Once a Week (magazine)/Series 1/Volume 3/Spirit-rapping made easy. II. - Part 2

by Henry Novra

SPIRIT RAPPING MADE EASY.—No. II.
THE CORNHILL NARRATIVE AND THE
PERFORMANCES OF MR. HOME. BY KATERFELTO.

(Concluded from page 494.)

 

I now come to the performances of Mr. Home himself, which are conceived to be so conclusive by Mr. Howitt and the whole Spiritualist fraternity.

If Mr. Home will meet some half dozen persons (myself included), to be named by the Editor of this Magazine, and, under the conditions which they will prescribe, as essential to a full and fair examination, will prevail on the Spirits to manifest themselves more clearly, or if, under such conditions, they will even repeat the effects mentioned in the “Cornhill” narrative, I will, if I fail in accounting for the phenomena on some known laws of nature, at once admit Mr. Home’s pretensions as a Medium of the Spirit world. If he will not accept this challenge, or, if professedly accepting it, he or the Spirits (I treat them as synonymous) decline the manifestations required for an adequate test, I shall maintain my right to regard him as a clever charlatan. On such occasions as these the avowal of one’s convictions is of far more importance than politeness to individuals; and I proceed in this spirit to perform a public duty.

The representations of Mr. Home himself, as to his relations with the Spirit world, I esteem of no consequence, and I put them aside. Whether he claims or disclaims a mastery of the “secrets of the grave” is perfectly immaterial to the question on which I propose to meet him. This question is a very short, or, at least, a very plain one. Is Mr. Home himself a conscious and controlling agent in the effects produced, and are the manifestations of the so-called Spirits the tricks and devices of his own ingenuity? Is he, in short, a conjuror, without the candour to avow his function? If so, he may tell us that he “is thoroughly impassive in these matters, and that, whatever happens, happens from causes over which he has not the slightest influence;” but his statement is merely a part of his jugglery, and the writer of the “Cornhill” narrative is begging the entire question when he terms it “unreserved,” as if it were true. If Mr. Home is really a conjuror, it is not only a reservation but a denial of the very basis and essence of the truth which it is our business to seek out and ascertain. As an answer to a charge, it is equivalent to a plea of “Not Guilty,” but as evidence to disprove the charge, it is frivolous and immaterial.

It is hardly more to the purpose to discuss Mr. Home’s personal appearance, or the ease and playfulness of his manner, or his apparent respectability. We can hardly expect him to cultivate the airs of a Cagliostro, if he professes to be none, while we give him credit for tact in a superior degree, when we admit the eminence to which he has attained as a Medium. His demeanour may be the effect of adroitness or sincerity, of conscious power or of conscious innocence. All that we can say upon this head is, that his demeanour alone does not convict him. As it is equally insufficient to procure his acquittal, we may dismiss it from our minds as of no more weight than his representations.

If he would favour us with a séance, we should have the best means of forming a conclusive opinion as to the value of both of these. In the meantime we confine ourselves to the description of his performances in the “Cornhill Magazine,” and judge, hypothetically, what these amount to.

Inasmuch as these performances were accompanied by devices obviously adapted to conceal the particular agencies employed, I conceive that they should be viewed with suspicion from the very outset. This is the proper mood in which to approach their consideration. Speculation as to motives or inferences from demeanour, and still less the statements of Mr. Home himself, should be brushed away as so much dust which is simply calculated to mislead us.

When we come to the substantial allegations of the narrative, I find that the writer describes the séance as commencing about nine o’clock in the evening in a spacious drawing-room, no matter where. The company consisted of eight or nine ladies and gentlemen who took their seats at a round table in the centre of the room. In other parts of the room there were sofas and ottomans, and between the centre table and three windows, which filled up one side of the room, there was a large sofa. The windows were draped with thick curtains and protected by spring blinds. The space in front of the centre window was unoccupied; but the windows on the right and left were filled by geranium stands. The reader is invited to observe the words I have italicised, for they indicate circumstances of considerable importance in the exhibitions which followed. We have a right to assume that Mr. Home was already acquainted with the furniture of the apartment and with the manner in which it was disposed. At all events, there was nothing to prevent him from taking a full survey of its capabilities before the séance actually commenced. For whether he has the appearance of a Cagliostro or the reverse, or is easy, or stiff, or candid, or reserved, there can be no doubt that the nature of his function, interpret it as we will, must develop the power of prompt and accurate observation.

