It is not a great many years ago since an account was telegraphed all
over the country, and duly appeared in the daily newspapers, of an
honest citizen, a resident of one of the largest towns in Pennsylvania,
whose wife “while yet in good health, frequently admonished her
friends that she did not wish her body to be buried in a certain
wet graveyard. She threatened to ‘speak to them’ if her wish was not
granted, and went so far as to tell them how she would haunt them by
coming back in ghostly form. The wife died, and her body was buried
in the graveyard she had disliked. Now, strange as it may appear, her
husband alleges that, since the funeral took place, she has appeared at
his bedside several times each week, always looking at him, and always
making motions with her bony hands, as a mark of her displeasure.
The husband says he is unable to sleep, and also that he is sure the
strange midnight visitor is none other than his wife. He declares that
whatever other people may think of it, he himself firmly believes that
he has brought the enmity of the spirit upon himself and children by
their refusal to grant the wife’s last request. The children’s beds
are also visited by her, as they say, and as a consequence the family
is kept in constant alarm. One of the nearest neighbors has also seen
the ‘spook’ several times, and corroborates the family in every
particular. The terrified husband relates the facts himself, and it is
the responsibility of the man that warrants publishing his story of the
appearance of the spook. He gives the account of the strange happenings
in a straightforward manner, which impresses a person with its truth,
and he further says it is not imagination, a dream, or an attack of
nightmare, but that the spook always comes when he is wide awake. The
women and children of the neighborhood are in great terror, and the
people hardly venture out of doors after dark.”
Upon the heels of this experience comes the following telegram to the
Associated Press, thus disseminating, through its thousand channels,
superstition broadcast:--
[“Copyright, 1899, by The Associated Press.]
“LONDON, March 4, 1899. Another link in the chain of illfortune
which has followed the famous Newstead Abbey was forged this
week. It seems that a curse rests on the abbey, and that the
eldest has never succeeded to the estate.
“Byron sold it to Col. Wildman in 1808, who died childless. The
trustees sold it to Webb, the famous sportsman, whose eldest
son died this week. Byron had the skull which was reported to
have belonged to the ghost that haunted the abbey, and he used
it as a punch bowl. Webb buried the skull, hoping to lay the
ghost.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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