boy." Mrs James confirmed the perfect
exactness of Phinuit's information; her husband had been wrong.

At the second sitting which Mrs Gibbens had she was told among other
things that one of her daughters, mentioned by name, had at the time a
bad pain in her back, to which she was by no means subject. The detail
was found to be exact.

On another occasion Phinuit announced to Mrs James and her brother,
before the arrival of any telegram, the death of their aunt, which had
just occurred in New York. It is true that this death was momentarily
expected.

At another sitting Phinuit said to Professor James, "You have just
killed a grey and white cat with ether. The wretched animal spun round
and round a long time before dying." This was quite true.

Phinuit, again, told Mrs James that her aunt in New York, the one whose
death he had announced, had written her a letter warning her against all
kinds of mediums. And he sketched the old lady's character, not very
respectfully, in a most amusing way.

I quote these examples to give an idea of the kind of information
furnished by Mrs Piper's controls. But it must not be believed that this
is all. The controls do not need to be entreated to speak. Phinuit is
particularly loquacious, and he often talks for an hour on end. His
remarks are frequently incoherent, and often also obviously false. But,
at the very least, in the good sittings, truthfulness and exactitude
much preponderate, whatever may be the source from which Phinuit
obtains his facts; whether he gets them from disincarnated spirits, as
he asserts; whether he reads them in the consciousness or
sub-consciousness of the sitter, or whether they are furnished him by
what he calls the "influence" which the persons to whom the objects
presented to him belonged have left upon them.

I have forgotten to say that Phinuit asks to have brought to him objects
of some sort which have belonged to the persons about whom he is
consulted. He feels the objects, and says at once, "I feel the influence
of such-a-one; he is dead or he is alive; such a thing has happened to
him." Detail follows on detail, for the most part exact.

As I have already said when speaking of Professor James, Phinuit showed
intimate knowledge of Mrs James's family. Now, there were no members of
the family in the neighbourhood; some were dead, others in California,
and others in the State of Maine.

What I have said will suffice to give the reader a first i