The writer passes over some preliminary vibrations and implied performances by the table as of very subordinate interest. At all events, they may have served as requisite preliminaries, and may have prepared the mood of the spectators for the greater marvels to follow. I infer that they were directly instrumental, in a further sense, in arranging the spectators in the very position which suited the subsequent requirements of Mr. Home. If we reflect for a moment we shall see the obvious objection to his placing the spectators at the outset in the position they afterwards assumed. Had he asked, of his own wish or desire, that none of them would sit with his back to the window, the request would have sounded singularly suspicious, and might have aroused the vigilance of some one or other present. It is really a great point to assign to the spirits not only a share in the performance of the tricks themselves, but to call in their aid in arranging the spectators, as I infer, from the following sentence, was done on this occasion.

Thus, the writer says, that “from the unmistakeable indications, conveyed in different forms, the table was finally removed to the centre window displacing the sofa, which was wheeled away. The deep space between the table and the window was unoccupied, but the rest of the circle was closely packed.”

My readers will again observe the part of the arrangement on which I lay stress, because, as I infer, it was absolutely essential that no person should be directly facing the side of the room from which I have reason to suppose that a chief phenomenon subsequently emanated. We are further told that “some sheets of white paper, and two or three lead pencils, an accordion, a small hand-bell, and a few flowers, were placed on the table.” Then “sundry communications took place,” and “at length an intimation was received, through the usual channel of correspondence, that the lights must be extinguished.”

Of course, for the more elaborate class of tricks which can only be performed by some such means as I am about to describe, it is important that the room should be as obscure as possible. The writer of the “Cornhill” narrative himself admits as much in his very brief comment on the intimation received from the table. “As this direction is understood to be given only when unusual manifestations are about to be made, it was followed by an interval of anxious suspense. There were lights on the walls, mantelpiece, and console-table, and the process of putting them out seemed tedious. When the last was extinguished a dead silence ensued, in which the tick of a watch could be heard.” I must confess to a passing contempt for the spirits who can do nothing unusual till all the candles are put out, and I assume this is a reason why they have not as yet ventured on any exhibitions in a public capacity. Moreover, I cannot conceive a more accommodating audience for a conjuror’s devices, nor indeed a much more ridiculous spectacle, than a company of ladies and gentlemen, prepared for something out of the common, sitting exactly as the exhibitor himself has disposed them, credulous, if not already half-convinced, in a state of breathless expectation, squeezed together in the dark.

If my readers will really let their minds dwell on this combination for a moment, and if it does not tickle them, they must be deficient in a sense of humour.

“We must now,” says the writer, “have been in utter darkness, but for the pale light that came in through the window, and the flickering glare thrown fitfully over a distant part of the room by a fire which was rapidly sinking in the grate. We could see, but could scarcely distinguish, our hands upon the table. A festoon of dull gleaming forms round the circle represented what we knew to be our hands. An occasional ray from the window, now and then, revealed the hazy surface of the white sheets” (we presume this means, of the paper) “and the misty bulk of the accordion. We knew where these were placed, and could discover them with the slightest assistance from the grey cold light of a watery sky. The stillness of expectation that ensued during the first few minutes of that visible darkness, was so profound, that, for all the sounds of life that were heard, it might have been an empty chamber. The table and the window, and the space between the table and the window, engrossed all eyes. It was in that direction everybody instinctively looked for a revelation,” and thus, when even the instincts of the audience were in tune, there commenced the series of revelations which I am about to describe.

It is material to observe that, as we are told some time afterwards, Mr. Home himself was seated next the window.

“Presently the tassel of the cord of the spring-blind began to tremble. We could see it plainly against the sky, and attention being drawn to the circumstance, every eye was upon the tassel. Slowly, and apparently with caution, or difficulty, the blind began to descend; the cord was evidently being drawn, but the force applied to pull down the blind seemed feeble and uncertain. It succeeded, however, at last, and the room was thrown into deeper darkness than before.” The instrument by which this was affected was probably a strong pair of lazy-tongs, such as these in figs. 16 and 17, inserted at the side and under cover of the “thick curtains with which the windows were draped.”

