CHAPTER XX.
THE MEDIUMSHIP OF WILLIAM FLETCHER.
It may be remembered in the "Story of John Powles" that when, as a perfect stranger to Mr. Fletcher, I walked one evening into the Steinway Hall, I heard him describe the circ.u.mstances of my old friend"s death in a very startling manner. It made such an impression on me that I became anxious to hear what more Mr. Fletcher might have to say to me in private, and for that purpose I wrote and made an appointment with him at his private residence in Gordon Square. I did not conceal my name, and I knew my name must be familiar to him; for although he had only just arrived from America, I am better known as an author in that country perhaps than in this. But I had no intention of gauging his powers by what he told me of my exterior life; and by what followed, his guide "Winona" evidently guessed my ideas upon the subject. After the _seance_ I wrote thus concerning it to the _Banner of Light_, a New York Spiritualistic paper:--
"I had seen many clairvoyants before, both in public and private, and had witnessed wonderful feats of skill on their part in naming and describing concealed objects, and reading print or writing when held far beyond their reach of sight; but I knew the trick of all that. If Mr.
Fletcher is going to treat me to any mental legerdemain, I thought, as I took my way to Gordon Square, I shall have wasted both my time and trouble upon him; and, I confess, as I approached the house, that I felt doubtful whether I might not be deceived against my senses by the clever lecturer, whose eloquence had charmed me into desiring a more intimate acquaintance with him. Even the private life of a professional person soon becomes public property in London; and had Mr. Fletcher wished to find out my faults and failings, he had but to apply to ----, say, my dearest friend, or the one upon whom I had bestowed most benefits, to learn the worst aspect of the worst side of my character. But the neat little page-boy answered my summons so promptly that I had no time to think of turning back again; and I was ushered through a carpeted hall, and up a staircase into a double drawing-room, strewn with evidence that my clairvoyant friend possessed not only artistic taste, but the means to indulge it. The back room into which I was shown was hung with paintings and fitted with a luxurious _causeuse_, covered with art needlework, and drawn against the open window, through which might be seen some fine old trees in the garden below, and Mr. Fletcher"s dogs enjoying themselves beneath their shade. Nothing could be further removed from one"s ideas of a haunt of mystery or magic, or the abode of a man who was forced to descend to trickery for a livelihood. In a few minutes Mr. Fletcher entered the room and saluted me with the air of a gentleman. We did not proceed to business, however, until he had taken me round his rooms, and shown me his favorite pictures, including a portrait of Sara Bernhardt, etched by herself, in the character of Mrs.
Clarkson in _L"Etrangere_. After which we returned to the back drawing-room, and without darkening the windows or adopting any precautions, we took our seats upon the _causeuse_ facing each other, whilst Mr. Fletcher laid his left hand lightly upon mine. In the course of a minute I observed several convulsive shivers pa.s.s through his frame, his eyes closed, and his head sunk back upon the cushions, apparently in sleep. I sat perfectly still and silent with my hand in his. Presently he reopened his eyes quite naturally, and sitting upright, began to speak to me in a very soft, thin, feminine voice. He (or rather his guide "Winona") began by saying that she would not waste my time on facts that she might have gathered from the world, but would confine herself to speaking of my inner life. Thereupon, with the most astonishing astuteness, she told me of my thoughts and feelings, reading them off like a book. She repeated to me words and actions that had been said and done in privacy hundred of miles away. She detailed the characters of my acquaintance, showing who were true and who were false, giving me their names and places of residence. She told me the motives I had had for certain actions, and what was more strange, revealed truths concerning myself which I had not recognized until they were presented to me through the medium of a perfect stranger. Every question I put to her was accurately answered, and I was repeatedly invited to draw further revelations from her. The fact being that I was struck almost dumb by what I had heard, and rendered incapable of doing anything but marvel at the wonderful gift that enabled a man, not only to read each thought that pa.s.sed through my brain, but to see, as in a mirror, scenes that were being enacted miles away with the actors concerned in them and the motives that animated them. "Winona" read the future for me as well as the past, and the first distinct prophecy she uttered has already most unexpectedly come to pa.s.s. When I announced that I was satisfied, the clairvoyant laid his head back again upon the cushions, the same convulsive shudders pa.s.sed through his frame, and in another minute he was smiling in my face, and hoping I had a good _seance_."
