re
described. If he found it difficult to perform simultaneously the two
operations of drawing his material from the astral light and
precipitating the writing on the paper, he might have either ordinary
ink or a small quantity of coloured powder on the table beside him,
which, being already physical matter, could be drawn upon more
readily.

It is of course obvious that the possession of this power would be a
very dangerous weapon in the hands of an unscrupulous person, since it
is just as easy to imitate one man's handwriting as another's, and it
would be impossible to detect by any ordinary means a forgery
committed in this manner. A pupil definitely connected with any Master
has always an infallible test by which he knows whether any message
really emanates from that Master or not, but for others the proof of
its origin must always lie solely in the contents of the letter and
the spirit breathing through it, as the handwriting, however cleverly
imitated, is of absolutely no value as evidence.

As to speed, a pupil new to the work of precipitation would probably
be able to image only a few words at a time, and would, therefore, get
on hardly more rapidly than if he wrote his letter in the ordinary
way, but a more experienced individual who could visualize a whole
page or perhaps the entire letter at once would get through his work
with greater facility. It is in this manner that quite long letters
are sometimes produced in a few seconds at a _seance_.

When a picture has to be precipitated the method is precisely the
same, except that here it is absolutely necessary that the entire
scene should he visualized at once, and if many colours are required
there is of course the additional complication of manufacturing them,
keeping them separate, and reproducing accurately the exact tints of
the scene to be represented. Evidently there is scope here for the
exercise of the artistic faculty, and it must not be supposed that
every inhabitant of the astral plane could by this method produce an
equally good picture; a man who had been a great artist in life, and
had therefore learnt how to see and what to look for, would certainly
be very much more successful than the ordinary person if he attempted
precipitation when on the astral plane after death.

[Sidenote: Slate-writing.]

The slate-writing, for the production of which under test conditions
some of the greatest mediums have been so famous, is sometimes
produced by