New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1873-01-19
UNDER THE FOAM.

1t Is not every one who possesses the
power to commune with the dead. 1t is
true that Spiritualists hold some such doc
trine; that there is hidden life in which
the disembodied and corporeal essences
known as human souls have the faculty of
intercourse. Be that as it may, it is certain
that some persons are so constituted as to
excite in this way strange influences in
their fellows.
An illustration of this theory or fact can
be obtained by visit to person in New
Orleans known as the
Priestess of the voudous.
She lives in quiet little alley running
out from Marais street. Overhung by old
tumble down buildings, redolent with evil
dences of decay. The green moss OF nearly
half a century covers the roofs and the
castings, the windows and the door steps
reek with accumulated damps. Now and
then on sunshiny days few struggling rays
of light penetrate the gloomy alley with
Intellectual attempts to make visible the sur
rouudings. But dusk and gloom are the
prevailing characteristics of the place.
The first glance into this desolate-looking,
out of -the way abode would chill the be-
holder with d. sort of superstitious awe.
The supernatural seems to have stamped
it with an indellible impression. But this
feeling is doubly enhanced when, on enter
ing the low doorway, the visitor is ushered
into the presence of weird, mysterious
looking being, hollow eyed and hollow.
checked, with long, struggling elf-locks,
and form attenuated to the verge of ema,
cia ton. 1t is a woman surely. But the
presence discloses none of the tender attri-
butes and softer traits Of the sex. The looks
are repellant, and few nerves are capable
of withstanding the fierce glowing light
that seems to leap and fash out of the hol-
low eyes.
The room is scantily furnished. few
some coarse prints are all. A chintz eur
tain hides a doorway leading into an ad-
joining room; but into this apartment no
visitor has ever entered 1t is sacred to
incarnation, and, as the supersttious be-
Heve, to the association of evil spirits.
DOulS years SlHC0 lulS WOnldu vi DIS ulauG
the medium of q strange revelation. A
young lady had died in her neighborhood
under peculiar circumstances. She was be-
trothed, and shortly to have been married.
Apparently enjoying the most perfect
health, she retired to her room at night, and
was found dead in the morning. The physi-
clans said it was not a natural death. Some
sudden shock, some terrible blow, some fear
full CONFUSION of the mind, snapped the
springs of life. What was it, The cham
Der had been perfectly secured before the
lady retired, and revealed nothing out of
place in the morning. No one but herself
had entered it-no one had left it. Yet the
victim lay there stark and stiff, scared to
death. Surrounded with the furniture and
belongings she had been accustomed to
from infancy, it was impossible to conceive
the cause of her fright.
The terrible blow almost shattered her
mothers reason. An only child she could
not realize the fact Of her death, and en-
treated that she might not be buried at
once. 1t may have been that faint of
suspicion in her mind induced her to visit
the voudou priestess and ask her advice.
At any rate, she did so. AS she entered
the door the woman said to her:
81 know why you have comes Your
daughter is not dead. Let her not be
buried she will revive on Wednesday,"
Confirmed in her hopes the mother fastened
back 60 her residence to find the prepare
tions for the funeral already far advanced.
She protested and entreated in vain. They
buried the girl despite all the mother could
say to the contrary.
A week afterward, however-the We'd
nesday named by the voudou-the mother
was allowed to visit the tomb, and at her
request the vault was opened. Suddenly
the sound of loud shrieks broke upon the
ear, and tearing open the coffin the mother
clasped her frantic child in her arms. She
had just come in time-an hour later and
the young lady would have fallen victim
to the terrible fate of the buried alive, How
did the voudou know it2