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.

Our mariner had in his youth gone mate of a slave vessel from Liverpool,
of which town he seemed to be a native. The captain of the vessel was a
man of a variable temper, sometimes kind and courteous to his men, but
subject to fits of humour, dislike, and passion, during which he was
very violent, tyrannical, and cruel. He took a particular dislike at one
sailor aboard, an elderly man, called Bill Jones, or some such name. He
seldom spoke to this person without threats and abuse, which the old
man, with the license which sailors take on merchant vessels, was very
apt to return. On one occasion Bill Jones appeared slow in getting out
on the yard to hand a sail. The captain, according to custom, abused the
seaman as a lubberly rascal, who got fat by leaving his duty to other
people. The man made a saucy answer, almost amounting to mutiny, on
which, in a towering passion, the captain ran down to his cabin, and
returned with a blunderbuss loaded with slugs, with which he took
deliberate aim at the supposed mutineer, fired, and mortally wounded
him. The man was handed down from the yard, and stretched on the deck,
evidently dying. He fixed his eyes on the captain, and said, "Sir, you
have done for me, but _I will never leave you_" The captain, in return,
swore at him for a fat lubber, and said he would have him thrown into
the slave-kettle, where they made food for the negroes, and see how much
fat he had got. The man died. His body was actually thrown into the
slave-kettle, and the narrator observed, with a _naГЇvetГ©_ which
confirmed the extent of his own belief in the truth of what he told,
"There was not much fat about him after all."

The captain told the crew they must keep absolute silence on the subject
of what had passed; and as the mate was not willing to give an explicit
and absolute promise, he ordered him to be confined below. After a day
or two he came to the mate, and demanded if he had an intention to
deliver him up for trial when the vessel got home. The mate, who was
tired of close confinement in that sultry climate, spoke his commander
fair, and obtained his liberty. When he mingled among the crew once more
he found them impressed with the idea, not unnatural in their situation,
that the ghost of the dead man appeared among them when they had a spell
of duty, especially if a sail was to be handed, on which occasion the
spectre was sure to be out upon the yard before any of the crew. The
narrator had seen this apparition himself repeatedly--he believed the
captain saw it also, but he took no notice of it for some time, and the
crew, terrified at the violent temper of the man, dared not call his
attention to it. Thus they held on their course homeward with great fear
and anxiety.

At length, the captain invited the mate, who was now in a sort of
favour, to go down to the cabin and take a glass of grog with him. In
this interview he assumed a very grave and anxious aspect. "I need not
tell you, Jack," he said, "what sort of hand we have got on board with
us. He told me he would never leave me, and he has kept his word. You
only see him now and then, but he is always by my side, and never out of
my sight. At this very moment I see him--I am determined to bear it no
longer, and I have resolved to leave you."

The mate replied that his leaving the vessel while out of the sight of
any land was impossible. He advised, that if the captain apprehended any
bad consequences from what had happened, he should run for the west of
France or Ireland, and there go ashore, and leave him, the mate, to
carry the vessel into Liverpool. The captain only shook his head
gloomily, and reiterated his determination to leave the ship. At this
moment the mate was called to the deck for some purpose or other, and
the instant he got up the companion-ladder he heard a splash in the
water, and looking over the ship's side, saw that the captain had thrown
himself into the sea from the quarter-gallery, and was running astern at
the rate of six knots an hour. When just about to sink he seemed to make
a last exertion, sprung half out of the water, and clasped his hands
towards the mate, calling, "By----, Bill is with me now!" and then sunk,
to be seen no more.

After hearing this singular story Mr. Clerk asked some questions about
the captain, and whether his companion considered him as at all times
rational. The sailor seemed struck with the question, and answered,
after a moment's delay, that in general _he conversationed well enough_.

It would have been desirable to have been able to ascertain how far this
extraordinary tale was founded on fact; but want of time and other
circumstances prevented Mr. Clerk from learning the names and dates,
that might to a certain degree have verified the events. Granting the
murder to have taken place, and the tale to have been truly told, there
was nothing more likely to arise among the ship's company than the
belief in the apparition; as the captain was a man of a passionate and
irritable disposition, it was nowise improbable that he, the victim of
remorse, should participate in the horrible visions of those less
concerned, especially as he was compelled to avoid communicating his
sentiments with any one else; and the catastrophe would in such a case
be but the natural consequence of that superstitious remorse which has
conducted so many criminals to suicide or the gallows. If the
fellow-traveller of Mr. Clerk be not allowed this degree of credit, he
must at least be admitted to have displayed a singular talent for the
composition of the horrible in fiction. The tale, properly detailed,
might have made the fortune of a romancer.

