length the enormous results obtained by
English scientists and the doctors of the medical school at Nancy, and
the facts which he adduced appeared to me so strange, that I declared
that I was altogether incredulous.

"We are," he declared, "on the point of discovering one of the most
important secrets of nature, I mean to say, one of its most important
secrets on this earth, for assuredly there are some up in the stars,
yonder, of a different kind of importance. Ever since man has thought,
since he has been able to express and write down his thoughts, he has
felt himself close to a mystery which is impenetrable to his coarse and
imperfect senses, and he endeavors to supplement the feeble penetration
of his organs by the efforts of his intellect. As long as that
intellect remained in its elementary stage, this intercourse with
invisible spirits assumed forms which were commonplace though
terrifying. Thence sprang the popular belief in the supernatural, the
legends of wandering spirits, of fairies, of gnomes, of ghosts, I might
even say the conception of God, for our ideas of the Workman-Creator,
from whatever religion they may have come down to us, are certainly the
most mediocre, the stupidest, and the most unacceptable inventions that
ever sprang from the frightened brain of any human creature. Nothing is
truer than what Voltaire says: 'If God made man in His own image, man
has certainly paid Him back again.'

"But for rather more than a century, men seem to have had a
presentiment of something new. Mesmer and some others have put us on an
unexpected track, and within the last two or three years especially, we
have arrived at results really surprising."

My cousin, who is also very incredulous, smiled, and Dr. Parent said to
her: "Would you like me to try and send you to sleep, Madame?"

"Yes, certainly."

She sat down in an easy-chair, and he began to look at her fixedly, as
if to fascinate her. I suddenly felt myself somewhat discomposed; my
heart beat rapidly and I had a choking feeling in my throat. I saw that
Madame Sable's eyes were growing heavy, her mouth twitched, and her
bosom heaved, and at the end of ten minutes she was asleep.

"Go behind her," the doctor said to me; so I took a seat behind her. He
put a visiting-card into her hands, and said to her: "This is a
looking-glass; what do you see in it?"

She replied: "I see my cousin."

"What is he doing?"

"He is twisting his mustache."

"And now