voted nem. con. that the person who did this mischief could have entered no other way than at the keyhole of the said doors. "In the night following this same day, the said Giles and two other of the commissioners' servants, as they were in bed at the same room with their honours, had their bed's feet lifted up so much higher than their heads, that they expected to have their necks broken, and then they were let fall at once with such violence as shook them up from the bed to a good distance; and this was repeated many times, their honours being amazed spectators of it. In the morning the bedsteads were found cracked and broken, and the said Giles, and his fellows, declared they were sore to the bones with the tossing and jolting of the beds.

October 19. As they were all in bed together, the candles were blown out with a sulphurous smell, and instantly many trenchers of wood were hurled about the room, and one of them putting his head above the clothes, had not less than six forcibly thrown at him, which wounded him very grievously. In the morning the trenchers were all found lying about the room, and were observed to be the same they had eaten on the day before, none being found remaining in the pantry.

"October 20. This night the candles were put out as before, the curtains of the bed in which their honours lay, were drawn to and fro many times with great violence; their honours received many cruel blows, and were much bruised beside with eight great pewter dishes, and three dozen wooden trenchers which were thrown on the bed, and afterwards heard rolling about the room.

"Many times also this night they heard the forcible falling of many faggots by their bed side, but in the morning no faggots were found there, no dishes or trenchers were there seen neither, and the aforesaid Giles attests that by their different arranging in the pantry, they had assuredly been taken thence and after put there again.

"October 21. The keeper of their ordinary and his bitch lay with them; this night they had no disturbance.

"October 22. Candles put out as before. They had the said bitch with them again, but were not by that protected; the bitch set up a very piteous cry, the clothes of their beds were all pulled off, and the bricks, without any wind, were thrown off the chimney tops into the midst.

"October 24. The candles put out as before. They thought all the wood of the king's oak was violently thrown down by their bedsides; they counted sixty-four faggots that fell with great violence, and some hit and shook the bed, but in the morning none were found there, nor the door of the room opened in which the said faggots were.

"October 25. The candles put out as before. The curtains of the bed in the drawing-room were forcibly drawn many times; the wood thrown out as before; a terrible crack like thunder was heard, and one of the servants running to see if his masters were not killed, found at his return three dozen of trenchers laid smoothly upon his bed under the quilt.

"October 26. The beds were shaken as before, the windows seemed all broken to pieces, and the glass fell in vast quantities all about the room. In the morning they found the windows all whole, but the floor strewed with broken glass, which they gathered and laid by.

This

"October 29.* At midnight, candles went out as before; something walked majestically through the room and opened and shut the window; great stones were thrown violently into the room, some whereof fell on the beds, others on the floor; and at about a quarter after one a noise was heard as of forty cannon discharged together, and again repeated at about eight minutes distance. alarmed and raised all the neighbourhood, who coming into their honours' room gathered up the great stones, fourscore in number, many of them like common pebbles and boulters, and laid them by where they are to be seen to this day at a corner of the adjoining field. This noise, like the discharge of cannon, was heard throughout the country for sixteen miles round. During these noises, which were heard in both rooms together, both the commissioners and their servants gave one another over for lost and cried out for help, and Giles Sharp snatching up a sword had well nigh killed one of their honours, taking him for the spirit, as he came in his shirt into the room. While they were together the noise was continued, and part of the tiling of the house and all the windows of an upper room were taken away with it.

* Slc in orig. Why the other two days are passed over so silently I know not.Ωνωφίλτατος.

"October 30. At midnight, something walked into the chamber treading like a bear it walked many times about, then threw the warming-pan violently on the floor, and so bruised it that it was spoiled. Vast quantities of glass were now thrown about the room, and vast numbers of great stones and horses' bones thrown in; these were all found in the morning, and the floor, beds, and walls, were all much damaged by the violence they were thrown in.

"November 1. Candles were placed in all parts of the room, and a great fire made; at midnight, the candles all yet burning, a noise like the burst of a cannon was heard in the room, and the burning billets were tossed all over the room and about the beds, that had not their honours called in Giles and his fellows, the house had been assuredly burnt; an hour after the candles went out as usual, the crack of many cannon was heard, and many pails full of green stinking water were thrown on their honours in bed; great stones were also thrown in as before, the bed curtains and bedsteads torn and broken the windows were now all really broken, and the whole neighbourhood alarmed with the noises; nay, the very rabbit-stealers that were abroad that night in the warren, were so frightened at the dismal thundering, that they fled for fear, and left their ferrets behind them.

