admitted me to private experiments in his study. He explained many a text-book for me. He had urged me to give up the idea of farming in Canada, and to read for medicine and become a doctor. "Specialize," he said (in 1883). "By the time you are qualified Suggestion will be a recognized therapeutic agent, accepted by all, and accomplishing marvellous results. Become a mental specialist."
I lay under my pine trees, wondering if it were still too late ... but speculating, further and chiefly, about those other states of consciousness, since called "subliminal," which his experiments had convinced me were of untold importance, both to the individual and to the race. Any lawful method of extending the field of consciousness, of increasing its scope, of developing latent faculties, with its corollary of greater knowledge and greater powers, excited and interested me more than the immediate prospect of making a million....
This doctor's family were sincere and convinced spiritualists. He let them be, paying no attention to them, yet pointing out to me privately the "secondary" state into which his wife, as the medium, could throw herself at will. His son had an Amati violin; we played together; I was invited to many séances. The power of reading a "sitter's" mind I often witnessed, my own unuttered thoughts often being announced as the communication from some "guide" or "spirit friend." But for the doctor's private exposition, I might doubtless have been otherwise persuaded and shared my hostess's convictions.
Some of the "communications" came back in memory, none the less, as I lay beside the little lake and watched the firelight reflected with the stars: "There is an Indian here; he says he comes for you. He is a medicine man. He says you are one, too. You have great healing power. He keeps repeating the word 'scratch.'" The dubious word meant "write"; I was to become a writer, a prophesy that woke no interest in me at all.... Another communication delved into the past: "You have been an
Indian in a recent life, and you will go back to their country
