily forget the aspect of an
affectionate father; and, for reasons opposite but equally powerful, the
countenance of a murdered person is engraved upon the recollection of
his slayer. A thousand additional circumstances, far too obvious to
require recapitulation, render the supposed apparition of the dead the
most ordinary spectral phenomenon which is ever believed to occur among
the living. All that we have formerly said respecting supernatural
appearances in general, applies with peculiar force to the belief of
ghosts; for whether the cause of delusion exists in an excited
imagination or a disordered organic system, it is in this way that it
commonly exhibits itself. Hence Lucretius himself, the most absolute of
sceptics, considers the existence of ghosts, and their frequent
apparition, as facts so undeniable that he endeavours to account for
them at the expense of assenting to a class of phenomena very
irreconcilable to his general system. As he will not allow of the
existence of the human soul, and at the same time cannot venture to
question the phenomena supposed to haunt the repositories of the dead,
he is obliged to adopt the belief that the body consists of several
coats like those of an onion, and that the outmost and thinnest, being
detached by death, continues to wander near the place of sepulture, in
the exact resemblance of the person while alive.
We have said there are many ghost stories which we do not feel at
liberty to challenge as impostures, because we are confident that those
who relate them on their own authority actually believe what they
assert, and may have good reason for doing so, though there is no real
phantom after all. We are far, therefore, from averring that such tales
are necessarily false. It is easy to suppose the visionary has been
imposed upon by a lively dream, a waking reverie, the excitation of a
powerful imagination, or the misrepresentation of a diseased organ of
sight; and in one or other of these causes, to say nothing of a system
of deception which may in many instances be probable, we apprehend a
solution will be found for all cases of what are called real ghost
stories.
In truth, the evidence with respect to such apparitions is very seldom
accurately or distinctly questioned. A supernatural tale is in most
cases received as an agreeable mode of amusing society, and he would be
rather accounted a sturdy moralist than an entertaining companion who
should employ himself in assailing its credibility. It would indeed be a
solecism in manners, something like that of impeaching the genuine value
of the antiquities exhibited by a good-natured collector for the
gratification of his guests. This difficulty will appear greater should
a company have the rare good fortune to meet the person who himself
witnessed the wonders which he tells; a well-bred or prudent man will,
under such circumstances, abstain from using the rules of
cross-examination practised in a court of justice; and if in any case he
presumes to do so, he is in danger of receiving answers, even from the
most candid and honourable persons, which are rather fitted to support
the credit of the story which they stand committed to maintain, than to
the pure service of unadorned truth. The narrator is asked, for example,
some unimportant question with respect to the apparition; he answers it
on the hasty suggestion of his own imagination, tinged as it is with
belief of the general fact, and by doing so often gives a feature of
minute evidence which was before wanting, and this with perfect
unconsciousness on his own part. It is a rare occurrence, indeed, to
find an opportunity of dealing with an actual ghost-seer; such
instances, however, I have certainly myself met with, and that in the
case of able, wise, candid, and resolute persons, of whose veracity I
had every reason to be confident. But in such instances shades of mental
aberration have afterwards occurred, which sufficiently accounted for
the supposed apparitions, and will incline me always to feel alarmed in
behalf of the continued health of a friend who should conceive himself
to have witnessed such a visitation.
The nearest approximation which can be generally made to exact evidence
in this case, is the word of some individual who has had the story, it
may be, from the person to whom it has happened, but most likely from
his family, or some friend of the family. Far more commonly the narrator
possesses no better means of knowledge than that of dwelling in the
country where the thing happened, or being well acquainted with the
outside of the mansion in the inside of which the ghost appeared.
In every point the evidence of such a second-hand retailer of the mystic
story must fall under the adjudged case in an English court. The judge
stopped a witness who was about to give an account of the murder upon
trial, as it was narrated to him by the ghost of the murdered person.
