“ ‘Show your quality,’ said Mai to the thing. ‘I will,’ it hissed, and straightway proceeding toward a table, it stood by it a few minutes, and it became apparent that it was charging the wood with something from itself, for soon the table began to turn, to tip, to move, to rise and float in the air, precisely as is done in spiritual circles.
“ ‘Now, ladies and gentlemen, you will please act just as if that before you was a human spirit, invisible to you, and desirous of imparting information. I dare say you will be surprised at the results. You see already that it is a capital table-mover, and I beg you to test its mental and physical powers also—for I assure you there is nothing to fear, now that I give you leave to break the silence—which was quite essential in the first part of the curious experiment.’
“Thus assured, several of us asked the thing to show us what it could do. Whereupon it made motions as if it wanted to write. Paper and pencil being placed upon the table, it seized the pencil with its long claw-like fingers, and its hand flew over the page like lightning, and in ten seconds it finished, and striking the table three heavy blows with its fist, signified that it had finished; whereupon Mr. D—— reached for the sheet, and read therefrom one of the most tender messages conceivable, from a dead mother to a living son. Even the hand writing was a perfect fac-simile of his mother’s; the name—Lucy—was correct, and certain dear and peculiar phrases, used by her when alive, were given with minute precision and fidelity; as, for instance, ‘sweet one, mine,’ instead of ‘my sweet one.’ Mr. D—— turned pale. ‘Is it possible I have been so imposed upon—so horribly deceived?’ said he, for he was a devout follower of the modern thaumaturgy.
“Several further tests, equally successful and decisive, were then given by this ghostly thing, both by writing, tipping, rapping, and the production of beautiful phantom hands, faces, flowers, and other objects, many of which were not only singular but magnificent. Probably thousands of persons have seen the curious pencil drawings, executed by ‘mediums,’ and which are said to be portraits of ‘Spiritual flowers’—for most certainly they resemble nothing growing on this earth. Well, in less than five minutes the horrible thing there at the table, the eyeless monster, executed thirteen such—and they would pass current as splendid specimens of ‘Spirit art.’
“ ‘Now,’ said Vatterale, ‘for something else.’ And then addressing the thing, he said: ‘You will now render yourself viewless, and show what you can do. And first let us have some music.’ Then turning to the company, he said: ‘Real spirits love the light, but such as that invariably act most efficiently in the dark—for then they have the advantage of the elements condensed upon their forms—a semi-material investiture—and can come in direct contact with material substances, which, in the case of real spirits, is exceedingly difficult of accomplishment.’
“During this speech, our attention was diverted from the incarnated to the incarnator—for it must not be forgotten that the entire phenomena exhibited by this wondrous personage, were the creatures of his conscious will, brought into being and again cast out by a thought, and according to a known and transferable formula. True, there were others in whom this creative faculty existed, but then such persons either exercised the power involuntarily through the mechanical processes of mind and will, or else they are but the proxies of the Larvæ. When he ceased speaking the monster was gone from our sight, but not from our hearing, for Mai gently waved his hand, and as he did so there came to us the softest, gentlest, sweetest, and the most soul-stirring strains of music that ever fell on human hearing. Above, below, around, now here, now there, close at hand, and then afar off, it sounded; and the only comparison I can make is, that it sounded like a solemn requiem chaunted by angels over the perished form of what was once a god—the tones were so pathetic, so solemn, so supremely sorrow-freighted—reminding one of the plaintive
“ ‘Huhm, meleagar malooshe,
Huhm meleagar, ma-looshe,’
only that it was ten-fold more profound, and stirred depths the other could never reach.
“This strange music was a perfect corroboration of the theory advanced by the Italian Count at the séance before Napoleon, already mentioned; for, allowing that the being who made it was a real and independent existence, it was impossible for such conceptions to exist in it, for the reason that none but a mighty soul could create them, and the thing itself was exceedingly, revoltingly low in the scale of organization. But, on the other hand, if the thing were the creature of Mai’s will, it was conceivable that it vocally expressed his unuttered thought, itself totally unconscious of either the music or its meaning.
“It ceased. It still remained invisible, and Mai proposed that Count de M—— should hold one end of an accordion, while the thing invisibly held and played upon the other. This was assented to, and the instrument, bottom up, was held at arm’s length, directly beneath the light. It was placed on, in masterly style, while in that position. It, as well as a guitar, harp and piano, were played on when no one was near them, and nothing to be seen; and then, at the command of the arch-magician, the whole performance was repeated by the terrific thing in its perfectly visible form.