CHAPTER XXIV.
SPIRITUALISM IN AMERICA.
I. _Mrs. M. A. Williams._
I went to America on a professional engagement in October, 1884. Some months beforehand a very liberal offer had been made me by the Spiritualists of Great Britain to write my experiences for the English press, but I declined to do so until I could add my American notes to them. I had corresponded (as I have shown) with the _Banner of Light_ in New York; and what I had heard of Spiritualism in America had made me curious to witness it. But I was determined to test it on a strictly private plan. I said to myself: "I have seen and heard pretty nearly all there is to be seen and heard on the subject in England, but, with one or two exceptions, I have never sat at any _seance_ where I was not known. Now I am going to visit a strange country where, in a matter like Spiritualism, I can conceal my ident.i.ty, so as to afford the media no clue to my surroundings or the names of my deceased friends." I sailed for America quite determined to pursue a strictly secret investigation, and with that end in view I never mentioned the subject to anyone.
I had a few days holiday in New York before proceeding to Boston, where my work opened, and I stayed at one of the largest hotels in the city. I landed on Sunday morning, and on Monday evening I resolved to make my first venture. Had I been a visitor in London, I should have had to search out the right sort of people, and make a dozen inquiries before I heard where the media were hiding themselves from dread of the law; but they order such things better on the other side of the Atlantic. People are allowed to hold their private opinions and their private religion there without being swooped down upon and clapped into prison for rogues and vagabonds. Whatever the views of the majority may be, upon this subject or any other (and Heaven knows I would have each man strong enough to cling to his opinion, and brave enough to acknowledge it before the world), I think it is a discredit to a civilized country to allow old laws, that were made when we were little better than savages, to remain in force at the present day. We are far too much over-ridden by a paternal Government, which has grown so blind and senile that it swallows camels while it is straining after a gnat.
There was no obstacle to my wish, however, in New York. I had but to glance down the advertis.e.m.e.nt columns of the newspapers to learn where the media lived, and on what days they held their public _seances_. It so happened that Mrs. M. A. Williams was the only one who held open house on Monday evenings for Materialization; and thither I determined to go. There is no such privacy as in a large _hotel_, where no one has the opportunity to see what his neighbor is doing. As soon, therefore, as my dinner was concluded, I put on a dark cloak, hat and veil, and walking out into the open, got into one of the cars that ran past the street where Mrs. Williams resided. Arrived at the house, I knocked at the door, and was about to inquire if there was to be any _seance_ there, that evening, when the attendant saved me the trouble by saying, "Upstairs, if you please, madam," and nothing more pa.s.sed between us.
When I had mounted the stairs, I found myself in a large room, the floor of which was covered with a thick carpet, nailed all round the wainscotting. On one side were some thirty or forty cane-bottomed chairs, and directly facing them was the cabinet. This consisted of four uprights nailed over the carpet, with iron rods connecting them at the top. There was no roof to it, but curtains of a dark maroon color were usually drawn around, but when I entered, they were flung back over the iron rods, so as to disclose the interior. There was a stuffed armchair for the use of the medium, and in front of the cabinet a narrow table with papers and pencils on it, the use of which I did not at first discover. At the third side of the room was a harmonium, so placed that the performer sat with his back both to the cabinet and the sitters. A large gas lamp, almost like a limelight, made in a square form like a lantern, was fixed against the wall, so as to throw the light upon the cabinet, but it was fitted with a sliding shade of red silk, with which it could be darkened if necessary. I was early, and only a few visitors were occupying the chairs. I asked a lady if I might sit where I chose, and on her answering "Yes," I took the chair in the front row, exactly opposite the cabinet, not forgetting that I was there in the cause of Spiritualism as well as for my own interests. The seats filled rapidly and there must have been thirty-five or forty people present, when Mrs.
Williams entered the room, and nodding to those she knew, went into the cabinet. Mrs. Williams is a stout woman of middle age, with dark hair and eyes, and a fresh complexion. She was dressed in a tight-fitting gown of pale blue, with a good deal of lace about the neck and sleeves.
She was accompanied by a gentleman, and I then discovered for the first time that it is usual in America to have, what they call, a "conductor"
of the _seance_. The conductor sits close to the cabinet curtains, and, if any spirit is too weak to shew itself outside, or to speak audibly, he conveys the message it may wish to send to its friends; and when I knew how very few precautions the Americans take to prevent such outrages as have occurred in England, and how many more materializations take place in an evening there than here, I saw the necessity of a conductor to protect the medium, and to regulate the order of the _seance_.
