and Norway, overflows with legend; strange traditions and wonderful tales meet us in every little village, in every parish church, in every old house or castle; but there is, perhaps, none more remarkable than the story of the vision of Charles XI. Strange as is the story, it is not, we believe, very extensively known. A recently published volume of anecdotes recites it from an old magazine published some fifty or sixty years since; but the more authentic account occurs in Arndt's "Recollections of Sweden," and it purports to be in the very language of the king himself, and to be attested by the several officers of state and of the royal household who were with him when he saw the vision. The interest of the vision, to our own mind, was called into fresh and vivid activity when, not very long since, we stood upon the spot in the palace where the king is said to have first beheld the mysterious lights, and when we afterwards passed through the chamber where the strange transactions were seen by the king and his attendants.

Charles XI was far from being a bad king; he was strong and just, but a very severe man, and subject to moods of depression and irritation, which made him far from being a pleasant companion. In 1676 he must have been a very young man, yet he had not long since lost his wife, Ulrica Eleanora. His treatment of her had frequently been most harsh, so that it is said his behaviour, by its want of tenderness, had precipitated her death; yet, such is the inconsistency of human nature, the untender man had been most tenderly attached to her, and, after her death, became still more the subject of depression and melancholy, and he could not bear the slightest allusion to his departed queen.

At the period to which we refer the palace of Stockholm was in the course of completion; the king occupied, as his ordinary room, a little cabinet, through whose windows, however, he was able to look out upon the more stately but incompleted galleries beyond.

It was late at night, the king himself sayssupposing that account to be true which Arndt tells us is preserved in the royal archives at Stockholm-between the sixteenth and seventeenth of

December, 1676; the king was in this cabinet, a large wood fire was blazing on the hearth, and he was sitting by it in one of his desultory moods. There were with him, apparently, the chancellor and two privy councillors, whose names presently transpire; it is not wonderful that they appear to have been getting sleepy, and gave the king a good many hints that it was time for them all to retire; these appear to have been thrown away on Charles, who told them he had no wish to sleep, and that they might remain, a permission which was equivalent to a command to stay.

But now it happened that the king arose, probably threw aside the curtains to look out upon the night, any aspect of which, however, could be but dimly seen from this point, which was a kind of embrasure in the palace. What the king did see, however, startled him; for, looking upon the long line of the windows of the great State gallery opposite, they seemed to be all illuminated. The king instantly called his drowsy attendants, and they declared it must be only the light reflected from the moon. For a moment or two the king was satisfied, but still continuing to look, he said it seemed that he saw people in the hall. Wrapping himself in a warmer dressing-gown, he threw up the window, looked out, and discovered the gallery to be unquestionably full of lights. "My good lords," said he, "all is not right here!" He tells how he exclaimed, "He who fears God fears nothing else!" and he was determined to set forth into the hall and see what this might mean. His majesty found this not quite so easy a task; the officers who had charge of the keys had to be awakened, then had to set forth to find the keys. At last he and they were both forthcoming.

We have said the palace was passing through changes. The king's cabinet led into his bedroom, and this again into a secret passage, not unknown in Swedish history. There appear now to have been five of them on this voyage of discovery the king, Carl Bjelke, chancellor, N. W. Bjelke, privy councillor, A. Oxenstiern, privy councillor-to whom was now added Peter Grauslen, the officer on guard. When they reached the door by which from the secret passage they entered the ante-chamber to the illuminated hall, the king desired the officer on guard to

open it, which the officer declined to do, begging the king to have the goodness to excuse him; then he requested the chancellor and the privy councillor to do so; they also, with all due homage, refused. "Then," says the king, "I desired the privy councillor, Oxenstiern, who was never afraid of anything, to unlock the door, but he answered, 'I have sworn to risk my body and soul for your majesty, but not to open this door.' I now began myself to be somewhat startled, but took courage, laid hold of the keys and opened the door."

Involuntarily they all started back. Instead of the tapestry which adorned the walls of the chamber, it was draped all round with black cloth. The king confesses they were daunted; inquiredprobably with no expectation of any satisfactory answer-what this might mean? and by whose orders the chamber had been so draped? course they all naturally and truly enough declared their ignorance and their innocence.

