The Phantom World Part 38

Notice well that the dead man did not return on the night of the day that his son communicated his dream to his friends, because, according to all appearances, these sat up with him, and prevented him from yielding to his fear.

I now come to those corpses full of fluid blood, and whose beard, hair and nails had grown again. One may dispute three parts of these prodigies, and be very complaisant if we admit the truth of a few of them. All philosophers know well enough how much the people, and even certain historians, enlarge upon things which appear but a little extraordinary. Nevertheless, it is not impossible to explain their cause physically.

Experience teaches us that there are certain kinds of earth which will preserve dead bodies perfectly fresh. The reasons of this have been often explained, without my giving myself the trouble to make a particular recital of them. There is at Thoulouse a vault in a church belonging to some monks, where the bodies remain so entirely perfect that there are some which have been there nearly two centuries, and appear still living.

They have been ranged in an upright posture against the wall, and are clothed in the dress they usually wore. What is very remarkable is, that the bodies which are placed on the other side of this same vault become in two or three days the food of worms.

As to the growth of the nails, the hair and the beard, it is often perceived in many corpses. While there yet remains a great deal of moisture in the body, it is not surprising that during some time we see some augmentation in those parts which do not demand a vital spirit.

The fluid blood flowing through the ca.n.a.ls of the body seems to form a greater difficulty; but physical reasons may be given for this. It might very well happen that the heat of the sun warming the nitrous and sulphureous particles which are found in those earths that are proper for preserving the body, those particles having incorporated themselves in the newly interred corpses, ferment, decoagulate, and melt the curdled blood, render it liquid, and give it the power of flowing by degrees through all the channels.

This opinion appears so much the more probable from its being confirmed by an experiment. If you boil in a gla.s.s or earthen vessel one part of chyle, or milk, mixed with two parts of cream of tartar, the liquor will turn from white to red, because the tartaric salt will have rarified and entirely dissolved the most oily part of the milk, and converted it into a kind of blood. That which is formed in the vessels of the body is a little redder, but it is not thicker; it is, then, not impossible that the heat may cause a fermentation which produces nearly the same effects as this experiment. And this will be found easier, if we consider that the juices of the flesh and bones resemble chyle very much, and that the fat and marrow are the most oily parts of the chyle. Now all these particles in fermenting must, by the rule of the experiment, be changed into a kind of blood. Thus, besides that which has been discoagulated and melted, the pretended vampires shed also that blood which must be formed from the melting of the fat and marrow.

CHAPTER XIII.

NARRATION EXTRACTED FROM THE "MERCURE GALENT" OF 1693 AND 1694, CONCERNING GHOSTS.

The public memorials of the years 1693 and 1694 speak of _oupires_, vampires or ghosts, which are seen in Poland, and above all in Russia.

They make their appearance from noon to midnight, and come and suck the blood of living men or animals in such abundance that sometimes it flows from them at the nose, and princ.i.p.ally at the ears, and sometimes the corpse swims in its own blood oozed out in its coffin.[472] It is said that the vampire has a sort of hunger, which makes him eat the linen which envelops him. This reviving being, or _oupire_, comes out of his grave, or a demon in his likeness, goes by night to embrace and hug violently his near relations or his friends, and sucks their blood so much as to weaken and attenuate them, and at last cause their death.

This persecution does not stop at one single person; it extends to the last person of the family, if the course be not interrupted by cutting off the head or opening the heart of the ghost, whose corpse is found in his coffin, yielding, flexible, swollen, and rubicund, although he may have been dead some time. There proceeds from his body a great quant.i.ty of blood, which some mix up with flour to make bread of; and that bread eaten in ordinary protects them from being tormented by the spirit, which returns no more.

Footnotes:

[472] V. Moreri on the word _stryges_.

CHAPTER XIV.

CONJECTURES OF THE "GLANEUR DE HOLLANDE," DUTCH GLEANER, IN 1733.--NO.

IX.

The Dutch Gleaner, who is by no means credulous, supposes the truth of these facts as certain, having no good reason for disputing them, and reasons upon them in a way which shows he thinks lightly of the matter; he a.s.serts that the people, amongst whom vampires are seen, are very ignorant and very credulous, so that the apparitions we are speaking of are only the effects of a prejudiced fancy. The whole is occasioned and augmented by the bad nourishment of these people, who, the greater part of their time, eat only bread made of oats, roots, and the bark of trees--aliments which can only engender gross blood, which is consequently much disposed to corruption, and produces dark and bad ideas in the imagination.

He compares this disease to the bite of a mad dog, which communicates its venom to the person who is bitten; thus, those who are infected by vampirism communicate this dangerous poison to those with whom they a.s.sociate. Thence the wakefulness, dreams, and pretended apparitions of vampires.

