A whole class of

superstitious observances arise, and are grounded upon inaccurate and imperfect

hearing. To the excited and imperfect state of the ear we owe the existence of what

Milton sublimely calls —

The airy tongues that syllable men's names, On shores, in desert sands, and

wildernesses.

These also appear such natural causes of alarm, that we do not sympathize more readily with Robinson Crusoe's apprehensions when he witnesses the print of the savage's foot in the sand, than in those which arise from his being waked from sleep by some one

calling his name in the solitary island, where there existed no man but the shipwrecked mariner himself. Amidst the train of superstitions deduced from the imperfections of the ear, we may quote that visionary summons which the natives of the Hebrides

acknowledged as one sure sign of approaching fate. The voice of some absent, or

probably some deceased, relative was, in such cases, heard as repeating the party's name.

Sometimes the aerial summoner intimated his own death, and at others it was no

uncommon circumstance that the person who fancied himself so called, died in

consequence; — for the same reason that the negro pines to death who is laid under the ban of an Obi woman, or the Cambro-Briton, whose name is put into the famous cursing

well, with the usual ceremonies, devoting him to the infernal gods, wastes away and

dies, as one doomed to do so. It may be remarked also, that Dr. Johnson retained a deep impression that, while he was opening the door of his college chambers, he heard the

voice of his mother, then at many miles' distance, call him by his name; and it appears he was rather disappointed that no event of consequence followed a summons sounding so

decidedly supernatural. It is unnecessary to dwell on this sort of auricular deception, of which most men's recollection will supply instances. The following may he stated as one serving to show by what slender accidents the human ear may be imposed upon. The

author was walking, about two years since, in a wild and solitary scene with a young

friend, who laboured under the infirmity of a severe deafness, when he heard what he

conceived to be the cry of a distant pack of hounds, sounding intermittedly. As the

season was summer, this, on a moment's reflection, satisfied the hearer that it could not be the clamour of an actual chase, and yet his ears repeatedly brought back the supposed cry. He called upon his own dogs, of which two or three were with the walking party.

They came in quietly, and obviously had no accession to the sounds which had caught

the author's attention, so that he could not help saying to his companion, “ I am doubly sorry for your infirmity at this moment, for I could otherwise have let you hear the cry of the Wild Huntsman.” As the young gentleman used a hearing tube, he turned when

spoken to, and, in doing so, the cause of the phenomenon became apparent. The

supposed distant sound was in fact a nigh one, being the singing of the Wind in the

instrument which the young gentleman was obliged to use, but which, from various

circumstances, had never occurred to his elder friend as likely to produce the sounds he had heard.

It is scarce necessary to add, that the highly imaginative superstition of the Wild

Huntsman in Germany seems to have had its origin in strong fancy, operating upon the

auricular deceptions, respecting the numerous sounds likely to occur in the dark recesses of pathless forests. The same clew may be found to the kindred Scottish belief, so finely embodied by the nameless author of ” Albania:” —

” There, since of old the haughty Thanes of Ross Were wont, with clans and ready

vassals thronged, To wake the bounding stag or guilty wolf; There oft is heard at

midnight or at noon, Beginning faint, but rising still more loud, And louder, voice of hunters, and of hounds, And horns hoarse-winded, blowing far and keen. Forthwith the

hubbub multiplies, the air Labours with louder shouts and rifer din Of close pursuit, the broken cry of deer Mangled by throttling dogs, the shouts of men, And hoofs, thick-beating on the hollow hill: Sudden the grazing heifer in the vale Starts at the tumult, and the herdsman's ears Tingle with inward dread. Aghast he eyes The upland ridge, and

every mountain round, But not one trace of living wight discerns, Nor knows, o'erawed and trembling as he stands, To what or whom he owes his idle fear — To ghost, to witch, to fairy, or to fiend, But wonders, and no end of wondering finds.”*

It must also be remembered, that to the auricular deceptions practised by the means of ventriloquism or otherwise,

may be traced many, of the most successful impostures which credulity has received as supernatural communications.

The sense of touch seems less liable to perversion than either that of sight or smell, nor are there many cases in which it can become accessary to such false intelligence as the eye and ear, collecting their objects from a greater distance and by less accurate enquiry, are but too ready to convey. Yet there is one circumstance in which the Sense of touch as well as others is very apt to betray its possessor into inaccuracy, in respect to the circumstances which it impresses on its owner. The case occurs during sleep, when the dreamer touches with his hand some other part of his own person. He is clearly, in this case, both the actor and patient, both the proprietor of the member touching, and of that which is touched; while, to increase the complication, the hand is both toucher of the limb on which it rests, and receives an impression of touch from it; and the same is the case with the limb, which at one and the same time receives an impression from the

band, and conveys to the mind a report respecting the size, substance, and the like, of the member touching. Now, as during sleep the patient is unconscious that both limbs are his own identical property, his mind is apt to be much disturbed by the complication of

sensations arising from two parts of his person being at once acted upon, and from their reciprocal action; and false impressions are thus received, which, accurately enquired into, would afford a clew to many puzzling phenomena in the theory of dreams. This

peculiarity of the organ of touch, as also that it is confined to no particular organ, but is diffused over the whole person of the man, is noticed by Lucretius: —

” Ut si forte mana, quam vis jam corporis, ipse Tute tibi partem ferias, æque experiare.”

A remarkable instance of such an illusion was told me by a late nobleman. He had fallen asleep, with some uneasy feelings arising from indigestion. They operated in their usual course of visionary terrors. At length they were all summed up in the apprehension that the phantom of a dead man held the sleeper by the wrist, and endeavoured to drag him

out of bed. He awaked in horror, and still felt the cold dead grasp of a corpse's hand on his right wrist. It was a minute before he discovered that his own left hand was in a state of numbness, and with it he had accidentally encircled his right arm.