Chapter 5

This is the first occasion on which there has been mention of the sound of continuous reading aloud, which afterwards became extremely familiar. The sound was always that well known to Roman Catholics as that of a priest "saying his office." It may be as well to remind the reader that Clerks in Holy Orders of that Church are, like those of the Anglican, strictly bound to read through the whole of the Daily Service every day, and it is not permitted to do this merely by the eye, the lips must utter the words. In practice some are accustomed to move the lips with hardly any sound, and such, we have ascertained, is the custom of the Rev. P---- H----; others read it absolutely aloud, and will retire to their own rooms or other places, where they may be alone for the purpose. This, we heard, was the invariable practice of the Rev. Mr. "I.," the chaplain of Mr. and Mrs. "G."

As a matter of fact, we were sleeping on the other side of the house, and the rooms under the maids' rooms were empty.... In the evening, about six o'clock, we strolled down the avenue again, and Scamp, who never does bark except under strong excitement, again barked and growled at the copse.

The Hon. E. F----, a fellow-member of an S.P.R. committee, arrives to-night. Hospitality constrains us to put him in No. 4, which is "not haunted."

I asked after the success of the new kitchenmaid, a local importation, who arrived yesterday. I was told she had already gone. The cook told me "she talked all sorts of nonsense about the house, and the things that had happened in it, and had been seen in it, all day; and then at night refused to sleep here, and the butler had to walk home with her at eleven o'clock."

The Factor [_anglicé_: bailiff] came this morning, and I fancied a special intention in his manner. He was much annoyed about the kitchenmaid, said such talk was "all havers" [_anglicé_: "drivel"], begged me not to employ her again, and undertook to get another, lending me a girl in his own service meanwhile.

I went with him into the wing to get him to see to things there. We have been too busy in getting the rest of the house into order to look after it yet; but I find the pipes are out of order, the cisterns frozen, and the "set-basins" in the three bedrooms and bath-room out of working order. He promised attention, but discouraged the use of the wing. "Had we not room enough without?" and so on. I suggested that, any way, for the sake of the rest of the house it must be aired and thawed, and he insisted that the kitchen fire below did that sufficiently.

I cannot help remembering that this is the scene of the phenomena recorded by Miss "B----," as Duncan R----, the factor, is well aware. Also, he was persistent about "keeping out the natives," and their chatter, if I wanted to keep the servants, but did not specify the nature of the chatter, and I asked no questions.

_February 6th, Saturday._--No phenomena last night. The house perfectly still.

During Colonel Taylor's tenancy a good many experiments of different kinds were made in hypnotism, crystal gazing, and automatic writing. These, however, belong to a class of matter quite different from that of spontaneous phenomena, and are therefore not referred to, with the exception of a single instance of crystal gazing, which, though relating to B----, was made elsewhere, and one or two occasions of automatic writing. This latter method of inquiry displayed all the weakness to which it is usually, and apparently, inherently liable, and is only mentioned here as explaining other matters. Its chief interest was that it supplied a name marked by a certain peculiarity which afterwards became familiar, and that it led to a hypothesis as to at least one of the personalities by whom certain phenomena were professedly caused.

In the afternoon an experiment was made with the apparatus known as a _Ouija_ board, and this, as is very often the case, resolved itself, after a time, into automatic writing. There is in the library a portrait of a very handsome woman, to which no name is attached, but which shows the costume of the last century. Her name was asked, and the word _Ishbel_ was given several times. It is not certain whether this word was meant as an answer to the question, or whether, as often happens in such cases, it was intended merely as an announcement of the name of the informant supposed to communicate.

The word, as given, possesses the following peculiarity. In the Gaelic language the vowels _e_ and _i_ have the effect of aspirating an _s_ immediately preceding them, in the same way in which they effect the _c_ in Italian, or the _g_ in Spanish, so that, as in Italian _ce_ and _ci_ are pronounced _chay_ and _chee_, so in Gaelic _se_ and _si_ are pronounced _shay_ and _shee_. The name Isabel is written in Gaelic _Iseabal_, but the _e_ is absorbed in its effect upon the _s_ (like the _i_ in the Italian _cìo_) and the first _a_ is so slurred as to be almost inaudible, so that the word is pronounced "Ish-bel."

It was obvious, therefore, that the intelligence from which the writing proceeded (if such existed) could write in English, and was familiar with the colloquial Gaelic pronunciation of the name, but was unacquainted with the Gaelic orthography. On this occasion also the name "Margaret" was given in its Gaelic form of Marghearad (somewhat similarly misspelt as _Marget_), without any special connection either with the questions asked, or, so far as could be discovered, with anything in the mind of any present, none of whom had interested themselves at that time in the S---- ancestry.

