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ON THE WARPATH IN AUSTRALIA, I92C-2I.

THE

WANDERINGS OF A
SPIRITUALIST

BY

SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE

AUTHOR OF
THE NEW REVELATION," " THE VITAL MESSAGE," ETC.

Aggressive fighting for the right is
the noblest sport the world affords."

Theodore Roosevelt.

\

HODDER AND STOUGHTON
LIMITED LONDON

LIBRARY -*

PSYCH.
LIBRARY

By SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE
THE 'NEW REVELATION

Ninth ^Edition. Cloth, 5/. net.. Paper, 2/6 net.

[ 'I This b*oo'k is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's confession

» • ot, fai,th, very frank, very courageous and very

* ' ' * r'esolute' . . . the courage and large-mindedness of

this book deserve cordial recognition." — Daily

Chronicle. " It is a book that demands our

respect and commands our interest. . . Much more

likely to influence the opinion of the general public

than ' Raymond ' or the long reports of the Society

for Psychical Research." — Daily News.

THE VITAL MESSAGE

Tenth Thousand. Cloth, 5/-
" Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's 'The New Revelation'
was his confession of faith. 'The Vital Message'
seeks to show our future relations with the Unseen
World."— Daily Chronicle. "... it is a clear,
earnest presentation of the case, and will serve as a
useful introduction to the subject to anyone anxious
to learn what the new Spiritualists claim for their
researches and their faith. . . Sir Arthur writes
with evident sincerity, and, within the limits of his
system, with much broad-mindedness and tolera-
tion.—Daily Telegraph. " A splendid propaganda
book, written in the author's telling and racy style,
and one that will add to his prestige and renown." —
Two Worlds.

SPIRITUALISM AND RATIONALISM

With a Drastic Examination
of Mr. Joseph M'Cabe

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's trenchant reply to
the criticisms of Spiritualism as formulated by
Mr. Joseph M'Cabe. Paper, 1/. net.

HODDER & STOUQHTON, Ltd., London, B.C. 4

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

PAGE
9

The inception of the enterprise. — The Merthyr Seance. —
Experience of British lectures. — Call from Australia. —
The Holborn luncheon. — Remarkable testimony to
communication. — Is individual proof necessary ? —
Excursion to Exeter. — Can Spiritualists continue to be
Christians ? — Their views on Atonement. — The party
on the " Naldera."

CHAPTER II 24

Gibraltar. — Spanish right versus British might. — Relics of
Barbary Rovers, and of German militarists. — Ichabod !
— Senegal Infantry. — No peace for the world. — Religion
on a liner. — Differences of vibration. — The Bishop of
Kwang-Si. — Religion in China. — Whisky in excelsis. —
France's masterpiece. — British errors. — A procession
of giants. — The invasion of Egypt. — Tropical weather.
— The Russian Horror. — An Indian experiment. —
Aden. — Bombay. — The Lambeth encyclical. A great
novelist. — The Mango trick. — Snakes. — The Cata-
marans.— The Robber Castles of Ceylon. — Doctrine of
Reincarnation. — Whales and Whalers. — Perth. — The
Bight.

CHAPTER III 60

Mr. Hughes' letter of welcome. — Challenges. — Mr. Carlyle
Smythe. — The Adelaide Press. — The great drought. —
The wine industry. — Clairvoyance. — Meeting with Bell-
chambers. — The first lecture. — The effect. — The Religi-
ous lecture. — The illustrated lecture. — Premonitions. —
The spot light. — Mr. Thomas' account of the incident. —
Correspondence. — Adelaide doctors. — A day in the Bush.
— The Mallee fowl. — Sussex in Australia. — Farewell
to Adelaide.

t 1

CONTENTS

PAGE

CHAPTER IV 84

Speculations on Paul and his Master. — Arrival at Melbourne. —
Attack in the Argus. — Partial press boycott. — Strength
of the movement. — The Prince of Wales. — Victorian
football. Rescue Circle in Melbourne. — Burke and
Wills' statue. — Success of the lectures. — Reception at
the Auditorium. — Luncheon of the British Empire
League. — Mr. Ryan's experience. — The Federal Govern-
ment.— Mr. Hughes' personality. — The mediumship
of Charles Bailey. — His alleged exposure. — His remark-
able record. — A test sitting. — The Indian nest. — A
remarkable lecture. — Arrival of Lord Forster. — The
future of the Empire. — Kindness of Australians. —
Prohibition. — Horse-racing. — Roman Catholic policy.

CHAPTER V -------- 114

More English than the English. — A day in the Bush. —
Immigration. — A case of spirit return. — A seance. —
Geelong. — The lava plain. — Good-nature of General
Ryrie. — Bendigo. — Down a gold mine. — Prohibition
v. Continuance. — Mrs. Knight MacLellan. — Nerrin. — A
wild drive. — Electric shearing. — Rich sheep stations. —
Cockatoo farmers. — Spinnifex and Mallee. — Rabbits. —
The great marsh.

CHAPTER VI 136

The Melbourne Cup. — Psychic healing. — M. J. Bloomfield.
— My own experience. — Direct healing. — Chaos and
Ritual. — Government House Ball. — The Rescue Circle
again. — Sitting with Mrs. Harris. — A good test case. —
Australian botany. — The land of myrtles. — English
cricket team. — Great final meeting in Melbourne.

CHAPTER VII -------- 151

Great reception at Sydney. — Importance of Sydney. —
Journalistic luncheon. — A psychic epidemic. — Gregory.
— Barracking. — Town Hall reception. — Regulation of
Spiritualism. — An ether apport. — Surfing at Manly. —
A challenge. — Bigoted opponents. — A disgruntled
photographer. — Outing in the harbour. — Dr. Mildred
Creed. — Leon Gellert. — Norman Lindsay. — Bishop
Leadbeater. — Our relations with Theosophy. — Incon-
gruities of H.P.B.— Of D.D. Home.

iv

CONTENTS

PAGE

CHAPTER VIII 176

Dangerous fog. — The six photographers. — Comic Advertise-
ments.— Beauties of Auckland. — A Christian clergy-
man.— Shadows in our American relations. — The Galli-
poli Stone. — Stevenson and the Germans. — Position of
De Rougemont. — Mr. Clement Wragge. — Atlantean
theories. — A strange psychic. — Wellington the windy.
— A literary oasis. — A Maori seance. — Presentation.

CHAPTER IX 198

The Anglican Colony. — Psychic dangers. — The learned dog.
— Absurd newspaper controversy. — A backward com-
munity.— The Maori tongue. — Their origin. — Their
treatment by the Empire. — A fiasco. — The Pa of
Kaiopoi. — Dr. Thacker. — Sir Joseph Kinsey. — A gener-
ous collector. — Scott and Amundsen. — Dunedin. — A
genuine medium. — Evidence. — The Shipping strike. —
Sir Oliver. — Farewell.

CHAPTER X 223

Christian origins. — Mithraism. — Astronomy. — Exercising
boats. — Bad news from home. — Futile strikes. — Labour
Party. — The blue wilderness. — Journey to Brisbane. —
Warm reception. — Friends and Foes. — Psychic ex-
perience of Dr. Doyle. — Birds. — Criticism on Melbourne
— Spiritualist Church. — Ceremony. — Sir Matthew
Nathan. — Alleged repudiation of Queensland. — Billy
tea. — The bee farm. — Domestic service in Australia. —
Hon. John Fihilly. — Curious photograph by the State
photographer. — The " Orsova."

CHAPTER XI ....... 855

Medlow Bath. — Jenolan Caves. — Giant skeleton. — Mrs.
Foster Turner's mediumship. — A wonderful prophecy.
— Final results. — Third sitting with Bailey. — Failure
of State Control. — Retrospection. — Melbourne presenta-
tion.—Crooks. — Lecture at Perth. — West Australia. —
Rabbits, sparrows and sharks.

CONTENTS

PAGE

CHAPTER XII 280

Pleasing letters. — Visit to Candy. — Snake and Flying Fox. —
Buddha's shrine. — The Malaya. — Naval digression. —
Indian trader. — Elephanta. — Sea snakes. — Chained to a
tombstone. — Berlin's escape. — Lord Chetwynd. — Lec-
ture in the Red Sea. — Marseilles.

CHAPTER XIII ------- 303

The Institut Metaphysique. — Lecture in French. — Wonder-
ful musical improviser. — Camille Flammarion. — Test of
materialised hand. — Last ditch of materialism. — Sitting
with Mrs. Bisson's medium, Eva. — Round the Aisne
battlefields. — A tragic intermezzo. — Anglo-French
Rugby match. — Madame Blifaud's clairvoyance.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

On the War-Path in Australia, 1920-1921 - Frontispiece

Facing page
9

How This Book was Written

The God-Speed Luncheon in London. On this occasion
250 out of 290 Guests rose as testimony that they
were in Personal touch with their Dead 16

The Wanderers, 1920-1921 ------ 72

Bellch ambers and the Mallee Fowl. " Get along with
you, do " 80

Melbourne, November, 1920 ----- 96

A Typical Australian Back-Country Scene by H. J.
Johnstone, a Great Painter Who Died Unknown.
Painting in Adelaide National Gallery - 128

At Melbourne Town Hall, November 12th, 1920 - - 144

The People of Turi's Canoe, after a Voyage of Great
Hardship, at last Sight the Shores of New Zealand.
From a Painting by C. F. Goldie and L. G. A. Steele - 208

Laying Foundation Stone of Spiritualist Church at
Brisbane - -___. 240

Curious Photographic Effect referred to in Text.
Taken by the* Official Photographer, Brisbane.
" Absolutely mystifying" is his Description - - 252

Our Party en route to the Jenolan Caves, January 20th,
1 92 1. In Front of Old Court House in which Bush-
rangers were Tried - - - - - - -256

Denis with a Black Snake at Medlow Bath - - - 264

TO MY WIFE.

THIS MEMORIAL OF A JOURNEY WHICH

HER HELP AND PRESENCE CHANGED

FROM A DUTY TO A PLEASURE.

A. C. D.

July 1 8/2 1.

See page u.

HOW THIS BOOK WAS WRITTEN.

CHAPTER I

The inception of the enterprise. — The Merthyr Seance.-
Experience of British lectures. — Call from Australia. —
The Holborn luncheon. — Remarkable testimony to
communication — Is individual proof necessary ? —
Excursion to Exeter. — Can spiritualists continue to be
Christians ? — Their views on Atonement. — The party on
the " Naldera."

This is an account of the wanderings of a spiritual-
ist, geographical and speculative. Should the
reader have no interest in psychic things — if
indeed any human being can be so foolish as not
to be interested in his own nature and fate, — then
this is the place to put the book down. It were
better also to end the matter now if you have no
patience with a go-as-you-please style of narra-
tive, which founds itself upon the conviction that
thought may be as interesting as action, and
which is bound by its very nature to be intensely
personal. I write a record of what absorbs my
mind which may be very different from that which
appeals to yours. But if you are content to come
with me upon these terms then let us start with
my apologies in advance for the pages which may
bore you, and with my hopes that some may com-
pensate you by pleasure or by profit. I write
these lines with a pad upon my knee, heaving upon

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

the long roll of the Indian Ocean, running large
and grey under a grey streaked sky, with the
rain-swept hills of Ceylon, just one shade greyer,
lining the Eastern skyline. So under many
difficulties it will be carried on, which may explain
if it does not excuse any slurring of a style, which
is at its best but plain English.

There was one memorable night when I walked
forth with my head throbbing and my whole
frame quivering from the villa of Mr. Southey
at Merthyr. Behind me the brazen glare of
Dowlais iron-works lit up the sky, and in front
twinkled the many lights of the Welsh town. For
two hours my wife and I had sat within listening
to the whispering voices of the dead, voices which
are so full of earnest life, and of desperate endea-
vours to pierce the barrier of our dull senses.
They had quivered and wavered around us, giving
us pet names, sweet sacred things, the intimate
talk of the olden time. Graceful lights, signs of
spirit power had hovered over us in the darkness.
It was a different and a wonderful world. Now
with those voices still haunting our memories we
had slipped out into the material world — a world
of glaring iron works and of twinkling cottage
windows. As I looked down on it all I grasped
my wife's hand in the darkness and I cried aloud,
" My God, if they only knew — if they could only
know ! " Perhaps in that cry, wrung from my
very soul, lay the inception of my voyage to the
other side of the world. The wish to serve was
strong upon us both. God had given us wonderful
signs, and they were surely not for ourselves alone.

10

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

I had already done the little I might. From
the moment that I had understood the over-
whelming importance of this subject, and realised
how utterly it must change and chasten the whole
thought of the world when it is whole-heartedly
accepted, I felt it good to work in the matter and
understood that all other work which I had ever
done, or could ever do, was as nothing compared
to this. Therefore from the time that I had
finished the history of the Great War on which I
was engaged, I was ready to turn all my remaining
energies of voice or hand to the one great end.
At first I had little of my own to narrate, and my
task was simply to expound the spiritual philo-
sophy as worked out by the thoughts and experi-
ences of others, showing folk so far as I was able,
that the superficial and ignorant view taken of it
in the ordinary newspapers did not touch the heart
of the matter. My own experiences were limited
and inconclusive, so that it was the evidence of
others which I quoted. But as I went forward
signs were given in profusion to me also, such
signs as were far above all error or deception, so
that I was able to speak with that more vibrant
note which comes not from belief or faith, but from
personal experience and knowledge. I had found
that the wonderful literature of Spiritualism did
not reach the people, and that the press was so full
of would-be jocosities and shallow difficulties that
the public were utterly misled. Only one way
was left, which was to speak to the people face to
face. This was the task upon which I set forth,
and it had led me to nearly every considerable

ii

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

city of Great Britain from Aberdeen to Torquay.
Everywhere I found interest, though it varied
from the heavier spirit of the sleepy cathedral
towns to the brisk reality of centres of life and
work like Glasgow or Wolverhampton. Many a
time my halls were packed, and there were as
many outside as inside the building. I have no
eloquence and make profession of none, but I am
audible and I say no more than I mean and can
prove, so that my audiences felt that it was
indeed truth so far as I could see it, which I
conveyed. Their earnestness and receptiveness
were my great help and reward in my venture.
Those who had no knowledge of what my views
were assembled often outside my halls, waving
banners and distributing tracts, but never once in
the course of addressing 150,000 people, did I
have disturbance in my hall. I tried, while never
flinching from truth, to put my views in such a
way as to hurt no one's feelings, and although I
have had clergymen of many denominations as my
chairmen, I have had thanks from them and no
remonstrance. My enemies used to follow and
address meetings, as they had every right to do,
in the same towns. It is curious that the most
persistent of these enemies were Jesuits on the one
side and Evangelical sects of the Plymouth
Brethren type upon the other. I suppose the
literal interpretation of the Old Testament was
the common bond.

However this is digression, and when the
digressions are taken out of this book there will not
be much left. I get back to the fact that the

12

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

overwhelming effect of the Merthyr Seance and of
others like it, made my wife and myself feel that
when we had done what we could in Britain we
must go forth to further fields. Then came the
direct invitation from spiritual bodies in Australia.
I had spent some never-to-be-forgotten days with
Australian troops at the very crisis of the war.
My heart was much with them. If my message
could indeed bring consolation to bruised hearts
and to bewildered minds — and I had boxes full of
letters to show that it did — then to whom should
I carry it rather than to those who had fought so
splendidly and lost so heavily in the common
cause ? I was a little weary also after three years
of incessant controversy, speaking often five times
a week, and continually endeavouring to uphold
the cause in the press. The long voyage presented
attractions, even if there was hard work at the end
of it. There were difficulties in the way. Three
children, boys of eleven and nine, with a girl of
seven, all devotedly attached to their home and
their parents, could not easily be left behind. If
they came a maid was also necessary. The pres-
sure upon me of correspondence and interviews
would be so great that my old friend and secretary,
Major Wood, would be also needed. Seven of us
in all therefore, and a cheque of sixteen hundred
pounds drawn for our return tickets, apart from
outfit, before a penny could be entered on the
credit side. However, Mr. Carlyle Smythe, the
best agent in Australia, had taken the matter up,
and I felt that we were in good hands. The
lectures would be numerous, controversies severe,

13

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

the weather at its hottest, and my own age over
sixty. But there are compensating forces, and I
was" constantly aware of their presence. I may
count our adventures as actually beginning from
the luncheon which was given us in farewell a
week or so before our sailing by the spiritualists of
England. Harry Engholm, most unselfish of men,
and a born organiser among our most unorganised
crowd, had the matter in hand, so it was bound to
be a success. There was sitting room at the
Holborn Restaurant for 290 people, and it was all
taken up three weeks before the event. The
secretary said that he could have filled the Albert
Hall. It was an impressive example of the
solidity of the movement showing itself for the
moment round us, but really round the cause.
There were peers, doctors, clergymen, officers of
both services, and, above all, those splendid lower
middle class folk, if one talks in our material earth
terms, who are the spiritual peers of the nation.
Many professional mediums were there also, and
I was honoured by their presence, for as I said
in my remarks, I consider that in these days of
doubt and sorrow, a genuine professional medium
is the most useful member of the whole com-
munity. Alas ! how few they are ! Four
photographic mediums do I know in all Britain,
with about twelve physical phenomena mediums
and as many really reliable clairvoyants. What
are these among so many ? But there are
many amateur mediums of various degrees,
and the number tends to increase. Perhaps
there will at last be an angel to every church

14

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

as in the days of John. I see dimly the time
when two congregations, the living and those
who have passed on, shall move forward together
with the medium angel as the bridge between
them.

It was a wonderful gathering, and I only wish
I could think that my own remarks rose to the
height of the occasion. However, I did my best
and spoke from my heart. I told how the
Australian visit had arisen, and I claimed that the
message that I would carry was the most im-
portant that the mind of man could conceive,
implying as it did the practical abolition of death,
and the reinforcement of our present religious
views by the actual experience of those who have
made the change from the natural to the spiritual
bodies. Speaking of our own experiences, I
mentioned that my wife and I had actually
spoken face to face beyond all question or doubt
with eleven friends or relatives who had passed
over, their direct voices being in each case audible,
and their conversation characteristic and eviden-
tial— in some cases marvellously so. Then with
a sudden impulse I called upon those in the
audience who were prepared to swear that they
had had a similar experience to stand up and
testify. It seemed for a moment as if the whole
audience were on their feet. The Times next day
said 250 out of 290 and I am prepared to accept
that estimate. Men and women, of all pro-
fessions and social ranks — I do not think that I
exaggerated when I said that it was the most
remarkable demonstration that I had ever seen

15

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

and that nothing like it had ever occurred in the
City of London.

It was vain for those journals who tried to
minimise it to urge that in a Baptist or a Unitarian
assembly all would have stood up to testify to
their own faith. No doubt they would, but this
was not a case of faith, it was a case of bearing
witness to fact. There were people of all creeds,
Church, dissent, Unitarian and ex-materialists.
They were testifying to an actual objective ex-
perience as they might have testified to having
seen the lions in Trafalgar Square. If such a
public agreement of evidence does not establish a
fact then it is indeed impossible, as Professor
Challis remarked long ago, to prove a thing by
any human testimony whatever. I confess that
I was amazed. When I remember how many
years it was before I myself got any final personal
proofs I should have thought that the vast
majority of Spiritualists were going rather upon
the evidence of others than upon their own. And
yet 250 out of 290 had actually joined hands across
the border. I had no idea that the direct proof
was so widely spread.

I have always held that people insist too much
upon direct proof. What direct proof have we of
most of the great facts of Science ? We simply
take the word of those who have examined. How
many of us have, for example, seen the rings of
Saturn ? We are assured that they are there, and
we accept the assurance. Strong telescopes are
rare, and so we do not all expect to see the rings
with our own eyes. In the same way strong

16

2 G

5 o

D c

H 3

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

mediums are rare, and we cannot all expect to
experience the higher psychic results. But if the
assurance of those who have carefully experi-
mented, of the Barretts, the Hares, the Crookes,
the Wallaces, the Lodges and the Lombrosos, is
not enough, then it is manifest that we are dealing
with this matter on different terms to those
which we apply to all the other affairs of science.
It would of course be different if there were a
school of patient investigators who had gone
equally deeply into the matter and come to
opposite conclusions. Then we should certainly
have to find the path of truth by individual
effort. But such a school does not exist. Only
the ignorant and inexperienced are in total
opposition, and the humblest witness who has
really sought the evidence has more weight than
they.

After the luncheon my wife made the final
preparations — and only ladies can tell what it
means to fit out six people with tropical and semi-
tropical outfits which will enable them for eight
months to stand inspection in public. I em-
ployed the time by running down to Devonshire
to give addresses at Exeter and Torquay, with
admirable audiences at both. Good Evan Powell
had come down to give me a last seance, and I had
the joy of a few last words with my arisen son, who
blessed me on my mission and assured me that I
would indeed bring solace to bruised hearts.
The words he uttered were a quotation from my
London speech at which Powell had not been
present, nor had the verbatim account of it

17 b

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

appeared anywhere at that time. It was one
more sign of how closely our words and actions
are noted from the other side. Powell was tired,
having given a sitting the night before, so the
proceedings were short, a few floating lights, my
son and my sister's son to me, one or two greetings
to other sitters, and it was over.

Whilst in Exeter I had a discussion with those
who would break away from Christianity. They
are a strong body within the movement, and how
can Christians be surprised at it when they
remember that for seventy years they have had
nothing but contempt and abuse for the true light-
bearers of the world? Is there at the present
moment one single bishop, or one head of a Free
Church, who has the first idea of psychic truth ?
Dr. Parker had, in his day, so too Archdeacons
Wilberforce and Colley, Mr. Haweis and a few
others. General Booth has also testified to
spiritual communion with the dead. But what
have Spiritualists had in the main save misre-
presentation and persecution ? Hence the move-
ment has admittedly, so far as it is an organised
religion — and it has already 360 churches and
1,000 building funds — taken a purely Unitarian
turn. This involves no disrespect towards Him
Whom they look upon as the greatest Spirit who
ever trod the earth, but only a deep desire to com-
municate direct without intermediary with that
tremendous centre of force from and to whom all
things radiate or return. They are very earnest
and good men, these organised religious Spiritua-
lists, and for the most part, so far as my

18

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

experience goes, are converts from materialism
who, having in their materialistic days said very
properly that they would believe nothing which
could not be proved to them, are ready now with
Thomas to be absolutely wholehearted when the
proof of survival and spirit communion has
actually reached them. There, however, the
proof ends, nor will they go further than the proof
extends, as otherwise their original principles
would be gone. Therefore they are Unitarians
with a breadth of vision which includes Christ,
Krishna, Buddha and all the other great spirits
whom God has sent to direct different lines of
spiritual evolution which correspond to the
different needs of the various races of mankind.
Our information from the beyond is that this
evolution is continued beyond the grave, and very
far on until all details being gradually merged,
they become one as children of God. With a
deep reverence for Christ it is undeniable that the
organised Spiritualist does not accept vicarious
atonement nor original sin, and believes that a man
reaps as he sows with no one but himself to pull
out the weeds. It seems to me the more virile
and manly doctrine, and as to the texts which
seem to say otherwise, we cannot deny that the
New Testament has been doctored again and
again in order to square the record of the Scrip-
tures with the practice of the Church. Professor
Nestle, in the preface to a work on theology (I
write far from books of reference), remarks that
there were actually officials named " Correc-
tors/' who were appointed at the time of the

19

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Council of Nicsea for this purpose, and St. Jerome,
when he constructed the Vulgate, complains to
Pope Damasus that it is practically a new book
that he is making, putting any sin arising upon the
Pope's head. In the face of such facts we can
only accept the spirit of the New Testament
fortified with common sense, and using such
interpretation as brings most spiritual strength to
each of us. Personally, I accept the view of the
organised Spiritual religion, for it removes difficul-
ties which formerly stood between me and the
whole Christian system, but I would not say or
do anything which would abash those others who
are getting real spiritual help from any sort of
Christian belief. The gaining of spirituality and
widening of the personality are the aims of life,
and how it is done is the business of the individual.
Every creed has produced its saints and has to
that extent justified its existence. I like the
Unitarian position of the main Spiritual body,
however, because it links the movement up with
the other great creeds of the world and makes it
more accessible to the Jew, the Mohammedan or the
Buddhist. It is far too big to be confined within
the palings of Christianity.

Here is a little bit of authentic teaching from
the other side which bears upon the question. I
take it from the remarkable record of Mr. Miller
of Belfast, whose dialogues with his son after the
death of the latter seem to me to be as certainly
true as any case which has come to my notice.
On asking the young soldier some question about
the exact position of Christ in religion he modestly

20

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

protested that such a subject was above his head,
and asked leave to bring his higher guide to answer
the question. Using a fresh voice and in a new
and more weighty manner the medium then
said : —

" I wish to answer your question. Jesus the
Christ is the proper designation. Jesus was
perfect humanity. Christ was the God idea in
Him. Jesus, on account of His purity, mani-
fested in the highest degree the psychic powers
which resulted in His miracles. Jesus never
preached the blood of the lamb. The disciples
after His ascension forgot the message in ad-
miration of the man. The Christ is in every
human being, and so are the psychic forces which
were used by Jesus. If the same attention were
given to spiritual development which you give to
the comfort and growth of your material bodies
your progress in spiritual life would be rapid and
would be characterised by the same works as were
performed by Jesus. The one essential thing for
all on earth to strive after is a fuller knowledge
and growth in spiritual living.' '

I think that the phrase, " In their admiration of
the man they forgot His message/' is as pregnant
a one as I ever heard.

To come back then to the discussion at Exeter,
what I said then and feel now is that every
Spiritualist is free to find his own path, and that
as a matter of fact his typical path is a Unitarian
one, but that this in no way obscures the fact that
our greatest leaders, Lodge, Barrett, Ellis Powell,
Tweedale, are devoted sons of the Church, that

21

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

our literature is full of Christian aspiration, and
that our greatest prophet, Vale Owen, is a priest
of a particularly sacerdotal turn of mind. We are
in a transition stage, and have not yet found any
common theological position, or any common
position at all, save that the dead carry on, that
they do not change, that they can under proper
physical conditions communicate with us, and
that there are many physical signs by which they
make their presence known to us. That is our
common ground, and all beyond that is matter of
individual observation and inference. Therefore,
we are not in a position to take on any anti-
Christian agitation, for it would be against the
conscience of the greater part of our own people.

Well, it is clear that if I do not begin my book I
shall finish it before I have begun, so let me end
this chapter by saying that in despite of all super-
stition we started for Australia in the good ship
"Naldera" (Capt. Lewellin, R.N.R.), on Friday,
August 13th, 1920. As we carried two bishops
in addition to our ominous dates we were fore-
doomed by every nautical tradition. Our party
were my dear, splendid wife, who has shared both
my evidence and my convictions. She it is who,
by breaking up her household, leaving her beloved
home, breaking the schooling of her children, and
venturing out upon a sea voyage, which of all
things she hates, has made the real sacrifice for
the cause. As to me, I am fond of change and
adventure, and heartily agree with President
Roosevelt when he said that the grandest sport
upon earth is to champion an unpopular cause

22

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

which you know to be true. With us were Denis,
Malcolm and Baby, concerning whom I wrote
the " Three of them " sketches some years
ago. In their train was Jakeman, most faithful
of maids, and in mine Major Wood, who has been
mixed up in my life ever since as young men we
played both cricket and football in the same team.
Such was the little party who set forth to try and
blow that smouldering glow of truth which already
existed in Australia, into a more lively flame.

23

CHAPTER II

Gibraltar. — Spanish right versus British might. — Relics of
Barbary Rovers, and of German militarists. — Xchabod !
Senegal Infantry. — No peace for the world. — Religion on
a liner. — Differences of vibration. — The Bishop of Kwang-
Si. — Religion in China. — Whisky in excelsis. — France's
masterpiece. — British errors. — A procession of giants. —
The invasion of Egypt. — Tropical weather. — The Russian
Horror. — An Indian experiment. — Aden. — Bombay. —
The Lambeth encyclical. — A great novelist. — The Mango
trick. — Snakes. — The Catamarans. — The Robber Castles
of Ceylon. — Doctrine of Reincarnation. — Whales and
Whalers.— Perth.— The Bight.

