y many opportunities, and that gentleman availed
himself of them with his usual tact.

In the evening they sat round the great fire, and Mr. Raby mulled and
spiced red wine by a family receipt, in a large silver saucepan; and
they sipped the hot and generous beverage, and told stories and
legends, the custom of the house on Christmas night. Mr. Raby was an
inexhaustible repertory of ghost-stories and popular legends. But I
select one that was told by Mr. Coventry, and told with a certain easy
grace that gave it no little interest.

MR. COVENTRY'S TALE.

"When I was quite a child, there was a very old woman living in our
village, that used to frighten me with her goggle eyes, and muttering.
She passed for a witch, I think; and when she died--I was eight years
old then--old people put their heads together, and told strange stories
about her early life. It seems that this Molly Slater was away in
service at Bollington, a village half way between our place and
Hillsborough, and her fellow-servants used to quiz her because she had
no sweetheart. At last, she told them to wait till next Hilisboro' fair,
and they should see. And just before the fair, she reminded them of
their sneers, and said she would not come home without a sweetheart,
though she took the Evil one himself. For all that, she did leave the
fair alone. But, as she trudged home in the dark, a man overtook her,
and made acquaintance with her. He was a pleasant fellow, and told her
his name was William Easton. Of course she could not see his face very
well, but he had a wonderfully sweet voice. After that night, he used to
court her, and sing to her, but always in the dark. He never would face
a candle, though he was challenged to more than once. One night there
was a terrible noise heard--it is described as if a number of men were
threshing out corn upon the roof--and Molly Slater was found wedged in
between the bed and the wall, in a place where there was scarcely room
to put your hand. Several strong men tried to extricate her by force;
but both the bed and the woman's body resisted so strangely that,
at last, they thought it best to send for the parson. He was a great
scholar, and himself under some suspicion of knowing more than it would
be good for any less pious person to know. Well, the parson came, and
took a candle that was burning, and held it to the place where poor
Molly was imprisoned, and moaning; and they say he turned pale, and
shivered, f