This is part of the letter I wrote concerning Mr. Fletcher to the _Banner of Light_. But a description of words, however strongly put, can never carry the same weight as the words themselves. So anxious am I to make this statement as trustworthy as possible, however, that I will now go further, and give the exact words as "Winona" spoke them to me on that occasion, and as I took them down from her lips. _Some_ parts I _must_ omit, not for my own sake, but because of the treachery they justly ascribed to persons still living in this world. But enough will, I trust, remain to prove how intimately the spirit must have penetrated to my inner life. This is, then, the greater part of what "Winona" said to me on the 27th of June, 1879:
"You are a Child of Destiny, who never was a child. Your life is fuller of tragedies than any life I ever read yet. I will not tell you of the past _facts_, because they are known to the world, and I might have heard them from others. But I will speak of yourself. I have to leave the earth-world when I come in contact with you, and enter a planetary sphere in which you dwell (and ever must dwell) _alone_. It is as if you were in a room shut off from the rest of mankind. You are one of the world"s magnets. You have nothing really in common with the rest. You draw people to you, and live upon their life; and when they have no more to give, nor you to demand, the liking fades on both sides. It must be so, because the spirit requires food the same as the body; and when the store is exhausted, the affection is starved out, and the persons pa.s.s out of your life. You have often wondered to yourself why an acquaintance who seemed necessary to you to-day you can live perfectly well without to-morrow. This is the reason. More than that, if you continue to cling to those whose spiritual system you have exhausted, they would poison you, instead of nourishing you. You may not like it, but those you value most you should oftenest part with. Separation will not decrease your influence over them; it will increase it. Constant intercourse may be fatal to your dearest affections. You draw so much on others, you _empty_ them, and they have nothing more to give you. You have often wondered, too, why, after you have lived in a place a little while, you become sad, weary, and ill--not physically ill, but mentally so--and you feel as if you _must_ leave it, and go to another place.
When you settle in this fresh place, you think at first that it is the very place where you will be content to live and die; but after a little while the same weariness and faintness comes back again, and you think you cannot breathe till you leave it, as you did the other. This is not fancy. It is because your nature has exhausted all it can draw from its surroundings, and change becomes a necessity to life. You will never be able to live long in any place without change, and let me warn you never to settle yourself down anywhere with the idea of living there entirely.
Were you forced to do so, you would soon die. You would be starved to death spiritually. All people are not born under a fate, but you were, and you can do very little to change it. England is the country of your fate. You will never prosper in health, mind, or money in a foreign country. It is good to go abroad for change, but never try to live there. You are thinking of going abroad now, but you will not remain there nearly so long as you antic.i.p.ate. Something will arise to make you alter your plans--not a real trouble--but an uneasiness. The plan you think of will not answer." (This prediction was fulfilled to the letter.) "This year completes an era in your professional career--not of ill-luck, so much as of stagnation. Your work has been rather duller of late years. The Christmas of 1879 will bring you brighter fortune. Some one who has appeared to drop you will come forward again, and take up your cause, and bring you in much money." (This also came to pa.s.s.) "You have not nearly reached the zenith of your success. It is yet to come. It is only beginning. You will have another child, certainly _one_, but I am not sure if it will live in this world. I do not see its earth-life, but I see you in that condition.
"Your nervous system was for many years strung up to its highest tension--now it is relaxed, and your physical powers are at their lowest ebb. You could not bear a child in your present condition. You must become much lighter-hearted, more contented and at ease before that comes to pa.s.s. You must have ceased to wish for a child, or even to expect it. You have never had a heart really at ease yet. All your happiness has been feverish.
