Yorkshire Oddities, Incidents, and Strange EventsBaring-Gould, S. (Sabine)
History
Yorkshire Oddities, Incidents, and Strange Events
Baring-Gould, S. (Sabine)
Legends -- England -- Yorkshire; Yorkshire (England) -- Miscellanea
ten seconds only, returned with what I believe to have been the
figure of a young child, and stopped at the last pane but one,
where both vanished. I did not see the child again, but a few
seconds afterwards the woman reappeared, and completed the passage,
behind the last pane, very rapidly. Nothing more was seen during
the service, and no other opportunity presented itself to me for
making observations. During each time, the chandelier prevented me
from obtaining a complete view but there could be no doubt as to
the shape, a certain amount of indistinctness, however, being
caused by the stained glass. On the reappearance for the last time,
I saw the head, which was, I believe, that of the child, move up
and down distinctly, as if nodding. The figure shone with dazzling
brightness, and appeared to be at a considerable distance, say
thirty yards or so, though at the same time as distinct as
possible, considering the obstruction of coloured glass. Each time
the level upon which it glided was precisely the same, and
afterwards, on carrying a straight line from the spot in the
gallery where I sat, through the part of the glass where the feet
of the figure shone, and continuing that line (in my mind's eye,
with all the objects before me, except the ghost, whose position I
had taken good notice of), I found that it would traverse a thick
holly tree eight or nine feet high at about four feet from the
ground, and at two or three feet from the ground a low wall about
four feet high, and would reach the ground itself in the middle of
a gravel yard belonging to the back premises of the house, called
the vicarage, at a distance of twelve or fifteen yards from the
window. Any person walking between the window and the holly tree
would barely be seen at all, much less be seen in the place which
the apparition occupies; and any one on the further side of the
tree would be almost if not quite invisible on account of the holly
and other bushes and the dead wall. Any one about there at all can
easily be seen from the many houses on all sides.
"If it were a shadow thrown upon the glass of the window it would,
of course, be seen by those who sit in the body of the church as
well as those in the gallery.
"It cannot be a reflection on the principle of Pepper's Ghost,
which is produced by the figure actually being in a very strong
light and appearing reflected on glass in a darkish spot. The
lights both inside and outside of the church at York which might
be thought to produce the ghost, are precisely the reverse, and any
figure required to be reproduced by reflection on the east window
would have to be standing or walking in the centre of the aisle.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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