Page:The Naturalisation of the Supernatural.pdf/135

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On Hallucinations in General
115

represented that in which the percipient was accustomed to see Mr. Godfrey, not the dress which he was actually wearing at the time. If the image in these cases is in fact nothing but the outward expression of the percipient's thought, this result is of course what we should naturally expect to find.

The next case is remarkable because three persons in the house appear to have been affected by the agent's experiment. Mr. F. W. Rose had, he tells us, mesmerised Mrs. E., the percipient, on several occasions. Some time in 1891 or 1892 he endeavoured "to send his astral body" to Mrs. E. On the first attempt Mrs. E. spent a restless night and the maid was disturbed by hearing a bell ringing. Mr. Rose mentioned his attempt two or three days afterwards. On the second occasion—Mr. Rose had, of course, not intimated beforehand his intention of experimenting—Mrs. E. and her daughter Mrs. A. were both disturbed.

No. 29

Mrs. A., the daughter, writes[1]:

Feb. 5th, 1896.
I cannot remember the date; but one night two or three years ago, I came back from the theatre to my mother's flat at 6, S.-street; and after I had been into her bedroom and told her all about it, I went to bed about 1 a.m. I had not been asleep long when I started up frightened, fancying that I had heard some one walk down the passage towards my mother's room; but hearing nothing more went again to sleep. I started up alarmed in the same way three or four times before dawn.
  1. Journal, S. P. R., May, 1896.