red every bit of my skill and my best tact to prevent them from going
away convinced of the imposture."

On the way to Rochester by canal, the "rappings," according to Mrs.
Underhill, pursued her. The "Spirits became quite bold and rapped loudly"
at the dinner-table in the cabin; "and occasionally" she adds, "_one end
of the table would jump up and nearly spill the water out of our glasses;
but there was so much noise on the boat (going through the locks, etc.)
that only we, who recognized the sounds, knew of them_."

It would be easy, indeed--on this very thin reservation, to the effect
that "only we, who recognized the sounds, knew of them"--to denounce the
whole of this statement as the grossest falsehood. I have, however, the
personal assurance of Mrs. Catharine Fox Jencken that the "rappings" were
really heard, but that they were done by her with her feet. On the other
hand, she declares that the joggling or lifting of the table never took
place; nor did she ever hear of it till Mrs. Underhill's book was
published. It may be observed here that the latter carefully refrains from
informing us whether the passengers also failed to observe the singular
disturbance of the cabin table, at which they were dining.

At Rochester, Mrs. Fish seems to have devoted herself to developing and
elaborating the falsehood of Spiritualism. Singularly enough, to this
matron, who had never before evinced the least possession of so-called
"mediumistic" qualities, all sorts of grotesque and terrorizing wonders
now arrived. This is a fair specimen of her narrative, relating to the
period in question:

"In the evening, my friend, Jane Little, and two or three other friends,
called in to spend an hour or two with us. We sang and I played on the
piano; but even then, while the lamp was burning brightly(!), I felt the
deep throbbing of the dull accompaniment of the invisibles, keeping time
to the music as I played; but I did not wish to have my visitors know it,
and the spirits seemed kind enough not to make themselves heard (!) that
others would observe what was so apparent to me."

The book to which I am obliged to refer so constantly, and which is a good
example of the bulk of spiritualistic literature, is full of passages ten
times as absurd as this one, and having just as strongly the stamp of the
crudest and most clumsy invention. For the most part, the only appropriate
treatment for such absurdities is contemptuous silence. Occasiona