dug up, and they soon came across a red coffin containing the body of a woman, together with a black coffin in which was the corpse of a man who had been decapitated. Both bodies were as perfectly preserved as though they had been buried that very day. The coffins and bodies were burned to ashes, whereupon the hauntings ceased.
This story might be paralleled from ghost tales the whole wide world over, but the following seems more particularly to belong to the Vampire legends. In the year 1751, a courier called Chang Kuei was sent express from Peking with a most urgent government dispatch. Late one night after he had passed through Liang Hsiang a fierce storm arose, and the gusts of wind completely extinguished his lantern. Fortunately he perceived at some little distance a humble khan whither he made his way as it was absolutely impossible to proceed in the darkness. The door was opened by a young girl who ushered him in and led his horse to a little stable. That night she admitted him to her bed promising to set him well on his way at dawn, but he did not wake in fact until many hours after, when he was not only benumbed with cold but to his surprise found himself lying stretched upon a tomb in a dense thicket, while his horse was tied to a neighbouring tree. His dispatch was not delivered until twelve hours after the time when it was due, and accordingly, being questioned and asked what accident had delayed him, he related the whole circumstance. The magistrate ordered that inquiries should be made locally, and they discovered that a girl, named Chang, a common strumpet, had hanged herself in the wood some years before, and that several persons had been led aside to enjoy her favours, and so been detained in the same way as the imperial courier. It was presently ordered that her tomb should be opened, and when this had been done the body was found therein perfectly preserved, plump and of a rosy complexion, as though she were but in a soft slumber. It was burned under the direction of the authorities, and from that time the spot ceased to be so terribly haunted.
These particulars are in some respects not altogether unlike a legend which is related of a certain S. Hilary,[31] who was one of the earliest missionaries in the Alpine districts of North Italy. The story goes that after they had journeyed for many days into the heart of a most desolate country
