{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_62873/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_62873","id":"gutenberg_62873","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/62873","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Archaeology & Anthropology","Category: History - Other","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Vampires"],"text":"VAMPIRES AND VAMPIRISM\n\n\n\n\n                              VAMPIRES AND\n                                VAMPIRISM\n\n                                   BY\n                              DUDLEY WRIGHT\n\n                                 LONDON\n                     WILLIAM RIDER AND SON, LIMITED\n                                  1914\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\n\nThe awakened interest in supernormal phenomena which has taken place in\nrecent years has included in its wake the absorbing subject of Vampirism.\nYet there has not been any collection published of vampire stories which\nare common to all the five continents of the globe. The subject of\nvampirism is regarded more seriously to-day than it was even a decade\nsince, and an attempt has been made in this volume to supply as far as\npossible all the instances which could be collected from the various\ncountries. How far a certain amount of scientific truth may underlie even\nwhat may be regarded as the most extravagant stories must necessarily be,\nfor the present, at any rate, an open question; but he would indeed be a\nbold man who would permit his scepticism as to the objective existence\nof vampires in the past or the possibility of vampirism in the future to\nextend to a categorical denial. If this collection of stories helps, even\nin a slight degree, to the elucidation of the problem, the book will not\nhave been written in vain.\n\n                                                           DUDLEY WRIGHT.\n\nAUTHORS\u2019 CLUB, 2 WHITEHALL COURT, S.W., _1st September, 1914_.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\n    CHAP.                                                  PAGE\n\n       I. INTRODUCTORY                                        1\n\n      II. EXCOMMUNICATION AND ITS POWER                      20\n\n     III. THE VAMPIRE IN BABYLONIA, ASSYRIA, AND GREECE      35\n\n      IV. VAMPIRISM IN GREAT AND GREATER BRITAIN             48\n\n       V. VAMPIRISM IN GERMANY AND SURROUNDING COUNTRIES     66\n\n      VI. VAMPIRISM IN HUNGARY, BAVARIA, AND SILESIA         79\n\n     VII. VAMPIRISM IN SERVIA AND BULGARIA                   95\n\n    VIII. VAMPIRE BELIEF IN RUSSIA                          109\n\n      IX. MISCELLANEA                                       130\n\n       X. LIVING VAMPIRES                                   142\n\n      XI. THE VAMPIRE IN LITERATURE                         150\n\n     XII. FACT OR FICTION?                                  161\n\n          BIBLIOGRAPHY                                      175\n\n\n\n\nVAMPIRES AND VAMPIRISM\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nINTRODUCTORY\n\n\nWhat is a vampire? The definition given in Webster\u2019s _International\nDictionary_ is: \u201cA blood-sucking ghost or re-animated body of a dead\nperson; a soul or re-animated body of a dead person believed to come from\nthe grave and wander about by night sucking the blood of persons asleep,\ncausing their death.\u201d\n\nWhitney\u2019s _Century Dictionary_ says that a vampire is: \u201cA kind of\nspectral body which, according to a superstition existing among the\nSlavic and other races on the Lower Danube, leaves the grave during the\nnight and maintains a semblance of life by sucking the warm blood of\nliving men and women while they are asleep. Dead wizards, werwolves,\nheretics, and other outcasts become vampires, as do also the illegitimate\noffspring of parents themselves illegitimate, and anyone killed by a\nvampire.\u201d\n\nAccording to the _Encyclop\u00e6dia Britannica_: \u201cThe persons who turn\nvampires are generally wizards, suicides, and those who come to a violent\nend or have been cursed by their parents or by the Church. But anyone may\nbecome a vampire if an animal (especially a cat) leaps over the corpse or\na bird flies over it.\u201d\n\nAmong the specialists, the writers upon vampire lore and legend, two\ndefinitions may be quoted:\u2014Hurst, who says that: \u201cA vampyr is a dead\nbody which continues to live in the grave; which it leaves, however, by\nnight, for the purpose of sucking the blood of the living, whereby it is\nnourished and preserved in good condition, instead of becoming decomposed\nlike other dead bodies\u201d; and Scoffern, who wrote: \u201cThe best definition I\ncan give of a vampire is a living mischievous and murderous dead body. A\nliving dead body! The words are idle, contradictory, incomprehensible,\nbut so are vampires.\u201d\n\n\u201cVampires,\u201d says the learned Zopfius, \u201ccome out of their graves in the\nnight time, rush upon people sleeping in their beds, suck out all their\nblood and destroy them. They attack men, women, and children, sparing\nneither age nor sex. Those who are under the malignity of their influence\ncomplain of suffocation and a total deficiency of spirits, after which\nthey soon expire. Some of them being asked at the point of death what is\nthe matter with them, their answer is that such persons lately dead rise\nto torment them.\u201d\n\nNot all vampires, however, are, or were, suckers of blood. Some,\naccording to the records, despatched their victims by inflicting upon\nthem contagious diseases, or strangling them without drawing blood, or\ncausing their speedy or retarded death by various other means.\n\nMessrs Skeat and Blagden, in _Pagan Races of the Malay Peninsula_ (vol.\ni. p. 473), state that \u201ca vampire, according to the view of Sakai of\nPerak, is not a demon\u2014even though it is incidentally so-called\u2014but a\nbeing of flesh and blood,\u201d and support this view by the statement that\nthe vampire cannot pass through walls and hedges.\n\nThe word _vampire_ (Dutch, _vampyr_; Polish, _wampior_ or _upior_;\nSlownik, _upir_; Ukraine, _upeer_) is held by Skeat to be derived from\nthe Servian _wampira_. The Russians, Morlacchians, inhabitants of\nMontenegro, Bohemians, Servians, Arnauts, both of Hydra and Albania, know\nthe vampire under the name of _wukodalak_, _vurkulaka_, or _vrykolaka_,\na word which means \u201cwolf-fairy,\u201d and is thought by some to be derived\nfrom the Greek. In Crete, where Slavonic influence has not been felt, the\nvampire is known by the name of _katakhan\u00e1_. Vampire lore is, in general,\nconfined to stories of resuscitated corpses of male human beings, though\namongst the Malays a _penangglan_, or vampire, is a living witch, who can\nbe killed if she can be caught in the act of witchery. She is especially\nfeared in houses where a birth has taken place, and it is the custom to\nhang up a bunch of thistle in order to catch her. She is said to keep\nvinegar at home to aid her in re-entering her own body. In the Malay\nPeninsula, parts of Polynesia and the neighbouring districts, the vampire\nis conceived as a head with entrails attached, which comes forth to suck\nthe blood of living human beings. In Transylvania, the belief prevails\nthat every person killed by a _nosferatu_ (vampire) becomes in turn a\nvampire, and will continue to suck the blood of other innocent people\nuntil the evil spirit has been exorcised, either by opening the grave of\nthe suspected person and driving a stake through the corpse, or firing\na pistol-shot into the coffin. In very obstinate cases it is further\nrecommended to cut off the head, fill the mouth with garlic, and then\nreplace the head in its proper place in the coffin; or else to extract\nthe heart and burn it, and strew the ashes over the grave.\n\nThe _murony_ of the Wallachians not only sucks blood, but also possesses\nthe power of assuming a variety of shapes, as, for instance, those of a\ncat, dog, flea, or spider; in consequence of which the ordinary evidence\nof death caused by the attack of a vampire, viz. the mark of a bite in\nthe back of the neck, is not considered indispensable. The Wallachians\nhave a very great fear of sudden death, greater perhaps than any other\npeople, for they attribute sudden death to the attack of a vampire, and\nbelieve that anyone destroyed by a vampire must become a vampire, and\nthat no power can save him from this fate. A similar belief obtains in\nNorthern Albania, where it is also held that a wandering spirit has power\nto enter the body of any individual guilty of undetected crime, and that\nsuch obsession forms part of his punishment.\n\nSome writers have ascribed the origin of the belief in vampires to Greek\nChristianity, but there are traces of the superstition and belief at a\nconsiderably earlier date than this. In the opinion of the anthropologist\nTylor, \u201cthe shortest way of treating the belief is to refer it directly\nto the principles of savage animism. We shall see that most of its\ndetails fall into their places at once, and that vampires are not mere\ncreations of groundless fancy, but causes conceived in spiritual form\nto account for specific facts of wasting disease.\u201d It is more than\nprobable that the practice of offering up living animals as sacrifices to\nsatisfy the thirst of departed human beings, combined with the ideas of\nthe Platonist and the teachings of the learned Jew, Isaac Arbanel, who\nmaintained that before the soul can be loosed from the fetters of the\nflesh it must lie some months with it in the grave, may have influenced\nthe belief and assisted its development. Vampirism found a place in\nBabylonian belief and in the folk-lore and traditions of many countries\nof the Near East. The belief was quite common in Arabia, although there\nis no trace of it there in pre-Christian times. The earliest references\nto vampires are found in Chaldean and Assyrian tablets. Later, the pagan\nRomans gave their adherence to the belief that the dead bodies of certain\npeople could be allured from their graves by sorcerers, unless the\nbodies had actually undergone decomposition, and that the only means of\neffectually preventing such \u201cresurrections\u201d was by cremating the remains.\nIn Grecian lore there are many wonderful stories of the dead rising from\ntheir graves and feasting upon the blood of the young and beautiful. From\nGreece and Rome the superstition spread throughout Austria, Hungary,\nLorraine, Poland, Roumania, Iceland, and even to the British Isles,\nreaching its height in the period from 1723 to 1735, when a vampire\nfever or epidemic broke out in the south-east of Europe, particularly in\nHungary and Servia. The belief in vampires even spread to Africa, where\nthe Kaffirs held that bad men alone live a second time and try to kill\nthe living by night. According to a local superstition of the Lesbians,\nthe unquiet ghost of the Virgin Gello used to haunt their island, and was\nsupposed to cause the deaths of young children.\n\nVarious devices have been resorted to in different countries at the time\nof burial, in the belief that the dead could thus be prevented from\nreturning to earth-life. In some instances, _e.g._ among the Wallachians,\na long nail was driven through the skull of the corpse, and the thorny\nstem of a wild rose-bush laid upon the body, in order that its shroud\nmight become entangled with it, should it attempt to rise. The Kroats\nand Slavonians burned the straw upon which the suspected body lay. They\nthen locked up all the cats and dogs, for if these animals stepped over\nthe corpse it would assuredly return as a vampire and suck the blood of\nthe village folk. Many held that to drive a white thorn stake through the\ndead body rendered the vampire harmless, and the peasants of Bukowina\nstill retain the practice of driving an ash stake through the breasts\nof suicides and supposed vampires\u2014a practice common in England, so far\nas suicides were concerned, until 1823, when there was passed \u201cAn Act\nto alter and amend the law relating to the interment of the remains of\nany person found _felo de se_,\u201d in which it was enacted that the coroner\nor other officer \u201cshall give directions for the private interment of\nthe remains of such person _felo de se_ without any stake being driven\nthrough the body of such person.\u201d It was also ordained that the burial\nwas only to take place between nine and twelve o\u2019clock at night.\n\nThe driving of a stake through the body does not seem to have had always\nthe desired effect. De Schartz, in his _Magia Postuma_, published at\nOlmutz in 1706, tells of a shepherd in the village of Blow, near Kadam,\nin Bohemia, who made several appearances after his death and called\ncertain persons, who never failed to die within eight days of such call.\nThe peasants of Blow took up the body and fixed it to the ground by means\nof a stake driven through the corpse. The man, when in that condition,\ntold them that they were very good to give him a stick with which he\ncould defend himself against the dogs which worried him. Notwithstanding\nthe stake, he got up again that same night, alarmed many people, and,\npresumably out of revenge, strangled more people in that one night than\nhe had ever done on a single occasion before. It was decided to hand\nover his body to the public executioner, who was ordered to see that the\nremains were burned outside the village. When the executioner and his\nassistants attempted to move the corpse for that purpose, it howled like\na madman, and moved its feet and hands as though it were alive. They\nthen pierced the body through with stakes, but he again uttered loud\ncries and a great quantity of bright vermilion blood flowed from him.\nThe cremation, however, put an end to the apparition and haunting of the\nspectre. De Schartz says that the only remedy for these apparitions is\nto cut off the heads and burn the bodies of those who come back to haunt\ntheir former abodes. It was, however, customary to hold a public inquiry\nand examination of witnesses before proceeding to the burning of a body,\nand if, upon examination of the body, it was found that the corpse had\nbegun to decompose, that the limbs were not supple and mobile, and the\nblood not fluidic, then burning was not commanded. Even in the case of\nsuspected persons an interval of six to seven weeks was always allowed\nto lapse before the grave was opened in order to ascertain whether the\nflesh had decayed and the limbs lost their suppleness and mobility. A\nStrigon or Indian vampire, who was transfixed with a sharp thorn cudgel,\nnear Larbach, in 1672, pulled it out of his body and flung it back\ncontemptuously.\n\nBartholin, in _de Causa contempt\u00fbs mortis_, tells the story of a man,\nnamed Harpye, who ordered his wife to bury him exactly at the kitchen\ndoor, in order that he might see what went on in the house. The woman\nexecuted her commission, and soon after his death he appeared to several\npeople in the neighbourhood, killed people while they were engaged\nin their occupations, and played so many mischievous pranks that the\ninhabitants began to move away from the village. At last a man named\nOlaus Pa took courage and ran at the spectre with a lance, which he drove\ninto the apparition. The spectre instantly vanished, taking the spear\nwith it. Next morning Olaus had the grave of Harpye opened, when he\nfound the lance in the dead body, which had not become corrupted. The\ncorpse was then taken from the grave, burned, and the ashes thrown into\nthe sea, and the spectre did not afterwards trouble the inhabitants.\n\nTo cross the arms of the corpse, or to place a cross or crucifix upon the\ngrave, or to bury a suspected corpse at the junction of four cross-roads,\nwas, in some parts, regarded as an efficacious preventive of vampirism.\nIt will be remembered that it was at one time the practice in England\nto bury suicides at the four cross-roads. If a vampire should make its\nappearance, it could be prevented from ever appearing again by forcing it\nto take the oath not to do so, if the words \u201cby my winding-sheet\u201d were\nincorporated in the oath.\n\nOne charm employed by the Wallachians to prevent a person becoming a\nvampire was to rub the body in certain parts with the lard of a pig\nkilled on St Ignatius\u2019s Day.\n\nIn Poland and Russia, vampires make their appearance from noon to\nmidnight instead of between nightfall and dawn, the rule that generally\nprevails. They come and suck the blood of living men and animals in such\nabundance that sometimes it flows from them at the nose and ears, and\noccasionally in such profusion that the corpse swims in the blood thus\noozing from it as it lies in the coffin. One may become immune from the\nattacks of vampires by mixing this blood with flour and making bread from\nthe mixture, a portion of which must be eaten; otherwise the charm will\nnot work. The Californians held that the mere breaking of the spine of\nthe corpse was sufficient to prevent its return as a vampire. Sometimes\nheavy stones were piled on the grave to keep the ghost within, a practice\nto which Frazer traces the origin of funeral cairns and tombstones. Two\nresolutions of the Sorbonne, passed between 1700 and 1710, prohibited\nthe cutting off of the heads and the maiming of the bodies of persons\nsupposed to be vampires.\n\nIn the German folk-tale known as _Faithful John_, the statue said to\nthe king: \u201cIf you, with your own hand, cut off the heads of both your\nchildren and sprinkle me with their blood, I shall be brought to life\nagain.\u201d According to primitive ideas, blood is life, and to receive\nblood is to receive life: the soul of the dead wants to live, and,\nconsequently, loves blood. The shades in Hades are eager to drink the\nblood of Odysseus\u2019s sacrifice, that their life may be renewed for a\ntime. It is of the greatest importance that the soul should get what it\ndesires, as, if not satisfied, it might come and attack the living. It is\npossible that the bodily mutilations which to this day accompany funerals\namong some peoples have their origin in the belief that the departed\nspirit is refreshed by the blood thus spilt. The Samoans called it an\n\u201coffering of blood\u201d for the dead when the mourners beat their heads till\nthe blood ran.\n\nThe Australian native sorcerers are said to acquire their magical\ninfluence by eating human flesh, but this is done once only in a\nlifetime. According to Nider\u2019s _Formicarius_, part of the ceremony of\ninitiation into wizardry and witchcraft consisted in drinking in a\nchurch, before the commencement of Mass, from a flask filled with blood\ntaken from the corpses of murdered infants.\n\nThe methods employed for the detection of vampires have varied according\nto the countries in which the belief in their existence was maintained.\nIn some places it was held that, if there were discovered in a grave two\nor three or more holes about the size of a man\u2019s finger, it would almost\ncertainly follow that a body with all the marks of vampirism would be\ndiscovered within the grave. The Wallachians employed a rather elaborate\nmethod of divination. They were in the habit of choosing a boy young\nenough to make it certain that he was innocent of any impurity. He was\nthen placed on an absolutely black and unmutilated horse which had never\nstumbled. The horse was then made to ride about the cemetery and pass\nover all the graves. If the horse refused to pass over any grave, even in\nspite of repeated blows, that grave was believed to shelter a vampire.\nTheir records state that when such a grave was opened it was generally\nfound to contain a corpse as fat and handsome as that of a full-blooded\nman quietly sleeping. The finest vermilion blood would flow from the\nthroat when cut, and this was held to be the blood he had sucked from\nthe veins of living people. It is said that the attacks of the vampire\ngenerally ceased on this being done.\n\nIn the town of Perlepe, between Monastru and Kiuprili, there existed\nthe extraordinary phenomenon of a number of families who were regarded\nas being the offspring of _vrykolakas_, and as possessing the power of\nlaying the wandering spirits to which they were related. They are said\nto have kept their art very dark and to have practised it in secret, but\ntheir fame was so widely spread that persons in need of such deliverance\nwere accustomed to send for them from other cities. In ordinary life and\nintercourse they were avoided by all the inhabitants.\n\nAlthough some writers have contended that no vampire has yet been caught\nin the act of vampirism, and that, as no museum of natural history has\nsecured a specimen, the whole of the stories concerning vampires may\nbe regarded as mythical, others have held firmly to a belief in their\nexistence and inimical power. Dr Pierart, in _La Revue Spiritualiste_\n(vol. iv. p. 104), wrote: \u201cAfter a crowd of facts of vampirism so often\nproved, shall we say that there are no more to be had, and that these\nnever had a foundation? Nothing comes of nothing. Every belief, every\ncustom, springs from facts and causes which give it birth. If one had\nnever seen appear in the bosom of their families, in various countries,\nbeings clothed in the appearance of departed ones known to them, sucking\nthe blood of one or more persons, and if the deaths of the victims had\nnot followed after such apparitions, the disinterment of corpses would\nnot have taken place, and there would never have been the attestation of\nthe otherwise incredible fact of persons buried for several years being\nfound with the body soft and flexible, the eyes wide open, the complexion\nrosy, the mouth and nose full of blood, and the blood flowing fully when\nthe body was struck or wounded or the head cut off.\u201d\n\nBishop d\u2019Avranches Huet wrote: \u201cI will not examine whether the facts of\nvampirism, which are constantly being reported, are true, or the fruit of\na popular error; but it is beyond doubt that they are testified to by so\nmany able and trustworthy authors, and by so many _eye-witnesses_, that\nno one ought to decide the question without a good deal of caution.\u201d\n\nDr Pierart gave the following explanation of their existence: \u201cPoor,\ndead cataleptics, buried as if really dead in cold and dry spots where\nmorbid causes are incapable of effecting the destruction of their bodies,\nthe astral spirit, enveloping itself with a fluidic ethereal body, is\nprompted to quit the precincts of its tomb and to exercise on living\nbodies acts peculiar to physical life, especially that of nutrition,\nthe result of which, by a mysterious link between soul and body which\nspiritualistic science will some day explain, is forwarded to the\nmaterial body lying still within its tomb, and the latter is thus helped\nto perpetuate its vital existence.\u201d\n\nApart from the spectre vampire there is, of course, the vampire bat in\nthe world of natural history, which is said to suck blood from a sleeping\nperson, insinuating its tongue into a vein, but without inflicting\npain. Captain Steadman, during his expedition to Surinam, awoke early\none morning and was alarmed to find his hammock steeped almost through\nand himself weltering in blood, although he was without pain. It was\ndiscovered that he had been bitten by a vampire bat. Pennant says that\nin some parts of America they destroyed all the cattle introduced by the\nmissionaries.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nEXCOMMUNICATION AND ITS POWER\n\n\nThe Greek Church at one time taught that the bodies of persons upon whom\nthe ban of excommunication had been passed did not undergo decomposition\nafter death until such sentence had been revoked by the pronouncement\nof absolution over the remains, and that, while the bodies remained in\nthis uncorrupted condition, the spirits of the individuals wandered up\nand down the earth seeking sustenance from the blood of the living. The\nnon-corruption of a body, however, was also held to be one of the proofs\nof sanctity; but, in this case, the body preserved its natural colour\nand gave an agreeable odour, whereas the bodies of the excommunicated\ngenerally turned black, swelled out like a drum, and emitted an offensive\nsmell. Very frequently, however, when the graves of suspected vampires\nwere opened, the faces were found to be of ruddy complexion and the veins\ndistended with blood, which, when opened with a lancet, yielded a supply\nof blood as plentiful, fresh, and free as that found in the veins of\nyoung and healthy living human beings. For many centuries in the history\nof Greek Christianity there was scarcely a village that had not its own\nlocal vampire stories which were related by the inhabitants and vouched\nfor by them as having either occurred within their own knowledge or been\nrelated to them by their parents or relatives as having come within their\npersonal observation or been verified by them.\n\nThe bodies of murderers and suicides were also held to be exempt from\nthe law of dissolution of the mortal remains until the Church granted\nrelease from the curse entailed upon them by such act. The priests, by\nthis assumption of power over the body as well as over the soul, made\nprofitable use of this superstitious belief by preying upon the fears and\ncredulity of the living. They also included in this ecclesiastical law of\nexemption from corruption after death those who in their lives had been\nguilty of heinous sins, those who had tampered with the magic arts, and\nall who had been cursed during life by their parents. These were all said\nto become vampires. This belief spread to other branches of the Christian\nChurch, and the story is related that St Libentius, Archbishop of Bremen,\nwho died 4th January 1013, once excommunicated a gang of pirates, one\nof whom died shortly afterwards and was buried in Norway. Seventy years\nafterwards his body was found quite entire and uncorrupted, nor did it\nfall to ashes until it had received absolution from the Bishop Alvareda.