s
so covered with blots as to fully answer the description in the
narrative above. It is noteworthy, also, that Lady Russell had no
comfort in her sons by her first husband. Her youngest son, a
posthumous child, caused her special trouble, insomuch so that she
wrote to her brother-in-law, Lord Burleigh, for advice how to treat
him. This may have been, it has been suggested, the unfortunate boy
who was flogged to death, though he seems to have lived to near man's
estate. Lady Russell was buried at Bisham, by the remains of her first
husband, Sir Thomas Hoby, and her portrait may still be seen,
representing her in widow's weeds and with a very pale face.

A mysterious crime is traditionally reported to have, some years ago,
taken place at the old parsonage at Market, or East Lavington, near
Devizes--now pulled down. The ghost of the lady supposed to have been
murdered haunted the locality, and it has been said a child came to an
untimely end in the house. "Previous to the year 1818," writes a
correspondent of _Notes and Queries_, "a witness states his father
occupied the house, and writes that 'in that year on Feast Day, being
left alone in the house, I went to my room. It was the one with marks
of blood on the floor. I distinctly saw a white figure glide into the
room. It went round by the washstand near the bed and disappeared!'"
It may be added that part of the road leading from Market Lavington to
Easterton which skirts the grounds of Fiddington House, used to be
looked upon as haunted by a lady who was locally known as the
"Easterton ghost." But in the year 1869 a wall was built round the
roadside of the pond, and curiously close to the spot where the lady
had been in the habit of appearing two skeletons were disturbed--one
of a woman, the other of a child. The bones were buried in the
churchyard, and no ghost, it is said, has since been seen. It would
seem, also, that blood stains, wherever they may fall, are equally
indelible; and even to this day the New Forest peasant believes that
the marl he digs is still red with the blood of his ancient foes, the
Danes, a form of superstition which we find existing in various
places.

For very many years the road from Reigate to Dorking, leading through
a lonely lane into the village of Buckland, was haunted by a local
spectre known as the "Buckland Shag," generally supposed to have been
connected with a love tragedy. In the most lonely part of this lane a
stream of clear