Fig. 16.

Fig. 17.

I say, “inserted at the side,” because it is perfectly obvious, from the trembling of the tassel, that it was not employed to pull down the blind, for directly it was so employed it would tremble no longer. We are further informed that the blind was also raised as well as pulled down several times, a feat more quickly manageable, since, as we have observed, it was a spring-blind; and nothing would be easier than to pull the tassel of the spring which hung behind the curtains. The writer remarks the difficulty with which the blind descended, but he does not say as much with respect to its ascent. He then adds a candid and very significant statement, that, “capricious as the movement appeared, the ultimate object seemed to be to diminish the light.”

The writer intimates that their vision was becoming accustomed to the previous gloom, and forms of things were growing palpable, although they could see nothing distinctly. But after the light had been diminished (the spirits being apparently particularly solicitous on this point), “a whisper passed round the table about hands having been seen or felt.” . . . “Unable,” says the writer, “to answer for what happened to others, I will speak only of what I observed myself. The table cover was drawn over my knees as it was with the others;” in short the most convenient means was taken to preclude the detection of the agencies about to operate beneath the table. The writer then says that he distinctly felt a twitch, several times repeated, at his knee. “It was the sensation of a boy’s hand, partly scratching, partly striking and pulling me in play. It went away. Others described the same sensation; and the celerity with which it frolicked, like Puck, under the table, now at one side and now at another, was surprising.” The surprise, however, vanishes at once, if we ascribe these twitches, scratches, blows, pinches, and gambols to their obvious source—a pair of lazy-tongs worked by some person present, and in all probability by Mr. Home himself.

Let us first of all mark the obscurity in which practically his movements were shrouded. “Through the semi-darkness his head was dimly visible against the curtains, and his hands might be seen in a faint white heap before him:” that is to say, they were probably held one over the other, and there would be no visible diminution of the white heap if one of them were withdrawn,—at all events no diminution that could be detected at a sessions of inquiring spirits restricted to observations in a room so effectually darkened. If Mr. Home could extract his under hand, he could work the lazy-tongs beneath the table, especially as the table cover was so conveniently disposed as to cover even the knees of the easy inquisitors. I make the inference that the lazy-tongs were at all events employed by some one, and that Mr. Home was not operating by means of his feet, like his sister Mediums described in my former paper. All the circumstances mentioned here point unequivocally to the employment of this instrument. Some such construction as this in Figs. 18 and 19, would produce the twitches and the pulling; the scratching would be produced by its attempt to get a hold of smooth surfaces, as for example where the trowsers were strained over the knees, &c.; the Fig. 18.

Fig. 19.striking would result from the blow given by the end of the tongs when it was suddenly shot out in search of objects to grasp. It might feel like a “boy’s hand,” or a girl’s hand, or an old woman’s hand, to anybody who speculated, with the least tendency to give licence to his imagination. Moreover, no hands or feet could compete with it in the “celerity with which it frolicked, like Puck, under the table, now at one side, now at another.” It would have been impossible to shift the feet or the hands, so as to attain this celerity without a derangement of the body, of which the contiguous sitters would have been sensible. Therefore I have not the slightest doubt that the lazy-tongs was the source of these phenomena, especially when I find the necessity for their employment, which arose at a subsequent stage of the performance, and to which I shall advert when I mount to that higher stage of the great Cornhill Mystery.

It will be observed that the writer was on the point of identifying this instrument to his own satisfaction; but if he just stopped short of that, he has identified it to mine. He states that soon after the twitching, scraping process, &c., “what seemed to be a large hand came under the table cover, and with the fingers clustered to a point, raised it between me and the table.” As it was “under the table cover,” the impression as to its fingers must have been somewhat conjectural, especially as these same fingers were “clustered to a point.” The writer evinces the uncertainty of his impression as to its nature, for he states that he was somewhat eager to satisfy his curiosity. “I seized it,” he adds, “felt it very sensibly, but it went out like air in my grasp. I know of no analogy in connection with the sense of touch by which I could make the nature of that feeling intelligible. It was as palpable as any soft substance, velvet or pulp, and at the touch it seemed as solid; but pressure reduced it to air.” The surface velvety-feel could be easily produced by various kinds of covering, while its evaporation in the writer’s grasp may be as easily accounted for.

