33S BELIEF IN GHOSTS. 



Whether I believe in ghosts or not, it is unneces- 

 sary here to state, but I will say that I have never 

 yet seen one, although nurtured and brought up in 

 a country where they were stated to be particularly 

 numerous. But although I have never been inter- 

 viewed by one of these visitors from the spirit world, 

 I will be honest enough to acknowledge that I have 

 listened to the narratives about them of my seniors 

 with awe, that I have felt my hair rise almost 

 perpendicular upon my head, and my pulse become 

 slow and interrupted, while a clammy damp gathered 

 on my hands and brow. 



As I sat devouring what had been seen and 

 might be witnessed at the corner of a lonely lane, 

 or by the rock where deeply eddied the dark waters 

 of some silent river, or where the road was closely 

 shadowed from the light of moon and sun by 

 intertwining branches of elm and beech, I have 

 emphatically thanked fortune that, by such places I 

 had not to pass on my way homeward on blustering 

 dark nights. 



If I may be permitted to express an opinion 

 upon a subject on which I am not an authority, I 

 would say that ghosts did well and wisely to seek 

 the silent veldts, the rocky kloofs, the darkling 

 forests, and the rugged and cavernous mountain 

 sides of the southern portion of the African conti 

 nent for a habitat and resting place. 



In canny Scotland, some terrible deed of violence, 



