ions of Mr. Stead and
the late Lord Bute. "Alas! poor ghost!" he is treated with scorn
and derision by the multitude in these advanced days of modern
enlightenment. The search-light of science has penetrated even
into his sacred haunts, until, no longer having a leg to stand
upon, he has fallen from the exalted position he occupied for
centuries, and fallen moreover into ridicule!

In the secret chamber, however, we have something tangible to deal
with--a subject not only keenly interesting from an antiquarian
point of view, but one deserving the attention of the general
reader; for in exploring the gloomy hiding-holes, concealed
apartments, passages, and staircases in our old halls and manor
houses we probe, as it were, into the very groundwork of romance.
We find actuality to support the weird and mysterious stories
of fiction, which those of us who are honest enough to admit
a lingering love of the marvellous must now doubly appreciate,
from the fact that our school-day impressions of such things
are not only revived, but are strengthened with the semblance
of truth. Truly Bishop Copleston wrote: "If the things we hear
told be avowedly fictitious, and yet curious or affecting or
entertaining, we may indeed admire the author of the fiction, and
may take pleasure in contemplating the exercise of his skill. But
this is a pleasure of another kind--a pleasure wholly distinct from
that which is derived from discovering what was _unknown_, or
clearing up what was _doubtful_. And even when the narrative
is in its own nature, such as to please us and to engage our
attention, how, greatly is the interest increased if we place
entire confidence in its _truth_! Who has not heard from
a child when listening to a tale of deep interest--who has not
often heard the artless and eager question, 'Is it true?'"

From Horace Walpole, Mrs. Radcliffe, Scott, Victor Hugo, Dumas,
Lytton, Ainsworth, Le Fanu, and Mrs. Henry Wood, down to the
latest up-to-date novelists of to-day, the secret chamber (an
ingenious _necessity_ of the "good old times") has afforded
invaluable "property"--indeed, in many instances the whole vitality
of a plot is, like its ingenious opening, hinged upon the masked
wall, behind which lay concealed what hidden mysteries, what
undreamed-of revelations! The thread of the story, like Fair
Rosamond's silken clue, leads up to and at length reveals the
buried secret, and (unlike the above comparison in this instance)
a