being gone to bed, except the maid with the child, the maid being in the kitchen, and having raked up the fire, took a candle in one hand and the child in the other arm, and turning about faw one in a black gown walk ing through the room, and thence out of the door into the orchard. Upon this the maid hafting up stairs, having recovered but two fteps, cried out; on which the mafter and mistress ran down, found the candle in her hand, the grafping the child about its neck with the other arm: She told them the reafon of her crying out; fhe would not that night tarry in the house, but removed to another belonging to one Henry Salter farmer; where the cried out all night from the terror she was in, and she could not be perfuaded to go any more to the house upon any terms.

On the morrow (i. e. Tuesday) the tenant's wife came to me, lodging then at Havant, to defire iny advice, and have confult with fome friends about it. I told her I thought it was a flam, and that they had a mind to abuse Mr. Brereton the rector, whofe house it was. She defired me to come up; I told her I would come up and fit up or lie there, as the pleased; for then as to all stories of ghofts and apparitions I was an infidel. I went thither, and fat up the Tuesday night with the tenant and his man-fervant: About twelve or one o'clock I fearched all the rooms in the house to fee if any body were hid there to impofe upon me: At laft we came into a lumber-room, there I fmilingly told the tenant that was with me, that I would call for the apparition if there was any, and oblige him to come. The tenant then feemed to be afraid, but I told him I would defend him from harm! and then I repeated Barbara, celarent Darii, &c. jestingly on this the tenant's countenance changed, fo that he was ready to drop down with fear. Then I told him I perceived he was afraid, and I would prevent it coming, and repeated Baralipton, &c.; then he recovered his fpirits pretty well, and we left the room and went down to the kitchen, where we were before, and fat up there the remaining part of the night, and had no manner of disturbance.

Thursday night the tenant and I lay together in one room and the man in another room, and he saw fomething walk along in a black gown, and place itself againft a window, and there ftood for fome time, and then walked off. Friday morning the man relating this, I asked him why he did not call me? and I told him that I thought that it was a trick or flam. He told me the reafon why he did not call me was, that he was not able to fpeak or move. Friday night we lay as before, and Saturday night, and had no difturbance either of the nights.

Sunday I lay by myself in one room (not that where the man faw the apparition)

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and the tenant and his man in one bed in another room; and betwixt twelve and two the man heard fomething walk in their room at the bed's foot, and whistling very well; at laft it came to the bed's fide, drew the curtain and looked on them: after fome time it moved off; then the man called me, defired me to come, for that there was fomething in the room went about whiftling. I afked him whether he had any light, or could ftrike one, he told me no; then I leapt out of bed, and not ftaying to put on my clothes, went out of my room, and along a gallery to the door, which I found locked or bolted; I defired him to unlock the door, for that I could not get in: then he got out of bed and opened the door, which was near, and went immediately to bed again. went in three or four fteps; and, it being a moonfhine night, I faw the apparition move from the bed fide, and clap up against the wall that divided their room and mine: I went and flood directly against it within my arin's length of it, and asked it in the name of God, what it was that made it come difturbing of us? I ftood for fome time expect ing an anfwer; and receiving none, and thinking it might be fome fellow hid in the room to fright me, I put out my arm to feel it, and my band feemingly went through the body of it, and felt no manner of fubftance till it came to the wall; then I drew back my band, and fill it was in the fame place: Till now I had not the leaft fear, and even now had very little; then I adjured it to tell me what it was. When I had faid thofe words, it, keeping its back against the wall, moving gently along towards the door: Í followed it, and it, going out at the door, turned its back toward me: It went a little along the gallery; I followed it a little into the gallery, and it disappeared, where there was no corner for it to turn, and before it came to the end of the gallery where was the ftairs. Then I found myself very cold from my feet as high as my middle, tho' I was not in great fear. I went into the bed betwixt the tenant and his man, and they complained of my being exceeding cold. The tenant's man leaned over his mafter in the bed, and faw me ftretch out my hand towards the apparition, and heard me speak the words; the tenant alfo heard the words. The apparition feemed to have a morning gown of a darkish colour, no hat nor cap, fhort black hair, a thin meagre visage of a pale fwarthy colour, seemed to be about forty or fifty years old; the eyes half fhut, the arms hanging down; the hands visible beneath the fleeve; of a middle ftature. I related this defcription to Mr. John Lardner, rector of Havant, and to Major Battin of Langftone in Havant parish; they both faid the defcription agreed very well to Mr. P.