We had a favourable journey across the Bay and
came without adventure to Gibraltar, that strange
crag, Arabic by name, African in type, Spanish
by right, and British by might. I trust that my
whole record has shown me to be a loyal son of
the Empire, and I recognise that we must have a
secure line of communications with the East, but
if any change could give us Ceuta, on the opposite
African coast, instead of this outlying corner of
proud old Spain, it would be good policy as well
as good morality to make the change. I wonder
how we should like it if the French held a garrison
at Mount St. Michael in Cornwall, which would
be a very similar situation. Is it worth having
a latent enemy who at any time might become an

24

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

active one, or is it wiser to hold them to us by the
memory of a great voluntary act of justice ?
They would pay, of course, for all quays, break-
waters and improvements, which would give us
the money to turn Ceuta into a worthy substitute,
which could be held without offending the pride
of a great nation, as old and proud as ourselves.
The whole lesson of this great war is that no
nation can do what is unjust with impunity, and
that sooner or later one's sin will find one out.
How successful seemed all the scheming of
Frederick of Prussia ! But what of Silesia and
of Poland now ? Only on justice can you build
with a permanent foundation, and there is no
justice in our tenure of Gibraltar. We had only
an hour ashore, a great joy to the children, and
carried away a vague impression of grey-shirted
Tommies, swarthy loungers, one long, cobble-
stoned street, scarlet blossoms, and a fine Gover-
nor's house, in which I picture that brave old
warrior, Smith-Dorrien, writing a book which
will set all the critics talking, and the military
clubs buzzing a year or two from now. I do not
know if he was really forced to fight at Le Cateau,
though our sympathies must always go to the man
who fights, but I do feel that if he had had his way
and straightened the salient of Ypres, there would
have been a mighty saving of blood and tears.
There were sentimental reasons against it, but I
can think of no material ones — certainly none
which were worth all the casualities of the Salient.
I had only one look at the place, and that by
night, but never shall I forget the murderous

25

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

loop, outlined by star shells, nor the horrible
noises which rose up from that place of wrath and
misery.

On August 19th we were running up the eastern
Spanish jcoast, a most desolate country of high
bare cliffs and barren uplands, studded with aged
towers which told of pirate raids of old. These
Mediterranean shore dwellers must have had a
hellish life, when the Barbary Rover was afloat,
and they might be wakened any night by the
Moslem yell. Truly, if the object of human life
was chastening by suffering, then we have given
it to each other in full measure. If this were the
only life I do not know how the hypothesis of the
goodness of God could be sustained, since our
history has been one hardly broken record of
recurring miseries, war, famine, and disease,
from the ice to the equator. I should still be a
materialist, as I was of yore, if it were not for the
comfort and teaching from beyond, which tells
me that this is the worst — far the worst — and that
by its standard everything else becomes most
gloriously better, so long as we help to make
it so. " If the boys knew what it was like
over here," said a dead soldier, " they would
just jump for it." He added however, " If
they did that they w^ould surely miss it." We
cannot bluff Providence, or short-circuit things
to our liking.

We got ashore once more at Marseilles. I saw
converted German merchant ships, with names
like " Burgomeister Miiller," in the harbour, and
railway trucks with " Mainz-Coin " still marked

26

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

upon their flanks — part of the captured loot.
Germany, that name of terror, how short is the
time since we watched you well-nigh all-powerful,
mighty on land, dangerous on the sea, conquering
the world with your commerce and threatening it
with your arms ! You had everything, numbers,
discipline, knowledge, industry, bravery, organisa-
tion, all in the highest — such an engine as the world
has never seen. And now — Ichabod ! Ichabod !
Your warships lie under the waves, your liners
fly the flags of your enemies, your mother Rhine
on either bank hears the bugles of your invaders.
What was wanting in you to bring you to such a
pass ? Was it not spirituality ? Had not your
churches become as much a department of State
as the Post Office, where every priest and pastor
was in State pay, and said that which the State
ordained ? All other life was at its highest, but
spiritual life was dead, and because it was dead
all the rest had taken on evil activities which could
only lead to dissolution and corruption. Had
Germany obeyed the moral law would she not
now be great and flourishing, instead of the ruin
which we see ? Was ever such an object lesson
in sin and its consequence placed before the
world? But let us look to it, for we also have
our lesson to learn, and our punishment is surely
waiting if we do not learn it. If now after such
years we sink back into old ruts and do not make
an earnest effort for real religion and real active
morality, then we cumber the ground, and it is
time that we were swept away, for no greater
chance of reform can ever come to us.

27

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

I saw some of the Senegal troops in the streets
of Marseilles — a whole battalion of them marching
down for re-embarkation. They are fierce, hard
soldiers, by the look of them, for the negro is a
natural fighter, as the prize ring shows, and these
have long service training upon the top of this
racial pugnacity. They look pure savages, with
the tribal cuts still upon their faces, and I do not
wonder that the Germans objected to them,
though we cannot doubt that the Germans would
themselves have used their Askaris in Europe as
well as in Africa if they could have done so. The
men who had as allies the murderers of the Arme-
nians would not stick at trifles. I said during the
war, and I can clearly see now, that the way in
which the war was fought will prove hardly second
to the war itself as a misfortune to the human
race. A clean war could end in a clean peace.
But how can we ever forget the poison gas, the
Zeppelin bombardments of helpless cities, the
submarine murders, the scattering of disease
germs, and all the other atrocities of Germany ?
No water of oblivion can ever wash her clean.
She had one chance, and only one. It was to at
once admit it all herself and to set to work purging
her national guilt by punishing guilty individuals.
Perhaps she may even now save herself and
clear the moral atmosphere of the world by
doing this. But time passes and the signs are
against it. There can be no real peace in the
world until voluntary reparation has been made.
Forced reparation can only make things worse,
for it cannot satisfy us, and it must embitter

28

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

them. I long for real peace, and should love
to see our Spiritualist bodies lead the van. But
the time is not yet and it is realities we need, not
phrases.

Old travellers say that they never remember
the Mediterranean so hot. We went down it
with a following breeze which just neutralised
our own head wind, the result being a quivering
tropical heat. With the Red Sea before us it was
no joke to start our trials so soon, and already the
children began to wilt. However, Major Wood
kept them at work for the forenoons and discip-
line still flourished. On the third day out we
were south of Crete, and saw an island lying there
which is surely the same in the lee of which Paul's:
galley took refuge when Euroclydon was behaving
so badly. I had been asked to address the first-
class passengers upon psychic religion that evening,
and it was strange indeed to speak in those waters,
for I knew well that however ill my little pip-
squeak might compare with that mighty voice,
yet it was still the same battle of the unseen
against the material, raging now as it did 2,000
years ago. Some 200 of the passengers, with the
Bishop of Kwang-Si, turned up, and a better
audience one could not wish, though the acoustic
properties of the saloon were abominable. How-
ever, I got it across, though I was as wet as if I
had fallen overboard when I had finished. I was
pleased to learn afterwards that among the most
keen of my audience were every coloured man and
woman on the ship, Parsees, Hindoos, Japanese
and Mohammedans.

29

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

" Do you believe it is true ? " they were asked
next day.

" We know that it is true," was the answer, and
it came from a lady with a red caste-mark like a
wafer upon her forehead. So far as I could learn
she spoke for all the Eastern folk.

And the others ? At least I set them talking
and thinking. I heard next morning of a queue
of six waiting at the barber's all deep in theo-
logical discussion, with the barber himself, razor
in hand, joining warmly in. " There has never
been so much religion talked on a P. & O. ship
since the line was started," said one old traveller.
It was all good-humoured and could do no harm.
Before we had reached Port Said all my books on
the subject were lent out to eager readers, and I
was being led aside into remote corners and cross-
questioned all day. I have a number of good
psychic photographs with me, some of them of my
own taking, and all of them guaranteed, and I find
these valuable as making folk realise that my
words do in truth represent realities. I have the
famous fairy photos also, which will appear in
England in the Christmas number of the Strand.
I feel as if it were a delay-action mine which I had
left behind me. I can imagine the cry of " Fake ! "
which will arise. But they will stand investiga-
tion. It has of course nothing to do with
Spiritualism proper, but everything which can
shake the mind out of narrow, material grooves,
and make it realise that endless worlds surround
us, separated only by difference of vibration,
must work in the general direction of truth.

30

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

" Difference of Vibration " — I have been trying
lately to get behind mere words and to realise
more clearly what this may mean. It is a fascinat-
ing and fruitful line of thought. It begins with
my electric fan whizzing over my head. As it
starts with slow vibration I see the little propellers.
Soon they become a dim mist, and finally I can
see them no more. But they are there. At any
moment, by slowing the movement, I can bring
them back to my vision. Why do I not see it all
the time ? Because the impression is so fast that
my retina has not time to register it. Can we
not imagine then that some objects may emit the
usual light waves, long enough and slow enough
to leave a picture, but that other objects may send
waves which are short and steep, and therefore
make so swift an impression that it is not recorded ?
That, so far as I can follow it, is what we mean
by an object with a higher rate of vibration. It
is but a feeling out into the dark, but it is a hypo-
thesis which may serve us to carry on with, though
the clairvoyant seems to be not a person with a
better developed physical retina, but rather one
who has the power to use that which corresponds
with the retina in their own etheric bodies which
are in harmony with etheric waves from outside.
When a man can walk round a room and examine
the pictures with the back of his head, as Tom
Tyrrell has done, it is clear that it is not his
physical retina which is working. In countless
cases inquirers into magnetic phenomena have
caused their subjects to read with various parts
of their bodies. It is the other body, the etheric

3i

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

body, the " spiritual " body of Paul, which lies
behind all such phenomena — that body which is
loose with all of us in sleep, but only exceptionally
in waking hours. Once we fully understand the
existence of that deathless etheric body, merged
in our own but occasionally detachable, we have
mastered many a problem and solved many a
ghost story.

However, I must get back to my Cretan lecture.
The bishop was interested, and I lent him one of
the Rev. Charles Tweedale's pamphlets next day,
which shows how sadly Christianity has wandered
away from its early faith of spiritual gifts and
Communion of Saints. Both have now become
words instead of things, save among our ranks.
The bishop is a good fellow, red and rough like a
Boer farmer, but healthy, breezy, and Apostolic.
" Do mention his kind grey eyes," says my wife.
He may die a martyr yet in that inland diocese
of China — and he would not shrink from it. Mean-
while, apart from his dogma, which must be
desperately difficult to explain to an educated
Chinaman, he must always be a centre of civilisa-
tion and social effort. A splendid fellow — but he
suffers from what all bishops and all cardinals and
all Popes suffer from, and that is superannuation.
A physiologist has said that few men can ever
entertain a new idea after fifty. How then can any
church progress when all its leaders are over that
age ? This is why Christianity has stagnated and
degenerated. If here and there one had a new
idea, how could it survive the pressure of the
others ? It is hopeless. In this particular

32

1HE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

question of psychic religion the whole order is an
inversion, for the people are ahead of the clergy
and the clergy of the bishops. But when the
laymen lead strongly enough the others will follow
unless they wish to see the whole Church organisa-
tion dissolve.

He was very interesting upon the state of
Christianity in China. Protestantism, thanks to
the joint British and American Missions, is gain-
ing upon Roman Catholicism, and has now far out-
stripped it, but the Roman Catholic organisations
are very wealthy on account of ancient valuable
concessions and well-invested funds. In case of
a Bolshevist movement that may be a source of
danger, as it gives a reason for attack. The
Bishop made the very striking remark that if the
whites cleared right out of China all the Christian
Churches of divers creeds would within a genera-
tion merge into one creed. " What have we to
do," they say, " with these old historical quarrels
which are hardly intelligible to us ? We are all
followers of Christ, and that is enough." Truly,
the converted seem far ahead of those who con-
verted them. It is the priesthoods, the organisa-
tions, the funds and the vested interests which
prevent the Churches from being united. In the
meanwhile ninety per cent, of our population shows
what it thinks by never entering into a church
at all. Personally, I can never remember since
I reached manhood feeling myself the better for
having gone into one. And yet I have been an
earnest seeker for truth. Verily, there is some-
thing deep down which is rotten. It is want of

33 c

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

fact, want of reality, words instead of things.
Only last Sunday I shuddered as I listened to the
hymns, and it amazed me to look around and see
the composed faces of those who were singing
them. Do they think what they are saying, or
does Faith atrophy some part of the brain ? We
are " born through water and blood into the true
church.,, We drink precious blood. " He hath
broken the teeth in their jaw." Can such phrases
really mean anything to any thoughtful man ?
If not, why continue them ? You will have your
churches empty while you do. People will not
argue about it — they will, and do, simply stay
away. And the clergy go on stating and re-
stating incredible unproved things, while neglect-
ing and railing at those which could be proved
and believed. On our lines those nine out of
ten could be forced back to a reconsideration of
their position, even though that position would
not square with all the doctrines of present-day
Christianity, which would, I think, have offended
the early Christians as much as it does the earnest
thinkers of to-day.

Port Said came at last, and we entered the Suez
Canal. It is a shocking thing that the entrance
to this, one of the most magnificent of the works of
man, are flanked by great sky advertisements of
various brands of whisky. The sale of whisky
may or may not be a tolerable thing, but its
flaunting advertisements, Dewar, Johnny Walker,
and the rest, have surely long been intolerable.
If anything would make me a total prohibitionist
those would. They are shameless. I do not

34

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

know if some middle way could be found by which
light alcoholic drinks could remain — so light that
drunkenness would be hardly possible — but if this
cannot be done, then let us follow the noble
example of America. It is indeed shameful to
see at the very point of the world where some
noble sentiment might best be expressed these
huge reminders of that which has led to so much
misery and crime. To a Frenchman it must seem
even worse than to us, while what the abstemious
Mohammedan can think is beyond my imagination.
In that direction at least the religion of Mohammed
has done better than that of Christ. If all those
Esquimaux, South Sea Islanders and others who
have been converted to Christianity and then
debauched by drink, had followed the prophet
instead, it cannot be denied that their develop-
ment would have been a happier and a higher one,
though the cast-iron doctrines and dogmas of the
Moslem have dangers of their own.

Has France ever had the credit she deserves
for the splendid faith with which she followed that
great beneficent genius Lesseps in his wonderful
work ? It is beautiful from end to end, French
in its neatness, its order, its exquisite finish.
Truly the opposition of our people, both experts
and public, was a disgrace to us, though it sinks
into insignificance when compared with our colossal
national stupidity over the Channel tunnel. When
our descendants compute the sums spent in
shipping and transhipping in the great war, the
waste of merchant ships and convoys, the suffer-
ings of the wounded, the delay in reinforcements,

35

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

the dependence upon the weather, they will agree
that our sin had found us out and that we have
paid a fitting price for our stupidity. Unhappily,
it was not our blind guides who paid it, but it was
the soldier and sailor and taxpayer, for the nation
always pays collectively for the individual blunder.
Would a hundred million pounds cover the cost of
that one ? Well can I remember how a year
before war was declared, seeing clearly what was
coming, I sent three memoranda to the Naval
and Military authorities and to the Imperial
Council of Defence pointing out exactly what the
situation would be, and especially the danger to
our transports. It is admitted now that it was
only the strange inaction of the German light
forces, and especially their want of comprehension
of the possibilities of the submarine, which
enabled our Expeditionary Force to get across at
all, so that we might have lost the war within the
first month. But as to my poor memoranda,
which proved so terribly correct, I might as well
have dropped them into my own wastepaper
basket instead of theirs, and so saved the postage.
My only convert was Captain, now General,
Swinton, part inventor of the tanks, who acted
as Secretary to the Imperial Defence Committee,
and who told me at the time that my paper had set
him thinking furiously.

Which leads my thoughts to the question of the
torpedoing of merchant vessels by submarines.
So sure was I that the Germans would do this,
that after knocking at official doors in vain, I
published a sketch called " Danger," which was

36

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

written a year before the war, and depicted all
that afterwards occurred, even down to such small
details as the ships zig-zagging up Channel to
escape, and the submarines using their guns to
save torpedoes. I felt as if, like Solomon Eagle,
I could have marched down Fleet Street with a
brazier on my head if I could only call people's
attention to the coming danger. I saw naval
officers on the point, but they were strangely blind,
as is shown by the comments printed at the end of
" Danger/' which give the opinions of several
admirals pooh-poohing my fears. Among others
I saw Captain Beatty, as he then was, and found
him alive to the possible danger, though he did not
suggest a remedy. His quiet, brisk personality
impressed me, and I felt that our national brain-
errors might perhaps be made good in the end by
the grit that is in us. But how hard were our tasks
from our want of foresight. Admiral Von Capelle
did me the honour to say during the war, in the
German Reichstag, that I was the only man who
had prophesied the conditions of the great naval
war. As a matter of fact, both Fisher and Scott
had done so, though they had not given it to the
public in the same detail — but nothing had been
done. We know now that there was not a single
harbour proof against submarines on our whole
East Coast. Truly the hand of the Lord was over
England. Nothing less could have saved her.

We tied up to the bank soon after entering the
Canal, and lay there most of the night while a
procession of great ships moving northwards swept
silently past jus in tthe ring of vivid light cast by

37

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

their searchlights and our own. I stayed on
deck most of the night to watch them. The
silence was impressive — those huge structures
sweeping past with only the slow beat of their
propellers and the wash of their bow wave on
either side. No sooner had one of these great
shapes slid past than, looking down the Canal, one
saw the brilliant head light of another in the
distance. They are only allowed to go at the
slowest pace, so that their wash may not wear
away the banks. Finally, the last had passed, and
we were ourselves able to cast off our warps and
push southwards. I remained on deck seeing the
sun rise over the Eastern desert, and then a
wonderful slow-moving panorama of Egypt as the
bank slid slowly past us. First desert, then green
oases, then the long line of rude fortifications from
Kantara downwards, with the camp fires smoking,
groups of early busy Tommies and endless dumps
of stores. Here and to the south was the point
where the Turks with their German leaders
attempted the invasion of Egypt, carrying flat-
bottomed boats to ford the Canal. How they
were ever allowed to get so far is barely com-
prehensible, but how they were ever permitted
to get back again across one hundred miles of
desert in the face of our cavalry and camelry
is altogether beyond me. Even their guns got
back untaken. They dropped a number of mines
in the Canal, but with true Turkish slovenli-
ness they left on the banks at each point the
long bamboos on which they had carried them
across the desert, which considerably lessened the

38

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

<

work of those who had to sweep them up. The
sympathies of the Egyptians seems to have been
against us, and yet they have no desire to pass
again under the rule of the Turk. Our dominion
has had the effect of turning a very poor country
into a very rich one, and of securing some sort of
justice for the fellah or peasant, but since we get
no gratitude and have no trade preference it is
a little difficult to see how we are the better for all
our labours. So long as the Canal is secure — and
it is no one's interest to injure it — we should be
better if the country governed itself. We have
too many commitments, and if we have to take
new ones, such as Mesopotamia, it would be well
to get rid of some of the others where our task
is reasonably complete. " We never let the
youngsters grow up," said a friendly critic.
There is, however, I admit, another side to
the question, and the idea of permitting a
healthy moral place like Port Said to relapse
into the hotbed of gambling and syphilis which
it used to be, is repugnant to the mind. Which
is better — that a race be free, immoral and
incompetent, or that it be forced into morality
and prosperity ? That question meets us at every
turn.

The children have been delighted by the fish on
the surface of the Canal. Their idea seems to be
that the one aim and object of our excursion is to
see sharks in the sea and snakes in Australia.
We did actually see a shark half ashore upon
a sandbank in one of the lower lakes near
Suez. It was lashing about with a frantic

39

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

tail, and so got itself off into deep water. To
the west all day we see the very wild and
barren country through which our ancestors
used to drive upon the overland route when they
travelled by land from Cairo to Suez. The smoke
of a tiny mail-train marks the general line of that
most desolate road. In the evening we were
through the Canal and marked the rugged shore
upon our left down which the Israelites pursued
their way in the direction of Sinai. One wonders
how much truth there is in the narrative. On the
one hand it is impossible to doubt that something
of the sort did occur. On the other, the im-
possibility of so huge a crowd living on the rare
wells of the desert is manifest. But numbers are
not the strong point of an Oriental historian.
Perhaps a thousand or two may have followed
their great leader upon that perilous journey. I
have heard that Moses either on his own or
through his wife was in touch with Babylonian
habits. This would explain those tablets of stone,
or of inscribed clay burned into brick, which we
receive as the Ten Commandments, and which only
differ from the moral precepts of other races in
the strange limitations and omissions. At least
ten new ones have long been needed to include
drunkenness, gluttony, pride, envy, bigotry, lying
and the rest.

The weather grows hotter and hotter, so that
one aged steward who has done ioo voyages
declares it to be unique. One passenger has died.
Several stewards have collapsed. The wind still
keeps behind us. In the midst of all this I had an

40

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

extensively signed petition from the second class
passengers that I should address them. I did so,
and spoke on deck for forty minutes to a very
attentive audience which included many of the
officers of the ship. I hope I got my points across
to them. I was a sad example of sweated labour
when I had finished. My wife tells me that the
people were impressed. As I am never aware of
the presence of any individual when I am speaking
on this subject I rely upon my wife's very quick
and accurate feminine impressions. She sits
always beside me, notes everything, gives me her
sympathetic atmosphere which is of such psychic
importance, and finally reports the result. If any
point of mine seems to her to miss its mark I
unhesitatingly take it out. It interests me to hear
her tell of the half-concealed sneer with which
men listen to me, and how it turns into interest,
bewilderment and finally something like reverence
and awe as the brain gradually realises the
proved truth of what I am saying, which upsets
the whole philosophy on which their lives are
built.

There are several Australian officers on board
who are coming from the Russian front full of
dreadful stories of Bolshevist atrocities, seen with
their own eyes. The executioners were Letts
and Chinese, and the instigators renegade Jews,
so that the Russians proper seem to have been the
more or less innocent dupes. They had dreadful
photographs of tortured and mutilated men as
corroboration. Surely hell, the place of punish-
ment and purgatorial expiation, is actually upon

41

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

this earth in such cases. One leader seems to have
been a Sadie madman, for after torturing his
victims till even the Chinese executioners struck,
he would sit playing a violin very exquisitely
while he gloated over their agonies. All these
Australian boys agree that the matter will burn
itself out, and that it will end in an immense
massacre of Jews which may involve the whole
seven millions now in Russia. God forbid, but
the outlook is ominous ! I remember a prophecy
which I read early in the war that a great figure
would arise in the north and have power for six
years. If Lenin was the great figure then he has,
according to the prophet, about two years more
to run. But prophecy is fitful, dangerous work.
The way in which the founders of the Christian
faith all foretold the imminent end of the world
is an example. What they dimly saw was no
doubt the destruction of Jerusalem, which seems to
have been equally clear to Ezekiel 600 years
before, for his picture of cannibalism and disper-
sion is very exact.

It is wonderful what chances of gaining direct
information one has aboard a ship of this sort,
with its mixed crowd of passengers, many of
them famous in their own lines. I have already
alluded to the officers returning from Russia with
their prophecies of evil. But there are many
other folk with tales of deep interest. There is a
Mr. Covell, a solid practical Briton, who may
prove to be a great pioneer, for he has made
farming pay handsomely in the very heart of
the Indian plains. Within a hundred miles of

42

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Lucknow he has founded the townlet of Covellpore,
where he handles 3,000 acres of wheat and cotton
with the aid of about the same number of natives.
This is the most practical step I have ever heard
of for forming a real indigenous white population
in India. His son was with him, going out to
carry on the work. Mr. Covell holds that the
irrigation of the North West of India is one of the
greatest wonders of the world, and Jacob the
engineer responsible. I had never heard of him,
nor, I am ashamed to say, had I heard of Sir
Leonard Rogers, who is one of those great men
like Sir Ronald Ross, whom the Indian Medical
Service throws up. Rogers has reduced the
mortality of cholera by intravenous injections of
hypertonic saline until it is only 15 per cent.
General Maude, I am informed, would almost
certainly have been saved, had it not been that
some false departmental economy had withheld
the necessary apparatus. Leprosy also seems in
a fair way to yielding to Rogers' genius for
investigation.

It is sad to hear that this same Indian Medical
Service which has produced such giants as Fayrer,
Ross, and Rogers is in a fair way to absolute ruin,
because the conditions are such that good white
candidates will no longer enter it. White doctors
do not mind working with, or even under, natives
who have passed the same British examinations
as themselves, but they bar the native doctor who
has got through a native college in India, and is
on a far lower educational level than themselves.
To serve under such a man is an impossible

43

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

inversion. This is appreciated by the medical
authorities at home, the word is given to the
students, and the best men avoid the service.
So unless a change is made, the end is in sight of
the grand old service which has given so much to
humanity.

Aden is remarkable only for the huge water
tanks cut to catch rain, and carved out of solid
rock. A whole captive people must have been
set to work on so colossal a task, and one wonders
where the poor wretches got water themselves
the while. Their work is as fresh and efficient as
when they left it. No doubt it was for the
watering, not of the population, but of the Egypt-
ian and other galleys on their way to Punt and
King Solomon's mines. It must be a weary life
for our garrison in such a place. There is strange
fishing, sea snakes, parrot fish and the like. It is
their only relaxation, for it is desert all round.

Monsoon and swell and drifting rain in the
Indian Ocean. We heard that " thresh of the
deep sea rain/' of which Kipling sings. Then at
last in the early morning the long quay of Bombay,
and the wonderful crowd of men of every race who
await an incoming steamer. Here at least half
our passengers were disgorged, young subalterns,
grey colonels, grave administrators, yellow-faced
planters, all the fuel which is grown in Britain and
consumed in the roaring furnace of India. So
devoted to their work, so unthanked and uncom-
prehended by those for whom they work ! They
are indeed-a splendid set of men, and if they with-
drew I wonder how long it would be before the

44

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

wild men of the frontier would be in Calcutta and
Bombay, as the Picts and Scots flowed over
Britain when the Roman legions were withdrawn.
What view will the coming Labour governments
of Britain take of our Imperial commitments ?
Upon that will depend the future history of great
tracts of the globe which might very easily relapse
into barbarism.

The ship seemed lonely when our Indian friends
were gone, for indeed, the pick of the company
went with them. Several pleased me by assuring
me as they left that their views of life had been
changed since they came on board the " Naldera."
To many I gave reading lists that they might look
further into the matter for themselves. A little
leaven in the great lump, but how can we help
leavening it all when we know that, unlike other
creeds, no true Spiritualist can ever revert, so
that while we continually gain, we never lose.
One hears of the converts to various sects, but
one does not hear of those who are driven out by
their narrow, intolerant doctrines. You can
change your mind about faiths, but not about
facts, and hence our certain conquest.

One cannot spend even a single long day in
India without carrying away a wonderful
impression of the gentle dignity of the Indian
people. Our motor drivers were extraordinarily
intelligent and polite, and all we met gave the same
impression.

India may be held by the sword, but it is cer-
tainly kept very carefully in the scabbard, for we
hardly saw a soldier in the streets of this, its

45

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

greatest city. I observed some splendid types
of manhood, however, among the native police.
We lunched at the Taj Mahal Hotel, and got back
tired and full of mixed impressions.

Verily the ingenuity of children is wonderful.
They have turned their active minds upon the
problem of paper currency with fearsome results.
Baby writes cheques in quaint ways upon odd bits
of paper and brings them to me to be cashed.
Malcolm, once known as Dimples, has made a
series of pound and five pound notes of his own.
The bank they call the money shop. I can trace
every sort of atavism, the arboreal, the cave
dweller, the adventurous raider, and the tribal
instinct in the child, but this development seems
a little premature.

Sunday once more, and the good Bishop
preaching. I wonder more and more what an
educated Chinaman would make of such doctrines.
To take an example, he has quoted to-day with
great approval, the action of Peter in discarding
the rite of circumcision as a proof of election.
That marked, according to the Bishop, the broad
comprehensive mind which could not confine the
mercies of God to any limited class. And yet
when I take up the oecumenical pronouncement
from the congress of Anglican bishops which he
has just attended, I find that baptism is made the
test, even as the Jews made circumcision. Have
the bishops not learned that there are millions
who revere the memory of Christ, whether they
look upon him as God or man, but who think that
baptism is a senseless survival of heathendom,

46

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

like so many of our religious observances ? The
idea that the Being who made the milky way can
be either placated or incensed by pouring a splash
of water over child or adult is an offence to reason,
and a slur upon the Divinity.

