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JOCK BROWN’S GHOST

Join me, Kelley Amstutz, as I re-tell the story: JOCK BROWN’S GHOST, which was published on the 12th of May 1882 by A Scottish Lawyer.

This story has NOT seen the light of day since the 1880’s and when I uncovered it, I could NOT help but share it with you. There is something in this story for everyone… and it’s perfect for SPOOKY SEASON, which is upon us!

YOU DON’T WANT TO MISS THIS EPISODE!

Transcription:

IN RE SPRING. 

___________________________________

[Written in a Lawyer’s Office.]

Whereas, on sundry boughs and sprays 

Now divers birds are heard to sing;

And sundry flowers their heads upraise - 

Hail to the coming on of Spring!

The song of the said birds arouse

The memory of our youthful hours,

As young and green as the said boughs,

As fresh and fair as the said flowers.

The birds aforesaid, happy pairs!

Love midst the aforesaid boughs enshrines

In household nests, themselves, their heirs-

Administrators and assigns. 

O, busiest term of Cupid’s court!

When tender plaintiff's actions bring;

Season of frolic and of sport,

Hail’ as aforesaid, coming spring. 

________________________________

JOCK BROWN’S GHOST.

By. A Scottish Lawyer 

From: The Sidney Journal  | 12 May 1882, (Fri) | Page 2

________________

Some five or six miles from the circuit town in the North in which my son practices there is a village which I may name Heather Howe. As a matter of fact the commonty close to the village- a long piece of rocky ground covered with fine grass and furze - is so named by the inhabitants; and as it was on this lone common, and near the old quarry hole, that Jock Brown’s ghost appeared, the name is not so very far-fetched.

Possibly the appearing and disappearing of the ghost - for it did both - would never have led to a law case had it not been for its somewhat libelous statements. Even a ghost can not be allowed to infringe the law with impunity. It is disagreeable enough for a hardworking, soncy, and thriving widow like Mysie Brown to have a peevish and ill-conditioned husband come back again in ghost form at all; but when the ghost adds to his offense by uttering statements not strictly true, and calculated to damage materially those not yet ghosts, it is high time to take action. 

Mysie Brown, when suddenly left a widow, had not sat down to wring her hands and shake her head. She had two bairns to think of, and being a strong-armed, energetic young woman, she resolved to work for them single-handed as their father had formerly done. The village was badly supplied with milk at a dear rate by a neighboring farmer; Mysie took in the position at a glance, and bought a cow, went round the village canvassing for customers, and in a week had more buyers than she could supply. In a short time she had three cows, and with these and some other trifles made a very comfortable livelihood. Mysie was in a year or two spoken of as a prosperous woman, with a few pounds laid past, a smug house, and a good stocking.  Moreover, Mysie was a jolly, open-faced woman, with a free, daffing way that pleased everyone; and, being neither old nor ugly, naturally attracted many suitors. Among those of her acquaintances whom gossips set down as suitors, none was spoken of so hopefully and decidedly as Peter Shand, the smith’s hammerman. Peter mended her fences, delved her yaird for her, planted her kail of potatoes, and killed her pigs. Peter in fact, when twitted on the point, only smiled in a pleased and self-satisfied manner, and never once denied the soft impeachment, thus letting the teasers know beyond a doubt that the marriage was a settled thing. Mysie, it is true, when any hint to that effect reached her ear, denied the truth of the rumor most firmly, but when was a woman’s “No” taken under such circumstances for anything but “Yes?” 

All at once there came a change - decisive and inexplicable. Peter went no more to the widow’s, but sat moping and silent at home, or in the public house, while Mysie either did her own mending and delving, or paid some one to do it for her. What could be the cause of the sudden change?  There was to be no marriage, either - Peter had plainly said so, with a solemn look which implied that it was a duty he owed to society nto to implement his engagement; and yet, at the same time he stoutly insisted that there was no quarrel between him and the soncy widow.  Was there ever a village gossip who would be satisfied with an evasion like that? Every one was quite sure something more was under his words, and at length, under their subtle plying Peter was got, to admit-after sundry hints at something mysterious and awful had failed to satisfy them - that a “veesitation has come atween them.”  The liveliest interest was roused by teh intimation, as it was well known that Jock Brown’s death had never been rightly explained. It was only known that Jock Brown had left his home one morning early, and had never been seen or heard of since. His wife had apparently been slow to believe him dead, even though he left a letter stating that she should never see him more, and only assumed widow’s mournings after he had been gone for three months. 

