Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1894-01-19
METHOD IN MADNESS.
A CRAZY MAN CAPABLE OF
LITERARY WORK.
A single Cog Misplaced Does Not
Affect the Operation of the Men.
tai Machine Until IL should Fall
In Place.

Thomas Beer. an old man Of distin-
guished appearance who was com.
mitted to the insane asylum at Steil.
accom- lately, has left most remark
able ghost story, written by himself a
few weeks ago, before his insanity took
a violent turn.
Beer is an Englishman, 80 years OF
age, and is said to have considerable
property in British Columbia. He is
a printer by trade, and, although he
has lived in Seattle some time, very
few of the craft are acquainted with
him. He was always distant in his
demeanor and lived by himself. For
some weeks he had been living quietly
at the Merrimac House, in Seattle, but
one night he awoke the other dodgers
by wild cries for help. He could see
the figure of an old, tottering woman
whom he declared, had haunted him
since his boyhood in England. She
would appear at his bedside
while aleep and he could not
shake himself free from the horrible
spell the apparation produced. The
lodgers at the Merrimac, fearing the
old man would harm himself, notified
the police and he was locked up. He
WAS aIraigned in the Superior Court
and there the old man admitted that
he was not in his right mind, and
asked that he be placed where he
could receive medical treatment. In
his early days in England he suffered
from a similar hallucination and was
committed to an asylum.
Little attention was paid to Beer
although his case was \ peculiar one
but since his confinement at Steil
accom- a remarkable document has
been found among his papers, and now
that the old man is insane, reads like
a message from the dead. The doc.
ument, which describes accurately the
spirit of the old, tottering woman that
has been a nightmare to his deranged
mind, is written with pencil on com
mon blank newspaper, and reads al
follows:
A HAUNTED HOUSE.
"The narrative l am about to relate
occurred 40 years ago, when l was 9
boy, and happened in small bourne
in Dovenshire, England. l shall sim
ply endeavor to relate what occurred
without attempting to exaggerate OF
extenuate or aught set down in NAL
ice, as the lawyers say, anything bu
what believe to be fact, pure ant
simple. Neither shall I attempt tt
account for the phenomena or psy
Geological power displayed at thai
time, simply because feel my inabil
ity to explain the same. shall entel
my tale without further apology.
"My mother was a widow, left with
a family of three, two boys and girl
I was the eldest, aged 10 years, brother
was Z years and my sister 4 years
When father died he left the house We
lived in and another house situated
in another part OF the town, and which
we could not let owing to the prevail
ing opinion that the building was
haunted, and so it remained unten.
anted for many years. Broken panef
of glass and other other outward evi'
dences showed that attention had moi
been paid to it, and naturally on this
account alone it would have been hard
to secure tenant. At first, however
the house received all the attention
necessary to keep it in proper repair
but it became known that apparations
were to be seen in and about the prem.
ises at night, consequently stone.
throwing became the order of the day
until we became weary of replacing
the broken panes with new ones and
permitted the building to 90 into de.
cline.
"This state of affairs continued for
some years, and various and weird
we're the reports that reached my
mothers ears, relative to apparitions
strange noises, ETC., that occurred
nightly in the apparently unoccupied
house. 1t was large three-story
stone building, containing some six
teen rooms, while in front OF the house
was garden, the whole intended to
fill the requirements Of a gentleman's
family. Although my mother repeat
ediy offered the premises, house rent
free, to anyone who would be courage
Gus enough to live there, so great wal
the dread Of ghosts (call it superstition
or whatever you willy, that out of a
population OF 5000 people in the town
none would accept the proposition to
make the place their residence.
"The windows in the rear portion
of the house were all broken out, but
the front windows escaped to a greater
extent the missiles thrown by the
street arabs, who invariably wher
passing the house would throw {
stone, give a shout and then take t.
their heels as if the Old Nick had tail
piped them. At the side OF the house
was flight of stone steps. Descending
ninety or more steps, you came int
a garden and here kept several rab
bits which had been given me by al
an old man we always called, Lux
the Laborer,' and who used to fee'
them and attend them generally
Among these rabbits was one littl
fellow OF the purest white with pinl
eyes, a black one, a yellow one, all
other of black and white color and al
immense lop-eared gray. Accom-
panied by the old man l used to visl