I cannot pretend to say what occurred on the 14th of April last at No.17, Badderly Gardens. Put down in black and white, my surmise mightseem too crude, too grotesque, for serious consideration. And yet thatsomething did occur, and that it was of a nature which will leave itsmark upon every one of us for the rest of our lives, is as certain asthe unanimous testimony of five witnesses can make it. I will notenter into any argument or speculation. I will only give a plainstatement, which will be submitted to John Moir, Harvey Deacon, andMrs. Delamere, and withheld from publication unless they are preparedto corroborate every detail. I cannot obtain the sanction of Paul LeDuc, for he appears to have left the country.It was John Moir (the well-known senior partner of Moir, Moir, andSanderson) who had originally turned our attention to occult subjects.He had, like many very hard and practical men of business, a mysticside to his nature, which had led him to the examination, andeventually to the acceptance, of those elusive phenomena which aregrouped together with much that is foolish, and much that isfraudulent, under the common heading of spiritualism. His researches,which had begun with an open mind, ended unhappily in dogma, and hebecame as positive and fanatical as any other bigot. He represented inour little group the body of men who have turned these singularphenomena into a new religion.Mrs. Delamere, our medium, was his sister, the wife of Delamere, therising sculptor. Our experience had shown us that to work on thesesubjects without a medium was as futile as for an astronomer to makeobservations without a telescope. On the other hand, the introductionof a paid medium was hateful to all of us. Was it not obvious that heor she would feel bound to return some result for money received, andthat the temptation to fraud would be an overpowering one? Nophenomena could be relied upon which were produced at a guinea anhour. But, fortunately, Moir had discovered that his sister wasmediumistic-in other words, that she was a battery of that animalmagnetic force which is the only form of energy which is subtle enoughto be acted upon from the spiritual plane as well as from our ownmaterial one. Of course, when I say this, I do not mean to beg thequestion; but I am simply indicating the theories upon which we wereourselves, rightly or wrongly, explaining what we saw. The lady came,not altogether with the approval of her husband, and though she nevergave indications of any very great psychic force, we were able, atleast, to obtain those usual phenomena of message-tilting which are atthe same time so puerile and so inexplicable. Every Sunday evening metin Harvey Deacon's studio at Badderly Gardens, the next house to thecorner of Merton Park Road.