"Now opposite the Tally Ho, on the far bank of the dingle, was a piece of ground facing the south, and old Corbett thought it would make an excellent cherry orchard. So the hitherto impecunious Corbett bought a portion, and when he had bought it he fenced it round, and from the opposite side it looked exactly the shape of a coffin, and the coffin piece it is called to this day. "At the time of which I am writing, if was permissible after a man had been hung, for his relatives to take the body away home for burial. One day, two men arrived at the Tally Ho, with such a body fastened across the back of a horse; tying up the horse they went into the inn for some refreshment, shortly to be called out by a woman who said the horse, burden and all, had jumped over the hedge into the dingle and was lying at the bottom. They hurried down and there found the horse with his neck broken and his ghastly burden under him. It was a curious fact that after the disappearance of Needle Jim, horses approaching this corner broke into heavy sweats and showed great signs of fear, and a number of people preferred to travel by the longer route, _via_ the Hundred Horse. "Some years ago some alterations were being made to the front of an old hotel in a little country town about five miles from the scenes depicted above, and on raising the large flagstone of the bottom step, there was discovered the skeleton of a man with his skull smashed. The old folks declared it must be the body of the missing packman; anyhow, after the discovery, the spirit or ghost seems to have departed from the precincts of the Tally Ho. "Now I am not a believer in ghosts or their allies, but when I was a small boy I went on my pony accompanied by two servants, who were taking a parcel to a house next door to the Tally Ho, and whilst they were inside the house, all at once the pony snorted and started full gallop for home as hard as he could go; we parted company going down a steep hill, and I have often thought it was a good thing for me we did, for if he had bolted into his stable (which he did do) I should probably have had my head smashed, as the doorway was very low. "Still, I do not believe in ghosts, I think it is more convenient not to!" CHAPTER XVII ACROSS THE THRESHOLD Once upon a time I had an interesting experience showing how often one may be in the presence of the disembodied without being in the least aware of the fact.