ANOTHER GHOST.

In the August number of this magazine a narrative is given of a ghostly appearance which haunted a house in a seaside town. The writer states that she was not an actor in its scenes, nor was it related to her by one who was. Having more than once heard the story from the lips of the principal witness of the events, Mrs. M—— of Newport, I can confirm the correctness of the narrative, in the main. Some of the particulars, however, having been altered in the transmission, I will give my version, to the best of my remembrance.

When Mrs. M—— hired the house, which had been for some time vacant, she found it difficult to procure or keep servants. This in itself is not uncommon, but in this case there was something more. The servants complained of being disturbed at night by a woman who walked the chambers with a white hood upon her head—not a sun-bonnet, as I am glad to state, which is certainly a more commonplace head-dress. Some of the neighbors were also asking from time to time who that woman was who sat at the upper hall window in a white hood. It could not have been a little boy who was disturbed by the strange woman, for Mrs. M—— had no son, but one of the daughters when sitting in the upper hall on a hot evening, and making the remark that it was very warm, heard the reply from out of the darkness, "I am so cold!"

As in Mrs. Hooper's version, the dénoûment was brought about by the aid of a clergyman. Men of this profession have always been considered the most efficient guardians against the powers of darkness. He, with the help of Mrs. M——, made the excavation in the cellar which brought to light the half-consumed skeleton. Here, unfortunately, is a gap in the evidence. The remains were pronounced by medical authority to be human, but was that authority reliable? was that doctor skilled in comparative anatomy? If not, the bones might have been those of a sheep, buried perchance in the cellar by a provident dog.

The house still stands, or did recently, in Washington street. The builder was a sea-captain returning after a long absence with plenty of money, supposed by the townspeople to have been  acquired in the slave-trade or by piracy. There was also a young woman, house-keeper to this Captain Kidd, who disappeared about the time that he did himself.

Mrs. M—— was fond of narrating this story, and, having a pretty talent that way, she had versified it; though I am bound to say that in plain prose it was much more effective. She was an Englishwoman, had seen much of the world, and was a person of considerable reading and cultivation. She had moral and physical courage in an uncommon degree, and was thoroughly reliable, so that this story is to me as well authenticated as one can well be at second hand.

I have another incident of the same shadowy and quasi-supernatural kind to relate, which took place in the same street of that town, formerly much affected by ghosts and other supernatural appearances. I say formerly, for what spirit, however perturbed, could revisit the glimpses of the moon in a modern villa, or abide long within the sound of the steam-whistle?

Some years ago I was living in Newport in an old-fashioned house, also built by a retired sea-captain in the early part of the century, but, unlike the other, there were no tales of terror connected with it that I ever heard of. At 1 p.m. on a winter's day, in the midst of a furious snow-storm, as we sat at dinner, we heard a commotion in the kitchen. Instead of the expected joint, enter a pallid woman: "Oh, please come out and see Martha!" The lady of the house hastened to the kitchen, and found Martha, the cook, almost fainting upon a chair. "What is the matter?" As soon as she could speak she gasped out, "Oh, that face at the window!" The window of the kitchen looked out upon the garden, which had a high fence all around it. I at once ran out to see if any person was there: the ground was covered with a pure and untrodden surface of snow six or eight inches deep. This was rather startling, when inside the window a woman was fainting at the sight of some fearful appearance on the outside. I looked out on the street, which ran alongside the garden fence, and which was not much of a thoroughfare. There were no tracks to be seen in the snow. No human foot had lately been in the garden.

When the woman came to herself, she said that, suddenly looking up, she saw a female face with an agonized expression looking in at her from the window. On being asked if it was any one whom she knew, she replied that the face seemed familiar, but that she could not recall the name that belonged to it. After reflection she said that it looked like a daughter of hers whom she had not seen since she was a child. The girl had been brought up by a lady in another State, and was now a married woman, living in Vermont.

About a week afterward, Martha received a letter from the lady who had brought up her daughter, informing her that the young woman had recently died after a short illness, and that her great anxiety seemed to be to see her mother before she died. Some time after I wrote to the town indicated to ascertain the exact time of the young woman's death. The husband had moved away immediately after the funeral, but the town clerk replied that a person of the name mentioned had died there about the time mentioned in my letter. Here came the fatal gap in the evidence, which always seems to prevent the chain being perfect. If I could have obtained a certificate of the death having occurred on the day of the snow-storm, I should have found myself nearer to a ghost than I ever expect to be again till I become one myself.

S.C. CLARKE.