the right hand was bound to the great toe of the left foot, and the thumb of the left hand to the great toe of the right foot, and retained by a cord; the victim was then cast "crosse wayes" into "a river or lake;" if she sink, she is counted innocent; if she float, and sink not, she is taken for a witch. It was inferred that Satan, being light, or having a small specific gravity, sustains them in the fluid. The witch-pool, and the witch-lake, are accordingly still pointed out in various parts of North Britain.

present itself to the reader of these "Darker Superstitions" is, that the persons employed in the several processes of conviction and punishment were sincere. They believed in the crime, dreaded the numerous evils which resulted from it, and, of course, saw their duty in checking its increase throughout the land. In this eagerness of detection the clergy acted a principal part, and even, on some occasions, allowed their zeal to outstrip both humanity and prudence. In 1607, a commission to seize and try certain persons was "Though privation of sleep be described as the refused by the privy council, "considering," to choicest means they use in Scotland for the discovery of use their own words, "the many inconveniences witches,' it was not restricted to them only; for after and the exceeding great slander which had arisen other expedients for detecting a conspiracy had failed to by the bypast trial of witches, by ministers who obtain confession, the commander of the forces was en- carried professed sorcerers with them to the parish joined to employ the most trusty officers and soldiers to kirks, and made them judges of the honesty or watch Mr. William Spence, by turns, and not to suffer guiltiness of men and women, undefamed before, him to sleep by night or by day, and for that end, to use and who were brought in question of their honesty, all effectual means for keeping him still awake.' An-life, and geir (goods), and made to be convicted other was withholden from sleep to the great perturba- and punished to the death." Through the credution of his brayne.' By means of torture, picking, watching, and keeping several women from sleep, James Gility of the minister of Glasgow, it is added, divers lespie, minister of Rind, and some coadjutors, were innocent women suffered, from one venturing to charged with having obtained false confessions, whereon affirm that all the proselytes of Satan had a certhe innocent had suffered death. Several also, under a tain mark in the eye whereby she could discover guard of drunken fellows at Pittenweem, were kept days whether they were witches or not. Imbecility of and nights awake, which cruel usage made some of them judgment, and love of dominion, promoted perseto be so wise as to acknowledge every question that was cution. The kirk-session, "tyrannical in arroasked of them, whereby they found the minister and gance," as Mr. Dalyell expresses it, employed baillies well pleased, and themselves better treated. One spies to ferret out the history, life, and manners was kept five days and nights awake by continual prick- of each individual. Some of their number, who ing, to the great effusion of her blood; and this kind of torture is alleged to have been protracted even to nine got the name of searchers, made an inroad into nights."—" Humanity and justice were outraged in the private dwellings on Sunday; or, without warncombinations of torture inflicted on the miserable objects of suspicion. Aleson Balfour, in Orkney, confessed certain allegations of witchcraft, but only be vehement tortour of the caschielawes, quharin she was kepit by the space of forty-eight hours:' nor did it come of her own sufferings only, for her aged husband, her eldest son, and daughter, were all in her presence put in tortour' at the same instant time, the fader being in the lang irnes of fiftie stone weight; the son driven into the boots with fifty-sev 7-seven strokes; and the daughter, being seven years old, put in the pinnywinks, to the effect that being In such proceedings we detect ignorance, inso tormented beside her, might move her to make any temperate zeal, narrow-mindedness, and the most confession for their relief. When condemned and led intolerable despotism; but in the darker superstito execution upon the heading-hill of Kirkwall, in 1594, this unhappy person declared herself as innocent, and tions of Ireland we may perceive something more would die as innocent of any point of witchcraft as a -even fraud combined with credulity. About bairne unborn.' Yet this was not enough to the tormen- ten years ago various miraculous cures were said tors, for, on the parson of Orphir asking whether she to have been effected in that country, through the would abide by her first confession, she returned the fol- intercession of Prince Hohenloe, and were vouched lowing impressive explanation: that she was then tor-by the highest ecclesiastical authority in the land. tourit divers and several times in the caschielawes, and The most remarkable of these is reported to have sundry thymes taken out of them dead, and out of all taken place in the convent of Ranelagh, in the remembrance either of good or evill; as lykewayis her immediate vicinity of Dublin, and on the person good-man being in the stokis, her son tortourit in the of Miss Mary Stuart, a member of that establishbuitis, and her daughter put in the pinnywinkies, quhairwith she and they wer so vexed and tormentit, that pairt-of Ireland, recognised the miracle; and in a pasDr. Murray, the Roman Catholic primate ly to eschew a greater punishment and torment, and upon promise of her life and guid deidis by the said toral address, published immediately afterwards, parson, she falsely against her soul and conscience made remarks, that the "voice of these facts, issuing that confession, and no other wayis; for the quhilk she from the bosom of his sanctuary, and publishing asked the Lord mercy and forgiveness,' and then patient- the glory of God with the loudness of thunder, ly submitted to her fate. Can a scene of greater atrocity may strike upon the ears and hearts of many to be pictured! The torture of those most dear to the whom the voice of our ministry could not reach." spouse and the mother before her; a clergyman violating Then he proceeds to the facts in the following all sanctity and morality, endeavouring, under treacher-terms: ous pledges, to elicit the confession of impossibilities.” "Mary Stuart, of the convent of St. Joseph, Ranelagh, The only alleviating consideration which can has, through the extraordinary interposition of that Om

