delivered in the mode of parody and burlesque; and so it is with the
extraordinary fantasy, "The Ghost-Ship," which gives its name to this
collection of tales. Take this story to bits, as it were; analyse it;
you will be astonished at its frantic absurdity: the ghostly galleon
blown in by a great tempest to a turnip-patch in Fairfield, a little
village lying near the Portsmouth Road about half-way between London
and the sea; the farmer grumbling at the loss of so many turnips; the
captain of the weird vessel acknowledging the justice of the claim
and tossing a great gold brooch to the landlord by way of satisfying
the debt; the deplorable fact that all the decent village ghosts
learned to riot with Captain Bartholomew Roberts; the visit of the
parson and his godly admonitions to the Captain on the evil work he
was doing; mere craziness, you will say?

Yes; but the strange thing is that as, in spite of all jocose tricks
and low-comedy misadventures, Don Quixote departs from us with a
great light shining upon him; so this ghost-ship of Richard
Middleton's, somehow or other, sails and anchors and re-sails in an
unearthly glow; and Captain Bartholomew's rum that was like hot oil
and honey and fire in the veins of the mortals who drank of it, has
become for me one of the _nobilium poculorum_ of story. And thus did
the ship put forth from the village and sail away in a great tempest
of wind--to what unimaginable seas of the spirit!

The wind that had been howling outside
like an outrageous dog had all of a sudden
turned as melodious as the carol-boys of a
Christmas Eve.

We went to the door, and the wind burst it