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Then they all strode along to the door of the great State chamber, and again the king offered the bunch of keys to Grauslen, but with the same result as before, and so in turn to the others; but if they were indisposed in the first instance, the gloomy drapery around them did not induce them to be more complying now. They all of them begged to be excused from any part in the matter, so the king's own hands had to be his servants. "I took the key myself," he says, "and opened the door. I had no sooner set a foot in the hall than I drew it hastily back.” What he saw appalled him. "I was," he says, 'somewhat frightened, but I said, My good friends, if you will follow me we will see what is the matter here. Perhaps God Almighty may purpose to reveal something to us.' They all made answer, with a trembling voice, 'Yes.' Then we all went in, and there was this extraordinary vision, concerning which whispers and hints soon flew about over Stockholm, and of which also the tradition has continued in Sweden from that day to the present."

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Standing on the very spot where it was supposed to have transpired, we ourselves mentioned it to our attendant through the palace -he evidently knew all about it; we are bound to say he did not seem to give much credence to it. At the same time, it seems to us now that he spoke with that kind of reserve with which an old housekeeper refers to some ghostly story of which the family is very well aware, but concerning which it is not deemed judicious to speak too openly.

Well might they all start, for if the story be true the hall was filled with spectral persons and spectral things. It was indeed illuminated with a number of torches, and hung round with the banners of Sweden won in her great victories by Gustavus Adolphus, but in the midst were the standard and banners of Sweden covered with black crape. There was a long table, at which were sitting sixteen venerable and noble-looking men. In the centre sat a youth of sixteen or eighteen, a young king, for a crown was on his head, and on his right hand sat a

noble-looking man, apparently about forty years of age, who seemed to be nearly on terms of equality with the king. All round these in the hall was a large assemblage, evidently representing the various estates of the realm. Amidst them all and throughout the great chamber the king and his attendants did not recognise a face they knew, and the whole of the weird and unearthly assembly seemed to be quite unaware, unconscious, of the presence of Charles and his companions. All were in black, and the judges -for it was evidently a trial which was going on

-were clothed in black robes. Also before the table there were blocks, evidently set for execution, and executioners, their shirt-sleeves tucked up, ready to strike when the order should be given. At last the eldest of the judges, who appeared to discharge the functions of a president, rose with dignity, and struck three times, when instantly came in several young men, evidently, by their attire and bearing, noble, their hands fettered behind them. They entered by a door opposite to that by which Charles himself had entered. Their doom was pronounced, the fatal axe glittered, and a head falling from the block rolled nearly to the feet of Charles-a drop of blood even stained his slipper. "I shuddered," says the king," and drew near to the door, crying aloud, 'What is the voice of the Lord that I am to hear? Oh, God! when shall this come to pass?' There was no answer. I cried again, 'Oh, God! when shall this come to pass?' Still there was no answer. Then again I cried, louder than before, 'Oh, God! when shall this come to pass ? Grant me Thy grace, great God, and tell me how I must behave myself till then?"" And then the young phantom king, from the throne, replied, Not in thy time shall this come to pass, but in the time of the sixth sovereign after thee; and he shall be of the same age and form that thou seest in me, and he who stands here shows what will be the appearance of his guardian!" and, with other mysterious words concerning the future of Sweden, he closed by saying, "Be it thy part, O King of Sweden, to leave behind thee a good name!"

As these words were uttered the numerous figures composing this extraordinary assemblage became less and less distinct. At last, from resembling a mass of coloured shadows, they disappeared altogether, the phantom torches were extinguished, and the faint lights of the (most likely) wax candles, which the royal party had snatched to enlighten their way from the king's cabinet, were the only lights which cast their dim and flickering lustre on the old-fashioned tapestry. But we will again give the king's own words. Referring to the words of the phantom sovereign, he says:

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'When he had said this everything disappeared, and we were left alone with our lights. We went away in the greatest astonishment, as everybody may suppose. When we got to the black room that too was changed, and everything was as usual. Then we went up to my room, and straightway I sat down to write my counsels in letters as well as I could. And all this is true

This I avouch with my bodily oath. So help me God.

"CHARLES THE Eleventh,

"Now King of Sweden."

And then follow the names of the companions of the king on this memorable night :

"As witnesses on the spot, we have seen every thing according as his majesty has related it, and this we avouch with our bodily oaths.

"CARL BJELKE, Chancellor.

"U. W. BJELKE, Privy Councillor.
"A. OXENSTIERN, Privy Councillor.
"PETER GRAUSLEN, Officer on Guard."