a former

The Monday after laft Michaelmas-day, a man of Chodfon in Warwickshire having been at Havant fair, paffed by the forefaid parfonage-house about nine or ten at night, and faw a light in most of the rooms of the houfe. His pathway being clofe by the houfe, he, wondering at the light, looked into the kitchen window, and faw only a light; but turning himfelf to go away, he faw the appearance of a man in a long gown. He made hafte away; the apparition followed him over a piece of glebe land of several acres to a lane, which he croffed, and over a little meadow, then over another lane to fome, which belong to farmer Henry Salter, my landlord, near a barn, in which were fome of the farmer's men and fome others. This man went into the barn, told them how he was frighted and followed from the parfonage-house by an apparition, which they might fee ftanding against the pales, if they went out. They went out, and faw it fcratch against the pales, and make a hideous noife; it flood there fome time and then difappeared; their defcription agreed with what I faw. This laft account I had from the man himself whom it followed, and also from the farmer's men.

THO. WILKINS, Curate of W. Dec. 11, 1695. Oxon.' I fhall make no remark upon this genuine account, except as to the paffage which I have put in italics: If Mr. Wilkins was thoroughly poffeffed of himself at that moment, as he depofes, and is ftrictly correct in this fact, the narrative is eftablished. Pietro Quirini's Voyage to the North, in the

THE

Year 1431.

HE following voyage of Quirini being little known to the English reader, and abounding in curious events, is tranflated from a work lately published in German by J. R. Forster, intitled, The Hiftory of Voyages and Difcoveries in the North.-The defcription of the ftate of Norway and of its commerce, together with the picture of the manners and cuftoms of its inhabitants, in the beginning of the 15th century, are fine fragments of the hiftory of mankind, and we hope will be acceptable to our read

ers.

Pietro Quirini, a Venetian nobleman, was a merchant and mafter of a fhip of Candia, which at that time was in the poffeffion of the Venetians. With a view to acquire fame as well as profit, in the year 1431 he undertook a voyage from Candia to Flanders; and, towards the end of autumn, ffered fhipwreck on the coaft of Norway,

not far from Roft island. Here he wintered; and the following fummer travelled through Drontheim to Wadstena in Sweden, and ar rived again in 1432 at Venice. He has himfelf given an account of the voyage; and two of his fellow-travellers, Chriftopho Fioravante and Nicolo de Michil, did the fame. Both thefe works are to be found in Ramufio's Collection, published at Venice, in two volumes, A. D. 1583, p. 200.-211. They have likewife been published in the German language, by way of extract from Ramusio, by Hieronymus Megiferus, in a work called Septrentrio Novantiquus, printed in 8vo at Leipfic, 1613.

"Quirini informs us, that on the 25th of April 1431 he fet fail from Candia on a weftward courfe; but meeting with contrary winds, he was obliged to keep near the coaft of Africa. On the fecond of June he pail ed the Straits of Gibraltar, and through the ignorance of his pilot ran upon the fhoals of St. Petro; in confequence of which the rudder was thrown off the hinges, and the fea entered the thip at three places. In fact, it was with great difficulty that they could fave the vessel from going to the bottom, and run into Cadiz, where they unloaded her; and in twenty-five days having put her into per fect repair, took her lading in again. In the mean time, having heard that the republic of Venice was at war with that of Genoa, he augmented the number of his crew, fo that in the whole it amounted to fixty-eight men. On the 14th of July he fet fail again, and bore up for the Cape of St. Vincent; but, by reafon of a contrary wind, which blew from off the land in a north-eaft direction, and on that coaft is called Agione, they were obliged to traverfe for the space of for ty-five days at a great diftance from the land, and indeed near the Canary Islands, in tracks which were very dangerous, and with which they were entirely unacquainted. But at length, juft as their flock of provifions be gan to fail, they had a fair wind from the fouth-weft, and directed their course to the northward: fome of the iron work, however, gave way on which the rudder was hung. In the mean time they mended them as well as they could, and on the 25th of Auguft arrived fafe at Lisbon.

