times move without any person near them, as that they sometimes move with hands on them. I cannot in this case doubt the evidence of my senses. I have seen tables move, and heard tunes beat on them, when no person was within several feet of them. This fact is proof positive that the force or power is not muscular.

129. "If any further evidence was necessary to set aside Professor Faraday's explanation, it is found in abundance in the great variety of other facts taking place through the country, such as musical instruments being played upon without any hands touching them, and a great variety of other heavy articles being moved without any visible cause. If tables never moved except when hands were on them, the case would be different; but as they do move, both with and without hands, it is plain that the true cause remains yet to be discovered.

130. "I wish, sir, that you had leisure and opportunity to witness some other phases of this matter, which seem not yet to have fallen under your notice, and I think you would be satisfied that there is less hallucination' and self-deception' about it, than you have imagined. The intelligence connected with these movements has not been accounted for.

131. “If these things can be accounted for on scientific principles, would it not be a great acquisition to science, to discover what those prinples are? If, however, science cannot discover them, the public are deeply interested in knowing the fact. It is certainly of great importance that these strange things that are taking place everywhere should be explained. It is affecting the churches seriously; whether for good or for evil is uncertain until the truth is known. No cause has yet been assigned that does not imply a greater absurdity than even to believe, as many do, that it is caused by spirits either good or bad, or both.

132. "I have examined this matter for the last three years with as much carefulness as possible, and am not satisfied. If the force is not muscular, as it is certain that it is not, I wish science to try again. AMASA HOLCOMBE."

Yours, respectfully,

133. It will be perceived that the letter alluded to by Mr. Holcombe, written in reply to some inquiries respecting my opinion of the cause of table turning, was published in the Philadelphia Inquirer, in July, 1853. This letter will show that I was at that time utterly incredulous of any cause of the phenomena excepting unconscious muscular action on the part of the persons with whom the phenomena were associated. The inferences of Faraday, tending to the same conclusion, I thoroughly sanctioned.

134. As no allusion to spirits as the cause had been made by this Herculean investigator in the letter which drew forth mine, they were not

contemplated in my view of the subject. Had I ever heard spiritual agency assigned as a cause, so great was my disbelief of any such agency, that it would have made no impression on my memory.

135. Though present on several occasions when table turning was the subject of discussion, it was not, within my hearing, attributed to spiritual agency. In common with almost all educated persons of the nineteenth century, I had been brought up deaf to any testimony which claimed assistance from supernatural causes, such as ghosts, magic, or witchcraft.

136. Subsequently to my publication corroborating the inferences of Faraday, having, in obedience to solicitations already cited, consented to visit circles in which spiritual manifestations were alleged to be made, I was conducted to a private house at which meetings for spiritual inquiry were occasionally held.

137. Seated at a table with half a dozen persons, a hymn was sung with religious zeal and solemnity. Soon afterward tappings were distinctly heard as if made beneath and against the table, which, from the perfect stillness of every one of the party, could not be attributed to any one among them. Apparently, the sounds were such as could only be made with some hard instrument, or with the ends of fingers aided by the nails.

138. I learned that simple queries were answered by means of these manifestations; one tap being considered as equivalent to a negative; two, to doubtful; and three, to an affirmative. With the greatest apparent sincerity, questions were put and answers taken and recorded, as if all concerned considered them as coming from a rational though invisible agent.

139. Subsequently, two media sat down at a small table, (drawer removed,) which, upon careful examination, I found to present to my inspection nothing but the surface of a bare board, on the under side as well as upon the upper. Yet the taps were heard as before, seemingly against the table. Even assuming the people by whom I was surrounded, to be capable of deception, and the feat to be due to jugglery, it was still inexplicable. But manifestly I was in a company of worthy people, who were themselves under a deception if these sounds did not proceed from spiritual agency.

140. On a subsequent occasion, at the same house, I heard similar tapping on a partition between two parlours. I opened the door between the parlours, and passed to that adjoining the one in which I had been sitting. Nothing could be seen which could account for the sounds.

141. The medium to whose presence these manifestations were due, then held a flute against the panel of the door, and invited me to listen. On putting my ear near to the flute, tapping was quite audible. On the ensuing evening, I carried with me a sealed glass tube, a hollow tube of the same material, and a brass rod. These being successively held against

the door panel, similarly to the holding of the flute, the rapping was again heard.*

142. I have much reason to confide in the disinterestedness of the medium through whose assistance these facts were observed. She would not allow me even to make a present to her child; and her sitting for me was deemed prejudicial to her comfort and health, so that by the advice of her physician it was finally discontinued. Her parents believed the manifestations obtained through her influence to be caused by spirits.

143. Sitting at another mansion, in company with an able lawyer, (an unbeliever in Spiritualism,) as well as an accomplished female medium. and two other persons, sounds were heard like those above mentioned. The lawyer alluded to, though from his profession accustomed to distrust and to scrutinize evidence, admitted that he found it utterly impossible to account for these sounds by any visible agency.

144. In order to make my narrative of the evidence upon the subject of rapping continuous, I would state that during the evening of my first visit to the circle of spiritualists, as above mentioned, while grasping with my utmost energy a table at which I was seated, two female media, by merely placing their hands upon the surface of the table on the opposite side, caused it to move to and fro, in despite of my utmost exertions.

145. Visiting another circle under the influence of another medium, I found that tilting a table was substituted for the sounds as a means of manifestation. As one rap signifies no, two, doubtful, and three, affirmative, so is it with the motions, or tippings, as they are usually called.