ing, broke open any door, under cloud of night, during the week. They imposed fines, and inflicted exile; the prisons were filled with delinquents, and the places of public repentance were crowded to such a degree that they could receive no more penitents. On one occasion, the kirksession of Holyroodhouse threatened to drown a woman, suspected as the parent of an illegitimate child, if she ever again appeared within the bounds of their jurisdiction.

ment.

nipotent Being who killeth and maketh alive, been re- of them would amply justify; and yet, coupling stored instantaneously to health, from a state of grievous them with the obvious import of the medical and hopeless infirmity, for the relief of which all the re-certificates issued on the occasion, we would sources of human skill had been expended in vain. The assert not only that there was no miracle in Miss account of this wonderful case reached us officially on Stuart's partial recovery, but that every man of the 2d instant, in a letter from Mrs. Mary Catherine common sense must have been aware, that the Meade, prioress of St. Joseph's convent, under date of the preceding evening. This communication stated in change produced upon her nervous condition by substance that one of the religious sisters of that commu- the exciting ceremony in which she had been ennity had been afflicted with sickness for four years and gaged, was strictly within the bounds of nature. about seven months; that during that period she had She had, it is true, been long an ailing person, frequent attacks of paralysis, each of which seemed to and subject to "various nervous affections of an threaten her with immediate dissolution; that the most anomalous kind;" but she was, we maintain, on powerful remedies had been applied without producing that very account the more likely to be roused to any other than partial and temporary relief; that for a temporary vigour of body by a stirring action on several months past she had been confined to bed, wholly her mind. It is generally known that, of the deprived of the power of assisting herself, or of moving numbers who came to St. Fillan's well-a celeout of the position in which she was laid; that when brated fountain mentioned by our author-some moved by her attendants, how gently soever, she not returned every year either completely cured or only suffered much pain, but was also liable to considerable danger and to the temporary loss of speech; and very much relieved. The effect of the water, the that for the last five weeks she had entirely lost the vigils, and the excitement, however, in this case, power of articulation; that up to the morning of the first as in Miss Stuart's, was exclusively confined to instant she continued in this deplorable state, without those whose nerves were diseased, and who, like any symptom of amendment, and apparently beyond the her, were "subject to stagnations." Other holy reach of human aid—that on a certain hour that morn- streams and consecrated buildings were regularly ing, as had been settled by previous arrangement, she frequented at the proper festivals by individuals united her devotions (as did also her numerous friends) who suffered under such affections; and the success, with the holy sacrifice of the mass, which was to be it is well known, was so great, and the confidence offered by Alexander, Prince Hohenloe, in the hope of of the ignorant people so strong, that the presbyobtaining immediately from God that relief which no terian ministers found it necessary to take down human means could afford-that with this view she re- the old walls, to lock doors, and to cover up the ceived, though with much difficulty, the divine communion at the mass which was celebrated at the same hour crystal current from the approach of the superin her chamber for her recovery-that mass being ended and no cure yet effected, she was in the act of resigning herself with perfect submission to the will of God, when instantly she felt a power of movement and a capability of speech-that she exclaimed with an animated voice, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts! raised herself without assistance to offer on bended knees the tribute of her gratitude to heaven; called for her attire, left that bed to which she had been for so many months as it were fastened, walked to the convent chapel with a firm step, and there, in presence of the community and congregation, joined her religious sisters in the solemn thanksgiving which was offered up to God for this wonderful and manifest interposition of his goodness."

