Animal Ghosts; Or, Animal Hauntings and the Hereafter — John Shaqi
Animal Ghosts; Or, Animal Hauntings and the HereafterO'Donnell, Elliott
Religion
Animal Ghosts; Or, Animal Hauntings and the Hereafter
O'Donnell, Elliott
Animal ghosts; Extrasensory perception in animals
During his occupation of the house, many people were seen to enter the
premises, but never leave them, and the place got the most sinister
reputation. Among other deeds credited to the murderer and his
offspring was the mutilation and boiling of a cat--the particular pet of
the young heir, who was compelled to witness the whole revolting
process. Years later, a subsequent owner of the property had a monument
erected in the churchyard to the memory of this poor, abused child, and
on the front of the house constructed the device of the cat.
Though it is impossible to determine what amount of truth there may be
in this tradition, it certainly seems to accord with the hauntings, and
to supply some sort of explanation to them. The ghostly head on the
banisters might well be that of the low and brutal guardian, whose
spirit would be the exact counterpart of his mind. The figure seen, and
noises heard in the passage, point to the re-enaction of some tragedy,
possibly the murder of the heir, or the slaughter of his cat, in either
of which a bucket might easily have played a grimly significant part.
And if human murderers and their victims have phantasms, why should not
animals have phantasms too? Why should not the phenomenon of the cat
seen by Mrs. Hartnoll and the Wheelers have been the actual phantasm of
an earthbound cat?
No amount of reasoning--religious or otherwise--has as yet annihilated
the possibility of all forms of earthly life possessing spirits.
LETTER FROM MY WIFE
I heard the foregoing account from my husband when first I met him years
ago, and I know it to be true. I have seen the rooms, etc. in the Old
Manor House, Oxenby, where the incidents Mrs. Hartnoll mentions took
place.
ADA B. O'DONNELL.
_July_ 2, 1913.
To further substantiate my views with regard to a future existence for
animals, I reproduce (by permission of the Editor) the following letters
and articles that have appeared from time to time in the _Occult
Review_:--
Letter 1
_That other Cat_
One evening about four years ago I was in my drawing-room with two
friends; we were all standing up on the point of going to bed, and only
waiting till the old cook had succeeded in inducing the grey Persian cat
to come in for the night. This was sometimes difficult, and then cook
came up as on this occasion and called him from the balcony, and the
French window was wide open, when a cat rushed in at the window and
through the door.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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