146. Passing the fingers over the letters upon an alphabetic pasteboard, like those to assist children in learning their letters, when it comes over the required letter, its selection is indicated either by a tapping or tilting. By this process, when the medium's eyes were directed to the ceiling, as independently observed by the legal friend above mentioned, as well as myself, the following communication was given :

147. "Light is dawning on the mind of your friend; soon he will speak trumpet-tongued to the scientific world, and add a new link to that chain of evidence on which our hope of man's salvation is founded."

148. The lawyer declared that he was utterly unable to conceive how, by the human means apparently employed, such sentences could be elaborated. Legerdemain on the part of the person who took down the manifestation was the only way to get rid of this evidence without resorting to the agency of some invisible intelligent being, who, by operating upon the tables, at once exercised physical force and mental power.

* I have since been assured by my spirit friends, that there was no deception on the part of the medium here alluded to. It has since been alleged by them that it was my own father who made the raps on the small table above mentioned, when I sat at it between the two media. It was my spirit friend, William Blodget, who rapped when the flute, tubes, and rod were held against the door, or when the rapping appeared to be made against the partition between the parlours.

149. But assigning the result to legerdemain was altogether opposed to my knowledge of his character. This gentleman, and the circle to which he belonged, spent about three hours, twice or thrice a week, in getting communications through the alphabet, by the process to which the lines above mentioned were due. This would not have taken place, had they not had implicit confidence, that the information thus obtained proceeded from spirits.

150. Subsequently, I contrived an apparatus which, if spirits were actually concerned in the phenomena, would enable them to manifest their physical and intellectual power independently of control by any medium. (See Engraving and description, Plate 1.)

151. Upon a pasteboard disk, more than a foot in diameter, the letters cut out from an alphabet card were nailed around the circumference, as much as possible deranged from the usual alphabetic order. About the centre a small pulley was secured of two and a half inches diameter, fitting on an axletree, which passed through the legs of the table, about six inches from the top. Two weights were provided-one of about eight pounds, the other about two pounds. These were attached one to each end of a cord wound about the pulley, and placed upon the floor immediately under it. Upon the table a screen of sheet zinc was fastened, behind which the medium was to be seated, so that she could not see the letters on the disk. A stationary vertical wire, attached to the axle, served for an index

152. On tilting the table, the cord would be unwound from the pulley on the side of the larger weight, being wound up simultaneously to an equivalent extent on the side of the small weight, causing the pulley and disk to rotate about the axle. Restoring the table to its normal position, the smaller weight being allowed to act unresisted upon the cord and pulley, the rotation would be reversed. Of course, any person actuating the table and seeing the letters, could cause the disk so to rotate as to bring any letter under the index; but should the letters be concealed from the operator, no letter required could be brought under the index at will.

153. Hence it was so contrived that neither the medium seated at the table behind the screen, nor any other person so seated, could, by tilting the table, bring any letter of the alphabet under the index, nor spell out any word requested.

154. These arrangements being made, an accomplished lady, capable of serving in the required capacity, was so kind as to assist me by taking her seat behind the screen, while I took my seat in front of the disk.

155. I then said, "If there be any spirit present, please to indicate the affirmative by causing the letter Y to come under the index." Forthwith this letter was brought under the index.

156. "Will the spirit do us the favour to give the initials of his name?" The letters R H were successively brought under the index. "My honoured father?" said I. The letter Y was again brought under the index.

157. "Will my father do me the favour to bring the letters under the index successively in alphabetical order?" Immediately the disk began to revolve so as to produce the desired result. After it had proceeded as far as the middle of the alphabet, I requested that "the name of Washington should be spelt out by the same process." This feat was accordingly performed, as well as others of a like nature.

158. The company consisted of but few persons besides the medium, who now urged that I could no longer refuse to come over to their belief. Under these circumstances the following communication was made by the revolving of the disk: "Oh, my son, listen to reason!”

159. I urged that the experiment was of immense importance, if considered as proving a spirit to be present, and to have actuated the apparatus; affording thus precise experimental proof of the immortality of the soul: that a matter of such moment should not be considered as conclusively decided until every possible additional means of verification should be employed.

160. This led my companions to accuse me of extreme incredulity. The medium said she "should not deem it worth while to sit for me again," and one of the gentlemen sat himself down by the fireside, declaring me "to be insusceptible of conviction, and that he would now give me up."

161. Nevertheless, the medium, relenting, gave me another sitting at her own dwelling a few days afterward; when I had improved the apparatus by employing two stationary weights by which the cord actuating the pulley, as in the drill-bow process, was made to pull it round by a horizontal motion of the table supported on castors, instead of the tilting

motion.

162. The results confirmed those previously received, my father reporting himself again. He said that my mother and sister were with him, but not my brother. I inquired "if they were happy." The disk revolved so as to bring the letter Y under the index, signifying the affirmation.

163. On the following week, I took my apparatus to the house of a spiritualist, where a circle was to meet. The apparatus being duly arranged, a lady whom I had never before noticed, and by whom my apparatus was seen for the first time, sat down at my table behind the screen. The spirit of an uncle who had left this life was invoked by this medium. Her invocation being successful, the spirit spelt his name out in full; other names were spelt out at request.

164. Although the requisite letters were ultimately found, there was evidently some difficulty, as if there was some groping for them with an imperfect light. This has been explained since by my father's spirit. He alleges that preferably the eyes of the medium would be employed, but that, although with difficulty, he used mine as a substitute.

165. But although, with a view to convince the skeptical, spirits will