Mr. ashton's Ghost To his late Companion in the TOWER. 
vid Account of the late horrid, Conspiracy.   Ld. P. 
I'm extremely Mistaken or I hear some Body Walking about the Room— Who is't that's so uncivil to disturb me at such an unseasonable Hour?  Ash (drawing the Curtains.) 
Start not my L— I'm e'en your Old Friend and Fellow Traveller, returned from the Dead, much more willingly than we all did from Graves-End, when that illnatured Tar of a Captain, would by no means be so generous, to run away with us, and be Hanged for Company.  L. P. 
You must give me leave, good Mr. Ghost, to be a little cautious how I believe you. We live in very bad times, and if we can't trust the Inhabitants of this World, 'tis not very likely we should find more honesty among those of the other. How finely were I cheated, if 'tis the Ghost of Essex, which appears to me (for there's no Features in Shades, and I can't tell how to distinguish ye.) To be short, Show me your Credentials, and I'll believe you. Let me see the t'other half of the Broken Six Pence and you shall know all my Heart the next moment.  M. Ash. 
Upon the Word of a Ghost, I gave it to Charon for my passage— by the sum token that he Grumbled Cursedly, and I'd much ado to persuade the Rascal to take it instead of his Halfpenny— But I'll give ye as good a Token. Your Lordship was this day at the Council, and I'll tell you in your Ear, (lest any of the Warders should be listening) what past there, and how you managed yourself in so ticklish a juncture.  L. P. 
That any one may do, that has but a good Correspondence, without being either a Conjurer or a Devil. But I've one great Objection, against your being my Old Frieud— If you are He, were not He and I Sentenced at the same time to be Hanged, Drawn and Quartered— the 19th. of January, and was not Sentence. Executed on you the 28th. after? Now were you really my Old Friend the Major, we should have you drop in like the Devil in D●●●● Dobson▪ here a Leg, and there an Arm; first your Head, than your Bowels, and then your other 〈◊〉 when as I see you're as sound as a Roach, and bating a little Black Ring about the Neck, no sign of Hanging, Drawing, and Quartering; all over your whole Body,  M. Ash. 
Just as wisely might I question, whether you were the Witty Scotch Viscount, I was formerly acquainted with, because you have your Flesh and Blood still about you, whereas he was condemned to the same Death, I already suffered. The truth is the Government has been more Merciful to us both, than we could have expected, or did deserve. It let me scape with no more than a fair Hanging, and your L— p with not so much— if it been't your own fault, and you han't a mind to Hang yourself.  
But to detain you in suspense no longer, I'll give you one Secret, and Infallible Token, that I am I, and that I have no design to Impose upon you— you know as well as I, that I was by, when you writ your Memoirs, 
See Account as before  and that I persuaded you to trust 'em, rather to your Memory then suffer a possibility of their ever rising up in Judgement against you. Besides I'm so far from being upon the Trappan with you, that I desire no acknowledgement from your L— p of what has past, either when you and I were acquainted, or since my kindness, and upon account of old 〈…〉 to infor●●●●● in some 〈…〉 may 〈◊〉 ve●●●uch concern you, and where in my Judgement is more altered, than you'd easily imagine, since I came into these Black Territories, where your Lordship is with as much impatience expected every moment, as our Master's great Enemy was at the Hague.  L. P. 
Nay, now you'd make me suspect you more than ever— had you not given me such a Token as I can't answer. Is't possible that you who have been a Martyr for the Cause, and slid of the Stage with so much Decorum and Bravery, should alter your Principles in another's World, when you died for 'em here? I thought you had been all firm enough in that; whatever I may be in this, and that no change of place or condition, neither Heaven or Hell could ever have made you started an inch from what you formerly professed.  Ash. 
My L— d, I come from a Country where Compliments are quite out of Fashion; where we see things as they are in their own Natures, stripe from all those odd Disgnises, which Prejudice, Interest, or Humour, here dresses 'em in and where you'd be certainly of my mind, the very next moment after you come thither, and which in a few more will make you forget most of the Politics, which you have hitherto been learning all your life long.  L. P. 
Torment me then no longer, but by our Old Friendship, if you are him whose▪ Name you take, inform me what Sentiments you had of those things we have so oft discoursed, as soon as you Arrived in the other World.  M. Ash. 
