CHAPTER II.
A few months after these events happened the Bells left the neighbourhood, and the house became tenanted by a Mr. and Mrs. Weekman, who lived there about eighteen months, and left in the year 1847. Mr. Weekman's statement respecting the noises he heard was to the effect that one evening when he was about to retire for the night, he heard a rapping on the outside door, and, what was rather unusual for him, instead of familiarly bidding them "come in," stepped to the door and opened it. He had no doubt of finding some one who wished to come in, but to his surprise found no one there. He stepped out and looked around, supposing that some person was imposing on him, he could discover no one, and went back into the house. After a short time he heard the rapping again, and stepped up and held on to the latch, so that he might ascertain if any one had taken that means to annoy him. The rapping was repeated, the door opened instantly, but no one was in sight. Mr. Weekman states that he could feel the jar of the door very plainly when the rapping was heard. As he opened the door he sprang out and went around the house, but no one was in sight, nor could he find trace of any intruder.
They were frequently afterwards disturbed by strange and unaccountable noises. One night Mrs. Weekman heard what she deemed to be the footsteps of someone walking in the cellar. Another night Mr. Weekman and his wife were disturbed by hearing a scream from their child, a girl about eight years of age,—this happened at midnight,—they went to her and she told them that something like a hand passed over her face and head; it seemed cold, and so badly had she been frightened that it was some time before she could be induced to tell her parents the cause of her alarm, nor would she consent to sleep in the same room for several nights afterwards.
All this might have happened, and been only the idle fabric of a child's dream, the Weekman family might have imagined what they gave out as fact, and we should be inclined to believe that such was the case, if we had not the most conclusive evidence that such manifestations were quite common, not only in this house, but in various others where similarly strange things have happened.
CHAPTER III.
"Know well my soul, God's hand controls
Whate'er thou fearest."
From the time the Fox family entered the house at Hydesville, about December, 1847, they were incessantly disturbed by similar noises to those heard by Lucretia Pulver and the Weekmans. During the next month however (January, 1848) the noises began to assume the character of slight knockings heard at night in the bedroom; sometimes appearing to sound from the cellar beneath. At first Mrs. Fox sought to persuade herself this might be the hammering of a shoemaker in a house hard by, sitting up late at work. But further observation showed that the sounds originated in the house. For not only did the knockings become more distinct, and not only were they heard first in one part of the house, then in another, but the family remarked that these raps, even when not very loud, often caused a motion, tremulous rather than a sudden jar, of the bedsteads and chairs—sometimes of the floor; a motion which was quite perceptible to the touch when a hand was laid on the chairs, which was sometimes sensibly felt at night in the slightly oscillating motion of the bed, and which was occasionally perceived as a sort of vibration even when standing on the floor. After a time also, the noises varied in their character, sounding occasionally like distinct footfalls in the different rooms.