Two weary days upon the sea with drifting rain
showers and wonderful scarlet and green sunsets.
Have beguiled the time with W. B. Maxwell's
" Lamp and the Mirror." I have long thought
that Maxwell was the greatest of British novelists,
and this book confirms me in my opinion. Who
else could have drawn such fine detail and yet so
broad and philosophic a picture ? There may have
been single books which were better than Maxwell's
best — the " Garden of Allah," with its gorgeous
oriental colour would, for example, make a bid for
first place, but which of us has so splendid a list
of first class serious works as " Mrs. Thompson,"
" The Rest Cure," " Vivian," " In Cotton Wool,"
above all, " The Guarded Flame " — classics, every
one. Our order of merit will come out very
differently in a generation or so to what it stands
now, and I shall expect to find my nominee at the
top. But after all, what's the odds ? You do
your work as well as you can. You pass. You
find other work to do. How the old work com-
pares with the other fellow's work can be a matter
of small concern.

In Colombo harbour lay H.M.S. " Highflyer,"
which we looked upon with the reverence which
everybody and everything which did well in the
war deserve from us — a saucy, rakish, speedy craft.
Several other steamers were flying the yellow

47

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

quarantine flag, but our captain confided to me
that it was a recognised way of saying " no
visitors," and did not necessarily bear any patho-
logical meaning. As we had nearly two days
before we resumed our voyage I was able to
give all our party a long stretch on shore, finally
staying with my wife for the night at the Galle
Face Hotel, a place where the preposterous charges
are partly compensated for by the glorious rollers
which break upon the beach outside. I was
interested in the afternoon by a native conjurer
giving us what was practically a private per-
formance of the mango-tree trick. He did it so
admirably that I can well understand those who
think that it is an occult process. I watched the
man narrowly, and believe that I solved the little
mystery, though even now I cannot be sure. In
doing it he began by laying several objects out in a
casual way while hunting in his bag for his mango
seed. These were small odds and ends including
a little rag doll, very rudely fashioned, about six
or eight inches long. One got accustomed to the
presence of these things and ceased to remark
them. He showed the seed and passed it for
examination, a sort of large Brazil nut. He then
laid it among some loose earth, poured some water
on it, covered it with a handkerchief, and crooned
over it. In about a minute he exhibited the same,
or another seed, the capsule burst, and a light
green leaf protruding. I took it in my hands,
and it was certainly a real bursting mango seed,
but clearly it had been palmed and substituted
for the other. He then buried it again and kept

48

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

raising the handkerchief upon his own side, and
scrabbling about with his long brown fingers
underneath its cover. Then he suddenly whisked
off the handkerchief and there was the plant, a
foot or so high, with thick foliage and blossoms,
its root well planted in the earth. It was certainly
very startling.

My explanation is that by a miracle of packing
the whole of the plant had been compressed into
the rag doll, or little cloth cylinder already men-
tioned. The scrabbling of the hands under the
cloth was to smooth out the leaves after it was
freed from this covering. I observed that the
leaves were still rather crumpled, and that there
were dark specks of fungi which would not be there
if the plant were straight from nature's manu-
factory. But it was wonderfully done when you
consider that the man was squatting in our
midst, we standing in a semi-circle around him,
with no adventitious aid whatever. I do not
believe that the famous Mr. Maskeleyne or any of
those other wise conjurors who are good enough
occasionally to put Lodge, Crookes and Lombroso
in their places, could have wrought a better
illusion.

The fellow had a cobra with him which he
challenged me to pick up. I did so and gazed into
its strange eyes, which some devilry of man's had
turned to a lapis lazuli blue. The juggler said it
was the result of its skin-sloughing, but I have my
doubts. The poison bag had, I suppose, been
extracted, but the man seemed nervous and slipped
his brown hand between my own and the swaying

49 d

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

venomous head with its peculiar flattened hood.
It is a fearsome beast, and I can realise what was
told me by a lover of animals that the snake was
the one creature from which he could get no return
of affection. I remember that I once had three
in my employ when the " Speckled Band " was
produced in London, fine, lively rock pythons,
and yet in spite of this profusion of realism
I had the experience of reading a review
which, after duly slating the play, wound up
with the scathing sentence, "The performance
ended with the production of a palpably artificial
serpent/' Such is the reward of virtue. After-
wards when the necessities of several travelling
companies compelled us to use dummy snakes we
produced a much more realistic effect. The real
article either hung down like a pudgy yellow bell
rope, or else when his tail was pinched, endeav-
oured to squirm back and get level with the stage
carpenter, who pinched him, which was not in the
plot. The latter individual had no doubts at all
as to the dummy being an improvement upon
the real.

Never, save on the west coast of Africa, have I
seen " the league-long roller thundering on the
shore/' as here, where the Indian Ocean with its
thousand leagues of momentum hits the western
coast of Ceylon. It looks smooth out at sea, and
then you are surprised to observe that a good-sized
boat has suddenly vanished. Then it scoops up-
wards once more on the smooth arch of the billow,
disappearing on the further slope. The native
catamarans are almost invisible, so that you see

50

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

a row of standing figures from time to time on the
crest of the waves. I cannot think that any craft
in the world would come through rough water as
these catamarans with their long outriggers can
do. Man has made few more simple and more
effective inventions, and if I were a younger man
I would endeavour to introduce them to Brighton
beach, as once I introduced ski to Switzerland, •
or auto-wheels to the British roads. I have other
work to do now, but why does not some sportsman
take the model, have it made in England, and then
give an exhibition in a gale of wind on the south
coast. It would teach our fishermen some possi-
bilities of which they are ignorant.

As I stood in a sandy cove one of them came
flying in, a group of natives rushing out and
pulling it up on the beach. The craft consists only
of two planks edgewise and lengthwise. In the
nine-inch slit between them lay a number of great
twelve-pound fish, like cod, and tied to the side of
the boat was a ten-foot sword fish. To catch that
creature while standing on a couple of floating
planks must have been sport indeed, and yet the
craft is so ingenious that to a man who can at a
pinch swim for it, there is very small element of
danger. The really great men of our race, the
inventor of the wheel, the inventor of the lever,
the inventor of the catamaran are all lost in the
mists of the past, but ethnologists have found that
the cubic capacity of the neolithic brain is as great
as our own.

There are two robbers' castles, as the unhappy
visitor calls them, facing the glorious sea, the one

5i

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

the Galle Face, the other the Mount Lavinia
Hotel. They are connected by an eight-mile
road, which has all the colour and life and variety
of the East for every inch of the way. In that
glorious sun, under the blue arch of such a sky,
and with the tropical trees and flowers around,
the poverty of these people is very different from
the poverty of a London slum. Is there in all
God's world such a life as that, and can it really
be God's world while we suffer it to exist ! Surely,
it is a palpable truth that no one has a right to
luxuries until every one has been provided with
necessities, and among such necessities a decent
environment is the first. If we had spent money
to fight slumland as we spent it to fight Germany,
what a different England it would be. The world
moves all the same, and we have eternity before
us. But some folk need it.

A doctor came up to me in the hotel and told
me that he was practising there, and had come
recently from England. He had lost his son in
the war, and had himself become unsettled.
Being a Spiritualist he went to Mrs. Brittain, the
medium, who told him that his boy had a message
for him which was that he would do very well in
Colombo. He had himself thought of Ceylon, but
Mrs. B. had no means of knowing that. He had
obeyed the advice thus given, and was glad that he
had done so. How much people may miss by
cutting themselves away from these ministers of
grace ! In all this opposition to Spiritualism the
punishment continually fits the crime.

Once again we shed passengers and proceeded in

52

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

chastened mood with empty decks where once it
was hard to move. Among others, good Bishop
Banister of Kwang-si had gone. I care little
for his sacramental and vicarious doctrines, but
I am very sure that wherever his robust, kindly,
sincere personality may dwell is bound to be a
centre of the true missionary effort — the effort
which makes for the real original teaching of his
Master, submission to God and goodwill to our
fellow men.

Now we are on the last lap with nothing but a
clear stretch of salt water between our prow and
West Australia. Our mission from being a sort
of dream takes concrete form and involves definite
plans. Meanwhile we plough our way through a
deep blue sea with the wind continually against
us. I have not seen really calm water since we
left the Canal. We carry on with the usual
routine of ship sports, which include an England
and Australia cricket match, in which I have the
honour of captaining England, a proper ending
for a long if mediocre career as a cricketer. We
lost by one run, which was not bad considering
our limited numbers.

Posers of all sorts are brought to me by thought-
ful inquirers, which I answer when I can. Often
I can't. One which is a most reasonable objec-
tion has given me a day's thought. If, as is
certain, we can remember in our next life ^ the
more important incidents of this one^ why is it
that in this one we can remember nothing of that
previous spiritual career, which must have existed
since nothing can be born in time for eternity?

53

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Our friends on the other side cannot help us there,
nor can even such extended spiritual visions as
those of Vale Owen clear it up. On the whole we
must admit that our Theosophical friends, with
whom we quarrel for their absence of evidence,
have the best attempt at an explanation. I
imagine that man's soul has a cycle which is com-
plete in itself, and all of which is continuous and
self conscious. This begins with earth life. Then
at last a point is reached, it may be a reincar-
nation, and a new cycle is commenced, the old one
being closed to our memory until we have reached
some lofty height in our further journey. Pure
speculation, I admit, but it would cover what we
know and give us a working hypothesis. I can
never excite myself much about the reincarnation
idea, for if it be so, it occurs seldom, and at long
intervals, with ten years spent in the other spheres
for one spent here, so that even admitting all that
is said by its supporters it is not of such great
importance. At the present rate of change this
world will be as strange as another sphere by the
time we are due to tread the old stage once more.
It is only fair to say that though many spiritual-
ists oppose it, there is a strong body, including
the whole French Allan Kardec school, who sup-
port it. Those who have passed over may well
be divided upon the subject since it concerns their
far future and is a matter of speculation to them
as to us.

Thrasher whales and sperm whales were seen
which aroused the old whaling thrill in my
heart. It was the more valuable Greenland whale

54

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

which I helped to catch, while these creatures are
those which dear old Frank Bullen, a childlike
sailor to the last, described in his " Cruise of the
Cachelot." How is it that sailors write such
perfect English. There are Bullen and Conrad,
both of whom served before the mast — the two
purest stylists of their generation. So was Loti
in France. There are some essays of Bullen's,
especially a description of a calm in the tropics,
and again of " Sunrise seen from the Crow's Nest,"
which have not been matched in our time for
perfection of imagery and diction. They are both
in his " Idyls of the Sea." If there is compensa-
tion in the beyond — and I know that there is —
then Frank Bullen is in great peace, for his whole
earthly life was one succession of troubles. When
I think of his cruel stepmother, his dreadful
childhood, his life on a Yankee blood ship, his
struggles as a tradesman, his bankruptcy, his
sordid worries, and finally, his prolonged ill-health,
I marvel at the unequal distribution of such
burdens. He was the best singer of a chanty
that I have ever heard, and I can hear him now
with his rich baritone voice trolling out " Sally
Brown " or " Stormalong." May I hear him once
again ! Our dear ones tell us that there is no
great gap between what pleases us here and that
which will please us in the beyond. Our own
brains, had we ever used them in the matter,
should have instructed us that all evolution,
spiritual as well as material, must be gradual.
Indeed, once one knows psychic truth, one can,
reasoning backwards, perceive that we should

55

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

unaided have come to the same conclusions, but
since we have all been deliberately trained not to
use our reason in religious matters, it is no wonder
that we have made rather a hash of it. Surely it
is clear enough that in the case of an artist the
artistic nature is part of the man himself. There-
fore, if he survives it must survive. But if it
survives it must have means of expression, or it is
a senseless thing. But means of expression im-
plies appreciation from others and a life on the
general lines of this one. So also of the drama,
music, science and literature, if we carry on they
carry on, and they cannot carry on without actual
expression and a public to be served.

To the east of us and just beyond the horizon
lie the Cocos Islands, where Ross established his
strange little kingdom, and where the Emden
met its end — a glorious one, as every fair minded
man must admit. I have seen her stern post
since then in the hall of the Federal Parliament at
Melbourne, like some fossil monster, once a terror
and now for children to gaze at. As to the Cocos
Islands, the highest point is, I understand, about
twenty feet, and tidal waves are not unknown upon
the Pacific, so that the community holds its tenure
at very short and sudden notice to quit.

On the morning of September 17th a low coast
line appeared upon the port bow — Australia at
last. It was the edge of the West Australian
State. The evening before a wireless had reached
me from the spiritualists of Perth saying that they
welcomed us and our message. It was a kind
thought and a helpful one. We were hardly

56

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

moored in the port of Fremantle, which is about
ten miles from the capital, when a deputation of
these good, kind people was aboard, bearing great
bunches of wild flowers, most of which were new
to us. Their faces fell when they learned that I
must go on in the ship and that there was very
little chance of my being able to address them.
They are only connected with the other States by
one long thin railway line, 1,200 miles long, with
scanty trains which were already engaged, so that
unless we stuck to the ship we should have to pass
ten days or so before we could resume our journey.
This argument was unanswerable, and so the idea
of a meeting was given up.

These kind people had two motors in attendance,
which must, I fear, have been a strain upon their
resources, for as in the old days the true believers
and practical workers are drawn from the poor and
humble. However, they certainly treated us
royally, and even the children were packed into
the motors. We skirted the Swan River, passed
through the very beautiful public park, and,
finally, lunched at the busy town, where Bone's
store would cut a respectable figure in London,
with its many departments and its roof restaurant.
It was surprising after our memories of England
to note how good and abundant was the food.
It is a charming little town, and it was strange,
after viewing its settled order, to see the mill
where the early settlers not so very long ago had
to fight for their lives with the black fellows.
Those poor black fellows ! Their fate is a dark
stain upon Australia. And yet it must in justice

57

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

to our settlers be admitted that the question was
a very difficult one. Was colonisation to be
abandoned, or were these brave savages to be
overcome ? That was really the issue. When
they speared the cattle of the settlers what were
the settlers to do ? Of course, if a reservation
could have been opened up, as in the case
of the Maoris, that would have been ideal.
But the noble Maori is a man with whom
one could treat on equal terms and he belonged
to a solid race. The Aborigines of Australia
were broken wandering tribes, each at war
with its neighbours. In a single reservation
they would have exterminated each other. It
was a piteous tragedy, and yet, even now in
retrospect, how difficult it is to point out what
could have been done.

The Spiritualists of Perth seem to be a small
body, but as earnest as their fellows elsewhere.
A masterful looking lady, Mrs. Mcllwraith, rules
them, and seems fit for the part. They have
several mediums developing, but I had no chance
of testing their powers. Altogether our encounter
with them cheered us on our way. We had the
first taste of Australian labour conditions at Fre-
mantle, for the men knocked off at the given hour,
refusing to work overtime, with the result that we
carried a consignment of tea, meant for their own
tea-pots, another thousand miles to Adelaide, and
so back by train which must have been paid for out
of their own pockets and those of their fellow
citizens. Verily, you cannot get past the golden
rule, and any breach of it brings its own

58

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

punishment somehow, somewhere, be the sinner a
master or a man.

And now we had to cross the dreaded Bight,
where the great waves from the southern ice come
rolling up, but our luck was still in, and we went
through it without a qualm. Up to Albany one
sees the barren irregular coast, and then there
were two days of blue water, which brought us at
last to Adelaide, our port of debarkation. The
hour and the place at last !

59

CHAPTER III

Mr. Hughes' letter of welcome.-— Challenges.— Mr. Carlyle
Smythe.— The Adelaide Press.— The great drought.—
The wine industry. — Clairvoyance. — Meeting with Bell-
chambers.— The first lecture.— The effect.— The Religious
lecture.— The illustrated lecture.— Premonitions.— The
spot light. — Mr. Thomas' account of the incident. —
Correspondence.— Adelaide doctors. — A day in the Bush.
— The Mallee fowl. — Sussex in Australia. — Farewell to
Adelaide.

I was welcomed to Australia by a hospitable letter
from the Premier, Mr. Hughes, who assured me
that he would do what he could to make our visit
a pleasant one, and added, " I hope you will see
Australia as it is, for I want you to tell the world
about us. We are a very young country, we
have a very big and very rich heritage, and the
great war has made us realise that we are Austra-
lians, proud to belong to the Empire, but proud
too of our own country.' '

Apart from Mr. Hughes's kind message, my
chief welcome to the new land came from Sydney,
and took the queer form of two independant
challenges to public debate, one from the Christian
Evidence Society, and the other from the local
leader of the materialists. As the two positions
are mutually destructive, one felt inclined to tell
them to fight it out between themselves and that
I would fight the winner. The Christian Evidence

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Society, is, of course, out of the question, since
they regard a text as an argument, which I can
only accept with many qualifications, so that there
is no common basis. The materialist is a more
worthy antagonist, for though he is often as
bigotted and inaccessible to reason as the worst
type of Christian, there is always a leaven of
honest, open-minded doubters on whom a debate
might make an impression. A debate with them,
as I experienced when I met Mr. MacCabe. can only
follow one line, they quoting all the real or alleged
scandals which have ever been connected with the
lowest forms of mediumship, and claiming that
the whole cult is comprised therein, to which you
counter with your own personal experiences, and
with the evidence of the cloud of witnesses who
have found the deepest comfort and enlarged
knowledge. It is like two boxers each hitting the
air, and both returning to their respective corners
amid the plaudits of their backers, while the
general public is none the better.

Three correspondents headed me off on the
ship, and as I gave each of them a long separate
interview, I was a tired man before I got ashore.
Mr. Carlyle Symthe, my impresario, had also
arrived, a small alert competent gentleman, with
whom I at once got on pleasant terms, which
were never once clouded during our long travels
together upon our tour. I was fortunate indeed
to have so useful and so entertaining a companion,
a musician, a scholar, and a man of many varied
experiences. With his help we soon got our stuff
through the customs, and made the short train

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

journey which separates the Port of Adelaide from
the charming city of that name. By one o'clock
we were safely housed in the Grand Central Hotel,
with windows in place of port holes, and the roar
of the trams to take the place of the murmurs of
the great ocean.

The good genius of Adelaide was a figure, already
almost legendary, one Colonel Light, who played
the part of Romulus and Remus to the infant
city. Somewhere in the thirties of last century
he chose the site, against strong opposition, and
laid out the plan with such skill that in all British
and American lands I have seen few such cities,
so pretty, so orderly and so self-sufficing. When
one sees all the amenities of the place, botanical
gardens, zoological gardens, art gallery, museum,
university, public library and the rest, it is hard
to realise that the whole population is still under
three hundred thousand. I do not know whether
the press sets the tone to the community or the
community to the press, but in any case Adelaide
is greatly blessed in this respect, for its two chief
papers the Register and the Advertiser, under Sir
William Sowden and Sir Langdon Bonython
respectively, are really excellent, with a world-
wide Metropolitan tone.

Their articles upon the subject in which I am
particularly interested, though by no means one-
sided, were at least informed with knowledge and
breadth of mind.

In Adelaide I appreciated, for the first time, the
crisis which Australia has been passing through
in the shape of a two-years drought, only recently

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

broken. It seems to have involved all the States
and to have caused great losses, amounting to
millions of sheep and cattle. The result was that
the price of those cattle which survived has risen
enormously, and at the time of our visit an
absolute record had been established, a bullock
having been sold for £41. The normal price
would be about £13. Sheep were about £3 each,
the normal being fifteen shillings. This had, of
course, sent the price of meat soaring with the
usual popular unrest and agitation as a result. It
was clear, however, that with the heavy rains the
prices would fall. These Australian droughts are
really terrible things, especially when they come
upon newly-opened country and in the hotter
regions of Queensland and the North. One lady
told us that she had endured a drought in Queens-
land which lasted so long that children of five had
never seen a drop of rain. You could travel a
hundred miles and find the brown earth the whole
way, with no sign of green anywhere, the sheep
eating twigs or gnawing bark until they died.
Her brother sold his surviving sheep for one
shilling each, and when the drought broke had
to restock at 50s. a head. This is a common ex-
perience, and all but the man with savings have
to take to some subordinate work, ruined men.
No doubt, with afforestation, artesian wells,
irrigation and water storage things may be
modified, but all these things need capital, and
capital in these days is hard to seek, nor can it
be expected that capitalists will pour their money
into States which have wild politicians who talk

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

lightly of past obligations. You cannot tell the
investor that he is a bloated incubus one moment,
and go hat in hand for further incubation the
next. I fear that this grand country as a whole
may suffer from the wild ideas of some of its
representatives. But under it all lies the solid
self-respecting British stuff, which will never
repudiate a just debt, however heavily it may
press. Australians may groan under the burden,
but they should remember that for every pound
of taxation they carry the home Briton carries
nearly three.

But to return for a moment to the droughts ;
has any writer of fiction invented or described a
more long-drawn agony than that of the man, his
nerves the more tired and sensitive from the
constant unbroken heat, waiting day after day
for the cloud that never comes, while under the
glaring sun from the unchanging blue above him,
his sheep, which represent all his life's work and
his hopes, perish before his eyes ? A revolver shot
has often ended the long vigil and the pioneer has
joined his vanished flocks. I have just come in
contact with a case where two young returned
soldiers, demobilised from the war and planted on
the land had forty-two cattle given them by the
State to stock their little farm. Not a drop of
water fell for over a year, the feed failed, and these
two warriors of Palestine and Flanders wept at
their own helplessness while their little herd died
before their eyes. Such are the trials which the
Australian farmer has to bear.

While waiting for my first lecture I do what I

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

can to understand the country and its problems.
To this end I visited the vineyards and wine plant
of a local firm which possesses every factor for
success, save the capacity to answer letters. The
originator started grape culture as a private hobby
about 60 years ago, and now such an industry has
risen that this firm alone has £700,000 sunk in the
business, and yet it is only one of several. The
product can be most excellent, but little or any
ever reaches Europe, for it cannot overtake the
local demand. The quality was good and purer
than the corresponding wines in Europe — especially
the champagnes, which seem to be devoid of that
poison, whatever it may be, which has for a
symptom a dry tongue with internal acidity,
driving elderly gentlemen to whisky and soda.
The Australian product, taken in moderate doses,
seems to have no poisonous quality, and is without
that lime-like dryness which appears to be the
cause of it. If temperance reform takes the sane
course of insisting upon a lowering of the alcohol
in our drinks, so that one may be surfeited before
one could be drunken, then this question of good
mild wines will bulk very largely in the future,
and Australia may supply one of the answers.
With all my sympathy for the reformers I feel
that wine is so useful a social agent that we should
not abolish it until we are certain that there is no
via media. The most pregnant argument upon
the subject was the cartoon which showed the
husband saying " My dear, it is the anniversary of
our wedding. Let us have a second bottle of
ginger beer."

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

We went over the vineyards, ourselves mildly
interested in the vines, and the children wildly
excited over the possibility of concealed snakes.
Then we did the vats and the cellars with their
countless bottles. We were taught the secrets of
fermentation, how the wonderful Pasteur had
discovered that the best and quickest was produced
not by the grape itself, as of old, but by the scraped
bloom of the grape inserted in the bottle. After
viewing the number of times a bottle must be
turned, a hundred at least, and the complex pro-
cesses which lead up to the finished article, I will
pay my wine bills in future with a better grace.
The place was all polished wood and shining brass,
like the fittings of a man-of-war, and a great
impression of cleanliness and efficiency was left
upon our minds. We only know the Australian
wines at present by the rough article sold in flasks,
but when the supply has increased the world will
learn that this country has some very different
stuff in its cellars, and will try to transport it to
their tables.

We had a small meeting of spiritualists in our
hotel sitting-room, under the direction of Mr.
Victor Cromer, a local student of the occult, who
seems to have considerable psychic power. He
has a small circle for psychic development which
is on new lines, for the neophytes who are learning
clairvoyance sit around in a circle in silence, while
Mr. Cromer endeavours by mental effort to build
up the thought form of some object, say a tree,
in the centre of the room. After a time he asks
each of the circle what he or she can see, and has

66

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

many correct answers. With colours in the same
way he can convey impressions to his pupils. It
is clear that telepathy is not excluded as an ex-
planation, but the actual effect upon the partici-
pants is according to their own account, visual
rather than mental. We had an interesting
sitting with a number of these developing mediums
present, and much information was given, but
little of it could be said to be truly evidential.
After seeing such clairvoyance as that of Mr. Tom
Tyrell or others at home, when a dozen names and
addresses will be given together with the descrip-
tions of those who once owned them, one is spoiled
for any lesser display.

There was one man whom I had particularly
determined to meet when I came to Australia.
This was Mr. T. P. Bellchambers, about whom I
had read an article in some magazine which showed
that he was a sort of humble Jeffries or Thoreau,
more lonely than the former, less learned than the
latter, who lived among the wild creatures in the
back country, and was on such terms with our
humble brothers as few men are ever privileged
to attain. I had read how the eagle with the
broken wing had come to him for succour, and how
little birds would sit on the edge of his pannikin
while he drank. Him at all cost would we see.
Like the proverbial prophet, no one I met had
ever heard of him, but on the third day of our
residence there came a journalist bearing with
him a rudely dressed, tangle-haired man, collarless
and unkempt, with kind, irregular features and
clear blue eyes — the eyes of a child. It was the

67

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

man himself. " He brought me," said he, nodding
towards the journalist. " He had to, for I always
get bushed in a town."

This rude figure fingering his frayed cap was
clearly out of his true picture, and we should have
to visit him in his own little clearing to see him as
he really was. Meanwhile I wondered whether
one who was so near nature might know something
of nature's more occult secrets. The dialogue
ran like this :

" You who are so near nature must have psychic
experiences.' '

" What's psychic ? I live so much in the wild
that I don't know much."

" I expect you know plenty we don't know.
But I meant spiritual."

" Supernatural ? "

" Well, we think it is natural, but little under-
stood."

" You mean fairies and things ? "

" Yes, and the dead."

" Well, I gmess our fairies would be black
fairies."

" Why not ? "

" Well, I never saw any."

" I hoped you might."

" No, but I know one thing. The night my
mother died I woke to find her hand upon my
brow. Oh, there's no doubt. Her hand was
heavy on my brow."

"At the time?"

" Yes, at the very hour."

" Well, that was good."

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

" Animals know more about such things.' '

" Yes."

" They see something. My dog gets terrified
when I see nothing, and there's a place in the
bush where my horse shies and sweats, he does,
but there's nothing to see."

" Something evil has been done there. I've
known many cases."

" I expect that's it."

So ran our dialogue. At the end of it he took a
cigar, lighted it at the wrong end, and took himself
with his strong simple backwoods atmosphere
out of the room. Assuredly I must follow him
to the wilds.

Now came the night of my first lecture. It
was in the city hall, and every seat was occupied.
It was a really magnificent audience of two
thousand people, the most representative of the
town. I am an embarrassed and an interested
witness, so let me for this occasion quote the
sympathetic, not to say flattering account of the
Register.

" There could not have been a more impressive
set of circumstances than those which attended
the first Australian lecture by Sir Arthur Conan
Doyle at the Adelaide Town Hall on Saturday
night, September 25th. The audience, large,
representative and thoughtful, was in its calibre
and proportions a fitting compliment to a world
celebrity and his mission. Many of the intel-
lectual leaders of the city were present —
University professors, pulpit personalities, men

69

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

eminent in business, legislators, every section
of the community contributed a quota. It
cannot be doubted, of course, that the brilliant
literary fame of the lecturer was an attraction
added to that strange subject which explored
the ' unknown drama of the soul/ Over all Sir
Arthur dominated by his big arresting presence.
His face has a rugged, kindly strength, tense and
earnest in its grave moments, and full of winning
animation when the sun of his rich humour plays
on the powerful features.''

