Seem’d all on fire, within, around,
      Deep sacristy and altar’s pale
    Shone every pillar, foliage-bound,
      And glimmer’d all the dead men’s mail.

    Blazed battlement and pinnet high,
      Blazed every rose-carved buttress fair;
    So still they blaze when Fate is nigh
      The lordly line of Hugh St. Clair.

But, although the last “Roslin,” as he was called, died in the year 1778, and the estates passed into the possession of the Erskines, Earls of Rosslyn, the old tradition has not been extinguished.  Something of the same kind is described as having happened to the old Cornish family of the Vingoes on their estate of Treville, for “through all time a peculiar token has marked the coming death of one of the family.  Above the deep caverns in the Treville Cliff rises a carn.  On this chains of fire were seen ascending and descending, and oftentimes were accompanied by loud and frightful noises.  But it is reported that these tokens have not taken place since the last male of the family came to a violent end.  According to Mr. Hunt,[42] “tradition tells us this estate was given to an old family who came with the Conqueror to this country.  This ancestor is said to have been the Duke of Normandy’s wine taster, and to have belonged to the ancient Counts of Treville, hence the name of the estate.  For many generations the family has been declining, and the race is now nearly, if not quite, extinct.

In some cases, families have been apprised of an approaching death by some strange spectre, either male or female, a remarkable instance of which occurs in the MS. memoirs of Lady Fanshaw, and is to this effect:  “Her husband, Sir Richard, and she, chanced, during their abode in Ireland, to visit a friend, who resided in his ancient baronial castle surrounded with a moat.  At midnight she was awakened by a ghastly and supernatural scream, and, looking out of bed, beheld by the moonlight a female face and part of the form hovering at the window.  The face was that of a young and rather handsome woman, but pale; and the hair, which was reddish, was loose and dishevelled.  This apparition continued to exhibit itself for some time, and then vanished with two shrieks, similar to that which had at first excited Lady Fanshaw’s attention.  In the morning, with infinite terror, she communicated to her host what had happened, and found him prepared not only to credit, but to account for, what had happened.

“A near relation of mine,” said he, “expired last night in the castle.  Before such an event happens in this family and castle, the female spectre whom you have seen is always visible.  She is believed to be the spirit of a woman of inferior rank, whom one of my ancestors degraded himself by marrying, and whom afterwards, to expiate the dishonour done his family, he caused to be drowned in the castle moat.”