Mrs. Williams" conductor opened the proceedings with a very neat little speech. He said, "I see several strange faces here this evening, and I am very pleased to see them, and I hope they may derive both pleasure and profit from our meeting. We have only one rule for the conduct of our _seances_, that you shall behave like ladies and gentlemen. You may not credit all you see, but remember this is our religion, and the religion of many present, and as you would behave yourselves reverently and decorously, if you were in a church of another persuasion to your own, so I beg of you to behave yourselves here. And if any spirits should come for you whom you do not immediately recognize, don"t wound them by denying their ident.i.ty. They may have been longing for this moment to meet you again, and doing their very utmost to a.s.sume once more the likeness they wore on earth; yet some fail. Don"t make their failure harder to bear by roughly repudiating all knowledge of them. The strangers who are present to-night may mistake the reason of this little table being placed in front of the cabinet, and think it is intended to keep them from too close an inspection of the spirits. No such thing! On the contrary, all will be invited in turn to come up and recognize their friends. But we make it a rule at these _seances_ that no materialized spirit, who is strong enough to come beyond that table, shall be permitted to return to the cabinet. They must dematerialize in sight of the sitters, that no possible suspicion may rest upon the medium. These pencils and papers are placed here in case any spirit who is unable to speak may be impressed to write instead. And now we will begin the evening with a song."
The accompanist then played "Footsteps of Angels," the audience sung it with a will, and the curtains having been drawn round Mrs. Williams, the shade was drawn across the gaslight, and the _seance_ began.
I don"t think it could have been more than a minute or two before we heard a voice whispering, "Father," and _three girls_, dressed in white clinging garments, appeared at the opening in the curtains. An old man with white hair left his seat and walked up to the cabinet, when they all three came out at once and hung about his neck and kissed him, and whispered to him. I almost forgot where I was. They looked so perfectly human, so joyous and girl-like, somewhere between seventeen and twenty, and they all spoke at once, so like what girls on earth would do, that it was most mystifying. The old man came back to his seat, wiping his eyes. "Are those your daughters, sir?" asked one of the sitters. "Yes!
my three girls," he replied. "I lost them all before ten years old, but you see I"ve got them back again here."
Several other forms appeared after this--one, a little child of about three years old, who fluttered in and out of the cabinet like a b.u.t.terfly, and ran laughing away from the sitters who tried to catch her. Some of the meetings that took place for the first time were very affecting. One young man of about seventeen or eighteen, who was called up to see his mother"s spirit, sobbed so bitterly, it broke my heart to hear him. There was not the least doubt if _he_ recognized her or no. He was so overcome, he hardly raised his eyes for the rest of the evening.
One lady brought her spirit-son up to me, that I might see how perfectly he had materialized. She spoke of it as proudly as she might have done if he had pa.s.sed some difficult examination. The young man was dressed in a suit of evening clothes, and he shook hands with me at his mother"s bidding, with the firm grasp of a mortal. Naturally, I had seen too much in England for all this to surprise me. Still I had never a.s.sisted at a _seance_ where everything appeared to be so strangely human--so little mystical, except indeed the rule of dematerializing before the sitters, which I had only seen "Katie King" do before. But here, each form, after having been warned by the conductor that its time was up, sunk down right through the carpet as though it were the most ordinary mode of egression. Some, and more especially the men, did not advance beyond the curtains; then their friends were invited to go up and speak to them, and several went inside the cabinet. There were necessarily a good many forms, familiar to the rest, of whom I knew nothing; one was an old minister under whom they had all sat, another a gentleman who had been a constant attendant at Mrs. Williams" _seances_.
Once the conductor spoke to me. "I am not aware of your name," he said (and I thought, "No! my friend, and you won"t be aware of it just yet either!"), "but a spirit here wishes you would come up to the cabinet."
I advanced, expecting to see some friend, and there stood a Catholic priest with his hand extended in blessing. I knelt down, and he gave me the usual benediction and then closed the curtains. "Did you know the spirit?" the conductor asked me. I shook my head; and he continued, "He was Father Hayes, a well-known priest in this city. I suppose you are a Catholic?" I told him "Yes," and went back to my seat. The conductor addressed me again. "I think Father Hayes must have come to pave the way for some of your friends," he said. "Here is a spirit who says she has come for a lady named "Florence," who has just crossed the sea. Do you answer to the description?" I was about to say "Yes," when the curtains parted again and my daughter "Florence" ran across the room and fell into my arms. "Mother!" she exclaimed, "I said I would come with you and look after you--didn"t I?"