He conjectures that this poison is nothing else than a worm, which feeds upon the purest substance of man, constantly gnaws his heart, makes the body die away, and does not forsake it even in the depth of the grave. It is certain that the bodies of those who have been poisoned, or who die of contagion, do not become stiff after their death, because the blood does not congeal in the veins; on the contrary, it rarifies and bubbles much the same as in vampires, whose beard, hair, and nails grow, whose skin is rosy, who appear to have grown fat, on account of the blood which swells and abounds in them everywhere.

As to the cry uttered by the vampires when the stake is driven through their heart, nothing is more natural; the air which is there confined, and thus expelled with violence, necessarily produces that noise in pa.s.sing through the throat. Dead bodies often do as much without being touched. He concludes that it is only an imagination that is deranged by melancholy or superst.i.tion, which can fancy that the malady we have just spoken of can be produced by vampire corpses, which come and suck away, even to the last drop, all the blood in the body.

A little before, he says that in 1732 they discovered again some vampires in Hungary, Moravia, and Turkish Servia; that this phenomenon is too well averred for it to be doubted; that several German physicians have composed pretty thick volumes in Latin and German on this matter; that the Germanic Academies and Universities still resound with the names of Arnald Paul, of Stanoska, daughter of Sovitzo, and of the Heyducq Millo, all famous vampires of the quarter of Medreiga, in Hungary.

Here is a letter which has been written to one of my friends, to be communicated to me; it is on the subject of the ghosts of Hungary;[473] the writer thinks very differently from the Gleaner on the subject of vampires.

"In reply to the questions of the Abbe dom Calmet concerning vampires, the undersigned has the honor to a.s.sure him that nothing is more true or more certain than what he will doubtless have read about it in the deeds or attestations which have been made public, and printed in all the Gazettes in Europe. But amongst all these public attestations which have appeared, the Abbe must fix his attention as a true and notorious fact on that of the deputation from Belgrade, ordered by his late Majesty Charles VI., of glorious memory, and executed by his Serene Highness the late Duke Charles Alexander of Wirtemberg, then Viceroy or Governor of the kingdom of Servia; but I cannot at present cite the year or the day, for want of papers which I have not now by me.

"That prince sent off a deputation from Belgrade, half consisting of military officers and half of civil, with the auditor-general of the kingdom, to go to a village where a famous vampire, several years deceased, was making great havoc amongst his kin; for note well, that it is only in their family and amongst their own relations that these blood-suckers delight in destroying our species. This deputation was composed of men and persons well known for their morality and even their information, of irreproachable character; and there were even some learned men amongst the two orders: they were put to the oath, and accompanied by a lieutenant of the grenadiers of the regiment of Prince Alexander of Wirtemberg, and by twenty-four grenadiers of the said regiment.

"All that were most respectable, and the duke himself, who was then at Belgrade, joined this deputation in order to be ocular spectators of the veracious proof about to be made.

"When they arrived at the place, they found that in the s.p.a.ce of a fortnight the vampire, uncle of five persons, nephews and nieces, had already dispatched three of them and one of his own brothers. He had begun with his fifth victim, the beautiful young daughter of his niece, and had already sucked her twice, when a stop was put to this sad tragedy by the following operations.

"They repaired with the deputed commissaries to a village not far from Belgrade, and that publicly, at night-fall, and went to the vampire's grave. The gentleman could not tell me the time when those who had died had been sucked, nor the particulars of the subject. The persons whose blood had been sucked found themselves in a pitiable state of languor, weakness, and la.s.situde, so violent is the torment. He had been interred three years, and they saw on this grave a light resembling that of a lamp, but not so bright.

"They opened the grave, and found there a man as whole and apparently as sound as any of us who were present; his hair, and the hairs on his body, the nails, teeth, and eyes as firmly fast as they now are in ourselves who exist, and his heart palpitating.

"Next they proceeded to draw him out of his grave, the body in truth not being flexible, but wanting neither flesh nor bone; then they pierced his heart with a sort of round, pointed, iron lance; there came out a whitish and fluid matter mixed with blood, but the blood prevailing more than the matter, and all without any bad smell. After that they cut off his head with a hatchet, like what is used in England at executions; there came out also a matter and blood like what I have just described, but more abundantly in proportion to what had flowed from the heart.

"And after all this they threw him back again into his grave, with quicklime to consume him promptly; and thenceforth his niece, who had been twice sucked, grew better. At the place where these persons are sucked a very blue spot is formed; the part whence the blood is drawn is not determinate, sometimes it is in one place and sometimes in another. It is a notorious fact, attested by the most authentic doc.u.ments, and pa.s.sed or executed in sight of more than 1,300 persons, all worthy of belief.

"But I reserve, to satisfy more fully the curiosity of the learned Abbe dom Calmet, the pleasure of detailing to him more at length what I have seen with my own eyes on this subject, and will give it to the Chevalier de St. Urbain to send to him; too glad in that, as in everything else, to find an occasion of proving to him that no one is with such perfect veneration and respect as his very humble, and very obedient servant, L. de Beloz, ci-devant Captain in the regiment of his Serene Highness the late Prince Alexander of Wirtemberg, and his Aid-de-Camp, and at this time first Captain of grenadiers in the regiment of Monsieur the Baron Trenck."

