r to the corp,'
about these and other related phenomena, a groan, a smack on the
nose from a viewless hand, and so forth. In October Briggs saw
Harris, about twilight in the morning. Later, at eight o'clock in
the morning, he was busy in the field with Bailey, aforesaid, when
Harris passed and vanished: Bailey saw nothing. At half-past nine,
the spectre returned, and leaned on a railing: Briggs vainly tried
to make Bailey see him. Briggs now crossed the fence, and walked
some hundreds of yards with Harris, telling him that his will was
disputed. Harris bade Briggs go to his aforesaid brother James, and
remind him of a conversation they had held, 'on the east side of the
wheat-stacks,' on the day when Harris's fatal illness began. James
remembered the conversation, and said he would fulfil his brother's
desire which he actually did. There was a later interview between
Briggs and Harris, the matter then discussed Briggs declined to
impart to the court, and the court overruled the question. 'He had
never related to any person the last conversation, and never would.'

Bailey was sworn, and deposed that Briggs had called his attention
to Harris, whom _he_ could not see, had climbed the fence, and
walked for some distance, 'apparently in deep conversation with some
person. Witness saw no one.'

It is plain that the ghost never really understood the legal
question at issue. The dates are difficult to reconcile. Thomas
Harris died in 1790. His ghost appeared in 1791. Why was there no
trial of the case till 'about 1798 or 1799'? Perhaps research in
the Maryland records would elucidate these and other questions; we
do but give the tale, with such authority as it possesses. Possibly
it is an elaborate hoax, played off by Nicholson, the plaintiffs'
counsel, on the correspondent of The Opera Glass, or by him on the
editor of that periodical.

The hallucinations of Briggs, which were fortunate enough, it is
said, to get into a court of justice, singularly resemble those of
M. Bezuel, in July and August, 1697, though these were not matter of
a sworn deposition. The evidence is in Histoire d'une Apparition
Arrivee a Valogne. {267} The narrator of 1708, having heard much
talk of the affair, was invited to meet Bezuel, a priest, at dinner,
January 7, 1708. He told his one story 'with much simplicity'.

In 1695, when about fifteen, Bezuel was a friend of a younger boy,
one of two brothers, Desfontaines. In 1696,