Here having carefully repaired the ironwork of their rudder, and taken in a fresh ftock of provifions, they fet fail again on the 14th of September. They were now a fe cond time toffed to and fro by contrary winds till the 26th of October, when they reached the port of Mures; whence Quirini, with thirteen of the crew, went to San Jago de Compoftella, in order to perform their de votions. They returned with all poffible fpeed; and fetting fail with a fair fouth-west wind, kept, in hopes that the wind would

continue,

1786.

continue, at the diftance of two hundred miles from the land and Cape Finifterre, till the 5th of November, when the wind fhifting to the eaft and fouth-eaft, prevented them from entering the British Channel, and carried them beyond the Sorlingian (or Scilly) Iflands. The wind now increafed in violence; and on the 10th of November carried the rudder a fecond time from off its hinges. They flung it indeed by ropes to the quarters of the ship, but it foon got loofe again, and was dragged after the fhip for the fpace of three days, when they ufed their utmost efforts and made it faft again. But their vessel now drove continually farther from the land; and as the crew confumed the victuals and drink without bounds or limitation, at length two or three of them were fet to guard the provifions, who twice a-day distributed to each man his fhare, Quirini himself not excepted. In this condition, by the advice of the carpenter, they conftructed, out of the main-maft and the spare yards, two rudders with triangular boarded ends, in order to prevent the veffel from going unfteady. Thefe new rudders were properly faftened, and proved very ferviceable, a circumftance which spirited them all with fresh hopes; but with the violence of the winds, likewife this their laft refuge was torn away from the fhip. On the 26th of November, the ftorm increased to such a degree, that they had no doubt but that day would be their last. The storm, indeed, by degrees, became fomewhat lefs violent; but they were driven out to fea weft north west, and the fails, which had been perpetually fatigued by the rain and wind, were now torn to fhivers; and though they clapt on new ones, yet thefe did not laft long. Now the fhip drove without either fails or rudder, and was filled with water by the waves which continually beat over it; infomuch, that the crew, debilitated by labour and anxiety, were scarce able to keep the water under. Having heaved the lead, and found ground at eighty fathoms, they fpliced all the four cables together, and rode at anchor for the fpace of forty hours. One of the crew, terrified at the dreadful working of the ship, in confequence of the tempeft and the fwell of the fea, cut the cable at the forecastle of the fhip, which now drove about as before. On the 4th of December four large waves breaking over the ill-fated veffel, filled it fo full that it was almoft ready to fink. The crew, however, fummoning up all their refolution and spirits, baled the water out, though it reached up to their waifls, and in the end quite emptied the veffel of it. On the feventh, the tempeft increafed to fuch a degree, that the fea flowed into the veffel on the windward fide, and their deftruction feemed to them inevitable. But now they

479

were of opinion, that if the main-maft were cut away it would lighten the fhip. They therefore fet about this bufinefs immediately, and a large wave fortunately carried away the maft, together with the yard, which made the fhip work lefs. The wind, too, and the waves, became fomewhat more calm, and they again baled out the water. But now the maft was gone, the veffel would no longer keep upright, and lying quite on one fide, the water ran into it in torrents; when, being exhaufted with labour and want of food, and finding that they had not strength left fufficient for clearing the veffel of the water, they resolved at length to fave themfelves in the boats, of which the larger held forty-feven, and the fmaller twenty-one, men. Quirini, who had the choice which boat he would go in, at laft went with his fervants into the great boat, into which he faw the officers enter. They took with them a flock of provifions; and as foon as the wind and the waves were become fomewhat more calm, which was on the 17th of December, they quitted the fhip, which, among other coftly articles of commerce, was laden with eight hundred cafks of Malmfey wine, and a great quantity of fweet-fcented Cyprus wood, ginger, and pepper. On the following night, the fmall boat, with the twentyone men in her, was feparated from them by the violence of the ftorm, and they never heard of her more. Indeed they were themfelves obliged, in order to lighten their boat a little, to throw overboard their ftock of wine and provifions, together with all their clothes, excepting what they carried on their backs. The weather proving fair for a time, they fteered to the eastward, with a view to get, as they fuppofed, to Iceland; but the wind chopping about, drove them to and fro again. Their liquor beginning to fail, and befides many of them being exhaufted in confequence of the preceding scarcity of provitions, as well as of the inceffant labour, long watchings, and other hardships they had undergone, a great number of them died: The fcarcity of drink, in particular, was fo great, that each man had no more than the fourth part of a cup (and that not a large one) every twenty-four hours. With falted meat, cheese, and biscuit, they were better provided: but this falt and dry food excited in them a thirst, which they were not able to quench. In confequence of this fome of them died fuddenly, and without having previously exhibited the leaft fymptoms of any complaint; and in particular it was obferved, that thofe were firft carried off who had before this period lived in the most riotous manner, who had drank great quantities of wine, or entirely given up themselves to drunkennefs, and had hovered continually over the fire, without ftirring at all, but