Research source

I will conclude this chapter with the following extract from “Lockhart’s Life of Scott:”

Date of account: First published 1848
Source: The Night-Side of Nature; Or, Ghosts and Ghost-Seers
Reference: The Night-Side of Nature; Or, Ghosts and Ghost-Seers · selected passage 169
Rights: public_domain
Language: English
Record updated: 2026-08-24

Record summary

Supposing this case to be as the men believed it, there are several things worthy of observation

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 only

Supposing this case to be as the men believed it, there are several things worthy of observation. In the first place, the ghost is guilty of that inconsistency so offensive to Francis Grose and many others. Instead of telling her secret to her husband, she commissions the corporal to tell it him, and it is not till a year after her departure from this life that she does even that; and she is heard in the ward two or three nights before she is visible. We are therefore constrained to suppose that, like Mrs. Bretton, she could not communicate with her husband, and that, till that Tuesday night, the necessary conditions for attaining her object, as regarded the corporal, were wanting. It is also remarkable that, although the latter heard her speak distinctly, and spoke to her, the other man heard no voice, which renders it probable that she had at length been able to produce that impression upon him which a magnetizer does on his somnambule, enabling each to understand the other by a transference of thought, which was undistinguishable to the corporal from speech, as it is frequently to the somnambule.

Historical context

Contextual commentary · mention only

This is a historical account assembled under the reporting and publishing conventions of its period. It may preserve testimony, hearsay, retelling and editorial interpretation together.

Modern context

Contextual commentary · mention only

A modern comparison can identify recurring descriptions and possible explanations, but the account is not treated as independently verified evidence merely because it appeared in print.

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