e of some foul
spirit, permitted to sojourn upon earth only on the fearful condition
that he should effect his entrance, at stated periods, into a living
human frame, whose proper occupant he might be able to dispossess for
this horrible purpose. Many circumstances would seem to corroborate
this belief. The adventure of the old poacher, in particular,
happening precisely on the night of his uncle's disappearance, led
Norton to conclude that the foul fiend was obliged to renew his
habitation upon every twelfth return of the holy festival of St
Bartholomew. That a solution so inconsistent with our belief in the
constant care and control of an all-wise and an all-powerful
Providence was incorrect, we need not be at any pains to prove in this
era of widely-disseminated knowledge and intelligence. Still, a
mystery, inscrutable under the ordinary operations of nature, appears
to hang over the whole proceeding, and though a legend only, yet the
events bear a wonderful semblance and affinity to truth, even in their
wildest details.

It is said that the "_Spectre Horseman_" appeared no more, and that
having failed in fulfilling the terms by which his existence upon
earth was, from time to time, permitted and prolonged, he was driven
to his own place, where he must abide for ever the doom of those
kindred and accursed spirits whose aim it is continually to seduce and
to destroy.

[19] The Two Lads are heaps of loose stones, about
ten or twelve feet in height, set up, as the story goes, to
commemorate the death of two shepherd boys, who were found on
the spot after a long search, missing their way during a heavy
fall of snow. The tale is most probably incorrect; these mural
monuments have been gradually accumulated by the passers-by;--a
custom handed down from the most remote ages, and still
observed as an act of religious worship in the East. There is
little doubt but they are remnants yet lingering amongst us of
the "altars upon every high hill," once dedicated to Baal, or
Bel, the great object of Carthaginian or Phoenician worship,
from which our Druidical rites were probably derived.

MOTHER RED-CAP; OR, THE ROSICRUCIANS.

A LEGEND OF THE NORTH.

PART THE FIRST.

In the wild and mountainous region of East Lancashire, at the foot of
the long line of hills called Blackstonedge, and not far from the town
of Rochdale, stood one of those old grim-looking m