THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF SELF. 397 



session' of the modern sort as one can find.* Lurancy was 

 a young girl of fourteen, living witli her parents at Watseka, 

 111., who (after various distressing hysterical disorders and 

 spontaneous trances, during which she was possessed by de- 

 parted spirits of a more or less grotesque sort) finally declared 

 herself to be animated by the spirit of Mary Roflf (a 

 neighbor's daughter, who had died in an insane asylum 

 twelve years before) and insisted on being sent ' home' to Mr. 

 Roif 's house. After a week of ' homesickness ' and impor- 

 tunity on her part, her parents agreed, and the Roffs, who 

 pitied her, and who were spiritualists into the bargain, took 

 her in. Once there, she seems to have convinced the family 

 that their dead Mary had exchanged habitations with Lu- 

 rancy. Lurancy was said to be temporarily in heaven, and 

 Mary's spirit now controlled her organism, and lived again 

 in her former earthly home. 



"The girl, now in ner new home, seemed perfectly happy and con- 

 tent, knowing every person and everything that Mary knew when in 

 her original body, twelve to twenty-five years ago, recognizing and call- 

 ing by name those who were friends and neighbors of the family from 

 1852 to 1865, when Mary died, calling attention to scores, yes, hundreds 

 of incidents that transpired during her natural life. During all the 

 period of her sojourn at Mr. Roffs she had no knowledge of, and did 

 not recognize, any of Mr. Vennum's family, their friends or neigliJbors, 

 yet Mr. and Mrs. Vennum and their children visited her and Mr. Roff's 

 people, she being introduced to them as to any strangers. After fre- 

 quent visits, and hearing them often and favorably spoken of, she 

 learned to love them as acquaintances, and visited them with Mrs. Roff 

 three times. From day to day she appeared natural, easy, affable, and 

 industrious, attending diligently and faithfully to her household duties, 

 assisting in the general work of the family as a faithful, prudent daugh- 

 ter might be supposed to do, singing, reading, or conversing as oppor- 

 tunity offered, upon all matters of private or general interest to the 

 family. 



The so-called Mary whilst at the Koffs' would sometimes 

 * go back to heaven,' and leave the body in a ' quiet trance,' 

 i.e., without the original personality of Lurancy returning. 

 After eight or nine weeks, however, the memory and 

 maijuer of Lurancy would sometimes partially, but not en- 

 tirely, return for a few minutes. Once Luraucy seems to 



* The Watseka Wonder, by E. W. Stevens. Chicago, Religio-Philo. 

 sophical Publishing House, 18S7. 



