. It is true that in his great work, "Human
Personality, and its Survival of Bodily Death," Mr. Myers gives a brief
summary of the Report; but he condenses the thirty-six pages of the
original Report and its appendices into four pages of "Human
Personality," which are quite insufficient to convey an adequate idea of
the Report itself. Also, the cost of Mr. Myers' book debars from it the
mass of readers. This Report was followed up a little later by a brief
article by Mr. Myers, forming an important supplement.[24]

In the Report itself its joint authors say: "We propose the
question--Have Home's phenomena ever been plausibly explained as
conjuring tricks, or in accordance with known laws of nature? And we
answer--No; they have not been so explained, nor can we so explain
them."[25] In commenting on the Joint Report, by Professor Barrett and
himself, Mr. Myers puts the problem as to Home in this form: "There is
thus a considerable body of evidence as to Home, which enables us to
discuss the three questions: (1) Was he ever convicted of fraud? (2) Did
he satisfy any trained observer in a series of experiments selected by
the observer and not by himself? (3) Were the phenomena entirely beyond
the scope of the conjurer's art?"[26]

In the Joint Report the writers say--(1) As to fraud: "We have found no
allegations of fraud on which we should be justified in laying much
stress. Mr. Robert Browning has told to one of us the circumstances
which mainly led to that opinion of Home which was expressed in 'Mr.
Sludge, the Medium,' It appears that a lady (since dead) repeated to Mr.
Browning a statement made to her by a lady and gentleman (since dead),
as to their finding Home in the act of experimenting with phosphorus on
the production of 'spirit lights,' which, so far as Mr. Browning
remembers, were to be rubbed round the walls of the room, near the
ceiling, so as to appear when the room was darkened. This piece of
evidence powerfully impressed Mr. Browning; but it comes to us at
third-hand, without written record, and at a distance of nearly forty
years.

"We have received one other account from a gentleman of character and
ability, of a seance in very poor light, when the 'spirit-hand' moved in
such a way as to seem dependent on the action of Home's arms and legs.
This account is subjoined [in the Report] as Appendix D. We may add that
few, if any, of the lights seen at Home's seances could (as they are
described to us) hav