“In the evening, my friend, Jane Little, and two or three other friends, called in to spend an hour or two with us. We sang and I played on the piano; but even then, while the lamp was burning brightly(!), I felt the deep throbbing of the dull accompaniment of the invisibles, keeping time to the music as I played; but I did not wish to have my visitors know it, and the spirits seemed kind enough not to make themselves heard (!) that others would observe what was so apparent to me.”
The book to which I am obliged to refer so constantly, and which is a good example of the bulk of spiritualistic literature, is full of passages ten times as absurd as this one, and having just as strongly the stamp of the crudest and most clumsy invention. For the most part, the only appropriate treatment for such absurdities is contemptuous silence. Occasionally, however, I shall find it necessary, for the sake of completeness in this exposition, to meet them with positive refutation, which in reality they do not deserve.
Having thus got one of the clever and lively little girls under her own control, Leah soon induced her mother to come to Rochester with the other. Nothing could show more clearly that she had already formed the resolve to reap a harvest of gain and renown from this auspicious beginning, than her decisive course, instantly upon realizing the public wonder and curiosity which the “rappings” had excited.
It was absolutely necessary to delude some people who were near, and who should have been dear to her, as well as the careless and easily gullible public. The good and simple-hearted old mother would never have been a partner in conscious deception. The matter-of-fact, unspeculative father, must be brought to a point where he would at least not deny the claims of the so-called “mediums,” his daughters. The honest and outspoken Lizzie must be awed into discretion by the prospect of great prosperity, which was opened before them, and the lesson that if she spoke too freely they would surely be deprived of it. Some stalwart and docile sympathizers must be enlisted outside of her own people who could be depended upon to stand by them as against too strenuous inquiry, or hot-tempered public assault.
Immediately upon Margaret’s arrival at the house in Rochester, in which Mrs. Fish lived, and which adjoined a graveyard, the “manifestations” redoubled. They were produced by the combined efforts of Leah, Margaret and Katie. Mrs. Underhill narrates that one night, about this time, a “spirit” walked about in their room, as if in his bare feet, when they were all supposed to be in bed. She continues: “He answered my question by stamping on the floor. I was amused—although afraid. He seemed so willing to do my bidding that I could not resist the temptation of speaking to him as he marched around my bed. I said, ‘Flat Foot, can you dance the Highland fling?’ This seemed to delight him. I sang the music for him, and he danced most admirably. This shocked mother and she said: ‘O, Leah, how can you encourage that fiend by singing for him to dance?’ I soon found that they took advantage of my familiarity, and gathered in strong force around us. And here language utterly fails to describe the incidents that occurred. Loud whispering, giggling, scuffling, groaning, death-struggles, murder scenes of the most fearful character—I forbear to describe them. Mother became so alarmed that she called to Calvin to come up stairs. He came—angry at the spirits—and declared that ‘he would conquer or die in the attempt.’ This seemed to amuse them. They went to his bed, raised it up and let it down, and shook it violently. He was still determined not to yield to them.
“Before Calvin came up stairs, and during a short lull in their performances, we quickly removed our beds to the floor, hoping thereby to prevent them from raising us up and letting us down with such violence. Calvin said as he came up, that we were foolish to make our beds on the floor, as it pleased the spirits to see how completely they had conquered us. So he laid down on his bed, and quietly awaited developments. Mother said, ‘Calvin, I wish your bed was on the floor, too. We have not been disturbed since we left the bedstead.’ Calvin remarked, ‘They are up to some deviltry now. I hear them.’ He no sooner uttered these words, than a shower of slippers came flying at him as he lay in his bed. He bore this without a murmur. The next instant he was struck violently with his cane. He seized it and struck back, right and left, with all his strength, without hitting anything; but received a palpable bang in return for every thrust he made. He sprang to his feet and fought with all his might. Everything thrown at him he pitched back to them, until a brass candlestick was thrown at him, cutting his lip. This quite enraged him. He pronounced a solemn malediction and throwing himself on the bed, he vowed he would have nothing more to do with ‘fiendish spirits.’
“He was not long permitted to remain in quiet there. They commenced at his bedstead and deliberately razed it to the floor, leaving the headboard in one place, the footboard in another, the two sides at angles, and the bedclothes scattered about the room. He was left lying on his mattress, and for a moment there was silence; after which some slight movements were heard in the ‘green room.’ I had stowed a large number of balls of carpet rags in an old chest standing on the floor, with two trunks and several other articles on the top of it. It seemed but the work of a moment for them to get at the carpet balls, which came flying at us in every direction, hitting us in the same place every time. They took us for their target, and threw with the skill of an archer. Darkness made no difference with them, and if either of us attempted to remonstrate against such violence, they would instantly give the remonstrant the benefit of a ball.”
Mrs. Kane remembers with tolerable distinctness the antics that distinguished this sojourn of her mother, herself and her sisters in the Rochester house. She and Katie did indulge in wild larks in the sleeping rooms of the family at all hours of the night. The “whispering” and “giggling,” the “scuffling” and “groaning,” and the tragic mimicry were natural to childish daredevils like themselves, and one can well understand how, with the attendant “rappings,” the showers of slippers hurled from the “green room,” the shaking of Calvin’s bed and the “banging” of him on the head, these things may have made the desired impression upon both him and the mother. Mrs. Kane says that this is the true and only explanation of it all, and that in comparatively recent years, at séances in Adelphi Hall, New York, she has done the most audacious things, similar in character to these, under cover of semi-darkness, and has not been detected, simply because nearly all of those who were present were believers and were not too curious.
There is another “evidence” given by Ann Leah which is too pitiably ridiculous to be considered, except as a subject of laughter.
“Often at meal-time,” she says, “the table would be gradually agitated, and Calvin in particular, [alas, poor Calvin!] would be more disturbed than the rest of us. Once he arose from his chair and reached across the table for a heavy pitcher of water, when the chair was instantly removed and he sat down on the floor, spilling the water all over himself!”