the degree in which it works within private families in America. Has
anything of the kind appeared in England? And has the motion of the
tables ever taken the form of alphabetical expression, which has been
the case in America? I had a letter from Athens the other day,
mentioning that 'nothing was talked of there except moving tables and
spiritual manifestations.' (The writer was not a believer.) Even here,
from the priest to the Mazzinian, they are making circles. An engraving
of a spinning table at a shop window bears this motto: '_E pur si
muove!_' That's adroit for Galileo's land, isn't it? Now mind you tell
me whatever you hear and see. How does Mrs. Crowe decide? By the way, I
was glad to observe by the papers that she has had a dramatic success.

Your Alexander Smith has noble stuff in him. It's undeniable, indeed. It
strikes us, however, that he has more imagery than verity, more colour
than form. He will learn to be less arbitrary in the use of his
figures--of which the opulence is so striking--and attain, as he ripens,
more clearness of outline and depth of intention. Meanwhile none but a
poet could write this, and this, and this.

Your faithfully affectionate
E.B.B., properly speaking BA.

July 3.

This was written ever so long since. Here we are in July; but I won't
write it over again. The 'tables' are speaking alphabetically and
intelligently in Paris; they knock with their legs on the floor,
establishing (what was clear enough before to _me_) the connection
between the table-moving and 'rapping spirits.' Sarianna--who is of the
unbelieving of temperaments, as you know--wrote a most curious account