"It is not altogether a sombre journey he
makes among the shadows, but apparently one of
happy, as well as tender experiences, so that
laughter is not necessarily excluded from the
exposition. Do not let that be misunderstood.
There was no intrusion of the slightest flippancy
— Sir Arthur, the whole time, exhibited that
attitude of reverence and humility demanded of
one traversing a domain on the borderland of
the tremendous. Nothing approaching a theat-
rical presentation of the case for Spiritualism
marred the discourse. It was for the most part
a plain statement. First things had to be said,
and the explanatory groundwork laid for future
development. It was a lucid, illuminating
introduction.' '

" Sir Arthur had a budget of notes, but after
he had turned over a few pages he sallied forth
with fluent independence under the inspiration
of a vast mental store of material. A finger
jutted out now and again with a thrust of
passionate emphasis, or his big glasses twirled

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

during moments of descriptive ease, and occas-
sionally both hands were held forward as though
delivering settled points to the audience for its
examination. A clear, well-disciplined voice,
excellent diction, and conspicuous sincerity of
manner marked the lecture, and no one could
have found fault with the way in which Sir Arthur
presented his case."

' The lecturer approached the audience in no
spirit of impatient dogmatism, but in the capa-
city of an understanding mind seeking to illu-
mine the darkness of doubt in those who had
not shared his great experiences. He did not
dictate, but reasoned and pleaded, taking the
people into his confidence with strong conviction
and a consoling faith. ' I want to speak to you
to-night on a subject which concerns the destiny
of every man and woman in this room/ began
Sir Arthur, bringing everybody at once into
an intimate personal circle. ' No doubt the
Almighty, by putting an angel in King William
Street, could convert every one of you to
Spiritualism, but the Almighty law is that we
must use our own brains, and find out our own
salvation, and it is not made too easy for us/ "

It is awkward to include this kindly picture,
and yet I do not know how else to give an idea of
how the matter seemed to a friendly observer.
I had chosen for my theme the scientific aspect of
the matter, and I marshalled my witnesses and
showed how Professor Mayo corroborated Pro-
fessor Hare, and Professor Challis Professor Mayo,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

and Sir William Crookes all his predecessors, while
Russell Wallace and Lombroso and Zollner and
Barrett, and Lodge, and many more had all
after long study assented, and I read the very
words of these great men, and showed how bravely
they had risked their reputations and careers for
what they knew to be the truth. I then showed
how the opposition who dared to contradict them
were men with no practical experience of it at all.
It was wonderful to hear the shout of assent when
I said that what struck me most in such a position
was its colossal impertinence. That shout told
me that my cause was won, and from then onwards
the deep silence was only broken by the occasional
deep murmur of heart-felt agreement. I told
them the evidence that had been granted to me,
the coming of my son, the coming of my brother,
and their message. " Plough ! Plough ! others
will cast the seed." It is hard to talk of such
intimate matters, but they were not given to me
for my private comfort alone, but for that of
humanity. Nothing could have gone better than
this first evening, and though I had no chairman
and spoke for ninety minutes without a pause, I
was so upheld — there is no other word for the
sensation — that I was stronger at the end than
when I began. A leading materialist was among
my audience. " I am profoundly impressed/'
said he to Mr. Smythe, as he passed him in the
corridor. That stood out among many kind
messages which reached me that night.

My second lecture, two nights later, was on the
Religious aspect of the matter. I had shown that

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

the phenomena were nothing, mere material signals
to arrest the attention of a material world. I had
shown also that the personal benefit, the conquest
of death, the Communion of Saints, was a high,
but not the highest boon. The real full flower of
Spiritualism was what the wisdom of the dead
could tell us about their own conditions, their
present experiences, their outlook upon the secret
of the universe, and the testing of religious truth
from the viewpoint of two worlds instead of one.
The audience was more silent than before, but
the silence was that of suspense, not of dissent,
as I showed them from message after message
what it was exactly which awaited them in the
beyond. Even I, who am oblivious as a rule to
my audience, became aware that they were tense
with feeling and throbbing with emotion. I
showed how there was no conflict with religion,
in spite of the misunderstanding of the churches,
and that the revelation had come to extend and
explain the old, even as the Christ had said that
he had much more to tell but could not do it now.
" Entirely new ground was traversed/' says my
kindly chronicler, " and the audience listened
throughout with rapt attention. They were
obviously impressed by the earnestness of the
speaker and his masterly presentation of the
theme/ ' I cannot answer for the latter but at
least I can for the former, since I speak not of
what I think but of what I know. How can a man
fail to be earnest then ?

A few days later I followed up the lectures by
two exhibitions of psychic pictures and photo-

73

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

graphs upon a screen. It was certainly an
amazing experience for those who imagined that
the whole subject was dreamland, and they freely
admitted that it staggered them. They might
well be surprised, for such a series has never been
seen, I believe, before, including as it does choice
samples from the very best collections. I showed
them the record of miracle after miracle, some of
them done under my very eyes, one guaranteed
by Russell Wallace, three by Sir William Crookes,
one of the Geley series from Paris, two of Dr.
Crawford's medium with the ecto-plasm pour-
ing from her, four illustrating the absolutely final
Lydia Haig case on the island of Rothesay, several
of Mr. Jeffrey's collection and several also of our
own Society for the Study of Supernormal Pic-
tures, with the fine photograph of the face within
a crystal. No wonder that the audience sat spell-
bound, while the local press declared that no such
exhibition had ever been seen before in Australia.
It is almost too overwhelming for immediate
propaganda purposes. It has a stunning, dazing
effect upon the spectators. Only afterwards, I
think, when they come to turn it all over in their
minds, do they see that the final proof has been
laid before them, which no one with the least sense
for evidence could reject. But the sense for
evidence is not, alas, a universal human quality.

I am continually aware of direct spirit inter-
vention in my own life. I have put it on record
in my " New Revelation " that I was able to say
that the turn of the great war would come upon
the Piave months before that river was on the

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Italian war map. This was recorded at the time,
before the fulfilment which occurred more than a
year later — so it does not depend upon my asser-
tion. Again, I dreamed the name of the ship
which was to take us to Australia, rising in the
middle of the night and writing it down in pencil
on my cheque-book. I wrote Nadera, but it was
actually N alder a. I had never heard that such a
ship existed until I visited the P. & O. office, when
they told me we should go by the Osterley, while
I, seeing the N alder a upon the list, thought " No,
that will be our ship ! " So it proved, through no
action of our own, and thereby we were saved
from quarantine and all manner of annoyance.

Never before have I experienced such direct
visible intervention as occurred during my first
photographic lecture at Adelaide. I had shown a
slide the effect of which depended upon a single
spirit face appearing amid a crowd of others.
The slide was damp, and as photos under these
circumstances always clear from the edges when
placed in the lantern, the whole centre was so
thickly fogged that I was compelled to admit that
I could not myself see the spirit face. Suddenly,
as I turned away, rather abashed by my failure, I
heard cries of " There it is," and looking up again
I saw this single face shining out from the general
darkness with so bright and vivid an effect that
I never doubted for a moment that the operator
was throwing a spot light upon it, my wife sharing
my impression. I thought how extraordinarily
clever it was that he should pick it out so accur-
ately at the distance. So the matter passed, but

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

next morning Mr. Thomas, the operator, who is
not a Spiritualist, came in great excitement to
say that "a palpable miracle had been wrought, and
that in his great experience of thirty years he had
never known a photo dry from the centre, nor, as
I understood him, become illuminated in such a
fashion. Both my wife and I were surprised to learn
that he had thrown no ray upon it. Mr. Thomas
told us that several experts among the audience
had commented upon the strangeness of the
incident. I, therefore, asked Mr. Thomas if he
would give me a note as to his own impression, so
as to furnish an independant account. This is
what he wrote : —

" Hindmarsh Square, Adelaide.
" In Adelaide, on September 28th, I projected
a lantern slide containing a group of ladies and
gentlemen, and in the centre of the picture, when
the slide was reversed, appeared a human face.
On the appearance of the picture showing the
group the fog incidental to a damp or new slide
gradually appeared covering the whole slide,
and only after some minutes cleared, and then
quite contrary to usual practice did so from a
central point just over the face that appeared in
the centre, and refused even after that to clear
right off to the edge. The general experience is
for a slide to clear from the outside edges to a
common centre. Your slide cleared only suffi-
ciently in the centre to show the face, and did
not, while the slide was on view, clear any more
than sufficient to show that face. Thinking that

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

perhaps there might be a scientific explanation
to this phenomenon, I hesitated before writing
you, and in the meantime I have made several
experiments but have not in any one particular
experiment obtained the same result. I am
'very much interested — as are hundreds of others
who personally witnessed the phenomenon."

Mr. Thomas, in his account, has missed the self-
illuminated appearance of the face, but otherwise
he brings out the points. I never gave occasion
for the repetition of the phenomenon, for in every
case I was careful that the slides were carefully
dried beforehand.

So much for the lectures at Adelaide, which were
five in all, and left, as I heard from all sides, a
deep impression upon the town. Of course, the
usual abusive messages poured in, including one
which wound up with the hearty words : " May
you be struck dead before you leave this Common-
wealth. " From Melbourne I had news that before
our arrival in Australia at a public prayer meeting
at the Assembly Hall, Collins Street, a Presbyterian
prayed that we might never reach Australia's
shores. As we were on the high seas at the time
this was clearly a murderous petition, nor could
I have believed it if a friend of mine had not
actually been present and heard it. On the other
hand, we received many letters of sympathy and
thanks, which amply atoned. " I feel sure that
many mothers, who have lost their sons in the
war, will, wherever you go, bless you, as I do, for
the help you have given." As this was the object

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

of our journey it could not be denied that we had
attained our end. When I say " we," I mean that
such letters with inquiries came continually to my
wife as well as myself, though she answered them
with far greater fullness and clearness than I had
time to do.

Hotel life began to tell upon the children, who
are like horses with a profusion of oats and no
exercise. On the whole they were wonderfully
good. When some domestic crisis wras passed the
small voice of Malcolm, once " Dimples/' was
heard from the darkness of his bed, saying, " Well,
if I am to be good I must have a proper start.
Please mammie, say one, two, three, and away ! '
When this ceremony had been performed a still
smaller voice of Baby asked the same favour, so
once more there was a formal start. The result was
intermittent, and it is as well. I don't believe in
angelic children.

The Adelaide doctors entertained me to dinner,
and I was pleased to meet more than one who
had been of my time at Edinburgh. They seemed
to be a very prosperous body of men. There was
much interesting conversation, especially from
one elderly professor named Watson, who had
known Bully Hayes and other South Sea cele-
brities in the semi-piratical, black-birding days.
He told me one pretty story. They landed upon
some outlying island in Carpentaria, peopled by
real primitive blacks, who were rounded up by the
ships crew on one of the peninsulas which formed
the end of the island. These creatures, the lowest
of the human race, huddled together in consterna-

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

tion while the white men trained a large camera
upon them. Suddenly three males advanced and
made a speech in their own tongue which, when
interpreted, proved to be an offer that those three
should die in exchange for the lives of the tribe.
What could the very highest do more than this,
and yet it came from the lowest savages. Truly,
we all have something of the divine, and it is the
very part which will grow and spread until it has
burned out all the rest. "Be a Christ ! " said
brave old Stead. At the end of countless aeons
we may all reach that point which not only Stead
but St. Paul also has foreshadowed.

I refreshed myself between lectures by going
out to Nature and to Bellchambers. As it was
twenty-five miles out in the bush, inaccessible by
rail, and only to be approached by motor roads
which were in parts like the bed of a torrent, I
could not take my wife, though the boys, after the
nature of boys, enjoy a journey the more for its
roughness. It was a day to remember. I saw
lovely South Australia in the full beauty of the
spring, the budding girlhood of the year, with all
her winsome growing graces upon her. The
brilliant yellow wattle was just fading upon the
trees, but the sward was covered with star-shaped
purple flowers of the knot-grass, and with familiar
home flowers, each subtly altered by their trans-
portation. It was wild bush for part of the way,
but mostly of the second growth on account of
forest fires as much as the woodman's axe. Bell-
chambers came in to guide us, for there is no one
to ask upon these desolate tracks, and it is easy

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

to get bushed. Mr. Waite, the very capable
zoologist of the museum, joined the party, and
with two such men the conversation soon got to
that high nature talk which represents the really
permanent things of material life — more lasting
than thrones and dynasties. I learned of the
strange storks, the " native companions " who
meet, 500 at a time, for their stately balls, where
in the hush of the bush they advance, retreat,
and pirouette in their dignified minuets. I heard
of the bower birds, who decorate their homes with
devices of glass and pebbles. There was talk, too,
of the little red beetles who have such cunning
ways that they can fertilise the insectivorous
plants without being eaten, and of the great ants
who get through galvanised iron by the aid of
some acid-squirting insect which they bring with
them to the scene of their assault. I heard also
of the shark's egg which Mr. Waite had raped
from sixty feet deep in Sydney Harbour, descend-
ing for the purpose in a diver's suit, for which I
raised my hat to him. Deep things came also
from Bellchambers' store of knowledge and little
glimpses of beautiful humanity from this true
gentleman.

" Yes," he said, " I am mostly vegetarian.
You see, I know the beasts too well to bring
myself to pick their bones. Yes, I'm friends with
most of them. Birds have more sense than
animals to my mind. They understand you like.
They know what you mean. Snakes have least of
any. They don't get friendly-like in the same
way. But Nature helps the snakes in queer ways.

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Some of them hatch their own eggs, and when
they do Nature raises the temperature of their
bodies. That's queer."

I carried away a mixed memory of the things I
had seen. A blue-headed wren, an eagle soaring
in the distance ; a hideous lizard with a huge open
mouth ; a laughing jackass which refused to
laugh ; many more or less tame wallabies and
kangaroos ; a dear little 'possum which got
under the back of my coat, and would not come
out ; noisy mynah birds which fly ahead and
warn the game against the hunter. Good little
noisy mynah ! All my sympathies are with you !
I would do the same if I could. This senseless
lust for killing is a disgrace to the race. We, of
England, cannot preach, for a pheasant battue is
about the worst example of it. But do let the
creatures alone unless they are surely noxious !
When Mr. Bellchambers told us how he had
trained two ibises — the old religious variety —
and how both had been picked off by some
unknown local " sportsman " it made one sad.

We had a touch of comedy, however, when Mr.
Bellchambers attempted to expose the egg of the
Mallee fowl, which is covered a foot deep in
mould. He scraped into the mound with his
hands. The cock watched him with an expression
which clearly said : " Confound the fellow ! What
is he up to now ? " He then got on the mound,
and as quickly as Bellchambers shovelled the
earth out he kicked it back again, Bellchambers
in his good-humoured way crying " Get along
with you, do ! " A good husband is the Mallee

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

cock, and looks after the family interests. But
what we humans would think if we were born deep
underground and had to begin our career by
digging our way to the surface, is beyond
imagination.

There are quite a clan of Bellchambers living
in or near the little pioneer's hut built in a clearing
of the bush. Mrs. Bellchambers is of Sussex, as is
her husband, and when they heard that we were
fresh from Sussex also it wras wonderful to see the
eager look that came upon their faces, while the
bush-born children could scarce understand what
it was that shook the solid old folk to their marrow.
On the walls were old prints of the Devil's Dyke
and Firle Beacon. How strange that old Sussex
should be wearing out its very life in its care for
the fauna of young Australia. This remarkable
man is unpaid with only his scanty holding upon
which to depend, and many dumb mouths de-
pendent upon him. I shall rejoice if my efforts
in the local press serve to put his affairs upon a
more worthy foundation, and to make South
Australia realise what a valuable instrument lies
to her hand.

Before I left Adelaide I learned many pleasing
things about the lectures, which did away with
any shadow cast by those numerous corre-
spondents who seemed to think that we were still
living under the Mosaic dispensation, and who
were so absent-minded that they usually forgot to
sign their names. It is a curious difference
between the Christian letters of abuse and those
of materialists, that the former are usually

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anonymous and the latter signed. I heard of
one man, a lame stockman, who had come 300
miles from the other side of Streaky Bay to
attend the whole course, and who declared that
he could listen all night. iVnother seized my
hand and cried, " You will never know the good
you have done in this town." Well, I hope it
was so, but I only regard myself as the plough.
Others must follow with the seed. Knowledge,
perseverance, sanity, judgment, courage — we ask
some qualities from our disciples if they are to do
real good. Talking of moral courage I would say
that the Governor of South Australia, Sir Archibald
Weigall with Lady Weigall, had no hesitation in
coming to support me with their presence. By
the end of September this most successful mission
in Adelaide was accomplished, and early in
October we were on our way to Melbourne, which
meant a long night in the train and a few hours
of the next morning during which we saw the
surface diggings of Ballarat on every side of the
railway line, the sandy soil pitted in every direction
with the shallow claims of the miners.

83

CHAPTER IV

Speculations on Paul and his Master. — Arrival at Melbourne. —
Attack in the Argus. — Partial press boycott. — Strength
of the movement. — The Prince of Wales. — Victorian
football. — Rescue Circle in Melbourne. — Burke and
Wills' statue. — Success of the lectures. — Reception at the
Auditorium.— Luncheon of the British Empire League. —
Mr. Ryan's experience. — The Federal Government. — Mr.
Hughes' personality. — The mediumship of Charles
Bailey. — His alleged exposure. — His remarkable record. —
A second sitting. — The Indian nest. — A remarkable lecture.
Arrival of Lord Forster. — The future of the Empire. —
Kindness of Australians. — Prohibition. — Horse-racing.
— Roman Catholic policy.

One cannot help speculating about those great
ones who first carried to the world the Christian
revelation. What were their domestic ties !
There is little said about them, but we should
never have known that Peter had a wife were it
not for a chance allusion to his mother-in-law, just
as another chance allusion shows us that Jesus
was one of a numerous family. One thing can
safely be said of Paul, that he was either a bachelor
or else was a domestic bully with a very submissive
wife, or he would never have dared to express his
well known views about women. As to his
preaching, he had a genius for making a clear
thing obscure, even as Jesus had a genius for

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

making an obscure thing clear. Read the Sermon
on the Mount and then a chapter of Paul as a con-
trast in styles. Apart from his style one can
reconstruct him as a preacher to the extent that
he had a powerful voice — no one without one
could speak from the historic rocky pulpit on the
hill of Mars at Athens, as I ascertained for myself.
The slope is downwards, sound ascends, and the
whole conditions are abominable. He was cer-
tainly long-winded and probably monotonous in
his diction, or he could hardly have reduced one of
his audience to such a deep sleep that he fell out
of the window. We may add that he was a man
of brisk courage in an emergency, that he was
subject to such sudden trances that he was occa-
sionally unaware himself whether he was normal
or not, and that he was probably short-sighted,
as he mistook the person who addressed him, and
had his letters usually written for him. At least
three languages were at his command, he had an
intimate and practical knowledge of the occult,
and was an authority upon Jewish law — a good
array of accomplishments for one man.

There are some points about Paul's august
Master which also help in a reconstruction of
Himself and His surroundings. That His mother
was opposed to His mission is, I think, very
probable. Women are dubious about spiritual
novelties, and one can well believe that her heart
ached to see her noble elder son turn from the sure
competence of His father's business at Nazareth
to the precarious existence of a wandering preacher.
This domestic opposition clouded Him as one can

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

see in the somewhat cold, harsh words which He
used to her, and his mode of address which began
simply as " Woman." His assertion to the dis-
ciples that one who followed His path had to give
up his family points to the same thing. No doubt
Mary remained with the younger branches at
Nazareth while Jesus pursued His ministry, though
she came, as any mother would, to be near Him
at the end.

Of His own personality we know extraordinarily
little, considering the supreme part that He
played in the world. That He was a highly trained
psychic, or as we should say, medium, is obvious
to anyone who studies the miracles, and it is cer-
tainly not derogatory to say that they were done
along the line of God's law rather than that they
were inversions of it. I cannot doubt also that
he chose his apostles for their psychic powers —
if not, on what possible principle were they
selected, since they were neither staunch nor
learned ? It is clear that Peter and James and
John were the inner circle of psychics, since they
were assembled both at the transfiguration and
at the raising of Jairus' daughter. It is from
unlearned open-air men who are near Nature that
the highest psychic powers are obtained. It has
been argued that the Christ was an Essene, but
this seems hard to believe, as the Essenes were not
only secluded from the world, but were certainly
vegetarians and total abstainers, while Jesus was
neither. On the other hand baptism was not a
Jewish rite, and his undergoing it — if He did,
indeed, undergo it — marks Him as belonging to

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

some dissenting sect. I say " if He did " because
it is perfectly certain that there were forgeries
and interpolations introduced into the Gospels in
order to square their teaching with the practice
of the Church some centuries later. One would
look for those forgeries not in the ordinary narra-
tive, which in the adult years bears every mark of
truth, but in the passages which support cere-
monial or tributes to the Church — such as the
allusions to baptism, " Unless a man be born
again," to the sacrament, " This is my body,
etc.," and the whole story of Ananias and Sapphira,
the moral of which is that it is dangerous to hold
anything back from the Church.

Physically I picture the Christ as an extremely
powerful man. I have known several famous
healers and they were all men who looked as if
they had redundant health and strength to give
to others. His words to the sick woman, " Who
has touched me ? Much power " (dunamis is
the word in the original Greek) " has gone out of
me," show that His system depended upon His
losing what He gave to others. Therefore He was
a very strong man. The mere feat of carrying a
wooden cross strong enough to bear a man from
Jerusalem to Calvary, up a hill, is no light one.
It is the details which convince me that the gospel
narrative is correct and really represents an actual
event. Take the incident during that sad journey
of Simon of Cyrene having helped for a time with
the cross. Why should anyone invent such a
thing, putting an actual name to the person ?
It is touches of this kind which place the narrative

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

beyond all suspicion of being a pure invention.
Again and again in the New Testament one is
confronted with incidents which a writer of fiction
recognises as being beyond the reach of invention,
because the inventor does not put in things which
have no direct bearing upon the matter in hand.
Take as an example how the maid, seeing Peter
outside the door after his escape from prison, ran
back to the guests and said that it was his angel
(or etheric body) which was outside. Such an
episode could only have been recorded because it
actually occurred.

But these be deep waters. Let me get back to
my own humble experiences, these interpolated
thoughts being but things which have been found
upon the wayside of our journey. On reaching
Melbourne we were greeted at the station by a few
devoted souls who had waited for two trains
before they found us. Covered with the flowers
which they had brought we drove to Menzies
Hotel, whence we moved a few days later to a flat
in the Grand, where we were destined to spend
five eventful weeks. We found the atmosphere
and general psychic conditions of Melbourne by no
means as pleasant or receptive as those of Adelaide,
but this of course was very welcome as the greater
the darkness the more need of the light. If
Spiritualism had been a popular cult in Australia
there would have been no object in my visit. I
was welcome enough as an individual, but by no
means so as an emissary, and both the Churches
and the Materialists, in most unnatural combina-
tion, had done their best to make the soil stony

88

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

for me. Their chief agent had been the Argus, a
solid, stodgy paper, which amply fulfilled the
material needs of the public, but was not given to
spiritual vision. This paper before my arrival
had a very violent and abusive leader which
attracted much attention, full of such terms as
" black magic," " Shamanism/' " witchcraft,"
"freak religion," "cranky faith," "cruelty,"
" black evil," " poison," finishing up with the
assertion that I represented " a force which we
believe to be purely evil." This was from a paper
which whole-heartedly supports the liquor interest,
and has endless columns of betting and racing
news, nor did its principles cause it to refuse sub-
stantial sums for the advertising of my lectures.
Still, however arrogant or illogical, I hold that a
paper has a perfect right to publish and uphold its
own view, nor would I say that the subsequent
refusal of the Argus to print any answer to its
tirade was a real breach of the ethics of journalism.
Where its conduct became outrageous, however,
and where it put itself beyond the pale of all
literary decency, was when it reported my first
lecture by describing my wife's dress, my own
voice, the colour of my spectacles, and not a word
of what I said. It capped this by publishing so-
called answers to me by Canon Hughes, and by
Bishop Phelan — critics whose knowledge of the
subject seemed to begin and end with the witch
of Endor — while omitting the statements to which
these answers applied. Never in any British
town have I found such reactionary intolerance
as in this great city, for though the Argus was the

89

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

chief offender, the other papers were as timid as
rabbits in the matter. My psychic photographs
which, as I have said, are the most wonderful
collection ever shown in the world, were received
in absolute silence by the whole press, though it is
notorious that if I had come there with a comic
opera or bedroom comedy instead of with the
evidence of a series of miracles, I should have had
a column. This seems to have been really due to
moral cowardice, and not to ignorance, for I saw
a private letter afterwards in which a sub-editor
remarked that he and the chief leader-writer had
both seen the photographs and that they could
see no possible answer to them.

There was another and more pleasing side to
the local conditions, and that lay in the numbers
who had already mastered the principles of
Spiritualism, the richer classes as individuals,
the poorer as organised churches. They were so
numerous that when we received an address of
welcome in the auditorium to which only Spiritual-
ists were invited by ticket, the Hall, which holds
two thousand, was easily filled. This would mean on
the same scale that the Spiritualists of London could
fill the Albert Hall several times over — as no doubt
they could. Their numbers were in a sense an
embarrassment, as I always had the fear that I was
addressing the faithful instead of those whom I
had come so far to instruct. On the whole their
quality and organisation were disappointing.
They had a splendid spiritual paper in their midst,
the Harbinger of Light, which has run for fifty
years, and is most ably edited by Mr. Britton

90

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Harvey. When I think of David Gow, Ernest
Oaten, John Lewis and Britton Harvey I feel that
our cause is indeed well represented by its press.
They have also some splendid local workers, like
Bloomfield and Tozer, whole-hearted and apos-
tolic. But elsewhere there is the usual tendency
to divide and to run into vulgarities and extrava-
gances in which the Spiritual has small share.
Discipline is needed, which involves central
powers, and that in turn means command of the
purse. It would be far better to have no Spiritual
churches than some I have seen.

However, I seem to have got to some of my final
conclusions at Melbourne before I have begun our
actual experience there. We found the place
still full of rumours and talk about the recent visit
of the Prince of Wales, who seems to have a perfect
genius for making himself popular and beloved.
May he remain unspoiled and retain the fresh
kindliness of his youth. His success is due not
to any ordered rule of conduct but to a perfectly
natural courtesy which is his essential self and
needs no effort. Our waiter at the hotel who had
waited upon him remarked : " God never made
anything nearer to Nature than that boy. He
spoke to me as he might have spoken to the
Governor/ ' It was a fine tribute, and character-
istic of the humbler classes in this country, who
have a vigour of speech and an independence of
view which is very refreshing. Once as I passed
a public house, a broken old fellow who had been
leaning against the wall with a short pipe in his
mouth, stepped forward to me and said : "lam

9*

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

all for civil and religious liberty. There is plenty
of room for your cult here, sir, and I wish you
well against the bigots/ ' I wonder from what
heights that old fellow had fallen before he brought
up against the public house wall ?

One of my first afternoons in Melbourne was
spent in seeing the final tie of the Victorian football
cup. I have played both Rugby and Soccer, and
I have seen the American game at its best, but I
consider that the Victorian system has some points
which make it the best of all — certainly from the
spectacular point of view. There is no off-side,
and you get a free kick if you catch the ball.
Otherwise you can run as in ordinary Rugby,
though there is a law about bouncing the ball as
you run, which might, as it seemed to me, be cut
out without harming the game. This bouncing
rule was put in by Mr. Harrison who drew up the
original rules, for the chivalrous reason that he
was himself the fastest runner in the Colony, and
he did not wish to give himself any advantage.
There is not so much man-handling in the Victorian
game, and to that extent it is less dramatic, but it
is extraordinarily open and fast, with none of the
packed scrums which become so wearisome, and
with linesmen who throw in the ball the instant
it goes out. There were several points in which
the players seemed better than our best — one was
the accurate passing by low drop kicking, very
much quicker and faster than a pass by hand.
Another was the great accuracy of the place
kicking and of the screw kicking when a runner
would kick at right angles to his course. There

92

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

were four long quarters, and yet the men were in
such condition that they were going hard at the
end. They are all, I understand, semi-professionals.
Altogether it was a very fine display, and the
crowd was much excited. It was suggestive that
the instant the last whistle blew a troop of mounted
police cantered over the ground and escorted the
referees to the safety of the pavilion.

