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“On one occasion, we had all five made an excursion into the country: and here I quote from Professor Richet’s notes:—‘Coming home—it was moonlight, and still twilight—we got down from the carriage—a private omnibus—to walk a while. Dr. Maxwell and M. Meurice lagged behind, and Dr. X., Mrs. S., and I got into the carriage again, before they had caught us up. As she was stepping in, Mrs. S. told me she felt as though a woman were running behind her, and were helping her into the carriage; seated, Mrs. S. continued to perceive this vision; it was wearing a hood on its head, and a cross on its breast; the vision bent its head over Mrs. S.’s hand, pressing its teeth on it “as though to show she had died in agony, stabbed to death,” said Mrs. S. When Dr. Maxwell and M. Meurice rejoined us, the former told me, in an undertone, that M. Meurice had just had a vision of a woman running behind Mrs. S.; the vision was wearing a hood on its head. M. Meurice and Mrs. S. continued to see this vision for above five minutes longer, when they both saw it disappear into a clump of trees. M. Meurice and Mrs. S. communicated their impressions to Dr. Maxwell and myself respectively.
“‘A few minutes afterwards, they both had another simultaneous vision. Mrs. S. saw a man astride one of the carriage-horses; M. Meurice, with an identical description of dress, saw a man not seated on, but running beside, the same horse holding the reins. He thought it was Chappe. Then everything disappeared.
“‘Neither visionary communicated their impressions to the other.’
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“Exception made of the attractions of the box and table, the foregoing results will probably be considered as demonstrative of nothing in particular. We were now to receive something more interesting.
“Let it be said, en passant, that Mrs. Stephens never once saw the medium alone. There had not been the slightest break in her reserve. And all, save Professor Richet and herself, continued to think she had been invited by Professor Richet solely because of her psychical powers. M. Meurice sometimes remarked, seeking a reason for the inexplicable failure of the experiments, that he believed the cause lay in a super-abundance of power, that the psychic force was too great, that Mrs. S. gave forth too much power, etc.
“Now, early one morning, three weeks after we had begun this series, Mrs. Stephens remarked to Professor Richet that [I again quote from Professor Richet’s notes] ‘during the night she had been thinking a great deal about the Christ, and had said to herself, if the spirits of the deceased can appear to man, why not the Christ? And she said she had asked for a sign to be given her that this could be. Mrs. Stephens had scarcely pronounced these words, when Dr. Maxwell came into the sitting-room and said: “I have just seen M. Meurice, he had a vision while I was conversing with him. He said he perceived the form of a man with short hair and beard; a halo of light behind him, a circle of gold on his head; he was dressed in white; M. Meurice says it was the Christ. With an imperious air, the form showed him a thick yellow manuscript—a papyrus—covered with writing. As M. Meurice was trying to decipher the characters for me, the vision disappeared. M. Meurice was suddenly exhausted, and had a fit of weeping before recovering his normal condition.”
“‘A few mornings afterwards the medium had another vision. This time it was Chappe who came, it appears, to tell him that it was not the Christ whom he had seen, but a Christ.’[32]
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