\n\nLeo Allatius, a Roman Catholic, describes a corpse which he found in\nan undecomposed condition. He implies that the Greeks connected the\ncircumstance with the power invested in them by the text: \u201cWhatsoever\nthou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven,\u201d and by which they\nhold that the soul is excluded from all hope of participation in future\nbliss so long as the body remains undecomposed. Poqueville, another\nwriter, also states that whenever a bishop or priest excommunicated a\nperson he added to the general sentence of excommunication the words:\n\u201cAfter death, let not thy body have power to dissolve.\u201d\n\nA manuscript was discovered many years ago in the Church of St Sophia at\nThessalonica, which is an interesting commentary upon the power claimed\nby the Church over excommunicated bodies. The manuscript states that:\n\n(1) Whoever has been laid under any curse or received any injunction\nfrom his deceased parents that he has not fulfilled, after his death the\nforepart of his body remains entire;\n\n(2) Whoever has been the object of any anathema appears yellow after\ndeath, and the fingers are shrivelled;\n\n(3) Whoever appears white has been excommunicated by the divine laws;\n\n(4) Whoever appears black has been excommunicated by a bishop.\n\nIt was held possible to discover, by means of these signs, the crime for\nwhich, as well as the person on whom, the judgment had been pronounced.\nOne horrible result of this ghastly superstition was the custom which\nwas at one time prevalent among the Greeks of Salonica, as well as the\nBulgarians in the centre of European Turkey, and other nations, of\ndisinterring indiscriminately the bodies of the dead after they had been\nburied for twelve months, in order to ascertain from the condition of the\nremains whether the souls were in heaven or hell, or perambulating the\nneighbourhood as vampires.\n\nThis assumed ecclesiastical power acted occasionally, however,\ninjuriously on the clergy themselves. There is on record one instance\nwhere a priest was killed in revenge for the death of a man whose illness\nwas attributed to the sentence of excommunication that had been passed\nupon him. On another occasion a bishop of some diocese in Morea was\nrobbed by a band of brigands as he was passing through a portion of the\nManiate territory. When the deed was done the mountaineers bethought\nthemselves that the bishop would, in all probability, excommunicate them\nas soon as he reached a place of safety. They saw no means of averting\nthis, to them, dreadful calamity, except by the committal of a further\nand more heinous crime; and so they set out in pursuit of the unfortunate\nbishop, whom they eventually overtook and murdered.\n\nMany years ago a Greek of Keramia complained to the Pasha of Khania that\nthe pap\u00e1s of his village had excommunicated him and so been the indirect\ncause of his having been bewitched. The Pasha sent for the priest, threw\nhim into prison, and only released him upon payment of a fine of 300\npiastres.\n\nDuring a local war a native of Theriso was taken ill: the cry went up:\n\u201cIt is an aphorismos.\u201d The pap\u00e1s was accused, reviled, and threatened\nwith murder unless the curse was removed; but the man continued to get\nworse, and eventually died. So firm was the belief of everyone in the\nneighbourhood that the ban had caused the man\u2019s death that some of his\ncompanions regarded it as a duty to avenge his fate, and, in consequence,\nthey sought out the priest and shot him.\n\nAt the beginning of the nineteenth century the Metropolitan of Larissa\nwas informed that a pap\u00e1s had disinterred two bodies and thrown them into\nthe Hali\u00e6mon on pretence of their being vruk\u00f3lakas. Upon being summoned\nbefore the bishop the priest admitted the truth of the accusation, and\njustified his act by saying that a report had been current that a large\nanimal, accompanied with flames, had been seen to issue from the grave\nin which these two bodies had been buried. The bishop fined the priest\n250 piastres, and sent a proclamation throughout the diocese that, in\nfuture, similar offences would be punished with double that fine and be\naccompanied with loss of position.\n\nMartin Crusius tells the following curious story. There were about\nthe court of Mahomet II. a number of men learned in Greek and Arabic\nliterature, who had investigated a variety of points connected with the\nChristian faith. They informed the Sultan that the bodies of persons\nexcommunicated by the Greek clergy did not decompose, and when he\ninquired whether the effect of absolution was to dissolve them, he was\nanswered in the affirmative. Upon this, he sent orders to Maximus, the\nPatriarch of that period, to produce a case by which the truth of the\nstatement might be tested. The Patriarch convened his clergy in great\ntrepidation, and after long deliberation they ascertained that a woman\nhad been excommunicated by the previous Patriarch for the commission of\ngrievous sins. They ascertained the whereabouts of her grave, and when\nthey had opened it they found that the corpse was entire, but swollen out\nlike a drum. When the news of this reached the Sultan, he despatched some\nof his officers to possess themselves of the body, which they did, and\ndeposited it in a safe place. On an appointed day the liturgy was said\nover it and the Patriarch recited the absolution in the presence of the\nofficials. As this was being done\u2014wonderful to relate!\u2014the bones were\nheard to rattle as they fell apart in the coffin, and at the same time,\nthe narrator adds, the woman\u2019s soul was also freed from the punishment to\nwhich it had been condemned. The courtiers at once ran and informed the\nSultan, who was astonished at the miracle, and exclaimed: \u201cOf a surety\nthe Christian religion is true.\u201d Calmet also relates this story, and\nadds that the body was found to be entirely black and much swollen; that\nit was placed in a chest under the Emperor\u2019s seal, which chest was not\nopened until three days after the absolution had been pronounced, when\nthe body was seen to be reduced to ashes.\n\nDuring the long war between the Christians and Mohammedans in the\nisland of Crete, it became a matter of astonishment that ravages caused\nby vampires were no longer the subject of conversation. \u201cHow can it be,\nwhen the number of deaths is so great, that none of those that die become\nkatakhan\u00e1s?\u201d was the question asked, to be met with the answer: \u201cNo one\never becomes a katakhan\u00e1 if he dies in time of war.\u201d\n\nLeo Allatius also relates that he was told by Athanasius, Metropolitan of\nImbros, that, on one occasion, being earnestly entreated to pronounce the\nabsolution over a number of corpses that had long remained undecomposed,\nhe consented to do so, and before the recitation was concluded they all\nfell away into ashes.\n\nRycaut relates a similar occurrence, to which he appends the following\nremark: \u201cThis story I should not have judged worth relating, but that I\nheard it from the mouth of a grave person who says that his own eyes were\nwitnesses thereof.\u201d\n\nThe Hydhr\u00e6ans (or Hydhrioks) say there used to be a great number of\nvampires in Hydhra, and that their present freedom is to be attributed\nsolely to the exertions of their bishop, who banished them all to\nSantor\u00e9he, where, on the desert isle, they now exist in great numbers,\nwandering about, rolling stones down the slope towards the sea, \u201cas may\nbe heard by anyone who passes near, in a ka\u00edk, during the night.\u201d\n\nAt the second Council of Limoges, held in 1031, the Bishop of Cahors\nmade the following statement: \u201cA knight of my diocese being killed in a\nstate of excommunication, I refused to comply with the request of his\nfriends, who solicited me earnestly to give him absolution. My resolution\nwas to make an example of him, in order to strike terror into others.\nNotwithstanding this, he was buried in a church dedicated to St Peter by\nsome soldiers or knights without any ecclesiastical ceremony, without\nany leave, and without the assistance of any priest. The next morning\nhis body was found out of the grave, perfectly entire, and without any\ntoken of its having been touched. The soldiers who buried him opened the\ngrave and found nothing but the linen which had been wrapped about his\nbody. They then buried him afresh and covered the grave with an enormous\nquantity of earth and stones. The next day the corpse was found out of\nthe grave again, and there were no symptoms of anyone having been at\nwork. The same thing was repeated five times, and at last they buried\nhim in unconsecrated ground, at a distance from the churchyard, when no\nfurther incident occurred.\u201d\n\nRycaut states that the following story was related to him with many\nasseverations of truth by a grave _Candive Kalois_ called Sofronio, a\npreacher, and a person of no mean repute and learning at Smyrna.\n\n\u201cI knew,\u201d he said, \u201ca certain person who, for some misdemeanours\ncommitted in the Morea, fled over to the Isle of Milo, where, though\nhe escaped the hand of justice, he could not avoid the sentence of\nexcommunication, from which he could no more fly than from the conviction\nof his own conscience, or the guilt which ever attended him; for the\nfatal hour of his death being come, and the sentence of the Church\nnot revoked, the body was carelessly and without solemnity interred\nin some retired and unfrequented place. In the meantime the relatives\nof the deceased were much afflicted and anxious for the sad estate of\ntheir dead friend, whilst the peasants and islanders were every night\naffrighted and disturbed with strange and unusual apparitions, which they\nimmediately concluded arose from the grave of the accursed excommunicant,\nwhich, according to their custom, they immediately opened, when they\nfound the body uncorrupted, ruddy, and the veins replete with blood. The\ncoffin was furnished with grapes, apples, and nuts, and such fruits as\nthe season afforded. Whereupon, consultation being taken, the Kaloires\nresolved to make use of the common remedy in those cases, which was to\ncut and dismember the body into several parts and to boil it in wine, as\nthe approved means of dislodging the evil spirit and disposing the body\nto a dissolution. But the friends of the deceased, being willing and\ndesirous that the corpse should rest in peace and some ease given to the\ndeparted soul, obtained a reprieve from the clergy, and hoped that for a\nsum of money (they being persons of a competent estate) a release might\nbe purchased from the excommunication under the hand of the Patriarch.\nIn this manner the corpse was for a little while freed from dissection,\nand letters thereupon sent to Constantinople with this direction, That\nin case the Patriarch should condescend to take off the excommunication,\nthat the day, hour, and minute that he signed the remission should be\ninserted in the document. And now the corpse was taken into the church\n(the country people not being willing it should remain in the field), and\nprayers and masses were daily said for its dissolution and the pardon\nof the offender; when one day, after many prayers, supplications, and\nofferings (as this Sofrino attested to me with many protestations), and\nwhilst he himself was heard performing divine service, on a sudden was\nheard a rumbling noise in the coffin of the dead party, to the fear and\nastonishment of all persons then present; which when they had opened they\nfound the body consumed and dissolved as far into its first principles\nof earth as if it had been several years interred. The hour and minute\nof this dissolution was immediately noted and precisely observed, which\nbeing compared with the date of the Patriarch\u2019s release when it was\nsigned at Constantinople, it was found exactly to agree with that moment\nin which the body returned to its ashes.\u201d\n\nIn most countries the vampire was regarded as a night-wanderer, but\nresting in its grave on Friday night, so that the ceremony of absolution\nhad to be performed on that night or during Saturday, because, if the\nspirit was out on its rambles when the ceremony took place, it was\nunavailing.\n\nThe Sfakians generally believe that the ravages committed by these\nnight-wanderers used in former times to be far more frequent than they\nare at the present day, and that they have become comparatively rare\nsolely in consequence of the increased zeal and skill possessed by\nmembers of the sacerdotal order.\n\nTournefort relates an entertaining story of a vampire that woefully\nannoyed the inhabitants of Myconi. Prayers, processions, stabbing with\nswords, sprinklings of holy water, and even pouring the latter in large\nquantities down the throat of the refractory _vroucolaca_ were all tried\nin vain. An Albanian who chanced to be at Myconi objected to two of these\nremedies. It was no wonder the devil continued in, he said, for how\ncould he possibly come through the holy water? And as to swords, they\nwere equally effectual in preventing his exit, for their handles being\ncrosses, he was so much terrified that he dare not pass them. To obviate\nthe latter objection, he recommended that Turkish scymetars should\nbe used. The scymetars were accordingly put in requisition, but the\npertinacious devil still retained his hold of the corpse and played his\npranks with as much vigour as ever. At length, when all the respectable\ninhabitants were packing up to take flight to Syra or Tinos, an effectual\nmethod of ousting the _vroucolaca_ was fortunately suggested. The body\nwas committed to the flames on January 1st, 1701, and the spirit being\nthus forcibly ejected from its abode, was rendered incapable of doing\nfurther mischief.\n\nThere is a story told of St Stanislaus raising to life a man who had been\ndead for three years, whom he called to life in order that he might give\nevidence on the saint\u2019s behalf in a court of justice. After having given\nhis evidence, the resuscitated man returned quietly to his grave.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nTHE VAMPIRE IN BABYLONIA, ASSYRIA, AND GREECE\n\n\nThe belief in the vampire and ghoul was prevalent even in Babylon and\nAssyria, where it was maintained that the dead could appear again\nupon earth and seek sustenance from the living. The belief is, in all\nprobability, linked up with the almost universal theory that transfused\nblood is necessary for revivification. Baths of human blood were\nanciently prescribed as a possible remedy for leprosy.\n\nMr R. Campbell Thompson, in his work _The Devils and Evil Spirits of\nBabylonia_, states that the _Ekimmu_ or departed spirit was the soul of\nthe dead person unable to rest, which wandered as a spectre over the\nearth. \u201cIf it found a luckless man who had wandered far from his fellows\ninto haunted places, it fastened upon him, plaguing and tormenting him\nuntil such time as a priest should drive it away with exorcisms.\u201d\n\nMr Thompson also gives the translation of the following two tablets,\nwhich, it will be seen, contain references to this belief:\u2014\n\n          The gods which seize (upon man)\n            Have come forth from the grave;\n          The evil wind-gusts\n            Have come forth from the grave.\n\n  To demand the payment of rites and the pouring out of libations,\n    They have come forth from the grave;\n  All that is evil in their hosts, like a whirlwind,\n    Hath come forth from the grave.\n\n  The evil Spirit, the evil Demon, the evil Ghost, the evil Devil,\n  From the earth have come forth;\n  From the underworld unto the land they have come forth;\n  In heaven they are unknown,\n  On earth they are not understood.\n  They neither stand nor sit\n  Nor eat nor drink.\n\nINCANTATION\n\n  Spirits that minish heaven and earth,\n  That minish the land,\n  Spirits that minish the land,\n  Of giant strength,\n  Of giant strength and giant tread,\n  Demons (like) raging bulls, great ghosts,\n  Ghosts that break through all houses,\n  Demons that have no shame,\n  Seven are they!\n  Knowing no care,\n  They grind the land like corn;\n  Knowing no mercy,\n  They rage against mankind:\n  They spill their blood like rain,\n  Devouring their flesh (and) sucking their veins.\n  Where the images of the gods are, there they quake\n  In the temple of Nabu, who fertiliseth the shoots of wheat.\n  They are demons full of violence\n  Ceaselessly devouring blood.\n  Invoke the ban against them,\n  That they no more return to this neighbourhood.\n  By Heaven be ye exorcised! By Earth be ye exorcised!\n\nGreek Christianity, as already stated, has been credited by many with the\norigin of the vampire belief, but this contention is hardly borne out by\nfacts. The belief was undoubtedly developed greatly under the influence\nof the Greek Church, and utilised by the Greek priests as an additional\npower which they possessed over the people. It did not become prominent\nin Greece until after the establishment of Christianity, and there are\nmany remarkable stories told of vampire apparitions among the Slavonic\nraces bordering on Greece, as well as among the Arabians. In later times,\nFather Richard, a French Jesuit of the seventeenth century, went as a\nmissionary to the Archipelago, and has left an account of the islands\nof Santerini in which he discourses at length upon the _bucolacs_ or\nvampires of that district.\n\nSome Greeks believe that the spectre which appears is not really the\nsoul of the deceased, but an evil spirit which enters his body after the\nsoul of the owner has been withdrawn. Thus Leo Allatius, in describing\nthe belief, says: \u201cThe corpse is entered by a demon which is the source\nof ruin to unhappy men. For frequently emerging from the tomb in the\nform of that body and roaming about the city and other inhabited places,\nespecially by night it betakes itself to any house it fancies, and, after\nknocking at the door, addresses one of the inmates in a loud tone. If\nthe person answers he is done for: two days after that he dies. If he\ndoes not answer he is safe. In consequence of this, all the people in\nChios, if anyone calls to them by night, never reply the first time; for\nif a second call is given they know that it does not proceed from the\n_vrykolaka_ but from someone else.\u201d\n\nIn the _Men\u00e9es des Grecs_ it is recorded that an ecclesiastic of Scheti,\nbeing excommunicated by his superior for some act of disobedience,\nquitted the desert and came to Alexandria, where he was apprehended by\nthe governor of the city, stripped of his religious habit, and strongly\nsolicited to sacrifice to the idols of the place. The man bravely\nresisted the temptation, and was tortured in several ways, till at last\nthey cut off his head, and threw his body out of the city to be devoured\nby dogs. The next night it was carried away by the Christians, who,\nhaving embalmed it and wrapped it up in fine linen, interred it in an\nhonourable part of the church with all the respect due to the remains\nof a martyr. But at the next celebration of the Mass, upon the deacons\ncrying out aloud as usual, \u201cLet the catechumens and all who do not\ncommunicate retire,\u201d his grave instantly opened and the martyr retired\ninto the church porch. When Mass was over he came again of his own accord\ninto the grave. Not long afterwards it was revealed by an angel to a\nholy person, who had continued three days in prayer, that the deceased\necclesiastic had been excommunicated by his superior, and would continue\nbound till that same superior had reversed the sentence. Upon this a\nmessenger was despatched to the desert after the holy anchorite, who\nordered the grave to be opened and absolved the deceased, who, after\nthis, continued in his grave in peace.\n\nPitton de Tournefort, in his _Voyage into the Levant_, gives the\nfollowing interesting account: \u201cWe were present at a very different scene\nand one very barbarous at Myconi. The man, whose story we are going to\nrelate, was a peasant of Myconi, naturally ill-natured and quarrelsome;\nthis is a circumstance to be taken notice of in such a case: he was\nmurdered in the fields, nobody knew how or by whom. Two days after his\nbeing buried in a chapel in the town it was noised about that he was\nseen to walk about in the night with great haste, that he tumbled about\nother people\u2019s goods, put out their lamps, gripped them behind, and\nplayed a dozen other monkey tricks. At first the story was received with\nlaughter, but the thing was looked upon seriously when the better sort\nof people began to complain of it: the pap\u00e1s themselves gave credit to\nthe fact, and no doubt had their reasons for so doing; masses were duly\nsaid; but for all this the peasant drove his old trade and heeded nothing\nthey could do. After divers meetings of the chief people of the city,\nof priests and monks, it was gravely concluded that it was necessary in\nconsequence of some musty ceremonial to wait till the ninth day after the\ninterment should be expired.\n\n\u201cOn the tenth day they said one Mass in the chapel where the body was\nlaid in order to drive out the demon which they imagined was got into it.\nAfter Mass they took up his body and got everything ready for blowing\nout his heart.... The corpse stunk so abominably that they were obliged\nto burn frankincense, but the smoke mixing with the exhalations from the\ncarcase increased the stench; every person averred that the blood of\nthe corpse was extremely red. The butcher swore that the body was still\nwarm....\u201d\n\nPitton concludes the story by ridiculing the theory that this was the\nbody of a vampire or _vroucolaca_.\n\nThe practice of burning the body of a suspected or proved vampire does\nnot appear to have found general favour in Greece, doubtless by reason of\nthe fact that the Greeks possessed a religious horror of burning a body\non which holy oil had been poured by the priest when performing the last\nrites upon the dying man.\n\nLeake, whose _Travels in Northern Greece_ were published in 1835, says\nin the fourth volume of that work: \u201cIt would be difficult now to meet\nwith an example of the most barbarous of all these superstitions,\nthe Vruk\u00f3laka. The name being Illyric, seems to acquit the Greeks of\nthe invention, which was probably introduced into the country by the\nbarbarians of Sclavonic race. Tournefort\u2019s description is admitted to be\ncorrect. The Devil is supposed to enter the Vruk\u00f3laka, who, rising from\nhis grave, torments first his nearest relatives and then others, causing\ntheir death or loss of health. The remedy is to dig up the body and if,\nafter it has been exorcised by the priest, the demon still persists in\nannoying the living, to cut it into small pieces, or, if that be not\nsufficient, to burn it.\u201d\n\nIn Crete the belief in vampires\u2014or katalkan\u00e1s, as the Cretans call\nthem\u2014and their existence and ill-deeds forms a general article of\npopular belief throughout the island, but is particularly strong in the\nmountains, and if anyone ventures to doubt it, undeniable facts are\nbrought forward to silence the incredulous.\n\nOne of the stories told by the Cretans is as follows: \u201cOnce upon a time\nthe village of Kalikr\u00e1ti, in the district of Sfakia, was haunted by a\nKatakhan\u00e1s, and the people did not know what man he was or from what part\nhe came. This Katakhan\u00e1s destroyed both children and full-grown men, and\ndesolated both that village and many others. They had buried him at the\nchurch of St George at Kalikr\u00e1ti, and in those times he was regarded as\na man of note, and they had built an arch over his grave. Now a certain\nshepherd, believed to be his mutual S\u00fdnteknos,[1] was tending his sheep\nand goats near the church, and, on being caught in a shower, he went\nto the sepulchre that he might be protected from the rain. Afterwards\nhe determined to sleep and pass the night there, and, after taking off\nhis arms, he placed them by the stone which served him as his pillow,\ncrosswise. And people might say that it was on this account that the\nKatakhan\u00e1s was not permitted to leave his tomb. During the night, then,\nas he wished to go out again, that he might destroy men, he said to the\nshepherd: \u2018Gossip, get up hence, for I have some business that requires\nme to come out.\u2019 The shepherd answered him not, either the first time,\nor the second, or the third; further, he knew that the man had become\na Katakhan\u00e1s, and that it was he who had done all those evil deeds. On\nthis account he said to him on the fourth time of his speaking: \u2018I shall\nnot get up hence, gossip, for I fear you are no better than you should\nbe and may do me some mischief; but if I must get up, swear to me by\nyour winding-sheet that you will not hurt me, and on that I will get\nup.\u2019 And he did not pronounce the proposed words, but said other things;\nnevertheless, when the shepherd did not suffer him to get up, he swore\nto him as he wished. On this he got up, and, taking his arms, removed\nthem away from the monument, and the Katakhan\u00e1s came forth, and, after\ngreeting the shepherd, said to him: \u2018Gossip, you must not go away, but\nsit down here; for I have some business which I must go after; but I\nshall return within the hour, for I have something to say to you.\u2019 So the\nshepherd waited for him.\n\n\u201cAnd the Katakhan\u00e1s went a distance of about ten miles, where there was a\ncouple recently married, and he destroyed them. On his return the gossip\nsaw that he was carrying some liver, his hands being moistened with\nblood; and, as he carried it, he blew into it, just as the butcher does,\nto increase the size of the liver. And he showed his gossip that it was\ncooked, as if it had been done on the fire. After this he said: \u2018Let us\nsit down, gossip, that we may eat.\u2019 And the shepherd pretended to eat it,\nbut only swallowed dry bread, and kept dropping the liver into his bosom.\nTherefore, when the hour for their separation arrived, the Katakhan\u00e1s\nsaid to the shepherd: \u2018Gossip, this which you have seen, you must not\nmention, for if you do, my twenty nails will be fixed in your children\nand yourself.