"Hold, sir," said his lordship; "the ghost is an excellent witness, and
his evidence the best possible; but he cannot be heard by proxy in this
court. Summon him hither, and I'll hear him in person; but your
communication is mere hearsay, which my office compels me to reject."
Yet it is upon the credit of one man, who pledges it upon that of three
or four persons, who have told it successively to each other, that we
are often expected to believe an incident inconsistent with the laws of
Nature, however agreeable to our love of the wonderful and the horrible.
In estimating the truth or falsehood of such stories it is evident we
can derive no proofs from that period of society when men affirmed
boldly, and believed stoutly, all the wonders which could be coined or
fancied. That such stories are believed and told by grave historians,
only shows that the wisest men cannot rise in all things above the
general ignorance of their age. Upon the evidence of such historians we
might as well believe the portents of ancient or the miracles of modern
Rome. For example, we read in Clarendon of the apparition of the ghost
of Sir George Villiers to an ancient dependant. This is no doubt a story
told by a grave author, at a time when such stories were believed by all
the world; but does it follow that our reason must acquiesce in a
statement so positively contradicted by the voice of Nature through all
her works? The miracle of raising a dead man was positively refused by
our Saviour to the Jews, who demanded it as a proof of his mission,
because they had already sufficient grounds of conviction; and, as they
believed them not, it was irresistibly argued by the Divine Person whom
they tempted, that neither would they believe if one arose from the
dead. Shall we suppose that a miracle refused for the conversion of
God's chosen people was sent on a vain errand to save the life of a
profligate spendthrift? I lay aside, you observe, entirely the not
unreasonable supposition that Towers, or whatever was the ghost-seer's
name, desirous to make an impression upon Buckingham, as an old servant
of his house, might be tempted to give him his advice, of which we are
not told the import, in the character of his father's spirit, and
authenticate the tale by the mention of some token known to him as a
former retainer of the family. The Duke was superstitious, and the ready
dupe of astrologers and soothsayers. The manner in which he had provoked
the fury of the people must have warned every reflecting person of his
approaching fate; and, the age considered, it was not unnatural that a
faithful friend should take this mode of calling his attention to his
perilous situation. Or, if we suppose that the incident was not a mere
pretext to obtain access to the Duke's ear, the messenger may have been
impressed upon by an idle dream--in a word, numberless conjectures might
be formed for accounting for the event in a natural way, the most
extravagant of which is more probable than that the laws of Nature were
broken through in order to give a vain and fruitless warning to an
ambitious minion.
It is the same with all those that are called accredited ghost stories
usually told at the fireside. They want evidence. It is true that the
general wish to believe, rather than power of believing, has given some
such stories a certain currency in society. I may mention, as one of the
class of tales I mean, that of the late Earl St. Vincent, who watched,
with a friend, it is said, a whole night, in order to detect the cause
of certain nocturnal disturbances which took place in a certain mansion.
The house was under lease to Mrs. Ricketts, his sister. The result of
his lordship's vigil is said to have been that he heard the noises
without being able to detect the causes, and insisted on his sister
giving up the house. This is told as a real story, with a thousand
different circumstances. But who has heard or seen an authentic account
from Earl St. Vincent, or from his "companion of the watch," or from his
lordship's sister? And as in any other case such sure species of direct
evidence would be necessary to prove the facts, it seems unreasonable to
believe such a story on slighter terms. When the particulars are
precisely fixed and known, it might be time to enquire whether Lord St.
Vincent, amid the other eminent qualities of a first-rate seaman, might
not be in some degree tinged with their tendency to superstition; and
still farther, whether, having ascertained the existence of disturbances
not immediately or easily detected, his lordship might not advise his
sister rather to remove than to remain in a house so haunted, though he
might believe that poachers or smugglers were the worst ghosts by whom
it was disturbed.
