EXPLANATION OF OBSERVATIONS 159 



accidentally or because his prejudice was temporarily 

 overcome — he commanded ; " Dis deux ! ". Hans re- 

 sponded promptly with 2 taps. He was greatly sur- 

 prised and believed that Hans had gotten hold of the 

 French by hearing it spoken in his environment. Possi- 

 bly he understood also " trois " and " quatre " ? He put 

 the questions and received correct responses. He asked 

 again, " dix ", " vingt ", and so on to " soixante ". At 

 " soixante — six " he became doubtful. Indeed, Hans 

 failed him. At " quatre-vingt ", the game began again. 

 " Cent ", again, succeeded. The old saying that " Faith 

 will move mountains " was verified once more.* 



* It has been scientifically proven that a number of supposed mys- 

 tical phenomena, table-moving, table-rapping, and divination by means 

 of the rod, all are the result of involuntary movements made unawares 

 by those concerned, just as in the case of this work with Hans. (We 

 must of course except those not infrequent instances in which the phe- 

 nomena in question are purposely and fraudulently simulated.) There 

 is this difference, however, that there the thing affected is a lifeless ob- 

 ject, — the table or the rod, — here it is a living organism, the horse; hence 

 there the immediate effect of the movement is physical work in the form 

 of energy expended in moving the table, here the movement becomes a 

 visual stimulus. A number of observations which I find in the relevant 

 literature, and which I shall introduce into this chapter, may serve to 

 show how close is the similarity between the two cases, how much 

 depends upon the questioner, and how little really upon the Instrument 

 — whether table or horse — which is acted upon. 



Two examples will sufiice to illustrate the significance of belief and 

 of the concentrated attention that results from it. The first is taken 

 from the letters of Father P. Lebrun on the divining rod ^, which ap- 

 peared in 1696. An old woman once told a treasure-seeker that she had 

 always heard that a treasure was buried at a certain place in the fields. 

 The man, who was known as an expert in the art of using the divining 

 rod, immediately set out to locate the gold. Lo, and behold, the moment 

 he set foot on the spot described by the old woman, the branch turns 

 downward, and from Its movements the man gathers that twelve feet 

 below ground there lies buried some copper, silver and gold. He calls 