I cannot forbear giving you, as congenial to this story, another
instance of a guilt-formed phantom, which made considerable noise about
twenty years ago or more. I am, I think, tolerably correct in the
details, though I have lost the account of the trial. Jarvis
Matcham--such, if I am not mistaken, was the name of my hero--was
pay-sergeant in a regiment, where he was so highly esteemed as a steady
and accurate man that he was permitted opportunity to embezzle a
considerable part of the money lodged in his hands for pay of soldiers,
bounty of recruits (then a large sum), and other charges which fell
within his duty. He was summoned to join his regiment from a town where
he had been on the recruiting service, and this perhaps under some shade
of suspicion. Matcham perceived discovery was at hand, and would have
deserted had it not been for the presence of a little drummer lad, who
was the only one of his party appointed to attend him. In the
desperation of his crime he resolved to murder the poor boy, and avail
himself of some balance of money to make his escape. He meditated this
wickedness the more readily that the drummer, he thought, had been put
as a spy on him. He perpetrated his crime, and changing his dress after
the deed was done, made a long walk across the country to an inn on the
Portsmouth road, where he halted and went to bed, desiring to be called
when the first Portsmouth coach came. The waiter summoned him
accordingly, but long after remembered that, when he shook the guest by
the shoulder, his first words as he awoke were: "My God! I did not kill
him."

Matcham went to the seaport by the coach, and instantly entered as an
able-bodied landsman or marine, I know not which. His sobriety and
attention to duty gained him the same good opinion of the officers in
his new service which he had enjoyed in the army. He was afloat for
several years, and behaved remarkably well in some actions. At length
the vessel came into Plymouth, was paid off, and some of the crew,
amongst whom was Jarvis Matcham, were dismissed as too old for service.
He and another seaman resolved to walk to town, and took the route by
Salisbury. It was when within two or three miles of this celebrated city
that they were overtaken by a tempest so sudden, and accompanied with
such vivid lightning and thunder so dreadfully loud, that the obdurate
conscience of the old sinner began to be awakened. He expressed more
terror than seemed natural for one who was familiar with the war of
elements, and began to look and talk so wildly that his companion became
aware that something more than usual was the matter. At length Matcham
complained to his companion that the stones rose from the road and flew
after him. He desired the man to walk on the other side of the highway
to see if they would follow him when he was alone. The sailor complied,
and Jarvis Matcham complained that the stones still flew after him and
did not pursue the other. "But what is worse," he added, coming up to
his companion, and whispering, with a tone of mystery and fear, "who is
that little drummer-boy, and what business has he to follow us so
closely?" "I can see no one," answered the seaman, infected by the
superstition of his associate. "What! not see that little boy with the
bloody pantaloons!" exclaimed the secret murderer, so much to the terror
of his comrade that he conjured him, if he had anything on his mind, to
make a clear conscience as far as confession could do it. The criminal
fetched a deep groan, and declared that he was unable longer to endure
the life which he had led for years. He then confessed the murder of the
drummer, and added that, as a considerable reward had been offered, he
wished his comrade to deliver him up to the magistrates of Salisbury, as
he would desire a shipmate to profit by his fate, which he was now
convinced was inevitable. Having overcome his friend's objections to
this mode of proceeding, Jarvis Matcham was surrendered to justice
accordingly, and made a full confession of his guilt But before the
trial the love of life returned. The prisoner denied his confession, and
pleaded Not Guilty. By this time, however, full evidence had been
procured from other quarters. Witnesses appeared from his former
regiment to prove his identity with the murderer and deserter, and the
waiter remembered the ominous words which he had spoken when he awoke
him to join the Portsmouth coach. Jarvis Matcham was found guilty and
executed. When his last chance of life was over he returned to his
confession, and with his dying breath averred, and truly, as he thought,
the truth of the vision on Salisbury Plain. Similar stories might be
produced, showing plainly that, under the direction of Heaven, the
influence of superstitious fear may be the appointed means of bringing
the criminal to repentance for his own sake, and to punishment for the
advantage of society.

