This was too much for my friend, who bent forward eagerly, saying:--"_Do let me try if I cannot see them too!_"
Well, she "tried" for the greater part of two hours, but absolutely in vain, and then got up, and suggested going home to luncheon. She added navely: "I _thought_ they must have something wrong about them, and I am quite sure of it now, _or I should have seen them_."
But it had taken her two hours of failure to be absolutely convinced that they came straight from the devil!
One sign--also birds--appeared to me on one occasion only. We had returned to Denver, where Miss Greenlow and I were to separate after a year"s constant travel together. She was going back to San Francisco to take steamer for the Sandwich Islands, and thence on to Australia; whilst I was returning to England for family reasons.
I had arranged to dine with the hospitable Dean of Denver the evening of the day of her departure, and I had not realised how much less lonely one would have felt had my journey East corresponded more closely with her journey West, especially as she was obliged to leave the hotel about nine o"clock in the morning.
Waking early, and lying in bed, feeling very melancholy at the idea of being left behind and alone in the very centre of America, I looked up, and, to my delight, saw a new sign.
Not my little birds this time, but two big, plump father and mother birds, with a short string attached, not horizontally as before, but perpendicularly. At the end of this little string was a tiny bird, even smaller than the swallows, being evidently guided by the two big birds, and quite safe in their charge.
My room communicated with that of my companion, whose door was open, and I told her of this new "sign in the heavens," adding that I hoped it had come to stay. Fortunately, I found a pencil, and made a rough sketch at the time, or I might have been tempted to imagine that I had never seen it at all, for the trio never appeared again, though I have longed to see them, and have certainly required the consolation quite as much, many times, since that far-away summer morning in Denver, Colorado.
On reaching home after this long American trip, I found a budget of letters awaiting me--amongst them a little registered box containing a kind birthday present from the brother who has been mentioned in the Introduction to this book. Was it another case of mental affinity which had induced him unconsciously to choose a gold brooch with two swallows in gold and pearls? Not an uncommon design; but _the birds were exactly the same size as those I was in the habit of seeing just at that time_.
I never told him how extraordinarily _a propos_ his present had proved, but I have always looked upon that brooch as a mascot, and have certainly worn it every day since it came into my possession.
CHAPTER III
AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND
Shortly after the Jubilee of 1887 had taken place, I sailed for Australia and New Zealand.
My first psychic experience in the Colonies took place in Melbourne, some months after my landing in Tasmania.
The wife of one of the "prominent citizens" in Melbourne had been specially invited to meet me at an afternoon reception in the house of friends to whom I had carried letters of introduction, as she was said to be so deeply interested in everything psychic, and would greatly enjoy hearing my American experiences. Fortunately, the lady arrived late, and we had already enjoyed some interesting conversation before she came. A wetter "wet blanket" it has never been my fortune to encounter. She was a very handsome woman, and therefore good to look at, but in the _role_ of sympathetic audience she was a miserable failure.
She sat with a cold, gla.s.sy eye fixed upon me, whilst I endeavoured to continue the conversation which had been interrupted by her arrival.
She might just as well have _said_ as have looked the words: "Now go on making a fool of yourself!--that is just what I have come to see."
The position was hopeless. So I began to talk about the weather, which is disagreeable enough from sirocco in the hot spring months (it was the end of October) to be useful.
Presently the daughter of the house came up to me, and said:
"Do, please, go on telling us your interesting experiences, Miss Bates; we can talk about other things at any time, and we asked Mrs Burroughes on purpose to meet you."
The lady in question had joined another group by this time, so I was able to whisper in reply: "I am so very sorry, but I cannot possibly talk of these things before your friend--she paralyses me absolutely from any psychic point of view. She is very handsome, and I like looking at her, but I cannot talk to her except about the weather."
"How very odd!" was the unexpected reply. "That is just what Lizzie Maynard says. And I did very much want Lizzie to hear about America too, but she has gone off to the other end of the room, saying she knows you won"t be able to talk whilst Mrs Burroughes is here."
This was interesting, for I had not noticed the young girl mentioned, who had not been introduced to me. So when my young hostess asked "if she might bring Lizzie to see me at my hotel next day," I gladly acquiesced, in spite of feeling very far from well at the moment.
This feeling of _malaise_ increased in the night, and was, in fact, the precursor of a short but sharp attack of a form of typhoid which was running through the hotel at the time. Being in bed next afternoon about four o"clock, I was dismayed to hear that Miss Maynard had arrived to see me, and, moreover, had arrived _alone_. I had never spoken to the girl nor even consciously set eyes on her before, but I knew she must have come at least three miles from the suburb where she lived, and would probably refuse to have a cup of tea downstairs during my absence.
