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 212
Rights: public_domain
Language: English
Record updated: 2026-08-24

Record summary

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

lights seen over graves, familiarly called “corpse-candles,” I have spoken elsewhere—as also of the luminous form perceived by Rilling in the garden at Colmar, as mentioned by Baron von Reichenbach. Most people have heard the story of the Radiant Boy seen by Lord Castlereagh—an apparition which the owner of the castle admitted to have been visible to many others. Dr. Kerner mentions a similar fact, wherein an advocate and his wife were awakened by a noise and a light, and saw a beautiful child enveloped by the sort of glory that is seen surrounding the heads of saints. It disappeared, and they never had a repetition of the phenomenon, which they afterward heard was believed to recur every seven years in that house, and to be connected with the cruel murder of a child by its mother.

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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