The Stoneground Ghost Tales: Compiled from the recollections of the Reverend Roland Batchel, Vicar of the parish. — John Shaqi
The Stoneground Ghost Tales: Compiled from the recollections of the Reverend Roland Batchel, Vicar of the parish.Swain, E. G. (Edmund Gill)
General
The Stoneground Ghost Tales: Compiled from the recollections of the Reverend Roland Batchel, Vicar of the parish.
Swain, E. G. (Edmund Gill)
English fiction -- 20th century; Ghost stories, English
Places like Stoneground, which lie on the banks of these defrauded
rivers, are now become helpless victims of Dutch engineering. The water
which has lost its natural outlet, invades their lands. The thrifty
cottager who once had the river at the bottom of his garden, has his
garden more often in these days, at the bottom of the river, and a
summer flood not infrequently destroys the whole produce of his ground.
Such a flood, during an early year in the 20th century, had been
unusually disastrous to Stoneground, and Mr. Batchel, who, as
a gardener, was well able to estimate the losses of his poorer
neighbours, was taking some steps towards repairing them.
Money, however, is never at rest in Stoneground, and it turned out
upon this occasion that the funds placed at his command were wholly
inadequate to the charitable purpose assigned to them. It seemed as if
those who had lost a rood of potatoes could be compensated for no more
than a yard.
It was at this time, when he was oppressed in mind by the failure
of his charitable enterprise, that Mr. Batchel met with the happy
adventure in which the Eastern window of the Church played so singular
a part.
The narrative should be prefaced by a brief description of the window
in question. It is a large painted window, of a somewhat unfortunate
period of execution. The drawing and colouring leave everything to be
desired. The scheme of the window, however, is based upon a wholesome
tradition. The five large lights in the lower part are assigned to
five scenes in the life of Our Lord, and the second of these, counting
from the North, contains a bold erect figure of St. John Baptist, to
whom the Church is dedicated. It is this figure alone, of all those
contained in the window, that is concerned in what we have to relate.
It has already been mentioned that Mr. Batchel had some knowledge of
music. He took an interest in the choir, from whose practices he was
seldom absent; and was quite competent, in the occasional absence of
the choirmaster, to act as his deputy. It is customary at Stoneground
for the choirmaster, in order to save the sexton a journey, to
extinguish the lights after a choir-practice and to lock up the Church.
These duties, accordingly, were performed by Mr. Batchel when the need
arose.
It will be of use to the reader to have the procedure in detail.
The large gas-meter stood in an aisle of the Church, and it was Mr.
Batchel's practice to go round and extinguish all the lights save one,
before turning off the gas at the meter. The one remaining light, which
was reached by standing upon a choir seat, was always that nearest the
door of the chancel, and experience proved that there was ample time to
walk from the meter to that light before it died out. It was therefore
an easy matter to turn off the last light, to find the door without its
aid, and thence to pass out, and close the Church for the night.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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