There was nothing for it, therefore, but to make an effort, order tea to be brought for her to my room, and send a message hoping she would not mind seeing me in my bedroom.
She came up--a modest, charming-looking girl of about twenty. I explained the circ.u.mstances, and apologised for being unable to join in the tea-party, but felt rather desperate when I realised that even the effort of taking any share in the conversation was beyond me.
Suddenly a brilliant idea pa.s.sed through my throbbing head. The day before, in planning the visit, which Miss Boyle had been unable to carry out herself, she had mentioned that her friend Lizzie Maynard was a very good automatic writer, and this seemed a solution of the difficulty.
So when my little friend had finished her tea, but was still looking tired from the long walk, I said to her: "I am so sorry to be so stupid to-day, Miss Maynard. I cannot talk, but I can listen; or do you think possibly you could get a little writing for me? Miss Boyle told me you wrote automatically sometimes?"
"I will try, certainly," was the ready response. "I never know, of course, what may come, and as this is our first meeting, it may be a little more difficult, but I should like to try."
She found paper and pencil, and sat by my bedside, holding the pencil very loosely between the second and third fingers, instead of between the thumb and first two fingers in the usual way.
She continued talking to me during the whole time, and not being well versed in automatic writing then, I could not believe that any writing could really be going on in this very casual sort of way.
"Is any writing really coming?" I questioned at last.
"Oh yes; but I can"t make out the last long word," she said, turning the paper round, so that she could see it, for the first time. "Kindly give me that word again," she remarked casually, and continued her conversation with me.
Finally the three or four sheets of rather large but not always very distinct caligraphy were submitted to me, and I saw that "Miscellaneous"
had been the long word at the beginning which Lizzie had asked to have repeated.
The whole message was intensely interesting to me, for it began: "_I who on earth was known as George Eliot._"
Now I had more than once seen, but had never spoken to, George Eliot in earth life, and although admiring her genius, as all who read her books are bound to do, there seemed no very obvious reason why she should come to me. Moreover, Lizzie Maynard, a charming but not highly educated girl (as I discovered later), seemed to know little about the famous author beyond her name. Another, and infinitely inferior, lady writer had been discussed with bated breath the day before in Lizzie"s presence. Her books--just then in the zenith of their popularity--had newly penetrated to the Colonies, and were being talked of there as though Minerva herself, helmet and all complete, had suddenly arrived in Melbourne. I had personally been greatly interested by one of this lady"s earlier books, and had a much less definite opinion of the author then, than I have at the present moment.
Threshing my brains for any sort of tie with George Eliot, I remembered having often stayed at Oxford as a young woman, when Jowett of Balliol was entertaining her and Mr Lewes, in his own home.
Of course, there was no question in those far-away days of my being asked to meet such a brilliant star; but it amused me often to hear the dull and uninteresting people of some standing in the University, whom Jowett had _not_ favoured with an invitation, declaring that nothing would have induced them to accept it!
This was, however, but a feeble link, even when added to the righteous indignation one had so often experienced on hearing similar remarks made, about a woman too far above her critics both in genius and morals, for them to be able to catch the faintest glimpse of her personality.
Apparently it only now lay with me to cease asking _why_, and accept the goods provided by the G.o.ds, making the most of such an opportunity. On these occasions so many possible questions tumble over each other in the brain that it is difficult to select any one to start with.
At length I asked the following question:--
"What did George Eliot think of the author who had been so much discussed and so highly applauded on the previous afternoon?"
Very quickly came the answer: "_I have no sympathy there--a mere puppet._"
Certainly this was not thought reading; for my own opinion then was very indefinite, and Lizzie"s views, as it turned out, were as enthusiastic as those of most people in the Colony. It was not until several years later that I realised that an extraordinarily _apt_ criticism had been made; for a puppet is made to dance by other ent.i.ties.
I was longing to ask another question, but had some natural hesitation in doing so before such a young girl. Moreover, I feared the answer must almost of necessity be coloured by the traditions of the latter, and therefore would be of no great value either way. But taking my courage "in both hands," I put the question:
"Please ask George Eliot if she _now_ thinks that she was justified in the position she took up with regard to George Lewes?"
The answer came in a flash: "CERTAINLY. _We are one here, as we were on earth._"
Anything less likely to emanate from the brain of an orthodox young girl can hardly be conceived!