stock of material. I set the
police to lighting them, and as they were lit, I took them, and sealed
them down on the floor, just within the chalk circle, five inches apart.
As each candle measured approximately one inch in diameter, it took
sixty-six candles to complete the circle; and I need hardly say that
every number and measurement has a significance.

"Then, from candle to candle I took a 'gayrd' of human hair, entwining it
alternately to the left and to the right, until the circle was
completed, and the ends of the hair shod with silver, and pressed into
the wax of the sixty-sixth candle.

"It had now been dark some time, and I made haste to get the 'Defense'
complete. To this end, I got the men well together, and began to fit the
Electric Pentacle right around us, so that the five points of the
Defensive Star came just within the Hair Circle. This did not take me
long, and a minute later I had connected up the batteries, and the weak
blue glare of the intertwining vacuum tubes shone all around us. I felt
happier then; for this Pentacle is, as you all know, a wonderful
'Defense.' I have told you before, how the idea came to me, after reading
Professor Garder's 'Experiments with a Medium.' He found that a current,
of a certain number of vibrations, _in vacuo,_ 'insulated' the medium. It
is difficult to suggest an explanation non-technically, and if you are
really interested you should read Carder's lecture on 'Astral Vibrations
Compared with Matero-involuted Vibrations below the Six-Billion Limit.'

"As I stood up from my work, I could hear outside in the night a constant
drip from the laurels, which as I have said, come right up around the
house, very thick. By the sound, I knew that a 'soft' rain had set in;
and there was absolutely no wind, as I could tell by the steady flames of
the candles.

"I stood a moment or two, listening, and then one of the men touched my
arm, and asked me in a low voice, what they should do. By his tone, I
could tell that he was feeling something of the strangeness of it all;
and the other men, including Wentworth, were so quiet that I was afraid
they were beginning to get shaky.

"I set-to, then, and arranged them with their backs to one common center;
so that they were sitting flat upon the floor, with their feet radiating
outward. Then, by compass, I laid their legs to the eight chief points,
and afterward I drew a circle with chalk around them; and opposite to
their feet, I m