Men who
lived in those days had many an evil thing to dread, for wolves, ghouls,
and vampires were as terribly real to them as in our day are the
microbes of cancer, of fever, or of tuberculosis. And when a man who was
notoriously a sinner came to his end, there was in the grave no rest for
him, nor was there peace for his fellow-men. Night after night he was
sure to rise from his tomb and go a-hunting for a human prey. He sucked
blood, and so drained the life of the innocent clean away. He devoured
human flesh. He chased his victims as though he were a mad dog, sending
them crazed by his bite, or worrying and mangling them to a dreadful
death.
This citizen, then, was not likely to rest in peace, and but a night or
two after the earth had been heaped over his grave, he was up and out
and rushing through the dark streets where his decorous footsteps had so
often fallen solidly by day, so often slunk stealthily by night.
By Satan's agency he was set free, all men averred, yet the master that
he had faithfully served did but little to pleasure him. For all the
night through, as long as darkness lasted, the dead sinner was hunted
through the deserted streets by a pack of baying hell-hounds. Round the
walls, down by the quay, up Hyde Hill, through the Scots Gate, down
lanes and byeways and back again round the walls--a weariful hunt it
was.
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