Fake Messages from the Spirit World 



How mediums read "messages" sent them to be answered 

 By Hereward Carrington 



SCENE: — The rooms of a professional 

 spiritualist. The medium asks a 

 number of persons to write out ques- 

 tions on a piece of paper and to fold up 

 the papers. After the papers are gathered 

 up, they are placed on the small table or 

 "altar" in front of the medium. The 

 eyes of the medium are bandaged. She 

 cannot see anything — apparently. The 

 investigators take their seats, and the 

 "readings" begin. 



One by one, the medium picks up the 

 papers, places them to her forehead and 

 proceeds to tell what question each con- 

 tains. Miraculously enough they are the 

 very questions asked by the writers. But 

 the medium 

 does more 

 than read the 

 writing on a 

 folded 

 paper. She 

 proceeds to 

 give advice, 

 or more 

 often mere 

 impressions, 

 which are 

 taken as par- 

 tial or com- 

 ple te an- 

 swers to the 

 que stions 

 by emotional 

 and imagina- 

 tive listen- 

 ers. With 

 the answers, 

 then , we 

 need not con- 

 cern our- 

 selves. They 

 consist only 

 of vague 

 advice and 

 guesses. 



How, then, 

 does the 

 medium find 

 out what is 



written on the carefully folded papers? 

 There are various ways. The illustra- 

 tions disclose some of them. 



Under cover of a pile of folded papers, 

 or perhaps of some small ornament on the 

 "altar" the medium quietly unfolds the 

 pellets, one at a time, and reads them 

 under the bandage. Folding them up 

 again, she places them to her forehead 

 and pretends that she is only then making 

 out their contents with the greatest diffi- 

 culty. The spectators are impressed! 



But suppose the medium's head is 

 covered up by a thick sack. Surely she 

 can't see. What then? 



In this case, the trick is rendered pos- 

 sible by the very means 

 which seem to make it 

 impossible — as so often 

 happens ! Under cover 

 of the sack, the me- 

 dium has taken from 

 under her skirt an 

 electric flash lamp, and 

 by its aid she reads the 

 contents of a number 

 of questions she has 

 concealed. In this case, 

 a number of dummy 

 (blank) pellets are left 

 upon the table, to take 

 the places of those sur- 



How can she read 

 with a sack over 

 her head? It's easy 

 — with a flashlight. 

 At riftht, a medium's 

 pad with its reveal- 

 ing carbon paper 



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