. Mill, who was not a
Spiritualist, and found that every detail was correct. Young Mill had
lost his life as narrated. Mr. Mill, senior, explained that while
sitting in his study at midnight on the date named he had heard the
Gipsy song from "Il Trovatore," which had been a favourite of his
boy's, and being unable to trace the origin of the music, had finally
thought that it was a freak of his imagination. The test connected
with the quick-step had reference to a tune which the young man used to
play upon the piccolo, but which was so rapid that he never could get
it right, for which he was chaffed by the family.

I tell this story at length to make the reader realise that when young
Mill, and others like him, give such proofs of accuracy, which we can
test for ourselves, we are bound to take their assertions very
seriously when they deal with the life they are actually leading,
though in their very nature we can only check their accounts by
comparison with others.

Now let me epitomise what these assertions are. They say that they are
exceedingly happy, and that they do not wish to return. They are among
the friends whom they had loved and lost, who meet them when they die
and continue their careers together. They are very busy on all forms
of congenial work. The world in which they find themselves is very
much like that which they have quitted, but everything keyed to a
higher octave. As in a higher octave the rhythm is the same, and the
relation of notes to each other the same, but the total effect
different, so it is here. Every earthly thing has its equivalent.
Scoffers have guffawed over alcohol and tobacco, but if all things are
reproduced it would be a flaw if these were not reproduced also. That
they should be abused, as they are here, would, indeed, be evil
tidings, but nothing of the sort has been said, and in the much
discussed passage in "Raymond," their production was alluded to as
though it were an unusual, and in a way a humorous, instance of the
resources of the beyond. I wonder how many of the preachers, who have
taken advantage of this passage in order to attack the whole new
revelation, have remembered that the only other message which ever
associated alcohol with the life beyond is that of Christ Himself, when
He said: "I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine until
that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom."

This matter is a detail, however, and it is