I signed my letter W. W. B. A fortnight after, the following letter appeared in Light:—
"Sir,—With reference to the communication by W. W. B. referring to the supposed thought transference, and mentioned by another correspondent, C. A. M., in connection with the entertainments of Professor Baldwin (an American conjurer and brother mason), whom I met in Cape Town on two separate occasions, permit me to state that (1) if it is the same Baldwin, he is one of the cleverest
illusionists in his special line of trick thought transference, and W. W. B. is quite right. (2) I know that Mr. and Mrs. Baldwin did most of their experiments by trick, because, being one of the chosen committee to test the so-called thought reading, I fixed it absolutely as trickery on the lines indicated by W. W. B.
(Signed) "Berks Hutchinson"
I was gratified to read this letter and to find that my conjecture was correct that the Baldwin performance was a mere exhibition of conjuring.
PART III
THE ZANCIGS
Some years ago there appeared at the Alhambra Theatre, London, two entertainers—Mr. and Mrs. Zancig—whose performances were of so puzzling a nature that to many who had witnessed them the only explanation of the results obtained appeared to be that genuine telepathy was at play. The Daily Mail newspaper arranged that Mr. and Mrs. Zancig should be subjected to a series of severe tests at its office, and on the 30th November 1906 these were carried out.
On the 1st December the Daily Mail published a full account of these experiments. The publication of this and of other accounts by persons who had witnessed the remarkable performances of the Zancigs led to a heated controversy between the corr
espondents of the Daily Mail and the Daily Chronicle. Those of the first paper mostly asserted that the performance was an exhibition of true telepathy, while those of the second paper declared that codes—visual and verbal—would account for the phenomena. Previously to the experiment carried out by the Daily Mail I had obtained a letter of introduction to the Zancigs from a friend of mine who had had private tests with them, but as it was necessary to have the permission of the manager of the Alhambra before an interview with the Zancigs could be arranged, I called at the offices of that theatre, and saw Mr. Scott, the manager. I informed him that I was a member of the Society for Psychical Research, which body I told him took the deepest interest in telepathy. I handed him a letter that I had written to Mr. Zancig, and on the 29th November 1906 I received the following communication from the last-named gentleman:—