A very guarded attestation of what the king said he saw ! Such is the story which has received several renderings and embellishments, but which in the narrative we have given is, we suppose, the most substantial. Admitting for the moment the reality of the vision, it is scarcely wonderful that so mystical an apparition-so dim and obscureshould have faded out of memory until circumstances in the history of Sweden and of its royal family seemed to give a clue to the interpretation. The sovereign who beheld the vision continued his reign, and upon the whole served his country well. He was succeeded by his son, Charles XII, concerning whom Johnson's famous couplet was written

"He left a name at which the world grew pale,
To point a moral and adorn a tale.'

To him succeeded his sister, Ulrica Eleanora. She resigned the crown, and the Senate elected her husband, the Prince of Hesse, and after him Adolphus Frederick. And then succeeded his son, Gustavus III. We are not writing a history of Sweden, and therefore we need not dwell upon the virtues of his reign-which certainly are undoubted-or the vices which seemed to strike at the strength and supremacy of the Swedish nobility. He was, as every one knows, assassinated, as he was going into the opera, by Ankarstrom; and then it became known that Gustavus III had deposited among the royal archives at Upsala a large heavy box full of documents, many of them of a singularly interesting and even mysterious character-among others, the prophetic paper which we have quoted.

The scene which appeared in the vision certainly does not seem to have transpired in the great hall, although we are reminded of it as probably into that very hall the king was borne from the opera where he had received his death-wound.

While the king was in the article of death, the chest to which we have referred, containing, as was known, a quantity of secret papers, was brought to the bedside. The papers were sealed by the king's private seal, and the mysterious chest fastened by three locks, the three separate keys given to Wachtmeister (the Lord Chancellor), the Archbishop of Upsala, and the Duke of Sodermanland, with the solemn injunction that it was not to be opened until fifty years after his decease.

It is not improbable that rumour seized upon these circumstances to give currency to the story of the marvellous vision. So far, indeed, the phantoms became realities, and, although not in that hall, the vision still fulfilled itself. Gustavus IV, a youth of about the age of the phantom beheld by Charles XI, succeeded his father, beneath the regency of his uncle, the Duke of Sodermanland -the figure, in middle life, seen in the vision. Ankarstrom, after suffering many tortures with heroic and glorying fortitude, was beheaded. His crime, however, had only excited the admiration of a large number of those who imagined that they saw in the policy of Gustavus III the growth of a despotism fatal to their own and to their country's freedom, and whose fears took effect in the limitation of the monarchy under Gustavus IV.

But what is to be said of the vision? Even many ghost stories admit of a reasonable interpretation. This looks wholly illogical. Can coming events cast their shadows before after such a fashion? To believe it would seem to deserve the imputation of the most irrational credulity; and yet portents there are which, although far less ambitious and exalted in their relation, are equally, and in the same manner, mysterious, yet which seem to be most authentic. Will the reader give any credence to a tradition which, even to this day, holds the place which it has held for nearly a hundred and fifty years in the history of a family for generations well-known and highly respected in Ipswich?

Mr. Notcutt was a highly respectable Independent minister in Ipswich, the ancestor of a succession of ministers of the same name, in the same town and church. Before he was married, the lady to whom he was engaged dreamed that she was, while going over a house which was quite unknown to her-and in a little room, a sort of linencloset which she had never seen-seized with a violent bleeding from the nose, and all attempts to stop it were quite unavailing. Shortly before her marriage, the happy young girl was going over her future home with Mr. Notcutt; she began to recognise the house, and at last, coming upon a closet such as we have described, she exclaimed, "Why, this is the very closet where I was in my dream when my nose began to bleed!" They were married; years passed along; she became a mother and a grandmother. Exactly forty years passed away, but the dream was not forgotten. One day, when in the very closet superintending the putting away of some linen, her nose began to bleed, and continued to do so without intermission. All efforts were, as in the dream, quite unavailing, and the old lady succumbed to the hæmorrhage, and so death visited the manse.

This will no doubt seem to many readers an even contemptible story, and certainly it is a great descent from the magnificent chambers of the palace of Stockholm, with its throne-room and throne of solid silver, and the great hall, called, for its exquisite beauty and chastity, the White Sea. But the principle of the vision and of the dream, in the palace and the parsonage, is the

same as unreasonable and inexplicable in the one instance as in the other; the circumstance to happen in remote years, or generations, projected upon the future scene of the transaction. And singular, and, as we have said, illogical and unreasonable as such an incident seems, we can find no explanation for it.

