sleep in a haunted house. Pray give me the address of the one which you
left so ignominiously."

My friend gave me the address; and when we parted, I walked straight
towards the house thus indicated.

It is situated on the North side of Oxford Street (in a dull but
respectable thoroughfare). I found the house shut up--no bill at the
window, and no response to my knock. As I was turning away, a beer-boy,
collecting pewter pots at the neighboring areas, said to me, "Do you
want any one at that house, sir?"

"Yes, I heard it was to be let."

"Let!--why, the woman who kept it is dead--has been dead these three
weeks, and no one can be found to stay there, though Mr. J---- offered
ever so much. He offered mother, who chars for him, £1 a week just to
open and shut the windows, and she would not."

"Would not!--and why?"

"The house is haunted: and the old woman who kept it was found dead in
her bed, with her eyes wide open. They say the devil strangled her."

"Pooh!--you speak of Mr. J----. Is he the owner of the house?"

"Yes."

"Where does he live?"