Ghosts I Have Seen, and Other Psychic ExperiencesTweedale, Violet
Religion
Ghosts I Have Seen, and Other Psychic Experiences
Tweedale, Violet
Ghosts; Parapsychology
After dinner, when the ladies were alone in the drawing-room, Mrs. Dilke
asked Mrs. Sinclair what they had seen, and on being told she explained
that before a death in the family a certain housekeeper, who had been
murdered, always haunted the chapel, and in consequence of this warning
always coming true her husband was exceedingly nervous of this
apparition. Nothing more was said upon the subject during Mrs.
Sinclair's stay, but before the end of the year Major Fetherston Dilke
lay dead.
Such warnings are very common, and very hard to understand. They suggest
that the apparition knows of the approaching death of a certain person,
and that it has the power to make itself visible to certain persons, at
certain times. Why this warning should be given is a baffling mystery.
Again, why did not Mrs. Sinclair see this ghost when her mother so
plainly saw it?
The fact is that all sorts of most unlikely persons see apparitions,
even the rankest unbeliever and the most matter-of-fact individual, and
they generally see them at most unexpected moments.
I remember one day walking along a country road, and seeing a dog-cart
in the distance coming towards me. As it drew nearer I saw that it
contained (the late) Lord Wemyss, and on recognizing me he drew up and
jumped down.
"I've got a confession to make to you," he said. "I wouldn't tell any
one else for the world. I'd have the life chaffed out of me. I've
actually seen a ghost."
"I'm not in the least surprised. Why shouldn't you see a ghost?" I
retorted.
"Well! I never believed in them, and I didn't think I was the sort of
man who'd ever see one. Now, if it had been Arthur Balfour there would
have been nothing in it. He's a member of the Psychical Society, and all
that sort of thing."
"But being a member of the Psychical Society does not predispose one to
see ghosts," I expostulated, but Lord Wemyss remained very puzzled.
He told me that when about half a mile from his own front door at
Gosford, East Lothian, he saw a man walking in front of him in the same
direction, going towards the house. In a vague sort of way he wondered
for a moment where this man had suddenly sprung from, as he had not
noticed him before, but there was nothing unusual in his appearance to
arouse curiosity. He was a stranger and looked like a foreman in his
Sunday clothes.
Lord Wemyss walked on, always keeping about ten yards between himself
and the stranger. At a certain point he fully expected he would strike
off by a path leading to the servants' and tradesmen's entrance, but
rather to his surprise, the man did no such thing. He pursued an
undeviating course towards the main entrance, and on observing this Lord
Wemyss became more interested, and looked at him more closely.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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