Fig. 20.

Assuming that he seized the two ends when they were in some degree open, as thus in Fig. 20, if they were instantly closed and withdrawn, the pressure of his hand would appear to reduce them to air.

“Whither were they vanished? Into the air; and what seemed corporeal, melted as breath into the wind—would they had staid!” we exclaim in the words of Macbeth, and then we could have given the reader their exact length and true dimensions, and told him whether they were covered with terry velvet or caoutchouc.

It is highly probable that the hand-bell, taken under the table from the hand of a person who held it there, which was rung at different points, and then returned (still under the table), was operated on by the same instrument. The hand of Mr. Home, which still remained on the table, could easily agitate the surface of the table-cloth, so as to cause the white sheets of paper to move, and gradually disappear over the edge of the table into the blank space beneath the window; and if it was there that they lay, any further movements of Mr. Home, who sat next the window, would equally account for their “creasing and crumpling on the floor” for a considerable time afterwards; and they could be returned in like manner. So, also, flowers could be grasped and distributed, with the assistance of the lazy-tongs, or disengaged hand, to any person in the circle. “The substance of what seemed a hand, with white, long, and delicate fingers, rose slowly in the darkness, and, bending over a flower, suddenly vanished with it. . . . The flowers were distributed in the manner in which they had been removed; a hand, of which the lambent gleam was visible, slowly ascending from beneath the cover, and placing the flower in the hand for which it was intended.” The same instrument could snip the geranium blossoms in the adjoining window, and toss them among the company. In all this there is nothing extraordinary—nothing half so strange as the inference seemingly suggested, that the spirits are unable to make presents to their favourites, unless the materials are provided at mortal cost, and are in tolerably close proximity to the recipients.

I infer that in the next place the accordion also disappeared by the very same agency. “It was as black as pitch,” says the writer, “but we could just make out ‘a dark mass’ rising awkwardly above the edge of the table, and clumsily emitting a sound as it passed over into the space beneath. A quarter of an hour afterwards we heard the accordion beginning to play where it lay on the ground.” The accordion was lying “in a narrow space which would not admit of its being drawn out with the requisite freedom to the full extent;” whence I assume that it did not falsify the principles of its construction by any performance of its own, but that something else was heard, of which in the dark, and with the help of the imagination, judiciously directed towards the place where it lay, the helpless accordion obtained all the credit. There is an instrument termed a mouth-harmonicon, of which a representation appears over-leaf, in fig. 21, and which is, in fact, the musical principle of an accordion, to which the mouth plays the part of bellows, with the increased powers of modulation belonging to the mouth by nature. This
Fig. 21.I assume was the instrument which executed the exquisite music described by the narrator, and which was so far beyond the compass of a stolid leather bellows.

The air was wild, and full of strange transitions; with a wail of the most pathetic sweetness running through it. The execution was no less remarkable for its delicacy than its power. When the notes swelled in some of the bold passages, the sound rolled through the room with an astounding reverberation; then, gently subsiding, sank into a strain of divine tenderness. But it was the close that touched the hearts, and drew the tears of the listeners. Milton dreamt of this wondrous termination when he wrote of “linked sweetness long drawn out.” By what art the accordion was made to yield that dying note, let practical musicians determine. Our ears, that heard it, had never before been visited by “a sound so fine.” It continued diminishing and diminishing, and stretching far away into distance and darkness, until the attenuated thread of sound became so exquisite that it was impossible at last to fix the moment when it ceased.

Of course, where the vanishing point was so extremely fine, it is difficult to interpose appropriately, “Bravo, mouth-harmonicon!” but I am not inclined to leave it to “practical musicians” to inquire if an accordion can yield that dying note. I have little doubt that a mouth-harmonicon deserved all the praise, and was really employed for these peculiar effects, more especially as during Mr. Home’s “aërial passage” it was subsequently heard from a distant corner of the room, while there is no evidence that the accordion was not still lying in the place beneath the table, to which it had descended, as I infer, by Mr. Home’s own agency.

