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The Seaforth News, 1960-02-25, Page 6Castle Haunted By H.aidf A Ghost In a tower xoom of dungeoned, historic 1VIeggernie Ceetie, in Glen Lyon, Perthshire, a guest was sleeping when suddenly, in the small hours, he was awaken- ed by what felt like a hot' kiss on his check, It was as it his flesh had been burned through to the cheekbone. Leaping out of bed, he saw the upper half of a woman's body drifting away from his bed- side, fading through the sealed- off door of a small secret cup- board which had been hollowed, out of the thick wall between his and the next room. Ile rushed to It, expecting to lac able to open it, but found it as firmly sealed as when he and a fellow -guest next door had exa- mined it some hours earlier. With his cheek still smarting, he lit the lamp and made for the mirror, sure that he would see evidence of a burn. But he saw nothing to account for the sensa- tion of fierce heat, He then de- scended the staircase, lamp in hand, but saw nothing Chilled and perplexed he returned to bed, but could nbt sleep. "Beau! I've had a terrible night!" he called to his friend in the next room when morning came. "So have I!" Beau answered. And the two men - E J, Sim- ons and Beaumont Fetherstone - found that they had had an al- most identical experience. When Simons began talking of it at breakfast his hostess, Mrs. Herbert Wood, silenced him with a warning glance. She was terri- fied lest the Highland servants should have heard. Already she was having diffi- culty in retaining them owing to the rumour that the place was haunted by half a ghost Only a day or two previously a kitchen- maid had rushed to hes, saying that she had seen the lower part of a mutilated female figure flit- ting through the castle corridors. This tallied with what others said they had seen from time to time, not only in the corridors but in an adjacent lime avenue and near -by graveyard. Later, Simons again saw the half -spectre go gliding through his room as he sat writing. The temperature suddenly dropped below freezing -point, as though a biting blizzard had blown in. Making for his bedroom along a ground -floor passage he saw a woman's face, sad and beautiful, peering in at a window. And about a year later Fetherstone met a lady who said she had had exactly the. same experience at Meggernie. Relating this eerie story in 01Phantom Footsteps, a second Ghost Book", Alasdair Alpin MacGregor, who has visited Meg- gernie, says that tradition as - Week's Sew -thrifty PRINTED PATTERN fy--40. 4444 Use a 100 -pound feedbag or a gay remnant to make this handy kitchen helper; It's sew -easy (see diagram) - your best friend at clean-up time. Printed Pattern 4725: Misses' Sizes Small (14, 16); Medium (18, 20). All sizes: 100 -pound feedbag or 1t yards 39 -inch. Printed directions on eaoh pat- tern part. Easier, accurate. Send FORTY CENTS(stamps cannot be accepted, use postal note for safety) for this pattern. Please print plainly S 1 Z E, NAME, ADDRESS, STYLE NUMBER. Send order to ANNE ADAMS, Box 1, 123 Eighteenth Ste Neer Toronto, Ont. TO ATTEND QUEEN - Sister Helen Rowe, above, royal mid- wife, slated to be in attendance at birth of Queen Elizabeth's third child. tribes the haunting to a Clan Menzies chief who murdered his young, beautiful wife in the tower, because he was insanely jealous of her. To dispose secretly of the body he cut it in two, then hid the parts in a cupboard and announc- ed that he and his wife would be absent abroad for some months. On his return he stated that she had been drowned acciden- tally on the Continent. Under cover of dark he' removed the lower half of the body and buried it in the. churchyard. The morning after the night that he tried to remove the up- per half .he was found dead in the tower, evidently murdered by someone aware of his awful crime. The matter was allowed to rest, But not so the woman's divided ghost, which haunted the two guests and kitchen -maid in 1862 and was seen again some thirty years ago by a Dr, MacKay, who had been summoned to Megger- nie to attend to someone taken ill. Another tower haunting oc- curred at Askham Hall, West- morland, when Lord and Lady Lowther lived .'there. She dis- closed that guests in a bedroom in the tower constantly com- plained of its evil atmosphere and asked to be moved. Indepen. dently of each other they said that at night they had seen two men in 'top hats" (probably Jacobean steeple hats) cross the floor carrying a box. Lady Lowther sought the serv- ices of a well-known woman exorcist who, after a lengthy search, finally pointed to a part of the room's oak -panelled wall, saying that behind it lay the source of the trouble. There workmen found a recess cut in the stone, and in it a mummified cat, which Lord Lowther took downstairs and placed in a cup- board in his study. This did not cure the. evil haunting, so a prominent student of the occult was consulted. He declared that it was a definite case of black magic and the mummy must be burned or buried. It was duly burned. "The body uncurled in the fire!" Lady Lowther said - and ' the manifestations evidently ceased. MacGregor's fascinating ghosts, though, do not all inhabit old castles, mansions or