The story of two highly respectable officers in the British army, who
are supposed to have seen the spectre of the brother of one of them in a
hut, or barrack, in America, is also one of those accredited ghost
tales, which attain a sort of brevet rank as true, from the mention of
respectable names as the parties who witnessed the vision. But we are
left without a glimpse when, how, and in what terms, this story obtained
its currency; as also by whom, and in what manner, it was first
circulated; and among the numbers by whom it has been quoted, although
all agree in the general event, scarcely two, even of those who pretend
to the best information, tell the story in the same way.
Another such story, in which the name of a lady of condition is made use
of as having seen an apparition in a country-seat in France, is so far
better borne out than those I have mentioned, that I have seen a
narrative of the circumstances attested by the party principally
concerned. That the house was disturbed seems to be certain, but the
circumstances (though very remarkable) did not, in my mind, by any means
exclude the probability that the disturbance and appearances were
occasioned by the dexterous management of some mischievously-disposed
persons.
The remarkable circumstance of Thomas, the second Lord Lyttelton,
prophesying his own death within a few minutes, upon the information of
an apparition, has been always quoted as a true story. But of late it
has been said and published, that the unfortunate nobleman had
previously determined to take poison, and of course had it in his own
power to ascertain the execution of the prediction. It was no doubt
singular that a man, who meditated his exit from the world, should have
chosen to play such a trick on his friends. But it is still more
credible that a whimsical man should do so wild a thing, than that a
messenger should be sent from the dead to tell a libertine at what
precise hour he should expire.
To this list other stories of the same class might be added. But it is
sufficient to show that such stories as these, having gained a certain
degree of currency in the world, and bearing creditable names on their
front, walk through society unchallenged, like bills through a bank when
they bear respectable indorsations, although, it may be, the signatures
are forged after all. There is, indeed, an unwillingness very closely to
examine such subjects, for the secret fund of superstition in every
man's bosom is gratified by believing them to be true, or at least
induces him to abstain from challenging them as false. And no doubt it
must happen that the transpiring of incidents, in which men have
actually seen, or conceived that they saw, apparitions which were
invisible to others, contributes to the increase of such stories--which
do accordingly sometimes meet us in a shape of veracity difficult to
question.
The following story was narrated to me by my friend, Mr. William Clerk,
chief clerk to the Jury Court, Edinburgh, when he first learned it, now
nearly thirty years ago, from a passenger in the mail-coach. With Mr.
Clerk's consent, I gave the story at that time to poor Mat Lewis, who
published it with a ghost-ballad which he adjusted on the same theme.
From the minuteness of the original detail, however, the narrative is
better calculated for prose than verse; and more especially as the
friend to whom it was originally communicated is one of the most
accurate, intelligent, and acute persons whom I have known in the course
of my life, I am willing to preserve the precise story in this place.
It was about the eventful year 1800, when the Emperor Paul laid his
ill-judged embargo on British trade, that my friend Mr. William Clerk,
on a journey to London, found himself in company, in the mail-coach,
with a seafaring man of middle age and respectable appearance, who
announced himself as master of a vessel in the Baltic trade, and a
sufferer by the embargo. In the course of the desultory conversation
which takes place on such occasions the seaman observed, in compliance
with a common superstition, "I wish we may have good luck on our
journey--there is a magpie." "And why should that be unlucky?" said my
friend. "I cannot tell you that," replied the sailor; "but all the world
agrees that one magpie bodes bad luck--two are not so bad, but three are
the devil. I never saw three magpies but twice, and once I had near lost
my vessel, and the second I fell from a horse, and was hurt." This
conversation led Mr. Clerk to observe that he supposed he believed also
in ghosts, since he credited such auguries. "And if I do," said the
sailor, "I may have my own reasons for doing so;" and he spoke this in a
deep and serious manner, implying that he felt deeply what he was
saying. On being further urged, he confessed that, if he could believe
his own eyes, there was one ghost at least which he had seen repeatedly.
He then told his story as I now relate it.