(I don't know how the following history is true, but I found it interesting.)
I was sitting one afternoon in my
office at the police-station, rather at a loose end (quite an unusual thing!)
when a man asked to see me. He turned out to be a Singhalese clerk, a
Christian, employed on the railway, and he spoke English very well. He
apologized for interrupting me, saying that his story was rather a long one.
When I told him to go ahead, he
began by informing me that when he left Ceylon after his father’s death, his
brother (who was still in that island) had threatened to be revenged upon him;
for they had quarreled over the inheritance. The man seemed a decent sort of
chap, and extremely disturbed in his mind.
I asked him what his trouble was,
and he went on to tell me that a few days previously, as he sat reading in the
evening beside his little shrine, a great stone had fallen from the ceiling — “where there are no stones,” he added
with a look of terror — and had narrowly escaped hitting him. Since then things
had begun to get lively in his bungalow.
Knives had flown at him, and one
night, to his extreme terror, the kettle had floated in from the kitchen, where
it had been singing on the stove, and had emptied boiling water at his feet. On
another occasion he had been severely beaten with sticks wielded by invisible
hands.
-
“Look here, my dear fellow!” I exclaimed, with an incredulous smile,
“Have you been drinking?”
-
“No, indeed, sir,” he assured me earnestly, and his manner carried
conviction.
I asked him who lived with him in
his bungalow, and he told me he was unmarried and employed only one
man-servant, who slept on the premises. I asked him if he had any witnesses to the alleged occurrences, and he
gave me quite a long list of credible folk.
When I further asked if there was
any evidence of the beating, he showed me several bruises on his body,
obviously caused by the blows of a stick.
-
“Very well,” I said, “as you
are plainly in earnest, I’ll call out my men and pay you a visit at once.”
I proceeded to give my orders,
and in a short time, accompanied by another European officer, whom I will call
Brown, and a posse of a dozen men, I went along with the terrified clerk.
We were led to an attap* bungalow standing in its own
compound, on the border of the residential part of the city. There was nothing
about the building to distinguish it from any other native habitation of the
same class.
I caused my men to make a
thorough search through the compound in order to see that no human being (or
even a monkey!) could possibly be concealed there.
After we had assured ourselves
that the coast was clear, I stationed my men around the bungalow, with strict
injunctions to allow nobody to enter or to leave the building or the compound
itself.
Then, taking with me Brown, the
clerk, and the servant, I went into the house.
We now made a most thorough
investigation of the premises, assuring ourselves, by entering and searching
each room — there were only two bedrooms and a living-room divided by a
passage, the kitchen being separate — by prodding the roof and bedding, and
looking into every nook, corner and cupboard on the premises, that no possible
agent for the alleged happenings could be anywhere concealed.
As we had previously locked both
the front and the back doors and shuttered and barred the windows, we felt that
we had done all that was humanly possible to eliminate chances of trickery.
I now ordered the clerk and the
servant to come into the living-room, where I asked them to strip, Brown and I
minutely examining each article of their clothing, their persons, their ears,
mouths and nostrils, and even making them take down their hair.
Nothing!
After they had dressed again,
Brown and I, keeping them in sight all the time, had one more good look round
the hall passage and the room itself, taking careful note of all the objects
lying about.
I then asked Brown whether he
would be willing to abide by the decision of a toss as to who should remain
alone with the natives. Brown lost the toss, and having made certain that he
was not feeling nervous at my withdrawal, I left him in the living-room with
the two men, carefully closed the doors and windows of the room and of the
front exit, and rejoined my men outside.
They reported that nothing had
been seen or heard.
I now made another patrol of the
compound, but had hardly concluded it when the front door burst open, and Brown
rushed out, obviously perturbed.
-
“Sir,” said he, “I wish you’d
come indoors. Queer things are happening.
While we were sitting quietly in there a knife lying on a table some
seven feet away from any of us suddenly rose, flew through the air in a curve,
and fell at the feet of the native servant!”
He pointed to the man who, with
his master, had also rushed out of the house.
-
“Nonsense, man,” I rejoined. “What
have they been treating you to in there?”
But Brown stuck to his story. Indeed,
he seemed almost as much agitated as the natives. I must admit that, as I
re-entered the bungalow, I was myself feeling a good deal impressed.
The four of us went back into the
living-room, where we all sat down, the natives crouching on the floor in a
corner, and Brown and I sitting on a box by the door
Feeling somewhat strung up and
excited, I began to chaff Brown, but soon, finding him unresponsive, I too,
sank into silence. So for a quarter of an hour we sat, waiting — and nothing
happened!
At last the master of the house
spoke:
-
“Sir,” said he, “the spirit
does not come. Perhaps if you were to curse__”
He made a gesture with his hand,
smiling deprecatingly.
Somewhat against my instinct, I
began to roll a few strong words upon my tongue, but hardly had I opened my
lips when, following a kind of dark streak in the air, a glass stopper fell on
to the box beside me! It was a very
ordinary glass stopper, and came from a vinegar bottle. But — I had seen just
such a stopper on the table in the passage a short time before!
I leapt to my feet, threw open
the door, and dashed into the passage.
The stopper had gone from the table.
I came back into the room mopping
my brow, and sat down again upon the box beside Brown. Nobody uttered a word,
and we all sat looking at each other.
Then a really nerve-racking thing
occurred.
Through the door which I had left
open behind me floated in a walking-stick, which glided across the room and
came to rest lightly across my knees!
Whether any further phenomena
would have happened I do not know. This
was too much for us. With smothered exclamations both Brown and I sprang to our
feet, while the two natives remained, as if frozen, in their comer.
I confess to being quite
convinced of the reality of the occurrences, although I am not prepared to give
an opinion as to the cause. Telling the clerk I would see what measures could
be taken to protect him, I returned to the police-station as fast as possible.
One of my native sergeants, a
Muslim, volunteered to see what he could do to exorcise the "evil
thing."
He went, therefore, to the
bungalow, where, having read several passages from the Koran, he copied them
out and fixed them up on the front and back doors.
That night, the clerk
subsequently informed me, he was left undisturbed, but the hauntings began
again the next day, and when I came home on leave shortly afterwards the
unfortunate tenant had been obliged to leave his bungalow, which now remains
empty.
I may add that I observed round
the house a seemingly endless piece of cotton, which I understand it is the
practice of some Southern Indian and Singhalese magicians to put round a house
upon which they intend to work their spells.
(* Note: an attap is a native thatch, generally made from the mipah palm)
(The Occult Review, April 1929, vol.
49, no. 3, p.246-249)
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