manors. A tenant moving into a new coun- cil house at Newry, Ireland, heard footsteps mount the stairs, saw the doorknob turn and the door stealthily opened. She then heard them ascend the next flight and sound ove head. Armed with an electric torch, the startled removal men search- ed the rooms above, but found no one. No sooner had they re- turned to their task downstairs than the whole eerie routine was repeated! They ran from the house in terror. RAINDROP CAUSED DEATH Little did Roger Baer, of Zee- land dream as he watched a high school football game that the rain was to turn his enjoyment to tragedy. A raindrop "shorted" a 1,000 - watt floodlight which exploded Such was the force of the ex- plosion that it blew a 10 -Ib, -por- celain reflector from its mount- ' ing,, and the heavy reflector fell 75 ft, on Baer's head, killing him outright. The tragedy was doub- ly sad because Baer .had recently undergone a successful brain operation. WHAT NEXT? After three days of freedom, Delbert K. Gregory, who escap- ed from Oahu Prison in Hono- lulu, Hawaii, w a s recaptured while swimming at Waikiki Beach. Later, when• questioned by po- lice officers;' he explained: "They don't need higher fences to keep us in prison. What they need is a swimming pool. Ha- waiian boys are crazy for the. water."! ROYAL FLOWER - With a dimpled smile, Crown Princess Beatrix poses for her birthday picture. The heiress to the throne of The Netherlands, daughter of Queen Juliana and _Prince Bernhard, is 22. We had been trying tor three weeks to get through by tele- phone to our farm friend's in the Shelburne area. The answer was always the same - "Sorry - that line . is 'temporarily' out of order" - which didn't make us feel any •happier. What wor- ried us most was the fact that their water supply was control- led by an'electroc'motor so, in the event of a major power fail- ure they would have no way of getting water, either at .the house or the barn. Naturally we were not surprised that we didn't get a letter knowing that the -worse the weather the lees, time 'they would have for wilting. How- ever last Friday we found a very welcome letter in the, mail. Our friends had had their troubles all right but had managed to survive - thanks to good neigh- bours who had kept them in sup- plies whenever: they were able to get through the snow -banked roads. Hydro had been on and off ever since the first ice -storm but never for any longer than five hours at a stretch, so they, were considerably luckier than a lot of farm folk. By .keeping pots, pans and tank full they had managed all right for water. Communication with the outside world had been almost nil - no telephone, and mail delivery spotty. Apparently they have very poor mail service, even • when the road has been plough- ed the mailman often makes no attempt to get through. It seems 'strange that in spite of better roads mail delivery in some placees isn't nearly as good as it used to be. I remember when we first came to Ontario one mail carrier in our district was a man with., only one leg. He could • neither read nor write but yet he was known as the best rural mail carrier for miles around. Far- mers said they could set their watches by "Old Jim". He made his rounds by horse and buggy in summer hid by horse and cutter in winter, and, no mat- ter what. the weather Old Jim al- ways got through. Although he couldn't read he knew by sight what letter belonged to each box. and of course he knew all the people on his route. - in those days all of them were farmers, many ' of. them second and third generations, Compared with winters years ago it would seem we shouldn't have much to complain about these days. And yet we have - , . why is it ?Obviously it isn't the weather that's at fault, it's our way of dealing with it. Instead of relying on our own means of navigation we depend on sand - trucks and snowploughs. For instance, we had arranged a W.A. quilting party at the parish hall for last Tuesday. Monday At snowed quite heavily Snow- ploughs were out and ploughed the steep hill up to the church. Even so I wouldn't attempt the. drive - not with a car With a horse and cutter it would not have been any problem. How- ever, one of the younger mem- bers was braver than I and offer- ed me a ride. She had to take a run at the hill several times be- fore she could make it and we got stuck in a snwobank com- ing home but we did manage to get there and back. By the way, we had better make the most of our winter because the prophecies are for another hot summer! Remember last year Well, we are just recovering from a triple celebration. Dee's birthday was yesterday; Bob's birthday exactly a month ago and our wedding anniversary six days from now so the grand- parents staged a family get- together. To eliminate: some of the confusion that seems un- avoidable with hot meals and, small children I had arranged a buffet supper and it really worked out quite well. Every- thing cold except the Christmas pudding -saved for just this oc- casion. For space reasons we had ,adults in the dining -room and JUNIOR'S IN THE SWIM - Mama hippo floats around to super- vise while her baby takes a dip at the Auckland, New Zealand zoo. The zoo has been staging, a national competition to