Night-Side of Nature; Or, Ghosts and Ghost-Seers — Chapter 15 - Apparitions Seeking the Prayers of the Living (Part 2)

The following particulars are worth observing, in the evidence of a girl sixteen years of age, called Margaret Laibesberg, who was confined for ten days for plucking some grapes in a vineyard.

She says she knew nothing about the spectre, but that she was greatly alarmed the first night at hearing the door burst open and something come shuffling in.

Eslinger bade her not fear, and said that it would not injure her.

The girl, however, being greatly terrified every night, and hiding her head under the bed-clothes, on the fourth Eslinger got out of her own bed, and, coming to her, said: “Do, in the name of God, look at him!

He will do you no harm, I assure you.

”—“Then,” says the girl, “I looked out from under the clothes, and I saw two white forms, like two lambs—so beautiful that I could have looked at them for ever.

Between them stood a white, shadowy form, as tall as a man, but I was not able to look longer, for my eyes failed me.

” The terrors of this girl were so great, that Eslinger had repeatedly occasion to get out of bed and fetch her to lie with herself.

When she could be induced to look, she always saw the figure, and he bade her also pray for him.

Whenever he touched her, which he did on the forehead and eyes, she felt pain, but says nothing of any subsequent swelling.

Both this girl and another, called Neidhardt, who was brought in on the last day of Margaret L——’s imprisonment, testified that on the previous night they had heard Eslinger ask the ghost why he looked so angry; and that they had heard him answer that it was “because she had on the preceding night neglected to pray for him as much as usual,” which neglect arose from two gentlemen having passed the night in the cell.

When on the tenth day the girl Margaret L—— was released, she said that there was something so awful to her in this apparition, that she had firmly resolved and vowed to be pious and lead henceforth a virtuous life.

Some of them seem to have felt little alarm; Maria Bar, aged forty-one, said: “I was not afraid, for I have a good conscience.

” The offences for which these women were confined appear to have been very slight ones, such as quarrelling, &c. In a room that opened into the same passage, men were shut up for disputing with the police, neglect of regulations, and similar misdemeanors.

These persons not only heard the noises as above described, such as the walking, shuffling, opening and shutting the door, &c. , &c. , but some of them saw the ghost.

Christian Bauer deposed that he had never heard anything about the ghost, but that, being disturbed by a knocking and rustling toward three o’clock on the second morning of his incarceration, he looked up and saw a white figure bending over him, and heard a strange hollow voice say: “You must needs have patience!

” He said he thought it must be his grandfather, at which Stricker, his companion, laughed.

Stricker deposed that he heard a hollow voice say: “You must needs have patience;” and that Bauer told him that there was a white apparition near him, and that he supposed it was his grandfather.

Bauer said that he was frightened the first night, but got used to it and did not mind.

It is worthy of observation, that when they heard the door of the women’s room open, they also heard the voice of Eslinger praying, which seems as if the door not only appeared to open, but actually did so.

We have already seen that this spirit could open doors.

In the “Seeress of Prevorst,” the doors were constantly _audibly_ and _visibly_ opened, as by an unseen hand, when she saw a spectre enter; and I know to an absolute certainty that the same phenomenon takes place in a house not far from where I am writing; and this, sometimes, when there are two people sleeping in the room—a lady and gentleman.

The door having been fast locked when they went to bed, the room thoroughly examined, and every precaution taken—for they are unwilling to believe in the spiritual character of the disturbances that annoy them—they are aroused by a consciousness that it is opening, and they do find it open, on rising to investigate the fact.

One of the most remarkable proofs, either of the force of volition or of the electrical powers of the apparition that haunted Eslinger, or else of his power to imitate sounds, was the real, or apparent, violent shaking of the heavy, iron-barred window, which it is asserted the united efforts of six men could not shake at all when they made the experiment.

The supreme court having satisfied itself that there was no imposture in this case, it was proposed that some men of science should be invited to investigate the strange phenomenon, and endeavor if possible to explain it.

Accordingly, not only Dr. Kerner himself and his son, but many others, passed nights in the prison for this purpose.

Among these, besides some ministers of the Lutheran church, there was an engraver called Duttenhofer; Wagner, an artist; Kapff, professor of mathematics at Heilbroun; Frass, a barrister; Doctors Seyffer and Sicherer, physicians; Heyd, a magistrate; Baron von Hugel, &c. , &c. : but their perquisitions elicited no more than has been already narrated—all heard the noises, most of them saw the lights, and some saw the figure.

