returned to life, only to expire in reality some ten hours later from the shock and from the injuries which had been inflicted upon her. Another case which is of particular interest as having occurred in Moravia, where the belief in vampires is particularly strong, is that of the postmaster in a small town who, as it was thought, died in a fit of epilepsy. About a year afterwards it became necessary to disinter some of the bodies from the graveyard in order to enlarge one of the transepts of the parish church, and the dreadful fact was revealed that the unfortunate postmaster must have been buried whilst still alive, a discovery which so horrified the physician who had signed the death certificate that he lost his reason.
In the chancel of S. Giles, Cripplegate, there is still to be seen a monument sacred to the memory of Constance Whitney, whose many virtues are described in somewhat rhetorical fashion upon a marble tablet. A figure above this scroll represents the lady in the act of rising from her coffin. This might be taken to be a beautiful symbolism, but such is not the case, for it represents an actual circumstance. The unfortunate lady had been buried while in a condition of suspended animation, and consciousness returned to her when the sexton opened the coffin and desecrated the body in order to steal a valuable ring which had been left upon one of her fingers.[72] In former years when the rifling of tombs and body-snatching were by no means an infrequent practice, many similar cases came to light, and there can be no doubt that no inconsiderable proportion of persons were buried in a state of trance or catalepsy.
The story of Gabrielle de Launay, a lady whose cause was tried before the High Court of Paris, about 1760, caused a profound sensation throughout the whole of France. When eighteen years of age Gabrielle, the daughter of M. de Launay, the President of the Civil Tribunal of Toulouse, was betrothed to Captain Maurice de Serres. Unhappily the latter was suddenly ordered abroad to the Indies on active service. The President, fearing that his child might die in a foreign land, refused to allow the marriage to be celebrated immediately so that she might accompany her husband under his protection. The lovers parted heart-broken, and in about two years’ time news reached France of the gallant young soldier’s death.