I looked at her. She was exactly the same in appearance as when she had come to me in England--the same luxuriant brown hair and features and figure, as I had seen under the different mediumships of Florence Cook, Arthur Colman, Charles Williams and William Eglinton; the same form which in England had been declared to be half-a-dozen different media dressed up to represent my daughter stood before me there in New York, thousands of miles across the sea, and by the power of a person who did not even know who I was. If I had not been convinced before, how could I have helped being convinced then?
"Florence" appeared as delighted as I was, and kept on kissing me and talking of what had happened to me on board ship coming over, and was evidently quite _au fait_ of all my proceedings. Presently she said, "There"s another friend of yours here, mother! We came over together.
I"ll go and fetch him." She was going back to the cabinet when the conductor stopped her. "You must not return this way, please. Any other you like," and she immediately made a kind of court curtsey and went down through the carpet. I was standing where "Florence" had left me, wondering what would happen next, when she came _up again_ a few feet off from me, head first, and smiling as if she had discovered a new game. She was allowed to enter the cabinet this time, but a moment afterwards she popped her head out again, and said, "Here"s your friend, mother!" and by her side was standing William Eglinton"s control, "Joey," clad in his white suit, with a white cap drawn over his head.
""Florence" and I have come over to make new lines for you here," he said: "at least, I"ve come over to put her in the way of doing it, but I can"t stay long, you know, because I have to go back to "w.i.l.l.y.""
I really didn"t care if he stayed long or not. I seemed to have procured the last proof I needed of the truth of the doctrine I had held so long, that there is no such thing as Death, as we understand it in this world.
Here were the two spiritual beings (for believing in the ident.i.ty of whom I had called myself a credulous fool fifty times over, only to believe in them more deeply still) in _propria personae_ in New York, claiming me in a land of strangers, who had not yet found out who I was.
I was more deeply affected than I had ever been under such circ.u.mstances before, and more deeply thankful. "Florence" made great friends with our American cousins even on her first appearance. Mrs. Williams" conductor told me he thought he had never heard anything more beautiful than the idea of the spirit-child crossing the ocean to guard its mother in a strange country, and particularly, as he could feel by her influence, what a pure and beautiful spirit she was. When I told him she had left this world at ten days old, he said that accounted for it, but he could see there was nothing earthly about her.
I was delighted with this _seance_, and hoped to sit with Mrs. Williams many times more, but fate decreed that I should leave New York sooner than I had antic.i.p.ated. The perfect freedom with which it was conducted charmed me, and the spirits seemed so familiar with the sitters. There was no "Sweet Spirit, hear my prayer," business about it. No fear of being detained or handled among the spirits, and no awe, only intense tenderness on the part of their relations. It was to this cause I chiefly attributed the large number of materializations I witnessed--_forty_ having taken place that evening. They spoke far more distinctly and audibly too than those I had seen in England, but I believe the dry atmosphere of the United States is far more favorable to the process of materialization. I perceived another difference. Although the female spirits were mostly clad in white, they wore dresses and not simply drapery, whilst the men were invariably attired in the clothes (or semblances of the clothes) they would have worn had they been still on earth. I left Mrs. Williams" rooms, determined to see as much as I possibly could of mediumship whilst I was in the United States.
CHAPTER XXV.
II. _Mrs. Eva Hatch._
I was so disappointed at being hurried off to Boston before I had seen any more of the New York media, that I took the earliest opportunity of attending a _seance_ there. A few words I had heard dropped about Eva Hatch made me resolve to visit her first. She was one of the Shaker sect, and I heard her spoken of as a remarkably pure and honest woman, and most reliable medium. Her first appearance quite gave me that impression. She had a fair, placid countenance, full of sweetness and serenity, and a plump matronly figure. I went incognita, as I had done to Mrs. Williams, and mingled unnoticed with the crowd. Mrs. Hatch"s cabinet was quite different from Mrs. Williams". It was built of planks like a little cottage, and the roof was pierced with numerous round holes for ventilation, like a pepper-box. There was a door in the centre, with a window on either side, all three of which were shaded by dark curtains. The windows, I was told, were for the accommodation of those spirits who had not the power to materialize more than a face, or head and bust. Mrs. Hatch"s conductor was a woman, who sat near the cabinet, as in the other case.
