aried
devotion; and one day when I was convalescent, finding me depressed in
spirits and crying, she said laughingly to me, "Why, child, there is
nothing the matter with you; but you are weak in body and mind." This
seemed to me the most degraded of all conceivable conditions, and I fell
into a redoublement of weeping over my own abasement and imbecility.

My attention was suddenly attracted to a large looking-glass opposite my
bed, and it occurred to me that in my then condition of nerves nothing
was more likely than that I should turn visionary and fancy I beheld
apparitions. And under this conviction I got up and covered the glass,
in which I felt sure I should presently "see sic sights as I daured na
tell." I speak of this because, though I was in a physical condition not
unlikely to produce such phenomena, I retained the power of perceiving
that they would be the result of my physical condition, and that I
should in some measure be accessory to my own terror, whatever form it
might assume.

I have so often in my life been on the very edge of ghost-seeing, and
felt so perfectly certain that the least encouragement on my part would
set them before me, and that nothing but a resolute effort of will would
save me from such a visitation, that I have become convinced that of the
people who have seen apparitions, one half have--as I should term
it--chosen to do so. I have all my life suffered from a tendency to
imaginary terrors, and have always felt sure that a determined exercise
of self-control would effectually keep them from having the dominion
over me. The most distressing form of nervous excitement that I have
ever experienced was one that for many years I was very liable to, and
which always recurred when I was in a state of unusual exaltation or
depression of spirits; both which states in me were either directly
caused or greatly aggravated by certain electrical conditions of the
atmosphere, which seemed to affect my whole nervous system as if I had
been some machine expressly constructed for showing and testing the
power of such influences on the human economy.

I habitually read while combing and brushing my hair at night, and
though I made no use of my looking-glass while thus employed, having my
eyes fixed on my book, I sat (for purposes of general convenience) at my
toilet table in front of the mirror. While engrossed in my book it has
frequently happened to me accidentally to raise my eyes and suddenly to