Duttenhofer and Kapff saw it without a defined outline; it was itself bright, but did not illuminate the room.

Some of the sounds appeared to them like the discharging of a Leyden jar.

There was also a throwing of gravel, and a heavy dropping of water, but neither to be found.

Professor Kapff says that he was quite cool and self-possessed, till there was such a violent concussion of the heavy, barred window, that he thought it must have come in; then both he and Duttenhofer felt horror-struck.

As they could not see the light emitted by the spectre when the room was otherwise lighted, they were in the dark; but they took every care to ascertain that Eslinger was in her bed while these things were going on.

She prayed aloud the whole time, unless when speaking to them.

By the morning, she used to be dreadfully exhausted, from this continual exertion.

It is also mentioned that the straw on which she lay was frequently changed and examined, and every means taken to ascertain that there was nothing whatever in her possession that could enable her to perform any sort of jugglery.

Her fellow-prisoners were also invited to tell all they knew or could discover; and a remission of their sentences promised to those who would make known the imposition, if there was one.

Dr. Sicherer, who was accompanied by Mr. Frass, says that, having heard of these phenomena, which he thought the more unaccountable from the circumstances of the woman’s age and condition, &c. —she being a healthy, hard-working person, aged thirty-eight, who had never known sickness—he was very desirous of inquiring personally into the affair.

While they were in the court of the prison, waiting for admittance, they heard extraordinary noises, which could not be accounted for, and during the night there was a repetition of those above described—especially the apparent throwing of gravel, or peas, which seemed to fall so near him that he involuntarily covered his face.

Then followed the feeling of a cool wind; and then the oppressive odor, for which, he says, he can find no comparison, and which almost took away his breath.

He was perfectly satisfied that it was no smell originating in the locality or the state of the prison.

Simultaneously with the perception of this odor, he saw a thick, gray cloud, of no defined shape, near Eslinger’s bed.

When this cloud disappeared, the odor was no longer perceptible.

It was a fine moonlight night, and there was light enough in the room to distinguish the beds, &c. The same phenomena recurred several times during the night: Eslinger was heard, each time the ghost was there, praying and reciting hymns.

They also heard her say, “Don’t press my hands so hard together!

”—“Don’t touch me!

” &c. The voice of the spirit they did not hear.

Toward three or four o’clock, they heard heavy blows, footsteps, opening and shutting of the door, and a concussion of the whole house, that made them think it was going to fall on their heads.

About six o’clock, they saw the phantom again; and altogether these phenomena recurred at least ten times in the course of the night.

Dr. Sicherer concludes by saying that he had undertaken the investigation with a mind entirely unprepossessed; and that in the report he made, at the desire of the supreme court, he had recorded his observations as conscientiously as if he had been upon a jury.

He adds that he had examined everything; and that neither in the person of the woman, nor in any other of the inmates of the prison, could he find the smallest grounds for suspicion, nor any clew to the mystery, which, in a scientific point of view, appeared to him utterly inexplicable.

Dr. Sicherer’s report is dated Heilbronn, January 8, 1836. Mr. Fraas, who accompanied him, confirms the above statement in every particular, with the addition that he several times saw a light, of a varying circumference, moving about the room; and that it was while he saw this, that the woman told him the ghost was there.

He also felt an oppression of the breath and a pressure on his forehead each time before the apparition came, especially once, when, although he had carefully abstained from mentioning his sensations, she told him it was standing close at his head.

He stretched out his hand, but perceived nothing, except a cool wind and an overpowering smell.

Dr. Seyffer being there one night, with Dr. Kerner, in order to exclude the possibility of light entering through the window, they stopped it up.

They, however, saw the phosphorescent light of the spectre, as before.

It moved quietly about, and remained a quarter of an hour.

The room was otherwise perfectly dark; the sounds accompanying it were like the dropping of water and the discharge of a Leyden jar.

They fully ascertained that these phenomena did not proceed from the woman.

I have already given the depositions of Madame Mayer, the wife of the deputy-governor or keeper of the prison, who is spoken of as a highly respectable person.

Mayer himself, however, though quite unable to account for all these extraordinary proceedings, found great difficulty in believing that there was anything supernatural in the affair; and he told Eslinger that, if she wished him to be convinced, she must send the ghost to do it!

He says: “The night after I had said this, I went to bed and to sleep, little expecting such a visiter; but, toward midnight, I was awakened by something touching my left elbow.