\u2019 Yet the shepherd lost no time, but gave information to the\npriests and others, and they went to the tomb, and there they found the\nKatakhan\u00e1s, just as he had been buried. And all people became satisfied\nthat it was he who had done all the evil deeds. On this account they\ncollected a great deal of wood, and they cast him on it, and burnt\nhim. His gossip was not present, but when the Katakhan\u00e1s was already\nhalf-consumed, he, too, came forward in order that he might enjoy the\nceremony. And the Katakhan\u00e1s cast, as it were, a single spot of blood,\nand it fell on his foot, which wasted away, as if it had been roasted on\na fire. On this account they sifted even the ashes, and found the little\nfinger nail of the Katakhan\u00e1s unburnt, and burnt it too.\u201d\n\nThe 22nd formula of the _Cuneiform Inscriptions of Western Asia_,\npublished by Sir Henry Rawlinson and Mr Edwin Norris in 1866, reads:\u2014\n\n  The phantom, child of heaven,\n  which the gods remember,\n  the _Innin_ (kind of hobgoblin) prince\n  of the lords\n  the ...\n  which produces painful fever,\n  the vampyre which attacks man,\n  the _Uruku_ multifold\n  upon humanity,\n  may they never seize him!\n\n[1] That is, related to each other through god-parents. In Crete, those\nwhose god-parents were the same or were connected by ties of kinship were\nregarded as being in consanguineous relationship, and therefore were\nunable to contract marriages with each other.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nVAMPIRISM IN GREAT AND GREATER BRITAIN\n\n\nWilliam of Newbury, who flourished about the middle of the twelfth\ncentury, relates that in his time a man appeared corporeally in the\ncounty of Buckingham for three nights together, to his wife and,\nafterwards, to his other relatives. The way they took to defend\nthemselves against his frightful visits was to stay up all night and make\na noise when they observed that he was coming. Upon this he appeared to\nseveral people in broad day. Hereupon the Bishop of Lincoln summoned his\ncouncil, and was informed that the thing was common in England, and that\nthe only way to stop it which they knew of was to burn the spectre. The\nbishop did not relish this advice, as he thought the expedient a cruel\none; but he wrote out a form of absolution on a scrap of paper and\nordered it to be laid on the body of the deceased, which was found to be\nas fresh and entire as if it had been dead only a day; and from that time\nthe apparition was no more heard of. The author adds that these stories\nwould be thought incredible if several instances of them had not happened\nin his time, attested by persons of undoubted credit.\n\nThe same author mentions a similar story, the _locale_ of which was\nBerwick-on-Tweed, where the body was cut in pieces and burnt. Another\nvampire was burnt at Melrose Abbey. It was that of a very worldly priest\nwho had been in his lifetime so fond of hunting that he was commonly\ncalled a _hundeprest_. A still more remarkable case occurred at a castle\nin the north of England, where the vampire so frightened all the people\nthat no one ever ventured out of doors between sunset and sunrise. The\nsons of one of his supposed victims at length opened his grave and\npierced his body, from which a great quantity of blood immediately\nflowed, which plainly proved that a large number of persons had been his\nvictims.\n\nAt Waterford, in Ireland, there is a little graveyard under a ruined\nchurch near Strongbow\u2019s Tower. Legend has it that underneath the ground\nat this spot there lies a beautiful female vampire still ready to kill\nthose she can lure thither by her beauty.\n\nA vampire story is also related concerning an old Cumberland farmhouse,\nthe victim being a girl whose screams were heard as she was bitten,\nand who only escaped with her life by thus screaming. In this case the\nmonster was tracked to a vault in the churchyard, where forty or fifty\ncoffins were found open, their contents mutilated and scattered around.\nOne coffin only was untouched, and on the lid being taken off the form\nwas recognised as being that of the apparition which had been seen, and\nthe body was accordingly burnt, when the manifestations ceased.\n\nIn vol. iii. of _Borderland_ Dr Franz Hartmann gave particulars of some\nvampire cases which had come under his observation.\n\n\u201cA young lady of G\u2014\u2014 had an admirer, who asked her in marriage; but as\nhe was a drunkard she refused and married another. Thereupon the lover\nshot himself, and soon after that event a vampire, assuming his form,\nvisited her frequently at night, especially when her husband was absent.\nShe could not see him, but felt his presence in a way that could leave\nno room for doubt. The medical faculty did not know what to make of the\ncase; they called it \u2018hysterics,\u2019 and tried in vain every remedy in the\npharmacop\u0153ia, until she at last had the spirit exorcised by a man of\nstrong faith.\u201d\n\nAnother case is that of a miller at D\u2014\u2014 who had a healthy servant boy,\nwho soon after entering his service began to fail in health. He had\na ravenous appetite, but nevertheless grew daily more feeble. Being\ninterrogated, he at last confessed that a thing which he could not see,\nbut which he could plainly feel, came to him every night and sat upon his\nstomach, drawing all the life out of him, so that he became paralysed for\nthe time being and could neither move nor cry out. Thereupon the miller\nagreed to share the bed with the boy, and proposed to him that he should\ngive him a certain sign when the vampire arrived. This was done, and when\nthe sign was given the miller grasped the invisible but very tangible\nsubstance that rested upon the boy\u2019s stomach, and although it struggled\nto escape, he grasped it firmly and threw it into the fire. After that\nthe boy recovered his health and there was no repetition of the vampire\u2019s\nvisits.\n\nDr Hartmann adds to this last account: \u201cThose who, like myself, have on\ninnumerable occasions removed astral tumours and thereby cured physical\ntumours will find the above not incredible nor inexplicable. Moreover,\nthe above accounts do not refer to events of the past, but to persons\nstill living in this country.\u201d\n\nThe following account is taken from the _Gentleman\u2019s Magazine_ of July\n1851:\u2014\n\n\n\u201c_Singular Instance of Superstition_, A.D. 1629\n\n\u201cThe Case, or, rather, History of a Case that happened in the County of\nHereford in the fourth Year of the Reign of King Charles the First, which\nwas taken from a MS. of Serjeant Mainard, who writes thus:\n\n\u201c\u2018I write the evidence which was given, which I and many others heard,\nand I write it exactly according to what was deposed at the Trial at the\nBar in the King\u2019s Bench. Johan Norkot, the wife of Arthur Norkot, being\nmurdered, the question arose how she came by her death. The coroner\u2019s\ninquest on view of the body and deposition of Mary Norkot, John Okeman\nand Agnes, his wife, inclined to find Joan Norkot _felo de se_: for they\n(_i.e._ the witnesses before mentioned) informed the coroner and the jury\nthat she was found dead in the bed and her throat cut, the knife sticking\nin the floor of the room; that the night before she was so found she\nwent to bed with her child (now plaintiff in this appeal), her husband\nbeing absent, and that no other person after such time as she was gone\nto bed came into the house, the examinants lying in the outer room, and\nthey must needs have seen if any stranger had come in. Whereupon the\njury gave up to the coroner their verdict that she was _felo de se_.\nBut afterwards upon rumour in the neighbourhood, and the observation of\ndivers circumstances that manifested she did not, nor according to these\ncircumstances, possibly could, murder herself, thereupon the jury, whose\nverdict was not drawn into form by the coroner, desired the coroner that\nthe body which was buried might be taken up out of the grave, which the\ncoroner assented to, and thirty days after her death she was taken up, in\nthe presence of the jury and a great number of the people, whereupon the\njury changed their verdict. The persons being tried at Hertford Assizes\nwere acquitted, but so much against the evidence that the judge (Harvy)\nlet fall his opinion that it were better an appeal were brought than so\nfoul a murder should escape unpunished.\n\n\u201c\u2018_Anno, pasch\u00e6 termino, quarto Caroli_, they were tried on the appeal\nwhich was brought by the young child against his father, the grandfather\nand aunt, and her husband Okeman. And because the evidence was so strange\nI took exact and particular notes of it, which was as followeth, of the\nmatters above mentioned and related, an ancient and grave person, the\nminister of the parish where the fact was committed, being sworn to give\nevidence according to custom, deposed, that the body being taken out of\nthe grave thirty days after the party\u2019s death and lying on the grave and\nthe four defendants present, they were required each of them to touch the\ndead body. O.\u2019s wife fell on her knees and prayed God to show token of\ntheir innocency, or to some such purpose, but her very words I forget.\nThe appellers did touch the dead body, whereupon the brow of the dead,\nwhich was all a livid or carrion colour (that was the verbal expression\nin the terms of the witness) began to have a dew or gentle sweat, which\nreached down in drops on the face, and the brow turned and changed to a\nlively and fresh colour, and the dead opened one of her eyes and shut\nit again, and this opening the eye was done three several times. She\nlikewise thrust out the ring or marriage finger three times and pulled it\nin again, and the finger dropt blood from it on the grass.\n\n\u201c\u2018Hyde (Nicholas), Chief Justice, seeming to doubt the evidence, asked\nthe witness: \u201cWho saw this beside yourself?\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2018Witness: \u201cI cannot swear that others saw it; but, my lord,\u201d said he,\n\u201cI believe the whole company saw it, and if it had been thought a doubt,\nproof would have been made of it, and many would have attested with me.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2018Then the witness observing some admiration in the auditors, he spoke\nfurther, \u201cMy lord, I am minister of the parish, long knew all the\nparties, but never had any occasion of displeasure against any of them,\nnor had to do with them, or they with me, but as their minister. The\nthing was wonderful to me, but I have no interest in the matter, but am\ncalled upon to testify the truth and that I have done.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2018This witness was a reverend person as I guess about seventy years of\nage. His testimony was delivered gravely and temperately, but to the good\nadmiration of the auditor. Whereupon, applying himself to the Lord Chief\nJustice, he said, \u201cMy lord, my brother here present is minister of the\nnext parish adjacent, and I am assured saw all done as I have affirmed,\u201d\nwhereupon that person was also sworn to give evidence, and he deposed\nthe same in every point, viz., the sweat of the brow, the changes of\nits colour, the opening of the eye, the thrice motion of the finger and\ndrawing it in again; only the first witness deposed that a man dipped\nhis finger in the blood to examine it, and swore he believed it was real\nblood. I conferred afterwards with Sir Edmund Vowel, barrister at law,\nand others who concurred in this observation, and for myself, if I were\nupon my oath, can depose that these depositions, especially of the first\nwitness, are truly here reported in substance.\n\n\u201c\u2018The other evidence was given against the prisoners, viz., against the\ngrandmother of the plaintiff and against Okeman and his wife, that they\nlay in the next room to the dead person that night, and that none came\ninto the house till they found her dead next morning, therefore if she\ndid not murther herself, they must be the murtherers, and to that end\nfurther proof was made. First she lay in a composed manner in her bed,\nthe bed cloaths nothing at all disturbed, and her child by her in the\nbed. Secondly, her throat was cut from ear to ear and her neck broken,\nand if she first cut her throat, she could not break her neck in the\nbed, nor _e contra_. Thirdly, there was no blood in the bed, saving that\nthere was a tincture of blood upon the bolster whereupon her head lay,\nbut no other substance of blood at all. Fourthly, from the bed\u2019s head on\nthere was a stream of blood on the floor, till it ponded on the bending\nof the floor to a very great quantity and there was also another stream\nof blood on the floor at the bed\u2019s feet, which ponded also on the floor\nto another great quantity but no other communication of blood on either\nof these places, the one from the other, neither upon the bed, so that\nshe bled in two places severely, and it was deposed that turning up the\nmatte of the bed, there were clotes of congealed blood in the straw of\nthe matte underneath. Fifthly, the bloody knife in the morning was found\nclinging in the floor a good distance from the bed, but the point of the\nknife as it stuck in the floor was towards the bed and the haft towards\nthe door. Sixthly, lastly, there was the brand of a thumb and four\nfingers of a left hand on the dead person\u2019s left hand.\n\n\u201c\u2018Hyde, Chief Justice: \u201cHow can you know the print of a left hand from\nthe print of a right hand in such a case?\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2018Witness: \u201cMy lord, it is hard to describe it, but if it please the\nhonourable judge (_i.e._ the judge sitting on the bench beside the Chief\nJustice) to put his left hand on your left hand, you cannot possibly\nplace your right hand in the same posture.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2018It being done, and appearing so, the defendants had time to make their\ndefence, but gave no evidence to that purpose.\n\n\u201c\u2018The jury departing from the bar and returning, acquitted Okeman and\nfound the other three guilty; who, being severally demanded why judgment\nshould not be pronounced, sayd nothing, but each of them said, \u201cI did not\ndo it.\u201d \u201cI did not do it.\u201d Judgment was made and the grandmother and the\nhusband executed, but the aunt had the privilege to be spared execution,\nbeing with child. I enquired if they confessed anything at execution, but\ndid not as I was told.\u2019\n\n\u201cThus far the serjeant, afterwards Sir John Mainard, a person of great\nnote and judgment in the law. The paper, of which this is a copy, was\nfound amongst his papers since his death (1690) fair written with his own\nhand. Mr Hunt of the Temple took a copy of it, gave it me, which I have\nhereby transcribed.\u2014H. S.\u201d\n\nIt has been asserted by some writers that the vampire is not to be found\nin Indian lore and legend, and an attempt has been made to connect this\nsupposititious absence of the blood-sucking demon with the Brahminical\nand Buddhistic vegetarian and cremation customs. The Indian belief,\nhowever, in the existence of vampire spectres is as prevalent as it is\nin any other country, although the folk-lore and legends concerning them\nmay, perhaps, be more scarce.\n\nFornari, in his _History of Sorcerers_, relates the following story: \u201cIn\nthe beginning of the fifteenth century there lived at Bagdad an aged\nmerchant who had grown wealthy in his business and who had an only son to\nwhom he was tenderly attached. He resolved to marry him to the daughter\nof another merchant, a girl of considerable fortune, but without any\npersonal attractions. Abul-Hassan, the merchant\u2019s son, on being shown\nthe portrait of the lady, requested his father to delay the marriage\ntill he could reconcile his mind to it. Instead, however, of doing this\nhe fell in love with another girl, the daughter of a sage, and he gave\nhis father no peace till he consented to the marriage with the object of\nhis affections. The old man stood out as long as he could, but finding\nthat his son was bent on acquiring the hand of the fair Nadilla, and was\nequally resolute not to accept the rich and ugly lady, he did what most\nfathers under such circumstances would do\u2014he acquiesced.\n\n\u201cThe wedding took place with great pomp and ceremony, and a happy\nhoneymoon ensued, which might have been happier but for one little\ncircumstance which led to very serious consequences.\n\n\u201cAbul-Hassan noticed that his bride quitted the nuptial couch as soon as\nshe thought her husband was asleep, and did not return to it till an hour\nbefore dawn.\n\n\u201cFilled with curiosity, Hassan one night, feigning sleep, saw his wife\nrise and leave the room. He rose, followed cautiously, and saw her enter\nthe cemetery. By the straggling moonbeams he saw her go into a tomb: he\nstepped in after her.\n\n\u201cThe scene within was horrible. A party of ghouls were assembled with the\nspoils of the graves they had violated and were feasting on the flesh of\nthe long-buried corpses. His own wife, who, by the way, never touched\nsupper at home, played a no inconsiderable part in the hideous banquet.\n\n\u201cAs soon as he could safely escape Abul-Hassan stole back to his bed.\n\n\u201cHe said nothing to his bride till next evening when supper was laid,\nand she declined to eat; then he insisted on her partaking, and when she\npositively refused he exclaimed roughly: \u2018Oh yes, you keep your appetite\nfor your feasts with the ghouls.\u2019 Nadilla was silent; she turned pale and\ntrembled, and without a word sought her bed. At midnight she rose, fell\non her husband with her nails and teeth, tore his throat, and, having\nopened a vein, attempted to suck his blood; but Abul-Hassan, springing\nto his feet, threw her down and, with a blow, killed her. She was buried\nnext day.\n\n\u201cThree days after at midnight she reappeared, attacked her husband again,\nand again attempted to suck his blood. He fled from her and on the morrow\nopened her tomb, burnt her to ashes and cast the ashes into the Tigris.\u201d\n\nThere is a monstrous vampire which is said to delight in sucking the\nblood of children, and is known as a P\u0103nangglan. It has also a liking for\nsucking the blood of women at childbirth; but, as it is also credited\nwith a dread of thorns, the custom has arisen of placing thorns about the\nrooms of Indian houses on the occasions of births.\n\nOne of the Northern Indian witches\u2014the Jigar-Khor or Liver-eater\u2014is\nbelieved to be possessed of the power of being able to steal the liver of\nanother by looks and incantations. A class of witches known as Bh\u00fats are\nsaid to have an extraordinary fondness for fish, but also eat rice and\nall kinds of human food.\n\nHugh Clifford, in his interesting work _In Court and Kampong_, refers\nto the \u201cP\u0115nangal, that horrible wraith of a woman who has died in\nchildbirth, and who comes to torment small children in the guise of a\nfearful face and bust with many feet of bloody, trailing entrails in her\nwake,\u201d also of that \u201cweird little white animal, the _Mati-\u00e2nak_, that\nmakes beast noises round the graves of children; and of the familiar\nspirits that men raise up from the corpses of babes who have never seen\nthe light, the tips of whose tongues they bite off and swallow, after the\nchild has been brought back to life by magic agencies.\u201d\n\nIn the Tamil dream of Harich\u00e1ndra, the frenzied Sandram\u00e1ti says to the\nking: \u201cI belong to the race of elves, for I killed thy child in order\nthat I might feed on its delicate flesh.\u201d The Vetala is said to feed\nchiefly on corpses. The Bh\u00fats and other dismal ravenous ghosts, who are\ndreaded at the moon-wane of the month Katik (October-November), were not\nsupposed to devour men, but only their food.\n\nThen there is the H\u00e1ntu S\u00e0buro, which chases men into the forest by\nmeans of his dogs, and if they are run down he drinks their blood. The\nH\u00e1ntu Dondong resides in caves and crevices in rocks. He kills dogs and\nwild hogs with the sumpitan, and then drinks their blood. The H\u00e1ntu Parl\nfastens on to the wound of an injured person and sucks the blood.\n\nBarth, in his _History of Religions_ (Hinduism), says that \u201cSiva is\nidentified with _Mrityu_, Death, and his old name _Pacupati_, Lord of\nherds, acquires the ominous meaning of Master of human cattle. He is\nchief of the mischievous spirits, of ghouls and vampires that frequent\nplaces of execution and those where the dead are buried, and he prowls\nabout with them at nightfall.\u201d\n\nOther classes of demons are also known as the _Rakshasas_ or the\n_Pis\u00e2ch\u00e2s_, a word which literally means \u201cflesh-eaters,\u201d which\nDelongchamps has translated as \u201cbloodthirsty savages,\u201d but other\netymologists actually as \u201cvampires.\u201d\n\nThe vampire demon is no stranger to Australia. Bonwick, in his _Daily\nLife of the Tasmanians_, tells us that: \u201cDuring the whole of the first\nnight after the death of one of their tribe they will sit round the body,\nusing rapidly a low, continuous recitative to prevent the evil spirit\nfrom taking it away. This evil spirit was the ghost of an enemy. Fires at\nnight kept off these mischievous beings, which were like the vampires of\nEurope.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nVAMPIRISM IN GERMANY AND SURROUNDING COUNTRIES\n\n\nGermany, the home of modern philosophy, is not free from the belief\nin the reality of the vampire apparition, although the more horrible\nforms of the superstition are not frequently encountered. Crosses are,\nhowever, frequently erected at the head, or by the side, of graves, even\nin Protestant cemeteries, in order that their presence may prevent the\noccupants from being controlled by any demon that might, but for the\npresence of such charm, take possession of a body; and the _Nachzehrer_\nis as much dreaded in many parts of Germany as the _Vrykolaka_ is in\nRussia. In some parts of the Kaiser\u2019s dominions, food is still buried\nwith the corpse in order to assuage any pangs of hunger that may arise;\nand even when this is not done, a few grains of corn or rice are\nscattered upon the grave as a survival of the ancient custom. In Diesdorf\nit is believed that if money is not placed in the mouth of a dead\nperson at burial, or his name not cut from his shirt, he will, in all\nprobability, become a Nachzehrer, and his ghost issue from the grave in\nthe form of a pig. Another sure preventive of such a calamity is to break\nthe neck of a dead body.\n\nThe following story was contributed by Dr Franz Hartmann to the _Occult\nReview_ for September 1909, under the title of \u201cAn Authenticated Vampire\nStory\u201d:\u2014\n\n\u201cOn June 10th, 1909, there appeared in a prominent Vienna paper (the\n_Neues Wiener Journal_) a notice saying that the castle of B\u2014\u2014 had been\nburned by the populace, because there was a great mortality among the\npeasant children, and it was generally believed that this was due to the\ninvasion of a vampire, supposed to be the last Count B\u2014\u2014, who died and\nacquired that reputation. The castle was situated in a wild and desolate\npart of the Carpathian Mountains, and was formerly a fortification\nagainst the Turks. It was not inhabited, owing to its being believed to\nbe in the possession of ghosts; only a wing of it was used as a dwelling\nfor the caretaker and his wife.\n\n\u201cNow it so happened that, when I read the above notice, I was sitting\nin a coffee-house at Vienna in company with an old friend of mine who\nis an experienced occultist and editor of a well-known journal, and who\nhad spent several months in the neighbourhood of the castle. From him\nI obtained the following account, and it appears that the vampire in\nquestion was probably not the old Count, but his beautiful daughter, the\nCountess Elga, whose photograph, taken from the original painting, I\nobtained. My friend said: \u2018Two years ago I was living at Hermannstadt,\nand being engaged in engineering a road through the hills, I often came\nwithin the vicinity of the old castle, where I made the acquaintance of\nthe old castellan, or caretaker, and his wife, who occupied a part of the\nwing of the house, almost separate from the main body of the building.\nThey were a quiet old couple and rather reticent in giving information\nor expressing an opinion in regard to the strange noises which were\noften heard at night in the deserted halls, or of the apparitions which\nthe Wallachian peasants claimed to have seen when they loitered in the\nsurroundings after dark. All I could gather was that the old Count was a\nwidower and had a beautiful daughter, who was one day killed by a fall\nfrom her horse, and that soon after the old man died in some mysterious\nmanner, and the bodies were buried in a solitary graveyard belonging to\na neighbouring village. Not long after their death an unusual mortality\nwas noticed among the inhabitants of the village: several children and\neven some grown people died without any apparent illness; they merely\nwasted away; and thus a rumour was started that the old Count had become\na vampire after his death. There is no doubt that he was not a saint, as\nhe was addicted to drinking, and some shocking tales were in circulation\nabout his conduct and that of his daughter; but whether there was any\ntruth in them, I am not in a position to say.\n\n\u201c\u2018Afterwards the property came into the possession of \u2014\u2014, a distant\nrelative of the family, who is a young man and officer in a cavalry\nregiment at Vienna. It appears that the heir enjoyed his life at the\ncapital and did not trouble himself much about the old castle in the\nwilderness; he did not even come to look at it, but gave his directions\nby letter to the janitor, telling him merely to keep things in order\nand to attend to repairs, if any were necessary. Thus the castellan was\nactually master of the house, and offered its hospitality to me and my\nfriends.\n\n\u201cOne evening I and my two assistants, Dr E\u2014\u2014, a young lawyer, and Mr\nW\u2014\u2014, a literary man, went to inspect the premises. First we went to the\nstables. There were no horses, as they had been sold; but what attracted\nour special attention was an old, queer-fashioned coach with gilded\nornaments and bearing the emblems of the family. We then inspected the\nrooms, passing through some halls and gloomy corridors, such as may\nbe found in any old castle. There was nothing remarkable about the\nfurniture; but in one of the halls there hung in a frame an oil-painting,\na portrait, representing a lady with a large hat and wearing a fur coat.