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A REMARKABLE STORY VOUCHED

ing on a single example. Animals may not have the gift of presentiment; but I think there is sufficient proof that they have spiritual perceptions. In a former work I have, inci dentally, brought up some evidence of this; and I esteem my self fortunate in being able here to present, from an accredited medical source, one of the best-attested and most circumstantially related incidents in proof, that I ever remember to have seen. It is the more valuable because medical writers as a class-like other scientific men-are ever reluctant to admit anything that savors of the supernatural.

The story appeared, three years before the advent of Spiritualism in America, in one of the best-known Medical Journals of Scotland. It occurs in a review of a work on Sleep, then just published. The reviewer touches on the subject of apparitions and, after noticing several cases which he thinks of easy solution, thus proceeds:

“The following case, however, is one of those very rare ones, whose explanation baffles the philosophic inquirer. It is, indeed, almost the only authentic one to which we could refer ; and, as it occurred to a particular friend and every circumstance was minutely inquired into at the time, the narrative is as authentic as such things can be. It may add to the interest of this case to state that it was communicated several years ago to Mr. Hibbert, after the publication of his work on apparitions, when he confessed that he could not explain it in the same philosophic way in which he had been able to account for all others, and that it appeared to him more nearly to approach the supernatural."

The story, thus strongly vouched for, is then given by the reviewer, as follows, the title only added by me:

THE DOG IN THE WOLFRIDGE WOOD.

"F. M. Swas passing through the Wolfridge wood at Alverston, one night at twelve o'clock. He was accompanied * Footfalls, pp. 217, 231, 398, 446, 448.

FOR BY A MEDICAL JOURNAL.

307

by his dog, of a breed between the Newfoundland and mastiff; a powerful animal, who feared neither man nor beast. He had a fowling-piece and a pair of pistols loaded, besides his sword; for he belonged to the Military School there and had been out for a day's shooting.

“The road ran centrally through the wood; and very nearly in the centre of the wood, at a part somewhat more open than the rest, there was a cross erected to point out the spot where a gamekeeper had been murdered. The place had the reputation of being haunted, and the ghost, it was said, had been repeatedly seen. S- had frequently before passed this cross in the wood without seeing anything, and treated the story of the ghost so lightly that he had, on more occasions than one, for a bet, gone there at midnight and returned without meeting anything except an occasional gamekeeper or poacher.

“This night, when he approached the open space in the wood, he thought he perceived, at the other end of that space, the form of a man, more indistinct, however, than usual. He called his dog to his side (for previously it had been ranging about, barking furiously and giving chase to the game it started), patted it on the head to make it keep a sharp look-out, and cocked his gun. The dog, on this, was all impatience. S challenged the figure, but no answer was returned. Suspecting it was a poacher and prepared for an encounter, he directed the dog's attention to the appearance, and the animal answered by growling. He then kept his eyes steadily fixed on the figure; when, instantaneously it glided within arm's length of him. Still he looked steadily in its face while it kept its eyes on his. It had approached him without noise or rustling. The face was ill-defined, but distinctly visible. He could not turn his eyes from those of this apparition; they fascinated him, as it were, to the spot; he had no power in his frame. He felt no fear of bodily injury, only a certain indescribable sense of awe. So fascinated were his eyes by those of the figure, that he did not observe its dress, nor even its form. It looked calmly and with a mild aspect, for a space of time which he does not

308

A DOG ENTRANCED.

think exceeded half a minute; then suddenly became invisi ble. The forın had flitted before him about five minutes altogether.

"The dog which before this was furious and growling, now stood crouched at his feet as if in a trance--his jaw fallen, his limbs quivering, and his whole frame agitated and covered with a cold sweat. After the form disappeared, S touched

the animal, then spoke to it without its seeming to recognize him; and it was some time before it appeared to recover its senses. The whole way home, it never moved from his side. but kept close to his feet; nor, on their way home, did it run after game, or take notice if game started near it.

"It was a fortnight before it recovered from the fright; and it was never afterward the same lively animal. No consideration could ever again induce that dog to enter the wood after nightfall, nor would it allow any of the family to enter it. When it was forced to pass by the open spot in daylight, it would only do so with its master, and it always exhibited signs of fear, trembling all the time and walking silently by his side. "Shas frequently since passed this spot in the wood at the midnight hour, but has never again seen the figure. fore this occurrence he had always treated with ridicule any stories about ghosts or spirits; now, he firmly believes in both."

Be

The reviewer does not hesitate to express the opinion that the appearance witnessed by his friend was the result of supernatural agency.*

*

* Edinburgh Medical and Surgical Journal for 1845; vol. lxiv. pp. 186-7.

The reviewer's remarks are as follows:

"This is almost the only recorded case known to us where the evidence is so strong, as to leave no other impression on the mind but that it was the appearance of some supernatural agency, and, after having in vain endeavored to explain it on any other supposition, we found ourselves forced to conclude, with Hamlet, that 'there are more things in heaven and carth than are dreamed of in our philosophy."

A SCEPTIC CONVERTED.

309

This, published in a Medical Journal of old standing and established reputation, three years before the term Spiritualism in its modern acceptation had been heard of—is certainly a very remarkable admission.

The incident here related caused a complete revolution of opinion in the witness. From being an entire sceptic in apparitions and in spirits, he became, through the evidence of his senses, a believer in both. But to have faith in spirits and their appearance is to have faith in the reality of another life.

Could he, rationally, withhold belief? Is not one such incident, unmistakably evidenced, as complete proof of a future phase of existence as a hundred? And even if S had been willing, as some men have been, to give the lie to his own senses, rather than believe that the denizens of the next world sometimes return to this, was there not a dumb witness remaining to bear testimony, by his changed character and unconquerable terrors, against such stiff-necked and illogical unbelief?

CHAPTER III.

UNIVERSALITY OF SPIRITUAL, MANIFESTATIONS.

'Miracles cease when men cease to believe and to expect them.”. LECKY.*

THIS is what is usually called a rationalistic, but it is not a rational, view of miracles.

A portion of the alleged events which go currently under the name of miracles undoubtedly do not happen. But a larger portion do. Unfounded belief may cause us to imagine the former. The latter are not dependent upon our thought of them—be it credulous or incredulous for their appearance or non-appearance.

What the world has been wont to term miracles, cease to be regarded as such when they are critically examined: that is true. But it is not true that phenomena similar to what theologians usually call the miracles of the New Testament cease, when we no longer have faith in them, or when we cease to look for their coming. It is not true, as to certain manifestations occurring through spiritual agency, and governed by intermundane laws, that these are the shadowy offspring of credulity, and that they disappear, like mist of the morning, when the Sun of Reason shines out.

* European Morals, vol. i. p. 373: (Amer. Ed.)

+ Hard-set unbelief may, now and then, by some law of mental science as yet imperfectly understood, arrest a certain class of spiritual phenomena, and so deprive a dogmatic sceptic of a chance to witnesI them: just as the contempt of Jesus' own countrymen diminished his spiritual power while among them (Mark vi. 5). But this is the exception only; as many of the narratives in this volume sufficiently show.