The medium seems exhausted, groans, laments, and we all regret this check to the proceedings; but Eusapia declares that she can begin again, and asks us to get ready. In fact, at the end of five or six minutes the same phenomena are produced. M. de Fontenay explodes a chlorate of pota.s.sium pistol. The light is instantaneous, but feeble. It enables us to see Eusapia's left hand being held upon the table by M. Sardou's right hand, her right hand held in the air by my left hand, and at a distance of about twelve inches in the rear, at the height of one's head, the violin, resting vertically against the curtain. But the photograph gives no picture.

Eusapia now asks for a little light ("_poco di luce_"). The small hand-lamp is lighted again, and the illumination is sufficient for us to see each other distinctly, including the arms, the head of the medium, the curtain, etc. The chain is formed again. The curtain flares widely out, and M. Sardou is several times touched by a hand which gives him a good whack on the shoulder, making him bend his head forward toward the table.

In the presence of this manifestation and of these sensations we have again the impression that there has been a hand there, a hand different from those of the medium (which we continue carefully to hold),--and from ours, because we are holding each other's hands in the chain. Moreover, there is no one near the curtain, which is plainly visible. I thereupon remark, "Since there is a hand there, let it take from me this violin, as it did day before yesterday." I take the violin by the handle and hold it out to the curtain. It is at once taken and lifted, then falls to the floor. I do not for a moment let go the hand of the medium. Yet I grasp this hand with my right hand, for a moment, in order to pick up with my left the violin that has fallen near me. As I stoop down to the floor, I feel an icy breath upon my hand, but nothing more. I take the violin and put it on the table; then I take again with my left hand the hand of the medium, and, seizing the violin with my right, I hold it out again to the curtain. But Mme. Brisson, peculiarly incredulous, asks me to let her take it herself. She does so, holds it out to the curtain, and the instrument is s.n.a.t.c.hed from her, in spite of all the efforts that she makes to retain it. Everybody declares they saw very distinctly this time.

The hands of the medium have not been let go a single minute.

It seems as if this experiment, made under these conditions, in sufficient light, ought to leave no doubt about the existence of a third hand of the medium which acts in obedience to her will. And yet!--

During this same soiree of November 19 I ask that the violin, which has fallen to the floor, be brought again upon the table. We keep holding carefully the medium's hands, M. Sardou her left hand and I her right.

Eusapia, wishing to give still more security, more certainty, proposes that I take her two hands, the right as I am holding it, and her left wrist in my right hand, her left hand always being held by M.

Sardou,--_the whole show of hands taking place on the table_. A noise is heard. The violin is brought on, pa.s.ses above our hands, thus criss-crossed, and is laid down, farther on, in the middle of the table. A candle is lighted, and the position of our hands is ascertained. They have not moved. Some time after this phenomena, in the dim light, we all saw will-o'-the-wisps shining in the cabinet. They were visible through the cleft in the curtains, which at that time was rather wide. For my part, I saw three of them, the first very brilliant, the others less intense. They were not tremulous, nor did they stir in the least, and remained in view scarcely more than a second.

M. Antoniadi having remarked that he is not always sure of holding her left hand, Eusapia says to me in a flush of pa.s.sion, "Since he is not sure, take my two hands yourself again." I already hold the right, and am absolutely certain of it. I thereupon take her left wrist in my right hand, M. A. declaring that he will take care of the fingers. In this position, Eusapia's two hands being thus held above the table, a cushion, which is at my right upon the table, having been forcibly thrown there some moments before, is seized and thrown over the sofa, brushing my forehead on the left. Those who sit at the table and form the chain affirm that the hands of the chain have not lost touch with each other.

Here is another circ.u.mstance recorded in the notes of Mme. Flammarion:

We were almost in complete darkness,--the lamp, removed as far as possible from Eusapia, having only the dim glow of a night-lamp.

Eusapia was seated at the experiment table,--between MM. Brisson and Pallotti, who were holding her two hands,--and almost facing this lamp.

Mme. Brisson and I were seated some yards distant from Eusapia, one of us on the side and the other in the middle of the salon, Eusapia facing us, while we had our backs turned to the light. This allowed us to distinguish well enough everything that pa.s.sed before us.

Up to the moment when the event that I am going to relate took place, Mme. Brisson had remained almost as incredulous as I, apropos of the phenomena, and she had just been expressing to me in a low tone her regret at not having yet seen anything herself, when, all of a sudden, the curtain behind Eusapia began to shake and move gracefully back, as if lifted by an invisible curtain band,--and what do I see? The little table on three feet, and leaping (apparently in high spirits) over the floor, at the height of about eight inches, while the gilded tambourine is in its turn leaping gayly at the same height above the table, and noisily tinkling its bells.

Stupefied with wonder, quick as I can I pull Mme. Brisson to my side, and, pointing with my finger at what is taking place, "Look!" said I.

