a restless spirit, the scene in which those crimes had been committed,
I should observe that the house was infested by strange sights and
sounds before the old woman died--you smile--what would you say?"

"I would say this, that I am convinced, if we could get to the bottom
of these mysteries, we should find a living human agency."

"What! you believe it is all an imposture? For what object?"

"Not an imposture in the ordinary sense of the word. If suddenly I
were to sink into a deep sleep, from which you could not awake me, but
in that sleep could answer questions with an accuracy which I could
not pretend to when awake,--tell you what money you had in your
pocket, nay, describe your very thoughts,--it is not necessarily an
imposture, any more than it is necessarily supernatural. I should be,
unconsciously to myself, under a mesmeric influence, conveyed to me
from a distance by a human being who had acquired power over me by
previous _rapport_."

"But if a mesmerizer could so affect another living being, can you
suppose that a mesmerizer could also affect inanimate objects: move
chairs,--open and shut doors?"

"Or impress our senses with the belief in such effects,--we never
having been _en rapport_ with the person acting on us? No. What is
commonly called mesmerism could not do this; but there may be a power
akin to mesmerism, and superior to it,--the power that in the old days
was called Magic. That such a power may extend to all inanimate
objects of matter, I do not say; but if so, it would not be against
Nature,--it would be only a rare power in Nature which might be given