Newspaper Clipping of the Day

via Newspapers.com

The dead can get so damned touchy about what you do with their remains. This charming little cautionary tale was related by one S.G. Hobson, in what appears to have been a syndicated column. This particular reprint comes from the "Pittsburgh Post-Gazette" for July 12, 1908.

Medical students are notoriously irreverent; serious views come to them later on in life. And they are apt to take a material view of the sanctities of the human body. But even their materialism sometimes gets a jolt.

This eerie story was told to me by a doctor in the west of Ireland one evening as we were discussing supernatural things. He was a King's man and therefore held a London degree. In his student days he used to foregather with a number of his college chums in a house in Bloomsbury where lodged a student, to whom money was not of much object.

By some subterranean means these young sparks had got hold of a corpse to dissect. It was the body of a distinguished-looking man, well nourished, and having every indication of cleanly habits during life. The corpse was regarded as a great find, and for several nights careful scientific dissection went on. After all dissecting possibilities had been exhausted the owner proceeded to retain the skeleton and took the necessary means to have the bones cleansed.

About a month later half a dozen of the fellows met for a jollification and I fear that what with whisky and soda, rum punch and other deleterious and distinctly unmedical lotions, the wee small hours found them in a rollicking mood, if not in an intoxicated condition. Practical jokes followed fast and furious upon each other, and finally irreverent hands were laid upon the new bleached skeleton. Nothing would satisfy one youngster but to detach the skull and place it in the bed of the student lodger. This led to other pranks on the unfortunate skeleton, and before long arms and legs were distributed in various parts of the room. Another hour's jollification witnessed the exhaustion of the party. Arm chairs were requisitioned for sleep, and there was a brisk fight for possession of the sofa. Soon silence came upon them. The room was dark enough for it reeked with tobacco smoke. Sleep came to tired eyes and one or two hoggishly snored.

Suddenly a startled voice rang out: "Hie. you chaps, look." All were immediately on the alert, and surely never did a more blood-curdling picture present itself, for the bones of that skeleton by some unseen agency one by one were coming together again. Not a man dared move. These brave youths, who had not scrupled to play silly jokes with a skeleton which six weeks before was clothed in the majesty of manhood, now sat in a horrid fright, eyes starting from their sockets. A nightmare was child's play to this. Soon the whole skeleton had been integrated save for the head. Then there was a pause. But in the silence each man instinctively knew that something even yet more uncanny was about to happen. After a lapse of about 30 seconds the door opened, and on a level with the handle the skull was seen to advance slowly to the corner of the room where stood the rest of the skeleton. The skull rose to the level of the neck and was placed in position by the same unseen agency that had brought together the other part.

Nothing more had happened, and it was half-an-hour before the first student dared utter a word. Then all rushed for hats and coats.

"My God, you fellows! Are you going to leave me here alone with that?" exclaimed the medical lodger, pointing dramatically to the skeleton.

This is how my informant finished the story: "Not one of us was disposed to stay there, but I said to him in a whisper, 'Come and spend the night with me, old man.'"

"And so we left the room where the ghost of the departed grandee had set up his own skeleton. Gad, my son! 'Twas an experience you would not go hunting for. Billy Stephens, who lodged there and owned the skeleton, got such a sickener that he gave up medicine and took to the church."

I always try to warn people that skeletons rarely have a sense of humor.