orth, and arrived at the haunted spot.
The spectre stood in his path, and, raising his stick, he struck it
with all his strength, but it made no impression, nor did the goblin
move. The stick fell as upon a blanket--so the man described it--and
he instantly became sober, while a cold tremor ran through every nerve
of his athletic frame.

He hurried on, and the spectre followed. At length he arrived at his
own door; then, and not till then, did the spectre vanish, leaving the
affrighted man in a state of complete exhaustion upon the threshold of
his cottage. He was carried to his bed, and from that bed he never
rose again; he died in a week."

Similarly, there is a romantic old legend connected with Kilburn
Priory, to the effect that there was formerly, not far distant, a
stone of dark red colour, which was said to be the stain of the blood
of St. Gervase de Mertoun. The story goes that Stephen de Mertoun,
being enamoured of his brother's wife, made immoral overtures to her,
which she threatened to make known to Sir Gervase, to prevent which
disclosure Stephen resolved to waylay his brother and slay him. By a
strange coincidence, the identical stone on which his murdered body
had expired formed a part of his tomb, and the eye of the murderer
resting upon it, adds the legend, blood was seen to issue from it.
Struck with horror at this sight, Stephen de Mertoun hastened to the
Bishop of London, and making confession of his guilt, demised his
property to the Priory of Kilburn.

In the same way the Cornishman knows, from the red, filmy growth on
the brook pebbles, that blood has been shed--a popular belief still
firmly credited. Some years ago a Cornish gentleman was cruelly
murdered, and his body thrown into a brook; but ever since that day
the stones in this brook are said to be spotted with gore--a
phenomenon which had never occurred previously. And, according to
another strange Cornish belief told of St. Denis's blood, it is
related that at the very time when his decapitation took place in
Paris, blood fell on the churchyard of St. Denis. It is further said
that these blood stains are specially visible when a calamity of any
kind is near at hand; and before the breaking out of the plague, it is
said the stains of the blood of St. Denis were seen; and, "during our
wars with the Dutch, the defeat of the English fleet was foretold by
the rain of gore in this remote and sequestered place."

It is also a common notion th