And then the table and the tambourine begin their carpet-dance again in perfect unison, one of them falling forcibly upon the floor and the other upon the table. Mme. Brisson and I could not help bursting out into laughter; for, indeed, it was too funny! A sylph could not have been more amusing.

Eusapia had not turned around. She was seen seated; and her hands, placed before her, were held by the two controllers. Even if she had been able to free both her hands, she would not have been able to take hold of the round table and tambourine, except by turning around; and the two ladies saw them leaping about all alone.

I observe to Eusapia that she must be very tired, that the seance has lasted over two hours and has yielded extraordinary results, and that it is perhaps time to end it. She replies that she desires to continue still a little longer, and that there will be new phenomena. We accept with pleasure, and sit down and wait.

Then she lays her head on my shoulder, takes my entire right arm, including the hand, and putting my leg between hers, and my feet between her feet, she held me very tight. Then she begins to rub the carpet, drawing my feet along with hers, and squeezing me tighter than before.

Then she cries, "_Spetta! spetta!_" ("Look! look!"); then, "_Vieni!

vieni!_" ("Come! come!") She invites M. Pallotti to take a place behind his wife and see what will happen. I must add that both of them had been earnestly asking, for some minutes, if they might see and embrace their daughter, as they had done at Rome.

After a new nervous effort on the part of Eusapia, and a kind of convulsion accompanied by groans, complaints, and cries, there was a great movement of the curtain. Several times I see the head of a young girl bowing before me, with high-arched forehead and with long hair.

She bows three times, and shows her dark profile against the window. A moment after we hear sounds from M. and Mme. Pallotti. They are covering with kisses the face of a being invisible to us, saying to her with pa.s.sionate affection, "Rosa, Rosa, my dear, my Rosalie," etc. They say they felt between their hands the face and the hair of their daughter.

My impression was that there was really there a fluidic being. I did not touch it. The grief of the parents, revived and consoled at the same time, seemed to me so worthy of respect that I did not approach them. But, as to the ident.i.ty of the spectral being, I believed it to be a sentimental illusion of theirs.

I come now to the strangest circ.u.mstances of all, the most incomprehensible, the most incredible, of any that we experienced in our seances.

On November 21 M. Jules Bois presents a book before the curtain at about the height of a man standing upright. The salon is dimly lighted by a little lamp with a shade, set pretty well to one side. Yet objects are seen with distinctness.

An invisible hand behind the curtain seizes the book. Then all the observers see it disappear as if it had pa.s.sed through the curtain. It is not seen to fall before the curtain. It is an octavo, rather slender, bound in red, which I have just taken from my library.

Now Mme. Flammarion, almost as sceptical as M. Baschet about these phenomena, had glided past the window to the rear of the curtain, in order to observe carefully what was pa.s.sing. She hoped to detect a movement of the medium's arm, and to unmask her, in spite of the courtesy she owed her as her hostess. She saw very plainly Eusapia's head, motionless before the mirror which reflected the light.

Suddenly the book appears to her, it having pa.s.sed through the curtain,--upheld in the air, without hands or arms, for a s.p.a.ce of one or two seconds. Then she sees it fall down. She cries, "Oh! the book: it has just pa.s.sed through the curtain!" and, pale and stupefied with wonder, she abruptly retires among the observers.

The entire hither side of the curtain was plainly visible, because the left portion of the left-hand curtain had been loosened from its rod by the weight of a person who had sat down on the sofa where the lower part of the curtain had been accidentally placed; and because a large opening had been made fronting the mirror which filled the entire wall of the farther end of the salon,--a mirror that reflected the light of the little lamp.

If such an event had really taken place, we should be forced to admit that the book went through the curtain without any opening, for the tissue of the fabric is wholly intact; and we cannot suppose for a single moment that it pa.s.sed through at the side, the book having been held out about the middle,--that is to say, about twenty-four inches from each side of the curtain, the breadth of which is four feet.

Nevertheless, this book was seen by Mme. Flammarion, who was looking behind the curtain; and it disappeared from the eyes of the persons who were in front, notably M. Baschet, M. Brisson, M. J. Bois, Mme. Fourton and myself. We were not expecting this miracle in any way; we were stupefied by it; we asked what had become of the book, and it seemed as if it had fallen behind the curtain.

Collective hallucination? But we were all in cool blood, entirely self-possessed.

If Eusapia had been able to adroitly slip her hand around and seize the book through the portiere, the bare outline of the book would not have been seen, but a protuberance of the portiere.

How great a value the sight of this thing pa.s.sing through a portiere would have as a scientific datum, if one were only sure of the absolute honesty of the medium,--if, indeed, this medium were a man of science, a physicist, a chemist, an astronomer, whose scientific integrity would be above suspicion! The mere fact of the possibility of fraud takes away ninety-nine one-hundredths of the worth of the observation, and makes it necessary for us to see it a hundred times before being sure. The conditions of certainty ought to be understood by all investigators, and it is curious to hear intelligent persons express surprise at our doubts, and at the strict scientific obligation we are under to lay down these conditions. In order to be sure of abnormalities like these levitations, for example, we must make sure of them a hundred times over; not see them once, but a hundred times.