These facts were laid by the archbishop before the Roman catholic priesthood and laity of Dublin, and pronounced by him as constituting a miracle of the most positive and regular description. To establish his testimony he subjoins certificates from several medical gentlemen, with affidavits from five religieuses of the convent, and two clergymen who officiated on the occasion. As might be expected, a deep and solemn impression was produced on the multitude; and every exertion was made to extend and confirm it. Dr. Murray's letter was widely circulated: it was hawked about at the cheapest rate, and in such shapes as to catch the vulgar attention. At last, the convent itself was thrown open, that all who chose might hear from Mary Stuart's own lips, the detail of her complicated sufferings, succeeded by the account of her miraculous restoration to health, and concluded by the ardent attestations of her religious sisters.

Now, we are willing to take the facts as they are recorded, without subjecting them to that minute examination which the use that was made

stitious.

She

But, in point of fact, the cure of Miss Stuart was not complete. She had, indeed, recovered in some measure the use of her limbs; and the symptoms of the principal disease with which she was afflicted were to a certain extent mitigated, after the moving scene of the first of August. Still, so far from walking with a firm step, as the archbishop was taught to say, she moved like a person whose legs were weak and feet sore. passed from one side of the room to the other with an evident effort and an unsteady pace-like a patient, in short, who was enjoying a brief respite from a chronic rheumatism. Three medical men were desired to visit her on the fourth of August, three days after the supposed miracle, to examine into the state of her health, and they report that she assured them "she was without complaint." She added that she had not walked in the grounds of the convent owing to a degree of weakness in her limbs, of which, however, she appeared to have the free use. They found her pulse at 120, a clear proof that the prayers of Prince Hohenloe had been blessed with but a very partial success: and of four issues which had been long established, three might be considered as healed, being without dressings, though the one "in the left arm was open and freely discharging, having made no progress in healing." One of the physicians was afterwards required to give a categorical answer to two questions put to him by a clergyman on this interesting matter. He replies

"I felt it necessary to see Mr. Mills and Mr. M'Namara before I could answer your letter of the 20th. Considering that the friends of Mrs. Stuart might not think it expedient to publish our certificates relative to the state

after having eaten heartily and unsuspiciously, retired to rest. "But (adds the chronicler) the Abbot of Kenloss, ruminating on I know not what psalms and prayers, beheld the blackest Ethiopian, with a horrible visage, enter by a shut window, and survey, with evident satisfaction, the bed of every guest, though chiefly interested in the cook, whom he seemed desirous of embracing." The abbot, however, on his approach, fortified himself with the sign of the cross, and awaited the issue in silence. Viewing him sternly, but daring to come no nearer, the visiter vanished like smoke through the shut window.

