“Strange noises like footsteps, sobbing, whispering, grim laughter, and shrieks were often heard about the house.  On one occasion my eldest sister and a girl cousin drove over to see the family and stayed the night.  They and my two younger sisters were all crowded into a huge, old-fashioned bed, and carefully drew and tucked in the curtains all round.  My eldest sister awoke feeling a cold wind blowing on her face, and putting out her hand found the curtains drawn back and, as they subsequently discovered, wedged between the bed and the wall.  She reached for the match-box, and was about to light the candle when a horrible mocking laugh rang out close to the bed, which awakened the other girls.  Being always a plucky woman, though then badly scared, she struck a match, and searched the room, but nothing was to be seen.  The closed room was said to have been deserted after a murder, and its floor was supposed to be stained with blood which no human power could wash out.”

Another house in Co.  Clare, nearer the estuary of the Shannon, which was formerly the residence of the D——­ family, but is now pulled down, had some extraordinary tales told about it in which facts (if we may use the word) were well supplemented by legend.  To commence with the former.  A lady writes:  “My father and old Mr. D——­ were first cousins.  Richard D——­ asked my father would he come and sit up with him one night, in order to see what might be seen.  Both were particularly sober men.  The annoyances in the house were becoming unbearable.  Mrs. D——­’s work-box used to be thrown down, the table-cloth would be whisked off the table, the fender and fireirons would be hurled about the room, and other similar things would happen.  Mr. D——­ and my father went up to one of the bedrooms, where a big fire was made up.  They searched every part of the room carefully, but nothing uncanny was to be seen or found.  They then placed two candles and a brace of pistols on a small table between them, and waited.  Nothing happened for some time, till all of a sudden a large black dog walked out from under the bed.  Both men fired, and the dog disappeared.  That is all!  The family had to leave the house.”

Now to the blending of fact with fiction, of which we have already spoken:  the intelligent reader can decide in his own mind which is which.  It was said that black magic had been practised in this house at one time, and that in consequence terrible and weird occurrences were quite the order of the day there.  When being cooked, the hens used to scream and the mutton used to bleat in the pot.  Black dogs were seen frequently.  The beds used to be lifted up, and the occupants thereof used to be beaten black and blue, by invisible hands.  One particularly ghoulish tale was told.  It was said that a monk (!) was in love with one of the daughters of the house, who was an exceedingly fat girl.  She died unmarried, and was buried in the family vault.  Some time later the vault was again opened for an interment, and those who entered it found that Miss D——­’s coffin had been disturbed, and the lid loosened.  They then saw that all the fat around her heart had been scooped away.