Here the romance and superstition end. The petitioner became a wiser and sadder man. Esmeralda lived to repent of her folly, and so did the Oxford man of learning.
CHAPTER LXXII.
Spiritualism—Spiritualism not a new Delusion—Phantoms at a Seance—Juggling of a Medium—Unsuccessful Effort at a Vulgar Deception—Spiritualists exposed—A Medium's Deception discovered—Foolish Exhibitions—Russian Peasants and their House Spirits—Spirits' Care over Persons and Property—Death, Pestilence, War, and other Evils foretold by Spirits—A Suggestion.
Much might be written concerning spiritualism (already alluded to in these pages); but really the subject deserves little attention, further than that it might be worth serious consideration whether the class of persons who lay claim to the power of raising the dead, and of being able to command responses from spirits, should not be prosecuted as rogues and cheats. Spiritualists cannot even pretend they have discovered anything new. We have repeatedly, particularly under the head "Laws against and Trials of Witches," shown that deceitful girls and old crones could perform all the sleight-of-hand and delusions practised by modern spiritualists.
Spiritualists have grossly imposed upon credulous persons; and others, without much consideration, attend seance after seance, for no other reason than that the manifestations displayed by the tricksters have become the grand arcana of fashion. The phantoms raised at a seance are in proportion to the gloom surrounding the audience. It cannot be doubted by men of penetration, that spiritualism, in its birth and maturity, is associated with sordidness and wickedness. At best, the spiritual operations are childish, or at least they fall short of the tricks of a Chinese juggler.
One gentleman, writing of the spiritualistic movement in 1871, says:—
"A new movement on behalf of spiritualism has sprung up in the metropolis, and Miss Kate Fox, Rochester, United States, in whose family the phenomena were first discovered, is now in England on a propagandist mission. I was invited last night to meet Miss Fox, but owing to a cold the lady was unable to come. A celebrated medium was, however, present, as were some half-dozen ladies and gentlemen well known in society—one of the latter being a sergeant-at-law, and a judge accustomed to sift evidence and determine the difference between truth and falsehood. The seance was not, however, productive of anything very strange. The only curious manifestation occurred with a lath about two feet long and a quarter of an inch thick, which most certainly rose off the table apparently of its own accord, and at one time seemed disposed to walk about the room, but didn't. Two glass ornaments, filled with flowers, were also attracted towards each other, and subsequently parted company though no hands were near them. The great anticipated incident of the evening was, however, a failure. A Morse writing telegraphic machine had been prepared, and it was hoped that the lever would be worked with spirit hands, but, after waiting two hours, no indication was given of any movement, and the experiment was abandoned in despair."
The well-known Walter Thornbury relates as follows his experience at a spiritual seance:—
"I went up into a stuffy parlour and found about fourteen people, hot, nervous, and evidently uncomfortable. They were staring at some weird-looking pictures. On a long table were several speaking-trumpets, formed of stiff brown and gilt paper. Some of the visitors took up these, talked hollowly through them, and laughed with uneasy scepticism. There were two ladies, several young men who looked like clerks, a bluff man from Liverpool, and a dwarf. Presently Messrs. A. and C. (two coarse-looking young men) entered, seated us round the table, and requested us to join hands. The gas was then turned down, and the seance began. A. was at the end of the table, facing C. at the other. There was at first a good deal of half-hysterical laughing and nervous talking, and shy or bold voices from here and there in the dark. The bluff Liverpool man objected to joining hands—he had been to successful seances, where hands were not joined. Mr. A. said that joining hands often improved 'the conditions.' One did not know what was passing behind one, or what was coming. So even the boldest of us 'held his breath for a time.' All at once Mr. C., at the further end from me, began to gurgle and groan like a person in an epileptic fit. Some one cried, 'Turn up the gas.' It was done, and we beheld the medium with his head twisted like a young laocoon in the folds of a red tablecloth. He disentangled himself with a disturbed, suffering air. The spirits were upon us, though why they should stifle their interpreter I could not quite see. The sceptics smiled sardonically. I suspected the lady in nankeen colour next me, and the dwarf and people immediately round both mediums. A female voice tremulously suggested that singing might 'improve the conditions;' on which Mr. C. struck up 'Power of Love Enchanting' in maudlin spiritualistic words. Things looked dull. All at once we were hailed by one of the most tremendous gruff bass voices that ever hailed a man-of-war. John King, the favourite spirit of Mr. A., had appeared with a grumbling announcement of his presence. 'Who is this John King?' inquired the Liverpool man, who, if he was a confederate, acted peculiarly well. 'He lived about three hundred years ago,' said some one in the dark. 'Then he must have fought with the Armada,' suggested the Liverpool representative. Mr. A. leaped at the suggestion, and replied, 'It is supposed he did.' On John King again growling that there he was and what did they want, a sceptic opposite me exclaimed in the true dramatic manner, 'Rest, rest, perturbed spirit,' which so enraged John King (whom the lady in buff next me whispered 'had been a notorious pirate') that he bellowed in his ear, 'You seem very fond of Shakspere.' A few minutes after there were sounds of violent blows, and several sceptics were struck on the head by John King's speaking-trumpet; a sofa cushion was flung at me, and something else was thrown at the gentleman from Liverpool. A sceptic who had said that any ventriloquist could imitate a deep voice, got rapped violently on the head, and John King bellowed at the same time, 'Is that ventriloquism?' A man near me said he thought he felt a cold breeze passing over his hands, and a cold finger touch his. One thing I could not help observing: this was, that the missiles hurled at sceptics came in a slanting line from where Mr. A. sat. I also noticed that a singular creaking of the medium's chair usually preceded any utterances of John King. The lady in nankeen now began, in a wheedling, coaxing voice, to beg 'Kate' to appear. Kate is Mr. A.'s second 'familiar,' and he described her to us as a short person with dark ringlets, and wearing a blue robe fastened by a girdle—facts which seemed to deeply interest the lady in nankeen. Presently a little whiffling voice announced Kate, who, however, only said something about 'Jenny Jones, of Hampstead,' and then withdrew. To Kate Mr. A. assumed a gallant, lover-like manner; to John King an air of half-amused defiance. By-and-bye two stones were thrown violently upon the table, but no one expressed any audible alarm. Still the room was hot and stifling, the darkness affected the coolest imagination, and straining one's eyes and ears for spiritual manifestations produced a not unnatural feeling of uneasiness in the mind. Sometimes I fancied the table jerked or reared a little, sometimes I thought I heard animals' feet pattering up and down the table. It is on such workings of the imagination that spiritualists, and especially the professional mediums, trade. No more voices coming, Mr. A. proposed our changing places to 'improve the conditions'—that is to say, to re-pack the confederates, and still more isolate the sceptics; but no result came. A grosser and more unsuccessful effort at a vulgar deception I never saw; and I only ask whether it is just to prosecute poor women for getting a few shillings by telling servants' fortunes, and leave professional spiritualists like Messrs. A. and C. unprosecuted? If pretending to evoke the dead and predict death for hire is not obtaining money under false pretences, what is?"