family Bible was
thrown upside down into the ashes. For three weeks, however, the spirits
ceased operations during the lying-in of Mrs. Mompesson. But they
sedulously avoided the family servants, especially when those retainers
happened to be armed with swords. Well they might, for we are told that
on one occasion, after a pistol shot had been fired at the place where
they were heard, blood was found on the spot. In another instance,
according to Mr. Mompesson's own account, there were seen figures, "in
the shape of Men, who, as soon as a Gun was discharg'd, would shuffle
away together into an Arbour."

It is clear enough that a somewhat clumsy fraud was being imposed upon
Mr. Mompesson. A contemporary writer tells us he was told that it was
done by "two Young Women in the House with a design to scare thence Mr.
Mompesson's Mother."[29] From other sources it is quite certain that the
injured drummer had a hand in the affair. A very similar game had been
played at Woodstock in 1649, and formed a comedy situation of which
Scott makes brilliant use in his novel of that name. Indeed, it is quite
possible that the drummer, who had been a soldier of Cromwell's, was
inspired by a memory of that affair.

But there was no one to detect the fraud, as at Woodstock. Tedworth
became a Mecca for those interested in the supernatural. One of the
visitors was Joseph Glanvill, at this time a young man of twenty-seven,
later to become a member of the Royal Society and chaplain in ordinary
to the king. The spirits were less noisy; they were always somewhat
restrained before visitors, but scratched on bed sheets and panted in
dog fashion, till Glanvill was thoroughly taken in. For the rest of his
life this psychic experimenter fought a literary war over this case with
those who made fun of it. While we cannot prove it, we may guess with
some confidence that this episode was the beginning of the special
interest in the supernatural upon Glanvill's part which was later to
make him the arch-defender of the witchcraft superstition in his
generation.

How wide an interest the matter evoked may be judged from the warm
discussions upon it at Cambridge, and from the royal interest in it
which induced Charles to send down a committee of investigation.
Curiously enough, the spirits were singularly and most extraordinarily
quiet when the royal investigators were at work, a fact to which
delighted skeptics pointed with satisfaction.

One wonders t