You have heard, I suppose, how unconcernedly I went off from this, and that I died a Traitor against my Country, perhaps with as much Resolution as Russel and the rest of 'em, Died Martyrs for it.  L. P. 
I have, and of the kindness of your Ghostly. Fathers— How Zealous the little Spark of I— was to clap you upon the Shoulder in the last Conflict, and what a deal of Maudlin grief their was at parting with so good a Friend, when they'd have made such excellent Company to have gone with you: I have heard too of your Speech delivered to the Sheriff, which our Party Swear is as Infallible as any Chapthe in the Bible, and is kept from the Laity for the same Reason that the Papists keep the Scriptures from 'em.  M. Ash. 
I confess, would good store of my Quondam Friends, take the same way, and never speak Treason but when at the Gallows; the Government might find it worth the while, to Print their Speeches, as fast as they or the Club could make 'em.— But otherwise, I myself can see no Reason why any Man should Print a Libel against himself. The Friends of the Government, cannot sure be so weak, as to desire the gratification of a Foolish Curiosity, at the Expense of a real damage to what they respect and honour, nor can its Enemy's with modesty expect to have their Fancies tickled with a mess of Treason, Cum Privilegio. Though all Truths would bear the light, all Lies won't, and where there are more Fools then Wise; as undoubtedly may be found all the World over, 'tis no hurt to keep Edged Tools from 'em, lest they should make use of 'em to cut their own Fingers, or an honester and wiser Man's throat.  L. P. 
Why, you argue as if you were all perfect Williamites in another's World, and designed to make us so in this. I expected far different discourse from the Ghost of Major Ashton.  M. Ash. 
I was just telling you what Converted me. The very FIRST STEP that I made into the Infernal Regions, before my body was well covered in St. Faiths, (whither I expect shortly to have any Tomb stone worn as deep with the knees of those good Catholics, who come to adore my Heretical Dust, as St. Patrick's Well, or the Marbles before the Shrine of Thomas a Becket:) But who should I see there but the Protomartyr of the Cause, poor Cross, who was Hanged another's day, (and showed us what we must all come to) for nothing, but a little Voyage that he made aboard the French Fleet, when they lay upon our Coast last Summer. He had about him the whole Rabble of Devils at his first Arrival, and looks exactly like a Pickpocket, when fallen into the clutches of their mortal Mob. However, they were civiler to him then those would have been above Ground, and gave him Law for his Life, hurrying him away before Judge Aedeus, who was then trying Causes at Pluto's Court, where appeared at least a thousand Witneses, against him summoned by his own Conscience, and two or three false Loons of Devils, who first tempted him to sin, and afterwards discovered him, all these gave their Affidavits, that he endeavoured to betray his Country, and Corresponded with its inveterate, and declared Enemies— and upon the clear proof of the whole, he was immediately Sentenced to be cast into the same Copper, where Judas, Herostratin, Guy Faux, Tarperia, and all the odious Traitors to their Country, or Friends are to be tortured, till a Ja●bite loves the Protestant Religion, and hates the King of France and his own good Godfather— your L— p may easily guests how much this Alarmed me— I immediately fell a trembling, and 'twas well I was nothing but Spirit, for had I been still chained to a Body, something not very pleasant about me had certainly betrayed me.  
If this Fool of a Rogu● has such hard treatment, what thought I, am I to expect, if once the truth is known to these grim Justices? On the whole, I e'en thought it the wisest way to step to the Bar of my own accord, where falling on my knees, I e'en fairly confessed the whole Fact before any one accused me● that I with several other false Traitors had Conspired to overturn and destroy my own Country and Government, and that this poor wretch just then Condemned, had a much less share in the Villainy, than I myself had.  L. P 
Was this the way to obtain any Mitigation, or would it not rather make you far worse than he that went before you?  M. Ash. 
There was no other Remedy— I knew 'twas but broiling fort at last. But besides I found out an Expedient which got me at least a Reprieve, whatever may become of a Pardon, I Humbly proposed to the Judges, who looked much more angry upon me, than those at the Old Eaily that I'd return again to Life, and persuade those Persons who were concerned with me in the same Villainies, to abandon their Cursed designs, and discover all they knew ou●t, giving my Parole of Honour to come back again as soon as I had accomplished my Errand.  
