, 1888-12-09
,pped beating, my jaw dropped, and I

stopped beating, my jaw dropped, and 1
was deadl
During my life 1 had always believed
in a dual existence-a bodily and a spir-
itual one. Now this duality was proven.
My spirit left my body and stopped to
look at the house it had tenanted. With
my spiritual vision l saw my eyes close
and my limbs grow rigid. 1 saw that !
was deadl
my mental faculties remained, but I
had no control of my actions. My spirit
was mysteriously borne from the room,
from the house and from the town. 1
Travelled in mid air and with a velocity
that appalled, me. / cannot describe my
sensations. l cannot say that the wind
rushed into my face, for / had no face.
/ cannot say that my head swan, for /
had no head. And yet / felt that the
wind was blowing cold and wet, and
the awful swiftness of my locomotion
thrilled me with terror. I kept thinking
I'm dead, and where am 1 going? / am
pretty high up, and am devoutly thank
full for it,"
1 had been regarding Campbell with
curiosity as well as suspicion. Some
times i believed that he was manufact-
uring his dream or vision or ghost story
out of whole cloth. l was tempted to
rate him soundly for trying to make a
fool of me, but something in his
AColldllltul mt.
81 was not up too high" he continued,
'to see where l was travelling. 1 was
passing over Albany, for 1 saw the out
line of a building that must have been
the capitol. / continued southwark with
the same awful impetus, passing over
towns that l supposed were Kingston,
Newburg and West Point. I followed
the Hudson until I came to New Jersey,
and went over the interior of that state.
All fhia firnn 7 uyaa Nunn1arfno xrhathar
the atmosphere was peopled by other
spirits than mine. Was mini the only
soul that was destined to travel in this
eccentric fashion? Some of my friends
had died, and, in the awful stiffness and
loneliness of that hour, / longed for their
companionship. But the air was empty,
and only my spirit was astir.
81 changed my course at length and
went westward. l seemed to be crossing
over the state of Pennsylvania. Sud
denly 1 thought / knew where l was
going, and, Bradford, l can give you no
idea of the agony / experienced at the
discovery. l was passing over n dark
country, and beyond me was a hideous
light. / could see no buildings, but |
saw n blaze of fire that filled me with
horror. II wa below me, and as il
belched out in all its lurid intensity !
thought l knew what it was. Man alive!
l thought / was going to hell as fast az
1 could travel, and hat nothing could
save me.
at was not the Internal regions, after
all. 1t was o boosted own of Pitts
burgl The fire that had frightened me
was from the iron foundries, the copper
smelling mills and the oil refineries, for
which the place Is famous. / could feel
the air hot with their fiery breath. l
passed them and q cathedral, and finally
/ reached a suburb of the town. Then !
went slower and lower, and at last
stopped before a dwelling.
"In an upper room n lamp was burn
ing, and a woman's shadow occasionally
fell upon the curtain. l new it was
Mailie Morrison's even before she stopped
at the window and looked out. Brad
ford, 1t was my lass, grown older, but
with the same sweet face that / had last
seen in the Bishops Walk. An instant
later her father jerked the curtains aside
and stood beside her. He was horribly
changed. His eyes were bloodshot, his
face was purple and his form wasted.
He was wholly unlike the strong bodied
politician of Dunblane. For ten years |
had hated him, but this morning l was
touched by his wretched condition. i
was grieved to know / was invisible TO
my lass; but her father saw mel Good
heaveni al | ever forget what wrath
and malice distorted his face at sight of
me? He seemed crazed with rage, and
he beat with his two clinched fists upon
the glass, shivering the pane into thou
sands of bits INT cutting his flesh to the
bone. He was O maniac, and he believed
l was in the flesh, for he tried to reach
me and strange me with his bleeding
hands. Man, mani in his blind and
eager fury he hurled his wretched body
from the window to the ground. i, a
thing of air, could do naught to save
him, and l saw him fall dead before mel
l could not speak to my lass, who also
saw his act; put l was forced to see the
anguish in her white, distracted face.
And while the people came from the
house to carry the dead man in l was
suddenly borne away.
Il returned with even greater swift
ness, and by the same long route by
which / had gone. 1 reached Montreal
before light was fairly here, and entered
the chateau unhindered by windows and
doors. l saw my dead body still lying
with drawn face, closed eyes and fallen
jaw. My spirit seemed to recognize my
body, as its natural home, for in the
twinkling of an eye it entered it again.
My heart began to pulsate, my blood
was flowing and my brain awake. Fer
gus Campbell was in the flesh againi a
II sat up and lighted my lamp. I was
still cold and wet with clammy p~erspira-
ton. The clock was striking Z, and I
remembered that l had been to Pitts
burg and back by an unnecessarily long
route in exactly three hours"
"You certainly made remarkably quick
time" commented, I'D say you'd
been suffering from delirium tremens if
/ was not aware of your temperate nab
its. You had the nightmare, Campbell"
He placed a telegram in my hands.
Read it," he said, eagerly. at came
this evening, and it proves that 1 saw
Morrison die"
The dispatch was from a relative of
Campbells in P%ittsburg. These were its
contents:
Morrison killed himself this morning
by jumping from his window. He has
been mad for years"
We looked at each other In silence.
"By Jovel" / said at last, ''you have
either been telling a ~stupendous lie or
this is q remarkable coincidence"
"It's no lie" he answered, solemnly.
Bradford, it's as true as gospel"
Two years passed before l saw Camp
bell again. he came down the corridor
Of the Windsor hotel, and I could not
fail to notice that his appearance had
ornot1- iu,nrorad IIa ha1 raina1 rnn-