Supreme Being." Miss Blank married Sir Martin Beresford. One day she appeared at breakfast with a pale face, and a black band round her wrist. Long afterwards, on her deathbed, she explained that this band covered shrunken sinews. The ghost of Lord Tyrone, at the hour of his death, had appeared to her, had prophesied (correctly) her future, and had touched her wrist by way of a sign.

"He struck my wrist; his hand was as cold as marble; in a moment the sinews shrank up, every nerve withered. . . . I bound a piece of black ribbon round my wrist." The black ribbon was formerly in the possession of Lady Betty Cobb, who, during her long life, was ever ready to attest the truth of this. narration, as are, to the present hour, the whole of the Tyrone and Beresford families.

Nothing would induce me to dispute the accuracy of a report vouched for by Lady Betty Cobb and all the Tyrones and Beresfords. But I must be permitted to point out that Lord Tyrone merely did what many ghosts had done before in that matter of touching Lady Beresford's wrist. Thus, according to Henry More, one (bogie) "took a relation of Melanchthon's by the hand, and so scorched her that she bore the mark of it to her dying day." Before Melanchthon the anecdote was "improved " by Eudes de Shirton in a sermon. According to Eudes, a certain clerk, Serlon, made with a friend the covenant which Miss Blank made with Lord Tyrone. The survivor was to bring news of the next world. Well, the friend died, and punctually appeared to Serlon, "in a parchment cloak, covered with the finest writing in the world." Being asked how he fared, he said that this cloak, a punishment for his love of Logic, weighed heavier than lead, and scorched like the shirt of Nessus. Then he held out his hand and let fall a drop which burned Serlon to the bone

"And evermore that Master wore
A covering on his wrist."

Before Eudes de Shirton, William of Malmesbury knew this anecdote, which he dates about 1060-1063, and localizes in Nantes. His characters are "two clerks," an Epicurean and a Platonist, who made the usual contract that the first to die should appear to the survivor, and state whether Plato's ideas or "Epicurus his were the correct reply to the conundrum of the universe.

atoms

The visit was to be paid within thirty days of the death. One of the philosophical pair was killed, a month passed, no news of him came. Then, when the other expected nothing less, and was busy with some ordinary matter, the dead man suddenly stood before him. The spectre explained that he had been unable to keep his appointment earlier; and, stretching out his hand, let fall three burning drops of blood, which branded, not the wrist, but the brow of the psychical inquirer. The anecdote recurs later, and is attached by certain commentators on Dante to one Siger de Brabant. Now this legend may be true about Lady Beresford, or about William of Malmesbury's two clerks, or about Siger de Brabant, or about Serlon; but the same facts of a compact, the punctual appearance of the survivor, and the physical sign which he gave, can scarcely have occurred more than once. I am inclined, therefore, to believe that the narrative vouched for by two noble families is accurate, and that the tales of William of Malmesbury, Henry More, Eudes de Shirton, and Siger de Brabant are myths

"Or such refraction of events
As often rises ere they rise."

From "The Comparative Study of Ghost Stories. »

THE

CELEBRATED LITERARY FORGERIES

HE most famous forgeries of the eighteenth century were those of Macpherson, Chatterton, and Ireland.

Space (fortu

nately) does not permit a discussion of the Ossianic question. That fragments of Ossianic legend (if not of Ossianic poetry) survive in oral Gaelic traditions, seems certain. How much Macpherson knew of these, and how little he used them in the bombastic prose which Napoleon loved (and spelled "Ocean ") it is next to impossible to discover. The case of Chatterton is too well known to need much more than mention. The most extraordinary poet for his years who ever lived began with the forgery of a sham feudal pedigree for Mr. Bergum, a pewterer. Ireland started on his career in much the same way, unless Ireland's "Confessions" be themselves a fraud, based on what he knew about Chatterton. Once launched in his career, Chatterton drew endless stores of poetry from "Rowley's MS." and the muni

an

ment chest in St. Mary Redcliff's. Jacob Bryant believed in them and wrote "Apology" for the credulous. Bryant, who believed in his own system of mythology, might have believed in anything. When Chatterton sent his "discoveries" to Walpole (himself somewhat of a mediæval imitator), Gray and Mason detected the imposture, and Walpole, his feelings as an antiquary injured, took no more notice of the boy. Chatterton's death was due to his precocity. Had his genius come to him later, it would have found him wiser and better able to command the fatal demon of intellect, for which he had to find work, like Michael Scott in the legend.

