The mention of the hallucinatory nature of such phenomena suggests
attention to the intellectual acumen displayed by _The Times_
correspondent in saying that "Lord Bute ought to have employed a
couple of intelligent detectives" for the purpose of catching
subjective hallucinations. On the same principle, he ought to offer to
his learned friend, Sir James Crichton-Browne, well known as an
alienist, some advice as to the best mode of securing morbid
hallucinations in strait-waistcoats. Is he prepared to propose to take
photographs of a dream, to put thoughts under lock and key, or to
advocate the supply of hot and cold water on every floor of a castle
in the air?
One of the guests at B---- during Colonel Taylor's tenancy wrote after
his return to London to Miss Freer as follows:--
"_March 24th._--I went to call the other day on the 'G.'s' who chanced
to be still in town.... I begin chronologically, and give you what I
was told in all seriousness.... The H----s knew nothing about any
stories of haunting when they took the place, and Miss H---- and one
of the sons went up, most innocently, to prepare for the arrival of
the others. As soon as they entered it the son said to his sister that
he couldn't explain why, but he had a conviction that the house was
haunted. That night, however, nothing happened. But the second night
the bangings began. An old Spanish nurse was in the haunted room, and
was greatly disturbed by the noise upon her door, which seemed as if
it were going to be burst open. She didn't seem to be alarmed in the
least however, and later took steps to secure its remaining shut by
stuffing a towel under the chink (why this should secure it I rather
fail to see, still that was her view). Apparently the ghost resented
this, and one night did actually burst the door open, with such
violence that the towel was precipitated into the middle of the room.
The longer they stayed in the house, the worse things got. The noises
were all over the house more or less, and were by no means confined to
bangings. Miss H---- slept in room No. 8, where the ghost limped round
her bed. She was so alarmed that she fetched her brother in, and he
slept on the sofa. The limping began again, and she asked him if he
heard anything, and he at once agreed that somebody was walking round
the bed. In his own room--I forget which--he twice _saw_ the ghost,
once in the shape of an indeterminate mist, once in the shape of a
man, who came in by the door and vanished in the wall. Mrs. 'G.'[B]
now appears on the scene, and slept in No. 1 (I _think_). She heard
only the bangings, which she declares were indescribably loud. They
were mostly at the door of the haunted room. Traps were laid to catch
unwary jesters; the door, or the surrounding floor, I forget which,
was covered with flour, and wires were stretched across the door; and
if I had the proper mind of a ghost-story narrator, I should say that
the bangings were as bad as ever, and the flour and the wires were
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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