\nWe were all involuntarily startled on beholding this picture\u2014not so much\non account of the beauty of the lady, but on account of the uncanny\nexpression of her eyes; and Dr E\u2014\u2014, after looking at the picture for a\nshort time, suddenly exclaimed: \u2018How strange! The picture closes its eyes\nand opens them again, and now it begins to smile!\u2019\n\n\u201cNow Dr E\u2014\u2014 is a very sensitive person, and has more than once had some\nexperience in spiritism, and we made up our minds to form a circle for\nthe purpose of investigating this phenomenon. Accordingly, on the same\nevening we sat around a table in an adjoining room, forming a magnetic\nchain with our hands. Soon the table began to move and the name _Elga_\nwas spelled. We asked who this Elga was, and the answer was rapped out:\n\u2018The lady whose picture you have seen.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Is the lady living?\u2019 asked Mr W\u2014\u2014. This question was not answered;\nbut instead it was rapped out: \u2018If W\u2014\u2014 desires it, I will appear to him\nbodily to-night at two o\u2019clock.\u2019 W\u2014\u2014 consented, and now the table seemed\nto be endowed with life and manifested a great affection for W\u2014\u2014; it rose\non two legs and pressed against his breast, as if it intended to embrace\nhim.\n\n\u201cWe inquired of the castellan whom the picture represented; but to our\nsurprise he did not know. He said that it was the copy of a picture\npainted by the celebrated painter Hans Markart of Vienna, and had been\nbought by the old Count because its demoniacal look pleased him so much.\n\n\u201cWe left the castle, and W\u2014\u2014 retired to his room at an inn a half-hour\u2019s\njourney distant from that place. He was of a somewhat sceptical turn of\nmind, being neither a firm believer in ghosts and apparitions nor ready\nto deny their possibility. He was not afraid, but anxious to see what\nwould come of his agreement, and for the purpose of keeping himself awake\nhe sat down and began to write an article for a journal.\n\n\u201cTowards two o\u2019clock he heard steps on the stairs and the door of the\nhall opened; there was the rustling of a silk dress and the sound of the\nfeet of a lady walking to and fro in the corridor.\n\n\u201cIt may be imagined that he was somewhat startled; but taking courage,\nhe said to himself: \u2018If this is Elga, let her come in.\u2019 Then the door\nof the room opened and Elga entered. She was most elegantly dressed,\nand appeared still more youthful and seductive than the picture. There\nwas a lounge on the other side of the table where W\u2014\u2014 was writing, and\nthere she silently posted herself. She did not speak, but her looks and\ngestures left no doubt in regard to her desires and intentions.\n\n\u201cMr W\u2014\u2014 resisted the temptation and remained firm. It is not known\nwhether he did so out of principle or timidity or fear. Be this as it\nmay, he kept on writing, looking from time to time at his visitor and\nsilently wishing that she would leave. At last, after half an hour, which\nseemed to him much longer, the lady departed in the same manner in which\nshe came.\n\n\u201cThis adventure left W\u2014\u2014 no peace, and we consequently arranged several\nsittings at the old castle, where a variety of uncanny phenomena took\nplace. Thus, for instance, once the servant-girl was about to light a\nfire in the stove, when the door of the apartment opened and Elga stood\nthere. The girl, frightened out of her wits, rushed from the room,\ntumbling down the stairs in terror with the lamp in her hand, which\nbroke, and came very near to setting her clothes on fire. Lighted lamps\nand candles went out when brought near the picture, and many other\n\u2018manifestations\u2019 took place which it would be tedious to describe; but\nthe following incident ought not to be omitted.\n\n\u201cMr W\u2014\u2014 was at that time desirous of obtaining the position as co-editor\nof a certain journal, and a few days after the above-narrated adventure\nhe received a letter in which a noble lady of high position offered him\nher patronage for that purpose. The writer requested him to come to a\ncertain place the same evening, where he would meet a gentleman who\nwould give him further particulars. He went, and was met by an unknown\nstranger, who told him that he was requested by the Countess Elga to\ninvite Mr W\u2014\u2014 to a carriage drive, and that she would await him at\nmidnight at a certain crossing of two roads, not far from the village.\nThe stranger then suddenly disappeared.\n\n\u201cNow it seems that Mr W\u2014\u2014 had some misgivings about the meeting and\ndrive, and he hired a policeman as detective to go at midnight to the\nappointed place, to see what would happen. The policeman went and\nreported next morning that he had seen nothing but the well-known,\nold-fashioned carriage from the castle, with two black horses, standing\nthere as if waiting for somebody, and that as he had no occasion to\ninterfere, he merely waited until the carriage moved on. When the\ncastellan of the castle was asked, he swore that the carriage had not\nbeen out that night, and in fact it could not have been out, as there\nwere no horses to draw it.\n\n\u201cBut that is not all, for on the following day I met a friend who is a\ngreat sceptic and disbeliever in ghosts, and always used to laugh at such\nthings. Now, however, he seemed to be very serious and said: \u2018Last night\nsomething very strange happened to me. At about one o\u2019clock this morning\nI returned from a late visit, and as I happened to pass the graveyard\nof the village, I saw a carriage with gilded ornaments standing at the\nentrance. I wondered about this taking place at such an unusual hour,\nand being curious to see what would happen, I waited. Two elegantly\ndressed ladies issued from the carriage. One of these was young and\npretty, but threw at me a devilish and scornful look as they both passed\nby and entered the cemetery. There they were met by a well-dressed man,\nwho saluted the ladies and spoke to the younger one, saying: \u201cWhy, Miss\nElga! Are you returned so soon?\u201d Such a queer feeling came over me that I\nabruptly left and hurried home.\u2019\n\n\u201cThis matter has not been explained; but certain experiments which we\nsubsequently made with the picture of Elga brought out some curious facts.\n\n\u201cTo look at the picture for a certain time caused me to feel a very\ndisagreeable sensation in the region of the solar plexus. I began to\ndislike the portrait and proposed to destroy it. We held a sitting in the\nadjoining room; the table manifested a great aversion to my presence.\nIt was rapped out that I should leave the circle, and that the picture\nmust not be destroyed. I ordered a Bible to be brought in, and read the\nbeginning of the first chapter of St John, whereupon the above-mentioned\nMr E\u2014\u2014 (the medium) and another man present claimed that they saw the\npicture distorting its face. I turned the frame and pricked the back of\nthe picture with my penknife in different places, and Mr E\u2014\u2014, as well as\nthe other man, felt all the pricks, although they had retired to the\ncorridor.\n\n\u201cI made the sign of the pentagram over the picture, and again the two\ngentlemen claimed that the picture was horribly distorting its face.\n\n\u201cSoon afterwards we were called away and left that country. Of Elga I\nheard nothing more.\u201d\n\nThus far goes the account of my friend the editor.\n\nSiegbert\u2019s _Chronicle_ for the year 858 has the following story: \u201cThere\nappeared this year in the diocese of Mentz a spirit which discovered\nhimself at first by throwing stones and beating against the walls of\nhouses, as if it had been with a great mallet. He then proceeded to speak\nand reveal secrets, and discovered the authors of several thefts and\nother matters likely to breed disturbances in the neighbourhood. At last\nhe vented his malice upon one particular person, whom he was industrious\nin persecuting and making odious to all the neighbours by representing\nhim as the cause of God\u2019s anger against the whole village. The spirit\nnever forsook the poor man, but tormented him without intermission,\nburnt all his corn in the barns, and set every place on fire where he\ncame. The priests attempted to frighten him away by exorcisms, prayers,\nand holy water; but the spectre answered them with a volley of stones\nwhich wounded several of them. When the priests were gone he was heard to\nbemoan himself and say that he was forced to take refuge in the cowl of\none of the priests, who had injured the daughter of a man of consequence\nin the village. He continued in this manner to infest the village for\nthree years together, and never gave over till he had set every house in\nit on fire.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nVAMPIRISM IN HUNGARY, BAVARIA, AND SILESIA\n\n\nThe Hungarians believe that those who have been passive vampires in life\nbecome active vampires after death; that those whose blood has been\nsucked in life by vampires become themselves vampires after death. In\nmany districts the belief also prevails that the only way to prevent this\ncalamity happening is for the threatened victim to eat some earth from\nthe grave of the attacking vampire, and to smear his own body with blood\nfrom the body of that vampire.\n\nThat the belief in vampirism is still current in Hungary was evidenced\nrecently. The _Daily Telegraph_ of February 15th, 1912, contained\nthe following paragraph: \u201cA Buda-Pesth telegram to the _Messaggero_\nreports a terrible instance of superstition. A boy of fourteen died\nsome days ago in a small village. A farmer, in whose employment the boy\nhad been, thought that the ghost of the latter appeared to him every\nnight. In order to put a stop to these supposed visitations, the farmer,\naccompanied by some friends, went to the cemetery one night, stuffed\nthree pieces of garlic and three stones in the mouth, and thrust a\nstake through the corpse, fixing it to the ground. This was to deliver\nthemselves from the evil spirit, as the credulous farmer and his friends\nstated when they were arrested.\u201d\n\nIn 1732, in a village in Hungary, in the space of three months, seventeen\npersons of different ages died of vampirism, some without being ill,\nand others after languishing two or three days. It is reported that a\ngirl named Stanoska, daughter of the Heyduk Jotiutso, who went to bed in\nperfect health, awoke in the middle of the night trembling violently and\nuttering terrible shrieks, declaring that the son of the Heyduk Millo,\nwho had been dead nine weeks, had nearly strangled her in her sleep. She\nfell into a languid state and died at the end of three days. Young Millo\nwas exhumed and found to be a vampire.\n\nCalmet, in his work _The Phantom World_, relates the following: \u201cAbout\nfifteen years ago a soldier who was billeted at the house of a Haidamaque\npeasant, on the frontiers of Hungary, as he was one day sitting at table\nnear his host, the master of the house, saw a person he did not know\ncome in and sit down to table also with them. The master of the house\nwas strangely frightened at this, as were the rest of the company. The\nsoldier knew not what to think of it, being ignorant of the matter in\nquestion. But the master of the house being dead the very next day, the\nsoldier inquired what it meant. They told him it was the body of the\nfather of the host, who had been dead and buried for ten years, who had\nthus come to sit down next to him, and had announced and caused his death.\n\n\u201cThe soldier informed the regiment of it in the first place, and the\nregiment gave notice of it to the general officers, who commissioned the\nCount de Cabreras, captain of the regiment of Alandetti infantry, to make\ninformation concerning this circumstance. Having gone to the place with\nsome other officers, a surgeon and an auditor, they heard the depositions\nof all the people belonging to the house, who decided unanimously that\nthe ghost was the father of the master of the house, and that all the\nsoldier had said and reported was the exact truth, which was confirmed by\nall the inhabitants of the village.\n\n\u201cIn consequence of this the corpse of the spectre was exhumed and found\nto be like that of a man who had just expired, and his blood like that\nof a living man. The Count de Cabreras had his head cut off and caused\nhim to be laid again in the tomb. He also took information concerning\nother similar ghosts: among others, of a man dead more than thirty years\nwho had come back three times to his house at meal-time. The first time\nhe had sucked the blood from the neck of his own brother, the second\ntime from one of his sons, and the third time from one of the servants\nin the house; and all three died of it instantly and on the spot. Upon\nthis deposition the commissary had this man taken out of his grave, and\nfinding that, like the first, his blood was in a fluidic state like that\nof a living person, he ordered them to run a large nail into his temple\nand then to lay him again in the grave.\n\n\u201cHe caused a third to be burned who had been buried more than sixteen\nyears and had sucked the blood and caused the death of two of his sons.\nThe commissary having made his report to the general officers, was\ndeputed to the Emperor, who commanded that some officers both of war and\nof justice, some physicians and surgeons and some learned men should be\nsent to examine the causes of these extraordinary events. The person who\nrelated these particulars to us had heard them from the Count de Cabreras\nat Fribourg in 1730.\u201d\n\nRaufft tells the story of a man named \u201cPeter Plogojowitz, an inhabitant\nof a village in Hungary called Kisolova, who, after he had been buried\nmore than ten years, appeared by night to several persons in the village,\nwhile they were asleep, and squeezed their throats in such a manner\nthat they expired within twenty-four hours. There died in this way no\nless than nine persons in eight days; and the widow of this Plogojowitz\ndeposed that she herself had been visited by him since his death, and\nthat his errand was to demand his shoes; which frightened her so much\nthat she at once left Kisolova and went to live somewhere else.\n\n\u201cThese circumstances determined the inhabitants of the village to dig\nup the body of Plogojowitz and burn it, in order to put a stop to such\ntroublesome visits. Accordingly they applied to the commanding officer\nof the Emperor\u2019s troops in the district of Gradisca, in the kingdom of\nHungary, and to the incumbent of the place, for leave to dig up the\ncorpse. They both made a great many scruples about granting it; but the\npeasants declared plainly that if they were not permitted to dig up this\naccursed carcase, which they were fully convinced was a vampire, they\nwould be forced to leave the village and settle where they could.\n\n\u201cThe officer who gave this account, seeing that there was no hindering\nthem either by fair means or foul, came in person, accompanied by the\nminister of Gradisca, to Kisolova, and they were both present at the\ndigging up of the corpse, which they found to be free from any bad smell,\nand perfectly sound, as if it had been alive, except that the tip of\nthe nose was a little dry and withered. The beard and hair were grown\nfresh and a new set of nails had sprung up in the room of the old ones\nthat had fallen off. Under the former skin, which looked pale and dead,\nthere appeared a new one, of a natural fresh colour; and the hands and\nfeet were as entire as if they belonged to a person in perfect health.\nThey observed also that the mouth of the vampire was full of fresh blood,\nwhich the people were persuaded had been sucked by him from the persons\nhe had killed.\n\n\u201cThe officer and the divine having diligently examined into all the\ncircumstances, the people, being fired with fresh indignation, and\ngrowing more fully persuaded that this carcase was the real cause of the\ndeath of their countrymen, ran immediately to fetch a sharp stake, which\nbeing driven into his breast, there issued from the wound, and also from\nhis nose and mouth, a great quantity of fresh, ruddy blood; and something\nwhich indicated a sort of life, was observed to come from him. The\npeasants then laid the body upon a pile of wood, and burnt it to ashes.\u201d\n\nCalmet says he was told by M. de Vassimont, who was sent to Moravia by\nLeopold, first Duke of Lorraine, that he was informed by public report\nthat it was common enough in that country to see men who had died some\ntime before present themselves in a party and sit down to the table with\npersons of their acquaintance without saying anything, but that nodding\nto one of the party he would infallibly die some days afterwards. M.\nde Vassimont received confirmation of this story from several persons,\namongst others an old cur\u00e9 who said he had seen more than one instance of\nit. The priest added that the inhabitants had been delivered from these\ntroublesome spectres owing to the fact that their corpses had been taken\nup and burned or destroyed in some way or other.\n\nAt the beginning of the eighteenth century several vampire investigations\nwere held at the instigation of the Bishop of Olmutz. The village of\nLiebava was particularly infested, and a Hungarian placed himself on the\ntop of the church tower and just before midnight saw a well-known vampire\nissue from his tomb, and, leaving his winding-sheet behind him, proceed\non his rounds. The Hungarian descended from the tower and took away the\nsheet and ascended the tower again. When the vampire returned he flew\ninto a great fury because of the absence of the sheet. The Hungarian\ncalled to him to come up to the tower and fetch it. The vampire mounted\nthe ladder, but just before he reached the top the Hungarian gave him a\nblow on the head which threw him down to the churchyard. His assailant\nthen descended, cut off the vampire\u2019s head with a hatchet, and from that\ntime the vampire was no more heard of.\n\nIn 1672 there dwelt in the market town of Kring, in the Archduchy of\nKrain, a man named George Grando, who died, and was buried by Father\nGeorge, a monk of St Paul, who, on returning to the widow\u2019s house, saw\nGrando sitting behind the door. The monk and the neighbours fled. Soon\nstories began to circulate of a dark figure being seen to go about the\nstreets by night, stopping now and then to tap at the door of a house,\nbut never to wait for an answer. In a little while people began to die\nmysteriously in Kring, and it was noticed that the deaths occurred in\nthe houses at which the spectred figure had tapped its signal. The\nwidow Grando also complained that she was tormented by the spirit of\nher husband, who night after night threw her into a deep sleep with\nthe object of sucking her blood. The Supan, or chief magistrate, of\nKring decided to take the usual steps to ascertain whether Grando was a\nvampire. He called together some of the neighbours, fortified them with a\nplentiful supply of spirituous liquor, and they sallied off with torches\nand a crucifix.\n\nGrando\u2019s grave was opened, and the body was found to be perfectly sound\nand not decomposed, the mouth being opened with a pleasant smile, and\nthere was a rosy flush on the cheeks. The whole party were seized with\nterror and hurried back to Kring, with the exception of the Supan. The\nsecond visit was made in company with a priest, and the party also took\na heavy stick of hawthorn sharpened to a point. The grave and body were\nfound to be exactly as they had been left. The priest kneeled down\nsolemnly and held the crucifix aloft: \u201cO vampire, look at this,\u201d he said;\n\u201chere is Jesus Christ who loosed us from the pains of hell and died for\nus upon the tree!\u201d\n\nHe went on to address the corpse, when it was seen that great tears were\nrolling down the vampire\u2019s cheeks. A hawthorn stake was brought forward,\nand as often as they strove to drive it through the body the sharpened\nwood rebounded, and it was not until one of the number sprang into the\ngrave and cut off the vampire\u2019s head that the evil spirit departed with a\nloud shriek and a contortion of the limbs.\n\nSimilar stories to this were continually being circulated from the\nborders of Hungary to the Baltic.\n\nAt one time the spectre of a village herdsman near Kodom, in Bavaria,\nbegan to appear to several inhabitants of the place, and either in\nconsequence of their fright or from some other cause, every person who\nhad seen the apparition died during the week afterwards. Driven to\ndespair, the peasants disinterred the corpse and pinned it to the ground\nwith a long stake. The same night he appeared again, plunging people into\nconvulsions of fright, and suffocated several of them. Then the village\nauthorities handed the body over to the executioner, who caused it to be\ncarried into a field adjoining the cemetery, where it was burned. The\ncorpse howled like a madman, kicking and tearing as if it had been alive.\n\nWhen it was run through again with sharp-pointed stakes, before the\nburning, it uttered piercing cries and vomited masses of crimson blood.\nThe apparition of the spectre ceased only after the corpse had been\nreduced to ashes.\n\nFortis, in his _Travels into Dalmatia_, says that the Moslacks have no\ndoubt as to the existence of vampires, and attribute to them, as in\nTransylvania, the sucking of the blood of infants. Therefore, when a man\ndies, and he is suspected of vampirism, or of being a _vukodlak_\u2014the\nterm they employ\u2014they cut his hams and prick his whole body with pins,\npretending that he will be unable to walk about after this operation has\nbeen performed. There are even instances of Moolacchi who, imagining\nthat they may possibly thirst for human blood after death, particularly\nthe blood of children, entreat their heirs, and sometimes even make them\npromise, to treat them in this manner directly after death.\n\nDr Henry More, in his _Antidote against Atheism_, argues for the reality\nof vampires, and relates the following stories.\n\n\u201cA shoemaker of Breslau, in Silesia, in 1591 terminated his life by\ncutting his throat. His family, however, spread abroad the report that he\nhad died of apoplexy, which enabled them to bury him in the ordinary way\nand save the disgrace of his being interred as a suicide. Despite this,\nhowever, the rumour got abroad that the man had committed suicide. It was\nalso reported that his ghost had been seen at the bedsides of several\npersons, and the rumours and reports spreading, it was decided by the\nauthorities to disinter the body. It had been buried on September 22nd,\n1591, and the grave was opened on April 18th, 1592. The body was found\nto be entire; it was not in any way putrid, the joints were flexible,\nthere was no ill smell, the wound in the throat was visible and there\nwas no corruption in it. There was also observed what was claimed to\nbe a magical mark on the great toe of the right foot\u2014an excrescence in\nthe form of a rose. The body was kept above ground for six days, during\nwhich time the apparitions still appeared. It was then buried beneath the\ngallows, but the apparition still came to the bedsides of the alarmed\ninhabitants, pinching and suffocating people, and leaving marks of its\nfingers plainly visible on the flesh. A fortnight afterwards the body\nwas again dug up, when it was observed to have sensibly increased its\nsize since its last interment. Then the head, arms, and legs of the\ncorpse were cut off; the heart, which was as fresh and entire as that in\na freshly killed calf, was also taken out of the body. The whole body\nthus dismembered was consigned to the flames and the ashes thrown into\nthe river. The apparition was never seen afterwards. A servant of the\ndeceased man was also said to have acted in a similar manner after her\ndeath. Her remains were also dug up and burned, and then her apparition\nceased to torment the inhabitants.\u201d\n\n\u201cJohannes Cuntius, a citizen and alderman of Pentach, in Silesia, when\nabout sixty years of age, died somewhat suddenly, as the result of a kick\nfrom his horse. At the moment of his death a black cat rushed into the\nroom, jumped on to the bed, and scratched violently at his face. Both at\nthe time of his death and that of his funeral a great tempest arose\u2014the\nwind and snow \u2018made men\u2019s bodies quake and their teeth chatter in their\nheads.\u2019 The storm is said to have ceased with startling suddenness as the\nbody was placed under the ground. Immediately after the burial, however,\nstories began to circulate of the appearance of a phantom which spoke\nto people in the voice of Cuntius. Remarkable tales were told of the\nconsumption of milk from jugs and bowls, of milk being turned into blood,\nof old men being strangled, children taken out of cradles, altar-cloths\nbeing soiled with blood, and poultry killed and eaten. Eventually it was\ndecided to disinter the body. It was found that all the bodies buried\nabove that of Cuntius had become putrefied and rotten, but his skin was\ntender and florid, his joints by no means stiff, and when a staff was\nput between his fingers they closed around it and held it fast in their\ngrasp. He could open and shut his eyes, and when a vein in his leg was\npunctured the blood sprang out as fresh as that of a living person. This\nhappened after the body had been in the grave for about six months. Great\ndifficulty was experienced when the body was cut up and dismembered, by\nthe order of the authorities, by reason of the resistance offered; but\nwhen the task was completed, and the remains consigned to the flames, the\nspectre ceased to molest the natives or interfere with their slumbers or\nhealth.