if he came in again she would speak to him if possible. He
presently came in again, walked round, and came behind her as before;
she turned her head and said, "Pray, sir, who are you, and what do you
want?" He put up his finger and said, "Take up the candle and follow me,
and I will tell you." She got up, took up the candle and followed him
out of the room. He led her through a long boarded passage, till they
came to the door of another room which he opened and went in; it was a
small room, or what might be called a large closet. "As the room was
small, and I believed him to be a spirit," said she, "I stopped at the
door; he turned and said, 'Walk in, I will not hurt you'; so I walked
in. He said, 'Observe what I do'; I said, 'I will.' He stooped and tore
up one of the boards of the floor, and there appeared under it a box
with an iron handle in the lid. He said, 'Do you see that box?' I said,
'Yes, I do.' He then stepped to one side of the room and showed me a
crevice in the wall, where he said a key was hid that would open it. He
said, 'This box and key must be taken out, and sent to the Earl in
London' (naming the Earl and his residence in the city). He said, 'Will
you see it done?' I said, 'I will do my best to get it done'; and he
said, 'Do, and I will trouble the house no longer!' He then walked out
of the room and left me. (He seems to have been a very civil spirit, and
to have been very careful to affright her as little as possible.) I
stepped to the room door, and set up a shout. The steward and his wife,
with the other servants, came to me immediately; all clinging together,
with a number of lights in their hands. It seems they had all been
waiting to see the issue of the interview betwixt me and the apparition.
They asked me what was the matter. I told them the foregoing
circumstances, and showed them the box. The steward durst not meddle
with it, but his wife had more courage, and, with the help of the other
servants, tugged it out, and found the key. She said by their lifting it
appeared to be pretty heavy, but that she did not see it opened, and
therefore did not know what it contained--perhaps money, or writings of
consequence to the family, or both." They took it away with them, and
she then went to bed and slept peaceably till morning.

It appeared that they sent the box to the Earl in London, with an
account of the manner of its discovery, and by whom; as the Earl sent
down orders immediately to his ste