ly in Somersetshire. And there are Burtons more than one there, and also Leighs, but this Burton is determined by the space of something more than a Mile and an halfs distance from Leigh. So that the Topograpical account is sufficiently exact. And the manner of the Narrative is so simple, plain, and rural, that it prevents all suspicion of Fraud or Imposture in the Relator.
The transporting of things out of one Room into another, and striking and the like by invisible Agents, minds me of Mr. Lloyd's story, as 'tis called in Mr. Glanvil's Papers, whom in a Letter he tells he may rely upon it for truth, as being sent from a Person of Quality and Integrity in those parts. It is of a House haunted of one Walter Meyrick of the Parish of Blethvaught, in the County of Radnor, some Two and twenty years ago. Where, besides strange kind of Tunable Whistlings in the Rooms, where none was seen to Whistle, there were stones flung down out of a loft of great weight, the doors bolted or barred against them on the inside, when returned from the Church, no body being within. And at Prayer at home when some of the Women out of fear held one another by the Arms, some invisible Power would pluck asunder their Arms, whether they would or no. By such an Invisible force, one as he was sitting at Supper, was struck flat to the ground, and a Trencher struck out of the Maid's hand that waited, and a smart Box on the Ear given to another, no Visible thing being near that did it. A Purse lost with two Gold Rings, and Six and Four-pence in it, the party complaining thereof, the Purse dropt down from the top of the Room, which had no Room over it, and Four pence only in it. That Men were struck down with Stones, and yet had no great hurt shews plainly they were not flung but carried. But there was one beaten with Two Staves black and blue, but none to be seen that thus belaboured him, though in the the Day.
We pass by the Frying-Pan, beaten with a little piece of Iron, and tinkling over a Man's Head in the Night, to his being struck down with a Stick by Day, while he tended the Goose roasting, which that Invisible Striker seemed to have a Plot upon, as also by his knocking a Pickax against the Lid of a Coffer, to have a Design upon a Bag of Mony. These and the like Feats, that Narrative relates, which Mr. Glanvil calls Mr. Lloyd's story, who assures him he may rely on the Truth thereof, he procuring it from a Justice of Peace, who took the parties Testimonies that dwelt in the House, or upon occasions were present there, and were Eye-witnesses of the strange Pranks that were plaid in the place. And there being that Congeneracy betwixt James Sherring's story and this, they mutually corroborate one another.
