PREFIXED TO THE FOLLOWING TALE, AND SUPPOSED TO HAVE BEEN WRITTEN BY THE SECRETARY OF THE JUNTO.
The author of the following paper vouches for the correctness of the whole story, having himself received it from the person who enacted the part of the spirit therein. When it was read at our meeting, a large number of listeners, who had been enjoying themselves in promiscuous conversation, were seated around the table in a cheerful circle. Although some were at first inclined, perhaps more from a habit to find fault than from a displeasure at the tale itself, to cavil at and doubt it rather than to be amused, there was an honest and bewitching humor in the face of the speaker which alone seemed to entitle his story to full belief: so that by the time he had finished it, but one or two continued serious, whilst all the rest at once agreed that it was creditable in every particular. Whether they were not influenced to this conclusion more through their mirth than their careful judgment, I could not well ascertain; yet I am disposed to think, they merely meant to “take the story for what it was worth.”
An old gentleman now advanced, who had not only been careful all his life long to avoid the frivolities of the world, but who had also experienced some of its rough realities, if true inferences were deducible from his care-worn appearance and thread-bare garments. Not satisfied with what had been read, the old man gazed inquiringly into the speaker’s face, and then so overwhelmed the poor fellow with troublesome questions, that he resolved from that moment never to read or narrate another story, without previously demanding a solemn pledge from his auditory that they will remain content with what he may choose to give them, and under no circumstances trouble him for further explanations. Whilst thus pelted with the old man’s queries to his great relief a smiling little gentleman stepped up, and turning to the questioner, told him that every story would be spoiled by too much minuteness in its narration; that wherever he found a blank he should fill it up with his own fancy, otherwise he would experience nothing but annoyance; and that the moral of the tale he had heard, simply warned him against too strong a love for worldly things,—a warning for which I could see no necessity in his case,—so that if he should ever be tempted by spirits or ghosts, he might avoid the alarming fatalities which so seriously afflicted poor Hans Dundermann.
S——Y.