of view by means of a sheet thrown over a small triangle. And now, amid a full chorus of voices and rat-tat-tat accompaniment of the tabor, the stone germinated; presently a section of the cloth was drawn aside, and gave to view the tender shoot, characterized by two long leaves of a blackish-brown color. The cloth was readjusted, and the incantation resumed. Not long was it, however, before the cloth was a second time drawn aside, and it was then seen that the two first leaves had given place to several green ones, and that the plant now stood nine or ten inches high. A third time, and the foliage was much thicker, the sapling being about thirteen to fourteen inches in height. A fourth time, and the little miniature tree, now about eighteen inches in height, had ten or twelve mangoes about the size of walnuts hanging about its branches. Finally, after the lapse of three or four minutes, the cloth was altogether removed, and the fruit, having the perfection of size, though not of maturity, was plucked and handed to the spectators, and, on being tasted, was found to be approaching ripeness, being sweetly acid.”
We may add to this, that we have witnessed the same experiment in India and Thibet, and that more than once we provided the flower-pot ourselves, by emptying an old tin box of some Liebig extracts. We filled it with earth with our own hands, and planted in it a small root handed to us by the conjurer, and until the experiment was ended never once removed our eyes from the pot, which was placed in our own room. The result was invariably the same as above described. Does the reader imagine that any prestidigitator could produce the same manifestation under the same conditions?
The learned Orioli, Corresponding Member of the Institute of France, gives a number of instances which show the marvellous effects produced by the will-power acting upon the invisible Proteus of the mesmerists. “I have seen,” says he, “certain persons, who simply by pronouncing certain words, arrest wild bulls and horses at headlong speed, and suspend in its flight the arrow which cleaves the air.” Thomas Bartholini affirms the same.
Says Du Potet: “When I trace upon the floor with chalk or charcoal this figure . . . a fire, a light fixes itself on it. Soon it attracts to itself the person who approaches it: it detains and fascinates him . . . and it is useless for him to try to cross the line. A magic power compels him to stand still.
At the end of a few moments he yields, uttering sobs. . . . The cause is not in me, it is in this entirely kabalistic sign; in vain would you employ violence.”
In a series of remarkable experiments made by Regazzoni in the
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presence of certain well-known French physicians, at Paris, on the 18th of May, 1856, they assembled on one night together, and Regazzoni, with his finger, traced an imaginary kabalistic line upon the floor, over which he made a few rapid passes. It was agreed that the mesmeric subjects, selected by the investigators and the committee for the experiments, and all strangers to him, should be brought blindfold into the room, and caused to walk toward the line, without a word being spoken to indicate what was expected of them. The subjects moved along unsuspiciously till they came to the invisible barrier, when, as it is described, “their feet, as if they had been suddenly seized and riveted, adhere to the ground, while their bodies, carried forward by the rapid impulse of the motion, fall and strike the floor. The sudden rigidity of their limbs was like that of a frozen corpse, and their heels were rooted with mathematical precision upon the fatal line!”
In another experiment it was agreed that upon one of the physicians giving a certain signal by a glance of the eye, the blindfolded girl should be made to fall on the ground, as if struck by lightning, by the magnetic fluid emitted by Regazzoni’s will. She was placed at a distance from the magnetizer; the signal was given, and instantly the subject was felled to the earth, without a word being spoken or a gesture made. Involuntarily one of the spectators stretched out his hand as if to catch her; but Regazzoni, in a voice of thunder, exclaimed, “Do not touch her! Let her fall; a magnetized subject is never hurt by falling.” Des Mousseaux, who tells the story, says that “marble is not more rigid than was her body; her head did not touch the ground; one of her arms remained stretched in the air; one of her legs was raised and the other horizontal. She remained in this unnatural posture an indefinite time. Less rigid is a statue of bronze.”
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