thing. She looked
down--nothing was to be seen. Amazed beyond description, she thrust
out her hands, and they alighted on an object, which she had little
difficulty in identifying. It was an enormous cask or barrel lying in
a horizontal position.

She bent down close to where she felt it, but she could see
nothing--nothing but the well-polished boards of the floor. To make
sure again that the barrel was there, she gave a little kick--and drew
back her foot with a cry of pain. She was not afraid--the sunshine in
the room forbade fear--only exasperated. She was certain a barrel was
there--that it was objective--and she was angry with herself for not
seeing it. She wondered if she were going blind; but the fact that
other objects in the room were plainly visible to her, discountenanced
such an idea. For some minutes she poked and jabbed at the Thing, and
then, seized with a sudden and uncontrollable panic, she turned round
and fled. And as she tore out of the room, along the passage and down
the seemingly interminable flight of stairs, she heard the barrel
behind her in close pursuit-bump--bump--bump!

At the foot of the staircase Mrs. Gibbons met her cousin, and, as she
clutched the latter for support, the barrel shot past her, still
continuing its descent--bump--bump--bump! (though the steps as far as
she could see had ended)--till the sounds gradually dwindled away in
the far distance.

Whilst the manifestations lasted, neither Mrs. Gibbons nor her cousin
spoke; but the latter, as soon as the sounds had ceased, dragged Mrs.
Gibbons away, and, in a voice shaking with terror, cried: "Quick,
quick--don't, for Heaven's sake, look round--worse has yet to come."
And, pulling Mrs. Gibbons along in breathless haste, she
unceremoniously hustled her out of the Tower.

"That was no barrel!" Mrs. Gibbons's cousin subsequently remarked by
way of explanation. "I saw it--I have seen it before. Don't ask me to
describe it. I dare not--I dare not even think of it. Whenever it
appears, a certain thing happens shortly afterwards. Don't, don't on
any account say a word about it to any one here." And Mrs. Gibbons, my
mother told me, came away from Glamis a thousand times more curious
than she was when she went.

* * * * *

The last story I have to relate is one I heard many years ago, when I
was staying near Balmoral. A gentleman named Vance, with strong
antiquarian tastes, was staying at an inn near t