I began at once to endeavour to find out the
conditions of local Spiritualism, and had a long
conversation with Mr. Tozer, the chairman of the
movement, a slow-talking, steady-eyed man, of the
type that gets a grip and does not easily let go.
After explaining the general situation, which needs
some explanation as it is full of currents and cross-
currents caused by individual schisms and seces-
sions, he told me in his gentle, earnest way some of
his own experiences in his home circle which
corroborate much which I have heard elsewhere.
He has run a rescue circle for the instruction of
the lower spirits who are so material that they
can be reached more easily by humanity than by
the higher angels. The details he gave me were
almost the same as those given by Mr. MacFarlane
of Southsea who had a similar circle of which Mr.
Tozer had certainly never heard. A wise spirit
control dominates the proceedings. The medium
goes into trance. The spirit control then explains
what it is about to do, and who the spirit is who
is about to be reformed. The next scene is often
very violent, the medium having to be held down
and using rough language. This comes from
some low spirit who has suddenly found this means

93

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

of expressing himself. At other times the language
is not violent but only melancholy, the spirit
declaring that he is abandoned and has not a
friend in the universe. Some do not realise that
they are dead, but only that they wander all alone,
under conditions they could not understand, in a
cloud of darkness.

Then comes the work of regeneration. They are
reasoned with and consoled. Gradually they
become more gentle. Finally, they accept the
fact that they are spirits, that their condition is
their own making, and that by aspiration and
repentance they can win their way to the light.
When one has found the path and has returned
thanks for it, another case is treated. As a rule
these errant souls are unknown to fame. Often
they are clergymen whose bigotry has hindered
development. Occasionally some great sinner of
the past may come into view. I have before me
a written lament professing to come from Alva,
the bigoted governor of the Lowlands. It is
gruesome enough. " Picture to yourself the hell
I was in. Blood, blood everywhere, corpses on
all sides, gashed, maimed, mutilated, quivering
with agony and bleeding at every pore ! At the
same time thousands of voices were raised in
bitter reproaches, in curses and execrations !
Imagine the appalling spectacle of this multitude
of the dead and dying, fresh from the flames,
from the sword, the rack, the torture chambers
and the gibbet ; and the pandemonium of voices
shrieking out the most terrible maledictions !
Imagine never being able to get away from these

94

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

sights and sounds, and then tell me, was I no'
in hell ? — a hell of greater torment than that to
which I believed all heretics were consigned. Such
was the hell of the ' bloody Alva/ from which I
have been rescued by what seems to me a great
merciful dispensation of Almighty God."

Sometimes in Mr. Tozer's circle the souls of
ancient clerics who have slumbered long show
their first signs of resuscitation, still bearing their
old-world intolerance with them. The spirit con-
trol purports to be a well-educated Chinaman,
whose presence and air of authority annoy the
ecclesiastics greatly. The petrified mind leads to
a long period of insensibility which means loss of
ground and of time in the journey towards happi-
ness. I was present at the return of one alleged
Anglican Bishop of the eighteenth century, who
spoke with great intolerance. When asked if he
had seen the Christ he answered that he had not
and that he could not understand it. When asked
if he still considered the Christ to be God he
threw up his hand and shouted violently, " Stop !
That is blasphemy ! " The Chinese control said,
" He stupid man. Let him wait. He learn
better " — and removed him. He was succeeded
by a very noisy and bigoted Puritan divine who
declared that no one but devils would come
to a seance. On being asked whether that meant
that he was himself a devil he became so abusive
that the Chinaman once more had to intervene.
I quote all this as a curious sidelight into some
developments of the subject which are familiar
enough to students, but not to the general public.

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

It is easy at a distance to sneer at such things and
to ask for their evidential value, but they are very
impressive to those who view them at closer
quarters. As to evidence, I am informed that
several of the unfortunates have been identified in
this world through the information which they
gave of their own careers.

Melbourne is a remarkable city, far more solid
and old-established than the European visitor
would expect. We spent some days in exploring
it. There are few cities which have the same
natural advantages, for it is near the sea, with
many charming watering places close at hand,
while inland it has some beautiful hills for the
week-end villas of the citizens. Edinburgh is the
nearest analogy which I can recall. Parks and
gardens are beautiful, but, as in most British
cities, the public statues are more solid than
impressive. The best of them, that to Burke
and Wills, the heroic explorers, has no name
upon it to signify who the two figures are, so that
they mean nothing at all to the casual observer,
in spite of some excellent bas-reliefs, round the
base, which show the triumphant start and the
terrible end of that tragic but successful journey,
which first penetrated the Continent from south
to north. Before our departure I appealed in the
press to have this omission rectified and it was,
I believe, done.

Mr. Smythe, my agent, had been unfortunate
in being unable to secure one of the very few
large halls in Melbourne, so we had to confine our-
selves to the Playhouse which has only seating

96

Photo : Stirling, Melbourne.

MELBOURNE, NOVEMBER, I92O.

See page 97.

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

for about 1,200. Here I opened on October 5th,
following my lectures up in the same order as in
Adelaide. The press was very shy, but nothing
could have exceeded the warmth and receptivity
of my hearers. Yet on account of the inadequate
reports of the press, with occasional total sup-
pression, no one who was not present could have
imagined how packed was the house, or how
unanimous the audience.

On October 14th the Spiritualists filled the
Auditorium and had a special service of welcome
for ourselves. When I went down to it in the
tram, the conductor, unaware of my identity, said,
when I asked to be put down at the Auditorium,
" It's no use, sir ; it's jam full an hour ago."
" The Pilgrims/ ' as they called us, were in special
seats, the seven of us all in a line upon the right
of the chair. Many kind things were said, and I
replied as best I might. The children will carry
the remembrance of that warm-hearted reception
through their lives, and they are not likely to
forget how they staggered home, laden with the
flowers which were literally heaped upon them.

The British Empire League also entertained my
wife and myself to lunch, a very select company
assembling who packed the room. Sir Joseph
Cook, Federal Chancellor of the Exchequer, made
a pleasant speech, recalling our adventures upon
the Somme, when he had his baptism of fire. In
my reply I pulled the leg of my audience with
some success, for I wound up by saying, very
solemnly, that I was something greater than
Governments and the master of Cabinet Ministers.

97 g

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

By the time I had finished my tremendous claims
I am convinced that they expected some ex-
travagant occult pretension, whereas I actually
wound up with the words, "for I am the man in
the street." There was a good deal of amusement
caused.

Mr. Thomas Ryan, a very genial and capable
member of the State Legislature, took the chair at
this function. He had no particular psychic
knowledge, but he was deeply impressed by an
experience in London in the presence of that
remarkable little lady, Miss Scatcherd. Mr. Ryan
had said that he wanted some evidence before he
could accept psychic philosophy, upon which Miss
Scatcherd said : " There is a spirit beside you now.
He conveys to me that his name is Roberts. He
says he is worried in his mind because the home
which you prepared for his widow has not been
legally made over to her/' All this applied to a
matter in Adelaide. In that city, according to
Mr. Ryan, a seance was held that night, Mr.
Victor Cromer being the medium, at which a
message came through from Roberts saying that
he was now easy in his mind as he had managed to
convey his trouble to Mr. Ryan who could set it
right. When these psychic laws are understood
the dead as well as the living will be relieved from
a load of unnecessary care ; but how can these laws
be ignored or pooh-poohed in the face of such
instances as this which I have quoted ? They are
so numerous now that it is hardly an exaggera-
tion to say that every circle of human beings
which meets can supply one.

98

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Mr. Hughes was good enough to ask me to
meet the members of the Federal Government at
lunch, and the experience was an interesting one,
for here round one small table were those who
were shaping the course of this young giant among
the nations. They struck me as a practical hard-
worked rough-and-ready lot of men. Mr. Hughes
dominated the conversation, which necessarily
becomes one-sided as he is very deaf, though his
opponents say that he has an extraordinary knack
of hearing what he is not meant to hear. He told
us a series of anecdotes of his stormy political
youth with a great deal of vivacity, the whole
company listening in silence. He is a hard, wiry
man, with a high-nosed Red Indian face, and a
good deal of healthy devilry in his composition —
a great force for good during the war.

After lunch he conducted me through the library,
and coming to a portrait of Clemenceau he cried :
" That's the man I learned to admire in Europe."
Then, turning to one of Wilson, he added, " And
that's the man I learned to dislike." He added a
number of instances of Wilson's ignorance of
actual conditions, and of his ungenial coldness
of heart. "If he had not been so wrapped in
himself, and if he had taken Lodge or some other
Republican with him, all could have easily been
arranged." I feel that I am not indiscreet in
repeating this, for Hughes is not a man who
conceals his opinions from the world.

I have been interested in the medium Bailey,
who was said to have been exposed in France in
1 910. The curious will find the alleged exposure

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

in " Annals of Psychical Science/' Vol. IX.
Bailey is an apport medium — that is to say, that
among his phenomena is the bringing of objects
which are said to come from a distance, passing
through the walls and being precipitated down
upon the table. These objects are of the strangest
description — Assyrian tablets (real or forged),
tortoises, live birds, snakes, precious stones, &c.
In this case, after being searched by the committee,
he was able to produce two live birds in the seance
room. At the next sitting the committee pro-
posed an obscene and absurd examination of the
medium, which he very rightly resented and
refused. They then confidently declared that on
the first occasion the two live birds were in his
intestines, a theory so absurd that it shakes one's
confidence in their judgment. They had, however,
some more solid grounds for a charge against him,
for they produced a married couple who swore
that they had sold three such birds with a cage to
Bailey some days before. This Bailey denied,
pointing out that he could neither speak French,
nor had he ever had any French money, which
Professor Reichel, who brought him from Australia,
corroborated. However, the committee con-
sidered the evidence to be final, and the seances
came to an end, though Colonel de Rochas, the
leading member, wound up the incident by writing :
" Are we to conclude from the fraud that we have
witnessed that all Bailey's apports may have
been fraudulent ? I do not think so, and this
is also the opinion of the members of the com-
mittee, who have had much experience with

ioo

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST'

mediums and are conversant with the literature of
the subject."

Reading the alleged exposure, one is struck, as
so often in such cases, with its unsatisfactory
nature. There is the difficulty of the language
and the money. There is the disappearance of
the third bird and the cage. Above all, how did
the birds get into the carefully-guarded seance
room, especially as Bailey was put in a bag
during the proceedings ? The committee say the
bag may not have been efficient, but they also
state that Bailey desired the control to be made
more effective. Altogether it is a puzzling case.
On my applying to Bailey himself for information,
he declared roundly that he had been the victim of
a theological plot with suborned evidence. The
only slight support which I can find for that view
is that there was a Rev. Doctor among his accusers.
I was told independently that Professor Reichel,
before his death in 1918, came also to the conclu-
sion that there had been a plot. But in any case
most of us will agree with Mr. Stanford, Bailey's
Australian patron, that the committee would have
been wise to say nothing, continue the sittings,
and use their knowledge to get at some more
complete conclusion.

With such a record one had to be on one's
guard with Mr. Bailey. I had a sitting in my
room at the hotel to which I invited ten guests,
but the results were not impressive. We saw
so-called spirit hands, which were faintly luminous,
but I was not allowed to grasp them, and they
were never further from the medium than he could

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

have reached. All this was suspicious but not
conclusive. On the other hand, there was an
attempt at a materialisation of a head, which took
the form of a luminous patch, and seemed to some
of the sitters to be further from the cabinet than
could be reached. We had an address purporting
to come from the control, Dr. Whitcombe, and
we also had a message written in bad Italian.
On the whole it was one of those baffling sittings
which leave a vague unpleasant impression, and
there was a disturbing suggestion of cuffs about
those luminous hands.

I have been reading Bailey's record, however,
and I cannot doubt that he has been a great apport
medium. The results were far above all possible
fraud, both in the conditions and in the articles
brought into the room by spirit power. For
example, I have a detailed account published by
Dr. C. W. McCarthy, of Sydney, under the title,
" Rigid Tests of the Occult." During these tests
Bailey was sealed up in a bag, and in one case was
inside a cage of mosquito curtain. The door and
windows were secured and the fire-place blocked.
The sitters were all personal friends, but they
mutually searched each other. The medium was
stripped naked before the seance. Under these
stringent conditions during a series of six sittings
138 articles were brought into the room, which
included eighty-seven ancient coins (mostly of
Ptolemy) , eight live birds, eighteen precious stones
of modest value and varied character, two live
turtles, seven inscribed Babylonian tablets, one
Egyptian Scarabaeus, an Arabic newspaper,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

a leopard skin, four nests and many other things.
It seems to me perfect nonsense to talk about
these things being the results of trickery. I may
add that at a previous test meeting they had a
young live shark about i| feet long, which was
tangled with wet seaweed and flopped about on
the table. Dr. McCarthy gives a photograph of
the creature.

My second sitting with Bailey was more success-
ful than the first. On his arrival I and others
searched him and satisfied ourselves he carried
nothing upon him. I then suddenly switched out
all the lights, for it seemed to me that the luminous
hands of the first sitting might be the result of
phosphorised oil put on before the meeting and
only visible in complete darkness, so that it could
defy all search. I was wrong, however, for there
was no luminosity at all. We then placed Mr.
Bailey in the corner of the room, lowered the lights
without turning them out, and waited. Almost
at once he breathed very heavily, as one in trance,
and soon said something in a foreign tongue
which was unintelligible to me. One of our
friends, Mr. Cochrane, recognised it as Indian, and
at once answered, a few sentences being inter-
changed. In English the voice then said that he
was a Hindoo control who was used to bring
apports for the medium, and that he would, he
hoped, be able to bring one for us. " Here it is,"
he said a moment later, and the medium's hand
was extended with something in it. The light
was turned full on and we found it was a very
perfect bird's nest, beautifully constructed of

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

some very fine fibre mixed with moss. It stood
about two inches high and had no sign of any
flattening which would have come with conceal-
ment. The size would be nearly three inches
across. In it lay a small egg, white, with tiny
brown speckles. The medium, or rather the
Hindoo control acting through the medium,
placed the egg on his palm and broke it, some fine
albumen squirting out. There was no trace of
yolk. " We are not allowed to interfere with
life," said he. " If it had been fertilised we could
not have taken it." These words were said before
he broke it, so that he was aware of the condition
of the egg, which certainly seems remarkable.

" Where did it come from ? " I asked.

" From India."

" What 'bird is it ? "

" They call it the jungle sparrow."

The nest remained in my possession, and I
spent a morning with Mr. Chubb, of the local
museum, to ascertain if it was really the nest of
such a bird. It seemed too small for an Indian
sparrow, and yet we could not match either nest
or egg among the Australian types. Some of Mr.
Bailey's other nests and eggs have been actually
identified. Surely it is a fair argument that
while it is conceivable that such birds might be
imported and purchased here, it is really an insult
to one's reason to suppose that nests with fresh
eggs in them could also be in the market. There-
fore I can only support the far more extended
experience and elaborate tests of Dr. McCarthy
of Sydney, and affirm that I believe Mr. Charles

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Bailey to be upon occasion a true medium, with a
very remarkable gift for apports.

It is only right to state that when I returned to
London I took one of Bailey's Assyrian tablets
to the British Museum and that it was pronounced
to be a forgery. Upon further inquiry it proved
that these forgeries are made by certain Jews in
a suburb of Bagdad — and, so far as is known,
only there. Therefore the matter is not much
further advanced. To the transporting agency
it is at least possible that the forgery, steeped in
recent human magnetism, is more capable of being
handled than the original taken from a mound.
Bailey has produced at least a hundred of these
things, and no Custom House officer has deposed
how they could have entered the country. On
the other hand, Bailey told me clearly that the
tablets had been passed by the British Museum,
so that I fear that I cannot acquit him of tampering
with truth — and just there lies the great difficulty
of deciding upon his case. But one has always to
remember that physical mediumship has no con-
nection one way or the other with personal
character, any more than the gift of poetry.

To return to this particular seance, it was
unequal. We had luminous hands, but they were
again within reach of the cabinet in which the
medium was seated. We had also a long address
from Dr. Whitcombe, the learned control, in which
he discoursed like an absolute master upon
Assyrian and Roman antiquities and psychic
science. It was really an amazing address, and if
Bailey were the author of it I should hail him as a

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

master mind. He chatted about the Kings of
Babylon as if he had known them all, remarked
that the Bible was wrong in calling Belthazar
King as he was only Crown Prince, and put in all
those easy side allusions which a man uses when
he is absolutely full of his subject. Upon his
asking for questions, I said : " Please give me some
light as to the dematerialisation and subsequent
reassembly of an object such as a bird's nest/'
" It involves/' he answered, "some factors which are
beyond your human science and which could not
be made clear to you. At the same time you may
take as a rough analogy the case of water which
is turned into steam, and then this steam which is
invisible, is conducted elsewhere to be reassembled
as visible water." I thought this explanation
was exceedingly apt, though of course I agree that
it is only a rough analogy. On my asking if there
were libraries and facilities for special study in
the next world, he said that there certainly were,
but that instead of studying books they usually
studied the actual objects themselves. All he
said was full of dignity and wisdom. It was
curious to notice that, learned as he was, Dr.
Whitcombe always referred back with reverence
to Dr. Robinson, another control not present at
the moment, as being the real expert. I am told
that some of Dr. Robinson's addresses have fairly
amazed the specialists. I notice that Col. de
Rochas in his report was equally impressed by
Bailey's controls.

I fear that my psychic experiences are pushing
my travels into the background, but I warned the

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

reader that it might be so when first we joined
hands. To get back to the earth, let me say that
I saw the procession when the new Governor-
General, Lord Forster, with his charming wife,
made their ceremonial entry into Melbourne, with
many workman-like Commonwealth troops before
and behind their carriage. I knew Lord Forster
of old, for we both served upon a committee over
the Olympic Games, so that he gave quite a start
of surprised recognition when his quick eye fell
upon my face in the line of spectators. He is a
man who cannot fail to be popular here, for he has
the physical as well as the mental qualities. Our
stay in Melbourne was afterwards made more
pleasant by the gracious courtesy of Government
House for, apart from attending several functions,
we were invited to a special dinner, after which I
exhibited upon a screen my fairy portraits and a
few of my other very wonderful psychic photo-
graphs. It was not an occasion when I could
preach, but no quick intelligence could be brought
in contact with such phenomena without asking
itself very seriously what lay behind them. When
that question is earnestly asked the battle is won.
One asks oneself what will be the end of this
system of little viceroys in each State and a big
viceroy in the Capital — however capable and
excellent in themselves such viceroys may be.
The smaller courts are, I understand, already
doomed, and rightly so, since there is no need for
them and nothing like them elsewhere. There
is no possible purpose that they serve save to
impose a nominal check, which is never used,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

upon the legislation. The Governor-Generalship
will last no doubt until Australia cuts the painter,
or we let go our end of it, whichever may come
first.

Personally, I have no fear of Britain's power
being weakened by a separation of her dominions.
Close allies which were independent might be a
greater source of moral strength than actual
dependencies. When the sons leave the father's
house and rule their own homes, becoming fathers
in turn, the old man is not weakened thereby.
Certainly I desire no such change, but if it came
I would bear it with philosophy. I hope that the
era of great military crises is for ever past, but, if
it should recur, I am sure that the point of view
would be the same, and that the starry Union Jack
of the great Australian nation would still fly beside
the old flag which was its model.

If one took a Machiavelian view of British
interests one would say that to retain a colony the
surest way is not to remove any danger which may
threaten her. We conquered Canada from the
French, removing in successive campaigns the
danger from the north and from the west which
threatened our American colonies. When we had
expended our blood and money to that end, so
that the colonies had nothing to fear, they took
the first opportunity to force an unnecessary
quarrel and to leave us. So I have fears for South
Africa now that the German menace has been
removed. Australia is, I think, loyal to the core,
and yet self-interest is with every nation the basis
of all policy, and so long as the British fleet can

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

guard the shores of the great empty northern
territories, a region as big as Britain, Germany,
France and Austria put together, they have need
of us. There can be no doubt that if they were
alone in the world in the face of the teeming
millions of the East, they might, like the Siberian
travellers, have to throw a good deal to the wolves
in order to save the remainder. Brave and
capable as they are, neither their numbers nor
their resources could carry them through a long
struggle if the enemy held the sea. They are
natural shots and soldiers, so that they might be
wiser to spend their money in a strategic railway
right across their northern coast, rather than in
direct military preparations. To concentrate
rapidly before the enemy was firmly established
might under some circumstances be a very vital
need.

But so long as the British Empire lasts Australia
is safe, and in twenty years' time her own enlarged
population will probably make her safe without
help from anyone. But her empty places are a
danger. History abhors a vacuum and finds some
one to fill it up. I have never yet understood
why the Commonwealth has not made a serious
effort to attract to the northern territories those
Italians who are flooding the Argentine. It is
great blood and no race is the poorer for it — the
blood of ancient Rome. They are used to semi-
tropical heat and to hard work in bad conditions
if there be only hope ahead. Perhaps the policy
of the future may turn in that direction. If that
one weak spot be guarded then it seems to me

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

that in the whole world there is no community,
save only the United States, which is so safe from
outside attack as Australia. Internal division is
another matter, but there Australia is in some
ways stronger than the States. She has no negro
question, and the strife between Capital and Labour
is not likely to be so formidable. I wonder, by the
way, how many people in the United States realise
that this small community lost as many men as
America did in the great war. We were struck also
by the dignified resignation with which this fact was
faced, and by the sense of proportion which was
shown in estimating the sacrifices of various nations.
We like the people here very much more than
we had expected to, for one hears in England
exaggerated stories of their democratic bearing.
When democracy takes the form of equality one
can get along with it, but when it becomes rude
and aggressive one would avoid it. Here one
finds a very pleasing good fellowship which no
one would object to. Again and again we have
met with little acts of kindness from people in
shops or in the street, which were not personal to
ourselves, but part of their normal good manners.
If you ask the way or any other information,
strangers will take trouble to put you right. They
are kindly, domestic and straight in speech and
in dealings. Materialism and want of vision in the
broader affairs of life seem to be the national weak-
ness, but that may be only a passing phase, for
when a nation has such a gigantic material proposi-
tion as this continent to handle it is natural that
their thoughts should run on the wool and the

no

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

wheat and the gold by which it can be accom-
plished. I am bound to say, however, that I
think every patriotic Australian should vote, if
not for prohibition, at least for the solution which
is most dear to myself, and that is the lowering of
the legal standard of alcohol in any drink. We
have been shocked and astonished by the number
of young men of decent exterior whom we have
seen staggering down the street, often quite early
in the day. The Biblical test for drunkenness,
that it was not yet the third hour, would not apply
to them. I hear that bad as it is in the big towns
it is worse in the small ones, and worst of all in
the northern territories and other waste places
where work is particularly needed. It must
greatly decrease the national efficiency. A recent
vote upon the question in Victoria only carried
total abstinence in four districts out of about 200,
but a two-third majority was needed to do it.
On the other hand a trial of strength in Queensland,
generally supposed to be rather a rowdy State, has
shown that the temperance men all combined can
out-vote the others. Therefore it is certain that
reform will not be long delayed.

The other curse of the country, which is a real
drag upon its progress, is the eternal horse-racing.
It goes on all the year round, though it has its
more virulent bouts, as for example during our
visit to this town when the Derby, the Melbourne
Cup, and Oaks succeeded each other. They call
it sport, but I fear that in that case I am no
sportsman. I would as soon call the roulette-
table a sport. The whole population is unsettled

in

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

and bent upon winning easy money, which dis-
satisfies them with the money that has to be
worked for. Every shop is closed when the Cup
is run, and you have lift-boys, waiters and maids
all backing their fancies, not with half-crowns but
with substantial sums. The danger to honesty
is obvious, and it came under our own notice that
it is not imaginary. Of course we are by no means
blameless in England, but it only attacks a limited
class, while here it seems to the stranger to be
almost universal. In fact it is so bad that it is
sure to get better, for I cannot conceive that any
sane nation will allow it to continue. The book-
makers, however, are a powerful guild, and will
fight tooth and nail. The Catholic Church, I am
sorry to say, uses its considerable influence to
prevent drink reform by legislation, and I fear
that it will not support the anti-gamblers either.
I wonder from what hidden spring, from what
ignorant Italian camarilla, this venerable and in
some ways admirable Church gets its secular
policy, which must have central direction, since
it is so consistent ! When I remember the recent
sequence of world events and the part played by
that Church, the attack upon the innocent Dreyfus,
the refusal to support reform in the Congo, and
finally the obvious leaning towards the Central
Powers who were clearly doomed to lose, one
would think that it was ruled by a Council of
lunatics. These matters bear no relation to faith
or dogma, so that one wonders that the sane
Catholics have not risen in protest. No doubt the
better class laymen are ahead of the clergy in this

112

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

as in other religious organisations. I cannot
forget how the Duke of Norfolk sent me a cheque
for the Congo Reform Movement at the very time
when we could not get the Catholic Church to line
up with the other sects at a Reform Demonstration
at the Albert Hall. In this country also there
were many brave and loyal Catholics who took
their own line against Cardinal Mannix upon the
question of conscription, when that Cardinal did
all that one man could do to bring about the defeat
of the free nations in the great war. How he
could face an American audience afterwards, or
how such an audience could tolerate him, is hard
to understand.

"3

CHAPTER V

More English than the English. — A day in the Bush. —
Immigration. — A case of spirit return. — A Seance. — Gee-
long. — The lava plain. — Good-nature of General Ryrie. —
Bendigo. — Down a gold mine. — Prohibition v. Con-
tinuance.— Mrs. Knight MacLellan. — Nerrin. — A wild
drive. — Electric shearing. — Rich sheep stations. — Cocka-
too farmers. — Spinnifex and Mallee. — Rabbits. — The
great marsh.

In some ways the Australians are more English
than the English. We have been imperceptibly
Americanised, while our brethren over the sea
have kept the old type. The Australian is less
ready to show emotion, cooler in his bearing, more
restrained in applause, more devoted to personal
liberty, keener on sport, and quieter in expression
(as witness the absence of scare lines in the papers
than our people are. Indeed, they remind me
more of the Scotch than the English, and Mel-
bourne on a Sunday, without posts, or Sunday
papers, or any amenity whatever, is like the
Edinburgh of my boyhood. Sydney is more
advanced. There are curious anomalies in both
towns. Their telephone systems are so bad that
they can only be balanced against each other, for
they are in a class by themselves. One smiles
when one recollects that one used to grumble at

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

the London lines. On the other hand the tramway
services in both towns are wonderful, and so
continuous that one never hastens one's step to
catch a tram since another comes within a minute.
The Melbourne trams have open bogey cars in
front, which make a drive a real pleasure.

One of our pleasant recollections in the early
days of our Melbourne visit was a day in the bush
with Mr. Henry Stead and his wife. My intense
admiration for the moral courage and energy of
the father made it easy for me to form a friendship
with his son, who has shown the family qualities
by the able way in which he has founded and
conducted an excellent journal, Stead's Monthly.
Australia was lucky ever to get such an immigrant
as that, for surely an honest, fearless and clear-
headed publicist is the most valuable man that a
young country, whose future is one long problem
play, could import. We spent our day in the
Dandenong Hills, twenty miles from Melbourne, in a
little hostel built in a bush clearing and run by
one Lucas, of good English cricket stock, his
father having played for Sussex. On the way we
passed Madame Melba's place at Lilydale, and
the wonderful woods with their strange tree-ferns
seemed fit cover for such a singing bird. Coming
back in Stead's light American car we tried a short
cut down roads which proved to be almost im-
possible. A rather heavier car ahead of us, with
two youths in it, got embedded in the mud, and
we all dismounted to heave it out. There suddenly
appeared on the lonely road an enormous coloured
man; he looked like a cross between negro and

US

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

black fellow. He must have lived in some hut
in the woods, but the way his huge form suddenly
rose beside us was quite surprising. He stood in
gloomy majesty surveying our efforts, and repeat-
ing a series of sentences which reminded one of
German exercises. " I have no jack. I had a
jack. Some one has taken my jack. This is
called a road. It is not a road. There is no road."
We finally levered out the Australian car, for which,
by the way, neither occupant said a word of thanks,
and then gave the black giant a shilling, which he
received as a keeper takes his toll. On looking
back I am not sure that this slough of despond is
not carefully prepared by this negro, who makes a
modest income 05^ the tips which he gets from the
unfortunates who get bogged in it. No keeper
ever darted out to a trap quicker than he did
when the car got stuck.