"I see your evil genius. She is out of your life at present, but she crossed your path last year, and caused you much heart-burning, and not without reason. It seems to me that some sudden shock or accident put an end to the acquaintance; but she will cross your path again, and cause you more misery, perhaps, than anything else has done. She is not young, but stout, and not handsome, as it seems to me. She is addicted to drinking. I see her rolling about now under the influence of liquor. She has been married more than once. I see the name ---- ---- written in the air. She would go any lengths to take that you value from you, even to compa.s.sing your death. She is madly in love with what is yours. She would do anything to compa.s.s her ends--not only immoral things, but filth--filth. I have no hesitation in saying this. Whenever she crosses your path, in public or private, flee from her as from a pestilence."
(This information was correct in every detail. The name was given at full length. I repeat it as a specimen of the succinctness of intelligence given through trance mediumship.) "1883 will be a most unfortunate year for you. You will have a severe illness, your friends will not know if you are going to live or die, and during this illness you will endure great mental agony, caused through a woman, one of whose names begins with ----. You will meet her some time before, and she will profess to be your dearest friend. I see her bending over you, and telling you she is your best friend, and you are disposed to believe it.
She is as tall as you are, but does not look so tall from a habit she has of carrying herself. She is not handsome, strictly speaking, but dark and very fascinating. She has a trick of keeping her eyes down when she speaks. She is possibly French, or of French extraction, but speaks English. She will get a hold upon ----"s mind that will nearly separate you." (At this juncture I asked, "How can I prevent it?") "If I told you, that if you went by the 3 o"clock train from Gower Street, you would be smashed, you would not take that train. When you meet a woman answering this description, stop and ask yourself whether she is the one I have warned you against, before you admit her across the threshold of your house.
"----"s character is positive for good, and negative for evil. If what is even for his good were urged upon him, he would refuse to comply; but present evil to him as a possible good, and he will stop to consider whether it is not so. If he is to be guided aright, it must be by making him believe it would be impossible for him to go wrong. Elevate his nature by elevating his standard of right. Make it impossible for him to lower himself, by convincing him that he _would_ be lowered. He is very conceited. Admiration is the breath of his life. He is always thinking what people will say of him or his actions. He is very weak under temptation, especially the temptation of flattery. He is much too fond of women. You have a difficult task before you, and you have done much harm already through your own fault. He believes too little in the evil of others--much too little. If he were unfaithful to those who trust him, he would be quite surprised to find he had broken their hearts.
Your work is but beginning. Hitherto all has been excitement, and there has been but little danger. Now comes monotony and the fear of satiety.
Your fault through life has been in not a.s.serting the positive side of your character. You were born to rule, and you have sat down a slave.
Either through indolence or despair of success, you have presented a negative side to the insults offered you, and in the end you have been beaten. You make a great mistake in letting your female friends read all your joys and sorrows. Men would sympathize and pity. Women will only take advantage of them. a.s.sert your dignity as mistress in your own house, and don"t let those visitors invite themselves who do not come for you. You are, as it were, the open door for more than one false friend. I warn you especially against two unmarried women--at least, if they are married, I don"t see their husbands anywhere. They are both too fond of ----; one _very much_ too fond of him, and you laugh at it, and give your leave for caresses and endearments, which should never be permitted. If I were to tell them that they visit at your house for ----, and not for you, they would be very indignant. They give you presents, and really like you; but ---- is the attraction, and with one of them it only needs time, place and opportunity to cause the ruin of ---- and yourself. She has an impediment in walking. I need say no more.