My view does not in the least exclude the presumption that the accordion itself was a remarkable instrument. On the contrary, it possessed an internal mechanical capacity of motion, if not of sound, since it subsequently performed, or seemed to perform, in the full light, while held by the narrator and others who were present. It was even difficult to hold, a self-acting accordion being, as I infer, a far more athletic instrument than its self-performing relative a musical snuffbox. If I had myself encountered such an eccentric self-willed instrument, I should have greatly desired to impound it for careful examination. Mr. Howitt would refer me to Plato, and Zoroaster, to Moses and Mrs. Marshall, to rebuke my incredulity; but in answer to all such vapid generalities, I persist in giving to any one, who may witness a similar phenomenon, this significant piece of advice,—“Impound that accordion.”

I now come to the great superlative feat of all, the ascent and aërial passage of Mr. Home; and this is so important, that I am solicitous not to lose a word of the writer’s description, and extract it that we may see just what it amounts to.

Mr. Home was seated next to the window. Through the semi-darkness his head was dimly visible against the curtains, and his hands might be seen in a faint white heap before him. Presently he said in a quiet voice, “My chair is moving—I am off the ground—don’t notice me—talk of something else,” or words to that effect. It was very difficult to restrain the curiosity not unmixed with a more serious feeling, which these few words awakened; but we talked incoherently enough, upon some indifferent topic. I was sitting nearly opposite to Mr. Home, and I saw his hands disappear from the table, and his head vanish into the deep shadow beyond. In a moment or two more he spoke again. This time his voice was in the air above our heads. He had risen from his chair to a height of four or five feet from the ground. As he ascended higher he described his position, which at first was perpendicular, and afterwards became horizontal. He said he felt as if he had been turned in the gentlest manner, as a child is turned in the arms of a nurse. In a moment or two more, he told us that he was going to pass across the window, against the grey silvery light of which he would be visible. We watched in profound stillness, and saw his figure pass from one side of the window to the other, feet foremost, lying horizontally in the air. He spoke to us as he passed, and told us that he would turn the reverse way, and recross the window; which he did. His own tranquil confidence in the safety of what seemed from below a situation of the most novel peril, gave confidence to everybody else; but, with the strongest nerves, it was impossible not to be conscious of a certain sensation of fear or awe. He hovered round the circle for several minutes, and passed this time perpendicularly over our heads. I heard his voice behind me in the air, and felt something lightly brush my chair. It was his foot, which he gave me leave to touch. Turning to the spot where it was on the top of the chair, I placed my hand gently upon it, when he uttered a cry of pain, and the foot was withdrawn quickly, with a palpable shudder. It was evidently not resting on the chair, but floating; and it sprang from the touch as a bird would. He now passed over to the farthest extremity of the room, and we could judge by his voice of the altitude and distance he had attained. He had reached the ceiling, upon which he made a slight mark, and soon afterwards descended and resumed his place at the table. An incident which occurred during this aërial passage, and imparted a strange solemnity to it, was that the accordion, which we supposed to be on the ground under the window close to us, played a strain of wild pathos in the air, from the most distant corner of the room.

It is to be observed that the writer throughout speaks of this feat as really accomplished.

“Mr. Home had risen from his chair four or five feet . . . he ascended higher . . . we saw his figure pass the window . . . he did recross it . . . he hovered round and passed over us . . . his foot was evidently floating . . . he reached the ceiling . . . he afterwards descended, and resumed his place at the table.” The spiritualists who quote this narrative quote it invariably in this sense, as if there was conclusive evidence that Home actually floated about the room. But if we examine the narrative we shall find that this is merely vague inference; and a very brief examination will show what the facts really amount to.

In the first place, there is no evidence that the corporeal Home was actually seen in the air at any time. His figure was seen passing and repassing the window, and even his figure was seen nowhere else. His foot was felt in the air at about the height of the narrator’s chair. His voice was heard in the air, or seemed to be heard in the air in different places. From all this I can make certain inferences as to his devices, but I do not arrive at the conclusion that he actually floated, still less that he did so by the assistance of spirits, whose function it was to chair him, like the candidate at an election.

