However objective my vision may be, before
believing in the materiality of a hallucination, I feel I am bound to
doubt my own senses and sanity.... Besides, what bosh all this is! As
if I ever will allow myself to believe in the reality of a thing that
I alone saw; which belief implies also the admission of somebody else
governing and dominating, for the time being, my optical nerves, as well
as my brains."

"However, there are any number of people, who do not doubt, because they
have had proof that this phenomenon really occurs," remarked the Takur,
in a careless tone, which showed he had not the slightest desire to
insist upon this topic.

However, this remark only increased Mr. Y----'s excitement.

"No doubt there are!" he exclaimed. "But what does that prove?
Besides them, there are equal numbers of people who believe in the
materialization of spirits. But do me the kindness of not including me
among them!"

"Don't you believe in animal magnetism?"

"To a certain extent, I do. If a person suffering from some contagious
illness can influence a person in good health, and make him ill, in his
turn, I suppose somebody else's overflow of health can also affect the
sick person, and, perhaps cure him. But between physiological contagion
and mesmeric influence there is a great gulf, and I don't feel inclined
to cross this gulf on the grounds of blind faith. It is perfectly
possible that there are instances of thought-transference in cases of
somnambulism, epilepsy, trance. I do not positively deny it, though I am
very doubtful. Mediums and clairvoyants are a sickly lot, as a rule. But
I bet you anything, a healthy man in perfectly normal conditions is not
to be influenced by the tricks of mesmerists. I should like to see a
magnetizer, or even a Raj-Yogi, inducing me to obey his will."

"Now, my dear fellow, you really ought not to speak so rashly," said the
colonel, who, till then, had not taken any part in the discussion.

"Ought I not? Don't take it into your head that it is mere boastfulness
on my part. I guarantee failure in my case, simply because every
renowned European mesmerist has tried his luck with me, without any
result; and that is why I defy the whole lot of them to try again, and
feel perfectly safe about it. And why a Hindu Raj-Yogi should succeed
where the strongest of European mesmerists failed, I do not quite
see...."

Mr. Y---- was growing altogether too excited, and the Takur dropped the
subj