In reply to questions as to what could be done that was of use or interest, the writers were told to go at dusk, and in silence, to the glen in the avenue, and this, rightly or wrongly, some of those present identified with what had been called Scamp's Copse. They were, however, perplexed by being told to go "up by the burn," for though Miss Freer and Miss Moore had twice explored the spot, they had not observed the presence of water. The journal continues--

We decided to walk in the avenue, and to explore "Scamp's Copse" before dinner, in spite of the fact that we were expecting Mr. MacP---- [a barrister], Mr. C---- [a solicitor], and Mr. W---- [an accountant] just about the time that we should be absent. Miss Moore took the dog off in the opposite direction, and we walked in silence to the plantation, Mr. L. F----, Mr. F----, and I. It was quite dark, but the snow gleamed so white, that we could see our way to the plantation. We went up among the trees, young firs; the snow was deep and untrodden; and when we got well off the road, we found that a burn comes down the brae side. It is frozen hard, and we found it out only by the shining of the ice.

We walked on in silence to the left of the burn, up the little valley, along a small opening between the trees and the railing which encloses them, Mr. L. F---- first, then I, then Mr. F----.

In a few minutes I saw what made me stop. The men stopped too, and we all stood leaning over the railings, and looking in silence across the burn to the steep bank opposite. This was white with snow, except to the left, where the boughs of a large oak-tree had protected the ground.

Against the snow I saw a slight black figure, a woman, moving slowly up the glen. She stopped, and turned and looked at me. She was dressed as a nun. Her face looked pale. I saw her hand in the folds of her habit. Then she moved on, as it seemed, on a slope too steep for walking. When she came under the tree she disappeared--perhaps because there was no snow to show her outline. Beyond the tree she reappeared for a moment, where there was again a white background, close by the burn. Then I saw no more. I waited, and then, still in silence, we returned to the avenue.

I described what I had seen. The others saw nothing. (This did not surprise me, for though both have been for many years concerned in psychical investigation, and have had unusual opportunities, neither has ever had any "experience," so that one may conclude that they are not by temperament likely to experience either subjective phenomena or even thought-transference.) It was proposed that we should ascend the glen in her track on the other side of the burn. It was very difficult walking, the snow very deep, and after two or three efforts to descend the side of the bank we gave it up, and followed to nearly her point of disappearance, keeping above the tree, not below as she had done. We saw no more, and returned to the house, agreeing not to describe what had occurred, merely to say that as the factor (who looks about eighteen stone) is said not to like the avenue at dark, we had been setting him and others a good example.

In a letter to Lord Bute under date February 25th, Miss Freer describes this figure with some detail:--

"As you know, these figures do not appear before 6.30 at earliest, therefore there is little light upon their surface. Like other phantasms seen at dark, they show 'by their own light,' _i.e._ they appear to be outlined by a thread of light. It is therefore only when the face appears in profile that one can describe the features, and this is somewhat prevented by the nun's veil. 'Ishbel' appears to me to be slight, and of fair height. I am unable, of course, to see the colour of her hair, but I should describe her as dark. There is an intensity in her gaze which is rare in light-coloured eyes. The face, as I see it, is in mental pain, so that it is perhaps hardly fair to say that it seems lacking in that repose and gentleness that one looks for in the religious life. Her dress presents no peculiarities. The habit is black, with the usual white about the face, and I have thought that when walking she showed a lighter under-dress. She speaks upon rather a high note, with a quality of youth in her voice. Her weeping seemed to me passionate and unrestrained."

The appearance of a nun was entirely unexpected, as the name "Ishbel" had been associated rather with the portrait of the beautiful woman in an eighteenth-century dress in the library, and it was she whom the witnesses, had they expected anything at all, would have expected to see. Miss Freer, moreover, the first witness, had regarded the statements of "Ouija" with her habitual scepticism as to induced phenomena, more particularly those of automatic writing, in which, as in dreams, it is almost always difficult to disentangle the operations of the normal from those of the subconscious personality.

If the name "Ishbel" were really intended to apply to the nun, it becomes a very curious question who is the person meant. A Robert S---- of B---- married, as has been already mentioned, Isabella H----, who died in 1784, but we know of no reason for supposing that she ever became a nun.

The portrait may possibly have represented her, but it shows a much older woman than the phantom so often seen; on the other hand, the dates are not inconsistent, and a considerable distance of time is suggested by certain phrases which occurred in the automatic writing.

The person to whom the mind more naturally reverts is Miss Isabella S----, the sister, and apparently the favourite sister, of Major S----. As already mentioned, she professed as a nun under the name of Frances Helen in 1850, and died in 1880, aged sixty-six. She did not, therefore, enter her convent till the age of thirty-five, an age much greater than that shown by the phantom.

