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Fear now commenced to grow into serious alarm, which in no way decreased as other incidents, equally, if not more, bewildering in their character, became of daily occurrence. Bowls took a fancy to route, with various degrees of swiftness, upon the tables, and then, as if smitten with the same idea of self-martyrdom, shot off at a tangent, ending sharply and forever their symmetrical usefulness upon the floor. Coats, which formerly hung with all staidness and propriety upon their respective pins, now shivered and fluttered, as if seized with an ague, and again expanded in all their proportions, as if each were enveloping an invisible Falstaff, or an aspiring Claimant. Hats took unto themselves wings, and bodily flew away. In sooth, the natural order of affairs in the house was completely deranged, and the more agitated became the inanimate articles, the more excited became, naturally enough, the members of the family. Every conceivable project that could be devised for elucidating these mysteries tailed utterly in pointing out a cause which could be understood. Even the potatoes boiling in a pot on the fire became mashed, and leaped behind the fire. And when ten or twelve were entered for boiling, a tot up in a few minutes revealed the startling fact that several had altogether and unaccountably disappeared, though many pairs of straining eyes were watching with almost painful eagerness every motion of the immovable pot Latterly, also, large stones, weighing on an average about three pounds, or three pounds and a half, have rolled slowly down the stairs, bobbing with leisurely ease from step to step. These have been sometimes damp and wet with clay, as if just removed from a ditch or roadway, and at other times dry and clean, as if preserved from the weather for a considerable space of time. | Fear now commenced to grow into serious alarm, which in no way decreased as other incidents, equally, if not more, bewildering in their character, became of daily occurrence. Bowls took a fancy to route, with various degrees of swiftness, upon the tables, and then, as if smitten with the same idea of self-martyrdom, shot off at a tangent, ending sharply and forever their symmetrical usefulness upon the floor. Coats, which formerly hung with all staidness and propriety upon their respective pins, now shivered and fluttered, as if seized with an ague, and again expanded in all their proportions, as if each were enveloping an invisible Falstaff, or an aspiring Claimant. Hats took unto themselves wings, and bodily flew away. In sooth, the natural order of affairs in the house was completely deranged, and the more agitated became the inanimate articles, the more excited became, naturally enough, the members of the family. Every conceivable project that could be devised for elucidating these mysteries tailed utterly in pointing out a cause which could be understood. Even the potatoes boiling in a pot on the fire became mashed, and leaped behind the fire. And when ten or twelve were entered for boiling, a tot up in a few minutes revealed the startling fact that several had altogether and unaccountably disappeared, though many pairs of straining eyes were watching with almost painful eagerness every motion of the immovable pot Latterly, also, large stones, weighing on an average about three pounds, or three pounds and a half, have rolled slowly down the stairs, bobbing with leisurely ease from step to step. These have been sometimes damp and wet with clay, as if just removed from a ditch or roadway, and at other times dry and clean, as if preserved from the weather for a considerable space of time. | ||
{{Style S-HPB SB. Continues on |3-95}} | <center>({{Style S-Small capitals |continued on page 176.}})</center> | ||
<center>THE ROYAL IRISH CONSTABULARY DEFIED BY SPIRITS.</center> | |||
<center> | |||
({{Style S-Small capitals |continued from page 170.}})</center> | |||
<center>ATTEMPTS TO ACCOUNT FOR THE DISTURBANCES.</center> | |||
The following portion of the report shows that some have thought that the disturbances are greatest when one member of the family is present: possibly one or more members of the family may nave medium power without knowing it, in which case the manifestations would be stronger when they are near: — | |||
No persons have been in the upper portion of the house where such events have happened, and not the vaguest shadow upon which to found a belief in the collusion or complicity of any parties in the causing of them has been at all afforded. These manifestations will serve to show the cruel and persistent manner in which Mr. Allen and his family have been afflicted, although they are far from exhausting the minor details of a system of persecution as vexatious and hard to be borne as it is strange and unexplainable, both in cause and result. The family consists of Mr. and Mrs. Allen, two sons, and a daughter. One of the male branches, a young man of twenty-two or thereabouts, resides constantly with his father, and is said to be an apt student of the art of legerdemain. Rumor will insist on mixing him up with the occurrences, but they have been known to take place when he was away working on the farm. Mr. Allen has ceased to accept, or even listen to, any interpretation or explanation of the facts. He is not by any means a nervous man, nor superstitious in his way of thinking; but, having seen these things occur, and being utterly unable to assert a reason for them, he would at the present moment be an easily manipulated disciple of the most ardent Spiritualist. The whole affair in its recital might seem quite a ludicrous matter, were it not for the very great pain suffered by those most concerned. That the people of the town are much excited by it, and anxiously awaiting its ''denouement, ''is unquestionable. The usual morning salute in meeting a friend is now invariably accompanied by the query, “Anything new from the ghost?’’ “Is all quiet at Allen's?” And not alone in Cookstown, but in all the district for miles around, the doings of the ghost are canvassed and criticised with the greatest interest. It has been shrewdly suggested that a Belfast detective might soon purge the premises of the spirit, but Mr. Allen scouts the possibility of such aid as not only useless, but absurd. Perhaps he is right, but in all human probability I think he is wrong. This being the market day, the great topic was, of course, actively discussed, and theories beyond number asserted each as the true and particular explanation of the whole business. Meanwhile the ghost is not yet laid, but more of him anon. | |||
<center>THE SPIRIT WILL NOT SHOW HIMSELF. — CHURCH WARDENS AND CLERGYMEN CALLED IN.—THE INVESTIGATORS AT FAULT.</center> | |||
In the News Letter of Nov. 19th is a later account of the disturbances, in which the reporter complains of the invisibility of the spirit, not knowing that such seldom show themselves except at seances with a materialization medium. A fortnight ago, Mr. Henry M. Dumphy, a gentleman well- known in Irish as well as London literary circles, published an article in these pages about a spirit in Dublin, who was invisible to all but one clairvoyant. | |||
The reporter makes a wild attempt to connect the disturbances with Dr. Tyndall, a gentleman of whose dealings with Spiritualism and general characteristics the News Letter displayed a remarkably accurate knowledge in leading articles during the late visit of the British Association to Belfast. At all events its readers have now good evidence of the neglect of duty of men of science (with a few honorable exceptions) in not investigating such facts: — | |||
Clergymen, doctors, elders, church wardens, and business men, of all grades and degrees of ability, have tried their hand at lifting the veil, but all with the same result, leaving the matter as mysterious as they found it. | |||
<center>THE MALICIOUS NATURE OF THE DISTURBANCES. — AMOUNT OF PROPERTY DESTROYED. — A TEST MANIFESTATION WITH A SAUCEPAN AND POTATOES.</center> | |||
Be this as it may, during a period of nearly eighteen months the most unaccountable proceedings have been going on, and at the present time we seem to be no nearer a solution of them than at the commencement. During this time an immense quantity of wearing apparel has been cut up into fragments, said to be valued for upwards of ''£60''—in one particular case to the amount of ''£4 ''{{Style S-Small capitals | ios}}. One time a new hat would be cut round and round, and found lying out in the street, a few minutes after having been used, without the apparent possibility of any person having done it. Coats, trousers, vesta, blankets, shawls were similarly destroyed without a shadow of suspicion resting on any person. This continued at intervals till within the last two months, when the work of destruction assumed another form, which brought it into public notice. The window smashing then commenced—first, the front windows were demolished, not all at once, but leisurely, generally one pane at a time. At first it was thought some miscreants were at work, but the premises were so closely watched that this idea was dismissed, and especially as the glass was frequently broken under the eyes of the watchers, when it would have been utterly impossible for the perpetrator to escape instant detection. Shutters were then put on, and the work of demolition immediately commenced in the rear of the house, and continued until nothing but the bare sashes remained. Several plans were tried to discover the supposed actors in these scenes; but, despite the presence of a watcher at each window, and the protection of shutters on the outside, the glass-breaking went on, and no clue was obtained. Not even the prints of a foot or mark of any description could be discovered within a reasonable distance; in fact, the whole circumstances were of the most inexplicable description, and completely excluded the whole work from the bounds of human possibility. It is worthy of notice, at the same time, that the ghosts took exactly the same means to break the windows that an ordinary mortal would adopt—namely, by flinging a stone through it; but with this striking difference in the result—as a rule the fragments of glass were found on the outside, and the stone in the inside; in a few instances, both in the inside, and in fewer cases still no stone could be discovered. This phenomenon, I think, would baffle the sagacity of even a Belfast detective to comprehend. Meanwhile, if possible, a darker mystery enveloped the proceedings inside. Of course the house was searched again and again— every corner minutely examined from roof to floor, but without the slightest discovery of a suspicious character being made. And, notwithstanding that the upper part of the house was thoroughly secured, and no means of communication with the outside practicable, sounds as of weighty bodies {{Style S-HPB SB. Continues on |3-95}} | |||