Stead agreed with me that the Australians do
not take a big enough view of their own destiny.
They — or the labour party, to be more exact —
are inclined to buy the ease of the moment at the
cost of the greatness of their continental future.
They fear immigration lest it induce competition
and pull down prices. It is a natural attitude.
And yet that little fringe of people on the edge of
that huge island can never adequately handle it.
It is like an enormous machine with a six horse-
power engine to drive it. I have a great sympathy
with their desire to keep the British stock as pure
as possible. But the land needs the men, and
somewhere they must be found. I cannot doubt
that they would become loyal subjects of the

116

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Empire which had adopted them. I have won-
dered sometimes whether in Lower California and
the warmer States of the Union there may not be
human material for Australia. Canada has
received no more valuable stock than from the
American States, so it might be that another por-
tion of the Union would find the very stamp of
man that Queensland and the north require.
The American likes a big gamble and a broad life
with plenty of elbow-room. Let him bring his
cotton seeds over to semi-tropical Australia and see
what he can make of it there.

To pass suddenly to other-worldly things,
which are my mission. People never seem to
realise the plain fact that one positive result must
always outweigh a hundred negative ones. It only
needs one single case of spirit return to be estab-
lished, and there is no more to be said. Inciden-
tally, how absurd is the position of those wiseacres
who say " nine-tenths of the phenomena are
fraud." Can they not see that if they grant
us one-tenth, they grant us our whole conten-
tion?

These remarks are elicited by a case which
occurred in 1883 in Melbourne, and which should
have converted the city as surely as if an
angel had walked down Collins Street. Yet
nearly forty years later I find it as stagnant and
material as any city I have ever visited. The
facts are these, well substantiated by docu-
mentary and official evidence. Mr. Junor Browne,
a well-known citizen, whose daughter afterwards
married Mr. Alfred Deakin, subsequently Premier,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

had two sons, Frank and Hugh. Together with
a seaman named Murray they went out into the
bay in their yacht the " Iolanthe," and they never
returned. The father was fortunately a Spiritua-
list and upon the second day of their absence,
after making all normal inquiries, he asked a
sensitive, Mr. George Spriggs, formerly of Cardiff,
if he would trace them. Mr. Spriggs collected
some of the young men's belongings, so as to get
their atmosphere, and then he was able by psycho-
metry to give an account of their movements, the
last which he could see of them being that they
were in trouble upon the yacht and that confusion
seemed to reign aboard her. Two days later, as
no further news wTas brought in, the Browne
family held a seance, Mr. Spriggs being the medium.
He fell into trance and the two lads, who had been
trained in spiritual knowledge and knew the
possibilities, at once came through. They ex-
pressed their contrition to their mother, who had
desired them not to go, and they then gave a clear
account of the capsizing of the yacht, and how
they had met their death, adding that they had
found themselves after death in the exact physical
conditions of happiness and brightness which their
father's teaching had led them to expect. They
brought with them the seaman Murray, who also
said a few words. Finally Hugh, speaking through
the medium, informed Mr. Browne that Frank's
arm and part of his clothing had been torn off by
a fish.

" A shark ? " asked Mr. Browne.

u Well, it was not like any shark I have seen/1

118

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Mark the sequel. Some weeks later a large
shark of a rare deep-sea species, unknown to the
fishermen, and quite unlike the ordinary blue
shark with which the Brownes were familiar, was
taken at Frankston, about twenty-seven miles
from Melbourne. Inside it was found the bone of
a human arm, and also a watch, some coins, and
other articles which had belonged to Frank
Browne. These facts were all brought out in the
papers at the time, and Mr. Browne put much of
it on record in print before the shark was taken,
or any word of the missing men had come by
normal means. The facts are all set forth in a
little book by Mr. Browne himself, called " A
Rational Faith/ ' What have fraudulent mediums
and all the other decoys to do with such a case as
that, and is it not perfectly convincing to any
man who is not perverse ? Personally, I value
it not so much for the evidence of survival, since
we have that so complete already, but for the
detailed account given by the young men of their
new conditions, so completely corroborating what
so many young officers, cut off suddenly in the
war, have said of their experience. " Mother, if
you could see how happy we are, and the beautiful
home we are in, you would not weep except for
joy. I feel so light in my spiritual body and
have no pain, I would not exchange this life for
earth life even it were in my power. Poor spirits
without number are waiting anxiously to com-
municate with their friends when an opportunity
is offered." The young Brownes had the enormous
advantage of the education they had received from

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their father, so that they instantly understood
and appreciated the new conditions.

On October 8th we had a seance with Mrs.
Hunter, a pleasant middle-aged woman, with a
soft South of England accent. Like so many of
our mediums she had little sign of education in her
talk. It does not matter in spiritual things,
though it is a stumbling block to some inquirers.
After all, how much education had the apostles ?
I have no doubt they were very vulgar provincial
people from the average Roman point of view.
But they shook the world none the less. Most
of our educated people have got their heads so
crammed with things that don't matter that they
have no room for the things that do matter.
There was no particular success at our sitting, but
I have heard that the medium is capable of better
things.

On October 13th I had my first experience of a
small town, for I went to Geelong and lectured
there. It was an attentive and cultured audience,
but the hall was small and the receipts could
hardly have covered the expenses. However, it
is the press report and the local discussion which
really matter. I had little time to inspect
Geelong, which is a prosperous port with 35,000
inhabitants. What interested me more was the
huge plain of lava which stretches around it
and connects it with Melbourne. This plain is a
good hundred miles across, and as it is of great
depth one can only imagine that there must be
monstrous cavities inside the earth to correspond
with the huge amount extruded. Here and there

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one sees stunted green cones which are the remains
of the volcanoes which spewed up all this stuff.
The lava has disintegrated on the surface to the
extent of making good arable soil, but the harder
bits remain unbroken, so that the surface is
covered with rocks, which are used to build up
walls for the fields after the Irish fashion. Every
here and there a peak of granite has remained
as an island amid the lava, to show what was
there before the great outflow. Eruptions appear
to be caused by water pouring in through some
crack and reaching the heated inside of the earth
where the water is turned to steam, expands, and
so gains the force to spread destruction. If this
process went on it is clear that the whole sea might
continue to pour down the crack until the heat
had been all absorbed by the water. I have
wondered whether the lava may not be a clever
healing process of nature, by which this soft
plastic material is sent oozing out in every direction
with the idea that it may find the crack and then
set hard and stop it up. Wild speculation no
doubt, but the guess must always precede the
proof.

The Australians are really a very good-natured
people. It runs through the whole race, high and
low. A very exalted person, the Minister of War,
shares our flat in the hotel, his bedroom being
imbedded among our rooms. This is General Sir
Granville Ryrie, a famous hero of Palestine,
covered with wounds and medals — a man, too, of
great dignity of bearing. As I was dressing one
morning I heard some rather monotonous whistling

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and, forgetting the very existence of the General,
and taking it for granted that it was my eldest
boy Denis, I put my head out and said, " Look
here, old chap, consider other people's nerves
and give up that rotten habit of whistling before
breakfast/' Imagine my feelings when the deep
voice of the General answered, " All right, Sir
Arthur, I will ! " We laughed together over the
incident afterwards, and I told him that he had
furnished me with one more example of Austra-
lian good humour for my notes.

On October 13th I was at the prosperous
50,000 population town of Bendigo, which every
one, except the people on the spot, believes to have
been named after the famous boxer. This must
surely be a world record, for so far as my memory
serves, neither a Grecian Olympic athletic, nor a
Roman Gladiator, nor a Byzantine Charioteer, has
ever had a city for a monument. Borrow, who
looked upon a good honest pugilist as the pick
of humanity, must have rejoiced in it. Is not
valour the basis of all character, and where shall
we find greater valour than theirs ? Alas, that
most of them began and ended there ! It is
when the sage and the saint build on the basis
of the fighter that you have the highest to which
humanity can attain.

I had a full hall at Bendigo, and it was packed,
I am told, by real old-time miners, for, of course,
Bendigo is still the centre of the gold mining
industry. Mr. Smythe told me that it was quite a
sight to see those rows of deeply-lined, bearded
faces listening so intently to what I said of that

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destiny which is theirs as well as mine. I never
had a better audience, and it was their sympathy
which helped me through, for I was very weary
that night. But however weary you may be,
when you climb upon the platform to talk about
this subject, you may be certain that you will be
less weary when you come off. That is my settled
conviction after a hundred trials.

On the morning after my lecture I found myself
half a mile nearer to dear Old England, for I
descended the Unity mine, and they say that the
workings extend to that depth. Perhaps I was
not at the lowest level, but certainly it was a long
journey in the cage, and reminded me of my
friend Bang's description of the New York
elevator, when he said that the distance to his
suburban villa and his town flat was the same,
but the one was horizontal and the other per-
pendicular.

It was a weird experience that peep into the
profound depths of the great gold mine. Time
was when the quartz veins were on the surface
for the poor adventurer to handle. Now they have
been followed underground, and only great com-
panies and costly machinery can win it. Always
it is the same white quartz vein with the little
yellow specks and threads running through it.
We were rattled down in pitch darkness until we
came to a stop at the end of a long passage dimly
lit by an occasional guttering candle. Carrying
our own candles, and clad in miner's costume we
crept along with bent heads until we came sud-
denly out into a huge circular hall which might

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

have sprung from Dore's imagination. The place
was draped with heavy black shadows, but every
here and there was a dim light. Each light
showed where a man was squatting toad-like, a
heap of broken debris in front of him, turning it
over, and throwing aside the pieces with clear
traces of gold. These were kept for special treat-
ment, while the rest of the quartz was passed in
ordinary course through the mill. These scattered
heaps represented the broken stuff after a charge
of dynamite had been exploded in the quartz
vein. It was strange indeed to see these squatting
figures deep in the bowels of the earth, their
candles shining upon their earnest faces and
piercing eyes, and to reflect that they were
striving that the great exchanges of London and
New York might be able to balance with bullion
their output of paper. This dim troglodyte
industry was in truth the centre and mainspring
of all industries, without which trade would stop.
Many of the men were from Cornwall, the troll
among the nations, where the tools of the miner are
still, as for two thousand years, the natural
heritage of the man. Dr. Stillwell, the geologist
of the company, and I had a long discussion as to
where the gold came from, but the only possible
conclusion was that nobody knew. We know
now that the old alchemists were perfectly right
and that one metal may change into another. Is
it possible that under some conditions a mineral
may change into a metal ? Why should quartz
always be the matrix ? Some geological Darwin
will come along some day and we shall get a great

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

awakening, for at present we are only disguising
our own ignorance in this department of know-
ledge. I had always understood that quartz
was one of the old igneous primeval rocks,
and yet here I saw it in thin bands, sandwiched
in between clays and slates and other water-
borne deposits. The books and the strata don't
agree.

These smaller towns, like the Metropolis itself,
are convulsed with the great controversy between
Prohibition and Continuance, no reasonable com-
promise between the two being suggested. Every
wall displays posters, on one side those very
prosperous-looking children who demand that
some restraint be placed upon their daddy, and
on the other hair-raising statements as to the
financial results of restricting the publicans. To
the great disgust of every decent man they have
run the Prince into it, and some remark of his
after his return to England has been used by the
liquor party. It is dangerous for royalty to be
jocose in these days, but this was a particularly
cruel example of the exploitation of a harmless
little joke. If others felt as I did I expect it cost
the liquor interest many a vote.

We had another seance, this time with Mrs.
Knight MacLellan, after my return from Bendigo.
She is a lady who has grown grey in the service of
the cult, and who made a name in London when
she was still a child by her mediumistic powers.
We had nothing of an evidential character that
evening save that one lady who had recently
lost her son had his description and an apposite

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

message given. It was the first of several tests
which we were able to give this lady, and before
we left Melbourne she assured us that she was a
changed woman and her sorrow for ever gone.

On October 18th began a very delightful
experience, for my wife and I, leaving our party
safe in Melbourne, travelled up country to be
the guests of the Hon. Agar Wynne and his
charming wife at their station of Nerrin-Nerrin
in Western Victoria. It is about 140 miles from
Melbourne, and as the trains are very slow, the
journey was not a pleasant one. But that was
soon compensated for in the warmth of the wel-
come which awaited us. Mr. Agar Wynne was
Postmaster-General of the Federal Government,
and author of several improvements, one of which,
the power of sending long letter-telegrams at low
rates during certain hours was a triumph of
common sense. For a shilling one could send
quite a long communication to the other end of
the Continent, but it must go through at the
time when the telegraph clerk had nothing else
to do.

It was interesting to us to find ourselves upon
an old-established station, typical of the real life
of Australia, for cities are much the same the
world over. Nerrin had been a sheep station for
eighty years, but the comfortable verandahed
bungalow house, with every convenience within it,
was comparatively modern. What charmed us
most, apart from the kindness of our hosts, was a
huge marsh or lagoon which extended for many
miles immediately behind the house, and which

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

was a bird sanctuary, so that it was crowded
with ibises, wild black swans, geese, ducks,
herons and all sorts of fowl. We crept out of our
bedroom in the dead of the night and stood under
the cloud-swept moon listening to the chorus of
screams, hoots, croaks and whistles coming out of
the vast expanse of reeds. It would make a most
wonderful hunting ground for a naturalist who
was content to observe and not to slay. The
great morass of 'Nerrin will ever stand out in our
memories.

Next day we were driven round the borders of
this wonderful marsh, Mr. Wynne, after the
Australian fashion, taking no note of roads, and
going right across country with alarming results
to anyone not used to it. Finally, the swaying
and rolling became so terrific that he was himself
thrown off the box seat and fell down between the
buggy and the front wheel, narrowly escaping a
very serious accident. He was able to show us
the nests and eggs which filled the reed-beds, and
even offered to drive us out into the morass to
inspect them, a proposal which was rejected by
the unanimous vote of a full buggy. I never knew
an answer more decidedly in the negative. As we
drove home we passed a great gum tree, and half-
way up the trunk was a deep incision where the
bark had been stripped in an oval shape some four
foot by two. It was where some savage in days
of old had cut his shield. Such a mark outside a
modern house with every amenity of cultured life
is an object lesson of how two systems have over-
lapped, and how short a time it is since this great

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

continent was washed by a receding wave, ere the
great Anglo-Saxon tide came creeping forward.

Apart from the constant charm of the wild life of
the marsh there did not seem to be much for the
naturalist around Nerrin. Opossums bounded
upon the roof at night and snakes were not un-
common. A dangerous tiger-snake was killed
on the day of our arrival. I was amazed also
at the size of the Australian eels. A returned
soldier had taken up fishing as a trade, renting
a water for a certain time and putting the con-
tents, so far as he could realise them, upon the
market. It struck me that after this wily digger
had passed that way there would not be much
for the sportsman who followed him. But the eels
were enormous. He took a dozen at a time from
his cunning eel-pots, and not one under six pounds.
I should have said that they were certainly
congers had I seen them in England.

I wonder whether all this part of the country
has not been swept by a tidal wave at some not
very remote period. It is a low coastline with
this great lava plain as a hinterland, and I can see
nothing to prevent a big wave even now from
sweeping the civilisation of Victoria off the
planet, should there be any really great disturbance
under the Pacific. At any rate, it is my impression
that it has actually occurred once already, for I
cannot otherwise understand the existence of great
shallow lakes of salt water in these inland parts.
Are they not the pools left behind by that terrible
tide ? There are great banks of sand, too, here
and there on the top of the lava which I can in no

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

way account for unless they were swept here in
some tremendous world-shaking catastrophe which
took the beach from St. Kilda and threw it up
at Nerrin. God save Australia from such a night
as that must have been if my reading of the signs
be correct.

One of the sights of Nerrin is the shearing of
the sheep by electric machinery. These sheep are
merinos, which have been bred as wool-producers
to such an extent that they can hardly see, and
the wool grows thick right down to their hoofs.
The large stately creature is a poor little shadow
when his wonderful fleece has been taken from
him. The electric clips with which the operation
is performed, are, I am told, the invention of a
brother of Garnet Wolseley, who worked away
at the idea, earning the name of being a half-
crazy crank, until at last the invention materialised
and did away with the whole slow and clumsy
process of the hand-shearer. It is not, however,
a pleasant process to watch even for a man, far
less a sensitive woman, for the poor creatures get
cut about a good deal in the process. The shearer
seizes a sheep, fixes him head up between his
knees, and then plunges the swiftly-moving
clippers into the thick wool which covers the
stomach. With wonderful speed he runs it a]ong
and the creature is turned out of its covering, and
left as bare as a turkey in a poulterer's window,
but, alas, its white and tender skin is too often
gashed and ripped with vivid lines of crimson
by the haste and clumsiness of the shearer. It
was worse, they say, in the days of the hand-

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

laid it' ouf in wheat, cows, sheep and mixed
farming. He worked from morning to night, his
wife was up at four, and his child of ten was
picking up stones behind the furrow. But he was
already making his £500 a year. The personal
equation was everything. One demobilised
soldier was doing well. Another had come to
smash. Very often a deal is made between the
small man and the large holder, by which the
latter lets the former a corner of his estate, taking
a share, say one-third, of his profits as rent. That
is a plan which suits everyone, and the landlord
can gradually be bought out by the " cockatoo
farmer," as he is styled.

There is a great wool-clip this year, and prices
in London are at record figures, so that Australia,
which only retains 17 per cent, of her own wool,
should have a very large sum to her credit. But
she needs it. When one considers that the debt of
this small community is heavier now than that of
Great Britain before the war, one wonders how
she can ever win through. But how can anyone
win through ? I don't think we have fairly
realised the financial problem yet, and I believe
that within a very few years there will be an
International Council which will be compelled to
adopt some such scheme as the one put forward
by my friend, Mr. Stilwell, under the name of
" The Great Plan." This excellent idea was that
every nation should reduce its warlike expenditure
to an absolute minimum, that the difference
between this minimum and the 1914 pre-war
standard should be paid every year to a central

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

fund, and that international bonds be now drawn
upon the security of that fund, anticipating not its
present amount but what it will represent in fifty
years' time. It is, in fact, making the future help
the present, exactly as an estate which has some
sudden great call upon it might reasonably
anticipate or mortgage its own development. I
believe that the salvation of the world may depend
upon some such plan, and that the Council of the
League of Nations is the agency by which it could
be made operative.

Australia has had two plants which have been a
perfect curse to her as covering the land and
offering every impediment to agriculture. They
are the Spinnifex in the West and the Mallee scrub
in the East. The latter was considered a hopeless
proposition, and the only good which could be
extracted from it was that the root made an ideal
fire, smouldering long and retaining heat. Sud-
denly, however, a genius named Lascelles dis-
covered that this hopeless Mallee land was simply
unrivalled for wheat, and his schemes have now
brought seven million acres under the plough.
This could hardly have been done if another genius,
unnamed, had not invented a peculiar and
ingenious plough, the " stump-jump plough/'
which can get round obstacles without breaking
itself. It is not generally known that Australia
really heads the world for the ingenuity and
efficiency of her agricultural machinery. There
is an inventor and manufacturer, MacKay, of
Sunshine, who represents the last word in auto-
matic reapers, etc. He exports them, a ship-

133

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

load at a time, to the United States, which, if one
considers the tariff which they have to surmount,
is proof in itself of the supremacy of the article.
With this wealth of machinery the real power of
Australia in the world is greater than her popula-
tion would indicate, for a five-million nation, which,
by artificial aid, does the work normally done by
ten million people, becomes a ten-million nation
so far as economic and financial strength is
concerned.

On the other hand, Australia has her hindrances
as well as her helps. Certainly the rabbits have
done her no good, though the evil is for the
moment under control. An efficient rabbiter gets
a pound a day, and he is a wise insurance upon
any estate, for the creatures, if they get the upper-
hand, can do thousands of pounds' worth of
damage. This damage takes two shapes. First,
they eat off all the grass and leave nothing at all
for the sheep. Secondly, they burrow under
walls, etc., and leave the whole place an untidy
ruin. Little did the man who introduced the
creature into Australia dream how the impreca-
tions of a continent would descend upon him.

Alas ! that we could not linger at Nerrin ; but
duty was calling at Melbourne. Besides, the
days of the Melbourne Cup were at hand, and not
only was Mr. Wynne a great pillar of the turf, but
Mr. Osborne, owner of one of the most likely horses
in the race, was one of the house-party. To Mel-
bourne therefore we went. We shall always,
however, be able in our dreams to revisit that
broad verandah, the low hospitable facade, the

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

lovely lawn with its profusion of scented shrubs,
the grove of towering gum trees, where the
opossums lurked, and above all the great marsh
where with dark clouds drifting across the moon
we had stolen out at night to hear the crying of
innumerable birds. That to us will always be the
real Australia.

135

CHAPTER VI

The Melbourne Cup. — Psychic healing. — M. J. Bloomfield. —
My own experience. — Direct healing. — Chaos and Ritual.
— Government House Ball. — The Rescue Circle again. —
Sitting with Mrs. Harris.— A good test case. — Australian
botany. — The land of myrtles. — English cricket team.
— Great final meeting in Melbourne.

It was the week of weeks in Melbourne when we
returned from Nerrin, and everything connected
with my mission was out of the question. When
the whole world is living vividly here and now
there is no room for the hereafter. Personally,
I fear I was out of sympathy with it all, though
we went to the Derby, where the whole male and
a good part of the female population of Mel-
bourne seemed to be assembled, reinforced by
contingents from every State in the Federation.
A fine handsome body of people they are when
you see them en masse, strong, solid and capable,
if perhaps a little lacking in those finer and more
spiritual graces which come with a more matured
society. The great supply of animal food must
have its effect upon the mind as well as the body
of a nation. Lord Forster appeared at the races,
and probably, as an all round sportsman, took a
genuine interest, but the fate of the Governor
who did not take an interest would be a rather

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

weary one — like that kind-hearted Roman
Emperor, Claudius, if I remember right, who had
to attend the gladiatorial shows, but did his
business there so as to distract his attention from
the arena. We managed to get out of attending
the famous Melbourne Cup, and thereby found
the St. Kilda Beach deserted for once, and I was
able to spend a quiet day with my wife watching
the children bathe and preparing for the more
strenuous times ahead.

One psychic subject which has puzzled me
more than any other, is that of magnetic healing.
All my instincts as a doctor, and all the traditional
teaching of the profession, cry out against unex-
plained effects, and the opening which their
acceptance must give to the quack. The man
who has paid a thousand pounds for his special
knowledge has a natural distaste when he sees a
man who does not know the subclavian artery
from the pineal gland, effecting or claiming to
effect cures on some quite unconventional line.
And yet . . . and yet !

The ancients knew a great deal which we have
forgotten, especially about the relation of one body
to another. What did Hippocrates mean when
he said, " The affections suffered by the body the
soul sees with shut eyes ? " I will show you
exactly what he means. My friend, M. J. Bloom-
field, as unselfish a worker for truth as the world
can show, tried for nearly two years to develop
the medical powers of a clairvoyant. Suddenly
the result was attained, without warning. He was
walking with a friend in Collins Street laughing

*37

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

over some joke. In an instant the laugh was
struck from his lips. A man and woman were
walking in front, their backs towards Bloomfield.
To his amazement he saw the woman's inner
anatomy mapped out before him, and especially
marked a rounded mass near the liver which he
felt intuitively should not be there. His com-
panion rallied him on his sudden gravity, and
still more upon the cause of it, when it was ex-
plained. Bloomfield was so certain, however, that
the vision was for a purpose, that he accosted the
couple, and learned that the woman was actually
about to be operated on for cancer. He reassured
them, saying that the object seemed clearly
defined and not to have widespread roots as a
cancer might have. He was asked to be present
at the operation, pointed out the exact place
where he had seen the growth, and saw it extracted.
It was, as he had said, innocuous. With this
example in one's mind the words of Hippocrates
begin to assume a very definite meaning. I
believe that the surgeon was so struck by the
incident that he was most anxious that Bloomfield
should aid him permanently in his diagnoses.

I will now give my own experience with Mr.
Bloomfield. Denis had been suffering from certain
pains, so I took him round as a test case. Bloom-
field, without asking the boy any questions, gazed
at him for a couple of minutes. He then said that
the pains were in the stomach and head, pointing
out the exact places. The cause, he said, was some
slight stricture in the intestine and he proceeded
to tell me several facts of Denis's early history

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

which were quite correct, and entirely beyond his
normal knowledge. I have never in all my
experience of medicine known so accurate a
diagnosis.

Another lady, whom I knew, consulted him for
what she called a " medical reading/ ' Without
examining her in any way he said : " What a
peculiar throat you have ! It is all pouched
inside/' She admitted that this was so, and that
doctors in London had commented upon it. By
his clairvoyant gift he could see as much as they
with their laryngoscopes.

Mr. Bloomfield has never accepted any fees for
his remarkable gifts. Last year he gave 3,000
consultations. I have heard of mediums with
similar powers in England, but I had never before
been in actual contact with one. With all my
professional prejudices I am bound to admit that
they have powers, just as Braid and Esdaile, the
pioneers of hypnotism, had powers, which must
sooner or later be acknowledged.

There are, as I understand it, at least two quite
different forms of psychic healing. In such cases
as those quoted the result may be due only to
subtle powers of the human organism which some
have developed and others have not. The clair-
voyance and the instinctive knowledge may both
belong to the individual. In the other cases,
however, there are the direct action and advice of a
wise spirit control, a deceased physician usually,
who has added to his worldly stock of knowledge.
He can, of course, only act through a medium —
and just there, alas, is the dangerous opening for

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

fraud and quackery. But if anyone wishes to
study the operation at its best let him read a tiny
book called " One thing I know," which records the
cure of the writer, the sister of an Anglican canon,
when she had practically been given up by doctors
of this world after fifteen years of bed, but was res-
cued by the ministrations of Dr. Beale, a physician
on the other side. Dr. Beale received promotion to
a higher sphere in the course of the treatment,
which was completed by his assistant and successor.
It is a very interesting and convincing narrative.
We were invited to another spiritual meeting at
the Auditorium. Individuality runs riot some-
times in our movement. On this occasion a con-
cert had been mixed up with a religious service
and the effect was not good, though the musical
part of the proceedings disclosed one young
violinist, Master Hames, who should, I think,
make a name in the world. I have always been
against ritual, and yet now that I see the effect of
being without it I begin to understand that some
form of it, however elastic, is necessary. The
clairvoyance was good, if genuine, but it offends
me to see it turned off and on like a turn at a music
hall. It is either nonsense or the holy of holies
and mystery of mysteries. Perhaps it was just
this conflict between the priest with his ritual and
the medium without any, which split the early
Christian Church, and ended in the complete
victory of the ritual, which meant the extinction
not only of the medium but of the living, visible,
spiritual forces which he represented. Flowers,
music, incense, architecture, all tried to fill the gap,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

but the soul of the thing had gone out of it. It
must, I suppose, have been about the end of the
third century that the process was completed,
and the living thing had set into a petrifaction.
That would be the time no doubt when, as already
mentioned, special correctors were appointed to
make the gospel texts square with the elaborate
machinery of the Church. Only now does the
central fire begin to glow once more through the
ashes which have been heaped above it.

We attended the great annual ball at the Govern-
ment House, where the Governor-General and his
wife were supported by the Governors of the
various States, the vice-regal party performing
their own stately quadrille with a dense hedge of
spectators around them. There were few chape-
rons, and nearly every one ended by dancing, so
that it was a cheerful and festive scene. My
friend Maj or Wood had played with the Governor-
General in the same Hampshire eleven, and it was
singular to think that after many years they should
meet again like this.

