Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 30.djvu/857

Rh wonderful at that sort of thing, so I thought I might as well give him a trial." This announcement being received with the burst of laughter he evidently expected, he hastily added, "Believe it or not as you like, sir, as soon as he said something the pain went clean away, and I've been easy ever since." It was worse than useless to explain the well-known effect on the nerves, of a visit to any sort of dental operator, and the agriculturist wended his way to spread abroad the fame of his healer, and no doubt to suffer renewed agonies as soon as he got home. It may be added that under no circumstances will a countryman, if he can help it, have a tooth taken out by a regular practitioner—a baker, grocer, or blacksmith, with a local reputation of being "uncommon handy," is almost always resorted to for this extreme measure. It is but another form of provincial superstition.

The familiar occurrence of a mysterious ringing of bells by some occult agency is a never-failing source of awful joy to the country town or neighborhood to which this supposed supernatural manifestation is vouchsafed. The house thus favored is the constant center of thought, conversation, and pilgrimage; groups of true believers stand outside with upturned gaze, as though expecting to see the ghost appear out of one of the chimney-pots and address the audience from the roof, while those who are sufficiently in the intimacy of the terrified though flattered household to be admitted to the haunted dwelling, would not change places with Mr. Rider Haggard's heroes. And when the inevitable dénoúment comes, when the half-silly servant-girl or wholly mischievous boy has been accidentally discovered throwing a rolled-up stocking or cap at the bell, in the general disappointment and sense of injury which ensues, faith though shaken is not destroyed. A few steadfast ones gather together, and comfort each other with such sayings as "'Twas better to make believe as 'twas all nat'ral," "Folks don't like their housen to get a bad name," or "Don't tell I as any gell could have kept they bells ringing the night through"; and the lump of incredulity thus gradually releavened, the next announcement that the spirits are at work again finds acceptance ready as ever. It must be frankly admitted that churchyards have of late years fallen from their high estate in rural estimation as the recognized ghost's playground; not that a countryman would willingly linger within these precincts after nightfall, nor would he appoint such a tryst for his lady-love, but he no longer regards the burying-place with his former feeling of reverential fear. The reason of this change is not easy to discover, as it can hardly be attributed to intellectual enlightenment. Perhaps he has good grounds for his confidence. It may be that since the passing of Mr. Osborne Morgan's bill, the manes of the older and orthodoxically interred residents sulk in their sepulchres, holding themselves aloof from possible contact with new-comers "licensed to walk" under a Nonconformist ritual, and that these latter, out of respect to class prejudice, or from a feeling of diffidence unknown in a previous