She wants to become still more familiar, and live under the same roof with you. You must prevent it. The other is doing more harm to herself than to anyone else. She is silly and romantic, and must dream of some one. It is a pity it should be encouraged by familiarity. ---- has no feeling for them beyond pity and friendship, but it is not necessary he should love a woman to make her dangerous to him. As far as I can see your lives extend, ---- will love you, and you will retain your influence over him if you _choose_ to do so. But it is in your own hands what you make of him. You must not judge his nature by your own. You are shutting yourself up too much. You should be surrounded by a circle of men, so that you might not draw influence from ---- alone. You should go out more, and a.s.sociate with clever men, and hear what they have to say to you. You must not keep so entirely with ----. It is bad for both of you. You are making too great a demand upon his spiritual powers, and you will exhaust them too soon. A woman cannot draw spiritual life from women only. She must take it from men. There is another acquaintance I must warn you against ----; a widow, fair hair, light eyes, not clever, but cunning. She has but one purpose in visiting you. She would like to stand in your shoes. She would not hesitate to usurp your rights. Be civil to her if you will, but do not encourage her visits. It were best if she pa.s.sed out of your lives altogether. She can never bring you any good luck. She may be the cause of much annoyance yet. ---- should have work, active and constant, or his health will fail, living in idleness, spiritually and bodily. You tell him too often that you love him. Let him feel there is always a higher height to gain, a lower depth to fall to, in your esteem. He is not the only man in the world. Why should you deceive him by saying so? You are much to blame." (Considering that Mr.
Fletcher had never seen, or, as far as I knew, heard of the persons he mentioned in this tirade, it becomes a matter of speculation where or from whom he gathered this keen insight to their character and personalities, every word of which I can vouch for as being strictly true.)
"Many spirits are round you. Some wish to speak.... A grand and n.o.ble spirit stands behind you, with his hands spread in blessing over your head. He is your father. He sends this message: "My dear child, there were so many influences antagonistic to my own in your late married life, that I found it very difficult to get near you. Now they are removed. The present conditions are much more favorable to me, and I hope to be with you often, and to help you through the life that lies before you." There is the face of a glorified spirit, just above your head, and I see the name "Powles." This spirit is nearer you, and more attached to you than any other in Spirit Land. He comes only to you, and one other creature through you--your second child. He says you will know him by the token, the song; you sung to him upon his death-bed. His love for you is the best and purest, and he is always by you, though lower influences sometimes forbid his manifesting himself.
Your child comes floating down, and joins hands with him. She is a very pure and beautiful spirit. She intimates that her name on earth was the same as yours, but she is called by another name in the spheres--a name that has something to do with flowers. She brings me a bunch of pure white lilies, tinged with blue, with blue petals, tied with a piece of blue ribbon, and she intimates to me by gesture that her spirit-name has something to do with them. I think I must go now, but I hope you will come and sit with me again. I shall be able to tell you more next time.
My name is "Winona," and when you ask for me I will come. Good-bye...."
This was the end of my first _seance_ with Mr. Fletcher, and I think even sceptics will allow that it was sufficiently startling for the first interview with an entire stranger. The following year I wrote again to the _Banner of Light_ concerning Mr. Fletcher, but will only give an extract from my letter. "I told you in my letter of last year that I had held a _seance_ with Mr. Fletcher of so private a nature that it was impossible to make it public. During that interview "Winona" made several startling prophecies concerning the future, which, it may interest your readers to know, have already been fulfilled. Wishing to procure some further proofs of Mr. Fletcher"s power before I wrote this letter to you, I prepared a different sort of test for him last week.
From a drawer full of old letters I selected, _with my eyes shut_, four folded sheets of paper, which I slipped into four blank envelopes, ready prepared for them--still without looking--and closed them in the usual manner with the adhesive gum, after which I sealed them with sealing wax. I carried these envelopes to Mr. Fletcher, and requested "Winona"
to tell me the characters of the persons by whom their contents had been written. She placed them consecutively to the medium"s forehead, and as she returned them to me, one by one, I wrote her comments on each on the side of the cover. On breaking the seals, the character of each writer was found to be most accurately defined, although the letters had all been written years before--(a fact which "Winona" had immediately discovered). She also told me which of my correspondents were dead, and which living. Here, you will observe, there could have been no reaction of my own brain upon that of the sensitive, as I was perfectly ignorant, until I reopened the envelopes, by whom the letters had been sent to me.
