I should like to have seen luminous phenomena produced, visions of brilliant lights, of sudden gleams of fire. M. Flammarion hoped that we were going to see some of these. He asked for them. But Eusapia was evidently fatigued by this long and very interesting séance. She asked for "un poco di luce" ("a little light"). The lamps were relighted. Everything was finished.
This morning I recall with a kind of anxious curiosity the least details of this very fascinating soirée. When we had returned to the observatory, on leaving our amiable hosts, I asked myself if I had been in a dream. But I said to myself, "We were present at the skilful performances of a woman prestidigitator; we witnessed only theatrical tricks." My son recalled to me the prodigies of skill of the brothers Isola. This morning, strange to say, reflection makes me at once more perplexed and less incredulous. We perhaps witnessed (we undoubtedly did witness) the manifestation of an unknown force which will hereafter be studied and perhaps one day utilized. I should no longer dare to deny the genuineness of Spiritualism. It isn't a question of animal magnetism: it is something else, I know not what; a quid divinum (a divine something), although science will some day analyze it and catalogue it. That which perhaps astonished me the most was the curtain swelling out like a sail! Where did the puff of wind come from? A regular breeze would have been needed to put such life into it as that. However, I do not discuss: I give in my evidence. I have seen these things, observed them carefully. I shall think of them for a long time. I do not stop here. I shall seek an explanation. Possibly I shall find one. But this much is certain, that we ought to be modest in the presence of all that appears to us to be for the moment inexplicable, and that, before affirming or denying, we ought to wait, to reserve our judgment.
In the mean time, while feeling of my right maxillary tooth, which is a little sore, I think of that line of Regnard and allow myself to mangle it a little while recalling that hard music-box,—
"Je vois que c'est un corps et non pas un esprit."
(I see that it is a body and not a spirit.)
Report of Dr. Gustave Le Bon
(Séance of November 28)
(There were present at this séance, besides the hosts, M. and Mme. Brisson, MM. Gustave Le Bon, Baschet, de Sergines, Louis Vignon, Laurent, Ed. de Rothschild, Delanne, Bloch, Mathieu, Ephrussi, Mme. la Comtesse de Chevigné, Mmes. Gagneur, Syamour, Fourton, Basilewska, Bisschofsheim.)
Eusapia is undoubtedly a marvellous subject. It struck me as something wonderful that, while I was holding her hand, she was playing on an imaginary tambourine to which the sounds of the tambourine that was behind the curtain accurately corresponded.
I do not see how any trick is possible in such a case, any more than in the case of the table.
My cigarette-holder was grasped by a very strong hand, which wrenched the object from me with a good deal of energy. I was on my guard and asked to see the experiment again. The phenomenon was so singular and so beyond all that we can comprehend that we must first try natural explanations.