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"I wish that you had done so!" said Sylvester.

"Then do you not think that it was really a ghost?"

"Why, the thing is so extraordinary, that I scarcely know what to think! But had you opened the door at the time, you would have seen at once whether it was a ghost or not."

"I'll do so if it should come again. I've made up my mind to that."

"That's the only way to satisfy yourself on the point. Take hold of it, if you can! You need not have recourse to any violence! Touch it; and if it be tangible, you may then, of course, be quite sure of its being no ghost."

"But if I were to find that it was not a ghost—if I were to catch any fellow playing such a trick as that—I'd make him remember it the longest day he had to live."

"And so would I!" cried Mrs. Legge. "I'd scratch his very eyes out !"

"I'd murder him right off!" exclaimed Pokey.

"And serve him right, too," said Quocks. "Hanging's too good for him."

"If," observed Sylvester, calmly, "a man in a state of consciousness, and with the view of creating alarm, were to be guilty of so disgraceful and dangerous an act, he would deserve to be punished with the utmost severity; but, if even the figure which you saw last night be a man, it does not of necessity follow that he deserves the rough treatment you contemplate. There are men who are in the habit of walking in their sleep, and who perform acts of the most extraordinary character while in a state of somnambulism; and it certainly would not be just to treat a man of that description with as much severity as you would treat a heartless, impious scoundrel, whose sole object is to inspire the most ap- palling species of apprehension!"

"Very true: very good!" said Legge. "That's right: quite right."

"If I were to see this figure," resumed Sylvester—"I'm not in the habit of boasting, nor do I pretend to any extraordinary valour—but if I were to see it, I should go right up to it at once. I should soon, of course, be able to discover what it was; and if I found it to be a man, and not the shade of a man, merely; my very first object would be to ascertain if he were asleep. If I found that he was, I should take the utmost care of him; but if on the contrary I found that he was not, I'd secure the villain instantly, and bring him to justice."

"That's a very proper view to take of the matter," observed Legge.

"Aye; but that's no man," cried Pokey. "There an't a mite of flesh and blood about it."

"I can scarcely believe that it is a man myself," said Legge. "No man could have gone through the panel of a door as that did—eh, Quocks?"

"No," replied Quocks, "not a bit of it. I don't mean to say that no man could go through; but I do mean to say that if he did, he'd make a hole in it, which wouldn't be closed up by magic, as that was."

"Well," said Sylvester, rising, "it is altogether a most extraordinary occurrence; still, were I to see the figure, I certainly should ascertain,