Two months ago I was invited to join in a speculation, of the advisability of which I felt uncertain. I went therefore to Mr.
Fletcher, and asked for an interview with "Winona," intending to consult her in the matter. But before I had time to mention the subject, she broached it to me, and went on to speak of the speculation itself, of the people concerned in it, and the money it was expected to produce; and, finally, she explained to me how it would collapse, with the means that would bring it to an end, putting her decided veto on my having anything to do with it. I followed "Winona"s" advice, and have been thankful since that I did so, as everything has turned out just as she predicted."
I think those people who desire to gain the utmost good they can out of clairvoyance should be more ready to listen and learn, and less to cavil and to question. Many who have heard me relate the results of my experience have rushed off pell-mell to the same medium, perhaps, and came away woefully disappointed. Were they to review the interview they would probably find they had done all the talking, and supplied all the information, leaving the clairvoyant no work to do whatever. To such I always say, whether their aim is to obtain advice in their business, or news of a lost friend, _Be perfectly pa.s.sive_, until the medium has said all he or she may have to say. Give them time to become _en rapport_ with you, and quietude, that he may commune with the spirits you bring with you; for it is _they_, and not _his_ controls, that furnish him with the history of your life, or point out the dangers that are threatening. When he has finished speaking, he will probably ask if you have any questions to put to him, and _then_ is your turn for talking, and for gaining any particular information you may wish to acquire. If these directions are carried out, you are likely to have a much more satisfactory _seance_ than otherwise.
CHAPTER XXI.
PRIVATE MEDIA.
People who wish to argue against Spiritualism are quite sure, as a rule, that media will descend to any trickery and cheating for the sake of gain. If you reply, as in my own case, that the _seances_ have been given as a free-will offering, they say that they expected introductions or popularity or advertis.e.m.e.nt in exchange. But what can be adduced against the medium who lends his or her powers to a person whom he has never seen, and probably never will see, and for no reason, excepting that his controls urge him to the deed? Such a man is Mr. George Plummer of Ma.s.sachusetts, America. In December, 1887, when my mind was very unsettled, my friend Miss Schonberg advised me to write to this medium and ask his advice. She told me I must not expect an immediate reply, as Mr. Plummer kept a box into which he threw all the letters he received from strangers on spiritualistic subjects, and when he felt impressed to do so, he went and took out one, haphazard, and wrote the answer that was dictated to him. All I had to do was to enclose an addressed envelope, not a _stamped_ one, in my letter, to convey the answer back again. Accordingly, I prepared a diplomatic epistle to this effect.
"Dear sir,--Hearing that you are good enough to sit for strangers, I shall be much obliged if you will let me know what you see for me.--Yours truly, F. Lane." It will be seen that I transposed the letters of my name "Lean." I addressed the return envelope in the same manner to the house in Regent"s Park, which I then occupied, and I wrote it all in a feigned hand to conceal my ident.i.ty as much as possible. The time went on and I heard nothing from Mr. Plummer. I was touring in the provinces for the whole of 1888, and at the end of the year I came back to London and settled down in a new house in a different quarter of the town. By this time I had almost forgotten Mr. Plummer and my letter to him, and when in _December_, 1889, two years after I had sent it, my own envelope in my own handwriting, forwarded by the postal authorities from Regent"s Park, was brought to me, I did not at first recognize it.
I kept twisting it about, and thinking how like it was to my own writing, when the truth suddenly flashed on me. I opened it and read as follows:
"Georgetown, November 28th, 1889.
