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"Infernal chilblains--I caught them clear up to the back of my head,
roosting out there under Newell's farm. But I love the place; I love it
as one loves his old home. There is no peace for me like the peace I
feel when I am there."
We talked along for half an hour, and then I noticed that he looked
tired, and spoke of it.
"Tired?" he said. "Well, I should think so. And now I will tell you all
about it, since you have treated me so well. I am the spirit of the
Petrified Man that lies across the street there in the museum. I am the
ghost of the Cardiff Giant. I can have no rest, no peace, till they have
given that poor body burial again. Now what was the most natural thing
for me to do, to make men satisfy this wish? Terrify them into it!--
haunt the place where the body lay! So I haunted the museum night after
night. I even got other spirits to help me. But it did no good, for
nobody ever came to the museum at midnight. Then it occurred to me to
come over the way and haunt this place a little. I felt that if I ever
got a hearing I must succeed, for I had the most efficient company that
perdition could furnish. Night after night we have shivered around
through these mildewed halls, dragging chains, groaning, whispering,
tramping up and down stairs, till, to tell you the truth, I am almost
worn out. But when I saw a light in your room to-night I roused my
energies again and went at it with a deal of the old freshness. But I am
tired out--entirely fagged out. Give me, I beseech you, give me some
hope!"
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