In the year 1704, a gentleman, to all appearance of large
fortune, took furnished lodgings in a house in Soho-square. After he had
resided there some weeks with his establishment, he lost his brother, who had
lived at Hampstead, and who on his death-bed particularly desired to be
interred in the family vault in Westminster Abbey. The gentleman requested his
landlord to permit him to bring the corpse of his brother to his lodgings, and
to make arrangements there for the funeral. The landlord without hesitation
signified his compliance.
The body, dressed in a white shroud, was accordingly brought
in a very handsome coffin, and placed in the great dining-room. The funeral was
to take place the next day, and the lodger and his servants went out to make
the necessary preparations for the solemnity. He stayed out late ; but this was
no uncommon thing. The landlord and his family, conceiving that they had no
occasion to wait for him, retired to bed as usual, about twelve o'clock. One
maid-servant was left up to let him in, and to boil some water, which he had
desired might be ready for making tea on his return. The girl was accordingly
sitting all alone in the kitchen, when a tall, spectre-looking figure entered,
and clapped itself down in a chair opposite to her.
The maid was by no means one of the most timid of her sex;
but she was terrified beyond expression, lonely as she was, at this unexpected apparition. Uttering a loud
scream, she flew out like an arrow at a side door, and hurried to the chamber
of her master and mistress. Scarcely had she awakened them, and communicated to
the whole family some portion of the fright with which she was herself
overwhelmed, when the spectre, enveloped in a shroud and with a face of
death-like paleness, made its appearance, and sat down in a chair in the
bedroom, without their having observed how it entered. The worst of all was,
that this chair stood by the door of the bed chamber, so that not a creature
could get away without passing close to the apparition, which rolled its
glaring eyes so frightfully, and so hideously distorted its features, that they
could not bear to look at it. The master and mistress crept under the
bed clothes, covered with profuse perspiration, while the maid-servant sunk
nearly insensible by the side of the bed.
At the same time the whole house seemed to be in an uproar;
for though they had covered themselves over head and ears, they could still
hear the incessant noise and clatter, which served to increase their terror.
At length all became perfectly still in the house. The
landlord ventured to raise his head, and to steal a glance at the chair by the
door; but behold, the ghost was gone! Sober reason began to resume its power.
The poor girl was brought to herself after a good deal of shaking. In a short
time, they plucked up sufficient courage to quit the bedroom, and to commence
an examination of the house; which they expected to find in great disorder. Nor
were their anticipations unfounded. The whole house had been stripped by artful
thieves, and the gentleman had decamped without paying for his lodging. It
turned out that he was no other than an accomplice of the notorious Arthur Chambers, who was executed at Tyburn in
1706; and that the supposed corpse was this arch rogue himself, who had
whitened his hands and face with chalk, and merely counterfeited death. About
midnight he quieted the coffin, and appeared to the maid in the kitchen. When
she flew up stairs, he softly followed her, and, seated at the door of the chamber,
he acted as a sentinel, so that his industrious accomplices were enabled to
plunder the house without the least molestation.
