192 



NOTES AND QUEEIES. 



[2°d s. X. Sept. 8, '60, 



rience reminds U8 of many practical contradictions of each 

 of them. We are not aware of any separate publication 

 of the " vulgar errors " in law ; but we believe many of 

 them will be fonud in Brown's colleetion.1 



30itplleS. 



GHOST IN THE TOWER. 

 (2'"> S. X. 145.) 



I have often purposed to leave behind me a 

 faithful record of all that I personally know of 

 this strange story ; and K. B.'s inquiry now puts 

 me upon consigning it to the general repertory of 

 " N. & Q." Forty-three years have passed, and 

 its impression is as vividly before me as on the 

 moment of its occurrence. Anecdotage, said 

 Wilkes, is an old man's dotage, and at eighty- 

 three I may be suspected of lapsing into omissions 

 or exaggerations ; but there are yet survivors who 

 can testify that I have not at any time either am- 

 plified or abridged my ghostly experiences. 



In 1814 I was appointed Keeper of the Crown 

 Jewels in the Tower, where I resided with my fa- 

 mily till my retirement in 1852. One Saturday 

 night in October, 1817, about "the witching 

 hour," I was at supper with my then wife, our 

 little boy, and her sister, in the sitting-room of 

 the Jewel House, which — then comparatively mo- 

 dernised — is said to have been the "doleful pri-' 

 son " of Anna Boleyn, and of the ten bisliops 

 whom Oliver Cromwell piously accommodated 

 therein. For an accurate picture of the locus in 

 quo my scene is laid, I refer to George Cruik- 

 shank's wood-cut in p. 384. of Ainsworth's Tower 

 of London; and I am persuaded that my gallant 

 successor in office, Colonel Wyndham, will not re- 

 fuse its collation with my statement. 



The room was — as it still is — irregularly shaped, 

 having three doors and two windows, which last 

 are cut nearly nine feet deep into the outer wall ; 

 between these is a chimney-piece projecting far 

 into the room, and (then) surmounted with a 

 .large oil picture. On the night in question, the 

 doors were all closed, heavy and dark cloth cur- 

 tains were let down over the windows, and the 

 only light in the room was that of two candles on 

 the table. I sate at the foot of the table, my son 

 on my right hand, his mother fronting the chim- 

 ney-piece, and her sister on the opposite side. I 

 had offered a glass of wine and water to my wife, 

 when, on putting it to her lips, she paused, and 

 exclaimed, " Good God ! what is that ? " I looked 

 up, and saw a cylindrical figure, like a glass tube, 

 seemingly about the thickness of my arm, and 

 hovering between the ceiling and the table : its 

 contents appeared to be a dense fluid, white and 

 pale azure, like to the gathering of a summer 

 cloud, and incessantly rolling and mingling within 

 the cylinder. Thisjasted about two minutes ; when 



it began slowly to move before my sister-in-law; 

 then, following the oblong shape of the table, 

 before my son and myself; passing JeAmrf my wife, 

 it paused for a moment over her ri<»ht shoulder 

 [observe, there was no mirror opposite to her in 

 which she could then behold it]. Instantly she 

 crouched down, and with both hands covering her 

 shoulder, she shrieked out, " Oh, Christ ! it has 

 seized me ! " Even now, while writing, I feel the 

 fresh horror of that moment. I caught up my 

 chair, struck at the wainscot behind her, rushed 

 up stairs to the other children's room, and told the 

 terrified nurse what I had seen. Meanwhile, the 

 other domestics had hurried into the parlour, 

 where their mistress recounted to them the scene, 

 even as I was detailing it above stairs. 



The marvel — some will say the absurdity — of 

 all this is enhanced by the fact that neither my 

 sister-in-law nor my son beheld this " appearance," — 

 as K. B. rightly terms it, — though to their mortal 

 vision it was as " apparent " as to my wife's and 

 mine. When I the next morning related the night's 

 horrors to our chaplain, after the service in the 

 Tower church, he asked me, might not one per- 

 son have his natural senses deceived ? And if one, 

 why might not two f My answer was, if two, why not 

 two thousand ? an argument which would reduce 

 history, secular or sacred, to a fable. But why 

 should I here discuss things not dreamed of in our 

 philosophy ? 



I am bound to add, that, shortly before this 

 strange event, some young lady-residents in the 

 Tower had been, I know not wherefore, suspected 

 of making phantasmagorial experiments at their 

 windows, which, be it observed, had no command 

 whatever on any windows in my dwelling. An 

 additional sentry was accordingly posted, so as to 

 overlook any such attempt. 



Happen, however, as it might, following hard at 

 heel the visitation of my household, one of the 

 night sentries at the Jewel Office was, as he said, 

 alarmed by a figure like a huge bear issuing from 

 underneath the door; he thrust at it with his 

 bayonet, which stuck in the door, even as my chair 

 dinted the wainscot ; he dropped in a fit, and was 

 carried senseless to the guard-room. His fellow- 

 sentry declared that the man was neither asleep 

 nor drunk, he himself having seen him the moment 

 before awake and sober. Of all this, I avouch no- 

 thing more than tliat I saw the poor man in the 

 guard-house prostrated with terror, and that in 

 two or three days the " fatal result," be it of fact 

 or of fancy, was — that he died. 



My story may claim more space than "H,& Q." 

 can afford : desiring to be circumstantial, I have 

 been diffuse. This I leave to the Editor's discre- 

 tion : let it only be understood, that to all which 

 I have herein set forth as seen by myself I abso- 

 lutely pledge my faith and my honour. 



Edmund Lenthal Swifte. 



