Page:Cornish feasts and folk-lore.djvu/111

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Legends of Parishes, etc. 99 ported in Mr. Dodge's arms ; but he soon revived, and they took him home, although it was some days before his reason recovered from the shock. A much fuller account of this may be found in the History of Polperro, by Mr. T. Q. Couch. It has also been published by Mr. Robert Hunt in his Popular Romances of the West of England. The Rev. R. S. Hawker, in his Footprints of Former Men in Far Cornwall, gives some very interesting extracts from the "Diurnal" of one Parson Rudall, of Launceston, who in 1665, with the sanction of his Bishop, laid the Botathen ghost — the spirit of a young woman by name Dorothy Dinglet, who could not rest in her grave — " Unquiet because of a certain sin." It is a very well-known fact that the Rev. John Wesley was a firm believer in supernatural agencies ; he compiled a book of ghost-stories, that was lent to me when I was about ten years old by a kind but ignorant woman, the reading of which caused me many sleepless nights. " On one occasion Wesley could, when at St. Agnes, find no place to pass the night save a house which had the reputation of being haunted. However, he was not deterred ; he entered and went to bed. But he could not rest, for there was a terrible tumult below ; the sound of carriages was heard, the noise of feet, and fearful oaths. At length he could bear it no longer ; he descended, and then found the large hall filled with guests. They greeted him with loud welcome, and begged him to be seated. He consented, saying, however, that he must say grace first. This remark was hailed with roars of laughter. Nothing daunted he began — "Jesus, the Name high over all." He did not finish ; in a moment the lights were ex- tinguished, he was alone, and from that time the house was no more haunted. — Through Rev. S. Rundle. Clergymen in Cornwall are still supposed to be able to drive out evil spirits. A poor, half-crazed woman, yet living in Madron parish, near Penzance, went about ten years since to the house of a clergyman then residing there, and asked him to walk around her, reading some passages from the Bible, to exorcise the ghost of her dead sister, who had entered into her, she said, and torment- ed her in the shape of a small fl}', which continually buzzed in