The first inference I make is that he is a very adroit ventriloquist, aware especially of the chief source of ventriloquial effect, the art of directing the expectations of his audience to look for certain sounds in certain directions and places. “I am off the ground,” he exclaims, that is, ascending into the air; and in a moment or two, “his voice was in the air above our heads.” He told us that he should pass the window, and accordingly, “he spoke to us,” or seemed to speak to us from the appointed situation. “We could judge by his voice of the altitude and distance he had attained.” Let us rather say that imagination assented to his statements when he had previously given an intimation where he desired it to be supposed he would be; for, let me observe, it is extremely difficult to judge of a man’s situation in a room, by his voice only. It would scarcely be fainter if he were near the ceiling than if he were standing on the ground. Let my readers, who doubt this, mount a set of library steps, and ascertain it by experiment. In fact ventriloquial effects will be found to be generally false when they are tested by any true criterion of comparison. Ventriloquists almost always exaggerate nature, especially as a means of indicating distance; and they make up the illusion by prompting their audiences to imagine the effects they fail themselves to represent completely; as any one may see any night of his life in the case of Herr Von Joel, who persists in looking and inducing his audience to look for his “leetle singing lark,” up in the ceiling of Evans’s supper room.

With the assistance of this sort of prompting, it is really extraordinary what ventriloquists can accomplish, and the extent to which they can affect a sympathising audience. Even savages possess this power, and I will cite an instance, described by Capt. Lyons, in which he found a performer as skilful as Mr. Home among the Esquimaux of Igloolik. The whole narrative is so much to the purpose, and so clearly suggestive, that I extract it entire, as a means of comparison and a very opportune assistance to our judgment.

“This personage,” says Captain Lyons, of the Esquimaux Home, “was cunning and intelligent, and whether professionally or from his skill in the chace—but, perhaps, from both reasons—was considered by all the tribe as a man of importance. As I invariably paid great deference to his opinion on all subjects connected with his calling, he freely communicated to me his superior knowledge, and did not scruple to allow of my being present at his interviews with Tornga, or his patron spirit. In consequence of this, I took an early opportunity of requesting my friend to exhibit his skill in my cabin. His old wife was with him, and, by much flattery and an accidental display of a glittering knife and some beads, she assisted me in obtaining my request. All light excluded, our sorcerer began chanting to his wife with great vehemence, and she, in return, answered by singing the Amna-Arja, which was not discontinued during the whole ceremony. As far as I could hear, he afterwards began turning himself rapidly round, and in a loud powerful voice vociferated for Tornga with great impatience, at the same time blowing and snorting like a walrus. His noise, impatience, and agitation increased every moment; and he at length seated himself on the deck, varying his tones and making a rustling with his clothes. Suddenly the voice seemed smothered, and was so managed as to sound as if retreating beneath the deck, each moment becoming more distant, and ultimately giving the idea of being many feet below the cabin, when it ceased entirely. His wife now, in answer to my questions, informed me very seriously that he had dived, and that he would send up Tornga. Accordingly, in about half a minute, a distant blowing was heard very slowly approaching, and a voice which differed from that at first heard was at times mingled with the blowing, until at length both sounds became indistinct, and the old woman informed me that Tornga was come to answer my questions. I accordingly asked several questions of the spirit, to each of which inquiries I received an answer by two loud claps on the deck—which I was given to understand were favourable.

A very hollow yet powerful voice—certainly much different from the tones of Toolmak—now chanted for some time, and a strange jumble of hisses, groans, shouts, and gobbling like a turkey succeeded in rapid order.

The old woman sang with increased energy; and, as I took it for granted that all this was intended to astonish the Kabloona, I cried repeatedly that I was very much afraid. This, as I expected, added fuel to the fire, until the poor immortal, exhausted by its own might, asked leave to retire.

The voice gradually sunk from our hearing as at first, and a very indistinct hissing succeeded; in its advance it sounded like the tones produced by the wind on the bass chords of the Æolian-harp. This was soon changed to a rapid hiss like that of a rocket, and Toolmak, with a yell, announced his return. I had held my breath at the first distant hissing, and twice exhausted myself, yet our conjuror did not once respire, and even his returning and powerful yell was uttered without a previous stop or inspiration of air.

Light being admitted, our wizard was, as might be expected, in a profuse perspiration, and certainly much exhausted by his exertions, which had continued for at least half an hour. We now observed a couple of bunches, each consisting of two stripes of white deerskin, and a long piece of sinew attached to the back of his coat. These we had not observed before, and were informed they were sewn on by Tornga while he was below.