The “veesitation” darkly alluded to by Peter Shand roused some old whisperings; Peter was plied more strenuously then ever for information, and at last he admitted, in the greatest confidence, that he had seen a ghost - no other than the ghost of the deceased Jock Brown, who had solemnly warned him against having anything more to do with his widow. This confidential revelation was but the first letting out of water; and gradually the circumstances of the spectral warning oozed out, and assumed something like the following shape: 

It had been Saturday night, and the hour was late, for Jock had been spending the evening with Mysie, and the time slipped by unheeded.

“I kissed her at the door,” Peter was won’t to declare with great pathos at this part of his description, “and I telly her it wadna be lang afore I wadna need to leave her ava. Little did I think it was to be my last kiss.” 

Peter had supped - that is, he had eaten some bread and cheese and taken one glass of whisky with the widow - but he was perfectly sober, and, more -over, perfectly free from fear or any thoughts of ghosts when he reached the commonty before mentioned. 

The night was cold, however, and Peter decided that a smoke for the remaining half mile would be a comfort and a luxury, so he paused to get out his pipe, only to discover that he had not a match in his possession. Just as he made the discovery a little, peevish-faced man passed him softly without looking up.  There was no lights near the spot, but both moon and stars were out, and everything was as “clear as day.”  The hammerman resolved to ask a light, and for that purpose moved after the little man, saying, “It’s a fine nicht - hae ye got a match on ye?”

To his surprise the figure neither halted nor responded. It moved straight on, slowly and steadily, and not in the direction Peter Shand meant to take. 

“The man maun be deaf,” was his reflection; “I’ll need to get a wee closer, for I canna dae without a licht.” 

He followed and made up on the slowly moving figure, and repeated his greeting. This time the man appeared to hear, for he turned round toward the speaker, and revealed to his startled gaze the well-remembered features of Jock Brown!  So unexpected was the encounter that the hammerman forgot all about his smoke and slowly stuttered out - 

“Guid gracious, Jock Brown, I thought ye was deid!?

The ghostly visitant stared at him in evident anger, as much as to say, “Well, and am I no deid?” but gave no audible response. 

One of those awkward pauses which sometimes occur even where there are no ghosts ensured. Peter would fain have filled it up by repeating his request for a light to his pipe, but a wholesome dread of the possible source of such a light checked the desire. Then he remembered Jock Brown’s weakness for snuff, and he politely inquired - 

“Hoo are ye aff for snuff owre by- ye ken what I mean - in your new quarters?” 

“Plenty brumstane to smell: nae need for snuff,” was the somewhat snappish reply.  “I’ve just come owre to warn ye no to marry Mysie.” the ghost abruptly added, as if wishing to change the subject. 

“And what for no?” cried Shand, in some dismay. “A ghaist has nae need for a wife, surely. Because ye’re dune wi’ her yersel’, ye need set ither folk against her.” 

“Pate Shand,” said the ghost, solemnly, “mairry her not or ye’ll rue it a’ the days of your life, and maybe a while after.” 

“Will ye be gude enough to explain yersel’?” said Shand, by no means satisfied with the dogmatic command. 

“You’re warniced - that’s a’,”  replied the ghost of Jock Brown, and without another word he moved on across the commonty in the direction of the quarry hole, which was a very good place for skating on in winter, so long as there was no weakness in the ice, but so dangerous at other times that it had been fenced round to keep out cattle and bairns. 

“I’ll see where the peevish sowl gangs,” was Shand’s resolve, and he followed the ghost till the quarry hole was reached.

He was but a short distance behind when the fence was reached by the ghost, and he naturally expected to see it either diverge or climb over the paling. But Jock Brown’s ghost did neither.  It walked right through the fence - or rather, as it seemed, the fence walked right through its vitals - and then calmly and sedately moved away down into the black pool of water filling the quarry.  Such is the force of habit and the association of ideas, however, that scarcely had the ghost thus vanished than Shand started forward in lively horror, crying - 

“Save us a’ ! the man’s drooned!” 

