Notices of Books. 
[July, 
far this test, had it been applied, would have satisfied the 
objedtor, may be imagined from his entirely ignoring all the 
tests, many of them at least as good, which were actually applied. 
The following are a few of these: — Test i. Von Reichenbach 
arranged with a friend to stand in another room with a stone 
wall between him and the patient’s bed, holding a powerful 
magnet, the armature of which was to be closed or opened at a 
given signal. The patient detected, on every occasion, whether 
the magnet was opened or closed. Test 2. M. Baumgartner, a 
professor of physics, after seeing the effedts of magnets on 
patients, took from his pocket what he said was one of his most 
powerful magnets, to try its effects. The patient, to Von Reichen- 
bach’s astonishment, declared she found this magnet on the 
contrary very weak, and its adtion on her hardly more perceptible 
than a piece of iron. M. Baumgartner then explained that this 
magnet, though originally very powerful, had been as completely 
as possible deprived of its magnetism, and that he had brought 
it as a test. Here was suggestion and expectation in full force, 
yet it did not in the least affedt the patient. (For these two 
tests see “ Ashburner’s Translation of Reichenbach,” pp. 39, 40.) 
Test 3. A large crystal (placed in a new position before each 
patient was brought into the dark room) was always at once 
detected by means of its light, yellower and redder than that 
from magnets ( loc . cit., p. 86). Test 4. A patient confined 
in a darkened passage held a wire which communicated with a 
room in which experiments were made on plates connedted with 
this wire. As these plates were exposed to sunlight or shade, 
the patient described corresponding changes in the luminous ap- 
pearances of the end of the wire {loc. cit. p. 147). Test 5. The 
light from magnets, &c., was thrown on a screen by a lens, 
so that the image could be instantly and noislessly changed in 
size and position at pleasure. Twelve patients, eight of them 
healthy and new to the enquiry, saw the image, and described its 
alterations of size and position as the lens or screen was shifted 
in the dark {loc. cit., p. 585). Dr. Carpenter’s only reply to all 
this is, that “ Baron Reichenbach’s researches upon ‘ Odyle ’ 
were discredited a quarter of a century ago, alike by the united 
voice of scientific opinion in his own country, and by that of the 
medical profession here.” Even if this were the fadf, it would 
have nothing to do with the matter, which is one of experiment 
and evidence, not of the belief or disbelief of certain prejudiced 
persons, since to discredit is not to disprove. The painless 
operations in mesmeric sleep were “ discredited ” by the highest 
medical authorities in this country, and yet they were true. But 
Dr. Elliotson, Dr. Ashburner, and others, accepted Reichen- 
bach’s discoveries ; and some of the Vienna physicians even, 
after seeing the experiments with persons “ whose honour, truth- 
fulness, and impartiality they could vouch for,” also accepted 
them as proved. 
