“It is on this account that the miserly dead wander at night in the neighborhood of the treasures they conceal during their life time.  They keep a strict watch over their gold; but the trouble they give themselves, far from being of service to them, turns to their disadvantage; and it is not a rare thing at all to come upon money buried in the ground on digging in a place haunted by a ghost.  In the same way deceased husbands come by night to harass their wives who have made a second matrimonial venture, and I could easily name several who have kept a better watch over their wives since death than they ever did while living.

“That sort of thing is blameworthy, for in all fairness the dead have no business to stir up jealousies.  Still I do but tell you what I have observed myself.  It is a matter to take into account if one marries a widow.  Besides, the tale I have told you is vouchsafed for in the manner following: 

“The morning after that extraordinary night Catherine Fontaine was discovered dead in her chamber.  And the beadle attached to St. Eulalie found in the copper bowl used for the collection a gold ring with two clasped hands.  Besides, I’m not the kind of man to make jokes.  Suppose we order another bottle of wine?...”

What Was It?

BY FITZ-JAMES O’BRIEN

It is, I confess, with considerable diffidence, that I approach the strange narrative which I am about to relate.  The events which I purpose detailing are of so extraordinary a character that I am quite prepared to meet with an unusual amount of incredulity and scorn.  I accept all such beforehand.  I have, I trust, the literary courage to face unbelief.  I have, after mature consideration resolved to narrate, in as simple and straightforward a manner as I can compass, some facts that passed under my observation, in the month of July last, and which, in the annals of the mysteries of physical science, are wholly unparalleled.

I live at No. ——­ Twenty-sixth Street, in New York.  The house is in some respects a curious one.  It has enjoyed for the last two years the reputation of being haunted.  It is a large and stately residence, surrounded by what was once a garden, but which is now only a green enclosure used for bleaching clothes.  The dry basin of what has been a fountain, and a few fruit trees ragged and unpruned, indicate that this spot in past days was a pleasant, shady retreat, filled with fruits and flowers and the sweet murmur of waters.

The house is very spacious.  A hall of noble size leads to a large spiral staircase winding through its center, while the various apartments are of imposing dimensions.  It was built some fifteen or twenty years since by Mr. A——­, the well-known New York merchant, who five years ago threw the commercial world into convulsions by a stupendous bank fraud.  Mr. A——­, as everyone knows, escaped to Europe, and died not long after, of a broken heart.