Morris tribune., 1882-12-07
TRUE PREsENTIEIENTS.

How Very Sensitive People Have Been
Known TO Foretell the Manner OF
Their Death.
From Ali the Year Round.
~ feel as I were fated to die on this
beautiful river" said young English
actress, as she talked to a oomrade on
the deck of 8 Hudson river steamboat.
A week later, going from Albany to New
York on the Oregon, che was suddenly
taken ill, and died off West Point, On the
most beautiful part of the river she 20
much admired. Other players have had
presentiments justified by the event, or
the author "Thirty years in Gotham" to
whom we stand indebted for the follow
ing histronic examples, sadly deceives
us:
An American actor named Chapman,
who WIS also a dramatist in a modest
sort of way, found it is 50 difh:uIt to ar
range the details of piece which he
called ''The Mail Robbers" exactly to
his mind, that he observed to a friend
that the play would be the death OF
him. A day or two afterward he rode
out of town to survey the surroundings
of the place where he had laid the chief
scene of the drama, and was thrown
from bis horse escaping with bruised
shoulder. Congratulating him upon
coming off SO lightly, his friend joked
him about his presentiment, but the
actor was not to be laughed out of his
notion, and persisted that his words
would yet come true. And 50 they did,
though in somewhat roundabout way.
In part he was then playing Chapman
bad to wear q suit of brass armor, and
the night being very hot, he discarded
his underclothing altogether, The ar
NOR chahns the bruised shoulder some
verdigris got into the wound and pois-
oned it, and of that poisoning he died.
Fulfill your engagements like SEN
s:ble creature" WIS the well meant adj
vice OF lille. louisette's con6dante,
when that tight-rops dancer coUsulted
herup the advisability Of cancelingan
agreement to appear at the Volks Thea
ire in New York, for no better reason
than that she had presentiment the
engagement would prove fatal one.
Sure enough it was So Her first appear
ance was her last. She went through
the performance without hitch. but as
she Tss stepping from the cross-trees to
the stage, her gauzy dress caught fire at
the footlights, and before help reached
her was so badly burned thet medical
skill was Of no avail.
There is nothing reoulsive about q
gold watch, yet when Sheppard the act
or took one from his mothers hand, as
her birthday gift, he shuddered, with
out knowing why, except that he felt it
was destined to bring his misfortune.
He wore it, however out ofrespect forthe
civ fnr flOr1
thing unpleasant becoming of it. One
night, when he vas playing at the Ma
tional Thester. Philadelphia the house
took fire, while he was on the stage.
Sheppard got safely into the street, and
then remembered that his watch was in
the dressing-room; unwilling to lose the
memento Of his dead mother, he went
back to the theater, and was never seen
alive again. His charred body was found
the next day under the gas-pipes; the
iateftll watch was in his
pocket. The actors presentineEt
in tardiness of fulfliment resembled
that which troubled Mrs Brownrigg.
As the execUtioner was doing the last
Office save one for the wretched woman,
al expression Of horror came over her
face, causing the clergyman to ask what
new temptation assailed her. 81 have
place and always when near this spot 0
ground q dreadful horror eiezed ne, for
fear that some day or other, l should
come to be hanged, and the recollection
terrifles me exceedingly"
Well aware of her deserving, it was no
wonder if the apprsntice-torturer had q
bad quarter Of an hour whenever she
came within hail Of Tyburn Tree; her
prophetic fears were born of q coward
conscience. Such was not the case with
the honest miner, who, talking to his
wife of the dangerous character of the
seam he was working, said, "Hennie,
Pm feared if there should be an explo-
sion I'll be knocked about worst" This
fear impelled him the next night, when
the dread of something happening was
strong upon him. to return home once
and again after startling for the pit, only
to shake off the feeling and 20 to his
work and his death.
Ter who was killed by the fall of rock
in 4 Stafordsflire mine, his wife deposed
that the night before the accident Der
husband woke, complaining that he had a
ton OF rock upan his head: and SO sure was
he Of some III Detailing him that it was
only by dint OF much coaxing that she
persuaded him to go to work. Before
leaving the house, he bent down to his
child, saying. LET me have my last
kiss" To make the story still stranger,
it came out in evidence that the news of
the poor fellows death had hardly
reached his home, when a cousin, much
attached to him, looked in to inquire for
him. impelled to do so by seeing, or
thinking he saw, the dead man standing
before him in the roadway.