thinking he had seen an apparition
of Lord Strafford, who, after upbraiding him for his cruelty, told him
he was come to return him good for evil, and that he advised him by no
means to fight the Parliament army that was at that time quartered at
Northampton, for it was one which the King could never conquer by arms.
Prince Rupert, in whom courage was the predominant quality, rated the
King out of his apprehensions the next day, and a resolution was again
taken to meet the enemy. The next night, however, the apparition
appeared to him a second time, but with looks of anger assuring him that
would be the last advice he should be permitted to give him, but that if
he kept his resolution of fighting he was undone. If His Majesty had
taken the advice of the friendly ghost, and marched northward the next
day, where the Parliament had few English forces, and where the Scots
were becoming very discontented, his affairs might, perhaps, still have
had a prosperous issue, or if he had marched immediately into the west
he might afterwards have fought on more equal terms. But the King,
fluctuating between the apprehensions of his imagination and the
reproaches of his courage, remained another whole day at Daintree in a
state of inactivity. The battle of Naseby, fought 14th June 1645, put a
finishing stroke to the King's affairs. After this he could never get
together an army fit to look the enemy in the face. He was often heard
to say that he wished he had taken _the warning_, and not fought at
Naseby; the meaning of which nobody knew but those to whom he had told
of the apparition which he had seen at Daintree, and all of whom were,
subsequently, charged to keep the affair secret.

XLI

KOTTER'S RED CIRCLE

From FERRIER'S "Apparitions"

Kotter's first vision was detailed by him, on oath, before the
magistrates of Sprottaw, in 1619. While he was travelling on foot, in
open daylight, in June 1616, a man appeared to him, who ordered him to
inform the civil and ecclesiastical authorities, that great evils were
impending over Germany, for the punishment of the sins of the people;
after which he vanished. The same apparition met him at different times,
and compelled him at length, by threats, to make this public
declaration.

After this, his visions assumed a more imposing appearance: on one
occasion the angel (for such he was now confessed to be) showed him
three suns, filling one half of the heavens; and nine moons, wit