Cases of this kind are numerous and easily imagined, so I shall dwell on
them no further; but rather advert to at least an equally abundant class
of ghost stories, in which the apparition is pleased not to torment the
actual murderer, but proceeds in a very circuitous manner, acquainting
some stranger or ignorant old woman with the particulars of his fate,
who, though perhaps unacquainted with all the parties, is directed by a
phantom to lay the facts before a magistrate. In this respect we must
certainly allow that ghosts have, as we are informed by the facetious
Captain Grose, forms and customs peculiar to themselves.

There would be no edification and little amusement in treating of clumsy
deceptions of this kind, where the grossness of the imposture detects
itself. But occasionally cases occur like the following, with respect to
which it is more difficult, to use James Boswell's phrase, "to know what
to think."

Upon the 10th of June, 1754, Duncan Terig, _alias_ Clark, and Alexander
Bain MacDonald, two Highlanders, were tried before the Court of
Justiciary, Edinburgh, for the murder of Arthur Davis, sergeant in
Guise's regiment, on the 28th September, 1749. The accident happened not
long after the civil war, the embers of which were still reeking, so
there existed too many reasons on account of which an English soldier,
straggling far from assistance, might be privately cut off by the
inhabitants of these wilds. It appears that Sergeant Davis was missing
for years, without any certainty as to his fate. At length, an account
of the murder appeared from the evidence of one Alexander MacPherson (a
Highlander, speaking no language but Gaelic, and sworn by an
interpreter), who gave the following extraordinary account of his cause
of knowledge:--He was, he said, in bed in his cottage, when an
apparition came to his bedside and commanded him to rise and follow him
out of doors. Believing his visitor to be one Farquharson, a neighbour
and friend, the witness did as he was bid; and when they were without
the cottage, the appearance told the witness he was the ghost of
Sergeant Davis, and requested him to go and bury his mortal remains,
which lay concealed in a place he pointed out in a moorland tract called
the Hill of Christie. He desired him to take Farquharson with him as an
assistant. Next day the witness went to the place specified, and there
found the bones of a human body much decayed. The witness did not at
that time bury the bones so found, in consequence of which negligence
the sergeant's ghost again appeared to him, upbraiding him with his
breach of promise. On this occasion the witness asked the ghost who were
the murderers, and received for answer that he had been slain by the
prisoners at the bar. The witness, after this second visitation, called
the assistance of Farquharson, and buried the body.

Farquharson was brought in evidence to prove that the preceding witness,
MacPherson, had called him to the burial of the bones, and told him the
same story which he repeated in court. Isabel MacHardie, a person who
slept in one of the beds which run along the wall in an ordinary
Highland hut, declared that upon the night when MacPherson said he saw
the ghost, she saw a naked man enter the house and go towards
MacPherson's bed.

Yet though the supernatural incident was thus fortified, and although
there were other strong presumptions against the prisoners, the story of
the apparition threw an air of ridicule on the whole evidence for the
prosecution. It was followed up by the counsel for the prisoners asking,
in the cross-examination of MacPherson, "What language did the ghost
speak in?" The witness, who was himself ignorant of English, replied,
"As good Gaelic as I ever heard in Lochaber." "Pretty well for the ghost
of an English sergeant," answered the counsel. The inference was rather
smart and plausible than sound, for, the apparition of the ghost being
admitted, we know too little of the other world to judge whether all
languages may not be alike familiar to those who belonged to it. It
imposed, however, on the jury, who found the accused parties not guilty,
although their counsel and solicitor and most of the court were
satisfied of their having committed the murder. In this case the
interference of the ghost seems to have rather impeded the vengeance
which it was doubtless the murdered sergeant's desire to obtain. Yet
there may be various modes of explaining this mysterious story, of which
the following conjecture may pass for one.

The reader may suppose that MacPherson was privy to the fact of the
murder, perhaps as an accomplice or otherwise, and may also suppose
that, from motives of remorse for the action, or of enmity to those who
had committed it, he entertained a wish to bring them to justice. But
through the whole Highlands there is no character more detestable than
that of an informer, or one who takes what is called Tascal-money, or
reward for discovery of crimes. To have informed against Terig and
MacDonald might have cost MacPherson his life; and it is far from being
impossible that he had recourse to the story of the ghost, knowing well
that his superstitious countrymen would pardon his communicating the
commission entrusted to him by a being from the other world, although he
might probably have been murdered if his delation of the crime had been
supposed voluntary. This explanation, in exact conformity with the
sentiments of the Highlanders on such subjects, would reduce the whole
story to a stroke of address on the part of the witness.

