already affected with anxiety, and I believe we shall have no occasion for
yielding to the idea of an apparition to explain the circumstance. I am
acquainted with another tale of the same kind, but I am debarred from
relating it, from my not being authorized to do so by the person, a
gentleman of large property in Scotland, to whom it occurred. Lord Byron
was much addicted to that species of superstition of which I am treating:
the gloomy idea of spirits revisiting the earth to gaze on those who they
loved, was congenial to his mind, and an overheated fancy indulged beyond
its due limits, converted the morbid visionary into the superstitious
ascetic.

There is an account of a ghost related in the Notes to Moore's Life of the
Noble Poet (vol. i.) I have mentioned, which I shall detail here, as it may
have escaped the memory of some of your readers. A captain of a merchant
vessel was on a voyage to some port; having retired to rest, he was
disturbed in the night by a horrid dream, that his brother, an officer in
the navy was drowned. He awoke and perceived something dark lying at the
foot of the hammock, and on putting out his hand discovered it was a naval
uniform, wet. Some days after this his dream was confirmed by a letter
informing him of his brother's death by drowning.

At Oakhampton, in Devonshire, there are the remains of a beautiful castle
dismantled by Henry VIII. on the attainder of Henry Courtenay, which is
situated in a park, concerning which many traditions exist, one of which I
will give here as it was told by a native. A great many years ago, there
lived a lady at Oakhampton Castle, who was famous for her love of cruelty
and for unbounded ostentation. This lady was killed, and her ghost haunted
some house in Oakhampton much to the discomfiture of all the inhabitants
thereof. A conclave of "most grave and reverend signiors" was convoked, who
ordained that the disturbed spirit should every night pluck a blade of