A PHENOMENON.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19019, 15 November 1923, Page 11

A PHENOMENON.

GHOST PORTRAIT ON A WALL. The face of Dean Liddell, who died more than 25 years ago, is gradually appearing on the east wall of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford. Tho mortar and cement in tne wall are drying up with ago in such a wav as lo leave n white patch of cement, tlm size of a marts head, standing out from the darker colour of tho wall. This patch has now assumed tho exact face and features of the famous dean. Tho face appears in profile. The chin. nose, and Imad of the dean, with the bald crown of tlio head and the curly white hair below it are clearly formed on iho wall. It is expected that as the mortar and cement continue to dry up the face will disappear. The phenomenon becomes all the more strange because it has appeared just below the memorial window which was set, up hy Ihe dean. The head in the wall is facing towards his wife’s tablet, which is engraved in Latin. “Farewell, sweetest and dearest, farewell.” Mr W. Francis, the dean's verger nt Christ Church Hathedrnl, is keenly interested. “Dne does not like to put it down to anything occult,” he said recently, “but the appearance ot Ihe dean’s face bir his wife's memorial tablet is certainly "an extraordinary matter. It has been' gradually anpearing for the last two years." Dean Liddell was the father of ■the “Alice” for whom Lewis Carroll’s masterpiece? were created. ’I he. plot of “Alice in Wonderland”, was thought out in the dean’s garden, a few yards away from the cathedral.