49 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



most readily admit of verification or disproof. Still, something has 

 been accomplished in each of the six departments of investigation. 

 The committee having in charge the Reichenbach experiments felt 

 justified in making a report about three years ago, of which the fol- 

 lowing is the tenor : 1. That three observers separately, on distinct 

 occasions, were in some way immediately aware when an electro-mag- 

 net was secretly " made " and " unmade," under such precautions as 

 were devised, to prevent ordinary means of knowing, and to exclude 

 chance and deception ; and the observers identified such magnetiza- 

 tion, with luminous appearances, which, as described, agreed generally 

 with the evidence recorded by Reichenbach. 2. That there were, 

 though less decisively, indications of other sensory effects of magnet- 

 ism. In view of these apparent confirmations of previous testimony, 

 the committee inclined to the opinion that, among other unknown 

 phenomena associated with magnetism there is a prima facie case for 

 the existence, under conditions not yet determined, of a peculiar and 

 unexplained luminosity resembling phosphorescence, in the region im- 

 mediately around the magnetic poles, and visible only to certain indi- 

 viduals. 



The committee on haunted houses has carried on widely extended 

 investigations, despite the fun which the public prints have poked at its 

 " ghost directory," but as yet has not made sufficient advance to war- 

 rant a report. It will strengthen our confidence in this committee's 

 work if we recollect that it holds that the unsupported evidence of 

 a single witness does not constitute sufficient ground for accepting an 

 apparition as having a prima facie claim to objective reality. Under 

 the operation of this rule, ninety-five of every hundred ghost-stories 

 must fall to the ground. 



The investigators of mesmerism are undoubtedly working in a field 

 which has been by no means neglected in the past. They, therefore, 

 have more definite lines of guidance than most of their colleagues. 

 We find that they divide the main phenomena connected with the mes- 

 meric state into three classes : (1) the dominance of a suggested idea ; 

 (2) transference of sensations, without suggestion, from operator to 

 patient ; (3) induction of general or local ansesthesia. Of these classes 

 the committee pronounces that the first is on the high-road to univer- 

 sal acceptance ; that the second is rarely contested, but the committee 

 has added something to the facts already recorded in its favor, and 

 has hope of adding more ; that the third class the production of 

 anaesthesia has already been established by overwhelming evidence, 

 and is to a certain extent admitted by modern physiologists. But it 

 remains undecided whether this ansesthesia is produced by mere ex- 

 pectant attention, exercised in a particular state of the nervous system, 

 and is thus the culminating example of the dominance of a suggested 

 idea ; or, whether it is the result of the inhibition of certain sensory 

 centers in consequence of prolonged stimulation of the peripheral ex- 



