to remove the pole he would withdraw it, and laugh heartily.  A caretaker in the place named Philip Coughlan used frequently to be visited by this apparition.  He came generally about supper time, and while Coughlan and his wife were seated at table he would shove the pole through the window; Coughlan would beg him to go away and not interfere with a poor hard-worked man; the pole would then be withdrawn, with a hearty laugh from the ghost.

In the Parish Church of Ardtrea, near Cookstown, is a marble monument and inscription in memory of Thomas Meredith, D.D., who had been a Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, and for six years rector of the parish.  He died, according to the words of the inscription, on 2nd May 1819, as a result of “a sudden and awful visitation.”  A local legend explains this “visitation,” by stating that a ghost haunted the rectory, the visits of which had caused his family and servants to leave the house.  The rector had tried to shoot it but failed; then he was told to use a silver bullet; he did so, and next morning was found dead at his hall-door while a hideous object like a devil made horrid noises out of any window the servant man approached.  This man was advised by some Roman Catholic neighbours to get the priest, who would “lay” the thing.  The priest arrived, and with the help of a jar of whisky the ghost became quite civil, till the last glass in the jar, which the priest was about to empty out for himself, whereupon the ghost or devil made himself as thin and long as a Lough Neagh eel, and slipped himself into the jar to get the last drops.  But the priest put the cork into its place and hammered it in, and, making the sign of the Cross on it, he had the evil thing secured.  It was buried in the cellar of the rectory, where on some nights it can still be heard calling to be let out.

A story of a phantom rat, which comes from Limerick, is only one of many which show the popular Irish belief in hauntings by various animals.  Many years ago, the legend runs, a young man was making frantic and unacceptable love to a girl.  At last, one day when he was following her in the street, she turned on him and, pointing to a rat which some boys had just killed, said, “I’d as soon marry that rat as you.”  He took her cruel words so much to heart that he pined away and died.  After his death the girl was haunted at night by a rat, and in spite of the constant watch of her mother and sisters she was more than once bitten.  The priest was called in and could do nothing, so she determined to emigrate.  A coasting vessel was about to start for Queenstown, and her friends, collecting what money they could, managed to get her on board.  The ship had just cast off from the quay, when shouts and screams were heard up the street.  The crowd scattered, and a huge rat with fiery eyes galloped down to the quay.  It sat upon the edge screaming hate, sprang off, and did not reappear.  After that, we are told, the girl was never again haunted.