Then we opened a conversation with the farmer; he looked an honest, hard-working man; his face was sunburnt, and his hands showed signs of toil. I should say that there was no romance about him, nor suspicion of any such thing. The day was warm, and he was sitting at ease in his shirt sleeves. “I suppose you get a number of people here to see the place?” we remarked by way of breaking the ice. “Yes, that we do; lots of folk come to see the house and hear about the ghost. We’ve had people come specially all the way from London since it’s got into the papers; two newspaper writers came down not long ago and made a lot of notes; they be coming down again to sleep in the house one night. We gets a quantity of letters too from folk asking to see the house. Have I ever seen the ghost? No, I cannot rightly say as how I have, but I’ve heard him often. There’s strange noises and bangings going on at nights, just like the moving about of heavy furniture on the floors, and knockings on the walls; the noises used to keep me awake at first, but now I’ve got used to them and they don’t trouble me. Sometimes, though, I wakes up when the noises are louder than usual, or my wife wakes me up when she gets nervous listening to them, but I only says, ‘The ghost is lively to-night,’ and go to sleep again. I’ve got used to him, you see, but he upsets the missus a lot. You see she’s seen the ghost several times, and I only hear him.” The wife meanwhile was intent on her work and made no remark. “This is all very strange and interesting,” we exclaimed; “and so the house is really haunted?” Now it was the wife’s turn. “I should rather think so,” she broke in, “and you’d think so too if you only slept a night here, or tried to, for you’d not get much sleep unless you are used to noises, I can tell you: they’re awful at times. I daren’t be in the house alone after sundown, I’m that afraid.” “And you’ve actually seen the ghost?” I broke in. “Yes, that I have, three or four times quite plainly, and several times not quite so plainly; he quite terrifies me, and one never knows when to expect him.” “Ah! that’s an unfortunate way ghosts have,” we remarked sympathetically, “but good-mannered ones are never troublesome in the daytime: that’s one blessing.”
A NOISY GHOST
Eventually the busy housewife finished her task, and the peeled potatoes were safely put in the pot to boil. At this juncture she turned to us and said she was free for a time and would be very pleased to show us over the house and give us any information we wished, which was very kind of her. We then slipped a certain coin of the realm into the hands of her husband as a slight return for the courtesy shown to us. He declared that there was no necessity for us to do this, as they did not wish to make any profit out of their misfortunes, and as he pocketed the coin with thanks said they were only too pleased to show the house to any respectable person. The farmer certainly had an honest, frank face. His wife, we noticed, had a dreamy, far-away look in her eyes, but she said she did not sleep well, which might account for this. She appeared nervous and did not look straight at us, but this might have been manner. First she led the way to a narrow passage, in the front of the house, that contained the staircase. On either side of this passage was a door, each leading into a separate sitting-room, both of which rooms were bare, being entirely void of furniture. Then she told her own story, which I repeat here from memory, aided by a few hasty notes I made at the time. “Ever since we came to this house we have been disturbed by strange noises at nights. They commenced on the very first night we slept here, just after we had gone to bed. It sounded for all the world as though some one were in the house moving things about, and every now and then there was a bang as though some heavy weight had fallen. We got up and looked about, but there was no one in the place, and everything was just as we left it. At first we thought the wind must have blown the doors to, for it was a stormy night, and my husband said he thought perhaps there were rats in the house. This went on for some weeks, and we could not account for it, but we never thought of the house being haunted. We were puzzled but not alarmed. Then one night, when my husband had gone to bed before me (I had sat up late for some reason), and I was just going up that staircase, I distinctly saw a little, bent old man with a wrinkled face standing on the top and looking steadily down at me. For the moment I wondered who he could be, never dreaming he was a ghost, so I rushed upstairs to him and he vanished. Then I shook and trembled all over, for I felt I had seen an apparition. When I got into the bedroom I shut the door, and on looking round saw the ghost again quite plainly for a moment, and then he vanished as before. Since then I’ve seen him about the house in several places.”
