March 1, 1888.] 



♦ > KNOWLEDGE ♦ 



101 



(in the fourth of the poems — some undoubtedly not by 

 Shakespeare, but this one certainly from his pen — included 

 under the strange heading " The Passionate Pilgrim "l ; and 

 again — 



Aarun, Here's a young lad, fram'd of another leer, 



with CeHa's, " he hath a Rosalind of a better leer than you." 

 "Titus Androniciis " is well worth .studying for the 

 many truly Shakespe;irean Ijeauties it contains, if only one 

 can overcome the sense of disgust which several scenes in 

 the play tend to inspire. Once recognised as in the main 

 Shakespeare's work, it is suggestive as to his character in 

 youth, and as to the development of his poetic and dramatic 

 instincts. Apart from direct suggestions of this sort, there 

 is something singularly suggestive of Shakespeare's modesty 

 at this part of his career, in his adhesion for the time to 

 the older tragic style, which even then he must have 

 recognised as distasteful, if not repulsive. 



HAVE GHOSTS BEEN SEEN? 



EW subjects tax more stringently what may 

 be called the scientific conscience than the 

 matter of apparitions. 



The student of science recognises two 

 clear duties in all scientific inquiries. In 

 the first place, he must strive to see things 

 as they are ; and in the second, he must 

 speak of them as he sees them. Against 

 strict obedience to the first duty prejudices of all sorts, 

 shapes, and sizes often oppose themselves ; but when he has 

 resisted the temptations thus soliciting him to careless or 

 sceptical or unfair inquii'V, he is often still harder beset by 

 the temptation to conceal views that he thinks may injure 

 him either among fellow-workers in science or in the lay 

 world. 



In regard to ghosts and goblins, science has travelled 

 along smoothly enough so long as apparitions of particular 

 classes have been in question. The whole subject of hallu- 

 cinations has been explored by science so thoroughly that no 

 one now is perplexed by stories of visions such as those that 

 troubled Nicolai, Jilake the painter, Mrs. A. (of Brewster's 

 "Natural Magic"), and a number of other persons. The 

 vision in such cases is but " the blot upon the brain that 

 will show itself without," and science is " not to be over- 

 awed by what it cannot but know is a juggle born of the 

 brain." 



Nor has science been much concerned about those old- 

 fashioned ghost stories, telling how sheeted foims and 

 unearthly sounds have affrighted sensitive folk under con- 

 ditions suitably suggestive. We have learned to understand 

 how readily under such conditions as the gloom of night, 

 chilly air (starting shivers and tremors, which of themselves 

 suggest unearthly feelings), and so forth, the mind will 

 unconsciously form false images out of dimly seen objects, 

 or transform unexplained noises into sounds significant of 

 horror. A waving cloth becomes a beckoning sheet-clad 

 ghost; the creaking of a door sounds like the shriek or 

 moan of some one in agony. Out in the open air, in 

 gloomy woods, or valleys half hid in mist, sights and .sounds 

 that by day would not be noticed are by the active mind 

 changed to awful appearances or terrible noises. 



To this day, for instance, in parts of England, the noises 



here and let us make a bay." Shakespeare's love of hunting comes 

 outmost markedly in his earlier plays and poems, as in "Titus 

 Andronicus," •' Love's Labour's Lost," " Midsummer Night's Dream," 

 and " Venus and Adonis." 



* From the Cosmojiolitan, a leading American monthly magazine. 



made at night by migrating birds are regarded as the bark- 

 ing and yelping of the Gabriel hounds (" CJabriel " is itself 

 a suggestive transformation from " gabble "), which in recent 

 times — I mean somewhere within the last ten or twelve 

 centuries — have been found by the foolish country folk to 

 be the souls of unbaptised children ; while (since the hounds 

 have never done any harm directly) it has been held reason- 

 able to regard them as indicating some approaching trouble 

 for those who may hear them. 



There has not only been no trouble in interpreting the 

 ghosts and goblins of this type, but no difficulty has arisen 

 in consequence of visions and voices which have seemed to 

 simulate the appearance or tones of the dead. Here the 

 argument from coincidence, rather too freely urged aljout 

 apparitions in general, may be safely used. Undoubtedly 

 fancies of the kind described are so numerous, that we may 

 f^iirly expect some among them to correspond (in the manner 

 characteristic of ghost stories) with the supposed return of 

 the spirit of the dead to his earthh' home. Especially is 

 this the case when we remember how such f^incies are in- 

 fluenced by predominant ideas, and how, therefore, a person 

 whose mind is full of the thought of some dear lost one 

 would be more apt to form a mental picture of the dead 

 friend or relative than of some form or face entirely un- 

 familiar. 



Even where several persons have seen, or seemed to see, 

 one and the same vision, science is at no loss to explain the 

 illusion, because it is well known that the thotight of one 

 mind is suggested readily in such cases to another mind 

 liable to similar impressions. Consider, for instance, the 

 well-known story of the widower, who thought he saw in 

 the dusk of evening the form of his late wife (only recently 

 deceased) sitting in a garden chair ; he called one of his 

 daughters, and asked in awe-struck tones whom she saw 

 sitting there 1 And the daughter saw her mother. Another 

 daughter being called was similarly impressed with the 

 thought that her mother sat in the chair which in life she 

 had been wont to occupy ; but when, summoning up his 

 resolution, he went forth into the garden to speak to bis 

 " late departed saint," lo ! he found not her in her habit as 

 she lived, but her garden dress, which a maid had placed 

 over the seat. It is obvious that the thoughts filling the 

 mind of the father transformed a dress into an apparition, 

 and it is probable that this thought was conveyed from his 

 mind to his daughters', rather than suggested independently 

 to them. In any case, there was no real apparition. 



It is when we turn to visions of living persons, or to 

 thoughts and suggestions relating to living persons, at a dis- 

 tance from the person affected by the vision or impression, 

 that we find evidence most difficult to deal with, and the 

 results not only difticult to explain, but not altogether satis- 

 factory for discussion, because the number of those who 

 welcome the discussion of all such matters, either with 

 credulity or with ridicule, enormously exceeds the number 

 of the more thoughtful. 



The following is one of the best authenticated of a class 

 of stories whose name is now becoming legion : — • 



In September 18.57 Captain W., of the Gth Dragoon 

 Guards, left England to join his regiment in India, leaving 

 his wife at Cambridge. On the night between November 14 

 and 1.1, 18.")7, she dreamed that she saw her hu.sband looking 

 very ill, and she thereupon woke in great agitation. When 

 she looked up she saw the same figure standing by her bed- 

 side. He ajipeared in uniform, and as if suffering intense 

 pain. He then gradually faded from her view. At first 

 Mrs. W. supposed she must still be asleep ; but rubbing her 

 eyes and listening to the breathing of a cliild beside her, she 

 convinced herself that what she had seen was no dream. 

 In December 1857 a telegram from the seat of war 



