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170 BYGONE SUSSEX.
effected it; but so that my father upon the least surcharge of new ale or beer, or any windy liquor, was obnoxious to fainting-fits ; till it pleased God, after 20 years, or thereabouts, to order it so, that the escharre broke out in way of an issue, which continued with him (I think) to almost the time of his death, which was in the 77th year of his age, a.d. 1689-90. This I thought myself bound in point of gratitude to the Divine Providence to record." (Chap, xxiii., Some Personal deliverances No. 5).
Forebodings of Death.
There was apparently a spice of the uncanny in the family. " I had a maternal uncle," he says, "that died the third of March last, 1678, which was the anniversary day of his birth ; and (which is a truth exceeding strange) many years ago he foretold the day of his death to be that of his birth ; and he also averr'd the same but about the week before his departure." (Chap, xv., 13).
It is therefore not surprising that he is ready to lend an ear to ghost stories and other wonderful narratives.
A Ghost Story.
" Being lately at Sir John Brisco's house, a |
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