private communication from the prioress of St. great distance, and in changes of apparel like her Joseph, which bears many unambiguous marks of own. This she believed, as it proved in fact to sincerity and cordial belief; and although the be, a presage of her dissolution. A young woman miracle performed on Miss Stuart was extremely of Lewis constantly beheld the back of her own incomplete, leaving her with weak limbs, her pulse image upon going into the open air. Aubrey at 120, and an issue in her arm in full discharge speaks of a daughter of the Earl of Holland meetwithout any appearance of healing, there is no ing her apparition in Kensington Garden; and of doubt that the head of the convent perceived in another who saw herself for a quarter of an hour the partial improvement which had taken place, a at a time; but she was not the only spectator of direct interposition of the hand of Providence. the phantom. Fordun, one of the Scotish histoBut, returning to the work more immediately rians, relates that Ralph, Abbot of Kinloss, acbefore us, we may remark that a large class of companied several other dignitaries to a chapter superstitions fall under the head of spectral illu- of the Cistertian order, held in 1214. At the apsions-those morbid impressions which arise from pointed place of convocation, the cook, unable to a disordered state of the blood or secretory vessels. serve up the usual meal of fish, with greater zeal Such phenomena were no less familiar to the an- than prudence substituted a quantity of flesh, from cients than they are to modern physicians, though which, collecting the boiling fat as it rose, he the cause had not been so clearly ascertained. resolved to call it butter, and without further cereHippocrates speaks of those who thought them-mony mixed it with the abbot's porridge. All, selves infested by demons; and he assigns reasons why-this being more incident to females-many of them in his time devoted offerings, even their richest apparel, to Diana for relief. Plato too observes that it was common, for women especially, and those who were imbecile, to be terrified by spectres; and when awake, recollecting the visions of their dreams, to vow statues and sacrifices, and to fill the streets and houses with altars and temples, in order to be free from such frightful visitations. But the spectres which occasion the greatest alarm, and which so long puzzled the ingenuity of physiologists, are those which present themselves to the waking eye, and at times when there is no consciousness of disease. For example, there was a quarrel between Janet Cook and John Richardson, "and immediatelie the said John did take sicknes so that he died, and all the two last days before he died he said that Janet Cook was there in his sight, howbeit the folkis in the house could not see her." Again; "James Douglas's horse fell under him. On recovering himself, though not much the worse, he seeth lively, to his appearance, Janet Coke sitting by him. He recommended himself to God, and went on his journey that night he took a high and sudden fit of sickness, which continued till his death; and about eleven hours at night the great fit always came upon him; and the same James being very tractable, said, before his death, that the said Janet was often standing at the bedfoot-the Lord forgive my friends if they do not cause to burn Jennet Coke, for she is the cause of my death.'"

|

All our readers will recollect the visit paid to Lady Beresford, a few years ago, by the ghost of Lord Tyrone. Her ladyship is said to have been a woman of very bad principles, and accordingly, to clear up her doubts with regard to a future existence, she had entered into a compact with the said baron, binding the one who should die first to appear as soon as possible to the other. Lady Beresford, it is added, expressed great doubts as to the reality of the apparition, even after the punctual lord had actually fulfilled his promise; in consequence of which scepticism he found it necessary, next visit, to mark her wrist, and to turn up the curtains of the bed in a most supernatural manner, that he might give her the most satisfactory proofs of his having really returned to the upper regions. She related the story next day to her husband, and shortly after a letter arrived announcing the death of Lord Tyrone. ( This anecdote requires no observations, and the mind of the public at the time soon satisfied itself In the same way Susanna Baylie, a penitent as to the real state of the fact. Lord Tyrone was and confessing witch, confronting another, ex-known to be dying, and Lady Beresford, half claimed, "thou fiery Lucifer, confess thy fault, for thou art worthy of death; because, upon a night about sixteen years since, you, having a pique at me, came into my house at midnight, the doors and the windows being shut, while I was asleep in bed with my husband and child; and you put your hands on my throat, and thought to have worried me." A learned, wealthy, and respectable citizen of Cologne, acquainted Nider A useful book might be written on the conthat, during a dangerous malady, he "conceived, nection between certain morbid conditions of the in viewing himself on all sides, that he was two body and the apparition of those numerous phanmen." In Okye, a woman repeatedly beheld an-toms which are known to harass plethoric persons. other resembling herself, walking solitary, at no Dr. Ferriar, who has treated this subject with

asleep, half awake, and probably a little uneasy in her imagination about the promised visit, would very naturally dream of spectres; and the mark on her wrist, if not occasioned by an over-tight bracelet, might have been produced by her coming in contact with some part of the bed during the agitation consequent upon the supposed interview with her departed friend.

