rongest impression on my mind was a tale that Jephson told us.

I had been relating a somewhat curious experience of my own. I met a man
in the Strand one day that I knew very well, as I thought, though I had
not seen him for years. We walked together to Charing Cross, and there
we shook hands and parted. Next morning, I spoke of this meeting to a
mutual friend, and then I learnt, for the first time, that the man had
died six months before.

The natural inference was that I had mistaken one man for another, an
error that, not having a good memory for faces, I frequently fall into.
What was remarkable about the matter, however, was that throughout our
walk I had conversed with the man under the impression that he was that
other dead man, and, whether by coincidence or not, his replies had never
once suggested to me my mistake.

As soon as I finished, Jephson, who had been listening very thoughtfully,
asked me if I believed in spiritualism "to its fullest extent."

"That is rather a large question," I answered. "What do you mean by
'spiritualism to its fullest extent'?"

"Well, do you believe that the spirits of the dead have not only the
power of revisiting this earth at their will, but that, when here, they
have the power of action, or rather, of exciting to action? Let me put a
definite case. A spiritualist friend of mine, a sensible and by no means
imaginative man, once told me that a table, through the medium of which
the spirit of a friend had been in the habit of communicating with him,
came slowly across the room towards him, of its own accord, one night as
he sat alone, and pinioned him against the wall. Now can any of you
believe that, or can't you?"

"I could," Brown took it upon himself to reply; "but, before doing so, I
should wish for an introduction to the friend who told you the story.
Speaking generally," he continued, "it seems to me that the difference
between what we call the natural and the supernatural is merely the
difference between frequency and rarity of occurrence. Having regard to
the phenomena we are compelled to admit, I think it illogical to
disbelieve anything we are unable to disprove."

"For my part," remarked MacShaughnassy, "I can believe in the ability of
our spirit friends to give the quaint entertainments credited to them
much easier than I can in their desire to do so."

"You mean," added Jephson, "that you cannot understand why a spirit, not
compelled as we are by t