With regard to things under head (a) Mrs Verrall says:
"Some very clearly marked instances have come within my own observation; the cases are not very numerous, but the response from the 'control' to what has been thought but not uttered by me has been so rapid and complete that, were it not for the evidence of the other sitter, I should have been disposed to believe that I had unconsciously uttered the thought aloud.
"Thus, on one occasion, 'Nelly' said that a red-haired girl was in my house that day, and I was wondering whether a certain friend of my daughter's, who is often at the house, would be there, when 'Nelly' added: 'Not So-and-so,' mentioning by name my daughter's friend, exactly as though I had uttered the passing thought. Again, when 'Nelly' was describing a certain bag given to me for my birthday, something she said made me for a moment think of a small leather handbag left in my house by a cousin and occasionally used by me, and she said: 'You had an uncle that died; it was not long after that.' The father of the cousin whom I had just thought of is the only uncle I have known, but his death long preceded the giving to me of the bag as a birthday present, which was what she had quite correctly described till my momentary thought apparently distracted her attention to the other bag. I have had in all some five or six instances of such apparently direct responses as the above to a thought in the sitter's mind; but when at 'Nelly's' suggestion I have fixed my attention on some detail for the sake of helping her to get it, I have never succeeded in doing anything but what she calls 'muggling her.'"
Another difficulty arises from the fact that mediums and their controls not infrequently receive impressions as pictures, and these pictures are liable to be misinterpreted. Mrs Verrall writes in her report of her sitting with Mrs Thompson:
"Merrifield was said to be the name of a lady in my family. The name was given at first thus: 'Merrifield, Merryman, Merrythought, Merrifield; there is an old lady named one of these who,' etc. Later, 'Nelly' said: 'Mrs Merrythought, that's not quite right; it's like the name of a garden'; and after in vain trying to give her the name exactly, she said: 'I will tell you how names come to us. It's like a picture; I see school children enjoying themselves. You can't say Merryman because that's not a name, or Merrypeople.' 'Nelly' later on spoke of my mother as Mrs Happyfield or Mrs Merryfield with indifference" ("Proceedings," part xliv. p. 208).
It is probably for this reason that so much use is made in spirit communications of symbolism. The passage in which Mr Myers deals with the use of symbolism in automatic messages, in his work on "Human Personality," should be studied in this connection. He points out that there is "no a priori ground for supposing that language will have the power to express all the thoughts and emotions of man." And if this is true of man in his present state, how much more does it apply to man in another and more advanced state? With reference to automatic writings he says: "There is a certain quality which reminds one of translation, or of the composition of a person writing in a language in which he is not accustomed to talk."
As a result of her investigations, Mrs Verrall declares:
"That Mrs Thompson is possessed of knowledge not normally obtained I regard as established beyond a doubt; that the hypothesis of fraud, conscious or unconscious, on her part fails to explain the phenomena seems to be equally certain; that to more causes than one is to be attributed the success which I have recorded seems to me likely. There is, I believe, some evidence to indicate that telepathy between the sitter and the trance personality is one of these contributory causes. But that telepathy from the living, even in an extended sense of the term, does not furnish a complete explanation of the occurrences observed by me, is my present belief."
Instances of clairvoyance in children are remarkably numerous. A few weeks ago the Rome correspondent of The Tribune reported that a boy of twelve, at Capua, "was discovered sobbing and crying as if his heart would break. Asked by his mother the reason of his distress, he said that he had just seen his father, who was absent in America, at the point of death, assisted by two Sisters of Charity. Next day a letter came from America announcing the father's death. Remembering the boy's vision, his mother tried to keep the tale a secret lest he should be regarded as 'possessed,' but her efforts were vain, several persons having been present when he explained the cause of his grief."
The explanation of telepathy would hardly seem to fit the case, since the father's death must have occurred at least eight or ten days previous to the vision.
I shall reserve for my next chapter what may be regarded as the classic illustration of the marvels of clairvoyance—that of Mrs Piper.