A STRANGE HALLUCINATION.

Inangahua Times, Volume IX, Issue 1471, 17 November 1884, Page 2

A STRANGE HALLUCINATION.

, e The New York Tinees f*ys a -strange, case which has just come tb light in Geueuee County has created .much excitement In a little farmhouse four and a half miles west of •: out Morris there lives ft family uf 16 persons all huddled together in apart* j inents not large enough for four. It ia ; not an inviting place under the best | circumstances, but when filled with people who are, to say the least, | nearly insane, it becomes far less so. I Some time ago a child died in the* family, and since then several members of the household have been impressed with the belief that everything around I the premises was bewitched, all h*in£ controlled by the evil spirit Mr* - ; Summer, who is and has for some j time been quite ill, was afflicted with this hallucination to a marked degree, and, while not pretending to prescribe for her mental trouble, Dr. Luman L. Fuller, of Clio, has been trying to> minister to her physical ailments. Hecalled at the house, and when he attempted to get in he was met hy Mrs, Livingston, another member of the strange family, who violently resisted bis advance in the sick room. She had aiax>r in one hand, a knife in the other, aud in her frenzied efforts to induce him not to interfere with the case already being handled by witch*! she attacked aud cut him savagely in the right breast, inflicting .* bad wound. She has been arrested and taken to gaol. A. younjf man named Whitney, a brother of Mrs Livingston, is also in custody. The prosecuting attorney and others were at the farmhome, and they say the neighbourhool is ful of stories of stranga hallucian tions of ihe occupants. Some of the things they have done are worthy ol the old witchcraft days. The pigs and cows have had little nicks cut. in. their ears or tails to let the - witches out, and &r& Summer, when seen, was lying in bed- without any clothing exoept the. coverlet Her baby was also naked having, as sho said, been stripped by the witches. The neighbours . frafe been .annoyed for weeks past, flraott beyond endurance by the firing off of ..guns at tho house the object being as alleged by the inmates, to frighten oft the witchea frotnthtf premises.