This was followed by a pain; and in the morning, when I looked at the place, I saw several blue spots.

I

told Eslinger that this was not enough, and that she must tell the ghost to touch my other elbow.

This was done on the following night, and, at the same time, I perceived a smell like putrefaction.

The blue spots followed.

” (It will be remembered that Eslinger had blue spots also.

) Mayer continues to say that the spectre made known its presence in his chamber by various sounds, such as were heard in the other part of the house.

He never saw the figure distinctly, but his wife did: she always prayed when it was there.

He, however, felt the cool wind that they all described.

The ghost told Eslinger that he should continue his visits to the prison after she had quitted it, and he did so.

The second night after her release, they felt his approach, especially from the cool wind, and Madame Mayer desired him to testify his presence to her husband.

Immediately there were sounds like a wind-instrument, and these were repeated at her desire.

The prisoners also heard and felt the apparition after Eslinger’s departure; and Mayer says he is perfectly assured that in this jail, where the inmates were frequently changed, everybody was locked up, and every place thoroughly examined, it was utterly impossible for any trick to be played: besides which, all parties agreed that the sounds were often of a description that could not have been produced by any known means.

But it was not to the prison alone that this apparition confined his visits.

To whomsoever Eslinger sent him, he went—testifying his presence by the same signs as above described.

He visited the chambers of several of the magistrates, of a teacher named Neuffer, of the referendary burgher, of a citizen named Rummel, and many others.

Of these, some only perceived his presence by the noises, the cool air, the smell, or the touch; others saw the light also, and others perceived the figure with more or less distinctness.

A Mr. Dorr, of Heilbronn, seems to have scoffed very much at these rumors, and Dr. Kerner bade Eslinger ask the ghost to convince him, which she did.

Mr. Dorr says: “When I heard these things talked of, I always laughed at them, and was thought very sensible for so doing.

Now I shall be laughed at in my turn, no doubt.

” He then relates that, on the morning of the 30th of December, 1835, he awoke, as usual, about five o’clock, and was thinking of some business he had in hand, when he became conscious that there was something near him, and he felt as if it blew cold upon him.

He started up, thinking some animal had got into his room, but could find nothing.

Next he heard a noise, like sparks from an electrical machine, and then a report close to his right ear.

Had there been anything visible, it was light enough to see it.

This report was frequently heard in the prison.

Wherever the apparition once made a visit, he generally continued to go for several successive nights.

He also visited Professor Kapff at Heilbronn, and Baron von Hugel at Eschenau, without being desired to do so by Eslinger; and Neuffer, whom he also went to, she knew nothing of.

When he visited Dr. Kerner’s chamber, his wife, who had prided herself on her incredulity, and boasted of being born on St. Thomas’s day, was entirely converted, for she not only heard him, but saw him distinctly.

He visited them for several nights, accompanied by the noises and the light.

One night, while lying awake observing these phenomena, they fancied they heard their horse come out of his stable, which was under their room.

In the morning, he was found standing outside, with his halter on;

it was not broken, and it was evident that the horse had not got loose by any violence.

Moreover, the door of the stable was closed behind him, as it had been at night when he was shut up.

Dr. Kerner’s sister, who came from a distance to visit them, had heard very little about this affair, yet she was awakened by a sound that seemed like some one trying to speak into her ear; and, looking up, she saw two stars, like those described by Margaret Laibesberg.

She observed that they emitted no rays.

She also felt the cool air, and perceived the corpse-like odor.

This odor accompanied the ghost even when it appeared at Heilbronn.

It is remarkable that some of these persons, both men and women, felt themselves unable to move or call out while the spectre was there, and that they were relieved the moment he went away.

They appeared to be magnetized; but this feeling was by no means universal.

Many were perfectly composed and self-possessed the whole time, and made their observations to each other.

All agreed that the speaking of the apparition seemed like that of a person making efforts to speak.

Now, as we are to presume that he did not speak by means of organs, as we do, but that he imitated the sounds of words as he imitated other sounds, by some means with which we are unacquainted—for since the noises were heard by everybody within hearing, we must suppose that they actually existed—we, who know the extreme difficulty of imitating human speech, may conceive how this imitation should be very defective.

Dutthenhofer and others remarked that there was no echo from the sounds, as well as that the phosphorescence shed no light around; and though the spectre could touch _them_, or produce the sensation that he did, they could not feel _him_: but, as in all similar cases, could thrust their hands through what appeared to be his body.

