themselves on the verge of the world of spirits, or employed in
dispatching others to these gloomy regions, conceived they beheld the
apparitions of those beings whom their national mythology associated
with such scenes. In such moments of undecided battle, amid the
violence, hurry, and confusion of ideas incident to the situation, the
ancients supposed that they saw their deities, Castor and Pollux,
fighting in the van for their encouragement; the heathen Scandinavian
beheld the Choosers of the slain; and the Catholics were no less easily
led to recognize the warlike Saint George or Saint James in the very
front of the strife, showing them the way to conquest. Such apparitions
being generally visible to a multitude, have in all times been supported
by the greatest strength of testimony. When the common feeling of
danger, and the animating burst of enthusiasm, act on the feelings of
many men at once, their minds hold a natural correspondence with each
other, as it is said is the case with stringed instruments tuned to the
same pitch, of which, when one is played, the chords of the others are
supposed to vibrate in unison with the tones produced. If an artful or
enthusiastic individual exclaims, in the heat of action, that he
perceives an apparition of the romantic kind which has been intimated,
his companions catch at the idea with emulation, and most are willing to
sacrifice the conviction of their own senses, rather than allow that
they did not witness the same favourable emblem, from which all draw
confidence and hope. One warrior catches the idea from another; all are
alike eager to acknowledge the present miracle, and the battle is won
before the mistake is discovered. In such cases, the number of persons
present, which would otherwise lead to detection of the fallacy, becomes
the means of strengthening it.

Of this disposition, to see as much of the supernatural as is seen by
others around, or, in other words, to trust to the eyes of others rather