It is, moreover, interesting to note that this lady's name was Isabella _Margaret_, so that both names, as given automatically, may have really referred to her. In the seventh edition of "Burke's Landed Gentry," 1886, there appears for the first time this entry--

"_IV. Isabella Margaret, a nun, regular Canoness of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre, d. 23 Feb. 1880._"

The editors have obtained from the Nunnery, where she lived and died, a photograph, representing the dress of the Community, and a description of herself, which is as follows:--

"She died 23rd February 1880, quickly, of an attack of pneumonia or acute bronchitis. She died a most edifying death, in perfect consciousness, assisted by the Confessor ... and the Community around her, and having received the last Sacraments only a few hours before she expired. As to her appearance, she was short, rather fair, not at all stout, but not extraordinarily thin.

"She entered the Community in April 1848, was clothed in May 1849, and professed May 1850. We do not know whether she could speak Gaelic. She was very fond of Scotland, and very particular about the pronunciation of Scotch names. She was a most entertaining companion, being full of natural wit."

The dress, which is dignified, is very peculiar and striking, and not the least like the very ordinary nun's attire in which the phantom appeared, while it would be difficult to imagine a greater contrast than that between the merry old lady of the description and the weeping girl so often seen.

There was, however, at least one very peculiar reason, which will be noticed presently, for supposing that this phantom was really intended to represent the late Rev. Mother Frances Helen, and that its inaccuracy was owing to the stupid, and rather melodramatic misconception in the mind which originally imagined it and transferred it to the witnesses at B----.

This is our arrangement for to-night:--

Room 1 (where we heard noises). Mr. F----. " 2. Dressing-room communicating with Nos. 1 and 3; doors opened between. " 3. Mr. L. F---- (specially "haunted"). " 4. Mr. MacP----. " 5. Mr. W----. " 6. Dressing-room, Miss Moore. " 7. Myself. " 8. Mr. C----. (Sounds alleged, see evidence.) _N.B._--Nothing is alleged against 4 and 5.

_February 7th, Sunday._--Miss Moore was awakened this morning soon after one o'clock by a loud reverberating bang, which seemed close to her bed. She lay awake for a long time afterwards, but the sound was not repeated. The men heard nothing. They report that they went to bed soon after eleven, and very quietly.

My maid, who has had to give up her room, slept downstairs last night. She was kept awake nearly all night by noises and footsteps. The wing is not yet fit for use, as all the pipes are frozen, and the only downstairs bedroom was insufficiently aired; so I told her to use that for dressing, and make herself up a bed on one of the sitting-room sofas, and she slept (or rather, lay awake) in the drawing-room. She was not frightened, as she thought all the noises were made by the gentlemen; but they declare they made no noise.

I asked her as to the other servants. She says the maids are still very nervous. I spoke to them for the first time about the noises to-day. The butler's wife has heard sounds, but her husband only scoffs. The upper housemaid thinks ghosts the proper thing, and tolerates them along with the high families to which she is accustomed. The under housemaid is very shy, is Highland, and knows little English, and won't talk, but owns to discomfort, and is scoffed at by the other servants, who think it all part of her having been only a "general" till she came here. The kitchenmaid goes home to sleep, but I believe some one fetches her.

I have had a girl out of the village to make up the linen, and she, we notice, is careful to go home before dark.

This morning we all went to churches of various sorts. When the men came in to tea they reported that they had had a conversation with an outdoor servant, who proved to have been in the service of [Mr. F----'s father] Lord D----, and was consequently the more communicative. I know him, and have found him extremely intelligent.

He says that having heard from the H----s' butler (who slept on the dining-room floor, in the room my maid is to occupy to-night) that it was impossible to sleep in a room so noisy, he induced him to allow him to share his room, that they heard much, but they dared not show a light for fear of his admission being discovered (the H----s being much on the alert), and they saw nothing [_cf._ p. 40 for evidence of the H----s' butler].

We did not like to send for him on a Sunday, but decided to have him in on Monday, and test him as to the intensity of the noise.

In the evening, while we were all chatting in the drawing-room, Miss Moore came out into the hall, where she had been looking after the dog. In spite of the noise we were all making, she distinctly heard the clang noise upstairs. She had said the same thing, though with less certainty, once before, and we agreed that one night some one must sit up in the hall. (This was afterwards done without result.)

_February 8th, Monday._--Last night my maid heard footsteps and the sound of hands fumbling on her door; this she told us when she came in with our early tea.

Miss Moore in the early morning, between one and two, heard again the sharp, reverberating bang as before. We speculated at breakfast as to whether the sound could have been made by the men after we had gone upstairs, though they were all sure of having been quite still before midnight. We made them rehearse every sound they had in fact made, but nothing was in the least like it, either in quality or quantity.