It is therefore of the last consequence, in considering the truth of
stories of ghosts and apparitions, to consider the possibility of wilful
deception, whether on the part of those who are agents in the supposed
disturbances, or the author of the legend. We shall separately notice an
instance or two of either kind.

The most celebrated instance in which human agency was used to copy the
disturbances imputed to supernatural beings refers to the ancient palace
of Woodstock, when the Commissioners of the Long Parliament came down to
dispark what had been lately a royal residence. The Commissioners
arrived at Woodstock, 13th October, 1649, determined to wipe away the
memory of all that connected itself with the recollection of monarchy in
England. But in the course of their progress they were encountered by
obstacles which apparently came from the next world. Their bed-chambers
were infested with visits of a thing resembling a dog, but which came
and passed as mere earthly dogs cannot do. Logs of wood, the remains of
a very large tree called the King's Oak, which they had splintered into
billets for burning, were tossed through the house, and the chairs
displaced and shuffled about. While they were in bed the feet of their
couches were lifted higher than their heads, and then dropped with
violence. Trenchers "without a wish" flew at their heads of free will.
Thunder and lightning came next, which were set down to the same cause.
Spectres made their appearance, as they thought, in different shapes,
and one of the party saw the apparition of a hoof, which kicked a
candlestick and lighted candle into the middle of the room, and then
politely scratched on the red snuff to extinguish it. Other and worse
tricks were practised on the astonished Commissioners who, considering
that all the fiends of hell were let loose upon them, retreated from
Woodstock without completing an errand which was, in their opinion,
impeded by infernal powers, though the opposition offered was rather of
a playful and malicious than of a dangerous cast.

The whole matter was, after the Restoration, discovered to be the trick
of one of their own party, who had attended the Commissioners as a
clerk, under the name of Giles Sharp. This man, whose real name was
Joseph Collins of Oxford, called _Funny Joe_, was a concealed loyalist,
and well acquainted with the old mansion of Woodstock, where he had been
brought up before the Civil War. Being a bold, active spirited man, Joe
availed himself of his local knowledge of trap-doors and private
passages so as to favour the tricks which he played off upon his masters
by aid of his fellow-domestics. The Commissioners' personal reliance on
him made his task the more easy, and it was all along remarked that
trusty Giles Sharp saw the most extraordinary sights and visions among
the whole party. The unearthly terrors experienced by the Commissioners
are detailed with due gravity by Sinclair, and also, I think, by Dr.
Plott. But although the detection or explanation of the real history of
the Woodstock demons has also been published, and I have myself seen it,
I have at this time forgotten whether it exists in a separate
collection, or where it is to be looked for.

Similar disturbances have been often experienced while it was the custom
to believe in and dread such frolics of the invisible world, and under
circumstances which induce us to wonder, both at the extreme trouble
taken by the agents in these impostures, and the slight motives from
which they have been induced to do much wanton mischief. Still greater
is our modern surprise at the apparently simple means by which terror
has been excited to so general an extent, that even the wisest and most
prudent have not escaped its contagious influence.

On the first point I am afraid there can be no better reason assigned
than the conscious pride of superiority, which induces the human being
in all cases to enjoy and practise every means of employing an influence
over his fellow-mortals; to which we may safely add that general love of
tormenting, as common to our race as to that noble mimick of humanity,
the monkey. To this is owing the delight with which every school-boy
anticipates the effects of throwing a stone into a glass shop; and to
this we must also ascribe the otherwise unaccountable pleasure which
individuals have taken in practising the tricksy pranks of a goblin, and
filling a household or neighbourhood with anxiety and dismay, with
little gratification to themselves besides the consciousness of
dexterity if they remain undiscovered, and with the risk of loss of
character and punishment should the imposture be found out.

