"'What! not this morning, as you were passing my quarter?' said I, amazed in my turn. 'Didn't you ask me to come and play a game at billiards; and didn't I tell you I'd come as soon as I had finished my letter? and I did.'
"P. B. looked at me as if he thought I'd suddenly become insane; but as I suppose my countenance did not confirm that impression, he said, 'Here's some mistake; when do you suppose I made this appointment with you?'
"'Suppose!' I answered, rather indignant; 'what do you mean by suppose? Didn't you come into my quarter about three hours ago, just as I was finishing breakfast, and ask me to come up here and play a game at billiards with you?'
"'No; it must have been somebody else. Who gave you the message?'
"'Message! there was no message,' I answered, quite bewildered. 'You came in yourself—you know you did. What's the use of trying to hoax one?'
"'I don't know whether you are trying to hoax me,' replied P. B.; 'but upon my soul I have not been in your quarter to-day; nor have I seen you at all, till I entered this room. Moreover, I went with my wife at an early hour to breakfast with Captain D., and we are now returning thence; and I told the coachman to set me down here as he passed.'
"This was most confounding; and as we were both equally positive in what we asserted, we left the billiard-room together, and proceeded to take the testimony of my servant. On being asked who he had introduced when I was finishing breakfast, he unhesitatingly answered, Captain B. His account, in short, coincided entirely with mine.
"'Now then,' said Captain B., 'as you have your witness, you must hear mine,' and we went on to his quarter, where I received the most satisfactory and unimpeachable evidence, that what he said was correct. He had left home with Mrs. B. at six o'clock, and gone by appointment to breakfast with Captain D., who lived quite in a different direction to my quarter; and Captain D. afterwards testified to his never having left his house till he stept into the carriage with his wife.
"This event created a great sensation at the time; and people endeavoured by every means to explain it away, but nobody ever could. Captain B. did not like it at all; and his wife and family were very much alarmed, but nothing ensued, and I believe he is alive and well at this moment."
We next turned to Madame Von B., who said she knew so many cases of spiritual appearances, and occurrences of that nature, that she was rather perplexed by the abundance of her recollections. Amongst these she selected the following on account of its singularity:—