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nVAMPIRISM IN SERVIA AND BULGARIA\n\n\nThe document which gives the particulars of the following remarkable\nstory is signed by three regimental surgeons and formally countersigned\nby the lieutenant-colonel and sub-lieutenant, and bears the date June\n7th, 1732, with the address Meduegna, near Belgrade.\n\n\u201cIn the spring of 1727 there returned from the Levant to the village of\nMeduegna, near Belgrade, one Arnod Paole, who, in a few years\u2019 military\nservice and varied adventure, had amassed enough to purchase a cottage\nand an acre or two of land in his native place, where he gave out that\nhe meant to pass the remainder of his days. He kept his word. Arnod\nhad yet scarcely reached the prime of manhood; and though he must have\nencountered the rough as well as the smooth of life, and have mingled\nwith many a wild and reckless companion, yet his natural good disposition\nand honest principles had preserved him unscathed in the scenes he had\npassed through. At all events, such were the thoughts expressed by his\nneighbours as they discussed his return and settlement among them in\nthe stube of the village hof. Nor did the frank and open countenance of\nArnod, his obliging habits and steady conduct, argue their judgments\nincorrect. Nevertheless, there was something occasionally noticeable in\nhis ways, a look and tone that betrayed inward disquiet. He would often\nrefuse to join his friends, or on some sudden plea abruptly quit their\nsociety. And he still more unaccountably, and it seemed systematically,\navoided meeting his pretty neighbour, Nina, whose father occupied the\nnext farm to his own. At the age of seventeen Nina was as charming a\npicture of youth, cheerfulness, innocence, and confidence as you could\nhave seen in all the world. You could not look into her limpid eye,\nwhich steadily returned your gaze, without seeing to the bottom of the\npure and transparent spring of her thoughts. Why then did Arnod shrink\nfrom meeting her? He was young; had a little property; had health and\nindustry; and he had told his friends he had formed no ties in other\nlands. Why then did he avoid the fascination of the pretty Nina, who\nseemed a being made to chase from any brow the clouds of gathering care?\nBut he did so, yet less and less resolutely, for he felt the charm of her\npresence. Who could have done otherwise? And how long he resisted the\nimpulse of his fondness for the innocent girl who sought to cheer his\nfits of depression!\n\n\u201cAnd they were to be united\u2014were betrothed; yet still the anxious gloom\nwould fitfully overcast his countenance, even in the sunshine of those\nhours.\n\n\u201c\u2018What is it, dear Arnod, that makes you sad? It cannot be on my account,\nI know, for you were sad before you noticed me; and that, I think surely,\nfirst made me notice you.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Nina,\u2019 he answered, \u2018I have done, I fear, a great wrong in trying to\ngain your affections. Nina, I have a fixed impression that I shall not\nlive; yet, knowing this, I have selfishly made my existence necessary to\nyour happiness.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018How strangely you talk, dear Arnod! Who in the village is stronger and\nhealthier than you? You feared no danger when you were a soldier. What\ndanger do you fear as a villager of Meduegna?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018It haunts me, Nina.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018But, Arnod, you were sad before you thought of me. Did you then fear to\ndie?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Oh, Nina, it is something worse than death.\u2019 And his vigorous frame\nshook with agony.\n\n\u201c\u2018Arnod, I conjure you, tell me.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018It was in Cossova this fate befell me. Here you have hitherto escaped\nthe terrible scourge. But there they die, and the dead visit the living.\nI experienced the first frightful visitation, and I fled; but not till I\nhad sought his grave and executed the dread expiation from the vampire.\u2019\n\n\u201cNina\u2019s blood ran cold. She stood horror-stricken. But her young heart\nsoon mastered her first despair. With a touching voice she spoke: \u2018Fear\nnot, dear Arnod; fear not now. I will be your shield, or I will die with\nyou!\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd she encircled his neck with her gentle arms, and returning hope\nshone, Iris-like, amid her falling tears. Afterwards they found a\nreasonable ground for banishing or allaying their apprehension in the\nlengthy time which had elapsed since Arnod left Cossova, during which\nno fearful visitant had again approached him; and they fondly protested\n_that_ gave them security.\n\n\u201cOne day about a week after this conversation Arnod missed his footing\nwhen on the top of a loaded hay-waggon, and fell from it to the ground.\nHe was picked up insensible, and carried home, where, after lingering a\nshort time, he died. His interment, as usual, followed immediately. His\nfate was sad and premature. But what pencil could paint Nina\u2019s grief?\n\n\u201cTwenty or thirty days after his decease, several in the neighbourhood\ncomplained that they were haunted by the deceased Arnod; and what was\nmore to the purpose, four of them died. The evil looked at sceptically\nwas bad enough, but aggravated by the suggestions of superstition it\nspread a panic through the whole district. To allay the popular terror,\nand, if possible, to get at the root of the evil, a determination\nwas come to publicly to disinter the body of Arnod, with the view of\nascertaining whether he really was a vampire, and, in that event, of\ntreating him conformably. The day fixed for these proceedings was the\nfortieth after his burial.\n\n\u201cIt was on a grey morning in early August that the commission visited\nthe cemetery of Meduegna, which, surrounded with a wall of stone, lies\nsheltered by the mountain that, rising in undulating green slopes,\nirregularly planted with fruit-trees, ends in an abrupt craggy ridge,\ncovered with underwood. The graves were, for the most part, neatly\nkept, with borders of box, or something like it, and flowers between,\nand at the head of most, a small wooden cross, painted black, bearing\nthe name of the tenant. Here and there a stone had been raised. One of\nterrible height, a single narrow slab, ornamented with grotesque Gothic\ncarvings, dominated over the rest. Near this lay the grave of Arnod\nPaole, towards which the party moved. The work of throwing out the earth\nwas begun by the grey, careful old sexton, who lived in the Leichenhaus\nbeyond the great crucifix. Near the grave stood two military surgeons\nor _feldscherers_ from Belgrade, and a drummer-boy, who held their\ncase of instruments. The boy looked on with keen interest; and when the\ncoffin was exposed and rather roughly drawn out of the grave, his pale\nface and bright, intent eye showed how the scene moved him. The sexton\nlifted the lid of the coffin; the body had become inclined to one side.\nThen, turning it straight: \u2018Ha, ha! What? Your mouth not wiped since last\nnight\u2019s work?\u2019\n\n\u201cThe spectators shuddered; the drummer-boy sank forward, fainting, and\nupset the instrument case, scattering its contents; the senior surgeon,\ninfected with the horror of the scene, repressed a hasty exclamation.\nThey threw water on the drummer-boy and he recovered, but would not leave\nthe spot. Then they inspected the body of Arnod. It looked as if it had\nnot been dead a day. After handling it, the scarfskin came off, but below\nwere _new skin and new nails_! How could they have come there but from\nthis foul feeding? The case was clear enough: there lay before them the\nthing they dreaded\u2014the vampire! So, without more ado, they simply drove a\nstake through poor Arnod\u2019s chest, whereupon a quantity of blood gushed\nforth, and the corpse uttered a dreadful groan.\n\n\u201c\u2018Murder! Murder!\u2019 shrieked the drummer-boy, as he rushed wildly, with\nconvulsed gestures, from the scene.\u201d\n\nThe body of Arnod was then burnt to ashes, which were returned to the\ngrave. The authorities further staked and burnt the bodies of the four\nothers who were supposed to have been infected by Arnod. No mention\nis made of the state in which they were found. The adoption of these\ndecisive measures failed, however, entirely to extinguish the evil, which\ncontinued still to hang about the village. About five years afterwards\nit had again become very rife, and many died through it; whereupon the\nauthorities determined to make another and a complete clearance of the\nvampire in the cemetery, and with that object they had all the graves,\nto which suspicion attached, opened, and their contents officially\nanatomised, and the following are abridgments of the medical reports:\u2014\n\n1. A woman of the name of Stana, twenty years of age, who had died three\nmonths before, of a three days\u2019 illness following her confinement.\nShe had before her death avowed that she had _anointed_ herself with\nthe blood of a vampire, to liberate herself from his persecution.\nNevertheless she had died. Her body was entirely free from decomposition.\nOn opening it the chest was found filled with recently effused blood, and\nthe bowels had exactly the appearance of sound health. The skin and nails\nof her hands and feet were loose and came off, but underneath were new\nskin and nails.\n\n2. A woman of the name of Miliza, who had died at the end of a three\nmonths\u2019 illness. The body had been buried ninety and odd days. In the\nchest was liquid blood. The viscera were as in the former instance.\nThe body was declared by a heyduk, who recognised it, to be in better\ncondition and fatter than it had been in the woman\u2019s legitimate lifetime.\n\n3. The body of a child eight years old, that had likewise been buried\nninety days; it was in the vampire condition.\n\n4. The son of a heyduk, named Milloc, sixteen years old. The body\nhad lain in the grave nine weeks. He had died after three days\u2019\nindisposition, and was in the condition of a vampire.\n\n5. Joachim, likewise the son of a heyduk, seventeen years old. He had\ndied after three days\u2019 illness; had been buried eight weeks and some\ndays; was found in the vampire state.\n\n6. A man of the name of Rusha, who had died of an illness of ten days\u2019\nduration and had been six weeks buried, in whom likewise fresh blood was\nfound in the chest.\n\n7. The body of a girl ten years of age who had died two months before. It\nwas likewise in the vampire state, perfectly undecomposed, with blood in\nthe chest.\n\n8. The body of the wife of one Hadnuck, buried seven weeks before; and\nthat of her infant eight weeks old, buried only twenty-one days. They\nwere both in a state of decomposition, though buried in the same ground\nand closely adjoining the others.\n\n9. A servant, by name Rhade, twenty-three years of age; he had died after\nan illness of three months\u2019 duration, and the body had been buried five\nweeks. It was in a state of decomposition.\n\n10. The body of the heyduk Stanco, sixty years of age, who had died six\nweeks previously. There was much blood and other fluid in the chest and\nabdomen, and the body was in a vampire condition.\n\n11. Millac, a heyduk, twenty-five years old. The body had been in the\nearth six weeks. It was also in the vampire condition.\n\n12. Stanjoika, the wife of a heyduk, twenty years old; had died after an\nillness of three days, and had been buried eighteen. The countenance was\nflorid. There was blood in the chest and in the heart. The viscera were\nperfectly sound, the skin remarkably flush.\n\nThe vampire tradition in its original loathsomeness, however, is to be\nfound only in the Bulgarian provinces, whither the knowledge of the\nsuperstition was first imported from Dalmatia and Albania. In the former\ncountry the vampire is known by the name of _wukodlak_.\n\nSt Clair and Brophy, in their work on Bulgaria, state that in Bulgaria\nthe vampire is no longer a dead body possessed by a demon, but a soul\nin revolt against the inevitable principle of corporeal death. He is\ndetected by a hole in the tombstone which is placed over his grave, which\nhole is filled up by the medicine man with dirt mixed with poisonous\nherbs.\n\nVampirism is claimed to be hereditary as well as epidemic and endemic,\nand vampires are also stated to be capable of exercising considerable\nphysical force. Stories are told of men who have had their jaws broken,\nas well as their limbs, as the result of their struggles with vampires.\n\nAbout 1863 there was a local epidemic of vampirism in one of the\nvillages of Bulgaria, when the place became so infested by them that the\ninhabitants were forced to assemble together in two or three houses,\nburn candles at night, and watch by turns in order to avoid the assaults\nmade by the Obours, who lit up the streets with their sparkles. Some of\nthe most enterprising of these threw their shadows on the walls of the\nrooms where the peasants were assembled through fear, while others howled\nand shrieked and swore outside the door, entered the abandoned houses,\nspat blood on the floors, turned everything topsy-turvy, and smeared\neverything, even the pictures of the saints, with cow-dung, until an\nold lady, suspected of witchcraft, discovered and laid the troublesome\nspirit, and afterwards the village was free.\n\nWhen the Bulgarian vampire has finished his forty days\u2019 apprenticeship to\nthe world of shadows, he rises from the tomb in bodily form, and is able\nto pass himself off as a human being living in the natural manner.\n\nIn Slavonic countries the vampire is said to be possessed of only one\nnostril, but is credited with possessing a sharp point at the end of his\ntongue, like the sting of a bee.\n\nIn Bulgaria one method of abolishing the vampire is said to be by\nbottling him. The sorcerer, armed with the picture of some saint, lies\nin ambush until he sees the vampire pass, when he pursues him with his\npicture. The vampire takes refuge in a tree or on the roof of a house,\nbut his persecutor follows him up with the talisman, driving him away\nfrom all shelter in the direction of a bottle specially prepared, in\nwhich is placed some favourite food of the vampire. Having no other\nalternative, he enters this prison, and is immediately fastened down\nwith a cork on the interior of which is a fragment of an eikon or\nholy picture. The bottle is then thrown into the fire and the vampire\ndisappears for ever.\n\nIn Bulgaria the vampire does not invariably seem to have the thirst for\nhuman blood, unless there happens to be a shortage in his human food\u2014a\ndistinction which marks him from the species found in other countries.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nVAMPIRE BELIEF IN RUSSIA\n\n\nThe Slavonic belief in vampires is one of the characteristic features of\ntheir creed.\n\nThe Little Russians hold that, if the vampire\u2019s hands have grown numb\nfrom remaining long crossed in the grave, he makes use of his teeth,\nwhich are like steel. When he has gnawed his way with these through\nall obstacles, he first destroys the babies he finds in a house, and\nafterwards the older inmates. If fine salt be scattered on the floor of\na room, the vampire\u2019s footsteps may be traced to his grave, in which he\nwill be found resting with rosy cheek and gory mouth.\n\nThe Kashoubes say that when a _vieszcy_, as they call a vampire, wakes\nfrom his sleep within the grave he begins to gnaw his hands and feet, and\nas he gnaws, first his relatives, and then his neighbours, sicken and\ndie. When he has finished his own store of flesh, he rises at midnight\nand destroys cattle or climbs a belfry and sounds the bell. All who hear\nthe ill-omened tones will soon die. Generally he sucks the blood of\nsleepers.\n\nRalston, in his _Songs of the Russian People_, says that it is in\nthe Ukraine and in White Russia\u2014so far as the Russian Empire is\nconcerned\u2014that traditions are most rife about this ghastly creation of\nmorbid fancy, and that the Little Russians attribute the birth of a\nvampire to an unholy union between a witch and a werwolf or a devil.\n\nHe relates the following as a specimen of the vampire stories prevalent\nin the country:\u2014\n\n\u201cA peasant was driving past a graveyard after it had grown dark. After\nhim came running a stranger, dressed in a red shirt and a new jacket, who\nsaid: \u2018Stop! Take me as your companion.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Pray take a seat.\u2019\n\n\u201cThey enter a village, drive up to this and that house. Though the gates\nare wide open, yet the stranger says, \u2018Shut tight!\u2019 for on those gates\ncrosses have been branded. They drive on to the very last house: the\ngates are barred, and from them hangs a padlock weighing a score of\npounds; but there is no cross there, and the gates open of their own\naccord.\n\n\u201cThey go into the house: there on the bench lie two sleepers\u2014an old man\nand a lad. The stranger takes a pail, places it near the youth, and\nstrikes him on the back; immediately the back opens, and forth flows\nrosy blood. The stranger fills the pail full and drinks it dry. Then he\nfills another pail with blood from the old man, slakes his brutal thirst,\nand says to the peasant: \u2018It begins to grow light! Let us go back to my\ndwelling.\u2019\n\n\u201cIn a twinkling they find themselves at the graveyard. The vampire would\nhave clasped the peasant in his arms, but luckily for him the cocks begin\nto crow, and the corpse disappears. The next morning, when folks come and\nlook, the old man and the lad are dead.\u201d\n\nAccording to the Servians and Bulgarians, unclean spirits enter into\nthe corpses of malefactors and other evilly disposed persons, who then\nbecome vampires. In some places the jumping of a boy over the corpse is\nconsidered as fatal as that of a cat.\n\nThere is a story told of a mother who lived in Saratof who cursed her\nson, and his body remained free from corruption after burial for a\nhundred years. When it was disinterred, his aged mother, who is said to\nhave been still alive, pronounced his pardon, and, at that very moment,\nthe corpse crumbled into dust.\n\nThe Russians say that, when driving a stake into the body of a vampire,\nthis must be done by one single blow, as a second blow will reanimate the\ncorpse.\n\nOne group of Russian stories relate to the sudden resuscitation shortly\nafter death of wizards and witches at midnight possessed with the longing\nto eat the flesh of the watchers around the bier. The stories go that\nthe body of the suspected witch was generally enclosed in a coffin which\nwas secured with iron bands and carried to the church, and a watcher was\nappointed to read aloud from the Scriptures over the coffin right through\neach night until burial. It was also the duty of the watcher to draw on\nthe floor a magic circle, within which he must stand and hold in his hand\na hammer, the ancient weapon of the thunder-god. If the suspicion that\nthe individual was a wizard or witch was a correct one, a mighty wind\nwould arise one night about twelve o\u2019clock, the iron bands of the coffin\nwould give way with a terrible crash, the coffin-lid fall off, and the\ncorpse leap forth and, uttering a terrible screech, rush at the watcher,\nwho, if he had not taken the prescribed precautions, would fall a victim\nto the monster, and in the morning there would be nothing left of him but\nhis bare bones. The following story of this character is contained in the\nrecords of the Kharkof government:\u2014\n\n\u201cOnce, in the days of old, there died a terrible sinner. His body was\ntaken into the church, and the sacristan was told to read some psalms\nover him. He took the precaution to catch a cock and carry it with him to\nthe church. At midnight the dead man leaped from his coffin, opened wide\nhis jaws, and rushed at his victim; but, at that moment, the sacristan\ngave the bird a hard pinch. The cock uttered his usual crow, and at the\nsame moment the dead man fell backwards to the ground a numb, motionless\ncorpse.\u201d\n\nThe following story is also given by Ralston in his collection of Russian\nfolk-stories:\u2014\n\n\n_The Coffin Lid_\n\n\u201cA moujik was driving along one night with a load of pots. His horse\ngrew tired, and all of a sudden it came to a standstill alongside of a\ngraveyard. The moujik unharnessed his horse and set it free to graze;\nmeanwhile he laid himself down on one of the graves. But somehow he\ndidn\u2019t go to sleep.\n\n\u201cHe remained there some time. Suddenly the grave began to open beneath\nhim; he felt the movement and sprang to his feet. The grave having\nopened, out of it came a corpse, wrapped in a white shroud, and holding\na coffin lid. He ran to the church, laid the coffin lid at the door, and\nthen set off for the village.\n\n\u201cThe moujik was a daring fellow. He picked up the coffin lid and remained\nstanding beside his cart, waiting to see what would happen. After a short\ndelay the dead man came back, and was going to snatch up his coffin\nlid\u2014but it was not to be seen. Then the corpse began to track it out,\ntraced it up to the moujik, and said: \u2018Give me my lid; if you don\u2019t, I\u2019ll\ntear you to bits!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018And my hatchet\u2014how about that?\u2019 answered the moujik. \u2018Why, it\u2019s I\nwho\u2019ll be chopping you into small pieces!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Do give it back to me, good man!\u2019 begs the corpse.\n\n\u201c\u2018I\u2019ll give it when you tell me where you\u2019ve been and what you\u2019ve done.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Well, I\u2019ve been in the village, and there I\u2019ve killed a couple of\nyoungsters.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Well, then, tell me how they can be brought back to life.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe corpse reluctantly made answer: \u2018Cut off the left skirt of my\nshroud. Take it with you, and when you come into the house where the\nyoungsters were killed, pour some live coals into a pot and put the piece\nof the shroud in with them, and then lock the door. The lads will be\nrevived by the smoke immediately.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe moujik cut off the left skirt of the shroud and gave up the coffin\nlid. The corpse went to its grave\u2014the grave opened. But just as the dead\nman was descending into it, all of a sudden the cocks began to crow, and\nhe had not time to get properly covered over. One end of the coffin lid\nremained standing out of the ground.\n\n\u201cThe moujik saw all this and made a note of it. The day began to dawn;\nhe harnessed his horse and drove into the village. In one of the houses\nhe heard cries and wailing. In he went\u2014there lay two dead lads.\n\n\u201c\u2018Don\u2019t cry,\u2019 said he; \u2018I can bring them to life.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Do bring them to life, kinsman,\u2019 said their relatives. \u2018We\u2019ll give you\nhalf of all we possess.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe moujik did everything as the corpse had instructed him, and the lads\ncame back to life. Their relatives were delighted, but they immediately\nseized the moujik and bound him with cords, saying: \u2018No, no, trickster!\nWe\u2019ll hand you over to the authorities. Since you know how to bring them\nback to life, maybe it was you who killed them!\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018What are you thinking about, true believers? Have the fear of God\nbefore your eyes!\u2019 cried the moujik.\n\n\u201cThen he told them everything that had happened to him during the night.\nWell, they spread the news through the village, and the whole population\nassembled and stormed into the graveyard. They found the grave from which\nthe dead man had come out; they tore it open, and they drove an aspen\nstake right into the heart of the corpse, so that it might no more rise\nup and slay. But they rewarded the moujik handsomely, and sent him home\nwith great honour.\u201d\n\n\n_The Soldier and the Vampire_\n\n\u201cA certain soldier was allowed to go home on furlough. Well, he walked\nand walked and walked, and after a time he began to draw near to his\nnative village. Not far off from that village lived a miller in his mill.\nIn old times, the soldier had been very intimate with him: why shouldn\u2019t\nhe go and see his friend? He went. The miller received him cordially, and\nat once brought out liquor; and the two began drinking and chattering\nabout their ways and doings. All this took place towards nightfall, and\nthe soldier stopped so long at the miller\u2019s that it grew quite dark.\n\n\u201cWhen he proposed to start for his village, his host exclaimed: \u2018Spend\nthe night here, trooper; it is very late now, and perhaps you may run\ninto mischief.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018How so?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018God is punishing us! A terrible warlock has died among us, and by\nnight he rises from his grave, wanders through the village, and does such\nthings as bring fear upon the very bailiffs; and so how could you help\nbeing afraid of him?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Not a bit of it! A soldier is a man who belongs to the Crown, and Crown\nproperty cannot be drowned in water or burned in fire. I will be off. I\nam tremendously anxious to see my people as soon as possible.\u2019\n\n\u201cOff he set. His road lay in front of a graveyard. On one of the graves\nhe saw a great fire blazing. What is that? Then he said: \u2018Let\u2019s have a\nlook.\u2019 When he drew near, he saw that the warlock was sitting at the\nfire, sewing boots.\n\n\u201c\u2018Hail, brother!\u2019 calls out the soldier.\n\n\u201cThe warlock looked up and said: \u2018What have you come here for?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Why, I wanted to see what you were doing.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe warlock threw his work aside and invited the soldier to a wedding.\n\n\u201c\u2018Come along, brother,\u2019 says he; \u2018let\u2019s enjoy ourselves. There is a\nwedding going on in the village.