In the year 1772, a train of transactions, commencing upon Twelfth Day,
threw the utmost consternation into the village of Stockwell, near
London, and impressed upon some of its inhabitants the inevitable belief
that they were produced by invisible agents. The plates, dishes, china,
and glass-ware and small movables of every kind, contained in the house
of Mrs. Golding, an elderly lady, seemed suddenly to become animated,
shifted their places, flew through the room, and were broken to pieces.
The particulars of this commotion were as curious as the loss and damage
occasioned in this extraordinary manner were alarming and intolerable.
Amidst this combustion, a young woman, Mrs. Golding's maid, named Anne
Robinson, was walking backwards and forwards, nor could she be prevailed
on to sit down for a moment excepting while the family were at prayers,
during which time no disturbance happened. This Anne Robinson had been
but a few days in the old lady's service, and it was remarkable that she
endured with great composure the extraordinary display which others
beheld with terror, and coolly advised her mistress not to be alarmed or
uneasy, as these things could not be helped. This excited an idea that
she had some reason for being so composed, not inconsistent with a
degree of connexion with what was going forward. The afflicted Mrs.
Golding, as she might be well termed, considering such a commotion and
demolition among her goods and chattels, invited neighbours to stay in
her house, but they soon became unable to bear the sight of these
supernatural proceedings, which went so far that not above two cups and
saucers remained out of a valuable set of china. She next abandoned her
dwelling, and took refuge with a neighbour, but, finding his movables
were seized with the same sort of St. Vitus's dance, her landlord
reluctantly refused to shelter any longer a woman who seemed to be
persecuted by so strange a subject of vexation. Mrs. Golding's
suspicions against Anne Robinson now gaining ground, she dismissed her
maid, and the hubbub among her movables ceased at once and for ever.

This circumstance of itself indicates that Anne Robinson was the cause
of these extraordinary disturbances, as has been since more completely
ascertained by a Mr. Brayfield, who persuaded Anne, long after the
events had happened, to make him her confidant. There was a love story
connected with the case, in which the only magic was the dexterity of
Anne Robinson and the simplicity of the spectators. She had fixed long
horse hairs to some of the crockery, and placed wires under others, by
which she could throw them down without touching them. Other things she
dexterously threw about, which the spectators, who did not watch her
motions, imputed to invisible agency. At times, when the family were
absent, she loosened the hold of the strings by which the hams, bacon,
and similar articles were suspended, so that they fell on the slightest
motion. She employed some simple chemical secrets, and, delighted with
the success of her pranks, pushed them farther than she at first
intended. Such was the solution of the whole mystery, which, known by
the name of the Stockwell ghost, terrified many well-meaning persons,
and had been nearly as famous as that of Cock Lane, which may be hinted
at as another imposture of the same kind. So many and wonderful are the
appearances described, that when I first met with the original
publication I was strongly impressed with the belief that the narrative
was like some of Swift's advertisements, a jocular experiment upon the
credulity of the public. But it was certainly published _bona fide_, and
Mr. Hone, on the authority of Mr. Brayfield, has since fully explained
the wonder.[85]

[Footnote 85: See Hone's "Every-Day Book," p. 62.]

Many such impositions have been detected, and many others have been
successfully concealed; but to know what has been discovered in many
instances gives us the assurance of the ruling cause in all. I remember
a scene of the kind attempted to be got up near Edinburgh, but detected
at once by a sheriff's officer, a sort of persons whose habits of
incredulity and suspicious observation render them very dangerous
spectators on such occasions. The late excellent Mr. Walker, minister at
Dunottar, in the Mearns, gave me a curious account of an imposture of
this kind, practised by a young country girl, who was surprisingly quick
at throwing stones, turf, and other missiles, with such dexterity that
it was for a long time impossible to ascertain her agency in the
disturbances of which she was the sole cause.

The belief of the spectators that such scenes of disturbance arise from
invisible beings will appear less surprising if we consider the common
feats of jugglers, or professors of legerdemain, and recollect that it
is only the frequent exhibition of such powers which reconciles us to
them as matters of course, although they are wonders at which in our
fathers' time men would have cried out either sorcery or miracles. The
spectator also, who has been himself duped, makes no very respectable
appearance when convicted of his error; and thence, if too candid to add
to the evidence of supernatural agency, is yet unwilling to stand
convicted by cross-examination, of having been imposed on, and
unconsciously becomes disposed rather to colour more highly than the
truth, than acquiesce in an explanation resting on his having been too
hasty a believer. Very often, too, the detection depends upon the
combination of certain circumstances, which, apprehended, necessarily
explain the whole story.

