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303
The Book of Dreams and Ghosts
·
Andrew Lang
8
While
this
book
passed
through
the
press,
a
long
correspondence
called
"On
the
Trail
of
a
Ghost"
appeared
in
The
Times.
It
illustrated
the
copious
fallacies
which
haunt
the
human
intellect.
Thus
it
was
maintained
by
some
persons,
and
denied
by
others,
that
sounds
of
unknown
origin
were
occasionally
heard
in
a
certain
house.
These,
it
was
suggested,
might
(if
really
heard)
be
caused
by
slight
seismic
disturbances.
Now
many
people
argue,
"Blunderstone
House
is
not
haunted,
for
I
passed
a
night
there,
and
nothing
unusual
occurred".
Apply
this
to
a
house
where
noises
are
actually
caused
by
young
earthquakes.
Would
anybody
say:
"There
are
no
seismic
disturbances
near
Blunderstone
House,
for
I
passed
a
night
there,
and
none
occurred"?
Why
should
a
noisy
ghost
(if
there
is
such
a
thing)
or
a
hallucinatory
sound
(if
there
is
such
a
thing),
be
expected
to
be
more
punctual
and
pertinacious
than
a
seismic
disturbance?
Again,
the
gentleman
who
opened
the
correspondence
with
a
long
statement
on
the
negative
side,
cried
out,
like
others,
for
scientific
publicity,
for
names
of
people
and
places.
But
neither
he
nor
his
allies
gave
their
own
names.
He
did
not
precisely
establish
his
claim
to
confidence
by
publishing
his
version
of
private
conversations.
Yet
he
expected
science
and
the
public
to
believe
his
anonymous
account
of
a
conversation,
with
an
unnamed
person,
at
which
he
did
not
and
could
not
pretend
to
have
been
present.
He
had
a
theory
of
sounds
heard
by
himself
which
could
have
been
proved,
or
disproved,
in
five
minutes,
by
a
simple
experiment.
But
that
experiment
he
does
not
say
that
he
made.
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