But authentic instances there seem to be nearer to our own times, and probably known to our readers.

Such, for instance, is that strange and weird succession of prophecies in the life of John Francis de la Harpe, a very distinguished writer of France, a contemporary and friend of Voltaire, thoroughly imbued with the principles and spirit of his master. It was in a distinguished convivial circle in Paris; the greatest writers of the Academy were present; illustrious ladies, such as the Duchess of Grammont, were there, when, amidst a burst of triumphant congratulation on the glorious results of the writings of Voltaire, Cazotte, one of the most distinguished of the company, gave utterance to a succession of prophecies of the way in which the French Revolution-then undreamed of-would affect all those

who were present. All the prophecies stood out from the lips of M. Cazotte like illuminated pictures beheld by the speaker. The story is long; La Harpe put it all down in writing at the time, and all the events happened as the strange prophet foretold. "You, M. Condorcet, will expire on the pavement of a dungeon; you will die by the poison which you will have taken to escape from the hands of the executioner; the poison which the happy state of that period will render it absolutely necessary that you should carry always about with you." This was astonishing, and not pleasant, "But what connection has this with philosophy and the reign of reason?" they exclaimed. Precisely that which I am telling you," he said; "it will be in the name of philosophy, of humanity, and liberty, and under the reign of reason, that all this will happen to you; throughout all France there will be no other places of worship but the temples of reason." He individualised others and their dooms amidst some merriment. 'But when, Mr. Prophet, is

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all this to happen? "Before six years has passed all I have told you will be accomplished." Here, indeed," said La Harpe," is an abundance of miracles; but do you set me down for nothing?” "You," said Cazotte, "will be a miracle as extraordinary as any I have related; you will be a Christian ! " Loud laughter followed this, and Chamfort exclaimed, "All my fears are vanished. If we do not perish till La Harpe becomes a Christian we shall all be immortal!" The Duchess de Grammont broke in, pleasantly alluding to the safety of her sex. "Your sex, my lady duchess, will be no defence to you. You will be conducted to the scaffold with many other ladies in the cart of the executioner with your hands tied behind your back." Surely," said she, "they will allow us a coach ?" No, madame : ladies of higher rank than you will be drawn in a cart in the same way." "Ladies of higher rank! What do you mean? Princesses of the blood?" "Greater still, madame!" A cloud seemed to be settling over the company; the duchess continued in a sprightly tone, "Well, you will leave me a confessor?" "No, madame; the last victim who will have that greatest of all favours will be—” "Who? Who?" "It will be the only prerogative left him-the King of France!" The duchess, desirous, if possible, of restoring the company to cheerfulness, called on the prophet to declare his own fate. He said he was "Like the man who cried Woe to Jerusalem!' and then Woe to myself!" He made his bow and retired. He fulfilled his prediction and died on the scaffold.

Quite as remarkable is the well-known dream of Lavalette, in the course of which-and in a dream which could only have lasted ten minutes at night in his prison-he saw, as in a horrible phantasmagoria, the whole course of the French Revolution in Paris pass before his eyes.

We have only referred to these later instances to show that, whatever may be the attempt at solution, the vision of Charles XI is not altogether exceptional in such strange-shall we not say unaccountable? — lore, the coming events throwing themselves in strange and motley medley before the mind.

A

CURIOUS reminiscence of the slavery of fashion in the past is vividly recalled by Mr. Dadd's spirited picture of "Pigtails and Powder," which first excited much interest in the spring exhibition of the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colour, and is now, we believe, amongst the extensive gathering of high-class pictures at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool. Although the martial men of the present day have a sufficiency of employment in keeping their accoutrements bright, and in the extensive use of "pipeclay," they may reasonably congratulate themselves

on their emancipation from the "pigtail drill" so graphically pictured in Mr. Dadd's vivacious souvenir of hair-powder. It is an illustration of the oft-reiterated fact that our ancestors evidently found time to perform more things than their descendants within the compass of twenty-four hours. The elaborate toilets of the past must have absorbed more than a fair share of the diurnal toil.

Rough as were the lives of our soldiers and sailors a century and more ago, a fresh burden must have been literally laid on their backs in the