For example, I once heard a sensible and intelligent friend in company
express himself convinced of the truth of a wonderful story, told him by
an intelligent and bold man, about an apparition. The scene lay in an
ancient castle on the coast of Morven or the Isle of Mull, where the
ghost-seer chanced to be resident. He was given to understand by the
family, when betaking himself to rest, that the chamber in which he
slept was occasionally disquieted by supernatural appearances. Being at
that time no believer in such stories, he attended little to this hint,
until the witching hour of night, when he was awakened from a dead sleep
by the pressure of a human hand on his body. He looked up at the figure
of a tall Highlander, in the antique and picturesque dress of his
country, only that his brows were bound with a bloody bandage. Struck
with sudden and extreme fear, he was willing to have sprung from bed,
but the spectre stood before him in the bright moonlight, its one arm
extended so as to master him if he attempted to rise; the other hand
held up in a warning and grave posture, as menacing the Lowlander if he
should attempt to quit his recumbent position. Thus he lay in mortal
agony for more than an hour, after which it pleased the spectre of
ancient days to leave him to more sound repose. So singular a story had
on its side the usual number of votes from the company, till, upon
cross-examination, it was explained that the principal person concerned
was an exciseman. After which _eclaircissement_ the same explanation
struck all present, viz., the Highlanders of the mansion had chosen to
detain the exciseman by the apparition of an ancient heroic ghost, in
order to disguise from his vigilance the removal of certain modern
enough spirits, which his duty might have called upon him to seize. Here
a single circumstance explained the whole ghost story.

At other times it happens that the meanness and trifling nature of a
cause not very obvious to observation has occasioned it to be entirely
overlooked, even on account of that very meanness, since no one is
willing to acknowledge that he has been alarmed by a cause of little
consequence, and which he would be ashamed of mentioning. An incident of
this sort happened to a gentleman of birth and distinction, who is well
known in the political world, and was detected by the precision of his
observation. Shortly after he succeeded to his estate and title, there
was a rumour among his servants concerning a strange noise heard in the
family mansion at night, the cause of which they had found it impossible
to trace. The gentleman resolved to watch himself, with a domestic who
had grown old in the family, and who had begun to murmur strange things
concerning the knocking having followed so close upon the death of his
old master. They watched until the noise was heard, which they listened
to with that strange uncertainty attending midnight sounds which
prevents the hearers from immediately tracing them to the spot where
they arise, while the silence of the night generally occasions the
imputing to them more than the due importance which they would receive
if mingled with the usual noises of daylight. At length the gentleman
and his servant traced the sounds which they had repeatedly heard to a
small store-room used as a place for keeping provisions of various kinds
for the family, of which the old butler had the key. They entered this
place, and remained there for some time without hearing the noises which
they had traced thither; at length the sound was heard, but much lower
than it had formerly seemed to be, while acted upon at a distance by the
imagination of the hearers. The cause was immediately discovered. A rat
caught in an old-fashioned trap had occasioned this tumult by its
efforts to escape, in which it was able to raise the trap-door of its
prison to a certain height, but was then obliged to drop it. The noise
of the fall, resounding through the house, had occasioned the
disturbance which, but for the cool investigation of the proprietor,
might easily have established an accredited ghost story. The
circumstance was told me by the gentleman to whom it happened.

There are other occasions in which the ghost story is rendered credible
by some remarkable combination of circumstances very unlikely to have
happened, and which no one could have supposed unless some particular
fortune occasioned a discovery.

An apparition which took place at Plymouth is well known, but it has
been differently related; and having some reason to think the following
edition correct, it is an incident so much to my purpose that you must
pardon its insertion.

A club of persons connected with science and literature was formed at
the great sea-town I have named. During the summer months the society
met in a cave by the sea-shore; during those of autumn and winter they
convened within the premises of a tavern, but, for the sake of privacy,
had their meetings in a summer-house situated in the garden, at a
distance from the main building. Some of the members to whom the
position of their own dwellings rendered this convenient, had a pass-key
to the garden-door, by which they could enter the garden and reach the
summer-house without the publicity or trouble of passing through the
open tavern. It was the rule of this club that its members presided
alternately. On one occasion, in the winter, the president of the
evening chanced to be very ill; indeed, was reported to be on his
death-bed. The club met as usual, and, from a sentiment of respect, left
vacant the chair which ought to have been occupied by him if in his
usual health; for the same reason, the conversation turned upon the
absent gentleman's talents, and the loss expected to the society by his
death. While they were upon this melancholy theme, the door suddenly
opened, and the appearance of the president entered the room. He wore a
white wrapper, a nightcap round his brow, the appearance of which was
that of death itself. He stalked into the room with unusual gravity,
took the vacant place of ceremony, lifted the empty glass which stood
before him, bowed around, and put it to his lips; then replaced it on
the table, and stalked out of the room as silent as he had entered it.
The company remained deeply appalled; at length, after many observations
on the strangeness of what they had seen, they resolved to dispatch two
of their number as ambassadors, to see how it fared with the president,
who had thus strangely appeared among them. They went, and returned with
the frightful intelligence that the friend after whom they had enquired
was that evening deceased.