"Mrs. Lane,--Dear Madam,--Please pardon me for seeming neglect in answering your request. At the time of receiving your letter I could not write, and it got mislaid. Coming across it now, even at the eleventh hour, I place myself in condition to answer. I see a lady with dark blue eyes before me, of a very nervous life--warm-hearted--impulsive--tropical in her nature. A woman of intense feeling--a woman whose life has been one of constant disappointment. To-day the current of life flows on smoothly but monotonous. I sense from the sphere of this lady, a weariness of life--should think she felt like Alexander, because there are no more worlds for her to conquer. She is her own worst enemy.
Naturally generous, she radiates her refined magnetic sphere to others, and does not get back that which she can utilize. I see a bright-complexioned gentleman in earth life--brave, generous, and kind--but does not comprehend your interior life. And yet thinks the world of you to-day. I feel from you talent of a marked order.
And yet life is a disappointment. Not but what you have been successful in a refined, worldly sense, but your spiritual nature has been repressed. The society you move in is one of intellectual culture; that is not of the soul. And it is soul food that you are hungering for to-day. You are an inspired woman. Thought seems to you, all prepared, so to speak. But it does not seem to free the tiny little messengers of your soul life. Somehow I don"t feel that confidence in myself in writing to you. The best kind of a reading is usually obtained in reading to a person direct. But if I don"t meet your case we will call it a failure and let it go. The year of 1890 is going to be more favorable to you than for the last ten years. I think in some way you are to meet with more reciprocity of soul. As the divining rod points to the stream of water in the earth, so I find my intuitive eye takes cognizance of your interior life. You will in a degree catch my meaning through this, and it will come clearer, more through your intuition than through your intellect. I should say to you, follow your instincts and intuitions always through life. If this throws any light over your path I am glad.--I remain, most respectfully yours, George Plummer."
Now there are two noticeable things in this letter. First, Mr. Plummer"s estimate of my interior life almost coincides with Mr. Fletcher"s given in 1879, ten years before. Next, although he read it through the medium of a letter written in 1887, he draws a picture of my position and surroundings in 1889. Both these things appeared to me very curious as coming from a stranger across the Atlantic, and I answered his letter at once, still preserving my slight incognita, and telling him that as he had read so much of my life from my handwriting of so long ago, I wished he would try to read more from words which went fresh from me to him. I also enclosed a piece of the handwriting of a friend. Mr. Plummer did not keep me waiting this time. His next letter was dated February 8th, 1890.
"Dear Madam,--I received yours of January 3rd, and would have answered before, but the spirit did not move. I have been tied to a sick room going on three months, with its cares and anxieties. Not the best condition for writing. The best condition to reflect your life, to give your soul strength, is to be at rest and have all earth conditions nullified. But that cannot be to-day. So I will try to penetrate the mystery of your life as best I can, and radiate to you at least some strength. The relation of soul is the difficulty of your life, and you are so perfectly inspirational that it makes the condition worse. Grand types of Manhood and Womanhood come to you from the higher life, and your spirit and soul catch the reflection, and are disappointed because they cannot live that life. But you are getting a development out of all this friction. Now if you would come in contact with that nature that could radiate to you just what you could give to it, you would be happy. Love is absolute, you well know. Often in the exchange of thought we give each other strength. And then every letter we write, every time we shake hands, we give some of our own personality out. You are too sensitive to the spheres of people.
You have such a strong personality of life that the power that inspires you could not make the perfect junction until you get so, you had rather die than live. That was a condition of negation. Now you have been running on a dead level of nothingness for two years and a half." (This was exactly the time since my daughter had been taken from me). "_I mean it seems so to you._ Such a sameness of things. I get from the writing of the gentleman. A good sphere--warm hearted--true to his understanding of things. He seems to be a sort of a half-way house to you. That is, you roam in the sea of Ideality, down deep, you know. And he rather holds on to matter-of-fact--sort of ballast for you. You need it. For you are, in fact, ripe for the other life, though it is not time to go yet.