great research and ingenuity, has by no means | tance of about a hundred yards. No sooner had exhausted it; and a still larger collection of cases, the first body, which seemed to consist of several well authenticated and properly explained, could hundreds, and extended four deep over an enclonot fail to be of the utmost service both to the sure of thirty acres, attained the hill, than anmedical student and to the valetudinarian. It is other assemblage of men, far more numerous than related of a celebrated literary character, that as the former, dressed in dark coloured clothes, arose he was sitting in his study, a room with which and marched, without any apparent hostility, after the passage which led to the kitchen communi- the military spectres: at the top of the hill both cated, he was interrupted in his studies by a little of the parties formed what the spectators called old woman, who had on her arm a basket of pro-an L, and passing down the opposite side, disapvisions. He requested the good old dame to step peared. At this moment a volume of smoke, apinto the kitchen, to which, he supposed, she had parently like that vomited by a park of artillery, mistaken her way; and in order that he might not spread over the plain, and was so impervious as be further disturbed by her, he opened the door for nearly two minutes to hide the cattle from the and showed her which direction she was to take. view of Turner and Jackson, who hurried home After he had returned to his desk he fancied him- with all possible expedition; and the effect upon self again assailed by the little old woman. He their minds, says the narrator, even at this disexpostulated with her, and once more pointed out tance of time, is so strong that they cannot menthe way to the kitchen; but after he had a second tion the circumstance without visible emotion. It time returned to his labours, he again found the ought to be remarked, in passing, that the accounts old woman at his elbow. He instantly conceived of this wonderful sight given by the two spectahis real situation, rung his bell, and sent for a tors, agreed precisely in the main points, differing surgeon; and it was not until he had been co- only as to the length of time during which the piously bled that he was set free from the visits military array continued in view, and as to a part of the stranger. The surgeon informed him that of the armour glistening in the sun. The younger his blood was in such a state, that, had he not person thought the phenomenon did not last longer been bled, he would have undoubtedly sustained than five minutes; the elder imagined that it could an attack of apoplexy, which in all probability not be less than a quarter of an hour. Jackson would have carried him off. declares that during the whole time it occupied their attention, "they were making to each other such remarks as arose out of the spectacle."

The case of M. Nicolai, a bookseller in Berlin, is still more striking; for he was annoyed by phantoms during several months in succession, all As similar appearances are said to have been which time he was in a state of perfect sanity, witnessed at various times in different parts of and quite aware that this strange phenomenon ori- the country, and as armies of mist and fog are ginated in the distempered condition of his nervous frequently seen by the solitary inhabitants of system. But by persevering in the use of medi-North America, Greenland, and the highlands of cine and phlebotomy, he compelled the spectres Scotland, it may be proper to observe, once for all, to take a final leave of him; and we have no doubt that they have been satisfactorily explained on that in many similar cases the mental eye will the common principles of optics, combined with be most successfully purged by cooling draughts, certain conditions as to the angle of the solar rays copious bleeding, and gentle cathartics. Leaving, and atmospherical refraction. The Spectre of the however, these grotesque creations of the "mind Brocken, the Fata Morgana in the Straits of diseased," we proceed to mention a few particu- Reggio, and the thousand visual deceptions relars connected with a physical apparition, which, corded by travellers in Africa, are all to be rein the year 1812, occasioned no small perturbation ferred to the physical circumstances now menin the northern counties of England, as being intioned. A phenomena analogous to that now some degree coincident with the greatest prepara- described is to be found in Adair's Travels in tions ever made by Buonaparte for a military en- North America. After contemplating the general terprise. On Sunday evening, the 26th of June, grandeur and sublimity of the fall at Niagara, he and between seven and eight o'clock, Anthony and his companions were drawn to admire the Jackson, farmer, aged forty-five, and Martin Tur-variety of shapes which the superincumbent vaner, the son of William Turner, farmer, aged fif- pour assumed beneath the impulse of the wind. teen years, while engaged in inspecting their cat-"Sometimes," says he, "it was driven with viotle, grazing in Havaral Park, near Pepley, part of lence against the rocky mountain to the north, the estate of Sir John Ingleby, Bart., were sud- and being broken by its projecting rugosities, it denly surprised by a most extraordinary appear-ascended, but with great rapidity, like an army ance in the Park. Turner, whose attention was climbing to the storm of some citadel on the sumfirst drawn to this spectacle, said, "Look, An- mit. We thought, as it shone in the setting sun, thony, what a quantity of beasts!" "Beasts!" cried Anthony, Lord bless us! they are not beasts, they are men!" By this time the body was in motion, and the spectators discovered that it was an army of soldiers, dressed in a white military uniform, and that in the centre stood a personage of a commanding aspect, clothed in scarlet. After performing a number of evolutions, the body began to march in perfect order to the summit of a hill, passing the spectators at a disVOL. XXVI. JAN. 1835.-4

that we could perceive the glittering of armour, and in the prismatic colours we fancied to ourselves the military uniform of our countrymen.” It has, accordingly, been imagined that the army seen by Jackson and Turner consisted of an exhalation, or rather, a sudden escape of vapour from the ground, carried gently along near the surface by a current of wind, and reflecting from its various portions, more or less condensed, the several colours of the rainbow; which would at

B