Register (Adelaide, SA : 1901 - 1929), Monday 9 December 1907, page 6


RIDER HAGGARD COINCIDENCE.

Mr. Rider Haggard, in a letter to The Si»ectator, relates a remarkable coincidence.. He says':— 'The following instance of- imagination being verified by fact may interest . mindenta of mirk molten. '±Vo

years «r so ago I wrote an historical romance, w*hic|i ' has recently appeared' under the'titic of 'Fair Margaret.' In tint romance the name of, the hero in Peter Brorae. The father. of this Peter Bronte is represented in the tale as having been killed at Bosworth Field. After the' apprarancB of the book I received a letter from Col. Peter 'Brome Giles, the High Sheriff of Bucks, asking me where I obtained the particulars concerning the said Peter Brome. I answered— out of my own bead. Indeed, I distinctly remember inventing the name as being one that I had never beard, and the fact of the father's death oh' Bosworth Field I introduced to suit' the. exigencies 'of the story- In reply to my request for further particulars, Col. Brome Giles kindly sent me a letter, from which,- in view of the curious interest of the matter, J am sure he will forgive ree for publishing the following extracts:— 'Your hero's father was the son of Sir Thomas Brome, theisecretarr* of Henry. VI. He was, as you relate, killed at Bosworth, but I never heard they had property in Essex, but had in Suffolk and Norfolk. . . . One branch of the family took the bird (that is as a coat-of-anna) .as you describe. ... The father of your hero was tho fret Peter, and was born 1437, and was SJ when killed. . . v Since the Peter of 1197 there have always been Peter BromeB: my father was, I am, and so is my boy. We assumed Oiks in 1761.' To this I sent the following answer:— 'All. I can say is that the coincidence,' is extremely curious (for I knew nothing whatsoever of all this), so much so indeed that, token in conjunction with some similar instances which have occurred to me, almost do I begin to believe in retrospective second sight.' If I smy judge from my own experience, socb coincidences '(and. as any one'who .has read the tale in question will admit, this is a'very.Temarkable coincidence) are by no means uncommon, . Although- tbe particulars are too long to set out, four times at the'verr least 'haver they happened to myself' in the case of my own' works of imagination. I do' not' know, if any of your readers . can' suggest an explanation. The odds against such- exact similitudea seem so tremendous that I confess I on? unable t) do so.' ['It almost looks' (says the edt tor* of The Spectator in a footnote) 'as if Mr. Rider Haggard when he thought be was inventing was unconaciously rcceiring ntudom and accidental .brain waves, a la Marconi,. from Col.' Brome Giles.. Was Col. Bromo Giles, we wonder, working at pedigree questions at tbe time when Mr. Rider Haggard was planning his noyieltfl