Mrs. Atkins examined the chamber in every imaginable direction; she sounded every panel of the wainscot to prove there was no hollowness that might argue a concealed passage; and having securely bolted the door of the room, retired to rest, confident that she was secure against every material visitor, and totally incredulous of the airy encroachments of spiritual beings. She had only been asleep a few minutes, when her dog, which lay by her bedside, leaped, howling and terrified, on the bed. The bolted door of the chamber slowly opened and a pale, thin, sickly youth came in, cast his eyes mildly toward her, walked up to the iron cage in the middle of the room, and then leaned in the melancholy attitude of one revolving in his mind the sorrows of a cheerless and unblest existence. After a while he again withdrew, and retired by the way he entered.
Mrs. Atkins, on witnessing his departure, felt the return of her resolution. She persuaded herself to believe the figure the work of some skillful imposter, and she determined on following its footsteps. She took up her lamp and hastened to the door. To her infinite surprise, she discovered it to be fastened, as she had herself left it on retiring to bed. On withdrawing the bolt, and opening the door, she saw the back of the youth descending the staircase. She followed till, on reaching the foot of the stairs, the form seemed to sink into the earth.
The event was related to Lady Pennyman. She determined to remain no longer in her present habitation. Another residence was offered in the vicinity of Lisle, and this she took under the pretext that it was better suited to the size of her family.
THE GHOST IN YELLOW CALICO
The Rev. Elwyn Thomas, 35, Park Village East, N. W., London, has published a very remarkable experience of his own. It is as follows:
“Twelve years ago,” says the doctor, “I was the second minister of the Bryn Mawr Welsh Wesleyan Circuit, in the South Wales District. It was a beautiful evening in June when, after conducting the service at Llanyndir, I told the gentlemen with whom I generally stayed when preaching there, that three young friends had come to meet me from Crickhowell, and that I meant to accompany them back for about half a mile on their return journey, so would not be home before nine o’clock.
“When I wished good-night to my friends it was about twenty minutes to nine but still light enough to see a good distance. The subject of our conversation all the way from the chapel until we parted was of a certain eccentric old character who then belonged to the Crickhowell church. I walked a little further down the road than I intended in order to hear the end of a very amusing story about him. Our conversation had no reference whatever to ghosts. Personally I was a strong disbeliever in ghosts and invariably ridiculed anyone whom I thought superstitious enough to believe in them.
“When I had walked about a hundred yards away from my friends, after parting from them, I saw on the bank of the canal, what I thought at the moment was an old beggar. I couldn’t help asking myself where this old man had come from. I had not seen him in going down the road. I turned round quite unconcernedly to have another look at him, and had no sooner done so than I saw, within half a yard of me one of the most remarkable and startling sights I hope it will ever be my lot to see. Almost on a level with my own face, I saw that of an old man, over every feature of which the putty colored skin was drawn tightly, except the forehead which was lined with deep wrinkles. The lips were extremely thin and appeared perfectly bloodless. The toothless mouth stood half open. The cheeks were hollow and sunken like those of a corpse, and the eyes which seemed far back in the middle of the head, were unnaturally luminous and piercing. The terrible object was wrapped in two bands of old yellow calico, one of which was drawn under the chin, and over the cheeks and tied at the top of the head, the other was drawn round the top of the wrinkled forehead and fastened at the back of the head. So deep and indelible an impression it made on my mind, that, were I an artist, I could paint that face to-day.
“What I have thus tried to describe in many words, I saw at a glance. Acting on the impulse of the moment, I turned my face toward the village and ran away from the horrible vision with all my might for about sixty yards. I then stopped and turned around to see how far I had distanced it, and to my unspeakable horror, there it was still face to face with me as if I had not moved an inch. I grasped my umbrella and raised it to strike him, and you can imagine my feelings when I could see nothing between the face and the ground, except an irregular column of intense darkness, through which my umbrella passed as a stick goes through water!