The Valet's Tragedy and Other Stories [95]
search for the body in the creek.' But Mr. Suttar thinks that Farley invented the tale as an excuse for laying information. That might apply, as has been said, to Highland witnesses in 1753, but hardly to an Englishman in Australia. Besides, if Farley knew the facts, and had the ghost to cover the guilt of peaching, WHY DID HE NOT PEACH? He only pointed to a fence, and, but for the ingenious black Sherlock Holmes, the body would never have been found. What Farley did was not what a man would do who, knowing the facts of the crime, and lured by a reward of 20 pounds, wished to play the informer under cover of a ghost-story.
The case for the ghost, then, stands thus, in my opinion. Despite the silence preserved at the trial, Farley's ghost-story was really told before the discovery of Fisher's body, and led to the finding of the body. Despite Mr. Suttar's theory (of information laid under shelter of a ghost-story), Farley really had experienced an hallucination. Mr. Rusden, who knew his doctor, speaks of his fright, and, according to the version of 1836, he was terrified into an illness. Now, the hallucination indicated the exact spot where Fisher was stricken down, and left traces of his blood, which no evidence shows to have been previously noticed. Was it, then, a fortuitous coincidence that Farley should be casually hallucinated exactly at the one spot--the rail in the fence--where Fisher had been knocked on the head? That is the question, and the state of the odds may be reckoned by the mathematician.
As to the Australian servant-girl's dream about the place where another murdered body lay, and the dreams which led to the discovery of the Red Barn and Assynt murders, and (May 1903) to the finding of the corpse of a drowned girl at Shanklin, all these may be mere guesses by the sleeping self, which is very clever at discovering lost objects.
X. THE MYSTERY OF LORD BATEMAN
Ever and again, in the literary and antiquarian papers, there flickers up debate as to the Mystery of Lord Bateman. This problem in no way concerns the existing baronial house of Bateman, which, in Burke, records no predecessor before a knight and lord mayor of 1717. Our Bateman comes of lordlier and more ancient lineage. The question really concerns 'The Loving Ballad of Lord Bateman. Illustrated by George Cruikshank, London: Charles Tilt, Fleet Street. And Mustapha Syried, Constantinople. MDCCCXXXIX.'
The tiny little volume in green cloth, with a design of Lord Bateman's marriage ceremony, stamped in gold, opens with a 'Warning to the Public, concerning the Loving Ballad of Lord Bateman.' The Warning is signed George Cruikshank, who, however, adds in a postscript: 'The above is not my writing.' The ballad follows, and then comes a set of notes, mainly critical. The author of the Warning remarks: 'In some collection of old English Ballads there is an ancient ditty, which, I am told, bears some remote and distant resemblance to the following Epic Poem.'
Again, the text of the ballad, here styled 'The Famous History of Lord Bateman,' with illustrations by Thackeray, 'plain' (the original designs were coloured), occurs in the Thirteenth Volume of the Biographical Edition of Thackeray's works. (pp. lvi-lxi).
The problems debated are: 'Who wrote the Loving Ballad of Lord Bateman, and who wrote the Notes?' The disputants have not shown much acquaintance with ballad lore in general.
First let us consider Mr. Thackeray's text of the ballad. It is closely affiliated to the text of 'The Loving Ballad of Lord Bateman,' whereof the earliest edition with Cruikshank's illustrations was published in 1839.* The edition here used is that of David Bryce and Son, Glasgow (no date).
*There are undated cheap broadside copies, not illustrated, in the British Museum.
Mr. Blanchard Jerrold, in his 'Life of Cruikshank,' tells us that the artist sang this 'old English ballad' at a dinner where Dickens and Thackeray were present. Mr. Thackeray remarked: 'I should like to print that ballad with illustrations,' but
The case for the ghost, then, stands thus, in my opinion. Despite the silence preserved at the trial, Farley's ghost-story was really told before the discovery of Fisher's body, and led to the finding of the body. Despite Mr. Suttar's theory (of information laid under shelter of a ghost-story), Farley really had experienced an hallucination. Mr. Rusden, who knew his doctor, speaks of his fright, and, according to the version of 1836, he was terrified into an illness. Now, the hallucination indicated the exact spot where Fisher was stricken down, and left traces of his blood, which no evidence shows to have been previously noticed. Was it, then, a fortuitous coincidence that Farley should be casually hallucinated exactly at the one spot--the rail in the fence--where Fisher had been knocked on the head? That is the question, and the state of the odds may be reckoned by the mathematician.
As to the Australian servant-girl's dream about the place where another murdered body lay, and the dreams which led to the discovery of the Red Barn and Assynt murders, and (May 1903) to the finding of the corpse of a drowned girl at Shanklin, all these may be mere guesses by the sleeping self, which is very clever at discovering lost objects.
X. THE MYSTERY OF LORD BATEMAN
Ever and again, in the literary and antiquarian papers, there flickers up debate as to the Mystery of Lord Bateman. This problem in no way concerns the existing baronial house of Bateman, which, in Burke, records no predecessor before a knight and lord mayor of 1717. Our Bateman comes of lordlier and more ancient lineage. The question really concerns 'The Loving Ballad of Lord Bateman. Illustrated by George Cruikshank, London: Charles Tilt, Fleet Street. And Mustapha Syried, Constantinople. MDCCCXXXIX.'
The tiny little volume in green cloth, with a design of Lord Bateman's marriage ceremony, stamped in gold, opens with a 'Warning to the Public, concerning the Loving Ballad of Lord Bateman.' The Warning is signed George Cruikshank, who, however, adds in a postscript: 'The above is not my writing.' The ballad follows, and then comes a set of notes, mainly critical. The author of the Warning remarks: 'In some collection of old English Ballads there is an ancient ditty, which, I am told, bears some remote and distant resemblance to the following Epic Poem.'
Again, the text of the ballad, here styled 'The Famous History of Lord Bateman,' with illustrations by Thackeray, 'plain' (the original designs were coloured), occurs in the Thirteenth Volume of the Biographical Edition of Thackeray's works. (pp. lvi-lxi).
The problems debated are: 'Who wrote the Loving Ballad of Lord Bateman, and who wrote the Notes?' The disputants have not shown much acquaintance with ballad lore in general.
First let us consider Mr. Thackeray's text of the ballad. It is closely affiliated to the text of 'The Loving Ballad of Lord Bateman,' whereof the earliest edition with Cruikshank's illustrations was published in 1839.* The edition here used is that of David Bryce and Son, Glasgow (no date).
*There are undated cheap broadside copies, not illustrated, in the British Museum.
Mr. Blanchard Jerrold, in his 'Life of Cruikshank,' tells us that the artist sang this 'old English ballad' at a dinner where Dickens and Thackeray were present. Mr. Thackeray remarked: 'I should like to print that ballad with illustrations,' but