This wrought so much on the Sooty-Faced Gentlemen that I obtained leave, and accordingly the first Persons I address myself to is your L— p, both upon account of the past intimacy which has been between us, and because it may conduce very much to the Mitigation of my Torments, if I can take off so 〈◊〉 able a Person as your L— p f●●m that cause which I am like to Suffer so much for in t'other World, as well as this.  L. P. 
You tell me wonders— but 'tis still a greater to me how Hell comes to be so angry with our design, or why, as our Predecessors in the Gunpowder Plot used to say, Satan discovered what we were about, or is since so mightily concerned at it; since had the Grand Lewis poured his Army in, as we had proposed, those below had undoubtedly received whole Legions of Souls every day crowding down to 'em, from every part of the Conquered Nation.  M. Ash. 
Notwithslansling all this they fear the examples and though they love Treason very well, I find they hate the Traitor as much as any of our mortal Politicians. For should those who live under so happy a Government as the English at present enjoy (say they among themselves) once Rebel against it and bring in the French, to torment enslave and destroy them if once they accomplish their design, all Europe it undoubtedly their own and in that as good as all the world when once the ●rand 〈◊〉, is Universal Monarch of the upper World ten to one but he'll h●ve such a Freak come into his Head as Alexander, the Great had and have a Month's mind for a Touch at the other World when he has conquered all his own and among these ours lies most open to his attempts both because, he's now very old and Sinful and not likely to stay long above before he gives us a visit and makes his last Campaign amongst us and because his Luidores have already made him such a party here by the help of his many Agents, which are come● it her before him that Lucifer, himself would hardly be safe in his Throne, but be daily in danger of Abdication and being the last conqust to the French Arms and Policies.  L. P. 
What course then would you advise me to take in order tomy own happiness and yours— You know several Gentlemen of my acquaintance and yours, will not be flack to tell me I must certainly have School Butter in another's World, if I tell Tales our of School in this; and o' another's side, dare pawn their own Souls for mine, that if I hold right to the Scaffold, my Soul shall be in Paradise, as soon as my Head leaps off from my Shoulders.  M. Ash. 
'Tis at your Liberty to believe them or me, as your L— p thinks fit. But to be free, the Question lies thus,— whether you can expect Heaven for endeavouring to Ruin Earth, and whether 'tis so Meritorious a ti●ing, as some pretend, whatever they think, to 〈…〉 Native 〈…〉 bar●●● 〈…〉 or 〈◊〉.  
〈…〉 L— p 〈◊〉 a Passion for 〈◊〉 〈…〉 in the 〈◊〉 di●●●●ged my 〈…〉 like a Ghost of Honour— In the 〈…〉 I'll about the rest of my E●●bissie, and see 〈…〉 I shall meet with among the remainder of my 〈◊〉 Friends.  L. P. 
If common Interests and Dangers have any Power, I conjure you by them to stay a Minute longer, and resolve me 2 or 3 very material Questions.  M. Ash. 
We don't forget every thing as soon as our Moths are cold, and therefore if I'm not forbidden by the Laws of the dark Kingdom, I'll give you all the satisfaction I'm able.  L. P. 
My first Query is— which will be out first, this Year, the French Fleet, or the English?  M. Ash. 
In that my L- your Memoires have failed you. The diligence of the Government, and readiness of the Seamen, the encouragement of the Proclamation; Reforming Officers, and Kicking Old Grizzel out of doors, have brought matters into so good a posture, that the Fleet is now in better Order than 'twas last Year by May, and whereas your Judgement was; 'twould not be out before Ju●●, you'll certainly see a great part on't ready before the end of this Month.  L. P. 
How did Mr. Reading and Mrs. Reading receive the News of our disappointment— our Factors being broken, our being nonsuited in our Law business, and the Lord of the Manors, sitting faster, and being more loved and feared th●n ever,— you know my meaning— for you are no stranger to this Language.  M. Ash. 
Mr. Reading was almost in as bad, a condition as his Grandfather used to be, 〈◊〉 poor Mrs. Reading was in ten times more fright and pain, then at her last Lying In.  L. P. 
One word more and I've done— shall I save my Life, or must I follow ●●n.  M. Ash. 
— Ask your L— y that— th●● you yourself know whether you can, or will do any thing to deserve it. But my time is passed— I must to the rest— Adieu.  
FINIS.   

LONDON. printed for T. Axe 1691