Mrs. Eva Hatch had not entered the cabinet five minutes before she came out again, under trance, with a very old lady with silver hair clinging to her arm, and walked round the circle. As they did so, the old lady extended her withered hand, and blessed the sitters. She came quite close to each one and was distinctly visible to all. I was told that this was the spirit of Mrs. Hatch"s mother, and that it was her regular custom to come first and give her blessing to the _seance_. I had never seen the spirit of an aged person before, and it was a beautiful sight.
She was the sweetest old lady too, very small and fragile looking, and half reclining on her daughter"s bosom, but smiling serenely upon every one there. When they had made the tour of the room, Mrs. Hatch re-entered the cabinet, and did not leave it again until the sitting was concluded.
There were a great many sitters present, most of whom were old patrons of Mrs. Hatch, and so, naturally, their friends came for them first. It is surprising though, when once familiarized with materialization, how little one grows to care to see the spirits who come for one"s next door neighbor. They are like a lot of prisoners let out, one by one, to see their friends and relations. The few moments they have to spare are entirely devoted to home matters of no possible interest to the bystander. The first wonder and possible shock at seeing the supposed dead return in their old likeness to greet those they left on earth over, one listens with languid indifference, and perhaps a little impatience for one"s own turn to come, to the whispered utterances of strangers. Mrs. Hatch"s "cabinet spirits" or "controls," however, were very interesting. One, who called herself the "Spirit of Prayer," came and knelt down in the middle of the circle, and prayed with us. She had asked for the gas to be extinguished first, and as she prayed she became illuminated with flashes of light, in the shape of stars and crosses, until she was visible from head to foot, and we could see her features and dress as if she had been surrounded by electricity.
Two more cabinet spirits were a negro and negress, who appeared together, chanting some of their native hymns and melodies. When I saw these apparitions, I thought to myself: "Here is a good opportunity to discover trickery, if trickery there is." The pair were undoubtedly of the negro race. There was no mistaking their thick lips and noses and yellow-white eyes, nor their polished brown skins, which no charcoal can properly imitate. They were negroes without doubt; but how about the negro bouquet? Everyone who has mixed with colored people in the East or the West knows what that is, though it is very difficult to describe, being something like warm rancid oil mingled with the fumes of charcoal, with a little worse thrown in. "Now," I thought, "if these forms are human, there will be some odor attached to them, and that I am determined to find out." I caught, therefore, at the dress of the young woman as she pa.s.sed, and asked her if she would kiss me. She left her companion directly, and put her arms (which were bare) round my neck, and embraced me several times; and I can declare, on my oath, that she was as completely free from anything like the smell of a colored woman as it was possible for her to be. She felt as fresh and sweet and pure as a little child.
Many other forms appeared and were recognized by the circle, notably a very handsome one who called herself the Empress Josephine; but as they could not add a grain"s weight to my testimony I pa.s.s them over. I had begun to think that "Florence" was not going to visit me that evening, when the conductor of the _seance_ asked if there was anybody in the room who answered to the name of "Bluebell." I must indulge in a little retrospect here, and tell my readers that ten years previous to the time I am writing of, I had lost my brother-in-law, Edward Church, under very painful circ.u.mstances. He had been left an orphan and in control of his fortune at a very early age, and had lived with my husband, Colonel Ross-Church, and myself. But poor "Ted" had been his own worst enemy. He had possessed a most generous heart and affectionate disposition, but these had led him into extravagances that swallowed up his fortune, and then he had taken to drinking and killed himself by it. I and my children had loved him dearly, but all our prayers and entreaties had had no avail, and in the end he had become so bad that the doctors had insisted upon our separation. Poor "Ted" had consequently died in exile, and this had been a further aggravation of our grief. For ten years I had been trying to procure communication with him in vain, and I had quite given up expecting to see him again. Only once had I heard "Bluebell" (his pet name for me) gasped out by an entranced clairvoyant, but nothing further had come of it. Now, as I heard it for the second time, from a stranger"s lips in a foreign country, it naturally roused my expectations, but I thought it might be only a message for me from "Ted."
