eBooks Base 2000

{188a}
The husband of Onkhari does not say _how_ she disturbed him, but the
manners of Egyptian haunters, just what they remain at present, may be
gathered from a magical papyrus, written in Greek. Spirits "wail and
groan, or laugh dreadfully"; they cause bad dreams, terror and
madness; finally, they "practice stealthy theft," and rap and knock.
The "theft" (by making objects disappear mysteriously) is often
illustrated in the following tales, as are the groaning and knocking.
{188b} St. Augustine speaks of hauntings as familiar occurrences, and
we have a chain of similar cases from ancient Egypt to 1896. Several
houses in that year were so disturbed that the inhabitants were
obliged to leave them. The newspapers were full of correspondence on
the subject.
The usual annoyances are apparitions (rare), flying about of objects
(not very common), noises of every kind (extremely frequent), groans,
screams, footsteps and fire-raising. Imposture has either been proved
or made very probable in ten out of eleven cases of volatile objects
between 1883 and 1895. {188c} Moreover, it is certain that the noises
of haunted houses are not equally audible by all persons present, even
when the sounds are at their loudest.


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