January, 1854.
The house was on a spur of the hill, three or four hundred yards under
the only road, with which it communicated by a "bridle path," never
used by horsemen. That path ended in a precipice; a footpath led into
the bridle path from Mr. Barter's house.

One evening Mr. Barter had a visit from a Mr. and Mrs. Deane, who
stayed till near eleven o'clock. There was a full moon, and Mr.
Barter walked to the bridle path with his friends, who climbed it to
join the road. He loitered with two dogs, smoking a cigar, and just
as he turned to go home, he heard a horse's hoofs coming down the
bridle path. At a bend of the path a tall hat came into view, then
round the corner, the wearer of the hat, who rode a pony and was
attended by two native grooms. "At this time the two dogs came, and
crouching at my side, gave low frightened whimpers. The moon was at
the full, a tropical moon, so bright that you could see to read a
newspaper by its light, and I saw the party above me advance as
plainly as if it were noon-day; they were above me some eight or ten
feet on the bridle road. . . . On the party came, . . . and now I had
better describe them. The rider was in full dinner dress, with white
waistcoat and a tall chimney-pot hat, and he sat on a powerful hill
pony (dark-brown, with black mane and tail) in a listless sort of way,
the reins hanging loosely from both hands." Grooms led the pony and
supported the rider. Mr. Barter, knowing that there was no place they
could go to but his own house, cried "Quon hai?" (who is it?), adding
in English, "Hullo, what the devil do you want here?" The group
halted, the rider gathered up the reins with both hands, and turning,
showed Mr. Barter the known features of the late Lieutenant B.

He was very pale, the face was a dead man's face, he was stouter than
when Mr. Barter knew him and he wore _a dark Newgate fringe_.

Mr. Barter dashed up the bank, the earth thrown up in making the
bridle path crumbled under him, he fell, scrambled on, reached the
bridle path where the group had stopped, and found nobody. Mr. Barter
ran up the path for a hundred yards, as nobody could go _down_ it
except over a precipice, and neither heard nor saw anything. His dogs
did not accompany him.

Next day Mr. Barter gently led his friend Deane to talk of Lieutenant
B., who said that the lieutenant "grew very bloated before his death,
and while on the sick list he allowed the fringe to grow in