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Come along,\u2019 says the soldier.\n\n\u201cThey came to where the wedding was; they were given drink, and treated\nwith the utmost hospitality. The warlock drank and drank, revelled and\nrevelled, and then grew angry. He chased all the guests and relatives\nout of the house, threw the wedded pair into a slumber, took out two\nphials and an awl, pierced the hands of the bride and bridegroom with the\nawl, and began drawing off their blood. Having done this, he said to the\nsoldier: \u2018Now, let\u2019s be off.\u2019\n\n\u201cAccordingly, they went off. On the way the soldier said: \u2018Tell me, why\ndid you draw off their blood in those phials?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Why, in order that the bride and bridegroom might die. To-morrow\nmorning no one will be able to wake them. I alone know how to bring them\nback to life.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018How\u2019s that managed?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018The bride and bridegroom must have cuts made in their heels, and some\nof their blood must then be poured back into these wounds. I\u2019ve got the\nbridegroom\u2019s blood stowed away in my right-hand pocket, and the bride\u2019s\nin my left.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe soldier listened to this without letting a single word escape him.\nThen the warlock began boasting again.\n\n\u201c\u2018Whatever I wish,\u2019 says he, \u2018that I can do.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018I suppose it\u2019s quite impossible to get the better of you,\u2019 says the\nsoldier.\n\n\u201c\u2018Impossible? If anyone were to make a pyre of aspen boughs, a hundred\nloads of them, and were to burn me on that pyre, then he\u2019d be able to get\nthe better of me. Only he\u2019d have to look sharp in burning me, for snakes\nand worms and different kinds of reptiles would creep out of my inside,\nand crows and magpies and jackdaws would come flying up. All these must\nbe caught and flung on the pyre. If so much as a single maggot were to\nescape, then there\u2019d be no help for it. In that maggot I should slip\naway.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe soldier listened to all this and did not forget it. He and the\nwarlock talked and talked, and at last they arrived at the grave.\n\n\u201c\u2018Well, brother,\u2019 said the warlock, \u2018now I\u2019ll tear you to pieces,\notherwise you\u2019ll be telling all this.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018What are you talking about? Don\u2019t you deceive yourself, for I serve God\nand the Empire.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe warlock gnashed his teeth, howled aloud, and sprang at the soldier,\nwho drew his sword and began laying about him with sweeping blows.\nThey struggled and struggled; the soldier was all but at the end of\nhis strength. \u2018Ah,\u2019 thinks he, \u2018I\u2019m a lost man, and all for nothing!\u2019\nSuddenly the cocks began to crow. The warlock fell lifeless to the ground.\n\n\u201cThe soldier took the phials of blood out of the warlock\u2019s pockets, and\nwent to the house of his own people. When he had got there and exchanged\ngreetings with his relatives, they said: \u2018Did you see any disturbance,\nsoldier?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018No, I saw none.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018There, now! Why, we\u2019ve a terrible piece of work going on in the\nvillage. A warlock has taken to haunting it.\u2019\n\n\u201cAfter talking a while they lay down to sleep. The next morning the\nsoldier awoke and began asking: \u2018I\u2019m told you\u2019ve got a wedding going on\nsomewhere here.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018There was a wedding in the house of a rich moujik,\u2019 replied his\nrelatives, \u2018but the bridegroom has died this very night\u2014what from nobody\nknows.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Where does this moujik live?\u2019\n\n\u201cThey showed him the house. Thither he went without speaking a word.\nWhen he got there he found the whole family in tears.\n\n\u201c\u2018What are you mourning about?\u2019 says he.\n\n\u201c\u2018Such and such is the state of things, soldier,\u2019 say they.\n\n\u201c\u2018I can bring your young people to life again. What will you give me if I\ndo?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Take what you like, even were it half of what we have got.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe soldier did as the warlock had instructed him, and brought the young\npeople back to life. Instead of weeping there began to be happiness\nand rejoicing: the soldier was hospitably treated and well rewarded.\nThen\u2014left about face! Off he marched to Starosta and told the burgomaster\nto call the peasants together and to get ready a hundred loads of aspen\nwood. Well, they took the wood into the graveyard, dragged the warlock\nout of his grave, placed him on the pyre, and set it in flames. The\nwarlock began to burn. His corpse burst, and out of it came snakes,\nworms, and all kinds of reptiles, and up came flying crows, magpies, and\njackdaws. The peasants knocked them down and flung them into the fire,\nnot allowing so much as a single maggot to creep away! And so the warlock\nwas thoroughly consumed, and the soldier collected his ashes and strewed\nthem to the winds. From that time there was peace in the village.\n\n\u201cThe soldier received the thanks of the whole community.\u201d\n\nIn Russian folk-lore there is a class of demons known as \u201cheart\ndevourers,\u201d who touch their victim with an aspen or other twig credited\nwith magical properties; the heart then falls out and may be replaced by\nsome baser one. There is a Moscovian story in which a hero awakes with\nthe heart of a hare, the work of a demon while the man was asleep. He\nremained a coward for the rest of his life. In another instance a very\nquiet, reserved, inoffensive peasant received a cock\u2019s heart in exchange\nfor his own, and afterwards was for ever crowing like a healthy bird.\n\nThe following is taken from the _Lettres Juives_ of 1738:\u2014\n\n\u201cIn the beginning of September there died in the village of Kisilova,\nthree leagues from Graditz, an old man who was sixty-two years of age.\nThree days after he had been buried, he appeared in the night to his\nson, and asked him for something to eat; the son having given him\nsomething, he ate and disappeared. The next day the son recounted to his\nneighbours what had happened. That night the father did not appear, but\nthe following night he showed himself and asked for something to eat.\nThey know not whether the son gave him anything or not; but the next day\nhe was found dead in his bed. On the same day, five or six persons fell\nsuddenly ill in the village, and died one after the other in a few days.\n\n\u201cThe officer or bailiff of the place, when informed of what had happened,\nsent an account of it to the tribunal of Belgrade, which despatched to\nthe village two of these officers and an executioner to examine into this\naffair. The imperial officer from whom we have this account repaired\nthither from Graditz to be a witness of what took place.\n\n\u201cThey opened the graves of those who had been dead six weeks. When they\ncame to that of the old man, they found him with his eyes open, having a\nfine colour, with natural respiration, nevertheless motionless as the\ndead: whence they concluded that he was most undoubtedly a vampire. The\nexecutioner drove a stake into his heart; they then raised a pile and\nreduced the corpse to ashes. No mark of vampirism was found either on the\ncorpse of the son or on the others.\u201d\n\nThe following story is told by Madame Blavatsky in _Isis Unveiled_, who\nstates that she had the account from an eye-witness of the occurrence:\u2014\n\n\u201cAbout the beginning of the nineteenth century there occurred in Russia\none of the most frightful cases of vampirism on record. The governor of\nthe province of Tch\u2014\u2014 was a man of about sixty years of age, of a cruel\nand jealous disposition. Clothed with despotic authority, he exercised\nit without stint, as his brutal instincts prompted. He fell in love with\nthe pretty daughter of a subordinate officer. Although the girl was\nbetrothed to a young man whom she loved, the tyrant forced her father to\nconsent to his having her marry him; and the poor victim, despite her\ndespair, became his wife. His jealous disposition soon exhibited itself.\nHe beat her, confined her to her room for weeks together, and prevented\nher seeing anyone except in his presence. He finally fell sick and died.\nFinding his end approaching, he made her swear never to marry again, and\nwith fearful oaths threatened that in case she did he would return from\nhis grave and kill her. He was buried in the cemetery across the river,\nand the young widow experienced no further annoyance until, getting the\nbetter of her fears, she listened to the importunities of her former\nlover, and they were again betrothed.\n\n\u201cOn the night of the customary betrothal feast, when all had retired,\nthe old mansion was aroused by shrieks proceeding from her room. The\ndoors were burst open, and the unhappy woman was found lying on her bed\nin a swoon. At the same time a carriage was heard rumbling out of the\ncourtyard. Her body was found to be black and blue in places, as from\nthe effect of pinches, and from a slight puncture in her neck drops\nof blood were oozing. Upon recovering, she stated that her deceased\nhusband had suddenly entered her room, appearing exactly as in life, with\nthe exception of a dreadful pallor; that he had upbraided her for her\ninconstancy, and then beaten and pinched her most cruelly. Her story was\ndisbelieved; but the next morning the guard stationed at the other end\nof the bridge which spans the river reported that just before midnight\na black coach-and-six had driven furiously past without answering their\nchallenge.\n\n\u201cThe new governor, who disbelieved the story of the apparition, took\nnevertheless the precaution of doubling the guards across the bridge. The\nsame thing happened, however, night after night, the soldiers declaring\nthat the toll-bar at their station near the bridge would rise of itself,\nand the spectral equipage would sweep past them, despite their efforts to\nstop it. At the same time every night the watchers, including the widow\u2019s\nfamily and the servants, would be thrown into a heavy sleep; and every\nmorning the young victim would be found bruised, bleeding, and swooning\nas before. The town was thrown into consternation. The physicians had no\nexplanations to offer; priests came to pass the night in prayer, but as\nmidnight approached, all would be seized with the same terrible lethargy.\nFinally the archbishop of the province came and performed the ceremony\nof exorcism in person. On the following morning the governor\u2019s widow was\nfound worse than ever. She was now brought to death\u2019s door.\n\n\u201cThe governor was finally driven to take the severest measures to stop\nthe ever-increasing panic in the town. He stationed fifty Cossacks along\nthe bridge, with orders to stop the spectral carriage at all hazards.\nPromptly at the usual hour it was heard and seen approaching from the\ndirection of the cemetery. The officer of the guard and a priest bearing\na crucifix planted themselves in front of the toll-bar and together\nshouted: \u2018In the name of God and the Czar, who goes there?\u2019 Out of the\ncoach was thrust a well-remembered head, and a familiar voice responded:\n\u2018The Privy Councillor of State and Governor C\u2014\u2014!\u2019 At the same moment the\nofficer, the priest, and the soldiers were flung aside, as by an electric\nshock, and the ghostly equipage passed them before they could recover\nbreath.\n\n\u201cThe archbishop then resolved as a last expedient to resort to the\ntime-honoured plan of exhuming the body and driving an oaken stake\nthrough its heart. This was done with great religious ceremony in the\npresence of the whole populace. The story is that the body was found\ngorged with blood, and with red cheeks and lips. At the instant that the\nfirst blow was struck upon the stake a groan issued from the corpse and\na jet of blood spouted high into the air. The archbishop pronounced the\nusual exorcism, the body was reinterred, and from that time no more was\nheard of the vampire.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nMISCELLANEA\n\n\nVoltaire was surprised that in the enlightened eighteenth century there\nshould still be people found who believed in the reality of vampires,\nand that the doctors of the Sorbonne should give their _imprimatur_ to\na dissertation on these unpleasant creatures. Yet from 1730 to 1735 the\nsubject of vampirism formed a principal topic of conversation, and may be\nsaid to have been a mania all over the world, with Europe as a particular\ncentre. Pamphlets on the subject streamed from the press, the newspapers\nvied with one another in recording fresh achievements of the spectres,\nand though the philosophers scoffed at and ridiculed the belief, yet\nsovereigns sent officers and commissioners to report upon their misdeeds.\nThe favourite scenes of their exploits were Hungary, Poland, Silesia,\nBohemia, and Moravia, and in those countries a vampire haunted and\ntormented almost every village.\n\nIn some parts of Scandinavia a singular method was adopted for getting\nrid of vampires, viz. by instituting judicial proceedings against them.\nInhabitants were regularly summoned to attend the inquest; a tribunal was\nconstituted; charges were preferred with the usual legal formalities,\naccusing them of molesting the houses and introducing death among the\ninhabitants; and at the end of the proceedings judgment was proclaimed.\nThe priest then entered with holy water, Mass was celebrated, and it was\nheld that complete conquest had been gained over the goblins.\n\nSir Walter Scott, in his translation of _Eyrbyggia Saga_, relates a\ntraditional story of several vampires who committed dreadful ravages in\nIceland in the year 1000, so that in a household of thirty servants no\nless than eighteen died.\n\nSaxo Grammaticus, the earliest chronicler and writer upon Danish history\nand folk-lore, in his _Danish History_ (book i.), dealing with the\norigin of the Danes, relates the following story:\u2014\n\nOne Mith-othin, who was famous for his juggling tricks, was quickened,\nas though by an inspiration from on High, to seize the opportunity\nof feigning to be a god; and, wrapping the minds of the barbarians\nin fresh darkness, he led them by the renown of his jugglings to pay\nholy observance to his name. He said that the wrath of the gods could\nnever be appeased nor the outrage to their deity expiated by mixed and\nindiscriminate sacrifices, and, therefore, forbade that prayers for\nthis end should be put up without distinction, appointing to each of\nthose above his especial drink-offering. But when Odin was returning, he\ncast away all help of jugglings, went to Finland to hide himself, and\nwas there attacked and slain by the inhabitants. Even in his death his\nabominations were made manifest, for those who came nigh his barrow were\ncut off by a kind of sudden death; and, after his end, he spread such\npestilence that he seemed almost to leave a filthier record in his death\nthan in his life; it was as though he would extort from the guilty a\npunishment for his slaughter. The inhabitants being in this trouble, took\nthe body out of the mound, beheaded it, and impaled it through the breast\nwith a sharp stake, and herein that people found relief.\n\nIn book ii. we have the story of Aswid and Asmund. Aswid died and was\nburied with horse and dog. Asmund died and was buried with his friend,\nfood being put in for him to eat. Later on the grave opened, when Asmund\nappeared and said: \u201cBy some strange enterprise of the power of hell the\nspirit of Aswid was sent up from the nether world, and with cruel tooth\neats the fleet-footed (horse) and has given his dog to his abominable\njaws. Not sated with devouring the horse or hound, he soon turned his\nswift nails upon me, tearing my cheek and taking off my ear. Hence the\nhideous sight of my slashed countenance, the blood spurts in the ugly\nwound. Yet the bringer of horrors did it not unscathed; for soon I cut\noff his head with my steel, and impaled his guilty carcase with a stake.\u201d\n\nIn Malaysia the vampires are mostly females, and are credited with a\ngreat fondness for fish. They are known as Langsuirs, and Skeat, in\n_Malay Magic_, gives the following charm for \u201claying\u201d a Langsuir:\u2014\n\n  O ye mosquito-fry at the river\u2019s mouth,\n  When yet a great way off ye are sharp of eye;\n  When near, ye are hard of heart.\n  When the rock in the ground opens of itself,\n  Then (and then only) be emboldened the hearts of my foes and opponents!\n  When the corpse in the ground opens of itself,\n  Then (and then only) be emboldened the hearts of my foes and opponents!\n  May your heart be softened when you behold me,\n  By grace of this prayer that I use, called Silam Bayn.\n\nAbercromby, in his work on the Finns, says that the Ceremis imagine\nthat the spirits that cause illness, especially fever and ague, are\ncontinually recruited on the death of old maids, murderers, and those\nthat die a violent death. Whenever anyone becomes dangerously ill, the\nLapps feel sure that one of his deceased relatives wants his company in\nthe region of the dead, either from affection or to punish him for some\ntrespass. The Truks of Altai have a similar belief. The soul after death\nwillingly lingers for some time in the house and leaves it unwillingly,\nand often takes with it some other members of the family or some of the\ncattle.\n\nCodrington, in his descriptive work on the Melanesians, says that there\nis a belief in Banks Islands in the existence of a power like that of\nvampires. A man or a woman would obtain this power out of a morbid desire\nfor communion with some ghost, and in order to gain it would steal and\neat a morsel of a corpse. The ghost of the dead man would then join in a\nclose friendship with the person who had eaten, and would gratify him by\nafflicting anyone against whom his ghostly power might be directed. The\nman so afflicted would feel that something was influencing his life, and\nwould come to dread some particular person among his neighbours, who was,\ntherefore, suspected of being a _talamur_. This name was also given to\none whose soul was supposed to go out and eat the soul or lingering life\nof a freshly dead corpse. There was a woman, some years ago, of whom the\nstory is told that she made no secret of doing this, and that once on the\ndeath of a neighbour she gave notice that she should go in the night and\neat the corpse. The friends of the deceased therefore kept watch in the\nhouse where the corpse lay, and at dead of night heard a scratching at\nthe door, followed by a rustling noise close by the corpse. One of them\nthrew a stone and seemed to hit the unknown thing; and in the morning the\n_talamur_ was found with a bruise on her arm, which she confessed was\ncaused by a stone thrown at her while she was eating the corpse.\n\nBaron von Haxthausen, in his work on Transcaucasia, tells us that there\nonce dwelt in a cavern in Armenia a vampire called Dakhanavar, who could\nnot endure anyone to penetrate into the mountains of Ulmish Altotem or\ncount their valleys. Everyone who attempted this had in the night his\nblood sucked by the monster from the soles of his feet until he died.\nThe vampire was, however, at last outwitted by two cunning fellows.\nThey began to count the valleys, and when night came on they lay down\nto sleep\u2014taking care to place themselves with the feet of the one under\nthe head of the other. In the night the monster came, felt as usual, and\nfound a head; then he felt at the other end and found a head there also.\n\u201cWell,\u201d cried he, \u201cI have gone through the whole 366 valleys of these\nmountains, and have sucked the blood of people without end, but never yet\ndid I come across anyone with two heads and no feet!\u201d So saying, he ran\naway and was never more seen in that country, but ever after the people\nknew that the mountain has 366 valleys.\n\nEven America is not free from the belief in the vampire. In one of\nthe issues of the _Norwich_ (U.S.A.) _Courier_ for 1854, there is the\naccount of an incident that occurred at Jewett, a city in that vicinity.\nAbout eight years previously, Horace Ray of Griswold had died of\nconsumption. Afterwards, two of his children\u2014grown-up sons\u2014died of the\nsame disease, the last one dying about 1852. Not long before the date of\nthe newspaper the same fatal disease had seized another son, whereupon\nit was determined to exhume the bodies of the two brothers and burn\nthem, because the dead were supposed to feed upon the living; and so\nlong as the dead body in the grave remained undecomposed, either wholly\nor in part, the surviving members of the family must continue to furnish\nsubstance on which the dead body could feed. Acting under the influence\nof this strange superstition, the family and friends of the deceased\nproceeded to the burial-ground on June 8th, 1854, dug up the bodies of\nthe deceased brothers, and burned them on the spot.\n\nDr Dyer, an eminent physician of Chicago, also reported in 1875 a case\noccurring within his own personal knowledge, where the body of a woman\nwho had died of consumption was taken from her grave and her lungs\nburned, under the belief that she was drawing after her into the grave\nsome of her surviving relatives. In 1874, according to the _Providence\nJournal_, in the village of Placedale, Rhode Island, Mr William Rose dug\nup the body of his own daughter and burned her heart, under the belief\nthat she was wasting away the lives of other members of the family.\n\nThe vampire is not an unknown spectre in China, where the measures\nadopted for the riddance of the pest are generally the burning of the\nmortal remains of the corpse, or removing to a distance the lid of the\ncoffin after the vampire has started on his nocturnal rounds. It is\nheld that the air thus entering freely into the coffin will cause the\ncontents to decay. Another Chinese cure for vampires is to watch any\nsuspected coffin until the corpse has quitted it, and then strew rice,\nred peas, and bits of iron around it. The corpse, on returning, will find\nit impossible to pass over these things, and will thus fall an easy prey\nto his captors.\n\nThe following story of a Chinese vampire is related by Dr J. J. M. de\nGroot in his _Religious System of China_ (vol. v. p. 747):\u2014\n\n\u201cLiu N. N., a literary graduate of the lowest degree in Wukiang (in\nKiangsu), was in charge of some pupils belonging to the Tsaing family\nin the Yuen-hwo district. In the season of Pure Brightness he returned\nhome, some holidays being granted him to sweep his ancestral tombs. This\nduty performed, he returned to his post, and said to his wife: \u2018To-morrow\nI must go; cook some food for me at an early hour.\u2019 The woman said she\nwould do so, and rose for the purpose at cockcrow. Their village lay on\nthe hill behind their dwelling, facing a brook. The wife washed some rice\nat that brook, picked some vegetables in the garden, and had everything\nready, but when it was light her husband did not rise. She went into his\nroom to wake him up, but however often she called he gave no answer. So\nshe opened the curtains and found him lying across the bed, headless, and\nnot a trace of blood to be seen.\n\n\u201cTerror-stricken, she called the neighbours. All of them suspected her of\nadultery with a lover, and murder, and they warned the magistrate. This\ngrandee came and held a preliminary inquest; he ordered the corpse to be\ncoffined, had the woman put in fetters, and examined her; so he put her\nin gaol, and many months passed away without sentence being pronounced.\nThen a neighbour, coming uphill for some fuel, saw a neglected grave with\na coffin lid bare; it was quite a sound coffin, strong and solid, and\nyet the lid was raised a little; so he naturally suspected that it had\nbeen opened by thieves. He summoned the people; they lifted the lid off\nand saw a corpse with features like a living person and a body covered\nwith white hair. Between its arms it held the head of a man, which they\nrecognised as that of Liu, the graduate. They reported the case to the\nmagistrate; the coroners ordered the head to be taken away, but it was so\nfirmly grasped in the arms of the corpse that the combined efforts of a\nnumber of men proved insufficient to draw it out. So the magistrate told\nthem to chop off the arms of the _kiangshi_ (corpse-spectre). Fresh blood\ngushed out of the wounds, but in Liu\u2019s head there was not a drop left, it\nhaving been sucked dry by the monster. By magisterial order the corpse\nwas burned, and the case ended with the release of the woman from gaol.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nLIVING VAMPIRES\n\n\nThere is, however, the living vampire, distinct and separate from\nthe dead species. In Epirus and Thessaly there is a belief in living\nvampires, who leave their shepherd dwellings by night and roam about,\nbiting and tearing men and animals and sucking their blood. In Moldavia\nand in Wallachia, the _murony_ are real, living men who become dogs at\nnight, with the backbone prolonged to form a sort of tail. They roam\nthrough the villages, and their main delight is to kill cattle.\n\nIn some countries the belief prevails that the soul of a living man,\noften of a sorcerer, leaves its proper body asleep and goes forth,\nperhaps in visible form of a straw or fluff of down, slips through the\nkeyholes, and attacks its sleeping victim. If the sleeper should wake in\ntime to clutch this tiny soul-embodiment, he may through it have his\nrevenge by maltreating or destroying its bodily owner.