ards the hour of noon, to a mountain, which appeared to be their
place of rendezvous. Some one in the neighborhood bolder than the
rest, having guarded himself with the sign of the cross, approached
one of these armed men, conjuring him in the name of God to declare
the meaning of this army, and their design. The soldier or phantom
replied, "We are not what you imagine; we are neither vain phantoms,
nor true soldiers; we are the spirits of those who were killed on this
spot a long time ago. The arms and horses which you behold are the
instruments of our punishment, as they were of our sins. We are all on
fire, though you can see nothing about us which appears inflamed." It
is said that they remarked in this company the Count Emico, who had
been killed a few years before, and who declared that he might be
extricated from that state by alms and prayers.

Trithemius, in his _Annales Hirsauginses_, year 1013,[486] asserts
that there was seen in broad day, on a certain day in the year, an
army of cavalry and infantry, which came down from a mountain and
ranged themselves on a neighboring plain. They were spoken to and
conjured to speak, and they declared themselves to be the spirits of
those who a few years before had been killed, with arms in their
hands, in that same spot.

The same Trithemius relates elsewhere[487] the apparition of the Count
of Spanheim, deceased a little while before, who appeared in the
fields with his pack of hounds. This count spoke to his cure, and
asked his prayers.

Vipert, Archdeacon of the Church of Toul, cotemporary author of the
Life of the holy Pope Leo IX., who died 1059, relates[488] that, some
years before the death of this holy pope, an infinite multitude of
persons, habited in white, was seen to pass by the town of Narni,
advancing from the eastern side. This troop defiled from the morning
until three in the afternoon, but towards evening it notably
diminished. At this sight all the population of the town of Narni
mounted upon the walls, fearing they might be hostile troops, and saw
them defile with extreme surprise.

One burgher, more resolute than the others, went out of the town, and
having observed in the crowd a man of his acquaintance, called to him
by name, and asked him the meaning of this multitude of travelers: he
replied, "We are spirits which not having yet expiated all our sins,
and not being as yet sufficiently pure to enter the kingdom of heaven,
we are going into hol