SCIENCE AND T8ft "SPIRITS." 33? 
there was no trickery in the furniture. This was done; 
and I then first learned that my hospitable host had 
arranged that the seance should be a dinner-party. This 
was to me an unusual form of investigation; but I accepted 
it, as one of the accidents of the occasion. 
The " medium " arrived a delicate-looking young lady, 
who appeared to have suffered much from ill-health. I 
took her to dinner and sat close beside her. Facts were 
absent for a considerable time, a series of very wonderful 
narratives supplying their place. The duty of belief on 
the testimony of witnesses was frequently insisted on. X. 
appeared to be a chosen spiritual agent, and told us many 
surprising things. He affirmed that, when he took a pen 
in his hand, an influence ran from his shoulder downward, 
and impelled him to write oracular sentences. I listened 
for a time, offering no observation. " And now," con- 
tinued X., " this power has so risen as to reveal to me the 
thoughts of others. Only this morning I told a friend 
what he was thinking of, and what he intended to do 
during the day." Here, I thought, is something that can 
be at once tested. I said immediately to X.: "If you 
wish to win to your cause an apostle, who will proclaim 
your principles to the world from the housetop, tell me 
what I am now thinking of." X. reddened, and did not 
tell me my thought. 
Some time previously I had visited Baron Reichenbach, 
in Vienna, and I now asked the young lady who sat beside 
me, whether she could see any of the curious things which 
he describes the light emitted by crystals, for example? 
Here is the conversation which followed, as extracted from 
my notes, written on the day following the seance. 
Medium. "Qh, yes; but I see light around all bodies." 
/. " Even in perfect darkness?" 
Medium. " Yes; I see luminous atmospheres round all 
people. The atmosphere which surrounds Mr. R. C. would 
fill this room with light." 
/. " You are aware of the effects ascribed by Baron 
Reichenbach to magnets?" 
Medium. "Yes; but a magnet makes me terribly ill." 
/. "Am I to understand that, if this room were per- 
fectly dark, you could tell whether it contained a magnet, 
without being informed of the fact? " 
Medium. "I should know of its presence on entering 
the room." 
