walked in silence to the plantation, Mr. L. F----, Mr. F----,
and I. It was quite dark, but the snow gleamed so white, that we
could see our way to the plantation. We went up among the trees,
young firs; the snow was deep and untrodden; and when we got
well off the road, we found that a burn comes down the brae
side. It is frozen hard, and we found it out only by the shining
of the ice.

We walked on in silence to the left of the burn, up the little
valley, along a small opening between the trees and the railing
which encloses them, Mr. L. F---- first, then I, then Mr.
F----.

In a few minutes I saw what made me stop. The men stopped too,
and we all stood leaning over the railings, and looking in
silence across the burn to the steep bank opposite. This was
white with snow, except to the left, where the boughs of a large
oak-tree had protected the ground.

Against the snow I saw a slight black figure, a woman, moving
slowly up the glen. She stopped, and turned and looked at me.
She was dressed as a nun. Her face looked pale. I saw her hand
in the folds of her habit. Then she moved on, as it seemed, on a
slope too steep for walking. When she came under the tree she
disappeared--perhaps because there was no snow to show her
outline. Beyond the tree she reappeared for a moment, where
there was again a white background, close by the burn. Then I
saw no more. I waited, and then, still in silence, we returned
to the avenue.

I described what I had seen. The others saw nothing. (This did
not surprise me, for though both have been for many years
concerned in psychical investigation, and have had unusual
opportunities, neither has ever had any "experience," so that
one may conclude that they are not by temperament likely to
experience either subjective phenomena or even
thought-transference.) It was proposed that we should ascend the
glen in her track on the other side of the burn. It was very
difficult walking, the snow very deep, and after two or three
efforts to descend the side of the bank we gave it up, and
followed to nearly her point of disappearance, keeping above the
tree, not below as she had done. We saw no more, and returned to
the house, agreeing not to describe what had occurred, merely to
say that as the factor (who looks about eighteen stone) is said
not to like the avenue at dark, we had