ving to him that no one is
with such perfect veneration and respect as his very humble, and very
obedient servant, L. de Beloz, ci-devant Captain in the regiment of
his Serene Highness the late Prince Alexander of Wirtemberg, and his
Aid-de-Camp, and at this time first Captain of grenadiers in the
regiment of Monsieur the Baron Trenck."

Footnotes:

[473] There is reason to believe that this is only a repetition of
what has already been said in Chapter X.

CHAPTER XV.

ANOTHER LETTER ON GHOSTS.

In order to omit nothing which can throw light on this matter, I shall
insert here the letter of a very honest man, who is well informed
respecting ghosts. This letter was written to a relation.

"You wish, my dear cousin, to be exactly informed of what takes place
in Hungary concerning ghosts who cause the death of many people in
that country. I can write to you learnedly upon it, for I have been
several years in those quarters, and I am naturally curious. I have
heard in my lifetime an infinite number of stories, true, or pretended
to be such, concerning spirits and sorceries, but out of a thousand I
have hardly believed a single one. We cannot be too circumspect on
this point without running the risk of being duped. Nevertheless,
there are certain facts so well attested that one cannot help
believing them. As to the ghosts of Hungary, the thing takes place in
this manner: A person finds himself attacked with languor, loses his
appetite, grows visibly thinner, and, at the end of eight or ten days,
sometimes a fortnight, dies, without fever, or any other symptom than
thinness and drying up of the blood.

"They say in that country that it is a ghost which attaches itself to
such a person and sucks his blood. Of those who are attacked by this
malady the greater part think they see a white spectre which follows
them everywhere as the shadow follows the body. When we were quartered
among the Wallachians, in the ban of Temeswar, two horsemen of the
company in which I was cornet, died of this malady, and several
others, who also were attacked by it, would have died in the same
manner, if a corporal of our company had not put a stop to the
disorder by employing the remedy used by the people of the country in
such case. It is very remarkable, and although infallible, I never
read it in any ritual. This is it:--

"They choose a boy young enough to be certain that he is innocent of
any impurity; they place him on an