I had been disturbed about 5.30 A.M. by the sound (which we had not heard hitherto) described by former witnesses as "explosive." I know of nothing quite like it. I have heard the Portsmouth guns when at a place eight miles away; the sound was like that, but did not convey the same impression of distance. I heard it, at intervals, during half-an-hour. Miss Moore is a very light sleeper, but she did not awake. At six I got up and went through my room to the dressing-room door (No. 6), after a sound that seemed especially near. It was so near, that though I thought it quite unlikely under the circumstances, I wanted to satisfy myself that no one was playing jokes on Mr. C----, whose room was close by. The house was deadly still. I could hear the clocks ticking on the stairs. As I stood, the sound came again. It might have been caused by a very heavy fall of snow from a high roof--not sliding, but percussive. Miss Moore had wakened up and heard it too.

(_N.B._--We afterwards found that, as the roof is flat, the snow is cleared away daily.)

Mr. W----, an utter sceptic, he declares, left early; then we all went for a walk. We spent the whole afternoon making experiments. Miss Moore or my maid or I, as having heard the noises, shut ourselves up in the room whence they were heard, or stood in the right places on hall or staircase.

The experimental noises made were as follows:--

1. Banging with poker or shovel as hard as possible on every part of the big iron stove in the hall; kicking it, hitting it with sticks (as Miss Moore and I persisted that the first noise was as of metal on wood, or _vice versâ_).

2. Trampling and banging in every part of the house, obvious and obscure, in cupboards and cistern holes.

3. (On the hypothesis of tricks from outside.) Beating on outside doors with shovels and pokers and wooden things, on the walls and windows accessible; banging and clattering in outside coal-cellars and in the sunk area round the house. (_N.B._--Beating on the front door handle with a wooden racket, was right in kind, but not nearly enough in degree.)

Miss Moore, who was familiar with the noise, did it rather well by going into a coal-cellar (always locked at night, however) outside and throwing big lumps of coal, from a distance, into a big pail, but _it wasn't nearly loud enough_.

4. Finally the men climbed on to the roof, outside, while Miss Moore and I shut ourselves into the proper places. They clattered and walked and stamped and kicked and struck the slates, but _they couldn't make noise enough_.

Then we had in the gardener they saw yesterday, and put him in the butler's room, and the four men made hideous rows as before. He was grateful and respectful, but contemptuous. _They couldn't make noise enough._

We went out at dusk, having sent Mr. MacP---- and Mr. C---- to pay a visit (as they had not been told of the brook scene), intending that the same trio as before should go to the copse. Mr. L---- F---- couldn't come, and as Mr. F---- and I went on alone, we met Mr. MacP---- and Mr. C---- returning before they were expected. On the spur of the moment I asked Mr. C---- to come with me, leaving Mr. F---- and Mr. MacP---- in the avenue. The snow had gone, and I saw less distinctly; but I saw the nun again, and an older woman in grey, who talked earnestly with her, she answering at intervals. I could hear no words; the ice was giving, and the burn had begun to murmur. (I tried to persuade myself that the murmur accounted for the voices, but the sounds were entirely distinct, and different in quality and amount.)

This older woman in grey afterwards became familiar. The name "Marget" was given to her at first half in fun and simply because this was one of the two names given by Ouija (_cf._ p. 98). She is apparently the grey woman referred to in the paper published by Mrs. G---- (_cf._ p. 64).

The fact of voices being heard by two persons, while one alone saw the figures, seems a clear proof that the figures were hallucinatory. It seems probable that the sounds also were hallucinatory, but were what is called in the vocabulary of the S.P.R. the "collective" hallucination of two persons. This seems to render it highly probable that in the case of each the hallucination had a cause external to both, although common to both; moreover, hallucinations are often contagious. _The Times_ correspondent states, that "the lady admitted that the apparition was purely subjective, but in regard to other matters was not willing to suppose that she might be the victim of hallucinations of hearing as well as of sight." On the contrary, as all readers of Miss Freer's published works are aware, she is entirely of opinion that such sights and sounds are pure sense-hallucinations, whatever may be their ultimate origin.

We rejoined the others in silence. Then Mr. MacP---- said to Mr. C----, "Did you see anything?" "Nothing; I only heard voices." "What sort of voices?" "Two women. The older voice talked most, almost continuously. I heard a younger voice, a higher one, now and then."

_Note by Mr. MacP----._

"I knew previously, though Mr. C---- did not, that Miss Freer had seen something up the burn; and when waiting for her and Mr. C----, Mr. F---- told me the whole story."