He ran up to the paling, leant over it, and looked down on the black surface of the water, but it showed not even a ripple on the spot into which Jock Brown’s ghost had so comfortably settled itself, and then the conviction slowly settled on his mind that he had been favored with a supernatural “veesitation.” During the meeting and interview he had felt not a vestige of fear, but now that it was over and the ghost evidently housed for the night, he shook in every limb and was altogether so overpowered that even after he got home, as his mother could testify, he was pale and trembling, and not at all like himself. 

According to his own account, Peter Shand was silenced but not convinced by the apparition; that is, he ceased visiting Mysie, but he was not quite certain that in doing so he was acting wisely.  But the obligating ghost soon settled matters by again waylaying him near the commonty, warning him solemnly against Mysie, concluding by saying she was a base and black-hearted woman(clearly a libel), and then popping into the quarry hole pool as before. 

It is possible that a third appearance would have been put in by the ghost, but at this juncture some kind friend revealed to the unsuspecting widow the cause of the strange looks and hints which were greeting her on every side, and even affecting the sale of her dairy produce.  The libels of Jock Brown’s ghost, as uttered to Peter Shand in the vicinity of the quarry hole, first horrified and then enraged her. 

“The low, mean vagabond!  The scoundrel!  To daur to attack me that way,” she hotly exclaimed, in allusion not to the ghost by the ghost-seer - honest Peter Shand - “and a’ because I telly him I wadna hae him or ony ither as lang’s I could work for my bairns mysel’. Find I kent it was na me but my coos and my bit hoose and furniture he was after, and I telly him sae and turned him to the door, the sneakin’ cooard. Ela, if my ain Jock Brown had only been spared he wadna have daured to utter a wheesht against me, but a’body turns against a woman the moment she loses her man.” 

Apparently Mysie had not thought her case without a remedy, for the same night, while Peter Shand was quietly finishing his supper in his mother’s house, Mysie stalked in at the door, scarcely waiting for the invitation to “come in” which followed her knock. Peter dropped the spoon he was using and changed color the moment her eye met his own. 

“Ye’ve been seeing Jock Brown’s ghost?” she inquired remarked, at the same time producing a thick walking-stick, and approaching the cowering man. 

“Yes,” he stammered.

“And he telly you I was a base, black-hearted woman?”  she added with the same deadly emphasis. 

There was no answer either in assent or dissent, and the thick stick descended and did its work most effectually, for Peter Shand was next morning too stiff and sore to go to work. He excused himself for a day by saying he had caught cold, but apparently he as not so ill but he could go out alone on the following night and see the ghost for the third time. 

This time, Shand declared, he found the ghost seated on a fence near the quarry, and at once began to abuse it for the scrape into which it had brought him by making such unsupported accusations. The ghost, professing regret, and being told of the beating which Shand had endured at the hands of Mysie, shuddered visibility and breathed a fervent thanksgiving that it was safe from all such troubles, and reminding the hammerman of its own warning, that if he married Maysie he would regret the step all his life. 

“That’s a specimen of what you would have got as her husband,” said the ghost with some show of logic, “but it is nothing to what I suffered at her hands. To be sure, death to me was a joyful release, but still that didna justify her in cruelly taking my life.” 

“Your life?” cried the horrified hammerman, with an inward thanksgiving for the escape he had made. “Do ye mean to tell me you were – were murdered?”

“Murdered in cauld blude,” solemnly returned the ghost. “Ye might a’ guessed that by seeing me gaun aboot this way instead o’ sleepin’ soondly in my grave, or daun’ering aboot in my new quarters. Naebody that has dee’d a natural death ever comes back as a ghaist, Peter - they’re owre glad to bide awa’, especially them that has been afflickit a’ their life like me by a wife wi’ a tongue that the devil himsel’ couldna match.”

“Weel, of course, ye sud ken.” observed the subdued and over-awed hammerman, in polite deference to his old friend. “But hoo was the awfu’ deed dune? Hoo did she manage to murder ye and syne get rid o’ the body withoot sae muckle as leavin’ a drap o’blude to tell the tale?”

“Didna I tell ye I was murdered in cauld blude?” said the ghost with some of tis earthly peevishness. “Every word a ghaist says has its meaning. There wasna a drap o’ my blude shed, so I’m no very sure if the auld Scriptural command wad apply to Mysie. She didna shed my blude, she only caulded it.” 

