The neglected piece of ground in front should
have been overrun with grass, but none grew
there. The door stood in a gloomy little corner
at the side, and close by there grew a strange-looking
tree, suggestive of upas and deadly
nightshade.

Mr. Ferguson, very fussy and very anxious,
giving our mental plates another sensitive bath
as he leads the way, ushers us into a dingy
little parlour, the prominent articles in which
are two round tables, one large and the other
small, the latter with one leg and three feet.
Mr. Ferguson tells us amazing stories about the
large table. How, on several occasions, it was
by spiritual agency lifted up nearly to the ceiling,
and how he, Mr. F., got on the top of
it, and could not bring it to the ground. We
were introduced to the male medium. He was
a tall man with a big bulging forehead, bushy
eyebrows, a weak quivering mouth, and a pair
of large watery dreamy-looking eyes. He was
dressed in a swallow-tailed black coat, and his
general appearance indicated the jobbing
shoe-maker who would preach in the Parks on Sunday
afternoon if the police would let him, and
who, if he were not permitted to preach, would
be sure to find some other way of giving vent to
his egotism and his dangerous little bit of learning.
He was the kind of man who takes up with
Voltaire and Tom Paine—who, under certain
other circumstances, would be attracted by the
purest Evangelism, by Puseyism, Mormonism,
or any other ism—a man whose mind is as soft
and impressionable as putty, and whose nerves
are as weakly strung as a spider's web.
Recognising a remarkably pulpy man of this type, I
could give him credit for believing anything. I
will candidly admit that he did not give me the
idea of a trickster.

There was no sign of preparation about the
humble little room, and I was abundantly
convinced that there was no preparation. We were
asked which table we would like to operate
upon, the large or the small one. We were
quite indifferent, and the choice being left to
the medium, he chose the small table. Six of
us, including the medium, sat down at it in a
circle, and placed our hands on its surface.
Thus we sat for fully five minutes, and nothing
came of it. The medium said he had never
known the spirits so backward. We sat for
another five minutes without any result, when
suddenly the door opened softly, and the
medium's wife stole into the room. She took a
seat on a chair near the door at some distance
from the table. Mrs. Wallace presented a very
striking contrast to her husband. She had a
sharp cunning look, with a lively twinkle in her
small dark eyes, indicating a strong sense of
humour. At last we had a manifestation. The
spirits did not rap and the table did not tilt,
but the medium's hand began to waggle about
in a sort of frenzy. "What was that?" we asked.
"Oh, that was a sperrit moving him." "Could
he see the spirit?" "Yes, he could see the
sperrit." "And what did the spirit indicate?"
"The sperrit indicated that he was to write."

Mr. Ferguson here brought forward a sheet
of foolscap and a pencil, and the medium
prepared to write. But it was a hand with St.
Vitus's dance. After much staggering about
the paper, the hand succeeded in writing
a few words in very irregular characters.
The medium said he could not make out
every word that the spirit had written, but
the purport of the communication was, that
she was to come to the table. She? There
could be no dispute about the person referred
to; for there was only one she present.
Accordingly, Mrs. Wallace (having, as I noticed,
previously wiped her fingers with a handkerchief)
came to the table. Still no raps, nor
tilts, but presently Mr. Wallace's hand in another
fit, moving backward and forward, and
apparently sweeping crumbs into my lap. (N.B.
I had just assured Mr. Wallace that I had never
before assisted at an exhibition of spiritualism
in this form.) "What did the agitated hand
mean by sweeping imaginary crumbs into my
lap?" It meant that Mrs. Wallace was to come
and sit by me. "How did he know that?"
"The sperrit told him so, and he knew by
experience how the sperrit indicated particular
things." "Oh," we said. Mrs. Wallace came
and sat by me. She wiped her hands again
before putting them on the table. Presently
the table creaked. That was not sperrits, Mr.
Wallace said: it was merely the creaking of the
table, and he warned us not to be too ready to
accept false signs. Presently a rap of another
kind was heard. It was a dull sound like the
rap of a knuckle on a solid piece of wood. That
was declared to be a sperrit. Mr. Wallace
proceeded to address the sperrit in mild and
persuasive accents. "Now, friend; if you are
ready to communicate with us, you will please
to give three raps for 'yes;' and two raps for
'no.' Is it your wish to communicate with us?
Give me a hanser." The spirit understood
Mr. Wallace's dialect, and gave him a hanser
with one rap, then another, and at length, after
some delay, a third.

While these raps were being made, I noticed
quite distinctly and visibly (without the
possibility of making any mistake about the matter)
that Mrs. Wallace was vigorously using the
muscles of her fingers to move the table. When
I had seen her in this way produce several raps,
I came to a tacit understanding with her by
wiping my fingers with my pocket-handkerchief.
She saw me do this, and it was a masonic sign
by which she recognised a medium of her own
class. By exerting the tips of my fingers on
the surface of the table, I found I could produce
the raps that were recognised as the communications
of spirits. I will explain at once how it
is done, so that any one may test the matter for
himself. By pushing the tips of your fingers
backward and forward you give to the table
an imperceptible motion which moves the foot
on the floor. It is this slight slip on the floor
that sounds through the boards and produces
the raps. There was a rapid succession of
knocks produced by Mrs. Wallace (not by me),