\n\nThe following account was contributed by me to the _Occult Review_ for\nJuly 1910. The particulars are given exactly as I wrote them down in\nshorthand from the narrator\u2019s dictation. My informant is a well-known\nmedical practitioner in the West End of London, who has held various\nofficial appointments in the tropics, and I received his assurance that\nthe incidents recorded happened exactly as they are described. Whether\nthe Indian referred to is still alive or not is unknown, but certainly\nthe two other principals, at the time of writing, are.\n\nSome years ago a small number of English officials were stationed in a\nsmall place in the tropics. Their residences were about a quarter of\na mile from each other, three of the bungalows standing in their own\ncompounds and on separate elevations. Suddenly one of the officials fell\nill, but the district medical officer was quite unable to trace the cause\nof the illness. The official in question made several applications to\nthe Colonial Office for transfer to another station, saying he felt he\nshould die if he remained there. At first the application was refused,\nbut the man got worse and fell into a very depressed mental condition.\nHe eventually wrote again, saying that if his application for transfer\ncould not be granted he would be compelled to throw up his appointment\u2014a\nserious matter for him, as he had no private means. The application was\nthen granted; he was transferred, and he recovered his health.\n\nAbout eighteen months later another official had a slight attack of\nfever, from which he fully recovered; but after this attack he began to\ncomplain of lassitude until he went beyond a certain distance from his\nresidence. The moment he returned to within this distance he said he felt\nas though a wet blanket had been thrown over him, and nothing could rouse\nhim from the depression which seized him. He, too, fell into a low state\nof health, and on his request was transferred to another station.\n\nShortly after this transfer the wife of the district medical officer,\nliving within the same area, began to fail in health and became terribly\ndepressed, apparently from no cause whatever. Previously she had been\na cheerful, happy woman, indulging in games and outdoor sports of all\nkinds, but now she became most depressed and miserable. At last, one\nnight, about twelve o\u2019clock, she woke up shrieking. Her husband rushed\ninto her room, and she said she had woken up with a most awful feeling\nof depression, and had seen a creature travelling along the cornice of\nthe room. She could only describe it as having a resemblance to something\nbetween a gigantic spider and a huge jelly-fish. Her husband ascribed it\nto an attack of nightmare, but he was disturbed in the same manner on the\nfollowing night, when his wife said she had been awake for a quarter of\nan hour, but had not had the strength to call him before. He found her\nin a state of collapse, pulse exceedingly low, temperature three degrees\nbelow normal, pallid, and in a cold sweat. He mixed her a draught which\nhad the effect of sending her to sleep.\n\nIn the morning she said she must leave the station and go home, as to\nstop there would mean her death. Thinking to divert her attention, her\nhusband took her away on a pleasure trip, when he was glad to see that\nshe entirely recovered her former cheerful expression and high spirits.\nThis state of things lasted until, returning home in a rickshaw alongside\nher husband\u2019s, her face changed and she resumed her gloomy countenance.\n\n\u201cThere,\u201d she said, \u201cis it not awful? I have been so well and happy all\nthe week, and now I feel as though a pall had been thrown over me.\u201d\n\nMatters got worse, and she became more depressed than ever, and only a\nfew nights passed before her husband was again called to her bedside\nabout midnight. He found his wife in a state of considerable weakness,\nalthough it was not so acute as on the previous occasion. She said to\nhim: \u201cI want you to examine the back of my neck and shoulders very\ncarefully and see if there is any mark on the skin of any kind whatever.\u201d\n\nHer husband did so, but could not find a mark.\n\n\u201cGet a glass and look again. See if you can find any puncture from a\nsharp-pointed tooth.\u201d\n\nHe made a microscopical examination, but found absolutely nothing.\n\n\u201cNow,\u201d said his wife, \u201cI can tell you what is the matter. I dreamed that\nI was in a house where I lived when I was a girl. My little boy called\nout to me. I ran down to him, but when I reached the bottom of the\nstairs a tall, black man came towards me. I waved him off, but I could\nnot move to get away from him, though I pushed the boy out of his reach.\nThe man came towards me, seized me in his arms, sat down at the bottom\nof the stairs, put me on his knee, and proceeded to suck from a point\nat the upper part of the spine, just below the neck. I felt that he was\ndrawing all the blood and life out of me. Then he threw me from him, and\napparently I lost consciousness as he did so. I felt as though I was\ndying. Then I woke up, and I had been lying here for a quarter of an hour\nor twenty minutes before I was able to call you.\u201d\n\n\u201cHave you ever experienced anything of this character before?\u201d asked her\nhusband.\n\n\u201cNo, I have not; but night after night for many months I have woken up\nin exactly the same state, and that has been the sole cause of my mental\ndepression. I have not said anything about it because it seemed so\nfoolish, but now I have had this definite dream I cannot hold my tongue\nany longer.\u201d\n\nShe soon passed into a peaceful sleep, and on discussing the matter the\nfollowing morning with her husband she said: \u201cI have a feeling somehow\nthat it will not happen again. I feel quite well and strong, and all my\ndepression is gone.\u201d\n\nIn the afternoon husband and wife were going together to the club, when\naround the corner of the jungle came a tall Indian, the owner of a large\nnumber of milch cattle, and reputed to be a wealthy man. The surgeon\u2019s\nwife suddenly stopped, turned pale, and said immediately: \u201cThat is the\nman I saw in my dream.\u201d\n\nThe husband went directly up to the man and said to him: \u201cLook here, I\nwill give you twelve hours to get out of this place. I know everything\nthat happened last night at midnight, and I will kill you like a dog if I\nfind you here in twelve hours\u2019 time.\u201d\n\nThe Indian disappeared the same night, taking with him only a few\nvaluables and a little loose money. He left behind him the money that\nwas deposited in the bank, as well as the whole of his property. His\nforty head of cattle, worth eighty dollars each, were impounded, and no\nnews had been heard of him five years afterwards. Since his departure no\none has complained of depression and lassitude in that area.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nTHE VAMPIRE IN LITERATURE\n\n\nThe subject of vampirism does not appear to have attracted litterateurs\ngreatly. True, there are the operas of Palma, Hart, Marschner, and von\nLindpainter; and Philostratus and Phlegon of Tralles have discoursed upon\nthe phenomena. There are not, however, many works of fiction based upon\nthe topic, or many poems in which the subject is introduced. There is\nan Anglo-Saxon poem with the title _A Vampyre of the Fens_, and a long,\nwearisome novel, full of gruesome details, entitled _Varney the Vampire_.\nAmong modern authors, Mr Bram Stoker has made the vampire the foundation\nof his exciting romance _Dracula_; but mention of these works almost\nexhausts the references to separate works upon the subject.\n\nNor are the references to vampires and vampirism in the ancient Greek\nauthors more numerous. The phantom of Achilles is represented by\nEuripides (_Hec._, 109, 599) as appearing on his tomb clad in golden\narmour and appeased by the sacrifice of a young virgin, whose blood he\ndrank. \u0152dipus also in Sophocles (_\u0152d. Col._, 621), when foretelling a\ndefeat which the Thebans would sustain near his tomb, declares that his\ncold, dead body will drink their warm blood. Human victims were offered\nat the funeral pyre of Patroclus in the _Iliad_ (vol. i.).\n\nThough human beings are not sacrificed in the _Odyssey_, yet the blood\nof slaughtered sheep was eagerly lapped up by the ghosts consulted\nby Odysseus (xi. 45, 48, 95, 96, 153, etc.). A sheep was also to be\nsacrificed at the tombs of mortals, and its blood was supposed to be an\noffering acceptable to the departed spirit.\n\nPausanias, Strabo, \u00c6lian, and Suidas relate the legend of Ulysses in\nhis wanderings coming to the town of Temesa, in Italy, where one of his\nassociates was stoned to death by the townsmen for having ravished a\nvirgin. His ghost forthwith haunted the inhabitants, and caused them\nsuch annoyance that many were thinking seriously of leaving the town\nwhen they were told by Apollo\u2019s oracle that to appease him they must\nbuild the hero a temple, and sacrifice to him yearly the most beautiful\nvirgin they had among them. The temple was accordingly raised: access\nto the sacred enclosure was prohibited to all except the priests, on\npenalty of death. An engraving of the evil spirit that is alleged to have\ninfested Temesa is given on page 18 of Beaumont\u2019s _Treatise on Spirits_\n(ed. 1705).\n\nPhilostratus, in his _Life of Apollonius of Tyana_ (iv. 25, p. 165), says\nthat the long intercourse which took place between a female spectre and\nthe Corinthian Menippus was but a prelude to the feast of flesh and blood\nin which she meant to revel after their marriage.\n\nSome have described the Hebrew _lilith_ as a vampire, but the _Jewish\nEncyclop\u00e6dia_ states that: \u201cThere is nothing in the Talmud to indicate\nthat the _lilith_ was a vampire.\u201d She was regarded as a nocturnal demon,\nflying about in the form of a night-owl, and stealing children, and was\nheld to have permission to kill all children sinfully begotten, even\nfrom a lawful wife. The _lilith_ is held to have the same signification\nas the Greek _strix_ and _lami\u00e6_, who were sorceresses or magicians,\nseeking to put to death new-born children. The ancient Greeks believed\nthat these _lami\u00e6_ devoured children, or sucked away all their blood\nuntil they died. Euripides and the scholiast of Aristophanes mention the\n_lilith_ as a dangerous monster, the enemy of mortals; and Ovid describes\nthe _strig\u00e6_ as dangerous birds, which fly by night and seek for infants\nto devour them and nourish themselves with their blood. The _aluka_ of\nProverbs xxx. 15 is more akin to the vampire. It is a blood-sucking,\ninsatiable monster; the word is synonymous with _algul_, the well-known\ndemon of the Arabian popular stories, \u201cthe man-devouring demon of the\nwaste,\u201d known as the ghoul or goule in the translated edition of the\n_Arabian Nights_.\n\nGoethe, in his ballad _The Bride of Corinth_, describes how a young\nAthenian visits a friend of his father, to whose daughter he had been\nbetrothed, and is disturbed at midnight by the appearance of the vampire\nspectre of her whom death has prevented from becoming his bride, and\nwho, when detected, says:\u2014\n\n  From my grave to wander I am forc\u2019d,\n    Still to seek The Good\u2019s long-sever\u2019d link,\n  Still to love the bridegroom I have lost,\n    And the life-blood of his heart to drink;\n          When his race is run,\n          I must hasten on,\n  And the young must \u2019neath my vengeance sink.\n\nThere is one scant reference to the subject in Shelley\u2019s poems. Byron, in\nhis poem _The Giaour_, has the following passage:\u2014\n\n  But first on earth as vampire sent\n  Thy corse shall from its tomb be rent:\n  Then ghastly haunt thy native place,\n  And suck the blood of all thy race.\n\nDryden relates:\u2014\n\n  Lo, in my walks where wicked elves have been,\n  The learning of the parish now is seen\u2014\n  From fiends and imps he sets the village free,\n  There haunts not any incubus but he:\n  The maids and women need no danger fear\n  To walk by night and sanctity so near.\n\nScott, in _Rokeby_, has the following lines:\u2014\n\n  For like the bat of Indian brakes,\n  Her pinions fan the wound she makes,\n  And soothing thus the dreamer\u2019s pains,\n  She drinks the life-blood from the veins.\n\nThe following legend is related in vol. ii. of _Minstrelsy of the\nScottish Border_, and is referred to in a footnote to Southey\u2019s _Thalaba\nthe Destroyer_ (p. 108, ed. 1814):\u2014\n\nIn the year 1058 a young man of noble birth had been married in Rome,\nand during the period of his nuptial feast, having gone with his\ncompanions to play at ball, he put his marriage ring on the finger of a\nbroken statue of Venus in the area, to remain while he was engaged in\nrecreation. Desisting from the exercise, he found the finger on which\nhe had put his ring contracted firmly against the palm, and attempted\nin vain either to break or disengage the ring. He concealed the\ncircumstances from his companions, and returned at night with a servant,\nwhen he found the finger extended and the ring gone. He dissembled the\nloss and returned to his wife; but when he attempted to embrace her he\nfound himself prevented by something dark and dense, which was tangible\nif not visible, interposing between them; and he heard a voice saying:\n\u201cEmbrace me! for I am Venus, whom this day you wedded, and I will not\nrestore your ring.\u201d As this was constantly repeated, he consulted\nhis relatives, who had recourse to Palumbus, the priest, skilled in\nnecromancy. He directed the young man to go at a certain hour of the\nnight to a spot among the ruins of ancient Rome where four roads meet,\nand wait silently till he saw a company pass by, and then, without\nuttering a word, to deliver a letter which he gave him to a majestic\nbeing who rode in a chariot after the rest of the company. The young man\ndid as he was directed, and saw the company of all ages, classes and\nranks, on horse and on foot, some joyful and others sad, pass along;\namong whom he distinguished a woman in a meretricious dress, who, from\nthe tenuity of her garments, seemed almost naked. She rode on a mule;\nher long hair, which flowed over her shoulders, was bound with a golden\nfillet; and in her hand was a golden rod with which she directed her\nmule. In the close of the procession a tall, majestic figure appeared\nin a chariot adorned with emeralds and pearls, who fiercely asked the\nyoung man what he did there. He presented the letter in silence, which\nthe demon dared not refuse. As soon as he had read, lifting up his hands\nto heaven, he exclaimed: \u201cAlmighty God! how long wilt Thou endure the\niniquities of the sorcerer Palumbus!\u201d and immediately despatched some of\nhis attendants, who, with much difficulty, extorted the ring from Venus\nand restored it to its owner, whose infernal banns were thus dissolved.\nThis legend was made the foundation of Liddell\u2019s poem, _The Vampire\nBride_.\n\nDion Boucicault wrote and produced a vampire play entitled _The Phantom_,\nthe scene of which was laid in the ruins of Raby Castle. Anyone remaining\nin these ruins for one night met with certain death before the morning.\nThe only sign of violence to be found was a wound on the right side of\nthe throat, but no blood was to be seen. The face of the victim was white\nand the gaze fixed, as though the person had died from fright.\n\nIn April 1819 a story entitled \u201cThe Vampyre\u201d appeared in _Colburn\u2019s New\nMonthly Magazine_, which was attributed to Lord Byron, but which was\nreally from the pen of Dr John William Polidori (uncle of William Michael\nRossetti), who was for a time Lord Byron\u2019s travelling physician. The work\nwas also published separately, but the authorship was denied by Lord\nByron. Polidori immediately claimed responsibility for the work, and the\ncorrespondence and statement of facts published in Rossetti\u2019s _Diary of\nDoctor John William Polydori_ show how the mistake occurred.\n\nThe following poem appears in the _Life of James Clerk Maxwell_, by Lewis\nCampbell and William Garnett, and was written by Maxwell in 1845, when he\nwas fourteen years of age:\u2014\n\nTHE VAMPYRE\n\nCOMPYLT INTO MEETER BY JAMES CLERK MAXWELL\n\n  Thair is a knichte rydis through the wood,\n      And a douchty knichte is hee.\n  And sure hee is on a message sent,\n      He rydis sae hastilie.\n  Hee passit the aik, and hee passit the birk,\n      And hee passit monie a tre,\n  Bot plesant to him was the saugh sae slim,\n      For beneath it hee did see\n  The boniest ladye that ever hee saw,\n      Scho was sae schyn and fair.\n  And thair scho sat, beneath the saugh,\n      Kaiming hir gowden hair.\n  And then the knichte\u2014\u201cOh ladye brichte,\n      What chance has broucht you here?\n  But say the word, and ye schall gang\n      Back to your kindred dear.\u201d\n  Then up and spok the ladye fair\u2014\n      \u201cI have nae friends or kin,\n  Bot in a little boat I live,\n      Amidst the waves\u2019 loud din.\u201d\n  Then answered thus the douchty knichte\u2014\n      \u201cI\u2019ll follow you through all,\n  For gin ye bee in a littel boat,\n      The world to it seemis small.\u201d\n  They goed through the wood, and through the wood,\n      To the end of the wood they came:\n  And when they came to the end of the wood\n      They saw the salt sea faem.\n  And then they saw the wee, wee boat,\n      That daunced on the top of the wave,\n  And first got in the ladye fair,\n      And then the knichte sae brave.\n  They got into the wee, wee boat,\n      And rowed wi\u2019 a\u2019 their micht;\n  When the knichte sae brave, he turnit about,\n      And lookit at the ladye bricht;\n  He lookit at her bonnie cheik,\n      And hee lookit at hir twa bricht eyne,\n  Bot hir rosie cheik growe ghaistly pale,\n      And schoe seymit as scho deid had been.\n  The fause, fause knichte growe pale wi\u2019 frichte,\n      And his hair rose up on end,\n  For gane-by days cam to his mynde,\n      And his former luve he kenned.\n  Then spake the ladye\u2014\u201cThou, fause knichte,\n      Hast done to me much ill,\n  Thou didst forsake me long ago,\n      Bot I am constant still;\n  For though I ligg in the woods sae cald,\n      At rest I canna bee\n  Until I sucks the gude lyfe blude\n      Of the man that gart me dee.\u201d\n  Hee saw hir lipps were wet wi\u2019 blude,\n      And hee saw hir lufelesse eyne,\n  And loud hee cry\u2019d, \u201cGet frae my syde,\n      Thou vampyr corps encleane!\u201d\n  Bot no, hee is in hir magic boat,\n      And on the wyde, wyde sea;\n  And the vampyr suckis his gude lyfe blude,\n      Sho suckis hym till hee dee.\n  So now beware, whoe\u2019er you are,\n      That walkis in this lone wood:\n  Beware of that deceitfull spright,\n      The ghaist that suckis the blude.\n\nMr Reginald Hodder, in _The Vampire_ (William Rider & Son, Ltd.), has\ndeveloped a theory which is a novel one in the annals of vampirism. The\nprincipal character is a living woman, a member of a secret sisterhood,\nwho is forced to exercise her powers as a vampire to prevent loss of\nvitality. This power, however, is exercised through the medium of a\nmetallic talisman, and the main thread of the story turns on the struggle\nfor the possession of this talisman. It is wrested ultimately from the\nhands of those who would use it for malignant purposes, but its recovery\nis only accomplished by means of a number of extraordinary\u2014though who\nwould dare say impossible?\u2014occult phenomena.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\nFACT OR FICTION?\n\n\nWhile some writers, belonging mainly to what is popularly known as the\northodox school of theology or professing a materialistic philosophy,\nhave expressed an entire disbelief in the alleged phenomena, others, on\nthe other hand, accepting generally the spiritistic or spiritualistic\nphilosophy, have admitted the possibility of the phenomena, though\nnot pledging their acceptance of all or any of the many stories told\nconcerning the deeds, or rather the misdeeds, of the apparitions.\n\nDr Pierart, the well-known French _savant_, maintained that \u201cthe facts\nof vampirism are as well attested by inquiries made as are the facts of\ncatalepsy,\u201d and that \u201cthe facts of vampirism are as old as the world,\u201d\nand pointed to the fact that Tertullian and St Augustine spoke of them.\n\nGabriele D\u2019Annunzio was another firm believer in their existence. In\nhis _Triumph of Death_, translated by Georgina Harding, we read: \u201cWhat\nhave they not done? Candia told of all the different means they had\ntried, all the exorcisms they had resorted to. The priest had come and,\nafter covering the child\u2019s head with the end of his stole, had repeated\nverses from the Gospel. The mother had hung up a wax cross, blessed on\nAscension Day, over a door, and had sprinkled the hinges with holy water\nand repeated the Creed three times in a loud voice; she had tied up a\nhandful of salt in a piece of linen and hung it round the neck of her\ndying child. The father had \u2018done the seven nights\u2019\u2014that is, for seven\nnights he had waited in the dark behind a lighted lantern, attentive\nto the slightest sound, ready to catch and grapple with the vampire. A\nsingle prick with the pin sufficed to make her visible to the human eye.\nBut the seven nights\u2019 watch had been fruitless, for the child wasted away\nand grew more hopelessly feeble from hour to hour. At last, in despair,\nthe father had consulted with a wizard, by whose advice he had called a\ndog and put the body behind the door. The vampire could not then enter\nthe house till she counted every hair on its body.\u201d\n\nCalmet\u2019s explanation of the spectres so much talked of in Hungary,\nMoravia, Poland, and elsewhere is that they are nothing but persons that\nare still alive in their graves, though without motion or respiration;\nand that the freshness and ruddy colour of their blood, the flexibility\nof their limbs, and their crying out when their hearts were run through\nwith a stick, or their heads cut off, were demonstrative proofs of their\nbeing still alive. \u201cBut this,\u201d he says, \u201cdoes not affect the principal\ndifficulty at which I stick, namely, how they come out of and go into\ntheir graves, without leaving any mark of the earth\u2019s being removed; and\nhow they appear to carry former clothes. If they are not really dead,\nwhy do they return to their graves again and not stay in the land of the\nliving? Why do they suck the blood of their relations, and torment and\npester persons that should naturally be true to them and never give them\nany offence? On the other hand, if it be nothing but a mere whim of the\npersons infested, whence comes it that these carcases are found in their\ngraves uncorrupted, full of blood, with their limbs pliant and flexible,\nand their feet dirty, the next day after they have been patrolling about\nand frightening the neighbourhood, whilst nothing of this sort can be\ndiscovered in other carcases that were buried at the same time and in the\nsame mound? Whence is it that they come no more after they are burned or\nimpaled?\u201d\n\nOther writers have accepted the theory that the subjects are not really\ndead, but are only in a death-like condition. The Germans express this\ncondition of apparent death and of the perfect preservation of the\nliving body by the term _scheintod_, which is, perhaps, better than the\nEnglish term \u201csuspended animation.\u201d Dr Herbert Mayo describes the special\ncondition of vampires as a \u201cdeath-trance\u201d\u2014a positive status, a period of\nrepose, the duration of which is sometimes definite and predetermined,\nthough unknown, and says that the patient sometimes awakes suddenly when\nthe term of the death-trance has expired. During this trance-period the\naction of the heart, breathing, voluntary motion, as well as feeling\nand intelligence and the vegetable changes in the body, are said to be\nsuspended. Two instances of the death-trance are quoted.\n\nCardinal Espinosa, prime minister under Philip the Second of Spain, died,\nas it was supposed, after a short illness. His rank entitled him to be\nembalmed. Accordingly, the body was opened for that purpose. The lungs\nand heart had just been brought into view, when the latter was seen to\nbeat. The cardinal, awakening at the fatal moment, had still strength\nenough left to seize with his hand the knife of the anatomist.\n\nOn the 23rd of September 1763, the Abb\u00e9 Pr\u00e9vost, the French novelist and\ncompiler of travels, was seized with a fit in the forest of Chantilly.\nThe body was found and conveyed to the residence of the nearest\nclergyman. It was supposed that death had taken place through apoplexy.\nBut the local authorities, desiring to be satisfied of the fact, ordered\nthe body to be examined. During the process the poor Abb\u00e9 uttered a cry\nof agony. It was too late.\n\nAmong Theosophists and Continental spiritists a solution to the problem\nis found in their teaching concerning the astral body and the astral\nplane, as conveyed by Madame Blavatsky in _Isis Unveiled_.\n\nIt is held that so long as the astral form is not entirely separated\nfrom the body there is a liability that it may be forced by magnetic\nattraction to re-enter it. Sometimes it will be only half-way out when\nthe corpse, which presents the appearance of death, is buried. In such\ncases the astral body voluntarily re-enters the mortal frame, and then\none of two things happens\u2014either the unhappy victim will writhe in the\nagonising torture of suffocation, or if he has been grossly material he\nbecomes a vampire. It is held that this ethereal form can go wherever\nit pleases, and that it is possible for this astral body to feed on\nhuman victims and carry the sustenance to the corpus lying within the\ntomb by means of an invisible cord of connection, the nature of which\nis at present unknown; but psychical researchers\u2014and these number many\neminent scientists\u2014have of late years devoted their efforts towards the\nelucidation of the phenomenon known as the projection of the double; and\nthis, if scientifically and satisfactorily explained, will give the clue\nto many of the phenomena of vampirism.