"'Surely,' said I to him, 'you don't mean to say that this man is
dead?'

"'It is only too true,' he replied.

"'Well, it must have been dreadfully sudden,' I said,
sympathetically, 'because I saw him only last Saturday.'

"The old gentleman shook his head sadly, and said, 'You are
mistaken, for he died last Saturday.'

"'Nay,' I returned, 'I am not mistaken, for I recognised him by the
negative.'

"However, the father (for such was his relationship to my sitter)
persisted in saying I was mistaken, and that it was he who called on
the Friday and not his son, and, he said, 'I saw that young lady
(pointing to Miss Simon), and she told me the photographs would not
be ready that week.'

"'That is quite right,' said Miss Simon, 'but Mr. Dickinson also saw
a gentleman on the Saturday morning, and, when I showed Mr.
Dickinson the negative, he said, "Yes, that's the man who called." I
told Mr. Dickinson _then_ of your having called on the Friday.'

"Still Mr. Thompson, sen., seemed to think that we were wrong, and
many questions and cross-questions I put to him only served to
confirm him in his opinion that I had got mixed; but this he
said--no one was authorised to call, nor had they any friend or
relative who would know of the portraits being ordered, neither was
there any one likely to impersonate the man who had sat for his
portrait.

"I had no further interview with the old gentleman until a week
later, when he was much calmer in his appearance and conversation,
and at this interview he told me that his son died on Saturday,
January 3rd, at about 2.30 p.m.; he also stated that at the time I
saw him (the sitter) he was unconscious, and remained so up to the
time of his death. I have not had any explanation of this mysterious
visit up to present date, February 26th, 1891.

"It is curious to me that I have no recollection of hearing the man
come upstairs, or of him going down. In appearance he was pale and
careworn, and looked as though he had been very ill. This thought
occurred to me when he said he had been travelling all night.

"James Dickinson.

"43, Grainger Street, Newcastle."

Miss Simon, in further conversation with me, stated that when the father
called on Friday night and asked for the photographs, he came late, at
least after the electric light w