< The Polter Gheist or The Ghost That Throws (continued from page 3-92) >
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The Royal Irish Constabulary Defied by Spirits
Some violent disturbance, evidently produced by a spirit, or spirits, have been going on for a long time at the house of Mr. Allen, grocer, Cookstown, Ireland, and the power at work appears to be malicious. The following account of the occurrences is taken from the Belfast News Letter of November 16th. The News Letter is the oldest and most important journal in the north of Ireland, and the property of the Mayor, Mr. J. A. Henderson. The report may therefore be considered to be reliable. Moreover, the narrative fits in with others of a like nature; only a few weeks ago we recorded some similar occurrences in America, and Mr. William Howitt once published a pamphlet full of authenticated cases of stone-throwing by spirits. Two or three years ago, we printed an account of stone-throwing by spirits at Peckham, in which case windows were broken over and over again, in broad daylight, under the eyes of the police: —
Cookstown has lately been singled out for the attention of a visitor whose freaks and doings have caused no little wonderment and curiosity. Were the time a little further advanced, the narrative of the manifestations which have to completely upset the ordinary tranquility of the community might be embodied in a fairly exciting Christmas story. It would abound with mystery and weirdness and incomprehensibility. The story, however, would lack the orthodox moral; it would be wanting in an end; the inexplicable would remain unexplained, for the simple reason that at present it admits not of solution. The stranger has not as yet made himself visible to any eye, but his presence is too obtrusively indicated by uncanny acts, to be either unnoticed or uncared for. The absolute identity of the unseen is, therefore, a matter of grave Conjecture, public opinion being strongly divided as to whether he is a ghost, a spirit, or simply an atom of depraved humanity, indulging in a fanciful and certainly much-to-be-condemned form of amusement. According to all preconceived notions of ghostdom, a form from that land of shades should assume a spectral, faintly-illumined, human aspect, having a peculiar predilection for the witching hour of midnight, “when churchyards yawn and graves give up their dead.” Such is not the case in this instance, for in no shape or entity is our unquiet friend ever observable, while neither cock-crow, the sun at noonday, nor the hush of twilight, exercises controlling power over his actions. If a ghost then he be, he has undoubtedly got a dispensation freeing him from all the thraldom of bis kindred genus. }}By some, who have sufficient nerve and courage to become facetious on the subject it is asserted that a spirit has broken loose from the mystic store-room of Mrs. Guppy—one which disdains the further confinement of dark seances and the undignified monotony of table-rapping. There are others again who are quite incredulous, and hem and haw, and hint and declare, that the thing is not so ghost-like or mysterious as it seems; that in fact, if they just had their way Cookstown would soon resume its wonted serenity, and be no more troubled with this paradoxical, invisible apparition. Whatever the agent may be, though, certain it is that the household selected for its scene of operations has been put to infinite pain and annoyance. And not all the sympathy, and kindness, and assistance, of friends and neighbors are at all able to relieve them from their unwelcome guest, or prevent them from suffering unpleasantnesses which, seemingly trivial in themselves, are yet perfectly torturing is their recurrence and strangeness. The unknown is of the most evil and malign disposition, with a well-developed tendency to destroy and to revel in mischief pure and simple. If it be a ghost, or a spirit, at liberty to wander “fancy free,” an unaccountable partiality is shown for one habitation, and very petty, perverse propensity for interfering with the delf, the cooking, and other domestic matters. In tact, the spirit seems most at home in the kitchen, as if it were the shade of some departed scullery-maid, whom “habit’s iron law” had compelled to return to earth, but whose sole remembered capacity was the smashing of the crockery-ware.
The haunted house is situated on Old Town Hill, and is occupied by a Mr. Allen, who carries on a respectable business as a grocer. If not exactly in the sere and yellow leaf, Mr. Allen it somewhat stricken in years. Intelligent and candid in his walk of life, he has gained the esteem of all who know him; and the fact that he should be the object of such bewildering occurrences as have and are almost daily taking place, creates all the more commiseration, and a feeling very much skin to indignation, in the town. The manifestations of something unusual and untoward, first became noticeable some eighteen months ago. The phenomena were <... continues on page 3-94 >
Editor's notes
Sources
Spiritual Scientist, v. 1, No. 15, December 17, 1874, p. 269-70, 176-77