Perhaps, he may have a headach; but that is the outside
of the effect produced. Alston, a man of genius, and the best painter yet
produced by America, when he was in England told me an anecdote which
confirms what I have been saying. It was, I think, in the university of
Cambridge, near Boston, that a certain youth took it into his wise head to
endeavour to convert a Tom-Painish companion of his by appearing as a ghost
before him. He accordingly dressed himself up in the usual way, having
previously extracted the ball from the pistol which always lay near the
head of his friend's bed. Upon first awaking, and seeing the apparition,
the youth who was to be frightened, A., very coolly looked his companion
the ghost in the face, and said, "I know you. This is a good joke; but you
see I am not frightened. Now you may vanish!" The ghost stood still.
"Come," said A., "that is enough. I shall get angry. Away!" Still the ghost
moved not. "By ----," ejaculated A., "if you do not in three minutes go
away, I'll shoot you." He waited the time, deliberately levelled the
pistol, fired, and, with a scream at the immobility of the figure, became
convulsed, and afterwards died. The very instant he believed it _to be_ a
ghost, his human nature fell before it.
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