tent in my own mind
or in the mind of the person in charge of the sitting, or in the mind of
the person trying to get communication with someone in another state of
existence, or of some companion present with such a person, or in the
mind of some absent person alive somewhere else in the world."

In the _Boston Advertiser_ of October 25, 1901, there appeared a
statement dictated by Mrs Piper to a representative of the paper, saying
that she had made no such statement as that published in _the New York
Herald_ to the effect that "spirits of the departed do not control" her,
and later in the _Boston Journal_ for October 29, 1901, there appeared
an account of interviews with Dr Hodgson and Mrs Piper, in which Mrs
Piper stated that though she had said "something to the effect that" she
"would never hold another sitting with Mr Hodgson," and that she "would
die first" to a _New York Herald_ reporter the summer before, when she
gave the original interview, she now intended, regardless of whatever
may have been said, to go on with the present arrangement with Dr
Hodgson and the Society as formerly. She still held and expressed the
view that the manifestations are not spiritualistic, and felt that the
telepathic theory is more probable than the spiritualistic hypothesis.

It will be seen that in none of these reports is there any justification
for the somewhat sensational use of the word "Confessions" in the
original article. Mrs Piper made no statements, as the use of that word
suggests, concerning the source of her knowledge; she expressed her
preference for one of two hypothetical explanations of the origin of
that knowledge. No question was raised in the original article as to Mrs
Piper's honesty or as to the genuineness of her trance phenomena; on the
contrary she is represented by the reporter of the _New York Herald_ as
holding a view of those phenomena which asserts that they are not
fraudulent. She expresses her personal preference for the telepathic
hypothesis rather than the spiritualist hypothesis as an explanation of
them; on this point it should be remembered that the medium is not in a
more favourable position for forming an opinion than those who sit with
her, since she does not remember what passes while she is in trance, and
is therefore dependent for her knowledge on the reports of the sitters.

The allegation of the _New York Herald_ as to her intention to
discontinue the sittings was unfounded; after a su