“What - what does that mean?” stammered Shand, with his hair creeping on his scalp. 

“We had a bit quarrel in the mornin’ as usual,” answered the ghost, “and in the middle o’t I banged a bit cake across the table at Mysie’s face. It was daichy and heavy, and gied her a gey rap on the face. Mysie up wi’ a joog o’ bilin’ water and let bank at my heid.” 

“That wasna makin’ ye cauld; it was makin’ ye het,” mildly corrected Shand. 

“Dinna interrupt me wi’ impident remarks,” peevishly returned the ghost, “or I’ll awa’ back to my cauld bed withoot tellin’ ye another thing. The joog dung me donnert, and Mysie thought I was killed, so she got a rape and a big stane and carried me to the quarry hole and drappit me in. Murdered in cauld blude, ye see,” and as the ghost laid a dead and ice-cold paw upon Shand’s warm hand to emphasize his words the hammerman nimbly leaped back a couple of yards in terror. 

“Ye’ve been deid an awfu’ time withoot sayin’ a word aboot it,” remarked the hammerman, at last. “Could ye no hae gien a bit hint o’ it to the police or the Fiscal?” 

“Only five years” said the ghost, with the air of one who considered that they were only equal to five minutes. 

“And hoo is the jaud to be brought to justice?” said Shand, with some concern. 

“She’ll never be brought to justice,” said the ghost, with the air of a ghost who knew. “Ye canna meddle wi’ her, for afore she can be ta’en up ye maun find my deid body.” 

“Weel, could that no be done? Could we no rake the quarry an’ fish ye up?” suggested the sympathizing Shand. 

“Fish me? -ay, that’s the word,” sadly rejoined the ghost. “There wasna a scrap o’ my flesh left a week after I was tummelt in- the perch made short wark o’ me, I can tell ye. Na, na, there’s nae gude raking for me. If I had been in a clear, running stream, where there was nsething but dainty, clean-feeding trooties, it might have been vera different. Dinna speak aboot fish’ me up - it’s a word that giars me grue.”

“Then what am I to do?” helplessly inquired Shand.

“Ye’re to bide as ye are, a single man,” said the ghost. “Ony fule micht ken that.” 

“Ay, that’s a’ richt - but aboot the murder, I mean?”  said Shand, anxiously.

“Do? Ye msum just do naething,” promptly answered the ghost. “What could ye dae? There’s nae proof that I was murdered, unless the besom should ever think of confessin’ it; and if ye were to tell only body ye believed sie a thing she micht hae the audacity to prosecute ye for libel. Na, ria; tak’ my advice and dae naething. When a sensible chiel like you hauds off and doesna marry her, folk’ll sune guess that there’s something wrang, and the truth may come oot some day.” 

With something like these words the ghost gravely left his perch on the paling and retired, as before, to the bottom of the pool, and Peter Shand left the spot greatly agitated; and so faithfully did he adhere to the advice of the ghost that he said nothing of the last meeting and the strange revelations until some others spoke of seeing the ghost at the same lonely spot. Whether these others really saw any apparition near the quarry hole, or only imagined they did from the stories already floating about, can not be known, but it is certain that they truthfully and conscientiously believed that they had, and that the specter thus encountered was the very image of the deceased Jock Brown. Some saw him flitting across the common in front of them, making no noise with the feet, and appearing to glide rather than walk; while others saw him either sitting pensively perched on the railway which surrounded the quarry hole, or quietly slipping down into his resting place in the black depths of the pool. It would be quite useless to attempt to convey any idea of the excitement which these reports, rumors, and specter-seeings caused in the district. Everybody believed in the ghost but the person chiefly concerned, Mysie Brown. She found herself all but ruined by the ghost, and protested, and stormed, and shed tears, all in vain, in opposition to the popular idea. The ghost carried all before it, and the very minister of the parish, who before had been skeptical regarding apparitions, preached a sermon on spirits, which showed how much  he had learned since Jock Brown’s ghost had visited the parish. Nor did the one ghost long have the run of the district to itself. Other ghosts, envious no doubt of this one’s immense popularity, trooped into the place, and titled at doors and hoisted beds and their occupants up in the middle of the night, and rapped on tables and walls, and rang bells with broken wires, and bewitched cows as cleverly as they could have done in the sensible, good old days when Mother Shipton and the witches had everything in their own hands, and the blazing faggot rewarded their genius. 