Although a writer, yet you are a disappointed one. No mortal but yourself knows this. You have winged your way in flights, grand and lofty, and cannot _pen it_, is what is the matter. Now, in time you will, more perfectly than to-day, by the touch of your pen, portray your soul and its flights. Then I see you happy. This gentleman is an auxiliary power, whether the power in full of your life I do not to-day get. You are emphatically a woman of Destiny, and should follow your _impressions_, for through that intuitive law you will be saved. I mean by "saved," leap, as it were, across difficulties instead of going round. For your soul is more positive and awake to its necessities to-day than ever before in your life, particularly in the last six months. Body marriages are good under the physical law--bring certain unfoldments. But when mortal man and woman reach a certain condition of development, they become dissatisfied, and yearn for the full fruition of love. And there is no limitation of this law. Women usually bow to the heart-love law, that sometimes brings great joy and misery. The time is ripe for rulers. There will be put into the field men, and more specifically women, who have exemplified love divine. They will teach the law so plainly that they who run can read. And it can only be taught by those who have embodied it. Some years ago, in this country, there was a stir-up. It did its work in fermentation. The next must be humanization. The material world must come under the spiritual.
Women will come to the front as inspired powers. This is what comes to me to write to you to-day. If it brings strength, or one ray of sun-shine to you, I am glad.--I remain, most respectfully yours, George Plummer."
Mr. Plummer is not occupying a high position in the world, nor is he a rich man. He gains no popularity by his letters--he hears no applause--he reaps no personal benefit, nor will he take any money. It would be difficult, with any degree of reason, to charge him with cheating the public for the sake of emptying their pockets. I fail to see, therefore, how he can obtain his insight to one"s interior life by mortal means, nor, unless compelled by a power superior to his own, why he should take the trouble to obtain it.
Another medium, whose health paid the sacrifice demanded of her for the exhibition of a power over which, at one time, she had no control, and which never brought her in anything but the thanks of her friends, is Mrs. Keningale Cook (Mabel Collins), whom I have mentioned in the "Story of my Spirit Child." There was a photographer in London, named Hudson, who had been very successful in developing spirit photographs. He would prepare to take an ordinary photograph, and on developing the plate, one or more spirit forms would be found standing by the sitter, in which forms were recognized the faces of deceased friends. Of course, the generality of people said that the plates were prepared beforehand with vague misty figures, and the imagination of the sitter did the rest. I had been for some time anxious to test Mr. Hudson"s powers for myself, and one morning very early, between nine and ten o"clock, I asked Mrs.
Cook, as a medium, to accompany me to his studio. He was not personally acquainted with either of us, and we went so early that we found him rather unwilling to set to work. Indeed, at first he declined. We disturbed him at breakfast and in his shirt sleeves, and he told us his studio had been freshly painted, and it was quite impossible to use it until dry. But we pressed him to take our photographs until he consented, and we ascended to the studio. It was certainly very difficult to avoid painting ourselves, and the screen placed behind was perfectly wet. We had not mentioned a word to Mr. Hudson about spirit photographs, and the first plate he took out and held up to the light, we saw him draw his coat sleeve across. When we asked him what he was doing, he turned to us and said, "Are you ladies Spiritualists?" When we answered in the affirmative, he continued, "I rubbed out the plate because I thought there was something on it, and most sitters would object. I often have to destroy three or four negatives before I get a clear picture." We begged him not to rub out any more as we were curious to see the results. He, consequently, developed three photographs of us, sitting side by side. The first was too indistinct to be of any use. It represented us, with a third form, merely a patch of white, lying on the ground, whilst a ma.s.s of hair was over my knee. "Florence" afterwards informed me that this was an attempt to depict herself. The second picture showed Mrs. Cook and myself as before, with "Charlie" standing behind me. I have spoken of "Charlie" (Stephen Charles Bernard Abbott) in "Curious Coincidences," and how much he was attached to me and mine.