The sensation of his falling tears, and the marks they left, seem most unaccountable; and yet, in the records of a ghost that haunted the countess of Eberstein, in 1685, we find the same thing asserted.

This account was made public by the authority of the consistorial court, and with the consent of the family.

At length, on the 11th of February, the ghost took his departure from Eslinger; at least, after that day he was no more seen or heard by her or anybody else.

He had always entreated her to go to Wimmenthal, where he had formerly lived, to pray for him; and, after she was released from the jail, by the advice of her friends, she did it.

Some of them accompanied her, and they saw the apparition near her while she was kneeling in the open air, though not all with equal distinctness.

A very respectable woman, called Wörner—a stranger to Eslinger, whom she says she never saw or spoke to till that day—offered to make oath that she had accompanied her to Wimmenthal, and that, with the other friends, she had stood about thirty paces off, quite silent and still, while the woman knelt and prayed; and that she had seen the apparition of a man, accompanied by two smaller spectres, hovering near her.

“When the prayer was ended, he went close to her, and there was a light like a falling star; then I saw something like a white cloud, that seemed to float away: and after that, we saw no more.

” Eslinger had been very unwilling to undertake this expedition: she took leave of her children before she started, and evidently expected mischief would befall her; and now, on approaching her, they found her lying cold and insensible.

When they had revived her, she told them that, on bidding her farewell, before he ascended—which he did, accompanied by two bright infantine forms—the ghost had asked her to give him her hand; and that, after wrapping it in her handkerchief, she had complied.

“A small flame had arisen from the handkerchief when he touched it; and we found the marks of his fingers like burns, but without any smell.

” This, however, was not the cause of her fainting;

but she had been terrified by a troop of frightful animals that she saw rush past her, when the spirit floated away.

From this time, nobody, either in the prison or out of it, was troubled with this apparition.

This is certainly a very extraordinary story; and what is more extraordinary, such cases do not seem to be very uncommon in Germany.

I

meet with many recorded: and an eminent German scholar of my acquaintance tells me that he has also heard of several, and was surprised that we have no similar instances here.

If these things occurred merely among the Roman catholics, we might be inclined to suppose that they had some connection with their notion of purgatory: but, on the contrary, it appears to be among the Lutheran population they chiefly occur—insomuch that it has even been suggested that the omission of prayers for the dead, in the Lutheran church, is the cause of the phenomenon.

But, on the other hand, as in the present case, and in several others, the person that revisits the earth was of the catholic persuasion when alive, we are bound to suppose that he had the benefit of his own church’s prayers.

I am here assuming that all the above strange phenomena were really produced by the agency of an apparition.

If they were not, what were they?

The three physicians, who were among the visiters, must have been perfectly aware of the contagious nature of some forms of nervous disorder, and from the previous incredulity of two of them, they must have been quite prepared to regard these phenomena from that point of view; yet they seem unable to bring them under the category of sensuous illusions.

The apparently electrical nature of the lights, and of several of the sounds, is very remarkable, as are also the swellings produced on some of the persons by the touch of the ghost, which remind us of Professor Hofer’s case, mentioned in a former chapter.

The apparition of the dog and the lambs also, strange as they are, are by no means isolated cases.

These appearances seem to be symbolical: the father had been evil, and had led his son to do evil, and he appeared in the degraded form of a dog; and the innocence of the children, who had been, probably, in some way wronged, was symbolized by their appearing as lambs.

“If I had lived as a beast,” said an apparition to the Seeress of Provorst, “I should appear as a beast.

” These symbolical transfigurations can not appear very extravagant to those who accept the belief of many theologians, that the serpent of the garden of Eden was an evil spirit incarnated in that degraded form.

How for the removal of the horse out of the stable was connected with the rest of the phenomena, it is impossible to say; but a similar circumstance has very lately occurred with regard to a dog that was locked up in the house in this neighborhood, which I have several times alluded to, where footsteps and rustlings are heard, doors are opened, and a feeling that some one is blowing or breathing upon them is felt by the inhabitants.

The holes burnt in the handkerchief are also quite in accordance with many other relations of the kind, especially that of the maid of Orlach, and also that of the Hammerschan family, mentioned in “Stilling’s Pneumatology,” when a ghost who had been, as he said, waiting one hundred and twenty years for some one to release him by their prayers, was seen to take a handkerchief, on which he left the marks of his five fingers, appearing like burnt spots.

