w, he is so frightfully
nervous. He so little expected it, he always thought it was only one of
the little ailments of girls, and Maria (Lady Stisted) was over anxious;
so it has come like a sledge-hammer upon him. I feel what a poor letter
this is, but my heart is full, and I do not know how to express myself.
Your attached and sympathising Aunt Zoo."

Burton was just then engaged upon his work The Land of Midian Revisited,
and he dedicated it to the memory of his "much loved niece."

96. Burton's "Six Senses."

On 2nd December 1878, Burton lectured at 38, Great Russell Street
before the British National Association of Spiritualists--taking as his
subject, "Spiritualism in Foreign Lands." His ideas on Spiritualism had
been roughly outlined some time previous in a letter to The Times. [312]
He said that the experience of twenty years had convinced him: (1) that
perception is possible without the ordinary channels of the senses, and
(2) that he had been in the presence of some force or power which he
could not understand. Yet he did not believe that any spirits
were subject to our calls and caprices, or that the dead could be
communicated with at all. He concluded, "I must be contented to be at
best a spiritualist without the spirits." The letter excited interest.
The press commented on it, and street boys shouted to one another, "Take
care what you're doing! You haven't got Captain Burton's six senses."
At Great Russell Street, Burton commenced by defending materialism. He
could not see with Guizot that the pursuit of psychology is as elevating
as that of materialism is degrading. What right, he asked, had the
theologian to limit the power of the Creator. "Is not the highest honour
His who from the worst can draw the best?" [313] He then quoted his
letter to The Times, and declared that he still held the same opinions.
The fact that thunder is in the air, and the presence of a cat may be
known even though one cannot see, hear, taste, smell or feel thunder
or the cat. He called this force--this sixth sense--zoo-electricity.
He then gave an account of spiritualism, thaumaturgy, and wizardry, as
practised in the East, concluding with a reference to his Vikram and
the Vampire. "There," said he, "I have related under a facetious form of
narrative many of the so-called supernaturalisms and preternaturalisms
familiar to the Hindus." [314] These studies will show the terrible
'training,' the ascetic tortures, whereby