Human Personality and Its Survival of Bodily Death

by F. W. H. Myers

The apparitions were of exactly the same type, seen in the same places and by the same people, at varying intervals.

The footsteps continued, and were heard by several visitors and new servants who had taken the places of those who had left, as well as by myself, four sisters and brother; in all by about twenty people, many of them not having previously heard of the apparitions or sounds.

Other sounds were also heard in addition which seemed gradually to increase in intensity. They consisted of walking up and down on the second-floor landing, of bumps against the doors of the bedrooms, and of the handles of the doors turning....

During this year, at Mr. Myers's suggestion, I kept a photographic camera constantly ready to try to photograph the figure, but on the few occasions I was able to do so, I got no result; at night, usually only by candle-light, a long exposure would be necessary for so dark a figure, and this I could not obtain. I also tried to communicate with the figure, constantly speaking to it and asking it to make signs, if not able to speak, but with no result. I also tried especially to touch her, but did not succeed. On cornering her, as I did once or twice, she disappeared.

Some time in the summer of this year (1886), Mrs. Twining, our regular charwoman, saw the figure, while waiting in the hall at the door leading to the kitchen stairs, for her payment. Until it suddenly vanished from her sight, as no real figure could have done, she thought it was a lady visitor who had mistaken her way. Mr. Myers interviewed her on December 29th, 1889, and has her separate account.

On one night in July 1886 (my father and I being away from home), my mother and her maid heard a loud noise in an unoccupied room over their heads. They went up, but seeing nothing and the noise ceasing, they went back to my mother's room on the first storey. They then heard loud noises from the morning-room on the ground floor. They then went half-way downstairs, when they saw a bright light in the hall beneath. Being alarmed, they went up to my sister E., who then came down, and they all three examined the doors, windows, etc., and found them all fastened as usual. My mother and her maid then went to bed. My sister E. went up to her room on the second storey, but as she passed the room where my two sisters L. and M. were sleeping, they opened their door to say that they had heard noises, and also seen what they described as the flame of a candle, without candle or hand visible, cross the room diagonally from corner to door. Two of the maids opened the doors of their two bedrooms, and said that they had also heard noises; they all five stood at their doors with their lighted candles for some little time. They all heard steps walking up and down the landing between them; as they passed they felt a sensation which they described as "a cold wind," though their candles were not blown about. They saw nothing. The steps then descended the stairs, re-ascended, again descended, and did not return.

In the course of the following autumn we heard traditions of earlier haunting, though, unfortunately, in no case were we able to get a first-hand account....

We also now heard from a carpenter who had done jobs in the house in Mrs. S.'s time, that Mrs. S. had wished to possess herself of the first Mrs. S.'s jewels. Her husband had called him in to make a receptacle under the boards in the morning-room on the ground-floor, in which receptacle he placed the jewels, and then had it nailed down and the carpet replaced. The carpenter showed us the place. My father made him take up the boards; the receptacle was there, but empty....

During the next two years, 1887 to 1889, the figure was very seldom seen, though footsteps were heard; the louder noises had gradually ceased. From 1889 to the present, 1892, so far as I know, the figure has not been seen at all; the lighter footsteps lasted a little longer, but even they have now ceased. The figure became much less substantial on its later appearances. Up to about 1886 it was so solid and life-like that it was often mistaken for a real person. It gradually became less distinct. At all times it intercepted the light; we have not been able to ascertain if it cast a shadow.

Proofs of Immateriality.