Social gaieties are somewhat out of key with my
present train of thought, and I was more in my
element next evening at a meeting of the Rescue
Circle under Mr. Tozer. Mr. Love was the medium
and it was certainly a very remarkable and con-
sistent performance. Even those who might
imagine that the different characters depicted
were in fact various strands of Mr. Love's sub-
conscious self, each dramatising its own peculiari-
ties, must admit that it was a very absorbing
exhibition. The circle sits round with prayer

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and hymns while Mr. Love falls into a trance
state. He is then controlled by the Chinaman
Quong, who is a person of such standing and
wisdom in the other world, that other lower
spirits have to obey him. The light is dim, but
even so the characteristics of this Chinaman get
across very clearly, the rolling head, the sidelong,
humorous glance, the sly smile, the hands crossed
and buried in what should be the voluminous folds of
a mandarin's gown. He greets the company in some-
what laboured English and says he has many who
would be the better for our ministrations. " Send
them along, please ! " says Mr. Tozer. The
medium suddenly sits straight and his whole face
changes into an austere harshness. " What is
this ribald nonsense ? " he cries. " WTio are you,
friend ? " says Tozer. " My name is Mathew
Barret. I testified in my life to the Lamb and to
Him crucified. I ask again : What is this ribald
nonsense ? " " It is not nonsense, friend. We
are here to help you and to teach you that you are
held down and punished for your narrow ideas,
and that you cannot progress until they are more
charitable.' ' " What I preached in life I still
believe." " Tell us, friend, did you find it on the
other side as you had preached ? " " What do
you mean ? " " Well, did you, for example, see
Christ ? ' There was an embarrassed silence.
" No, I did not." " Have you seen the devil ? "
" No, I have not." " Then, bethink you, friend,
that there may be truth in what we teach." " It
is against all that I have preached." A moment
later the Chinaman was back with his rolling head

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

and his wise smile. "He good man — stupid
man. He learn in time. Plenty time before
him/'

We had a wonderful succession of " revenants."
One was a very dignified Anglican, who always
referred to the Control as " this yellow person."
Another was an Australian soldier. " I never
thought I'd take my orders from a ' Chink,'" said
he, " but he says ' hist ! ' and by gum you've got
to ' hist ' and no bloomm' error." Yet another
said he had gone down in the Monmouth.
" Can you tell me anything of the action ? " I
asked. " We never had a chance. It was just
hell." There was a world of feeling in his voice.
He was greatly amused at their " sky-pilot," as
he called the chaplain, and at his confusion when
he found the other world quite different to what he
had depicted. A terrifying Ghurkha came along,
who still thought he was in action and charged
about the circle, upsetting the medium's chair,
and only yielding to a mixture of force and per-
suasion. There were many others, most of whom
returned thanks for the benefit derived from
previous meetings. " You've helped us quite a
lot," they said. Between each the old Chinese
sage made comments upon the various cases, a
kindly, wise old soul, with just a touch of mis-
chievous humour running through him. We had
an exhibition of the useless apostolic gift of tongues
during the evening, for two of the ladies present
broke out into what I was informed was the Maori
language, keeping up a long and loud conversation.
J was not able to check it, but it was certainly a

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

coherent language of some sort. In all this there
was nothing which one could take hold of and
quote as absolutely and finally evidential, and yet
the total effect was most convincing. I have been
in touch with some Rescue Circles, however, where
the identity of the " patients/' as we may call
them, was absolutely traced.

As I am on the subject of psychic experiences
I may as well carry on, so that the reader who is
out of sympathy may make a single skip of the
lot. Mrs. Susanna Harris, the American voice-
medium, who is well known in London, had arrived
here shortly after ourselves, and gave us a sitting.
Mrs. Harris's powers have been much discussed,
for while on the one hand she passed a most diffi-
cult test in London, where, with her mouth full of
coloured water, she produced the same voice effects
as on other occasions, she had no success in Norway
when she was examined by their Psychic Research
Committee ; but I know how often these intellect-
uals ruin their own effects by their mental attitude,
which acts like those anti-ferments which prevent
a chemical effervescence. We must always get
back to the principle, however, that one positive
result is more important than a hundred negative
ones — just as one successful demonstration in
chemistry makes up for any number of failures.
We cannot command spirit action, and we can only
commiserate with, not blame, the medium who
does not receive it when it is most desired.
Personally I have sat four times with Mrs. Harris
and I have not the faintest doubt that on each of
these occasions I got true psychic results, though

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

I cannot answer for what happens in Norway or
elsewhere.

Shortly after her arrival in Melbourne she gave
us a seance in our private room at the hotel, no
one being present save at my invitation. There
were about twelve guests, some of whom had no
psychic experience, and I do not think there was
one of them who did not depart convinced that
they had been in touch with preternatural forces.
There were two controls, Harmony, with a high
girlish treble voice, and a male control with a
strong decisive bass. I sat next to Mrs. Harris,
holding her hand in mine, and I can swear to it that
again and again she spoke to me while the other
voices were conversing with the audience. Har-
mony is a charming little creature, witty, friendly
and innocent. I am quite ready to consider the
opinion expressed by the Theosophists that such
controls as Harmony with Mrs. Harris, Bella with
Mrs. Brittain, Feda with Mrs. Leonard, and others
are in reality nature-spirits who have never lived
in the flesh but take an intelligent interest in our
affairs and are anxious to help us. The male
control, however, who always broke in with some
final clinching remark in a deep voice, seemed
altogether human.

Whilst these two controls formed, and were the
chorus of the play, the real drama rested with the
spirit voices, the same here as I have heard them
under Mrs. Wriedt, Mrs. Johnson or Mr. Powell in
England, intense, low, vibrating with emotion
and with anxiety to get through. Nearly every-
one in the circle had communications which

M5 K

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

satisfied them. One lady who had mourned her
husband very deeply had the inexpressible satis-
faction of hearing his voice thanking her for putting
flowers before his photograph, a fact which no one
else could know. A voice claiming to be " Moore-
Usborne Moore/' came in front of me. I said,
" Well, Admiral, we never met, but we corre-
sponded in life. He said, ' ' Yes, and we disagreed, ' '
which was true. Then there came a voice which
claimed to be Mr. J. Morse, the eminent pioneer
of Spiritualism. I said, "Mr. Morse, if that is you,
you can tell me where we met last." He answered,
" Was it not in 'Light' office in London ? " I
said, " No, surely it was when you took the chair
for me at that great meeting at Sheffield/' He
answered, "Well, we lose some of our memory in
passing." As a matter of fact he was perfectly
right, for after the sitting both my wife and I
remembered that I had exchanged a word or two
with him as I was coming out of Light office at
least a year after the Sheffield meeting. This was
a good test as telepathy was excluded. General
Sir Alfred Turner also came and said that he
remembered our conversations on earth. When I
asked him whether he had found the conditions
beyond the grave as happy as he expected he
answered, " infinitely more so." Altogether I
should think that not less than twenty spirits
manifested during this remarkable seance. The
result may have been the better because Mrs.
Harris had been laid up in bed for a week before-
hand, and so we had her full force. I fancy that
like most mediums, she habitually overworks her

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

wonderful powers. Such seances have been going
on now for seventy years, with innumerable
witnesses of credit who will testify, as I have done
here, that all fraud or mistake was out of the
question. And still the men of no experience
shake their heads. I wonder how long they will
succeed in standing between the world and the
consolation which God has sent us.

There is one thing very clear about mediumship
and that is that it bears no relation to physical
form. Mrs. Harris is a very large lady, tall and
Junoesque, a figure which would catch the eye in
any assembly. She has, I believe, a dash of the
mystic Red Indian blood in her, which may be
connected with her powers. Bailey, on the other
hand, is a little, ginger-coloured man, while Camp-
bell of Sydney, who is said to have apport powers
which equal Bailey, is a stout man, rather like the
late Corney Grain. Every shape and every
quality of vessel may hold the psychic essence.

I spend such spare time as I have in the
Melbourne Botanical Gardens, which is, I
think, absolutely the most beautiful place that I
have ever seen. I do not know what genius laid
them out, but the effect is a succession of the most
lovely vistas, where flowers, shrubs, large trees
and stretches of water, are combined in an extra-
ordinary harmony. Green swards slope down to
many tinted groves, and they in turn droop over
still ponds mottled with lovely water plants. It
is an instructive as well as a beautiful place, for
every tree has its visiting card attached and
one soon comes to know them. Australia is

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preeminently the Land of the Myrtles, for a large
proportion of its vegetation comes under this one
order, which includes the gum trees, of which
there are 170 varieties. They all shed their bark
instead of their leaves, and have a generally untidy,
not to say indecent appearance, as they stand
with their covering in tatters and their white under-
bark shining through the rents. There is not the
same variety of species in Australia as in England,
and it greatly helps a superficial botanist like
myself, for when you have learned the ti-tree, the
wild fig tree and the gum trees, you will be on terms
with nature wherever you go. New Zealand
however offers quite a fresh lot of problems.

The Melbourne Cricket Club has made me an
honorary member, so Denis and I went down
there, where we met the giant bowler, Hugh
Trumble, who left so redoubtable a name in
England. As the Chela may look at the Yogi so
did Denis, with adoring eyes, gaze upon Trumble,
which so touched his kind heart that he produced
a cricket ball, used in some famous match, which
he gave to the boy — a treasure which will be
reverently brought back to England. I fancy
Denis slept with it that night, as he certainly did
in his pads and gloves the first time that he owned
them.

We saw the English team play Victoria, and it
was pleasant to see the well-known faces once
more. The luck was all one way, for Armstrong
was on the sick list, and Armstrong is the main-
stay of Victorian cricket. Rain came at a critical
moment also, and gave Woolley and Rhodes a

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

wicket which was impossible for a batsman.
However, it was all good practice for the more
exacting games of the future. It should be a
fine eleven which contains a genius like Hobbs,
backed by such men as the bustling bulldog,
Hendren, a great out-held as well as a grand
bat, or the wily, dangerous Hearne, or Douglas,
cricketer, boxer, above all warrior, a worthy
leader of Englishmen. Hearne I remember as
little more than a boy, when he promised to carry
on the glories of that remarkable family, of which
George and Alec were my own playmates. He
has ended by proving himself the greatest of
them all.

My long interval of enforced rest came at last
to an end, when the race fever had spent itself, and
I was able to have my last great meeting at the
Town Hall. It really was a great meeting, as the
photograph of it will show. I spoke for over
two hours, ending up by showing a selection of
the photographs. I dealt faithfully with the
treatment given to me by the Argus. I take the
extract from the published account. " On this,
the last time in my life that I shall address a
Melbourne audience, I wish to thank the people
for the courtesy with which we have been received.
It would, however, be hypocritical upon my part
if I were to thank the Press. A week before I
entered Melbourne the Argus declared that I
was an emissary of the devil (laughter). I care
nothing for that. I am out for a fight and can
take any knocks that come. But the Argus
refused to publish a word I said. I came 12,000

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

miles to give you a message of hope and comfort,
and I appeal to you to say whether three or four
gentlemen sitting in a board-room have a right
to say to the people of Melbourne, ' You shall not
listen to that man nor read one word of what he
has to say/ (Cries of ' Shame ! ') You, I am
sure, resent being spoon-fed in such a manner/ '
The audience showed in the most hearty fashion
that they did resent it, and they cheered loudly
when I pointed out that my remarks did not
arise, as anyone could see by looking round, from
any feeling on my part that my mission had failed
to gain popular support. It was a great evening,
and I have never addressed a more sympathetic
audience. The difficulty always is for my wife
and myself to escape from our kind well-wishers,
and it is touching and heartening to hear the
sincere " God bless you ! " which they shower
upon us as we pass.

This then was the climax of our mission in Mel-
bourne. It was marred by the long but unavoid-
able delay in the middle, but it began well and
ended splendidly. On November 13th we left the
beautiful town behind us, and embarked upon
what we felt would be a much more adventurous
period at Sydney, for all we had heard showed
that both our friends and our enemies were more
active in the great seaport of New South Wales.

150

CHAPTER VII

Great reception at Sydney. — Importance of Sydney. —
Journalistic luncheon. — A psychic epidemic— ^Gregory.
— Barracking. — Town Hall reception. — Regulation of
Spiritualism. — An ether apport — Surfing at Manly. —
A challenge.— Bigoted opponents. — A disgruntled photo-
grapher.—Outing in the Harbour. — Dr. Mildred Creed. —
Leon Gellert. — Norman Lindsay. — Bishop Leadbeater. —
Our relations with Theosophy. — Incongruities of H.P.B.
—Of D.D. Home.

We had a wonderful reception at Sydney. I
have a great shrinking from such deputations as
they catch you at the moment when you are
exhausted and unkempt after a long journey,
and when you need all your energies to collect
your baggage and belongings so as to make your
way to your hotel. But on this occasion it was
so hearty, and the crowd of faces beamed such
good wishes upon us that it was quite a pick-me-up
to all of us. " God bless you ! " and " Thank
God you have come ! " reached us from all sides.
My wife, covered with flowers, was hustled off in
one direction, while I was borne away in another,
and each of the children was the centre of a
separate group. Major Wood had gone off to
see to the luggage, and Jakeman was herself
embedded somewhere in the crowd, so at last I
had to shout, " Where's that little girl ? Where's

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

that little boy ? " until we reassembled and were
able, laden with bouquets, to reach our carriage.
The evening paper spread itself over the scene.

" When Sir Conan Doyle, his wife and their
three children arrived from Melbourne by the
express this morning, an assembly of Spiritualists
accorded them a splendid greeting. Men swung
their hats high and cheered, women danced in
their excitement, and many of their number
rushed the party with rare bouquets. The excite-
ment was at its highest, and Sir Conan being
literally carried along the platform by the pressing
crowds, when a digger arrived on the outskirts.
* Who's that ? ' he asked of nobody in particular.
Almost immediately an urchin replied, ' The
bloke that wrote " Sherlock Holmes/ ' ' When
asked if the latter gentleman was really and
irretrievably dead the author of his being re-
marked, ' Well, you can say that a coroner has
never sat upon him/ "

It was a grand start, and we felt at once in a
larger and more vigorous world, where, if we had
fiercer foes, we at least had warm and well-
organised friends. Better friends than those of
Melbourne do not exist, but there was a method
and cohesion about Sydney which impressed us
from the first day to the last. There seemed, also,
to be fewer of those schisms which are the bane
of our movement. If Wells' dictum that
organisation is death has truth in it, then we are
very much alive.

We had rooms in Petty's Hotel, which is an
old-world hostel with a very quiet, soothing

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

atmosphere. There I was at once engaged with
the usual succession of journalists with a long list
of questions which ranged from the destiny of the
human soul to the chances of the test match.
What with the constant visitors, the unpacking of
our trunks, and the settling down of the children,
we were a very weary band before evening.

I had no idea that Sydney was so great a place.
The population is now very nearly a million,
which represents more than one-sixth of the
whole vast Continent. It seems a weak point of
the Austraiian system that 41 per cent, of the
whole population dwell in the six capital cities.
The vital statistics of Sydney are extraordinarily
good, for the death rate is now only twelve per
thousand per annum. Our standard in such
matters is continually rising, for I can remember
the days when twenty per thousand was reckoned
to be a very good result. In every civic amenity
Sydney stands very high. Her Botanical Gardens
are not so supremely good as those of Melbourne,
but her Zoo is among the very best in the wond.
The animals seem to be confined by trenches
rather than by bars, so that they have the appear-
ance of being at large. It was only after Jakeman
had done a level hundred with a child under each
arm that she realised that a bear, which she saw
approaching, was not really in a state of freedom.

As to the natural situation of Sydney, especially
its harbour, it is so world-renowned that it is
hardly necessary to allude to it. I can well
imagine that a Sydney man would grow homesick
elsewhere, for he couid never find the same

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

surroundings. The splendid landlocked bay with
its numerous side estuaries and its narrow entrance
is a grand playground for a sea-loving race. On
a Saturday it is covered with every kind of craft,
from canoe to hundred-tonner. The fact that
the water swarms with sharks seems to present
no fears to these strong-nerved people, and I have
found myself horrified as I watched little craft,
manned by boys, heeling over in a fresh breeze
until the water was up to their gunwales. At very
long intervals some one gets eaten, but the fun
goes on all the same.

The people of Sydney have their residences
(bungalows with verandahs) all round this beauti-
ful bay, forming dozens of little townlets. The
system of ferry steamers becomes as important as
the trams, and is extraordinarily cheap and con-
venient. To Manly, for example, which lies some
eight miles out, and is a favourite watering place,
the fare is fivepence for adults and twopence for
children. So frequent are the boats that you never
worry about catching them, for if one is gone
another will presently start. Thus, the whole
life of Sydney seems to converge into the Circular
Quay, from which as many as half a dozen of
these busy little steamers may be seen casting off
simultaneously for one or another of the oversea
suburbs. Now and then, in a real cyclone, the
service gets suspended, but it is a rare event, and
there is a supplementary, but roundabout, service
of trams.

The journalists of New South Wales gave a
lunch to my wife and myself, which was a very

154

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

pleasant function. One leading journalist an-
nounced, amid laughter, that he had actually
consulted me professionally in my doctoring days,
and had lived to tell the tale, which contradicts the
base insinuation of some orator who remarked
once that though I was known to have practised,
no living patient of mine had ever yet been seen.

Nothing could have been more successful than
my first lecture, which rilled the Town Hall.
There were evidently a few people who had come
with intent to make a scene, but I had my
audience so entirely with me, that it was im-
possible to cause real trouble. One fanatic near
the door cried out, " Anti-Christ ! " several times,
and was then bundled out. Another, when I
described how my son had come back to me, cried
out that it was the devil, but on my saying with
a laugh that such a remark showed the queer
workings of some people's minds, the people
cheered loudly in assent. Altogether it was a
great success, which was repeated in the second,
and culminated in the third, when, with a hot
summer day, and the English cricketers making
their debut, I still broke the record for a Town
Hall matinee. The rush was more than the
officials could cope with, and I had to stand for
ten long minutes looking at the audience before it
was settled enough for me to begin. Some spiritua-
lists in the audience struck up " Lead, Kindly
Light ! ' which gave the right note to the
assemblage. Mr. Smythe, with all his experience,
was amazed at our results. " This is no longer
a mere success/' he cried. " It is a triumph. It is

155

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

an epidemic ! " Surely, it will leave some per-
manent good behind it and turn the public mind
from religious shadows to realities.

We spent one restful day seeing our cricketers
play New South Wales. After a promising start
they were beaten owing to a phenomenal first-
wicket stand in the second innings by Macartney
and Collins, both batsmen topping the hundred.
Gregory seemed a dangerous bowler, making the
ball rise shoulder high even on that Bulli wicket,
where midstump is as much as an ordinary bowler
can attain. He is a tiger of a man, putting every
ounce of his strength and inch of his great height
into every ball, with none of the artistic finesse
of a Spofforth, but very effective all the same.
We have no one of the same class; and that will
win Australia the rubber unless I am— as I hope
I am - a false prophet. I was not much impressed
either by the manners or by the knowledge of the
game shown by the barrackers. Every now and
then, out of the mass of people who darken the
grass slopes round the ground, you hear a raucous
voice giving advice to the captain, or, perhaps,
conjuring a fast bowler to bowl at the wicket
when the man is keeping a perfect length outside
the off stump and trying to serve his three slips.
When Mailey went on/ because he was slow and
seemed easy, they began to jeer, and, yet, you
had only to watch the batsman to see that the ball
was doing a lot and kept him guessing. One
wonders why the neighbours of these bawlers
tolerate it. In England such men would soon be
made to feel that they were ill-mannered nuisances,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

I am bound to testify, however, that they seem
quite impartial, and that the English team had
no special cause for complaint. I may also add
that, apart from this cricketing peculiarity, which
is common to all the States, the Sydney crowd
is said to be one of the most good-humoured
and orderly in the world. My own observation
confirms this, and I should say that there was a
good deal less drunkenness than in Melbourne,
but, perhaps the races gave me an exaggerated
impression of the latter.

On Sunday, 28th, the spiritualists gave the
pilgrims (as they called us) a reception at the
Town Hall. There was not a seat vacant, and
the sight of these 3,500 well-dressed, intelligent
people must have taught the press that the move-
ment is not to be despised. There are at least
10,000 professed spiritualists in Sydney, and even
as a political force they demand consideration.
The seven of us were placed in the front of the
platform, and the service was very dignified and
impressive. When the great audience sang, " God
hold you safely till we meet once more," it was
almost overpowering, for it is a beautiful tune,
and was sung with real feeling. In my remarks I
covered a good deal of ground, but very parti-
cularly I warned them against all worldly use of
this great knowledge, whether it be fortune
telling, prophecies about races and stocks, or any
other prostitution of our subject. I also exhorted
them when they found fraud to expose it at once,
as their British brethren do, and never to trifle
with truth. When I had finished, the whole

J57

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

3,500 people stood up, and everyone waved a
handkerchief, producing a really wonderful scene.
We can never forget it.

Once more I must take refuge behind the local
Observer. " The scene as Sir Arthur rose will be
long remembered by those who were privileged
to witness it. A sea of waving handkerchiefs
confronted the speaker, acclaiming silently and
reverently the deep esteem in which he was held
by all present. Never has Sir Arthur's earnest-
ness in his mission been more apparent than on
this occasion as he proceeded with a heart to heart
talk with the spiritualists present, offering friendly
criticisms, sound advice, and encouragement to
the adherents of the great movement.

" ' He had got/ he said, ' so much into the
habit of lecturing that he was going to lecture the
spiritualists/ With a flash of humour Sir Arthur
added : ' It does none of us any harm to be
lectured occasionally. I am a married man
myself (laughter). 'I would say to the
spiritualists, ' For Heaven's sake keep this thing
high and unspotted. Don't let it drop into the
regions of fortune telling and other things which
leave such an ugly impression on the public mind,
and which we find it so difficult to justify. Keep
it in its most religious and purest aspect." At the
same time, I expressed my view that there was no
reason at all why a medium should not receive
moderate payment for work done, since it is
impossible, otherwise, that he can live.

Every solid spiritualist would, I am sure, agree
with me that our whole subject needs regulating,

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

and is in an unsatisfactory condition. We cannot
approve of the sensation mongers who run from
medium to medium (or possibly pretended
medium) with no object but excitement or
curiosity. The trouble is that you have to
recognise a thing, before you can regulate it, and
the public has not properly recognised us. Let
them frankly do so, and take us into counsel, and
then we shall get things on a solid basis. Per-
sonally, I would be ready to go so far as to agree
that an inquirer should take out a formal permit
to consult a medium, showing that it was done
for some definite object, if in return we could get
State recognition for those mediums who were
recommended as genuine by valid spiritual
authorities. My friends will think this a reac-
tionary proposition, but none the less I feel the
need of regulation almost as much as I do that of
recognition.

One event which occurred to me at Sydney I
shall always regard as an instance of that fostering
care of which I have been conscious ever since
we set forth upon our journey. I had been over-
tired, had slept badly and had a large meeting
in the evening, so that it was imperative that I
should have a nap in the afternoon. My brain
was racing, however, and I could get no rest or
prospect of any. The second floor window was
slightly open behind me, and outside was a broad
open space, shimmering in the heat of a summer
day. Suddenly, as I lay there, I was aware of a
very distinct pungent smell of ether, coming in
waves ^from outside. With each fresh wave I felt

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

my over-excited nerves calming down as the sea
does when oil is poured upon it. Within a few
minutes I was in a deep sleep, and woke all
ready for my evening's work. I looked out of
the window and tried to picture where the ether
could have come from ; then I returned thanks
for one more benefit received. I do not suppose
that I am alone in such interpositions, but I think
that our minds are so centred on this tiny mud
patch, that we are deaf and blind to all that im-
pinges on us from beyond.

Having finished in Sydney, and my New
Zealand date having not yet arrived, we shifted
our quarters to Manly, upon the sea coast, about
eight miles from the town. Here we all devoted
ourselves to surf-bathing, spending a good deal of
our day in the water, as is the custom of the place.
It is a real romp with Nature, for the great Pacific
rollers come sweeping in and break over you,
rolling you over on the sand if they catch you
unawares. It was a golden patch in our restless
lives. There were surf boards, and I am told that
there were men competent to ride them, but I saw
none of Jack London's Sun Gods riding in erect
upon the crest of the great rollers. Alas, poor
Jack London ! What right had such a man to
die, he who had more vim and passion, and know-
ledge of varied life than the very best of us ?
Apart from ali his splendid exuberance and
exaggeration he had very real roots of grand
literature within him. I remember, particularly,
the little episodes of bygone days in " The
Jacket/' The man who wrote those could do

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anything. Those whom the American public love
die young. Frank Norris, Harold Frederic
Stephen Crane, the author of " David Hamm,"
and now Jack London — but the greatest of these
was Jack London.

There is a grand beach at Manly, and the
thundering rollers carry in some flotsam from the
great ocean. One morning the place was covered
with beautiful blue jelly-fish, like little Roman
lamps with tendrils hanging down. I picked up
one of these pretty things, and was just marvelling
at its complete construction when I discovered
that it was even more complete than I supposed,
for it gave me a violent sting. For a day or two
I had reason to remember my little blue castaway,
with his up-to-date fittings for keeping the stranger
at a distance.

I was baited at Sydney by a person of the name
of Simpson, representing Christianity, though I
was never clear what particular branch of religion
he represented, and he was disowned by some
leaders of Christian Thought. I believe he was
president of the Christian Evidence Society. His
opposition, though vigorous, and occasionally
personal, was perfectly legitimate, but his well-
advertised meeting at the Town Hall (though no
charge was made for admission) was not a success.
His constant demand was that I should meet him
in debate, which was, of course, out of the ques-
tion, since no debate is possible between a man
who considers a text to be final, and one who
cannot take this view. My whole energies, so
much needed for my obvious work, would have

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been frittered away in barren controversies had I
allowed my hand to be forced. I had learned my
lesson, however, at the M'Cabe debate in London,
when I saw clearly that nothing could come
from such proceedings. On the other hand, I
conceived the idea of what would be a real test,
and I issued it as a challenge in the public press.
" It is clear," I said, " that one single case of
spirit return proves our whole contention. There-
fore, let the question be concentrated upon one,
or, if necessary, upon three cases. These I would
undertake to prove, producing my witnesses in the
usual way. My opponent would act the part of
hostile counsel, cross-examining and criticising
my facts. The case would be decided by a
majority vote of a jury of twelve, chosen from men
of standing, who pledged themselves as open-
minded on the question. Such a test could
obviously only take place in a room of limited
dimensions, so that no money would be involved
and truth only be at stake. That is all that I
seek. If such a test can be arranged I am ready
for it, either before I leave, or after I return from
New Zealand." This challenge was not taken up
by my opponents.

Mr. Simpson had a long tirade in the Sydney
papers about the evil religious effects of my mis-
sion, which caused me to write a reply in which
I defined our position in a way which may be
instructive to others. I said : —

" The tenets which we spiritualists preach and
which I uphold upon the platform are that any
man who is deriving spirituality from his creed,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

be that creed what it may, is learning the lesson
of life. For this reason we would not attack your
creed, however repulsive it might seem to us, so
long as you and your colleagues might be getting
any benefit from it. We desire to go our own
way, saying what we know to be true, and claiming
from others the same liberty of conscience and of
expression which we freely grant to them.

" You, on the other hand, go out of your way to
attack us, to call us evil names, and to pretend
that those loved ones who return to us are in
truth devils, and that our phenomena, though they
are obviously of the same sort as those which are
associated with early Christianity, are diabolical
in their nature. This absurd view is put forward
without a shadow of proof, and entirely upon the
supposed meaning of certain ancient texts which
refer in reality to a very different matter, but
which are strained and twisted to suit your
purpose.

"It is men like you and your colleagues who,
by your parody of Christianity and your constant
exhibition of those very qualities which Christ
denounced in the Pharisees, have driven many
reasonable people away from religion and left the
churches half empty. Your predecessors, who
took the same narrow view of the literal inter-
pretation of the Bible, were guilty of the murder
of many thousands of defenceless old women who
were burned in deference to the text, ' Suffer no
witch to live.' Undeterred by this terrible result
of the literal reading, you still advocate it, al-
though you must be well aware that polygamy,

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slavery and murder can all be justified by such a
course.