A CURIOUS HISTORY
Next she showed us into the empty sitting-room to the left of the staircase; the floor of this was paved with bricks. “It was from this room,” she continued, “that the noises seemed to come mostly, just as though some one were knocking a lot of things about in it. This struck us as singular, so one day we carefully examined the room and discovered in that corner that the flooring was very uneven, and then we noticed besides that the bricks there were stained as though some dark substance had been spilled over them. It at once struck me that some one might have been murdered and buried there, and it was the ghost of the murdered man I had seen. So we took up the bricks and dug down in the earth below, and found some bones, a gold ring, and some pieces of silk. You can see where the bricks were taken up and relaid. I’m positive it was a ghost I saw. The noises still continue, though I’ve not seen the ghost since we dug up the bones.” After this, there being nothing more to be seen or told, we returned to the kitchen. Here we again interviewed the farmer, and found out from him that the town of Spilsby, with a good inn, was only a mile away. Thereupon I decided to myself that we would drive on to Spilsby, secure accommodation there for wife and horses for the night, and that I would come back alone and sleep in the haunted room, if I could arrange matters. With the carriage rugs, the carriage lamp and candles, some creature comforts from the inn, and a plentiful supply of tobacco, it appeared to me that I could manage to pass the night pretty comfortably; and if the ghost looked in—well, I would approach him in a friendly spirit and, he being agreeable, we might spend quite a festive evening together! If the ghost did not favour me, at least I might hear the noises—it would be something to hear a ghost! Thereupon I mentioned my views to the farmer; he made no objection to the arrangement, simply suggesting that I should consult the “missus” as to details; but alas! she did not approve. “You know,” she said, addressing her husband, “the gentleman might take all the trouble to come and be disappointed; the ghost might be quiet that very night; he was quiet one night, you remember. Besides, we promised the two gentlemen from the London paper that they should come first, and we cannot break our word.” Appeals from this decision were in vain; the wife would not hear of our sleeping the night there on any terms, all forms of persuasion were in vain. Manifestly our presence in the haunted chamber for the night was not desired by the wife. As entreaties were useless there was nothing for it but to depart, which we did after again thanking them for the courtesies already shown; it was not for us to resent the refusal. “Every Englishman’s house is his castle” according to English law, and if a ghost breaks the rule—well, “the law does not recognise ghosts.” So, with a sense of disappointment amounting almost to disillusion, we departed. I feel quite hopeless now of ever seeing a ghost, and have become weary of merely reading about his doings in papers and magazines. I must say that ghosts, both old and new, appear to behave in a most inconsiderate manner; they go where they are not wanted and worry people who positively dislike them and strongly object to their presence, whilst those who would really take an interest in them they leave “severely alone!”
MARKET-DAY AT SPILSBY
Arriving at Spilsby we found it to be market-day there, and the clean and neat little town (chiefly composed of old and pleasantly grouped buildings) looked quite gay and picturesque with its motley crowds of farmers and their wives, together with a goodly scattering of country folk. The womankind favoured bright-hued dresses and red shawls, that made a moving confusion of colour suggestive of a scene abroad—indeed, the town that bright sunny day had quite a foreign appearance, and had it not been for the very English names and words on the shops and walls around, we might easily have persuaded ourselves that we were abroad. To add to the picturesqueness of the prospect, out of the thronged market-place rose the tall tapering medieval cross of stone; the shaft of this was ancient, and only the cross on the top was modern, and even the latter was becoming mellowed by time into harmony with the rest. The whole scene composed most happily, and it struck us that it would make an excellent motive for a painting with the title, “Market-day in an old English town.” Will any artist reader, in search of a fresh subject and new ground, take the hint, I wonder?
Not far from the inn we noticed a bronze statue, set as usual upon a stone pedestal of the prevailing type, reminding us of the numerous statues of a like kind that help so successfully to disfigure our London streets. I must say that this statue had a very latter-day look, little in accord with the unpretentious old-world buildings that surrounded it. Bronze under the English climate assumes a dismal, dirty, greeny-browny-gray—a most depressing colour. At the foot of the statue was an anchor. Who was this man, and what great wrong had he done, we wondered, to be memorialised thus? So we went to see, and on the pedestal we read—
Sir John Franklin
Discoverer of the North West Passage
Born at Spilsby
April 1786.
Died in the Arctic Regions
June 1847.
After this we visited the church, here let me honestly confess, not for the sake of worship or curiosity, but for a moment’s restful quiet. The inn was uncomfortably crowded, a farmers’ “Ordinary” was being held there. The roadways of the town were thronged; there were stalls erected in the market square from which noisy vendors gave forth torrents of eloquence upon the virtues of the goods they had to sell,—especially eloquent and strong of voice was a certain seller of spectacles, but he was hard pressed in these respects by the agent of some