It seems to us impossible that matter could pa.s.s through matter. You place for example a stone upon a napkin. If one should tell you that he has found it under the napkin, without any break in the continuity of the tissue, you would not believe him. However, I take a piece of ice, weighing say two pounds, and place it upon a napkin; I place both upon a strainer, in the oven; the piece of ice melts, pa.s.ses through the napkin, and falls drop by drop into a basin. I put the whole thing into a freezing machine, the melted water congeals again; the piece of ice weighing two pounds has pa.s.sed through the napkin.

It is very simple, you think. Yes, it is simple because we understand it.

But, of course, this is not the same case as that of the book. Yet, after all, it is matter pa.s.sing through matter, after a transformation of its physical condition.

We might seek explanations, invoke the hypotheses of the fourth dimension, or discuss the non-Euclidian geometry. It seems to me more simple, however, to think that, on the one hand, these experiments are not yet sufficient for us to make an absolute affirmation, and that, on the other hand, our ignorance of everything is formidable and forbids us to deny anything.

The phenomena of which I am speaking are so extraordinary that one is led to doubt them, even when one feels a.s.sured that he has seen them. Thus, for example, I noticed that M. Rene Baschet--my learned friend, present editor of _Ill.u.s.tration_--affirmed before us all, during the seance and afterward, that he saw with his own eyes, under the table, a head like that of a young girl of about twelve years of age, together with the bust.

This head sank down vertically while he was looking at it and disappeared.

He made the affirmation on the 21st, repeated it on the 22d at a theatre where we met, and on the 25th again at his home. Some time after, M.

Baschet was convinced that he had been deceived, that he had been the dupe of an illusion. That is also possible. I was looking at the same time, as well as other persons, and we did not see anything.

It is then very human, when we are thinking, some days later, of these curious things, for us to suspect ourselves.

But there are prejudices less explicable. Thus, for example, at the seance of November 28 a distinguished engineer, M. L., absolutely refused to admit the levitation of the table, in spite of the evidence. Of this my readers may judge for themselves. Here is a note which I extract from my reports:

M. L. tells me that the medium lifts the table _with her feet_, while resting her hands upon it. I ask Eusapia to draw back her feet under her chair. The table is lifted.

After this second levitation, M. L. declares that he is not satisfied (although neither of the feet of the medium is under a foot of the table), and that we must begin the experiment again, without having _her legs_ touched at any point. The medium then proposes that her legs be fastened to those of M. L. A third levitation takes place, after the left leg (the incriminated one) of the medium has been bound to the left leg of M. L.

This gentleman then declares that the hypotheses he has made, in order to explain the phenomenon, are null and void, but that there must be, all the same, a trick in the thing, because he does not believe in the supernatural.

Neither do I believe in the supernatural. And yet there is no trick.

This manner of reasoning, rather common, does not seem to me scientific.

It is to claim that we know the limits of the possible and of the impossible.

People who deny that the earth moves reason in just this way. That which is contrary to common sense is not impossible. Common sense is the average state of popular knowledge; that is to say, of general ignorance.

A man acquainted with the history of the sciences, and who reasons calmly, cannot succeed in understanding the ostracism to which certain sceptics subject unexplained phenomena. "It is impossible," they think. This famous common sense on which they plume themselves is nothing after all, let me say, but common opinion, which accepts habitual facts without comprehending them, and which varies from time to time. What man of good sense would formerly have admitted that we should one day be able to photograph the skeleton of a living being, or store up the voice in a phonograph, or determine the chemical composition of an inaccessible star?

What was science a hundred years ago, two hundred years, three hundred?

Look at astronomy five hundred years ago, and physiology, and medicine, and natural philosophy, and chemistry. In five hundred years, in a thousand years, in two thousand years, what will these sciences of ours be? And in a hundred thousand years? Yes, in a hundred thousand years, what will human intelligence be? Our actual condition will be to that what the knowledge of a dog is to that of a cultivated man; that is to say, there is no possible comparison.

We smile to-day at the science of learned men of the time of Copernicus or Christopher Columbus or Ambroise Pare, and we forget that, in a few centuries, savants will estimate us in the same fashion. There are properties of matter which are completely hidden from us, and humanity is endowed with faculties still unknown to us. We only advance very slowly in the knowledge of things.

The critics do not always give proof that they possess a very compact logical power. You speak to them of facts proved by centuries of testimony. They challenge the value of popular testimony, and declare that these uncultivated folks, these petty merchants, these manufacturers, these laborers, these peasants, are incapable of observing with any exact.i.tude.