There she died,

nine miles distant from her own.

June the 4th, this present year, 1691. The day before her departure she grew very impatiently desirous to see her two children, whom she had left at home to the care of a nurse. She prayed her husband to hire a horse, for she must go home and die with the children." As she was 66 not fit to be taken out of her bed," her request was refused. This grieved her much and "between one and two o'clock in the morning she fell into a trance. One Widow Turner, who watched with her that night, says that her eyes were open and fixed, and her jaw fallen. She put her hand upon her mouth and nostrils, but could perceive no breath. She thought her to be in a fit, and doubted whether she were dead or alive. The next morning this dying woman told her mother that she had been at home with her children. That is impossible,' said the mother; for you have been in bed all the while.' 'Yes,' replied the other, but I was with them last night when I was asleep.'

"The nurse at Rochester, Widow Alexander by name, affirms, and says she will take her oath on't, before a magistrate, and receive the sacrament upon it, that a little before two o'clock that morning she saw the likeness of the said Mary Goffe, come out of the next chamber (where the elder child lay in a bed by itself), the door being left open, and stood by her bedside for about a quarter of an hour; the younger child was then lying by her. Her eyes moved and her mouth went; but she said nothing. The nurse, moreover, says that

she was perfectly awake; it was then daylight, being one of the longest days in the year. She sate up in her bed, and looked stedfastly upon the apparition. In that time she heard the bridge-clock strike two, and a while after said, 'In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, what art thou?' Thereupon the appearance removed and went away; she slipped on her cloaths and followed, but what became on't she cannot tell. Then, and not before, she began to be grievously affrighted, and went out of doors and walked upon the wharf (the house is just on the river side) for some hours, only going in now and then to look to the children. At five-a-clock she went to a neighbour's house, and knocked at the door; but they would not rise. At six she went again; then they rose, and let her in. She related to them all that had passed; they would persuade her she was mistaken or dreamt. But she confidently affirmed, ‘If ever I saw her in all my life, I saw her this night.'"

This brings to my remembrance a singular circumstance, which was narrated to me by the late J. G. Teed, Esq., then judge of the County Court of Lincolnshire. He said that a friend of his, one of the old masters in Chancery, I believe, once fell into a trance, and was supposed to be dead. In this state he continued for several weeks; but afterwards regained his consciousness. The Judge asked him, if he remembered anything during that period; when he told him that the only thing that he could remember was that “ his soul seemed to have left his body, and was fluttering like a bird against the window to get out; but could not, because it was closed!" This reminded me of the old saying of the Lincolnshire women, who laid out the dead when I was a boy, "Mind, and open the window, to let the soul out!"

The Scriptures speak, as we have seen, in contempt of " the astrologers, the star-gazers," and "the monthly prognosticators," as unable to "save" their victims. from the judgments that the Lord will bring upon them; although they had been able, under Satanic influence, to predict some events, which had actually come to pass. And as instances of their skill in this respect, I will here recount, out of many others that might have been adduced, two only-one of which occurred in India, and the other in Great Britain.

The one which occurred in India is given by Col. Meadows Taylor in his "Story of my Life." He was at that time "an Officer of the Nizam," for the administration of the Shorapoor State, during the minority of the Rajah Enketappa Naik; his mother, the Ranee, being a woman of much energy, but dissolute to a degree. The Ranee becoming very ill, and thinking she was going to die, sent for Col. Taylor; and in his presence, told the priest of the family, one of the professors, as it were, in the Brahmin Sanscrit College, to bring a certain box, which contained the secret papers of the house, and bade him open it. The man demurred.

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These papers have never been seen by any one but my lord the Rajah, who is gone to heaven, yourself and me. No one else knows of them,' he cried; why should you show them to Taylor Sahib?'

1 Isa. xlvii. 13.

"The Ranee sat up straight in her bed, and glared at him. I had never seen such a look on any human face before.

Do as you are told,' she cried, savagely; 'what is it to you what I do?'

"The Shastree trembled all over, and without speaking, he unlocked the padlock and opened the lid. The first thing I saw was a roll tied with red silk.

"Tell him first about that,' said the Ranee, and fell back again.

"It is not fit that you should hear it,' said the Shastree, who spoke both Mahratta and Hindoostanee fluently.

The

"It is the Rajah's horoscope that I wrote. moment he was born I noted the time, and the conjunction of planets, and the result was bad.'

"Yes, it is bad!' cried the Ranee, seizing my arm, as I was sitting on the ground by her bedside—‘it is bad! All that concerns that base-born boy is bad! Yes! he is fated to die in his twenty

Is

fourth year, and I shall not see it. it not so, Shastree? Did we not spend a lakh of rupees over this, and it availed nothing?' and she stopped for want of breath, her eyes flashing with excitement. Is it not so? Tell the truth!"

"You speak truth, lady,' said the Shastree, who was sobbing. 'It is only the truth, Taylor Sahib; I have tested all the calculations and find them exactly conforming to the truth according to the planets. The Rajah is safe till then; but when

that time comes, how, I know not, but he will surely die. He will never complete his twenty-fourth year!

never! never!'

"No!' cried the Ranee, interrupting him—‘he will not live; he is the last of his race. He will lose his country, and all the lands, and all the honour that the Sumnothan has gained for 500 years.'

This took place in the year 1847.

1

When the Rajah attained his majority, Colonel Taylor's connection with Shorapoor came to an end. This was in the year 1853. Then came the Indian mutiny, which the Rajah of Shorapoor was, under evil advice, induced to join; but when the mutiny was quelled, the Rajah was captured; and taken as a prisoner to Secunderabad, to be tried for his life by a military commission. Colonel Taylor having then occasion to go again to Shorapoor, a few hours after his arrival there, "the old Brahmin priest came to him privately.

"Do you remember, Sahib,' he asked, 'what I once told you, and what the Ranee said when we were with her at her bedside?'

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'Perfectly,' I answered; 'you said the Rajah would not live to complete his twenty-fourth year, and that he would lose his country.'

"Yes, Sahib,' he went on, 'part of the prediction is already fulfilled, and the rest will surely follow-it is quite inevitable.'

1 "Story," &c., Vol. II., pp. 10-13.