f a large merchant vessel
in the Lisbon trade, gave the writer an account of such an instance
which came under his observation. He was lying in the Tagus, when he was
put to great anxiety and alarm by the following incident and its
consequences. One of his crew was murdered by a Portuguese assassin, and
a report arose that the ghost of the slain man haunted the vessel.
Sailors are generally superstitious, and those of my friend's vessel
became unwilling to remain on board the ship; and it was probable they
might desert rather then return to England with the ghost for a
passenger. To prevent so great a calamity, the captain determined to
examine the story to the bottom. He soon found that, though all
pretended to have seen lights and heard noises, and so forth, the weight
of the evidence lay upon the statement of one of his own mates, an
Irishman and a Catholic, which might increase his tendency to
superstition, but in other respects a veracious, honest, and sensible
person, whom Captain ----had no reason to suspect would wilfully deceive
him. He affirmed to Captain S---- with the deepest obtestations, that
the spectre of the murdered man appeared to him almost nightly, took him
from his place in the vessel, and, according to his own expression,
worried his life out. He made these communications with a degree of
horror which intimated the reality of his distress and apprehensions.
The captain, without any argument at the time, privately resolved to
watch the motions of the ghost-seer in the night; whether alone, or with
a witness, I have forgotten. As the ship bell struck twelve, the sleeper
started up, with a ghastly and disturbed countenance, and lighting a
candle, proceeded to the galley or cook-room of the vessel. He sate down
with his eyes open, staring before him as on some terrible object which
he beheld with horror, yet from which he could not withhold his eyes.
After a short space he arose, took up a tin can or decanter, filled it
with water, muttering to himself all the while--mixed salt in the water,
and sprinkled it about the galley. Finally, he sighed deeply, like one
relieved from a heavy burden, and, returning to his hammock, slept
soundly. In the next morning the haunted man told the usual precise
story of his apparition, with the additional circumstances, that the
ghost had led him to the galley, but that he had fortunately, he knew
not how, obtained possession of some holy water, and succeeded in
getting