d of fencingwire,
or pull a wool-team of bullocks out of a bog; and before he invoked the
ungodly power, which he let them believe he could--he'd stick there and
starve till he and his bullocks died a "natural" death. (He was a bit
Irish--as all Scots are--back on one side.)

But the strangest is to come. The Professor, next morning, proved
uncomfortably unsociable, and though he could have done a roaring
business that night--and for a week of nights after, for that
matter--and though he was approached several times, he, for some
mysterious reason known only to himself, flatly refused to give one more
performance, and said he was leaving the town that day. He couldn't get
a vehicle of any kind, for fear, love, or money, until Harry Chatswood,
who took a day off, volunteered, for a stiff consideration, to borrow
a buggy and drive him (the Professor) to the next town towards the then
railway terminus, in which town the Professor's fame was not so awesome,
and where he might get a lift to the railway. Harry ventured to remark
to the Professor once or twice during the drive that "there was a rum
business with old Mac's van last night," but he could get nothing out of
him, so gave it best, and finished the journey in contemplative silence.

Now, the fact was that the Professor had been the most surprised and
startled man in Cunnamulla that night; and he brooded over the thing
till he came to the conclusion that hypnotism was a dangerous power
to meddle with unless a man was physically and financially strong and
carefree--which he wasn't. So he threw it up.

He learnt the truth, some years later, from a brother of Harry
Chatswood, in a Home or Retreat for Geniuses, where "friends were
paying," and his recovery was so sudden that it surprised and
disappointed the doctor and his friend, the manager of the home. As it
was, the Professor had some difficulty in getting out of it.

THE EXCISEMAN

Harry Chatswood, mail contractor (and several other things), was driving
out from, say, Georgeville to Croydon, with mails, parcels, and only one
passenger--a commercial traveller, who had shown himself unsociable,
and close in several other ways. Nearly half-way to a place that was
half-way between the halfway house and the town, Harry overhauled "Old
Jack," a local character (there are many well-known characters named
"Old Jack") and gave him a lift as a matter of course.

"Hello! Is that you, Jack?" in the gathering dusk