610 PSYCHOLOGY. 



over, or upside down, altliougli the bystanders have to re- 

 sort to artifice to identify it again. The Subject notes pe- 

 culiarities on the card, too small for waking observation to 

 detect.* If it be said that the spectators guide him by 

 their manner, their breathing, etc., that is only another 

 proof of his hypersesthesia ; for he undoubtedly is con- 

 scious of subtler personal indications (of his operator's 

 mental states especially) than he could notice in his waking 

 state. Examples of this are found in the so-called ' mag- 

 netic rapport.' This is a name for the fact that in deep 

 trance, or in lighter trance whenever the suggestion is 

 made, the subject is deaf and blind to everyone but the 

 operator or those spectators to whom the latter expressly 

 awakens his senses. The most violent appeals from any- 

 one else are for him as if non-existent, whilst he obeys the 

 faintest signals on the part of his hypnotizer. If in cata- 

 lepsy, his limbs will retain their attitude only when the 

 operator moves them ; when others move them they fall 

 down, etc. A more remarkable fact still is that the patient 

 will often answer anyone whom his operator touches, or at 

 whom he even points his finger, in however concealed a 

 manner. All which is rationally explicable by expectation 

 and suggestion, if only it be farther admitted that his 

 senses are acutely sharpened for all the operator's move- 

 ments, f He often shows great anxiety and restlessness if 

 the latter is out of the room. A favorite experiment of 

 Mr. E. Gurney's was to put the subject's hands througli an 

 opaque screen, and cause the operator to point at one 

 finger. That finger presently grew insensible or rigid. A 

 bystander pointing simultaneously at another finger, never 

 made that insensible or rigid. Of course the elective rap- 

 port with their operator had been developed in these 



* It should be said, however, that the bystander's abihty lo di-scrimi- 

 nate unmarked cards and sheets of paper from each other is much greater 

 than one would naturally suppose. 



f I must repeat, however, that we are here on the verge of possibly un- 

 known forces and modes of communication. Hypuotizatiou at a distance, 

 with no grounds for expectation on the subject's part that it was to be 

 tried, seems pretty well established in certain very rare cases. See in 

 general, for information on these matters, the Proceedings of the Soc. for 

 Psych. Research, passim. 