The end of the eighteenth century, which had been puzzled or diverted by the Chatterton and Macpherson frauds, witnessed also the great and famous Shakespearean forgeries. We shall never know the exact truth about the fabrication of the Shakespearean documents, and "Vortigern," and the other plays. We have, indeed, the confession of the culprit; habemus confitentem reum, but Mr. W. H. Ireland was a liar and a solicitor's clerk, so versatile and accomplished that we cannot always believe him, even when he is narrating the tale of his own iniquities. The temporary, but wide and turbulent success of the Ireland forgeries suggests the disagreeable reflection that criticism and learning are (or a hundred years ago were) worth very little as literary touchstones. A polished and learned society, a society devoted to Shakespeare and to the stage, was taken in by a boy of eighteen. Young Ireland not only palmed off his sham documents, most makeshift imitations of the antique, but even his ridiculous verse on the experts. James Boswell went down on his knees and thanked Heaven for the sight of them; and feeling thirsty after these devotions, drank hot brandy and water. Dr. Parr was as readily gulled, and probably the experts, like Malone, who held aloof, were as much influenced by jealousy as by science. The whole story of young Ireland's forgeries is not only too long to be told here, but forms the topic of a novel, "The Talk of the Town," on which Mr. James Payn is at present engaged. The frauds are not likely in his hands to lose either their humor or their complicated interest of plot. To be brief, then, Mr. Samuel Ireland was a gentleman extremely fond of old literature and old books. If we may trust the "Confessions" (1805) of his candid son, Mr. W. H. Ireland, a more harmless and confiding old person than Samuel never collected early English tracts.

Living in his learned society, his son, Mr. W. H. Ireland, acquired not only a passion for black letters, but a desire to emulate Chatterton. His first step in guilt was the forgery of an autograph on an old pamphlet, with which he gratified Samuel Ireland. He also wrote a sham inscription on a modern bust of Cromwell, which he presented as an authentic antique. Finding that the critics were taken in, and attributed this new bust to the old sculptor Simon, Ireland conceived a very low and not unjustifiable opinion of critical tact. Critics would find merit in anything which seemed old enough. Ireland's next achievement was the forgery of some legal documents concerning Shakespeare. Just as the bad man who deceived the guileless Mr. Shapira, forged his Deuteronomy on the blank spaces of old synagogue rolls, so young Ireland used the cut-off ends of old rent rolls. He next bought up quantities of old fly-leaves of books, and on this ancient paper he indited a sham confession of faith, which he attributed to Shakespeare. Being a strong "evangelical," young Mr. Ireland gave a very Protestant complexion to this edifying document. And still the critics gaped and wondered and believed. Ireland's method was to write in an ink made by blending various liquids used in the marbling of paper for bookbinding. This stuff was supplied to him by a bookbinder's apprentice. When people asked questions as to whence all the new Shakespeare manuscripts came, he said they were presented to him by a gentleman who wished to remain anonymous. Finally, the impossibility of producing this gentleman was one of the causes of the detection of the fraud. According to himself, Ireland performed prodigies of acuteness. Once he had forged, at random, the name of a contemporary of Shakespeare. He was confronted with a genuine signature, which, of course, was quite different. He obtained leave to consult his "anonymous gentleman," rushed home, forged the name on the model of what had been shown to him, and returned with this signature as a new gift from his benefactor. That nameless friend had informed him that there were two persons of the same name, and that both signatures were genuine. Ireland's impudence went the length of introducing an ancestor of his own, with the same name as himself, among the companions of Shakespeare. If "Vortigern" had succeeded (and it was actually put on the stage with all possible pomp), Ireland meant to have produced a series of pseudo-Shakespearean plays from William the Conqueror to Queen Elizabeth. When

busy with "Vortigern" he was detected by a friend of his own age, who pounced on him while he was at work, as Lasus pounced on Onomacritus. The discoverer, however, consented to "stand in" with Ireland, and did not divulge his secret. At last, after the fiasco of "Vortigern," suspicion waxed so strong, and disagreeable inquiries for the anonymous benefactor were so numerous that Ireland fled from his father's house. He confessed all, and, according to his own account, fell under the undying wrath of Samuel Ireland. Any reader of Ireland's "Confessions" will be likely to sympathize with old Samuel as the dupe of his son. whole story is told with a curious mixture of impudence and humor, and with great plausibility. Young Ireland admits that his "desire for laughter" was almost irresistible, when people — learned, pompous, sagacious people listened attentively to the papers. One feels half inclined to forgive the rogue for the sake of his youth, his cleverness, his humor. But the "Confessions" are, not improbably, almost as apocryphal as the original documents. They were written for the sake of money, and it is impossible to say how far the same mercenary motive actuated Ireland in his forgeries. Dr. Ingleby, in his "Shakespeare Fabrications," takes a very rigid view of the conduct, not only of William, but of old Samuel Ireland. Sam, according to Dr. Ingleby, was a partner in the whole imposture, and the "Confessions" was only one element in the scheme of fraud. Old Samuel was the Fagan of a band of young literary Dodgers. He "positively trained his whole family to trade in forgery," and as for Mr. W. H. Ireland, he was "the most accomplished liar that ever lived," which is certainly a distinction in its way. The point of the joke is that, after the whole conspiracy exploded, people were anxious to buy examples of the forgeries. Mr. W. H. Ireland was equal to the occasion. He actually forged his own, or (according to Dr. Ingleby) his father's forgeries, and, by thus increasing the supply, he deluged the market with sham shams, with imitations of imitations. If this accusation be correct, it is impossible not to admire the colossal impudence of Mr. W. H. Ireland. Dr. Ingleby, in the ardor of his honest indignation, pursues William into his private life, which it appears was far from exemplary. But literary criticism should be content with a man's works, his domestic life is matter, as Aristotle often says, "for a separate kind of investigation."