The Spectral Coach of Blackadon

The old vicarage-house at Talland, as seen from the Looe road, its low
roof and grey walls peeping prettily from between the dense boughs of
ash and elm that environed it, was as picturesque an object as you
could desire to see. The seclusion of its situation was enhanced by
the character of the house itself. It was an odd-looking, old-
fashioned building, erected apparently in an age when asceticism and
self-denial were more in vogue than at present, with a stern disregard
of the comfort of the inhabitant, and in utter contempt of received
principles of taste. As if not secure enough in its retirement, a high
wall, enclosing a courtelage in front, effectually protected its
inmates from the prying passenger, and only revealed the upper part of
the house, with its small Gothic windows, its slated roof, and heavy
chimneys partly hidden by the evergreen shrubs which grew in the
enclosure. Such was it until its removal a few years since; and such
was it as it lay sweetly in the shadows of an autumnal evening one
hundred and thirty years ago, when a stranger in the garb of a country
labourer knocked hesitatingly at the wicket gate which conducted to
the court. After a little delay a servant-girl appeared, and finding
that the countryman bore a message to the vicar, admitted him within
the walls, and conducted him along a paved passage to the little, low,
damp parlour where sat the good man. The Rev. Mr Dodge was in many
respects a remarkable man. You would have judged as much of him as he
sat before the fire in his high-back chair, in an attitude of thought,
arranging, it may have been, the heads of his next Sabbath's
discourse.