Reporting History

The celebrated general, Marshall Saxe, having arrived with a great part of his army at a village in Germany, where they were to pass the night, proposed sleeping himself in an old castle which had been long neglected, and was believed by all the neighbourhood to be haunted by spectres, whose nightly yells were often heard by those who dwelt beneath its walls. Marshal Saxe was not the man to be terrified by such reports from taking possession of his destined chamber. He accordingly went to bed at his usual time, but had not been long asleep before be was awakened by the most horrid sound his ears had ever heard, and while he was endeavouring to recollect himself, the door of his chamber opened, and a human figure of very large dimensions appeared at the side of the bed. The Marshal instantly discharged a pistol at the supposed spectre, which appeared to strike, as it fell on the floor; he then rose from his bed and aimed a blow with his sabre at the figure, but the blade found a resistance, and shivered in his hand.