Footnotes:

[473] There is reason to believe that this is only a repet.i.tion of what has already been said in Chapter X.

CHAPTER XV.

ANOTHER LETTER ON GHOSTS.

In order to omit nothing which can throw light on this matter, I shall insert here the letter of a very honest man, who is well informed respecting ghosts. This letter was written to a relation.

"You wish, my dear cousin, to be exactly informed of what takes place in Hungary concerning ghosts who cause the death of many people in that country. I can write to you learnedly upon it, for I have been several years in those quarters, and I am naturally curious. I have heard in my lifetime an infinite number of stories, true, or pretended to be such, concerning spirits and sorceries, but out of a thousand I have hardly believed a single one. We cannot be too circ.u.mspect on this point without running the risk of being duped. Nevertheless, there are certain facts so well attested that one cannot help believing them. As to the ghosts of Hungary, the thing takes place in this manner: A person finds himself attacked with languor, loses his appet.i.te, grows visibly thinner, and, at the end of eight or ten days, sometimes a fortnight, dies, without fever, or any other symptom than thinness and drying up of the blood.

"They say in that country that it is a ghost which attaches itself to such a person and sucks his blood. Of those who are attacked by this malady the greater part think they see a white spectre which follows them everywhere as the shadow follows the body. When we were quartered among the Wallachians, in the ban of Temeswar, two hors.e.m.e.n of the company in which I was cornet, died of this malady, and several others, who also were attacked by it, would have died in the same manner, if a corporal of our company had not put a stop to the disorder by employing the remedy used by the people of the country in such case. It is very remarkable, and although infallible, I never read it in any ritual. This is it:--

"They choose a boy young enough to be certain that he is innocent of any impurity; they place him on an unmutilated horse, which has never stumbled, and is absolutely black. They make him ride about the cemetery and pa.s.s over all the graves; that over which the animal refuses to pa.s.s, in spite of repeated blows from a switch that is delivered to his rider, is reputed to be filled by a vampire. They open this grave, and find therein a corpse as fat and handsome as if he were a man happily and quietly sleeping. They cut the throat of this corpse with the stroke of a spade, and there flows forth the finest vermilion blood in a great quant.i.ty. One might swear that it was a healthy living man whose throat they were cutting. That done, they fill up the grave, and we may reckon that the malady will cease, and that all those who had been attacked by it will recover their strength by degrees, like people recovering from a long illness, and who have been greatly extenuated. That happened precisely to our hors.e.m.e.n who had been seized with it. I was then commandant of the company, my captain and my lieutenant being absent. I was piqued at that corporal's having made the experiment without me, and I had all the trouble in the world to resist the inclination I felt to give him a severe caning--a merchandize which is very cheap in the emperor's troops. I would have given the world to be present at this operation; but I was obliged to make myself contented as it was."

A relation of this same officer has written me word, the 17th of October, 1746, that his brother, who has served during twenty years in Hungary, and has very curiously examined into everything which is said there concerning ghosts, acknowledges that the people of that country are more credulous and superst.i.tious than other nations, and they attribute the maladies which happen to them to spells. That as soon as they suspect a dead person of having sent them this illness, they inform the magistrate of it, who, on the deposition of some witnesses, causes the dead body to be exhumed. They cut off the head with a spade, and if a drop of blood comes from it, they conclude that it is the blood which he has sucked from the sick person. But the person who writes appears to me very far from believing what is thought of these things in that country.

At Warsaw, a priest having ordered a saddler to make him a bridle for his horse, died before the bridle was made, and as he was one of those whom they call vampires in Poland, he came out of his grave dressed as the ecclesiastics usually are when inhumed, took his horse from the stable, mounted it, and went in the sight of all Warsaw to the saddler's shop, where at first he found only the saddler's wife, who was frightened, and called her husband; he came, and the priest having asked for his bridle, he replied, "But you are dead, Mr. Cure." To which he answered, "I am going to show you I am not," and at the same time struck him so hard that the poor saddler died a few days after, and the priest returned to his grave.

The steward of Count Simon Labienski, starost of Posnania, being dead, the Countess Dowager de Labienski wished, from grat.i.tude for his services, to have him inhumed in the vault of the lords of that family. This was done; and some time after, the s.e.xton, who had the care of the vault, perceived that there was some derangement in the place, and gave notice of it to the ________, who desired, according to the received custom in Poland, that the steward's head might be cut off, which was done in the presence of several persons, and amongst others of the Sieur Jouvinski, a Polish officer, and governor of the young Count Simon Labienski, who saw that when the s.e.xton took this corpse out of his tomb to cut off his head, he ground his teeth, and the blood came from him as fluidly as that of a person who died a violent death, which caused the hair of all those who were present to stand on end; and they dipped a white pocket-handkerchief in the blood of this corpse, and made all the family drink some of the blood, that they might not be tormented.