to say that every family has a ghost in its records.
Sometimes it is a ghost of the living, sometimes of the dead; but there
are few who, if they inquire among their relatives, will not find one or
more instances of apparitions, which, however small their evidential
credentials, are implicitly accepted as genuine by those who witnessed
them. In taking the Census of Hallucinations I made inquiry of an old
schoolfellow of mine, who, after I came to Wimbledon, was minister of
the Congregational Church in that suburb. He subsequently removed to
Portsmouth, where I found him with his father one morning, on the
occasion of the laying of the foundation-stone of the new Sunday school.
On mentioning the subject of the Census of Ghosts, the Rev. Mr. Talbot,
senior, mentioned a very remarkable apparition which, unlike most
apparitions, appeared in time to save the life of its owner.

_How a Double Saved a Life._

The Rev. Mr. Talbot, the father of my late pastor, gave me the following
account of the apparition:--

"My mother had an extraordinary power of foreseeing and also of seeing
visions. Of her premonitions and dreams I could give you many instances;
but as that is not the point at present, I will give you the narrative
of her other faculty, that of seeing spiritual or phantasmal forms which
were not visible to others. We were sitting at tea one evening when my
mother suddenly exclaimed, 'Dear me, Mrs. Lister is coming up the path,
with her handkerchief to her eyes as if crying, on her way to the door.
What can have brought her out at this time? There seems to be something
the matter with her head. I will go to the door and let her in.' So
saying, my mother arose and went to the front door, where she firmly
expected to find Mrs. Lister. None of the rest of us had seen Mrs.
Lister come up the path, but as our attention might have been occupied
in another direction we did not think anything of it. To my mother's
astonishment, when she reached the door Mrs. Lister was not visible. She
came back into the room much disturbed. 'There is something the matter
with Mrs. Lister,' she said. 'I am certain there is. Yoke the horse and
we will drive over at once to the Listers' house'--which stood about one
mile from our place--'and see what is the matter.'

"My father, knowing from of old that mother had reason for what she
said, yoked the horse and drove off with my mother as rapidly as
possible to Lister's house. When they arrived