And lights indeed we saw at times that night, and cowered shivering in ditches and mudholes as they flitted to and fro about the marshes.

For these, we knew, were no earthly lights, but ghost flares tempting us to destruction--stealthy pale flames of greenish-blue which hovered like ghostly butterflies, and danced on the darkness, and fluttered from place to place as though blown by unfelt winds.

And one time, after we had left the dead man behind, one such came dancing straight towards us, and we turned and ran for our lives till we fell into a hole.

For Le Marchant vowed it was the dead man's spirit, and that the others were the spirits of those who had died in similar fashion.

But for myself I was not sure, for I had seen similar lights on our masts at sea in the West Indies, though indeed there was nothing to prove that they also were not the spirits of drowned mariners..