"Is there anyone here who recognizes the name of "Bluebell"?" repeated the conductor. "I was once called so by a friend," I said. "Someone is asking for that name. You had better come up to the cabinet," she replied. I rose at once and did as she told me, but when I reached the curtain I encountered "Florence." "My darling child," I said, as I embraced her, "why did you ask for "Bluebell"?" She did not answer me, except by shaking her head, placing her finger on her lips, and pointing downwards to the carpet. I did not know what to make of it. I had never known her unable to articulate before. "What is the matter, dear?" I said; "can"t you speak to me to-night?" Still she shook her head, and tapped my arm with her hand, to attract my attention to the fact that she was pointing vigorously downwards. I looked down, too, when, to my astonishment, I saw rise through the carpet what looked to me like the bald head of a baby or an old man, and a little figure, _not more than three feet in height_, with Edward Church"s features, but no hair on its head, came gradually into view, and looked up in my face with a pitiful, deprecating expression, as if he were afraid I should strike him. The face, however, was so unmistakably Ted"s, though the figure was so ludicrously insignificant, that I could not fail to recognize him. "Why, Ted!" I exclaimed, "have you come back to see me at last?" and held out my hand. The little figure seized it, tried to convey it to his lips, burst into tears, and sank down through the carpet much more rapidly than he had come up.
I began to cry too. It was so pitiful. With her uncle"s disappearance "Florence" found her tongue. "Don"t cry, mother," she said; "poor Uncle Ted is overcome at seeing you. That"s why he couldn"t materialize better. He was in such a terrible hurry. He"ll look more like himself next time. I was trying so hard to help him, I didn"t dare to use up any of the power by speaking. He"ll be so much better, now he"s seen you.
You"ll come here again, won"t you?" I told her I certainly would, if I could; and, indeed, I was all anxiety to see my poor brother-in-law again. To prove how difficult it would have been to deceive me on this subject, I should like to say a little about Edward Church"s personal appearance. He was a very remarkable looking man--indeed, I have never seen anyone a bit like him before or after. He was very small; not short only, but small altogether, with tiny hands and feet, and a little head.
His hair and eyes were of the deepest black--the former parted in the middle, with a curl on either side, and was naturally waved. His complexion was very dark, his features delicate, and he wore a small pointed moustache. As a child he had suffered from an attack of confluent small-pox, which had deeply pitted his face, and almost eaten away the tip of his nose. Such a man was not to be easily imitated, even if anyone in Boston had ever heard of his inconsequential existence. To me, though, he had been a dear friend and brother, before the curse of Drink had seemed to change his nature, and I had always been anxious to hear how he fared in that strange country whither he had been forced to journey, like all of us, _alone_. I was very pleased then to find that business would not interfere with my second visit to Mrs. Eva Hatch, which took place two nights afterward. On this occasion "Florence" was one of the first to appear, and "Ted" came with her, rather weak and trembling on his second introduction to this mundane sphere, but no longer bald-headed nor under-sized. He was his full height now, about five feet seven; his head was covered with his black crisp hair, parted just as he used to wear it while on earth; in every particular he resembled what he used to be, even down to his clothes. I could have sworn I had seen that very suit of clothes; the little cut-away coat he always wore, with the natty tie and collar, and a dark blue velvet smoking cap upon his head, exactly like one I remembered being in his possession. "Florence" still seemed to be acting as his interpreter and guide. When I said to him, "Why! Ted, you look quite like your old self to-day," she answered, "He can"t talk to you, mamma, he is weak still, and he is so thankful to meet you again. He wants me to tell you that he has been trying to communicate with you often, but he never could manage it in England. He will be so glad when he can talk freely to you."
Whilst she was speaking, "Ted" kept on looking from her to me like a deaf and dumb animal trying to understand what was going on in a manner that was truly pitiful. I stooped down and kissed his forehead. The touch seemed to break the spell that hung over him. "_Forgive_," he uttered in a choked voice. "There is nothing to forgive, dear," I replied, "except as we all have need to forgive each other. You know how we all loved you, Ted, and we loved you to the last and grieved for you deeply. You remember the children, and how fond you were of them and they of you. They often speak to this day of their poor Uncle Ted."
"Eva--Ethel," he gasped out, naming my two elder children. At this juncture he seemed suddenly to fail, and became so weak that "Florence"
took him back into the cabinet again. No more spirits came for me that evening, but towards the close of the _seance_ "Florence" and "Ted"
appeared again together and embraced me fondly. "Florence" said, "He"s so happy now, mother; he says he shall rest in peace now that he knows that you have forgiven him. And he won"t come without his hair again,"
she added, laughing. "I hope he won"t," I answered, "for he frightened me." And then they both kissed me "good-night," and retreated to the cabinet, and I looked after them longingly and wished I could go there too.