What as the accused widow to do under the circumstances? She could not starve, and to remain inactive would be to imply conscious guilt. She brought her case to my son, and asked him to get up a prosecution for libel. But against whom was the charge to be preferred?  Shand had uttered no libel; it was the ghost who had declared Mysie a murderer, and the ghost, unfortunately, was beyond the jurisdiction of any court of law. This was the decision of my son and myself, but Mysie was not to be repressed. 

She went to the authorities and demanded to be put upon her trial. This request could not be acceded to, from the simple fact that the principal witness- the ghost, had no known address, and therefore could not be cited; and also because the body of the missing Jock Brown had never been found. Still undaunted, Mysie employed men to search the pool, and then, most singular to relate, there was found and brought up a human skull, some human bones, and a muddy fragment of rope attached to a heavy stone!  The skull was submitted to the medical man of the district, and he at once pronounced it not only the skull of a man, but of one about age and make of the missing Jock Brown. 

This discovery created an extraordinary sensation, not only in the district, but over a wide tract of the country as well, when the circumstances got into the newspapers, and the case promised to be one of the most celebrated in history. Something like a body being now found, Mysie was arrested and formally accused of the murder; and though she protested more strenuously than ever her innocence, every one now disbelieved her, and hourly expected her to make a clean breast of it by confessing the whole particulars of the crime. 

The case had thus been blown up steadily till it had assumed enormous and balloon-like proportions. It now seemed as if the mere prick of a pin was to make the whole collapse.

Mysie was examined twice before the Sheriff, I and my son attending to watch her case, but on the second occasion the pin which was to prick the balloon appeared in the person of a somewhat diminutive man, who stalked into the room and quietly said: 

“Div ye no ken me?”

Mysie screamed out and was at his side in a moment, clasping the peevish-faced man to her breast, and crying, hysterically: 

“It’s Jock! It’s my Jock - my bonnie Jock - come hame safe and sound, after a’!”

The apparition being questioned, declared on his oath that he had never been dead, nor thrown into a quarry hole, nor eaten with perch, nor forced to haunt the district as a specter; but had been all the five years quietly working at his trade as a tailor in a distant city. He had, he admitted, quarreled with his wife before leaving, and had really left her a letter saying she should never see him more, but he did so without any thought of suicide or death of any kind in his head. 

“What was your quarrel about, pray,” inquired the Sheriff, with a half-amused expression of countenance, “that you should form the desperate resolve to part from your wife and bairns for ever? Was it anything deadly?”

“Deidly enough, sir,” was the grave reply. “It was just aboot my parritch being owre saut. I had telly her till I was tired hoo I likit them  sautit, and a’ my tellin’ did nae guid. She was saut them to please hersel’, and gied me some tonguin’ forbye, so I saw fine we could never live thegither peaceably, and determined to leave her for guid. Still, I wadna like her ot be hangit for killing me while I’m leevin’, so I cam’ through to explain maitters.”

Mysie and her recovered husband returned home together, and there was immediate inquiry for Peter Shand, the more so as the village gravedigger now remembered that Peter had been employed in putting a lock on a vault in which were kept a number of skulls and human bones, turned up in the course of some alterations on the graveyard, and thus had probably possessed himself of the remains found in the quarry hole. Peter was found hiding in a barn loft among straw, and brought forth by the villagers, and nearly made a ghost of by being ducked in the very quarry hole into which he had so often, by the aid of a lively imagination, a liar’s tongue, and a revengeful mind, seen the ghost of Jock Brown vanish, the bodily Jock Brown taking an active part and lively interest in the punishment. After the ducking Shand disappeared from the village and the district, but Jock Brown is still here, living contentedly with his wife and family, and not quite so peevish as he was when younger. 

“Do you never quarrel over the salting of your porridge now?” I asked him the last time we met. 

“Deed, no; I let her saut them as she likes,” was his laughing reply; “and when they’re owre saut, I just tak’ the mair milk to them. Ye’ken we hae plenty o’ that noo, for we’ve hale twenty coos.”

The End…

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