r."[25] (Correct, as
before.) "Where's Thompson? The one that lost the purse?"

O. L.--"Yes, I know."

Phinuit.--"Well, I met his brother, and he sent love to all--to sister
Fanny, he told me especially. He tried to say it just as he was going
out, but had no time--was too weak."

O. L.--"Oh, yes, we just heard him."

Phinuit.--"Oh, you did? That's all right. She's an angel; he has seen
her to-day. Tell Ike I'm very grateful to him. Tell Ike the girls will
come out all right. Ted's mother and.... And how's Susie? Give Susie my
love."

O. L.--"I couldn't find that Mr Stevenson you gave me a message to.
What's his name?"

Phinuit.--"What! little Minnie Stevenson? Don't you know his name is
Henry? Yes, Henry Stevenson. Mother in spirit too, not far away.[26]
Give me that watch." (Trying to open it.) "Here, open it. Take it out of
its case. Jerry says he took his knife once and made some little marks
with it up here, up here near the handle, near the ring, some little
cuts in the watch. Look at it afterwards in a good light and you will
see them." (There is a little engraved landscape in the place described,
but some of the sky-lines have been cut unnecessarily deep, I think,
apparently out of mischief or idleness. Certainly I knew nothing of
this, and had never had the watch out of its case before.--O. J. L.)

This example shows the kind of information given. Much of it is true;
other assertions are unverifiable, which does not prove that they are
untrue; others contain both truth and errors; finally, there are
certainly some which are entirely untrue. For this reason these
transcendental conversations very much resemble the conversations of
incarnated human beings. _Errare humanum est._ And it would appear that
the heavy corpse we drag about with us is not alone to blame when we
sacrifice to Error.

But, since the hypothesis of fraud and of unconscious muscular movement
may not be invoked, where shall we find the source of the mass of exact
information Mrs Piper gives us? The simplest hypothesis, after those we
have been obliged to set aside, consists in believing that the medium
obtains her information from the minds of those present. She must be
able to read their souls, as others read in a book; thought-transference
must take place between her and them. With these data, she would be
supposed to construct marionettes so perfect, so life-like, that a large
number of sitters leave the sittings persuaded that the