name the little one. a table for the boy$ in the kith en, 1`Nearly-everyone was Meagre as Grandpa and Dee had taken the two biggest boys over to, the golf course for toboggan ride. Eddie gtitl has his leg in e cast p,p to the knee butit doesn't •tether himna bit. He was tratzip a„rgltnd in the snow ,just the same, 3'erry has a non-infectious gland swelling in his neck so he wasn'tquite, himself. Cedric is busy cutting .baby. teeth -- so altogether it' was quite a party. Grandpa says he feels Tike the last rose of summer this morn- ing - and a faded one at that. As a climax Ross went home with Jerry's overshoes so Jerry took over what Ross bad left behind. It wouldn't matter except that Jerry's' were mismated. In her hurry to get away Dee had pick- ed up one of Jerry's own over- shoes and the one that Eddie can't wear because of his cast. So that's what Ross has to wear until the parents get things straightened out, Are you con- fused? Well, believe me, so am I!! Canadian Tenor Now Metro Star Fox an opera singer, particu- larly a tenor, Jon Vickers had behaved in a most peculiar way: He studiouslyavoided photogra- phers and begged off all inter-, views. As he sat in his dressing room at the Metropolitan one nightrecently, still decked out ip the unkempt- beard and rags and tatters of Florestan in Bee- thoven's "Fidelio," the husky Canadian explained ' his reti- cence, "I'm a strange person. If I do my job, that's the publicity that counts." Vickers had done his job well, Eleven days after his actual de- but as Canio in "Pagliacei," he lived up to his glowing European notices by carrying off the tax- ing tenor part in the Met's new production of Beethoven's ;only opera. Now be was only too happy to talk. To the biggest question of all - when did he. think he wouldbe ready to sing'. Tristan - he was most decisive. "I am just, .ix weeks over 33," he said, ."and 3 feel that singing. these big roles, Tristan and the iegfrieds, would be asking. for trouble at my age. I am feeling , my way along, '-and I have no intention of becoming a Wag- nerian specialist. I sing dramatic tenor ':in . the Italian repertory too, for Italian 'opera. preserves the beauty of the voice more than German opera." Vickers has the big ringing voice one would expect from a muscular singer from Prince Al- bert in the forests of Saskatche- wan. If he keeps it under con- trol and doesn't drive it too hard, he may in•time become just what the Met's Wagnerian fans are How. Brigitte Stuck To The Ship None of the crew of the freighter wanted to look after "Brigitte Bardot," the ship's cat named after the famous film star; ' so the skipper ordered that the animal 'be thrown overboard, The "execution" order was car- ried out in Marseilles, just be- fore the ship, the Tadla, sailed for Casablanca. Upon arrival at the North Afri- can port, the ship's engineer was walking around the moored freighter when he spotteda black ball of fur clinging to the rudder, which was riding high out, of the water. Covered in oil and soaked in sea water, "Brigitte" was alive, and faithfully clinging to her ship. The skipper issued new orders. "The cat will be scrubbed down in the galley, given regu- lar meals and accorded treat- ment fit for a heroine." waiting for: A Tristan to Birgit Nilsson's Isoide. -From NEWS=. WEEK. Modern Etiquette 153 11t bertr Lee Q. ;isn't (1 the girl's privilege to select the table when enter - Ing a restaurant with a male escort? A. No; she should allow her Q. After finishing a glass of sherbet at the dinner table, what Should' one do with the spoon? A, Place it on the saucer which holds the glass, Q. When one is eating a steak or roast, or something shnilar, isn't it all right and more con- venient to eut the nseat up into several tnonthfuls at a time be- fore eating it? A. It may seem more conveni- ent to get your "cutting -up" all clone at the same time but st certainly is not considered in good form, One should cut oft, a single bite at a .time. BACs{WARD..AGE? Not a little concerned by the antics of a teenage 'girl who per- sisted in driving her car in re- verse, a police patrol in Idaho stopped her and asked for an explanation. It appeared that the car be- longed to her father and, un- known to him, she had run up quite a mileage. She was now, to use her own words, "unwind- ing some of the miles registered on the clock." Needle Painting ete"% \Pit; tit £a W Display your artistry with needle and thread - it's easy. Done en' true peacock colors. This panel is embroidered in outline and single stitch. Use• glowing, colors. Pattern 777: transfer of 1.5 x 19% -inch panel; directions; color chart. Send THIRTY-FIVE CENTS stamps cannot be accepted, use postal note for safety) for this pattern to Laura Wheeler, Box 1, 123 Eighteenth St., New Tor- onto, Ont. Print plainly 'PAl'•- TERN NUMBER, your NAME and ADDRESS. News! New! New! Our 1900 Laura Wheeler Needlecraft Book is ready NOW! Crammed with exciting, unusual, popular de- signs to crochet, knit, sew, em- broider, quilt, weave -fashions, home furnishings, toys, gifts, bazaar _hits. In the book FREE - 3 quilt patterns. Hurry, send 25 cents for your, copy. ISSUE 8 - 1960 ' IRON CURTAIN -• June Adler steps right through this chain wail in a new restaurant.