\n\nThis \u201cdouble\u201d may sometimes during life be projected unconsciously, and\nsometimes purposely, by means of hypnotism or provoked somnambulism. An\nexample of the former appeared in the _Journal du Magn\u00e9tisme_ for October\n1909, and the translation of the account was published in the _Annals of\nPsychical Science_ for January-March 1910, and is here reproduced. The\nnarrator is M. Antonio Salazar of Mexico.\n\n\n\u201c_A Romantic Case of Projection of the Double_\n\n\u201cIn 1889 I lived at Juatlahuaca, in the state of Oaxaca, Mexico. For a\nlong time I passionately loved the woman who afterwards became my wife.\n\n\u201cAt the beginning of 1890, through one of those unfortunate disagreements\nwhich occasionally arise between parents and their children, those of my\nbeloved one, wishing to put an end to our mutual love, separated us by\ntaking her to the mountains; but this only increased our love, because of\nthe difficulties and our desire to see each other.\n\n\u201cSeveral months passed after our separation, and though the distance\nbetween us was not great, we had to take into account the vigilance\nwith which she was surrounded, and which was a greater obstacle than the\ndifficulties of the road.\n\n\u201cOne night, when I was feeling, as usual, very sad and gloomy, the\nthought came to me to say to my servant: \u2018Jeanette, if any morning you\ncome into my room and do not find me, do not look for me; take the keys\nand open the shop. If at midday I have not arrived, you can seek for me\nin the mountains.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Ah, sir,\u2019 she replied, \u2018I would never oppose myself to your commands,\nif what you tell me did not concern persons whom I love and respect,\nbecause you will never thereby accomplish your object.\u2019\n\n\u201cI knew that she was right, and I thought that the best thing I could\ndo was to go to sleep and try to calm my imagination. She also retired,\nmuch distressed, and imploring all the saints, to whom she prayed, to\nprevent any unfortunate incident which would threaten the lives of three\npersons\u2014my _fianc\u00e9e_, her father, and myself.\n\n\u201cThe following day I awoke with the same project in my mind, but before\ncarrying it out I wished to inform my _fianc\u00e9e_ as to the day and hour at\nwhich I hoped to speak to her. She replied by showing me the rashness of\nmy project, and offering to do all she could to overcome the obstacles\nwhich prevented her from returning to live in the town, which she hoped\nto do in a few days, and which came to pass as she had predicted. I\nreckoned, however, on my sagacity and youthful ardour to realise my\nproject before my _fianc\u00e9e_ was able to return.\n\n\u201cOne day, when my mind was indulging itself in all kinds of fancies, I\nthought it would be quite easy to elude the vigilance of all those who\nwere around my _fianc\u00e9e_, and who were opposed to our meeting. When night\ncame on I continued to think of my project, and I resolved to lie down\nand try to sleep.\n\n\u201cI passed a very disturbed night, waking frequently, and when the day\nbegan to break, the servant came to my room to bid me \u2018good morning,\u2019 and\nto ask for the keys of the shop.\n\n\u201c\u2018How have you passed the night, sir?\u2019 she asked.\n\n\u201c\u2018Rather badly, Jeanette. I have dreamed continually, and it is\nimpossible for me to give you an idea of all the dangers and precipices\nwhich I thought I overcame and crossed; it seems to me that I went over\nthe mountain road which leads to the farm, but it was a very different\nroad. I dreamed that our interview was prevented, I do not know how, and\nthat I had a long walk home again. What can it all mean?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018It is only the result of your wishes and preoccupation in regard to the\nyoung lady. She will soon return, and then these follies will disappear.\u2019\n\n\u201cI very soon forgot all about what I have just described, and so did my\nservant, for neither of us attached any importance to a dream; but, after\na short time, a messenger from the farm handed me a letter, in which my\n_fianc\u00e9e_ reproached me for my violence, my bad conduct and disobedience\nin going there in defiance of the commands and wishes of her father.\n\n\u201c\u2018What? I? No. Never! Tell your mistress that, although I have thought of\ngoing to see her, I have never carried out my desires; if I have not done\nso, it has not been through lack of courage and will on my part, but only\nbecause of my desire to please her and not to oppose her wishes.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018But we saw you.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Me?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Yes, sir\u2014you.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018You are telling an untruth. I have not been out. My servant can\ncorroborate that; and, further, I have nothing to lose by telling the\ntruth.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018That may be as you please, but it is true that you spoke to me; you\nquestioned me on the subject of Mademoiselle\u2014desired me to tell her that\nyou were there and wished to speak to her.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018These are illusions on your part; you have been dreaming.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018That is possible; but there were two, three, all the servants, who also\nsaw you. You did not arrive until nearly midnight; you were dressed as\nyou are now, and riding a white horse, which you fastened to the gnarled\noak. We could all recognise you by the moonlight, and you were going\ntowards the side door when I stopped you from entering.\n\n\u201c\u2018Hearing our voices, the dogs began to bark, which caused all the\nservants to get up. You were recognised by my master and the young lady,\nwho fell on her knees before her father, beseeching him not to fire on\nyou. Without showing any fear, you returned step by step to your horse\nand went down the mountain again. My master was much annoyed with you,\ncalled his confidential servant Marino, ordered him to follow you and\nnot to be afraid, but to fire on you two or three times, as he would be\nresponsible. Marino set out, and, although he walked quickly and tried\nall he could to catch you up, he could not do so. A curious phenomenon\naroused his attention, which was that he always saw you going at the same\npace, and he had not the courage to fire his rifle.\n\n\u201c\u2018You arrived at the entrance to the town about five o\u2019clock in the\nmorning; the moon was setting and the day commencing to break. Before you\narrived at the first crossing of the streets you began to run, and turned\nquickly along the first street in the town; and though Marino ran after\nyou, he lost sight of you at the next crossing.\u2019\n\n\u201cMy persecutor, frightened by what he had seen, returned immediately to\nthe farm to inform his master of what had taken place, and which seemed\nvery extraordinary and supernormal.\n\n\u201cFor a long time this adventure, of which I was the unconscious hero,\nmade a great stir in the town.\u201d\n\nColonel de Rochas, a distinguished French savant, has made this\nquestion of the externalisation or projection of the double and of the\nmotricity and sensibility of the subject his special and patient study,\nand has embodied the results of many of his experiments in separate\nworks. Some have also been published in the pages of the _Annals of\nPsychical Science_, so that the reader who is particularly interested\nin the question will have no difficulty in finding material for further\nconsideration and study.\n\nThe Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 Magn\u00e9tique de France has also conducted extensive experiments\nin this field of research, particulars of which are published from\ntime to time in the _Journal du Magn\u00e9tisme_. The following theoretical\nexplanation given at the conclusion of the report of a series of these\nexperiments is reprinted from the _Annals_ for July-September 1910:\u2014\n\n\u201cWe know that the phantom is the psychical body projected from the\nphysical body. It is that which enjoys or suffers, thinks, wishes,\njudges, and perceives all sensations. It is constantly animated by\nextremely rapid vibratory movements which are certainly the same as when\nit is within the body. This principle being admitted, we understand that,\nwhen it animates the body, its vibratory movements are not projected\noutside, and that it exercises no appreciable action on other organisms\nin its neighbourhood. But when it is outside the body its movements are\neasily externalised. Then the phantom and another person, vibrating in\nunison, represent two stringed instruments which sound at the same time\nwhen one only is touched. If I can obtain this transmission at great\ndistances, we can explain this strange and unexpected phenomenon by the\ntheory of wireless telegraphy or telephony.\u201d\n\nThe results of the many experiments conducted by and under the auspices\nof French scientists in particular tend to indicate that in the near\nfuture an explanation of the phenomena of vampirism will be forthcoming.\n\n\n\n\nBIBLIOGRAPHY\n\n\nAbercromby\u2019s _Finns_.\n\nLeo Allatius.\n\nBarth\u2019s _The Religions of India_.\n\nBartholin\u2019s _de Causa contempt\u00fbs mortis_.\n\nBeaumont\u2019s _Treatise on Spirits_.\n\nBlavatsky\u2019s _Isis Unveiled_.\n\nCalmet\u2019s _Dissertation upon Apparitions_.\n\nCalmet\u2019s _The Phantom World_.\n\nHugh Clifford\u2019s _In Court and Kampong_.\n\nCodrington\u2019s _Melanesians_.\n\nConway\u2019s _Demonology and Folk-lore_.\n\nWilliam Crooke\u2019s _Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India_.\n\nGabriele D\u2019Annunzio\u2019s _The Triumph of Death_.\n\nDe Schartz, _Magia Postuma_.\n\nC. M. Doughty\u2019s _Arabia Deserta_.\n\nEaves\u2019 _Modern Vampirism_.\n\n_Encyclop\u00e6dia Britannica._\n\nEyre\u2019s _Discoveries in Central Australia_.\n\nFarrer\u2019s _Primitive Manners and Customs_.\n\nFornari\u2019s _History of Sorcerers_.\n\nFortis\u2019 _Travels into Dalmatia_.\n\nFrazer\u2019s _Golden Bough_.\n\nGoethe\u2019s _Bride of Corinth_.\n\nBaring Gould\u2019s _Book of Were Wolves_.\n\nGrimm\u2019s _Teutonic Mythology_.\n\nJ. J. Morgan de Groot\u2019s _Religious System of China_.\n\nBaron von Haxthausen\u2019s _Transcaucasia_.\n\nHikayat Abdullah.\n\nReginald Hodder\u2019s _The Vampire_.\n\n_Jewish Encyclop\u00e6dia._\n\nKeightley\u2019s _Fairy Mythology_.\n\nT. S. Knowlson\u2019s _Origin of Popular Superstitions_.\n\nLeake\u2019s _Travels in Northern Greece_.\n\nLiddell\u2019s _The Vampire Bride_.\n\nMackenzie and Irby\u2019s _Travels in the Slavonic Provinces of Turkey in\nEurope_.\n\nMayo\u2019s _On the Truths contained in Popular Superstitions_.\n\n_Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border_ (vol. ii.).\n\nMore\u2019s _Antidote against Atheism_.\n\nNider\u2019s _Formicarius_.\n\nLaurence Oliphant\u2019s _Scientific Religion_.\n\nPashley\u2019s _Crete_ (vol. ii.).\n\nPolidori\u2019s _The Vampyre_.\n\nMichael Psellus\u2019 _Dialogus de Operationibus D\u00e6monum_.\n\nRalston\u2019s _Russian Folk Tales_.\n\nRalston\u2019s _Songs of the Russian People_.\n\nRoussel\u2019s _Transfusion of Human Blood_.\n\nRycaut\u2019s _The Present State of the Greek and Armenian Churches_.\n\nRymer\u2019s _Varney the Vampire_.\n\nSt Clair and Brophy\u2019s _Bulgaria_.\n\nSaxo Grammaticus\u2019 _Danish History_.\n\nSayce\u2019s _Ancient Empires of the East_.\n\nScoffern\u2019s _Stray Leaves of Science and Folk-lore_.\n\nSir Walter Scott\u2019s translation of _Eyrbyggia Saga_.\n\nSiegbert\u2019s _Chronicle_.\n\nW. W. Skeat\u2019s _Malay Magic_.\n\nSkeat and Blagden\u2019s _Pagan Races of the Malay Peninsula_.\n\nSouthey\u2019s _Thalaba the Destroyer_.\n\nBram Stoker\u2019s _Dracula_.\n\nR. Campbell Thompson\u2019s _The Devils and Evil Spirits of Babylonia_.\n\nJ. Pitton de Tournefort\u2019s _A Voyage into the Levant_.\n\nTozer\u2019s _Researches in the Highlands of Turkey_.\n\nTrumbull\u2019s _Blood Covenant_.\n\nTurner\u2019s _Nineteen Years in Polynesia_.\n\nTylor\u2019s _Primitive Culture_.\n\nVoltaire\u2019s _Dictionnaire Philosophique_.\n\nHorace Walpole\u2019s _Reminiscences_.\n\nWestermarck\u2019s _Origin and Development of Moral Ideas_.\n\nWilliam of Newbury.\n\n\nPERIODICAL LITERATURE\n\n_All the Year Round_ (vol. xxv.).\n\n_Annals of Psychical Science._\n\n_Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_ (vol. lxi.).\n\n_Borderland._\n\n_Chambers\u2019s Journal_ (vol. lxxiii.).\n\n_Colburn\u2019s Magazine_ (vol. vii.).\n\n_Contemporary Review_ (July 1885).\n\n_Gentleman\u2019s Magazine_ (July 1851).\n\n_Household Words_ (vol. xi.).\n\n_Journal du Magn\u00e9tisme._\n\n_Journal Indian Archipelago_ (vol. i.).\n\n_Lippincott\u2019s Magazine_ (vol. xlvii.).\n\n_London Journal_ (March 1732).\n\n_New Monthly Magazine_ (1st April 1819).\n\n_Nineteenth Century_ (September 1885).\n\n_Notes and Queries._\n\n_Occult Review._\n\n_Open Court_ (vol. vii.).\n\n_Revue Spiritualiste_ (vol. iv.).\n\n_St James\u2019s Magazine_ (vol. x.).\n\n_Wonderful Magazine_ (1764).\n\n\nPRINTED BY NEILL AND CO., LTD., EDINBURGH\n\n\n\n\nTHE VAMPIRE\n\nA ROMANCE OF THE UNCANNY\n\n6/=\n\nBY REGINALD HODDER\n\nAUTHOR OF \u201cA SOLDIER OF FORTUNE,\u201d ETC.\n\n_Crown 8vo, Cloth Gilt, Coloured Frontispiece_\n\n\n\u201cThe story is really exciting, and the ordinary reader who merely wishes\nto be thrilled will gain his desire and find Mr Hodder\u2019s pages most\nengrossing. To occultists the author presents a new theory and a novel\ntreatment of an ancient subject, both of which merit their attention and\nconsideration.\u201d\u2014_Times._\n\n\u201cReaders who enjoy fierce mystery of the supernatural order will discover\na most thrilling experience in \u2018The Vampire.\u2019\u201d\u2014_Glasgow Herald._\n\n\u201cFor the first few pages we attempted to employ a critical mind, but the\nnarrative soon held us in a grip of terror, and we could do no more than\nsit at the author\u2019s feet and abandon ourselves to fearful joy.\u201d\u2014_The\nStandard._\n\n\u201cHorror succeeds horror, and mystery is piled upon mystery. It is\na blood-curdling, hair-raising story of the black art and of evil\nspirits.\u201d\u2014_Sheffield Independent._\n\n\u201cIt is one of the most sensationally weird stories ever written\u2014a\nmarvellous excursion into the realms of the occult.\u201d\u2014_Hampshire\nIndependent._\n\n\u201cAn astounding story.\u201d\u2014_The New Statesman._\n\n\u201cMr Hodder\u2019s story is full of thrills and uncanny excitements....\nAs thrilling an experience as one could wish for in the pages of\nfiction.\u201d\u2014_The Globe._\n\n\u201cThose who enjoy grim fantasies such as the late Mr Bram Stoker used to\ngive us will appreciate Mr Hodder\u2019s clever essay in the same class of\nfiction.... Events move so quickly and are so startling that there is\nlittle inclination for criticism.\u201d\u2014_Western Morning News._\n\n    LONDON:\n    WILLIAM RIDER & SON, LIMITED,\n    8-11 PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.\n\n\n\n\nRIDER\u2019S NEW SERIES OF SHILLING NOVELS\n\n_Crown 8vo. Artistically bound in illustrated coloured jacket. 1s. net\neach._\n\nTHE BEST VALUE EVER OFFERED TO THE READING PUBLIC\n\n\n=POSSESSED.= By FIRTH SCOTT, Author of \u201cThe Rider of Waroona,\u201d \u201cThe Last\nLemurian,\u201d \u201cThe Track of Midnight,\u201d etc. _Now Ready._\n\n\u201cWe can say with assurance that no one who begins reading this book will\nbe inclined to put it down until the last page has been turned.... This\nis such a tale of mystery and imagination as Poe himself would have been\nproud to own.\u201d\u2014_The Globe._\n\n\u201cThe story with its mixture of stark realism and wild supernaturalism is\ngrimly powerful, and we watch the progress of the \u2018Possessed\u2019 Mordaunt\nwith intense interest.\u201d\u2014_The Outlook._\n\n=THE RAKE\u2019S PROGRESS.= By MARJORIE BOWEN, Author of \u201cThe Viper of\nMilan,\u201d \u201cI Will Maintain,\u201d etc. A tale of London life and manners in the\neighteenth century. _Now Ready._\n\n\u201cA brilliant romance, well worthy of its gifted author.\u201d\u2014_Pall Mall\nGazette._\n\n\u201c\u2018The Rake\u2019s Progress\u2019 is a feast of colour, of grace, and of\nscenery.\u201d\u2014_Westminster Gazette._\n\n\u201cBecause I am certain that Thackeray himself would have loved this piece\nof art and beauty, I have put \u2018The Rake\u2019s Progress\u2019 on my shelf beside\n\u2018Esmond.\u2019\u201d\u2014_Dundee Advertiser._\n\n=NYRIA.= By Mrs CAMPBELL PRAED, Author of \u201cThe Body of His Desire,\u201d \u201cThe\nMaid of the River,\u201d etc. _Now Ready._\n\nThis celebrated reincarnation story, in which is vividly depicted the\nlife-history of a slave girl in the days of Domitian, is now offered to\nthe public at the price of one shilling.\n\n\u201cStirring and dramatic, terrible in their intense realism, as many of\nthe scenes here are, there is yet nothing \u2018theatrical\u2019\u2014no jarring note\noffending our literary or artistic sense.... Books such as Mrs Campbell\nPraed\u2019s beautifully conceived tale have a far more lasting value than is\ncommonly accredited to fiction of this class.\u201d\u2014_Pall Mall Gazette._\n\n\u201cAs enthralling as ever.\u201d\u2014_Daily Graphic._\n\n    LONDON:\n    WILLIAM RIDER & SON, LIMITED,\n    8-11 PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.\n\n\n\n\nRIDER\u2019S POPULAR FICTION\n\nNOW READY. Uniform with DRACULA.\n\n\nTHE LADY OF THE SHROUD\n\nBy BRAM STOKER. _Small crown 8vo, cloth gilt, 1s. net._\n\nThe latest addition to Rider\u2019s Popular Fiction.\n\n\u201cA wild and whirling romance no less fascinating than his first horribly\ngrim story of \u2018DRACULA.\u2019\u201d\u2014_Daily Telegraph._\n\n\u201cA veritable feast of horrors and excitements\u2014one is left aghast at the\nfertility of Mr Stoker\u2019s imagination and the vigour of his pen.\u201d\u2014_The\nWorld._\n\nTwenty-Seventh Thousand.\n\nDRACULA\n\nBy BRAM STOKER. 1_s._ _net_.\n\n\u201cThe very weirdest of weird tales.\u201d\u2014_Punch._\n\n\u201cIts fascination is so great that it is impossible to lay it aside.\u201d\u2014_The\nLady._\n\nTHE MYSTERY OF THE SEA\n\nBy BRAM STOKER. 1_s._ _net_.\n\n\u201cAn admirable story for the holiday season.\u201d\u2014_Westminster Gazette._\n\n\u201cTo anyone who loves an enthralling tale told with unflagging zest and\ngood spirits we recommend \u2018The Mystery of the Sea.\u2019\u201d\u2014_Pall Mall Gazette._\n\nTHE JEWEL OF THE SEVEN STARS\n\nBy BRAM STOKER. 1_s._ _net_.\n\n\u201cIn mystery and interest the book is thrilling, and at times\nsensational.\u201d\u2014_Daily Graphic._\n\nWIND ALONG THE WASTE\n\nA Story of Parisian Life\n\nBy MAUDE ANNESLEY. _Uniform with above. Crown 8vo, cloth, 1s. net._\n\n\u201cA dashing and spirited novel.\u201d\u2014_Pall Mall Gazette._\n\n\u201cIt is seldom that so dramatic a story is combined with so close a truth\nto life, and so modern a setting.\u201d\u2014_The Observer._\n\n    LONDON\n    WILLIAM RIDER & SON, LIMITED\n    8-11 PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.\n    _And of all Booksellers._\n\n\n\n\nLETTERS FROM A LIVING DEAD MAN\n\nWRITTEN DOWN BY\n\nELSA BARKER\n\nAUTHOR OF \u201cTHE SON OF MARY BETHEL\u201d\n\n_Cloth Gilt, Crown 8vo. Price 3s. 6d. net._\n\n\n\u201cThese letters are really \u2018the letters of a traveller in a strange\ncountry. They record his impressions, often his mistakes, sometimes\nperhaps his provincial prejudices; but at least they are not a re-hash\nof what somebody else has said.\u2019 It is obvious that the writer took over\nwith him to the other side the keen intelligence of an investigator as\nwell as the impartiality of a judicial mind, which his occupation on\nearth had been the best means of cultivating. I question if the same can\nbe said of any previous communication from the other world, and it is\nthis very fact that renders \u2018Letters from a Living Dead Man\u2019 so original\nand supremely absorbing. Compared with it, all previous records seem\ntrivial and commonplace.\u201d\u2014RALPH SHIRLEY in the _Occult Review_.\n\n\u201cOf all the communications we have seen purporting to come from beyond\nthe veil, these are quite the most entertaining and from the hypothesis\nof their authenticity some of the most instructive. They give a vivid\nglimpse into life on the other side and some idea of the laws of nature\non that plane.... With all their romance they are a quite serious\ncontribution to the life beyond death.\u201d\u2014_The Christian Commonwealth._\n\n\u201cThese letters are of enthralling interest, and open up many vistas of\nthought and speculation.\u201d\u2014_Oxford Chronicle._\n\n\u201cWhatever the reader\u2019s personal opinion may be, he cannot do amiss\nin studying this remarkable series of letters, all intensely\ninteresting.\u201d\u2014_The Daily Citizen._\n\n    LONDON:\n    WILLIAM RIDER & SON, LIMITED\n    8-11 PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.\n\n\n\n\nBOOKS BY SEPHARIAL\n\n\n=COSMIC SYMBOLISM.= By \u201cSEPHARIAL.\u201d _Crown 8vo, ornamental cloth gilt,\n304 pp. 3s. 6d. net._\n\nThe author of this new work on the symbology of the universe has taken\nas the basis of his argument that \u201cnothing can be accepted as true which\nis not reducible to a mathematical statement; ... a tacit confession of\nfaith in the law of numerical ratios, the geometry of the universe which\nunderlies all revelation.\u201d Consequently he translates a number of occult\nconcepts into terms of geometrical science, shows the application of the\nprinciples of symbolism to a system of ethics and philosophy, and gives\nrules for the practical use of this universal symbolism in daily life.\n\n=A MANUAL OF OCCULTISM.= A Complete Exposition of the Occult Arts and\nSciences by \u201cSEPHARIAL.\u201d With numerous diagrams and illustrations. _368\npp., handsomely bound in cloth gilt. Gilt tops. Crown 8vo. 6s. net._\n\n=A NEW MANUAL OF ASTROLOGY.= In four books. With Set of Tables. By\n\u201cSEPHARIAL.\u201d Revised and Enlarged Edition. _Demy 8vo, cloth gilt. 264 pp.\n10s. 6d. net._\n\n=SECOND SIGHT=: A Study of Natural and Induced Clairvoyance. By\n\u201cSEPHARIAL.\u201d _Crown 8vo, 96 pp. Stiff boards, 1s. net._\n\nThe author writes from personal experience in this department of psychic\nresearch and brings to his aid a considerable knowledge of the methods\nemployed in the general field of Occultism.\n\nThe present publication embraces the theory and practice of Clairvoyance,\nboth natural and induced.\n\n=THE KABALA OF NUMBERS.= A Handbook dealing with the Traditional\nInterpretation of Numbers and their Predictive Value. By \u201cSEPHARIAL.\u201d\n_Second Edition. Crown 8vo, cloth gilt. 2s. 6d. net._\n\n=KABALA OF NUMBERS. Part II.= By \u201cSEPHARIAL.\u201d _Crown 8vo, cloth. 2s. 6d.\nnet._\n\n\u201cThe book is forcible and interesting in style, and opens up many\nfascinating vistas of thought and speculation.\u201d\u2014_Oxford Chronicle._\n\n\u201cA handbook dealing with the occult and prophetic powers of numbers....\nWonderfully interesting.\u201d\u2014_Sheffield Daily Telegraph._\n\n_Cheaper Edition._\n\n=YOUR FORTUNE IN YOUR NAME; OR, KABALISTIC ASTROLOGY.= Being the Hebraic\nMethod of Divination by the power of Sound, Number, and Planetary\nInfluence. _Demy 8vo, cloth gilt. 2s. net._ By \u201cSEPHARIAL.\u201d\n\n=SCIENCE AND THE INFINITE=: or, Through a Window in a Blank Wall. By\nSYDNEY T. KLEIN. _Crown 8vo, 183 pp. Cloth gilt. Price 2s. 6d. net._\n\nCONTENTS IN EIGHT VIEWS: Clearing the Approach\u2014The Vision\u2014Mysticism and\nSymbolism\u2014Love in Action\u2014The Physical Film\u2014Space\u2014Time\u2014Creation.\n\n\u201cThis book is of an importance which I think it would be hard to\noverrate. The two main religious tendencies of to-day are towards Science\nand Mysticism. Mr Klein unites the two.... Mr Klein undermines our\nna\u00efve belief in Time and Space, and shows us that to perfect knowledge\nthere is only Here and Now. The universe is a single instantaneous\nphenomenon.\u201d\u2014_The English Review._\n\n\u201cA most fascinating and suggestive book.\u201d\u2014_Globe._\n\n=THE HIDDEN WAY ACROSS THE THRESHOLD=; or, The Mystery which hath been\nHidden for Ages and from Generations. An explanation of the concealed\nforces in every man to open THE TEMPLE OF THE SOUL, and to learn THE\nGUIDANCE OF THE UNSEEN HAND. Illustrated and made plain, with as few\noccult terms as possible, by J. C. STREET. _Large 8vo. With plates, 12s.\nnet._\n\nThe writer of this book, it is admitted, has enjoyed access to sources\nof information not commonly open to mankind in its present state of\ndevelopment.\n\n=THE OCCULT ARTS.= An examination of the claims made for the existence\nand practice of Supernormal Powers, and an attempted justification of\nsome of them by the conclusions of the researches of modern science, by\nJ. W. FRINGS. _Crown 8vo. 2s. 6d. net._\n\n\u201cThere are a great many people to whom this book, which is seriously\nintended, will appeal; and the \u2018conclusion\u2019 is plainly the result of much\nthought.\u201d\u2014_The English Review._\n\n\u201cHis work will probably take many readers further along this path once\nthey have started on it.\u201d\u2014_The Athen\u00e6um._\n\n\u201cThe book is a very spirited and successful attempt to justify the\nOccult Arts on a purely scientific basis. It is written very clearly and\nconvincingly, and shows that the author has a fine grasp of both the\noccult and the scientific sides of the question.\u201d\u2014_Review of Reviews._\n\n=WHAT IS OCCULTISM?= A Philosophical and Critical Study. By \u201cPAPUS.\u201d\nTranslated from the French by F. ROTHWELL. _Crown 8vo, Cloth. Price 2s.\nnet._\n\n\u201cA remarkably condensed statement of the leading principles of\nOccultism.\u201d\u2014_T.P.\u2019s Book Notes._\n\n\u201c\u2018Papus\u2019 is the pen name of Dr Encausse, of Paris, who is one of the\nleading French exponents of occult science. The views of the different\nschools are clearly epitomised, and in one of the chapters magic is\nexplained from a practical standpoint. The treatise has been ably\ntranslated.\u201d\u2014_The Sunday Times._\n\n    LONDON:\n    WILLIAM RIDER & SON, LIMITED\n    8-11 PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.","title":"Vampires and Vampirism","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":34929}