"'You are an impudent scoundrel, sir,' said the chairman, 'and deserve to be kicked down stairs. However, a promise is a promise. There is your money, and let us never see your face again.'
"'Och, long life to yese all!' said the undaunted O'Shaughnessy, 'but its mismirism is a beautiful science! Divil a barrow have I wheeled this last month on the North British Railway, and it isn't soon that I'll be after doing it again. Teddy, ye sowl! let's be off to the ould place, and dhrink good luck to the gintlemin in a noggin.'
"Such," concluded the Jemadar, "was the result of our meeting; and I can tell you that you lost a rich treat by not hearing of it in time."
"I don't want to be disenchanted," said we. "Nothing that you have said can shake my firm belief in mesmerism in all its stages. I allow that the science, like every thing else, is liable to abuse, but that does not affect my faith in the slightest degree. Have you ever read Chauncey Hare Townshend's book? Why, my dear fellow, he has magnetized a female patient, through mere volition alone, at the other end of the town; and I have not the remotest doubt that it is quite possible to exercise the same powers between Edinburgh and Madras. What a beautiful thought it is that two lovers, separated by land and ocean, may yet exercise a sweet influence over each other—that at a certain hour, a balmy slumber, stealing over their frames, apprises them that their souls are about to meet in undisturbed and tranquil union! That in a few moments, perhaps, far, far above the galaxy"—
"Oh, confound the galaxy!" interrupted the prosaic Jemadar. "If you're going on in that style, I shall be off at once. I have no idea of any communication quicker than the electric telegraph; and as for your sympathies, and that sort of rubbish, any body may believe them that likes. I suppose, too, you believe in clair-voyance?"
"Most assuredly," we replied. "The case of Miss M'Avoy of Liverpool—of Prince Hohenlohe, and many others"——
"Are all very wonderful, I daresay; but I should like to see the thing with my own eyes. A friend of mine told me, no later than yesterday, that he had been present at a meeting, held in a professional gentleman's house, for the purpose of testing the powers of a lad said to be clair-voyant, who was exhibited by one of those itinerant lecturers. In addition to the usual bandages, of which there was much suspicion, a mask, previously prepared, was put upon the face, so that all deception was impossible. In this state, the boy, though professedly in the mesmeric sleep, could see nothing. He fingered the cards—fumbled with the books—but could read no more than my poodle-dog. In fact, the whole thing was considered by every one present not only a failure, but a rank and palpable sham; and until I have some better evidence in support of these modern miracles, I shall take the liberty of denouncing the system as one of most impudent imposture."
"But, my dear fellow, recollect the number of persons of rank and station—the highly intellectual and cultivated minds which have formed a directly opposite opinion. What say you to Van Helmont? What say you to Michael Scott,
'A wizard of such dreaded fame,
That when in Salamanca's cave,
Him listed his magic wand to wave,
The bells would ring in Notre Dame?'
What say you to the sympathetic secrets still known to be preserved in the monastery of Mount Carmel? What say you"—