544 
The Transfer of Sensation . [September, 
occasions the room was darkened. The only loophole left 
for those who contend that Mrs. Croad and her friends are 
deceivers, and have succeeded in mystifying Dr. Davey and 
his professional friends, is the theory of collusion. Did any 
person present, for instance, and more especially the daugh- 
ter, convey to Mrs. Croad hints as to the nature of the 
pictures and photographs by means of touches or pressure ? 
It has been already stated that a peculiar “ sympathy,” or 
“ community of ideas and sensations,” existed between the 
mother and the daughter. This point has not escaped the 
attention of the author. He informs us that “ Miss Croad 
stood or sat, as a very general rule, on the left of her mother 
and very close to her ; in fadt the head of Mrs. Croad re- 
clined on the right shoulder of her daughter, to say nothing 
of the frequent, though temporary, contact of the fingers of 
Miss Croad with the cheek of her mother.” Dr. Davey, 
therefore, very naturally asks, “ In what relationship, if any, 
did such close and personal contact of these two persons 
stand to the strange perceptive power already explained with 
regard to the pidture-cards and photographs ? Was the said 
contadt the cause or source in any degree of the lucidity or 
clairvoyance manifested over and over again by Mrs. Croad, 
and witnessed by so many?” It has been suggested that 
Miss Croad did, in some strange way, convey to her mother 
during the testing a knowledge of the cards, the objedts 
represented on them, their colours, &c. Well, the suggestion 
was adted on : the same testing, on being again and again 
repeated, and in the absence of Miss Croad from the room 
occupied by her mother, proved altogether and conclusively 
in favour of Mrs. Croad. The same evidence of the same 
“ transference of special sense ” from the eyes to the fingers 
was always forthcoming. 
Hence, therefore, except we are prepared to say boldly 
“ Tant pis pour les faits ,” we must accept the phenomena as 
genuine, and may, if we please, pronounce them clair- 
voyance. 
But we must now refer *to the two cases where the expe- 
riments were performed, as it would appear successfully, in 
a darkened room. Here the eyes would evidently be at 
fault. Sight depends plainly on a perception of the rays of 
light partially absorbed by and partially refledted from the 
surfaces of bodies illuminated. But where there is no light, 
either absorbed or reflected, seeing, as we commonly under- 
stand it, can be performed neither by the eye nor by any 
other organ of the body adting vicariously in its stead. Two 
suppositions are, however, still open : — Do objedts which 