The reader will perceive that Toolmak had great natural capacities similar to those which I ascribe to Mr. Home, and that, with a few lessons from the latter gentleman, he might also have floated about, as Mediums can float, with a “tranquil confidence” in their aërial capacities, inversely proportioned to the darkness of the atmosphere. I have yet, however, to account for the appearance of Mr. Home himself, seen to cross and re-cross the drawing-room window-blind, as in fig. 22; but I will, first of all, quote a letter from Dr. Gully, who was present at this very identical séance, and who, in a letter to the “Morning Star,” exhausts his theory of the artistic contrivances capable of producing this extraordinary spectacle. “Only consider,” says the ingenious Doctor, “that here is a man, between ten and eleven stone in weight, floating about the room for many minutes—in the tomb-like silence which prevailed, broken only by his voice coming from different quarters of the room, according to his then position—is it probable, is it possible,
Fig. 22.that any machinery could be devised—not to speak of its being set up and previously made ready in a room, which was fixed upon as the place of meeting only five minutes before we entered it—capable of carrying such a weight about without the slightest sound of any description? Or suppose, as has been suggested, that he bestrode an inflated balloon, could a balloon have been introduced inflated large enough to hold in mid-air such a weight? Or could it have been inflated with hydrogen gas without being detected by ears, eyes, or nose?”

As this exhausts the list of Dr. Gully’s hypotheses, and as I have no desire to shock such a sincere believer, I say at once that I lay no stress on machinery or inflated balloons. I do not think it likely even that Mr. Home sent past the window an inflated dummy of gold-beater’s skin to represent himself, as many more wary persons have a tendency to suppose. I do not think so for a couple of reasons, either of which is quite sufficient. In the first place, though Mediums must run unusual risks whenever they favour us with unusual performances, it would be too much to risk the ludicrous discovery of a great dummy figure from the sputter of a chance lucifer match or the sudden flash of a concealed lantern. Such a dummy would be liable to a prod with a stick, which would evaporate his hydrogen, and be a “home-thrust” indeed. And, secondly, there is no occasion whatever to encounter this risk; for the effect witnessed on this particular occasion can be produced, by a little compact portable magic-lantern, with the simple addition of one phantasmagoria slide.

As to the disc of the lantern it may be reduced to any shape or figure we please, Fig. 23.

Fig. 24.and nothing would be easier than to make its subdued light correspond exactly with the dimensions and tone of the window-blind on which its shadows are projected. We all know how the black shadows of the phantasmagoria appear to stand out from the surface on which they are displayed into the very centre of a room, and thus we obtain a body—apparently an actual corporeal substance—passing above heads which are mystified by the assistance of a little ventriloquism. A single slide is sufficient, for we have only to insert that slide the reverse way, and the Home who crossed, will then re-cross the blind with undiminished effectiveness.

We now see why there was no one sitting so as to face the wall opposite the window, and why the sofa was displaced to procure this arrangement. Mr. Home’s foot was doubtless touched by the narrator under some such circumstances as these:—

Fig. 25.

“It was withdrawn quickly, with a palpable shudder” at his imminent risk of detection; while as to his “slight mark” upon the ceiling, this could easily have been made by the lazy-tongs.

After this mystification obtained on such very cheap terms, it is easy enough to induce the audience to hear “the tread of spirits with velvet steps across the floor;” and by means of further ventriloquism “the ear catches the plaintive murmur of the departed child whispering a tender cry of ‘Mother!’ through the darkness.” A circle of Pundits so completely puzzled might be permitted even to hear the bottled sounds of the Bells of Solomon’s Temple, which were proffered for sale to the faithful in the middle ages. For my own part, I see, hear, and understand only this much, that Mr. Home is a very clever ventriloquist, a superior player on the mouth-harmonicon; that he possesses an accordion, probably self-acting, a magic-lantern, a lazy-tongs, much assurance, an accomplice or two—perhaps many of them in various quarters—a large circle of accommodating dupes, and of candid, half-doubting, half-credulous spectators, and that he has been too leniently treated by our friends of the “Cornhill Magazine,” who have missed their chance of detecting an ingenious charlatan.

 

[From the communications already received on the subject of these articles, and from those yet expected, it may be necessary to recur to the subject in some future number. On this point, should occasion arise, our readers will not be disappointed.—Ed. Once a Week.]