gave rise to a famous lawsuit, in which it was strenuously debated whether her burial had not released her à vinculo matrimonii, so as to render her second spousals valid.
But whether the bride of Machates was a dead or a living one, the nature of the skeleton lady who danced at the wedding of Alexander III. King of Scotland, according to that grave historian Hector Boethius, can hardly admit of a question, any more than of the skeleton knight, of whom mention is made in one of the ballads of that equally grave chronicler and contemporary of our own, Matthew Lewis, Esq. We would cite, to the same purpose, another story of “a certain Frenchman of noble family,” related by our friend Thomas Heywood, in the curious work already mentioned, only, that, as we cannot with perfect decency relate it in his own words, we content ourselves with referring to the place, (page 542, 543.)
The short story of “the Storm,” which is added to the collection by the English translator of the others, is said by him to be “founded on an incident similar in its features, which was some time since communicated to me by a female friend of very deserved literary celebrity, as having actually occurred in this country;” and it forms a very fit companion to those by the side of which it is now placed.
“The Spectre-barber,” which is the last in the volume, is of a ludicrous cast, but not unentertaining. The idea of a familiar spirit or goblin (here indeed it is the ghost of a departed barber) who makes it his amusement to shave such persons as happen to come within the reach of his jurisdiction, is supported by classical authority. The younger Pliny mentions a well-attested occurrence of this nature in his epistles, (Lib. 16. Ep. 27.) The operation seems, it is true, to demand something more of real flesh and blood in the agent than is usually attributed to spectres; but perhaps we labour under an error on this subject, and that real substantial phantoms, like the Vampires of Hungary and Moravia, and the Vroucholachis of the modern Greeks, are more common in their appearance than we are at all aware of. That spirits may be fattened by good living, and again reduced to circumstances more befitting their ghostly character, by an alteration of diet, is a fact of which we have the most unquestionable evidence; and, if they have one, it is fair to conclude they may, upon occasion, be invested with all the other properties of common humanity. We wish it were consistent with the limits we must prescribe to a disquisition of this nature to quote from our most excellent author, Thomas Heywood, aforesaid, the whole of his very edifying history of the “Spirit of the Buttery;” but if our present author ever adds to his collection of “Tales of the Dead,” we would earnestly recommend it to him, as a fit companion for the tale which has given us occasion to introduce the mention of it. It is to be found, set down at full length “in most delicate verse,” at page 557—9, of the work so often referred to.
We have taken occasion, from the publications before us, to justify our decided anti-ferriarism by examples; and we have surely advanced enough, and more than enough, to prove that the philosophical principle of “Hallucination” will not answer its turn; at best, not in one out of a dozen commonly alleged instances of spectral apparitions. For the sake of that noble faculty of our souls, the imagination, we are not ashamed to confess, that we take greater pleasure in hearing of one story of the sort which defies the attempt of a probable natural solution, than twenty of which the physician or moralist may pique himself upon being able to finish the explanation. There is too much philosophy stirring in our days, and has been for this last century at least; too much for the free indulgence of our poetical power. Nay, we are not sure but we may call the whole world at present a world of accountants and botanists, with at least as much justice as Bonaparte used to call this nation a nation of shopkeepers. We cordially wish, for the happiness of the rising generation, that some things at least may still remain unexplained for their forces to work upon.
Let us not, however, be misunderstood, lest in our zeal for the interests of the imagination, we may be conceived to turn rebels to the established empire of reason. That the last wish we expressed may be carried into effect as far as we have any power or influence, we will leave our own opinions in that enviable state of mys-