CHAPTER XXVI.
III. _The Misses Berry._
No one introduced me to the Misses Berry. I saw their advertis.e.m.e.nt in the public papers and went incognita to their _seance_, as I had done to those of others. The first thing that struck me about them was the superior cla.s.s of patrons whom they drew. In the ladies" cloak room, where they left their heavy wraps and umbrellas, the conversation that took place made this sufficiently evident. Helen and Gertrude Berry were pretty, unaffected, lady-like girls; and their conductor, Mr. Abrow, one of the most courteous gentlemen I have ever met. The sisters, both highly mediumistic, never sat together, but on alternate nights, but the one who did _not_ sit always took a place in the audience, in order to prevent suspicion attaching to her absence. Gertrude Berry had been lately married to a Mr. Thompson, and on account of her health gave up her _seances_, soon after I made her acquaintance She was a tall, finely-formed young woman, with golden hair and a beautiful complexion.
Her sister Helen was smaller, paler and more slightly built. She had been engaged to be married to a gentleman who died shortly before the time fixed for their wedding, and his spirit, whom she called "Charley,"
was the princ.i.p.al control at her _seances_, though he never showed himself. I found the _seance_ room, which was not very large, crammed with chairs which had all been engaged beforehand, so Mr. Abrow fetched one from downstairs and placed it next his own for me, which was the very position I should have chosen. I asked him afterwards how he dared admit a stranger to such close proximity, and he replied that he was a medium himself and knew who he could and who he could _not_ trust at a glance. As my professional duties took me backwards and forwards to Boston, which was my central starting-point, sometimes giving me only a day"s rest there, I was in the habit afterwards, when I found I should have "a night off," of wiring to Mr. Abrow to keep me a seat, so difficult was it to secure one unless it were bespoken. Altogether I sat five or six times with the Berry sisters, and wished I could have sat fifty or sixty times instead, for I never enjoyed any _seances_ so _much_ in my life before. The cabinet was formed of an inner room with a separate door, which had to undergo the process of being sealed up by a committee of strangers every evening. Strips of gummed paper were provided for them, on which they wrote their names before affixing them across the inside opening of the door. On the first night I inspected the cabinet also as a matter of principle, and gummed my paper with "Mrs. Richardson" written on it across the door. The cabinet contained only a sofa for Miss Helen Berry to recline upon. The floor was covered with a nailed-down carpet. The door which led into the cabinet was shaded by two dark curtains hung with rings upon a bra.s.s rod. The door of the _seance_ room was situated at a right angle with that of the cabinet, both opening upon a square landing, and, to make "a.s.surance doubly sure," the door of the _seance_ room was left open, so that the eyes of the sitters at that end commanded a view, during the entire sitting, of the outside of the locked and gummed-over cabinet door. To make this fully understood, I append a diagram of the two rooms--
[Ill.u.s.tration]
By the position of these doors, it will be seen how impossible it would have been for anybody to leave or enter the cabinet without being detected by the sitters, who had their faces turned towards the _seance_ room door. The first materialization that appeared that evening was a bride, dressed in her bridal costume; and a gentleman, who was occupying a chair in the front row, and holding a white flower in his hand, immediately rose, went up to her, embraced her, and whispered a few words, then gave her the white flower, which she fastened in the bosom of her dress, after which he bowed slightly to the company, and, instead of resuming his seat, left the room. Mr. Abrow then said to me, "If you like, madam, you can take that seat now," and as the scene had excited my curiosity I accepted his offer, hoping to find some one to tell me the meaning of it. I found myself next to a very sweet-looking lady, whom I afterwards knew personally as Mrs. Seymour. "Can you tell me why that gentleman left so suddenly?" I asked her in a whisper. "He seldom stays through a _seance_," she replied; "he is a business man, and has no time to spare, but he is here every night. The lady you saw him speak to is his wife. She died on her wedding day, eleven years ago, and he has never failed to meet her on every opportunity since. He brings her a white flower every time he comes. She appears always first, in order that he may be able to return to his work." This story struck me as very interesting, and I always watched for this gentleman afterwards, and never failed to see him waiting for his bride, with the white flower in his hand. "Do you expect to see any friends to-night?" I said to my new acquaintance. "O! yes!" she replied. "I have come to see my daughter "Bell." She died some years ago, and I am bringing up the two little children she left behind her. I never do anything for them without consulting their mother. Just now I have to change their nurse, and I have received several excellent characters of others, and I have brought them here this evening that "Bell" may tell me which to write for. I have the pattern for the children"s winter frocks, too," she continued, producing some squares of woolen cloths, "and I always like to let "Bell" choose which she likes best." This will give my readers some idea of how much more the American spiritualists regard their departed friends as still forming part of the home circle, and interested in their domestic affairs. "Bell" soon after made her appearance, and Mrs.
