nts of the table--generally to the
left. The present experiment did not stand alone. You must remember also
that the table was at this time more than two feet from Mrs. Smiley's
toes, her dress was tacked to the floor, and her ankles controlled by a
tape whose ends were nailed to the floor four feet behind her chair.

"So far as matter can testify, Mrs. Smiley is not concerned in this
movement of the table," I said. "The question is now up to us. Which of
us is doing this?"

"I am not," answered Brierly.

"Nor I," declared Fowler.

"Nor I," chimed in Mrs. Fowler.

At this moment the psychic began to stir again. "Look out!" I called,
warningly. "Let every hand be accounted for. Some new demonstration is
preparing. These periods of suffering are strangely like the pangs of
childbirth. I wonder if, after all, Archdeacon Colley was not in the
right when he asserted that he had seen the miraculous issue of
phantoms. I confess that when I read it first I smiled with the rest,
for his description of the process was not very poetic. He declared that
he saw a white vapor steam from the side of the psychic, like vapor from
a kettle, forming a little cloud, and from this nebulous mass various
phantasms appeared, ranging from a little child to a full-grown man. It
is curious how exactly similar all the reports of this process are.
Crookes speaks of a milky-white vapor which condensed to a form, and
Richet and Maxwell describe it as a sort of condensing process. I have
seen it myself, but could not believe in the evidence of my own eyes.
One can see all kinds of things in the dark."

Peace had again fallen upon our psychic--the peace of exhaustion; as if,
her struggles being over, her flesh-free spirit were at large in the
room. The silence was profound, yet somehow thrilling with potency.

In this hush the megaphone was lifted slightly and dropped, making us
all start. It was as if a feeble hand had tried to manipulate it without
success. "Let us keep test conditions," I urged. "Please do not make a
movement now without warning me of your intentions. Keep the circuit
closed." Here I addressed "Wilbur": "Let's see if you can handle the
cone under strictly test conditions. Come now, lift it! Lift it!" I
repeated the command with intent to concentrate all will-power of both
psychic and sitters upon the thing desired, as Maxwell was accustomed to
do in his experiments with Meurice.

Several times the forces strove to carry out