A bible that he touched was marked in the same manner; and these two mementoes of the apparition were carefully retained in the family.

This particularity, also, reminds us of Lord Tyrone’s leaving the marks of his hand on Lady Beresord’s wrist, on which she ever afterward wore a black riband.

In several instances I find it reported that when an apparition is requested to render himself visible to, or to enter into communication with, other persons besides those to whom he addresses himself, he answers that it is impossible;

and in other cases, that he could do it, but that the consequences to those persons would be pernicious.

This, together with the circumstance of their waiting so long for the right person, tends strongly to support the hypothesis that an intense magnetic rapport is necessary to any facility of intercourse.

It also appears that the power of establishing this rapport with one or more persons, varies exceedingly among these denizens of a spiritual world, some being only able to render themselves audible, others to render themselves visible to one person, while a few seem to possess considerably greater powers or privileges.

Another particular to be observed is, that in many instances, if not in all, these spirits are what the Germans call _gebannt_, that is, _banned_, or _proscribed_, or, as it were, _tethered_ to a certain spot, which they can occasionally leave, as Anton did the cellar at Wimmenthal, to which he was _gebannt_, but from which they can not free themselves.

To this spot they seem to be attached, as by an invisible chain, whether by the memory of a crime committed there, or by a buried treasure, or even by its being the receptacle of their own bodies.

In short, it seems perfectly clear, admitting them to be apparitions of the dead, that, whatever the bond may be that keeps them down, they can not quit the earth; they are, as St. Martin says, _remainers_, not _returners_, and this seems to be the explanation of haunted houses.

In the year 1827, Christian Eisengrun, a respectable citizen of Neckarsteinach, was visited by a ghost of the above kind, and the particulars were judically recorded.

He was at Eherbach, in Baden, working as a potter, which was his trade, in the manufactory of Mr. Gehrig, when he was one night awakened by a noise in his chamber, and, on looking up, he saw a faint light, which presently assumed a human form, attired in a loose gown; he could see no head.

He had his own head under the clothes; but it presently spoke, and told him that he was destined to release it, and for that purpose he must go to the catholic churchyard of Neckarsteinach, and there, for twenty-one successive days, repeat the following verse from the New Testament, before the stone sepulchre there:— “For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him?

So, the things of God knoweth no man, but the spirit of God.

”—1 Cor.

ii.

11. The ghost having repeated his visits and his request, the man consulted his master what he should do, and he advised him not to trifle with the apparition, but to do what he required, adding that he had known many similar instances.

Upon this, Eisengrun went to Neckarsteinach, and addressed himself to the catholic priest there, named Seitz, who gave him the same counsel, together with his blessing and also a hymn of Luther’s, which he bade him learn and repeat, as well as the verse, when he visited the sepulchre.

As there was only one stone sepulchre in the churchyard, Eisengrun had no difficulty in finding it; and while he performed the service imposed on him by the ghost, the latter stood on the grave with his hands folded as if in prayer; but when he repeated the hymn, he moved rapidly backward and forward, but still not overstepping the limits of the stone.

The man, though very frightened, persevered in the thing for the time imposed, twenty-one days; and during this period he saw the perfect form of the apparition, which had no covering on its head except very white hair.

It always kept its hands folded, and had large eyes, in which he never perceived any motion; this filled him with horror.

Many persons went to witness the ceremony.

The surviving nephews and nieces of the apparition brought an action against Eisengrun, and they contrived to have him seized and carried to the magistrate’s house, one day, at the time he should have gone to the churchyard.

But the ghost came and beckoned, and made signs to him to follow him, till the man was so much affected and terrified that he burst into tears.

The two magistrates could not see the spectre, but feeling themselves affected with a cold shudder, they consented to his going.

He was then publicly examined in court, together with the offended family and a number of witnesses; and the result was, that he was permitted to continue the service for the twenty-one days, after which he never saw or heard more of the ghost, who had been formerly a rich timber-merchant.

The terror and anxiety attendant on these daily visits to the churchyard, affected Eisengrun so much, that it was some time before he recovered his usual health.

He had all his life been a ghost-seer, but had never had communication with any before this event.

The catholic priest, in this instance, appears to have been more liberal than the deceased timber-merchant, for the latter did not seem to like the Lutheran hymn which the former prescribed.

His dissatisfaction, however, may have arisen from their making any addition to the formula he had himself indicated.

----- [5] It is to be observed that this is the sensation asserted to be felt by Reichenbach’s patients on the approach of the magnet.