Seymour brought her up to me. She was a young woman of about three or four and twenty, and looked very happy and smiling. She perused the servants" characters as practically as her mother might have done, but said she would have none of them, and Mrs. Seymour was to wait till she received some more. The right one had not come yet. She also looked at the patterns, and indicated the one she liked best. Then, as she was about to retire, she whispered to her mother, and Mrs. Seymour said, to my surprise (for it must be remembered I had not disclosed my name to her), "Bell tells me she knows a daughter of yours in the spirit life, called "Florence." Is that the case?" I answered I had a daughter of that name; and Mrs. Seymour added ""Bell" says she will be here this evening, that she is a very pure and very elevated spirit, and they are great friends." Very shortly after this, Mr. Abrow remarked, "There is a young girl in the cabinet now, who says that if her mother"s name is "Mrs. Richardson," she must have married for the third time since she saw her last, for she was "Mrs. Lean" then." At this remark I laughed; and Mr. Abrow said, "Is she come for you, madam? Does the cap fit?" I was obliged to acknowledge then that I _had_ given a false name in order to avoid recognition. But the mention of my married name attracted no attention to me, and was only a proof that it had not been given from any previous knowledge of Mr. Abrow"s concerning myself. I was known in the United States as "Florence Marryat" only, and to this day they believe me to be still "Mrs. Ross-Church," that being the name under which my first novels were written. So I recognized "Florence" at once in the trick that had been played me, and had risen to approach the curtain, when she came _bounding_ out and ran into my arms. I don"t think I had ever seen her look so charming and girlish before. She looked like an embodiment of sunshine. She was dressed in a low frock which seemed manufactured of lace and muslin, her hair fell loose down her back to her knees, and her hands were full of damask roses. This was in December, when hot-house roses were selling for a dollar a piece in Boston, and she held, perhaps, twenty. Their scent was delicious, and she kept thrusting them under my nose, saying, "Smell my roses, mother.
Don"t you wish you had my garden? We have _fields_ of them in the Summer Land! O! how I wish you were there." "Shan"t I come soon, darling?" I said. "No! not yet," replied "Florence." "You have a lot of work to do still. But when you come, it will be all flowers for you and me." I asked her if she knew "Bell," and she said, "O! yes! We came together this evening." Then I asked her to come and speak to "Bell"s" mother, and her manner changed at once. She became shy and timid, like a young girl, unused to strangers, and quite hung on my arm, as I took her up to Mrs. Seymour"s side. When she had spoken a few words to her in a very low voice, she turned to me and said, "I must go now, because we have a great surprise for you this evening--a _very_ great surprise." I told her I liked great surprises, when they were pleasant ones, and "Florence" laughed, and went away. I found that her _debut_ had created such a sensation amongst the sitters--it being so unusual for a materialized spirit to appear so strong and perfect on the first occasion of using a medium--that I felt compelled to give them a little explanation on the subject. And when I told them how I had lost her as a tiny infant of ten days old--how she had returned to me through various media in England, and given such unmistakable proofs of her _ident.i.ty_--and how I, being a stranger in their country, and only landed there a few weeks, had already met her through Mrs. Williams, Mrs. Hatch and Miss Berry--they said it was one of the most wonderful and perfect instances of materialization they had ever heard of. And when one considers how perfect the chain is, from the time when "Florence" first came back to me as a child, too weak to speak, or even to understand where she was, to the years through which she had grown and became strong almost beneath my eyes, till she could "_bound_" (as I have narrated) into my arms like a human being, and talk as distinctly as (and far more sensible than) I did myself, I think my readers will acknowledge also, that hers is no common story, and that I have some reason to believe in Spiritualism.
Miss Berry"s cabinet spirits were quite different from the common type.
