(26) "About 2 o'clock on the morning of October 21st, 1881, while I was perfectly wide awake, and looking at a lamp burning on my washhandstand, a person, as I thought, came into my room by mistake, and stopped, looking into the looking-glass on the table. It soon occurred to me it represented Robinson Kelsey, by his dress and wearing his hair long behind. When I raised myself up in bed and called out, it instantly disappeared.1 The next day2 I mentioned to some of my friends how strange it was. So thoroughly convinced was I, that I searched the local papers that day (Saturday) and the following Tuesday, believing his death would be in one of them. On the following Wednesday, a man, who formerly was my drover, came and told me Robinson Kelsey was dead. Anxious to know at what time he died, I wrote to Mr. Wood, the family undertaker at Lingfield; he learnt from the brother-in-law of the deceased that he died at 2 a.m. He was my first cousin, and was apprenticed formerly to me as a miller; afterwards he lived with me as journeyman; altogether, 8 years. I never saw anything approaching that before. I am 72 years old, and never feel nervous; I am not afraid of the dead or their spirits.

I hand you a rough plan of the bedroom, etc".

1 The man who gave this account doubtless received the reward of a few dollars which had been placed in the editor's hands. In only one other instance has any payment been made to a witness: in that ease the evidence had been spontaneously given, partly in writing and partly viva voce, and the payment was simply for the time occupied in drawing up a more complete written statement.

In answer to inquiries, Mr. Marchant replied: -

"Robinson Kelsey had met with an accident. His horse fell with him, and from that time he seemed at times unfit for business. He had a farm at Penshurst, in Kent. His friends persuaded him to leave it. He did, and went to live on his own property, called Batnors Hall, in the parish of Lingfield, Surrey. I had not been thinking about him, neither had I spoken to him for 20 years. About 3 or 4 years before his death I saw him, but not to speak to him. I was on the up-side platform of Red-hill Station, and I saw him on the opposite down-side. In the morning after seeing the apparition, I spoke about it to a person in the house. In the evening I again spoke about it to two persons, how strange it was. It was several days after our conversation about what I had seen that I heard of the death. These people will confirm my statement, for after I heard of his death I spoke of it to the same people, that my relation died the same night as I saw the apparition. When I spoke to these three persons I did not know of his death, but had my suspicions from what I had seen. As the apparition passed between my bed and the lamp I had a full view of it; it was unmistakable.

When it stopped looking in the glass I spoke to it, then it gently sank away downwards.

"Probably it was 10 days before I found out, through Mr. Wood, the hour he died, so that these persons I spoke to knew nothing of his death at the time. "George Marchant".

We have received the following confirmation of this incident: -

"July 18th, 1883. "We are positive of hearing Mr. Marchant one day say that he saw the apparition of Robinson Kelsey during the previous night.

"Ann Langeridge, Linkfield Street, Redhill. "Matilda Fuller, Station Road, Redhill. "William Miles, Station Road, Redhill".

Mr. Anthony Kelsey, of Lingfield, Surrey, brother-in-law and cousin of Robinson Kelsey, has confirmed October 21st, 1881, as the date of the death (which we have also verified in the Register of Deaths), but he has forgotten the hour; and Mr. Robinson Kelsey's widow having since died, Mr. Marchant's recollection on this point cannot now be independently confirmed. As to the hour of the apparition, again, Mr. Marchant's statement is only a conclusion, drawn from his regular habit of waking once in the middle of the night at about 2. But there can be no reasonable doubt that the day of the death and of the vision was the same.

1 As to the disappearance on sudden speech or movement, see p. 427, second note.

2 This means the day following the night of the experience; but, two lines lower, that day should no doubt be the next day as Oct. 21, 1881, was a Friday.

On February 12th, 1884, I had an interview with Mr. Marchant, who is a very vigorous and sensible old man, with a precise mind. He went through all the details of his narrative in a methodical manner, and his description corresponded in every particular with the written account, which was sent to me many months before. Mr. Marchant was positive that he never had any other hallucination of the senses, and laughed at the very idea of such things. He quite realised the ordinary criticisms which might be made about a nocturnal vision, e.g., that he had had a glass too much, and also realised their absurdity as applied to his own case. I cannot doubt his statement that he has been a most temperate man. He showed me in his bedroom the precise line that the figure took; appearing at his right hand, then passing along in front of a lamp which was on the wash-hand-stand, and finally standing between the foot of his bed and the dressing-table. He described Kelsey's long and bushy black hair as a very distinct peculiarity. In answer to inquiries on this point he says: "I have not any doubt whatever that Robinson Kelsey did have that peculiarity of the hair at the day of his death.

My recollection of him is as clear as if I had his photo before me." The figure was visible, he thinks, for nearly a minute; but the length of time in such cases is of course likely to be overestimated.

I likewise saw Mrs. Langeridge, a sensible person, without any belief in "ghosts," who at once volunteered the remark that Mr. Marchant described his vision to her next morning.

This case is remarkable from the fact that there was no immediate interest between the two parties - though it is of course possible that the dying man's thoughts reverted to his kinsman and old employer. But comments on this point must be reserved.

§ 6. We now come to examples of the most important class of all, Class A - externalised impressions, occurring to persons who are up, and manifestly in the full possession of their waking senses. Of this class the most important examples are visual impressions, or apparitions. But I will first give a case which is on the line between Classes A and B, a vision not absolutely externalised in space, but where the mental image took on a sort of vividness and objectivity which the percipient believes to have been unexampled in his experience. The coincidence with the death of the agent was apparently quite exact; and we have the testimony of a third person to the fact that the percipient mentioned his impression immediately on its occurrence. The narrator is Mr. Rawlinson, of Lansdown Court West, Cheltenham.

"September 18th, 1883.