In the photograph he is represented in his cowl and monk"s frock--with ropes round his waist, and his face looking down. In the third picture, an old lady in a net cap and white shawl was standing with her two hands on Mrs. Cook"s shoulders. This was her grandmother, and the profile was so distinctly delineated, that her father, Mr. Mortimer Collins, recognized it at once as the portrait of his mother. The old lady had been a member of the Plymouth Brethren sect, and wore the identical shawl of white silk with an embroidered border which she used to wear during her last years on earth. I have seen many other spirit photographs taken by Mr. Hudson, but I adhere to my resolution to speak only of that which I have proved by the exercise of my own senses. I have the two photographs I mention to this day, and have often wished that Mr. Hudson"s removal from town had not prevented my sitting again to him in order to procure the likenesses of other friends.
Miss Caroline Pawley is a lady who advertises her willingness to obtain messages for others from the spirit world, but is forbidden by her guides to take presents or money. I thought at first this must be a "_ruse_." "Surely," I said to a friend who knew Miss Pawley, "I ought to take books, or flowers, or some little offering in my hand." "If you do she will return them," was the reply. "All that is necessary is to write and make an appointment, as her time is very much taken up." Accordingly I did write, and Miss Pawley kindly named an early date for my visit. It was but a few months after I had lost my beloved daughter, and I longed for news of her. I arrived at Miss Pawley"s residence, a neat little house in the suburbs, and was received by my hostess, a sweet, placid-faced woman, who looked the embodiment of peace and calm happiness. After we had exchanged greetings she said to me, "You have lost a daughter." "I lost one about twenty years ago--a baby of ten days old," I replied. "I don"t mean her," said Miss Pawley, "I mean a young woman. I will tell you how I came to know of it. I took out my memoranda yesterday and was looking it through to see what engagements I had made for to-day, and I read the names aloud to myself. As I came to the entry, "Mrs. Lean, 3 o"clock," I heard a low voice say behind me, "That is my dear, _dear_ mother!" and when I turned round, I saw standing at my elbow a young woman about the middle height, with blue eyes and very long brown hair, and she told me that it is _she_ whom you are grieving for at present." I made no answer to this speech, for my wound was too fresh to permit me to talk of her; and Miss Pawley proceeded. "Come!"
she said cheerfully, "let us get paper and pencil and see what the dear child has to say to us." She did not go under trance, but wrote rapidly for a few moments and then handed me a letter written in the following manner. I repeat (what I have said before) that I do not test the genuineness of such a manifestation by the act itself. _Anyone_ might have written the letter, but no one but myself could recognize the familiar expressions and handwriting, nor detect the apparent inconsistencies that made it so convincing. It was written in two different hands on alternate lines, the first line being written by "Eva," and the next by "Florence," and so on. Now, my earthly children from their earliest days have never called me anything but "Mother,"
whilst "Florence," who left me before she could speak, constantly calls me "Mamma." This fact alone could never have been known to Miss Pawley.
Added to which the portion written by my eldest daughter was in her own clear decided hand, whilst "Florence"s" contribution was in rather a childish, or "young ladylike" scribble.
The lines ran thus. The italics are Florence"s:--
"My own beloved mother.
_My dear, dear, dearest Mamma._ You must not grieve so terribly for me.
_And knowing all we have taught you, you should not grieve._ Believe me, I am not unhappy.
_Of course not, and she will be very happy soon._ But I suffer pain in seeing you suffer.
_Dear Mamma, do try to see that it is for the best._ Florence is right. It is best! dear Mother.
_And we shall all meet so soon, you know._ G.o.d bless you for all your love for me.
_Good-bye, dear, dearest Mamma._ Your own girl.
_Your loving little Florence._"
I cannot comment on this letter. I only make it public in a cause that is sacred to me.