The Night-Side of Nature; Or, Ghosts and Ghost-SeersCrowe, Catherine
Religion
The Night-Side of Nature; Or, Ghosts and Ghost-Seers
Crowe, Catherine
Ghosts; Parapsychology
house. It was the young lady who slept at the foreman’s who saw,
as above related, the singular apparition of the luminous figure
in the window, along with the foreman and his wife.
“It would be too long to relate all the forms in which this
nocturnal disturbance is said by the family to present itself.
When a figure appears, it is sometimes that of a man, as already
described, which is often very luminous, and passes through the
walls as though they were nothing. This male figure is well
known to the neighbors by the name of “Old Jeffrey!” At other
times, it is the figure of a lady, also in gray costume, and as
described by Mr. Drury. She is sometimes seen sitting wrapped in
a sort of mantle, with her head depressed, and her hands crossed
on her lap. The most terrible fact is, that she is without eyes.
“To hear such sober and superior people gravely relate to you
such things, gives you a very odd feeling. They say that the
noise made is often like that of a pavior with his rammer
thumping on the floor. At other times it is coming down stairs,
making a similar loud sound. At others it coughs, sighs, and
groans, like a person in distress; and, again, there is the
sound of a number of little feet pattering on the floor of the
upper chamber, where the apparition has more particularly
exhibited itself, and which, for that reason, is solely used as
a lumber-room. Here these little footsteps may be often heard as
if careering a child’s carriage about, which in bad weather is
kept up there. Sometimes, again, it makes the most horrible
laughs. Nor does it always confine itself to the night. On one
occasion, a young lady, as she assured me herself, opened the
door in answer to a knock, the housemaid being absent, and a
lady in fawn-colored silk entered, and proceeded up stairs. As
the young lady, of course, supposed it a neighbor come to make a
morning call on Mrs. Procter, she followed her up to the
drawing-room, where, however, to her astonishment, she did not
find her, nor was anything more seen of her.
“Such are a few of the ‘questionable shapes’ in which this
troublesome guest comes. As may be expected, terror of it is
felt by the neighboring cottagers, though it seems to confine
its malicious disturbance almost solely to the occupants of this
one house. There is a well, however, near to which no one
ventures after it is dark, because it has been seen near it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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