' Then they
thoroughly overhauled the ship, and on discovering half a dozen bottles
of rum and a small cask of water stowed away in the skipper's cabin,
they threw him overboard and pelted him with empty bottles till he sank;
after which they cleared the deck and danced till sunset.

"Two nights later, when they were all lying on the deck near the
companion way, licking their parched lips and commiserating with
themselves on the prospect of their gradually approaching end--for they
had abandoned all idea of the rat poison--they suddenly saw a hideous,
seaweedy object rise up over the bulwarks on the leeward side of the
ship. In breathless expectation they all sat up and watched. Inch by
inch it rose, until they saw before them a tall form enveloped from head
to foot in green slime, and horribly suggestive of the well-known figure
of the murdered captain. Gliding noiselessly over the deck, it shook its
hands menacingly at each of the sailors, until it came to the
cabin-boy--the only one among them who had not participated in the
skipper's death--when it touched him gently on the forehead, and,
stooping down, appeared to whisper something in his ears. It then
recrossed the deck, and, mounting the bulwarks, leaped into the sea.

"For some seconds no one stirred; and then, as if under the influence of
some hypnotic spell, one by one, each of the crew, with the exception of
the cabin-boy, got up, and, marching in Indian file to the spot where
the apparition had vanished, flung themselves overboard. The last of the
procession had barely disappeared from view, when the cabin-boy, whose
agony of mind during this infernal tragedy cannot be described, fell
into a heavy stupor, from which he did not awake till morning. In the
meanwhile the brig, owing to a stiff breeze that had arisen in the
night, was freed from its environment, and was drifting away from the
seaweed. It went on and on, day after day, and day after day, till it
was eventually sighted by a steamer and taken in tow. The cabin-boy, by
this time barely alive, was nursed with the tenderest care, and, owing
to the assiduous attention bestowed on him, he completely recovered."

I think this story, though naturally ridiculed and discredited by some,
may be unreservedly accepted by those whose knowledge and experience of
the occult warrant their belief in it.

Along the coast of Brittany are many haunted spots, none more so than
the "Bay of the Departed," where, in the