"One of their honours this night spoke, and in the name of God asked what it was and why it disturbed them so. No answer was given to this, but the noise ceased for a while, when the spirit came again, and as they all agreed brought with it seven devils worse than itself. One of the servants now lighted a large candle, and set it in the doorway between the two chambers, to see what passed, and as he watched it he plainly saw a hoof striking the candle and candlestick into the middle of the room, and afterwards making three scrapes over the snuff of the candle to scrape it out. Upon this, the same person was so bold as to draw a sword; but he had scarce got it out when he perceived another invisible hand had hold of it too, and pulled with him for it, and at length prevailing, struck him so violently on the head with the pummel, that he fell down for dead with the blow. At this instant was heard another burst like the discharge of a broadside of a ship of war, and at about a minute or two's distance each, no less than nineteen more

such; these shook the house so violently that they expected every moment it would fall upon their heads. The neighbours on this were all alarmed, and running to the house, they all joined in prayers and psalm-singing, during which the noise still continued in the other rooms, and the discharge of cannon without though no one was there."

Dr. Plot concludes his relation of this memorable event with observing, that though tricks have been often played in affairs of this kind, many of these things are not reconcileable to juggling; such as-1. The loud noises beyond the power of man to make without such instruments as were not there. 2. The tearing and breaking the beds. 3. The throwing about the fire. 4. The hoof treading out the candle; and, 5. The striving for the sword, and the blow the man received from the pummel of it.

To see, however, how great men are sometimes deceived, we may recur to this one tract, where among other things there is one entitled “The secret history of the good devil of Woodstock," in which we find it under the author's own hand, that he, Joseph Collins, commonly called funny Joe, was himself this very devil; that he hired himself as a servant to the commissioners under the feigned name of Giles Sharp, and by the help of two friends, an unknown trap-door in the ceiling of the bedchamber, and a pound of commou gunpowder, played all these amazing tricks by himself, and his fellow servants, whom he had introduced on purpose to assist him, had lifted up their own beds.

The candles were contrived by a common trick of gunpowder put in them, to put themselves out by a certain time."

The dog who began the farce was, as he swore, no dog, but truly a bitch who had the day before whelped in that room and made all this disturbance in seeking for her puppies; and which when she had served his purpose, he let out and then looked for. The story of the hoof and sword himself alone was witness to, and was never suspected as to the truth of them though mere fictions. By the trapdoor his friends let down stones, faggots, glass, water, &c.which they either left there or drew up again as best suited with him; and by this way let themselves in and out without opening the doors and going through the key-holes; and all the noises he declares he made by placing quantities of white gunpowder over pieces of

burning charcoal on plates of tin, which as they melted went off with that violent explosion.

One thing there was beyond all these he tells us, which was also what drove them from the house in reality, though they never owned it. This was they had formed a reserve of part of the premises to themselves, and hid their mutual agree ment, which they had drawn up in writing, under the earth in a pot in a corner of the room in which they usually dined, in which an orange tree grew: when in the midst of their dinner one day this earth of itself took fire and burned violently with a blue flame, filling the room with a strong sulphurous stench; and this he also professes was his own doing, by a secret mixture he had placed there the day before.

I am very happy in having an opportunity of setting history right about these remarkable events; and would not have the reader disbelieve my author's account of them, from his naming either white gunpowder going off when melted, or his making the earth about the pot take fire of its own accord; since, however improbable these accounts may appear to some

readers, and whatever secrets they might be in Joe's time, they are well known now in chemistry. As to the last, there needs only to mix an equal quantity of iron filings, finely powered, and powder of pure brimstone, and make them into a paste with fair water. This paste, when it has lain together about twenty-six hours, will of itself take fire, and burn all the sulphur away, with a blue flame and great stink. For the others, what he calls white gunpowder, is plainly the thundering powder called pulvis fulminans by our chemists. It is made only of three parts of saltpetre, two parts of pearl-ashes, or salt of tartar, and one part of flower of brimstone, mixed together and beat to a fine powder; a small quantity of this held on the point of a knife over a candle will not go off till it melts, and then give a report like a pistol; and this he might easily dispose of in larger quantities, so as to make it go off of itself, while he was with his masters.

From this diversion at Woodstock, wherein if we have exceeded be it remembered that Aubrey car ied us thither, we return to the diversions of the month.