interested in hypnotism. The subject has become fascinating to
me. I have made a great many successful trials of my power, and the
affair of this afternoon was nothing but a trial of my powers on a more
extensive scale than anything I have yet attempted. I wanted to see if
it were possible for me to hypnotize a considerable number of people
without any one suspecting what I intended to do. The result was a
success. I hypnotized all those people by means of the first part of
my performance, which consisted of some combinations of colored glass
with lights thrown upon them. They revolved, and looked like
fireworks, and were strung on a wire high up on the stage.

"I kept up the glittering and dazzling show--which was well worth
seeing, I can assure you--until the people had been straining their
eyes upward for almost half an hour. And this sort of thing--I will
tell you if you do not know it--is one of the methods of producing
hypnotic sleep.

"There was no one present who was not an impressionable subject, for I
was very careful in sending out my invitations, and when I became
almost certain that my audience was thoroughly hypnotized, I stopped
the show and began the real exhibition, which was not really for their
benefit, but for mine.

"Of course, I was dreadfully anxious for fear I had not succeeded
entirely, and that there might be at least some one person who had not
succumbed to the hypnotic influences, and so I tested the matter by
bringing out that table and telling them it was something it was not.
If I had had any reason for supposing that some of the audience saw the
table as it really was, I had an explanation ready, and I could have
retired from my position without any one supposing that I had intended
making hypnotic experiments. The rest of the exhibition would have
been some things that any one could see, and as soon as possible I
would have released from their spell those who were hypnotized. But
when I became positively assured that every one saw a light pine table
with four straight legs, I confidently went on with the performances of
the magic egg."

Edith Starr was still standing by the library table. She had not
heeded Loring's advice to sit down, and she was trembling with emotion.

"Herbert Loring," she said, "you invited my mother and me to that
exhibition. You gave us tickets for front seats, where we would be
certain to be hypnotized if your experiment succeeded, and you would