but through a desire to obtain natural temperate
heat and moisture from the animals they killed; that they disliked the
sun's rays; and that they attained a great age.

Of all the kinds of demons we have heard of, the most loathsome are
the vampires. Horst speaks of a vampire as a "dead body which
continues to live in the grave, which it leaves, however, by night for
the purpose of sucking the blood of the living, whereby it is
nourished and preserved in good condition, instead of becoming
decomposed like other dead bodies." Fischer, who believed there were
vampires, informs us that the bite of a vampire left no mark upon the
person, but that the bite speedily proved fatal, unless counteracted
by the injured person eating some of the earth from the vampire's
grave, and smearing himself with his blood. These precautions had only
a temporary effect, if at all successful; for the bitten victim,
sooner or later, became a vampire himself--died and was buried, but
continued to follow the examples of old vampires in nourishing
themselves, infecting others, and propagating vampirism.

Down to the middle of the last century there was a belief in vampirism
in the east of Europe. This form of superstition created much anxiety
in the public mind, none knowing when he might be bitten by one of
those hated demons, and be thereby transformed into a vampire. Men of
science bore testimony in favour of vampirism with seeming
truthfulness and ability, worthy of a better subject.

In England every man was supposed to have his "double" or "fetch." The
appearance of a fetch created great uneasiness in the mind of the
person witnessing the apparition. It was taken as foreboding death or
serious calamity to the being represented.

There were also churchyard ghosts in England, whose duty it was to
watch bodies over which church rites had not been performed after
violent death. In Scotland and England there were peculiar
superstitious views concerning the souls of suicides. Authoritative
decrees prohibited graveyard gates being opened to permit the bodies
of such persons being carried through them for interment. If relations
persisted in depositing the remains of a friend who had committed
suicide, it was necessary for them to take the dead body over the
graveyard wall after sunset. But in most cases the bodies of suicides
and murderers were buried at a "cross road," with a stake driven
through the corpse, to prevent its ghost rising to fri