292 ROUGHING IT IN SOUTHERN INDIA 



An account of this affair was drawn up, to which very- 

 many of those who witnessed it signed their names — names 

 well known in the British official circle, civil and military, 

 of Lahore society. The signatories were therefore people 

 who were generally credited with the full use of their facul- 

 ties, and who up to that time had so credited themselves. 

 This declaration was afterwards published in the Pioneer 

 and other prominent Indian journals of the day. Never- 

 theless, not a few persons, while certain of what they had 

 seen and set their names to, were equally certain that there 

 had been nothing to see ; which seeming paradox expresses 

 the simple truth, that the whole thing was hallucination 

 induced by hypnotism, a subject of study through all ages 

 in the East, and in which the jugglers are past masters. 

 Doctors of science, with decorations and honours galore 

 pinned to their coats, who live to contradict one another — 

 ay, and themselves too — year by year, in London, Paris, 

 or Vienna, might have sat with advantage at the feet of this 

 Gamaliel — a man with only a couple of yards of cloth for 

 wardrobe — who knew more about hypnotism and kindred 

 subjects than do they all put together ; knew, perhaps, all 

 there is to know. 



Jugglers are born, not made. I am not speaking of the 

 mere trick-mongers of the bazaars, but the true magicians, 

 who are not common nor easily found. The otherwise 

 universal rule of the son following in his father's steps is 

 put aside here if the infant be unfitted, in which case another 

 boy is adopted instead, the horoscope cast at the birth of 

 every child being an unerring guide. The stars cannot lie ; 

 they are an open book for those who can read them. 



Another noted juggler gave an exhibition of his powers 

 at a garden party in Bangalore, the host being Major M., 

 the Political Resident there. Bangalore is the capital of 

 Mysore, in the Madras Presidency, and has such an English 

 climate that plants and shrubs common in our gardens at 



