One of the most singular cases that have come to my knowledge, perhaps because the unaccountable disturbances happened in the daytime, whereas they habitually occur only in the night-time, when churchyards are supposed to yawn, was that of a haunted schoolhouse. This was downright bravado. If we do not err, in this case a bell was repeatedly rung during the regular sessions, by no visible agency, to the amazement of both teachers and scholars. After a vain search for the cause, the schoolhouse was shut up, and so remained for a considerable time, a speechless but tangible witness to the general belief that the devil was at the bottom of it all. Not many generations ago, when ghosts were perhaps more numerous than at present, there were professional exorcists who could be hired to clear the premises of ghosts or no pay; but this is now a lost art. As Shakespeare says:-- “No exorciser harm thee! Nor no witchcraft charm thee! Ghost unlaid forbear thee!” While upon this interesting subject it may be instructive to know what our ancestors sometimes suffered from similar visitations. We take the following extract from Ben Franklin’s _New England Courant_, of 1726:-- “They write from Plymouth, that an extraordinary event has lately happened in that neighborhood, in which, some say, the Devil and the man of the house are very much to blame. The man it seems, would now and then in a frolic call upon the Devil to come down the chimney; and some little time after the last invitation, the goodwife’s pudding turned black in the boiling, which she attributed to the Devil’s descending the chimney, and getting into the pot upon her husband’s repeated wishes for him. Great numbers of people have been to view the pudding, and to inquire into the circumstances; and most of them agree that so sudden a change must be produced by a preternatural power. However, ’tis thought it will have this good effect upon the man, that he will no more be so free with the Devil in his cups, lest his Satanic Majesty should again unluckily tumble into the pot.” But houses are by no means the only things subject to these astounding visitations. Dark and secluded ponds, thick swamps, and barren hillsides often bear that unsavory reputation to-day, it may be from association with some weird tale or legend, or mayhap because such places seldom fail, of themselves, to produce a certain effect upon an active imagination. Let any such person, who has ever been lost in some thick forest, recall his sensations upon first making the unwelcome discovery. The solemn old woods then seem all alive with-- “The dim and shadowy armies of our unquiet dreams, Their footsteps brush the dewy fern and print the shaded streams.” As regards haunted ships, the following incident, taken down as literally as I could transcribe it at the time, from the lips of a seafaring friend, speaks for itself:--