Double Apparition.
In a letter of Philip, the second Earl of Chesterfield, it is related, that "on a morning in 1652, the earl saw an object in white, like a standing sheet, within a yard of his bedside. He attempted to catch it, but it slid to the foot of the bed, and he saw it no more. His thoughts turned to his lady, who was then at Networth, with her father, the Earl of Northumberland. On his arrival at Networth, a footman met him on the stairs, with a packet directed to him from his wife, whom he found with Lady Essex, her sister, and Mr. Ramsey. He was asked why he had returned so suddenly. He told his motive; and on perusing the letters in the packet, he found that his lady had written to him, requesting his return, for she had seen an object in white, with a black face, by her bedside. These apparitions were seen by the earl and countess at the same moment, when they were forty miles asunder."
Spirit of Dundee.
At the time Viscount Dundee fell in the battle of Killiecrankie, in 1689, his friend, the Lord Balcarras, was a prisoner in the Castle of Edinburgh, upon a strong suspicion of attachment to the unfortunate house of Stuart. The captive earl was in bed, when a hand drew aside the curtain, and the figure of his friend was revealed to him, armed as for battle. The spectre gazed mournfully on Lord Balcarras, passed to the other end of the chamber, leaned some time on the mantlepiece, and then slowly passed out of the door. The earl, not for a moment supposing that he was looking at an apparition, called out "Stop!" but the figure heeded him not. Immediately afterwards, the news was conveyed to his lordship of the battle, and that the gallant Dundee was slain; or, as the song says, that
"Low lay the bonnet of bonny Dundee."
Captain Kidd's Vision.
Lord Byron used to mention a strange story which the commander of a packet related to him. This officer stated, that being asleep one night in his berth, he was awakened by the pressure of something heavy on his limbs; and, there being a faint light in his room, could see, as he thought distinctly, the figure of his brother, who was at that time in the same service in the East Indies, dressed in his uniform, and stretched across the bed. Concluding it to be an illusion of the senses, he shut his eyes and made an effort to sleep. But still the same pressure continued, and still, as often as he ventured to look, he saw the figure lying across in the same position. To add to his wonder, on putting forth his hand to touch the figure, he found the uniform in which it appeared to be dressed dripping wet. On the entrance of one of his brother officers, to whom he called out in alarm, the apparition vanished. A few months later Captain Kidd received intelligence that on that very night his brother had been drowned in the Indian seas.—Moore's Life of Byron.
Sir Henry Wotton's Strange Dream.
Honest Isaac Walton makes Sir Henry Wotton a dreamer in the family line; for, just before his death, he dreamed that the University treasury was robbed by townsmen and poor scholars, and that the number was five. He then wrote to his son Henry at Oxford, inquiring about it, and the letter reached him the morning after the night of the robbery. "Henry," says the account, "shows his father's letter about, which causes great wonderment, especially as the number of thieves was exactly correct."