PHOTOGRAPHIC GHOSTS. 293 



PHOTOGRAPHIC GHOSTS. 



ON the outskirts of the ever-widening circle lighted 

 up by science there is always a border-land wherein su- 

 perstition holds sway. The arts and sciences may drive 

 away the vulgar hobgoblin of darker days ; but they 

 bring with them new sources -of illusion. The ghosts 

 of old could only gibber ; the spirits of our day can 

 read and write, and play on divers instruments, and 

 quote Shakespeare and Milton. It is not, therefore, 

 altogether surprising to learn that they can take pho- 

 tographs also. You go to have your photograph 

 taken, we will suppose, desiring only to see your own 

 features depicted in the carte; and lo ! the spirits have 

 been at work, and a photographic phantom makes its 

 appearance beside you. It is true this phantom is of a 

 hazy and dubious aspect the "dull mechanic ghost" 

 is indistinct, and may be taken for any one. Still, it 

 is not difficult for the eye of fancy to trace in it the 

 lineaments of some departed friend, who, it is to be 

 assumed, has come to be photographed along with you. 

 In fact, photography, according to the spiritualist, re- 

 sembles what Byron called 



" The lightning of the mind, 

 "Which, out of things familiar, undesigned, 

 When least we deem of such, calls np to view 

 The spectres whom no exorcism can bind." 



The phenomena of spiritual photography were first 