One was, or rather had been, a dancing girl--not European, but rather more, I fancy, of the Asiatic or Egyptian type. Anyway she used to come out of the cabinet--a lithe lissom creature like a panther or a snake--and execute such twists and bounds and pirouettes, as would have made her fortune on the stage. Indeed I used to think (being always on the lookout for chicanery) that no _human_ creature who could dance as she did would ever waste her talents, especially in a smart country like America, on an audience of spiritualists, whose only motive for meeting was to see their friends, and who would not pay an extra cent to look at a "cabinet spirit." Another one was an Indian whom they called "The Brave." He was also a lithe, active creature, without an ounce of superfluous flesh upon his body, but plenty of muscle. He appeared to like the ladies of the company very much, but evidently distrusted the men. One stout, big man who was, I fancy, a bit of a sceptic, wished to test the "Brave"s" muscular power by feeling his biceps, and was invited to step in front of the circle for that purpose. He had no sooner approached him than the Indian seized him up in his arms and threw him _right over his head_. He did not hurt him, but as the gentleman got up again, he said, "Well! I weigh 200 pounds, and I didn"t think any man in the room could have done that." The ladies in the circle mostly wore flowers in their bosom--bouquets, after the custom of American ladies--and they began, one and all, to detach flowers from their bouquets and give them to the "Brave," "to give to his squaw." He nodded and gabbled some unintelligible Sioux or Cherokee in reply, and went all round the circle on his knees. The stout man had surmised that he was painted, and his long, straight, black hair was a wig. When he came to me I said, "Brave! may I try if your hair is a wig?" He nodded and said, "Pull--pull!" which I did, and found that it undoubtedly grew on his head. Then he took my finger and drew it across his face several times to show he was not painted. I had no flowers to present him with, so I said, "Come here, Brave, and I"ll give you something for your squaw,"
and when he approached near enough I kissed him. He chuckled, and his eyes sparkled with mischief as he ran chatting in his native dialect behind the curtains. In another minute he dashed out again, and coming up to me e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, "No--give--squaw!" and rushed back. Mr. Abrow laughed heartily at this incident, and so did all the sitters, the former declaring I had entirely captivated the "Brave." Presently the cabinet curtains were shaken, and after a pause they parted slowly, and the figure of an Indian squaw crept out. Anything more malignant and vicious than her look I have seldom seen. Mr. Abrow asked her _who_ she wanted and _what_ she wanted, but she would not speak. She stood there silent, but scowling at me from beneath the tangles of her long black hair. At last Mr. Abrow said to her, "If you don"t want to speak to anyone in the circle you must go away, as you are only preventing other spirits from coming." The squaw backed behind the curtains again rather sulkily, but the next time the "Brave" appeared she came with him, and _never_ did he come again in my presence but what his "squaw" stood at the curtains and watched his actions. Mrs. Abrow told me that the "Brave" had been in the habit of manifesting at their _seances_ for years, but that they had never seen the "squaw" until that evening.
Indeed, I don"t think they were very grateful to me for having by my rashness eliminated this new feature in their evening"s entertainment, for the "squaw" proved to be a very earthly and undeveloped spirit, and subsequently gave them some trouble, as they could not drive her away when they wanted to do so. Towards the close of the evening Mr. Abrow said, "There is a spirit here now who is very anxious to show himself, but it is the first time he has ever attempted to fully materialize, and he is not at all certain of success. He tells me there is a lady in the circle who has newly arrived in America, and that this lady years ago sang a song by his dying bed in India. If she will step up to the cabinet now and sing that song again he will try and shew himself to her."
Such of my readers as have perused "The story of John Powles" will recognize at once who this was. I did, of course, and I confess that as I rose to approach the cabinet I trembled like an aspen leaf. I had tried so often, and failed so often to see this dear old friend of mine, that to think of meeting him now was like a veritable resurrection from the dead. Think of it! We had parted in 1860, and this was 1884--twenty-four years afterwards. I had been a girl when we said "Good-bye," and he went forth on that journey which seemed then so mysterious an one to me. I was a middle-aged woman now, who had pa.s.sed through so much from which _he_ had been saved, that I felt more like his mother than his friend. Of all my experiences this was to me really the most solemn and interesting. I hardly expected to see more than his face, but I walked up to the cabinet and commenced to sing in a very shaky voice the first stanza of the old song he was so fond of:--