after this we saw the accident in the paper, it was effective, as you
may suppose!

Profane or not, I am resolved on getting as near to a solution of the
spirit question as I can, and I don't believe in the least risk of
profanity, seeing that whatever is, must be permitted; and that the
contemplation of whatever is, must be permitted also, where the
intentions are pure and reverent. I can discern no more danger in
psychology than in mineralogy, only intensely a greater interest. As to
the spirits, I care less about what they are capable of communicating,
than of the fact of there being communications. I certainly wouldn't set
about building a system of theology out of their oracles. God forbid.
They seem abundantly foolish, one must admit. There is probably,
however, a mixture of good spirits and bad, foolish and wise, of the
lower orders perhaps, in both kinds....

Isa, you and I must try to make head against the strong-minded women,
though really you half frighten me prospectively....

---- ----, one of the strong-minded, we just escaped with life from in
London, and again in Paris. In Rome she has us! What makes me talk so
ill-naturedly is the information I have since received, that she has put
everybody unfortunate enough to be caught, into a book, and published
them at full length, in American fashion. Now I do confess to the
greatest horror of being caught, stuck through with a pin, and
beautifully preserved with other butterflies and beetles, even in the
album of a Corinna in yellow silk. I detest that particular sort of
victimisation....

We are invited to go to Constantinople this summer, to visit the