I am still near, Watching the smiles I prized on earth, Your converse mild, your blameless mirth.[64
- Date of account
- Late nineteenth-century compilation
- Source
- The Ghost World
- Reference
- The Ghost World · selected passage 165
- Rights
- public_domain
- Language
- English
- Record updated
- 2026-08-24
Record summary
Mines have long been supposed to be haunted, a fact which is no cause of wonderment, considering the many unearthly sounds--such as 'the dripping of water down the shafts, the tunnelling of distant passages, the rumbling of trains from some freshly-exploded lode'--constantly to be heard there
Published source text
Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.
Source passage
Source text · mention onlyMines have long been supposed to be haunted, a fact which is no cause of wonderment, considering the many unearthly sounds--such as 'the dripping of water down the shafts, the tunnelling of distant passages, the rumbling of trains from some freshly-exploded lode'--constantly to be heard there. In early times it was thought that all mines of gold, &c. were guarded by evil spirits, a belief to which Falstaff alludes in 2 Henry IV. (Act iv. sc. 3), where he speaks of 'learning a mere hoard of gold kept by a devil.' The Peruvian Indians affirm that the treasures in emerald mines are guarded by evil spirits, and Stevenson, speaking of the emerald mine in the neighbourhood of Los Esmeraldos, writes: 'I never visited it, owing to the superstitious dread of the natives, who assured me it was enchanted, and guarded by a dragon, which poured forth thunder and lightning on those who dared to ascend the river.' The spirits that haunt mines are considered to be unfriendly, because, as an old writer quoted by Reginald Scot remarks, 'they do exceedingly envy every man's benefit in the discovery of hidden treasure, ever haunting such places where money is concealed, and diffusing malevolent and poisonous influences to blast the lives and limbs of
Historical context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyThis material belongs to a folklore tradition. Story type, collector, community, transmission and literary editing matter when comparing it with other sources.
Modern context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyLattice compares motifs and reported features without assuming that a traditional being is a biological species or that similar stories document one external cause.
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