" In conclusion, let me give you the advice to
reconsider your position, to be more charitable to
your neighbours, and to devote your redundant
energies to combating the utter materialism which
is all round you, instead of railing so bitterly at
those who are proving immortality and the need
for good living in a way which meets their spiritual
wants, even though it is foreign to yours."

A photographer, named Mark Blow, also caused
me annoyance by announcing that my photographs
were fakes, and that he was prepared to give £25
to any charity if he could not reproduce them. I
at once offered the same sum if he could do so,
and I met him by appointment at the office of
the evening paper, the editor being present to
see fair play. I placed my money on the table,
but Mr. Blow did not cover it. I then produced a
packet of plates from my pocket and suggested
that we go straight across to Mr. Blow's studio
and produce the photographs. He replied by
asking me a long string of questions as to the
conditions under which the Crewe photographs
were produced, noting down all my answers. I
then renewed my proposition. He answered that
it was absurd to expect him to produce a spirit
photograph since he did not believe in such foolish
things. I answered that I did not ask him to
produce a spirit photograph, but to fulfil his
promise which was to produce a similar result
upon the plate under similar conditions. He held
out that they should be his own conditions. I

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pointed out that any school boy could make a
half-exposed impression upon a plate, and that the
whole test lay in the conditions. As he refused
to submit to test conditions the matter fell through,
as all such foolish challenges fall through. It was
equally foolish on my part to have taken any
notice of it.

I had a conversation with Mr. Maskell, the
capable Secretary of the Sydney spiritualists, in
which he described how he came out originally
from Leicester to Australia. He had at that
time developed some power of clairvoyance, but
it was very intermittent. He had hesitated in his
mind whether he should emigrate to Australia,
and sat one night debating it within himself,
while his little son sat at the table cutting patterns
out of paper. Maskell said to his spirit guides,
mentally, " If it is good that I go abroad give me
the vision of a star. If not, let it be a circle/ '
He waited for half an hour or so, but no vision
came, and he was rising in disappointment when
the little boy turned round and said, " Daddy,
here is a star for you/' handing over one which he
had just cut. He has had no reason to regret the
subsequent decision.

We had a very quiet, comfortable, and healthy
ten days at the Pacific Hotel at Manly, which was
broken only by an excursion which the Sydney
spiritualists had organised for us in a special
steamer, with the intention of showing us the
glories of the harbour. Our party assembled
on Manly Pier, and the steamer was still far away
when we saw the fluttering handkerchiefs which

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announced that they had sighted us. It was a
long programme, including a picnic lunch, but it
all went off with great success and good feeling.
It was fairly rough within the harbour, and some
of the party were sea sick, but the general good
spirits rose above such trifles, and we spent the
day in goodly fellowship. On Sunday I was asked
to speak to his congregation by Mr. Sanders, a
very intelligent young Congregational Minister
of Manly, far above the level of Australasian or,
indeed, British clerics. It was a novel experience
for me to be in a Nonconformist pulpit, but I
found an excellent audience, and I hope that they
in turn found something comforting and new.

One of the most interesting men whom I met in
Australia was Dr. Creed, of the New South Wales
Parliament, an elderly medical man who has held
high posts in the Government. He is blessed
with that supreme gift, a mind which takes a
keen interest in everything which he meets in life.
His researches vary from the cure of diabetes and
of alcoholism (both of which he thinks that he has
attained) down to the study of Australian
Aborigines and of the palaeontology of his country.
I was interested to find the very high opinion
which he has of the brains of the black fellows,
and he asserts that their results at the school
which is devoted to their education are as high
as with the white Australians. They train into
excellent telegraphic operators and other employ-
ments needing quick intelligence. The increasing
brain power of the human race seems to be in the
direction of originating rather than of merely

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

accomplishing. Many can do the latter, but only
the very highest can do the former. Dr. Creed
is clear upon the fact that no very ancient remains
of any sort are to be found anywhere in Australia,
which would seem to be against the view of a
Lemurian civilisation, unless the main seat of it
lay to the north where the scattered islands
represent the mountain tops of the ancient con-
tinent. Dr. Creed was one of the very few public
men who had the intelligence or the courage to
admit the strength of the spiritual position, and he
assured me that he would help in any way.

Another man whom I was fortunate to meet was
Leon Gellert, a very young poet, who promises
to be the rising man in Australia in this, the
supreme branch of literature. He served in the
war, and his verses from the front attain a very high
level. His volume of war poems represents the
most notable literary achievement of recent years,
and its value is enhanced by being illustrated by
Norman Lindsay, whom I look upon as one of the
greatest artists of our time. I have seen three
pictures of his, " The Goths," " Who Comes ? "
and " The Crucifixion of Venus," each of which,
in widely different ways, seemed very remarkable.
Indeed, it is the versatility of the man that is his
charm, and now that he is turning more and more
from the material to the spiritual it is impossible
to say how high a level he may attain. Another
Australian whose works I have greatly admired is
Henry Lawson, whose sketches of bush life in
" Joe Wilson ' and other of his studies, remind
one of a subdued Bret Harte. He is a considerable

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

poet also, and his war poem, " England Yet,"
could hardly be matched.

Yet another interesting figure whom I met in
Sydney was Bishop Leadbeater, formerly a close
colleague of Mrs. Besant in the Theosophical
movement, and now a prelate of the so-called
Liberal Catholic Church, which aims at preserving
the traditions and forms of the old Roman Church,
but supplementing them with all modern spiritual
knowledge. I fear I am utterly out of sympathy
with elaborate iorms, which always in the end
seem to me to take the place of facts, and to
become a husk without a kernel, but none the less
I can see a definite mission for such a church as
appealing to a certain class of mind. Leadbeater,
who has suffered from unjust aspersion in the
past, is a venerable and striking figure. His
claims to clairvoyant and other occult powers are
very definite, and so far as I had the opportunity of
observing him, he certainly lives the ascetic life,
which the maintenance of such power demands.
His books, especially the little one upon the
Astral Plane, seem to me among the best of the
sort.

But the whole subject of Theosophy is to me a
perpetual puzzle. I asked for proofs and
spiritualism has given them to me. But why
should I abandon one faith in order to embrace
another one ? I have done with faith. It is a
golden mist in which human beings wander in
devious tracks with many a collision. I need the
white clear light of knowledge. For that we
build from below, brick upon brick, never getting

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

beyond the provable fact. There is the building
which will last. But these others seem to build
from above downwards, beginning by the assump-
tion that there is supreme human wisdom at the
apex. It may be so. But it is a dangerous
habit of thought which has led the race astray
before, and may again. Yet, I am struck by the
fact that this ancient wisdom does describe the
etheric body, the astral world, and the general
scheme which we have proved for ourselves.
But when the high priestess of the cult wrote of
this she said so much that was against all our own
spiritual experience, that we feel she was in touch
with something very different from our angels of
light. Her followers appreciate that now, and
are more charitable than she, but what is the worth
of her occult knowledge if she so completely mis-
read that which lies nearest to us, and how can we
hope that she is more correct when she speaks of
that which is at a distance ?

I was deeply attracted by the subject once, but
Madame Blavatsky's personality and record re-
pelled me. I have read the defence, and yet
Hodgson and the Coulombs seem to me to hold
the field. Could any conspiracy be so broad that
it included numerous forged letters, trap doors
cut in floors, and actually corroborative accounts
in the books of a flower seller in the bazaar ? On
the other hand, there is ample evidence of real
psychic powers, and of the permanent esteem of
men like Sinnett and Olcott, whom none could fail
to respect. It is the attitude of these honourable
men which commends and upholds her, but

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

sometimes it seems hard to justify it. As an
example, in the latter years of her life she wrote a
book, " The Caves and Jungles of Hindustan/' in
which she describes the fearsome adventures
which she and Olcott had in certain expeditions,
falling down precipices and other such escapes.
Olcott, like the honest gentleman he was, writes
in his diary that there is not a word of truth in
this, and that it is pure fiction. And yet, after
this very damaging admission, in the same page
he winds up, " Ah, if the world ever comes to
know who was the mighty entity, who laboured
sixty years under that quivering mask of flesh,
it will repent its cruel treatment of H. P. B., and
be amazed at the depth of its ignorance/ ' These
are the things which make it so difficult to under-
stand either her or the cult with which she was
associated. Had she never lived these men and
women would, as it seems to me, have been the
natural leaders of the spiritualist movement, and
instead of living in the intellectual enjoyment of
far-off systems they would have concentrated
upon the all-important work of teaching poor
suffering humanity what is the meaning of the
dark shadow which looms upon their path.
Even now I see no reason why they should not
come back to those who need them, and help them
forward upon their rocky road.

Of course, we spiritualists are ourselves vulner-
able upon the subject of the lives of some of our
mediums, but we carefully dissociate those
lives from the powers which use the physical
frame of the medium for their own purposes, just

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as the religious and inspired poetry of a Verlaine
may be held separate from his dissipated life.
Whilst upon this subject I may say that whilst in
Australia I had some interesting letters from a
solicitor named Rymer. All students of spiritualism
will remember that when Daniel Home first came
to England in the early fifties he received great
kindness from the Rymer family, who then
lived at Ealing. Old Rymer treated him entirely
as one of the family. This Bendigo Rymer was
the grandson of Home's benefactor, and he had
no love for the great medium because he con-
sidered that he had acted with ingratitude towards
his people. The actual letters of his father, which
he permitted me to read, bore out this statement,
and I put it on record because I have said much in
praise of Home, and the balance should be held
true. These letters, dating from about '57, show
that one of the sons of old Rymer was sent to
travel upon the Continent to study art, and that
Home was his companion. They were as close as
brothers, but when they reached Florence, and
Home became a personage in society there, he
drifted away from Rymer, whose letters are those
of a splendid young man. Home's health was
already indifferent, and while he was laid up in his
hotel he seems to have been fairly kidnapped by
a strong-minded society lady of title, an English-
woman living apart from her husband. For
weeks he lived at her villa, though the state of his
health would suggest that it was rather as patient
than lover. What was more culpable was that
he answered the letters of his comrade very

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

rudely and showed no sense of gratitude for all
that the family had done for him. I have read the
actual letters and confess that I was chilled and
disappointed. Home was an artist as well as a
medium, the most unstable combination possible,
full of emotions, flying quickly to extremes,
capable of heroisms and self-denials, but also of
vanities and ill-humour. On this occasion the
latter side of his character was too apparent. To
counteract the effect produced upon one's mind
one should read in Home's Life the letter of the
Bavarian captain whom he rescued upon the
field of battle, or of the many unfortunates whom
he aided with unobtrusive charity. It cannot,
however, be too often repeated — since it is never
grasped by our critics — that the actual character
of a man is as much separate from his mediumistic
powers, as it would be from his musical powers.
Both are inborn gifts beyond the control of their
possessor. The medium is the telegraph instru-
ment and the telegraph boy united in one, but the
real power is that which transmits the message,
which he only receives and delivers. The remark
applies to the Fox sisters as much as it does to
Home.

Talking about Home, it is astonishing how the
adverse judgment of the Vice-Chancellor Gifford,
a materialist, absolutely ignorant of psychic
matters, has influenced the minds of men. The
very materialists who quote it, would not attach
the slightest importance to the opinion of an
orthodox judge upon the views of Hume, Payne,
or any free-thinker. It is like quoting a Roman

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

tribune against a Christian. The real facts of the
case are perfectly clear to anyone who reads the
documents with care. The best proof of how
blameless Home was in the matter is that of all
the men of honour with whom he was on intimate
terms — men like Robert Chambers, Carter Hall,
Lord Seaton, Lord Adare and others — not one
relaxed in their friendship after the trial. This was
in 1866, but in 1868 we find these young noblemen
on Christian-name terms with the man who would
have been outside the pale of society had the
accusations of his enemies been true.

Whilst we were in Sydney, a peculiar ship, now
called the " Marella," was brought into the harbour
as part of the German ship surrender. It is
commonly reported that this vessel, of very
grandiose construction, was built to conduct the
Kaiser upon a triumphal progress round the
world after he had won his war. It is, however,
only of 8,000 tons, and, personally, I cannot believe
that this would have had room for his swollen
head, had he indeed been the victor. All the
fittings, even to the carpet holders, are of German
silver. The saloon is of pure marble, eighty by
fifty, with beautiful hand-painted landscapes.
The smoke-room is the reproduction of one in
Potsdam Palace. There is a great swimming
bath which can be warmed. Altogether a very
notable ship, and an index, not only of the danger
escaped, but of the danger to come, in the form
of the super-excellence of German design and
manufacture.

Our post-bag is very full, and it takes Major

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Wood and myself all our time to keep up with the
letters. Many of them are so wonderful that I
wish I had preserved them all, but it would have
meant adding another trunk to our baggage.
There are a few samples which have been rescued.
Many people seemed to think that I was myself
a wandering medium, and I got this sort of
missive :

" Dear Sir, — / am very anxious to ask you
a question, trusting you will answer me. What I
wish to know I have been corresponding with
a gentleman for nearly three years. From this
letter can you tell me if I will marry him. I
want you to answer this as I am keeping it strictly
private and would dearly love you to answer this
message if possible, and if I will do quite right
if I marry him. Trusting to hear from you soon.
Yours faithfully .

P.S. — / thoroughly believe in Spirit-ualism.y>
Here is another.

" Honored Sir, — Just a few lines in limited
time to ask you if you tell the future. If so, what
is your charges ? Please excuse no stamped and
ad. envelope — out of stamps and in haste to catch
mail. Please excuse"

On the other hand, I had many which were
splendidly instructive and helpful. I was particu-
larly struck by one series of spirit messages
which were received in automatic writing by

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

a man living in the Bush in North Queensland
and thrown upon his own resources. They
were descriptive of life in the beyond, and
were in parts extremely corroborative of the
Vale Owen messages, though they had been
taken long prior to that date. Some of the
points of resemblance were so marked and so
unusual that they seem clearly to come from a
common inspiration. As an example, this script
spoke of the creative power of thought in the
beyond, but added the detail that when the
object to be created was large and important a
band of thinkers was required, just as a band of
workers would be here. This exactly corresponds
to the teaching of Vale Owen's guide.

175

CHAPTER VIII

Dangerous fog. — The six photographers. — Comic advertise-
ments.— Beauties of Auckland. — A Christian clergyman.
— Shadows in our American relations. — The Gallipoli
Stone. — Stevenson and the Germans. — Position of De
Rougemont. — Mr. Clement Wragge. — Atlantean theories.
— A strange psychic. — Wellington the windy. — A literary
Oasis. — A Maori Seance. — Presentation.

My voyage to New Zealand in the Maheno was
pleasant and uneventful, giving me four days in
which to arrange my papers and look over the
many manuscripts which mediums, or, more often,
would-be mediums, had discharged at me as I
passed. Dr. Bean, my Theosophic friend, who
had been somewhat perturbed by my view that
his people were really the officers of our move-
ment who had deserted their army, formed an
officers' corps, and so taken the money and brains
and leadership away from the struggling masses,
was waiting on the Sydney Quay, and gave me
twelve books upon his subject to mend my wicked
ways, so that I was equipped for a voyage round
the world. I needed something, since I had left
my wife and family behind me in Manly, feeling
that the rapid journey through New Zealand would
be too severe for them. In Mr. Carlyle Smythe,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

however, I had an admirable " cobber/' to use the
pal phrase of the Australian soldier.

Mr. Smythe had only one defect as a comrade,
and that was his conversation in a fog. It was
of a distinctly depressing character, as I had
occasion to learn when we ran into very thick
weather among the rocky islands which make
navigation so difficult to the north of Auckland.
Between the screams of the siren I would hear a
still small voice in the bunk above me.

" We are now somewhere near the Three Kings.
It is an isolated group of rocks celebrated for the
wreck of the Elingamite, which went ashore on
just such a morning as this." (Whoo-ee ! re-
marked the foghorn). " They were nearly starved,
but kept themselves alive by fish which were
caught by improvised lines made from the ladies'
stay-laces. Many of them died/'

I lay digesting this and staring at the fog which
crawled all round the port hole. Presently he
was off again.

" You can't anchor here, and there is no use
stopping her, for the currents run hard and she
would drift on to one of the ledges which would
rip the side out of her." (Whoo-ee ! repeated the
foghorn). " The islands are perpendicular with
deep water up to the rocks, so you never know
they are there until you hit them, and then, of
course, there is no reef to hold you up/'
(Whoo-ee !) " Close by here is the place where
the Wairarapa went down with all hands a few
years ago. It was just such a day as this when
she struck the Great Barrier "

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It was about this time that I decided to go on
deck. Captain Brown had made me free of the
bridge, so I climbed up and joined him there,
peering out into the slow-drifting scud.

I spent the morning there, and learned some-
thing of the anxieties of a sailor's life. Captain
Brown had in his keeping, not only his own career
and reputation, but what was far more to him, the
lives of more than three hundred people. We had
lost all our bearings, for we had drifted in the
fog during those hours when it was too thick to
move. Now the scud was coming in clouds, the
horizon lifting to a couple of miles, and then
sinking to a few hundred yards. On each side of
us and ahead were known to be rocky islands or
promontories. Yet we must push on to our destina-
tion. It was fine to see this typical British
sailor working his ship as a huntsman might take
his horse over difficult country, now speeding
ahead when he saw an opening, now waiting for a
fogbank to get ahead, now pushing in between
two clouds. For hours we worked along with the
circle of oily lead-coloured sea around us, and then
the grey veil, rising and falling, drifting and
waving, with danger lurking always in its shadow.
There are strange results when one stares intently
over such a sea, for after a time one feels that
it all slopes upwards, and that one is standing
deep in a saucer with the rim far above one.
Once in the rifts we saw a great ship feeling
her way southwards, in the same difficulties as
ourselves. She was the Niagara, from Van-
couver to Auckland. Then, as suddenly as the

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

raising of a drop-curtain, up came the fog, and
there ahead of us was the narrow path which led
to safety. The Niagara was into it first, which
seemed to matter little, but really mattered a good
deal, for her big business occupied the Port
Authorities all the evening, while our little business
was not even allowed to come alongside until such an
hour that we could not get ashore, to the disappoint-
ment of all, and very especially of me, for I knew
that some of our faithful had been waiting for
twelve hours upon the quay to give me a welcoming
hand. It was breakfast time on the very morning
that I was advertised to lecture before we at last
reached our hotel.

Here I received that counter-demonstration
which always helped to keep my head within the
limits of my hat. This was a peremptory demand
from six gentlemen, who modestly described
themselves as the leading photographers of the
city, to see the negatives of the photographs which
I was to throw upon the screen. I was assured at
the same time by other photographers that they
had no sympathy with such a demand, and that
the others were self-advertising busybodies who
had no mandate at all for such a request. My
experience at Sydney had shown me that such
challenges came from people who had no knowledge
of psychic conditions, and who did not realise that
it is the circumstances under which a photograph
is taken, and the witnesses who guarantee such
circumstances, which are the real factors that
matter, and not the negative which may be so
easily misunderstood by those who have not

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

studied the processes by which such things are
produced. I therefore refused to allow my
photographs to pass into ignorant hands, explain-
ing at the same time that I had no negatives, since
the photographs in most cases were not mine at
all, so that the negatives would, naturally, be with
Dr. Crawford, Dr. Geley, Lady Glenconnor, the
representatives of Sir William Crookes, or whoever
else had originally taken the photograph. Their
challenge thereupon appeared in the Press with a
long tirade of abuse attached to it, founded upon
the absurd theory that all the photos had been
taken by me, and that there was no proof of their
truth save in my word. One gets used to being
indirectly called a liar, and I can answer arguments
with self-restraint which once I would have met
with the toe of my boot. However, a little breeze
of this sort does no harm, but rather puts ginger
into one's work, and my audience were very soon
convinced of the absurdity of the position of the
six dissenting photographers who had judged that
which they had not seen.

Auckland is the port of call of the American
steamers, and had some of that air of activity and
progress which America brings with her. The
spirit of enterprise, however, took curious shapes,
as in the case of one man who was a local miller,
and pushed his trade by long advertisements at
the head of the newspapers, which began with
abuse of me and my ways, and ended by a recom-
mendation to eat dessicated corn, or whatever his
particular commodity may have been. The result
was a comic jumble which was too funny to be

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offensive, though Auckland should discourage such
pleasantries, as they naturally mar the beautiful
impression which her fair city and surroundings
make upon the visitor. I hope I was the only
victim, and that every stranger within her gates
is not held up to ridicule for the purpose of calling
attention to Mr. Blank's dessicated corn.

I seemed destined to have strange people mixed
up with my affairs in Auckland, for there was a
conjuror in the town, who, after the fashion of
that rather blatant fraternity, was offering £1,000
that he could do anything I could do. As I could
do nothing, it seemed easy money. In any case,
the argument that because you can imitate a
thing therefore the thing does not exist, is one
which it takes the ingenuity of Mr. Maskelyne to
explain. There was also an ex-spiritualist medium
(so-called) who covered the papers with his
advertisements, so that my little announcement
was quite overshadowed. He was to lecture the
night after me in the Town Hall, with most terri-
fying revelations. I was fascinated by his para-
graphs, and should have liked greatly to be present,
but that was the date of my exodus. Among
other remarkable advertisements was one " What
has become of ' Pelorus Jack ' ? Was he a lost
soul ? " Now, " Pelorus Jack " was a white
dolphin, who at one time used to pilot vessels into
a New Zealand harbour, gambolling under the
bows, so that the question really did raise curiosity.
However, I learned afterwards that my successor
did not reap the harvest which his ingenuity
deserved, and that the audience was scanty and

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derisive. What the real psychic meaning of
" Pelorus Jack " may have been was not recorded
by the press.

From the hour I landed upon the quay at
Auckland until I waved my last farewell my visit
was made pleasant, and every wish anticipated by
the Rev. Jasper Calder, a clergyman who has a
future before him, though whether it will be in the
Church of England or not, time and the Bishop
will decide. Whatever he may do, he will remain
to me and to many more the nearest approach we
are likely to see to the ideal Christian — much as he
will dislike my saying so. After all, if enemies are
given full play, why should not friends redress the
balance ? I will always carry away the remem-
brance of him, alert as a boy, rushing about to serve
anyone, mixing on equal terms with scallywags on
the pier, reclaiming criminals whom he called his
brothers, winning a prize for breaking-in a buck-
jumper, which he did in order that he might gain
the respect of the stockmen ; a fiery man of God in
the pulpit, but with a mind too broad for special
dispensations, he was like one of those wonderfully
virile creatures of Charles Reade. The clergy of
Australasia are stagnant and narrow, but on the
other hand, I have found men like the Dean of
Sydney, Strong of Melbourne, Sanders of Manly,
Calder of Auckland, and others whom it is worth
crossing this world to meet.

Of my psychic work at Auckland there is little
to be said, save that I began my New Zealand tour
under the most splendid auspices. Even Sydney
had not furnished greater or more sympathetic

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audiences than those which crowded the great
Town Hall upon two successive nights. I could
not possibly have had a better reception, or got
my message across more successfully. All the
newspaper ragging and offensive advertisements
had produced (as is natural among a generous
people) a more kindly feeling for the stranger, and
I had a reception I can never forget.

This town is very wonderfully situated, and I
have never seen a more magnificent view than
that from Mount Eden, an extinct volcano about
900 feet high, at the back of it. The only one
which I could class with it is that from Arthur's
Seat, also an extinct volcano about 900 feet high,
as one looks on Edinburgh and its environs.
Edinburgh, however, is for ever shrouded in smoke,
while here the air is crystal clear, and I could
clearly see Great Barrier Island, which is a good
eighty miles to the north. Below lay the most mar-
vellous medley of light blue water and light green
land mottled with darker foliage. We could see
not only the whole vista of the wonderful winding
harbour, and the seas upon the east of the island,
but we could look across and see the firths which
connected with the seas of the west. Only a seven-
mile canal is needed to link the two up, and to save
at least two hundred miles of dangerous navigation
amid those rock-strewn waters from which we had
so happily emerged. Of course it will be done,
and when it is done it should easily pay its way,
for what ship coming from Australia — or going to
it — but would gladiy pay the fees ? The real
difficulty lies not in cutting the canal, but in

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dredging the western opening, where shifting sand-
banks and ocean currents combine to make a
dangerous approach. I see in my mind's eye two
great breakwaters, stretching like nippers into the
Pacific at that point, while, between the points of
the nippers, the dredgers will for ever be at work.
It will be difficult, but it is needed and it will be
done.

The Australian Davis Cup quartette — Norman
Brooks, Patterson, O'Hara Wood and another —
had come across in the Maheno with us and
were now at the Grand Hotel. There also was the
American team, including the formidable Tilden,
now world's champion. The general feeling of
Australasia is not as cordial as one would wish to
the United States for the moment. I have met
several men back from that country who rather
bitterly resent the anti-British agitation which
plays such a prominent part in the American
press. This continual nagging is, I am sorry
to say, wearing down the stolid patience of the
Britisher more than I can ever remember, and it is
a subject on which I have always been sensitive as
I have been a life-long advocate of Anglo-
American friendship, leading in the fullness of
time to some loose form of Anglo-American
Union. At present it almost looks as if these
racial traitors who make the artificial dissensions
were succeeding for a time in their work of
driving a wedge between the two great sections
of the English-speaking peoples. My fear is
that when some world crisis comes, and
everything depends upon us all pulling to-

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gether, the English-speakers may neutralise each
other. There lies the deadly danger. It is
for us on both sides to endeavour to avoid
it.

Everyone who is in touch with the sentiment of
the British officers in Flanders knows that they
found men of their own heart in the brave, unassum-
ing American officers who were their comrades,
and often their pupils. It is some of the stay-at-
home Americans who appear to have such a false
perspective, and who fail to realise that even
British Dominions, such as Canada and Australia,
lost nearly as many men as the United States in the
war, while Britain herself laid down ten lives
for every one spent by America. This is not
America's fault, but when we see apparent forget-
fulness of it on the part of a section of the
American people when our wounds are still fresh,
it cannot be wondered at that we feel sore. We
do not advertise, and as a result there are few who
know that we lost more men and made larger
captures during the last two years of the war than
our gallant ally of France. When we hear that
others won the war we smile — but it is a bitter
smile.

Strange, indeed, are some of the episodes of
psychic experience. There came to me at my
hotel in Auckland two middle-aged hard-working
women, who had come down a hundred miles from
the back country to my lecture. One had lost
her boy at Gallipoli. She gave me a long post-
mortem account from him as to the circumstances
of his own death, including the military operations

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which led up to it. I read it afterwards, and it
was certainly a very coherent account of the events
both before and after the shell struck him.
Having handed me the pamphlet the country
woman then, with quivering ringers, produced
from her bosom a little silver box. Out of this
she took an object, wrapped in white silk. It
was a small cube of what looked to me like sand-
stone, about an inch each way. She told me it
was an apport, that it had been thrown down on
her table while she and her family, including, as I
understood, the friend then present, were holding
a seance. A message came with it to say that it
was from the boy's grave at Gallipoli. What are
we to say to that ? Was it fraud ? Then why
were they playing tricks upon themselves ? If
it was, indeed, an apport, it is surely one of the
most remarkable for distance and for purpose
recorded of any private circle.

A gentleman named Moors was staying at the
same hotel in Auckland, and we formed an acquain-
tance. I find that he was closely connected with
Stevenson, and had actually written a very
excellent book upon his comradeship with him at
Samoa. Stevenson dabbled in the politics of
Samoa, and always with the best motives and on
the right side, but he was of so frank and impetuous
a nature that he was not trusted with any inside
knowledge. Of the German rule Mr. Moors says
that for the first twelve years Dr. Solf was as good
as he could be, and did fair justice to all. Then
he went on a visit to Berlin, and returned " bitten
by the military bug," with his whole nature

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changed, and began to " imponieren " in true
Prussian fashion. It is surely extraordinary how
all the scattered atoms of a race can share the
diseases of the central organism from which they
sprang. I verily believe that if a German had been
alone on a desert island in 1914 he would have
begun to dance and brandish a club. How many
cases are on record of the strange changes and
wild deeds of individuals ?

Mr. Moors told me that he dropped into a
developing circle of spiritualists at Sydney, none
of whom could have known him. One of them
said, " Above your head I see a man, an artist, long
hair, brown eyes, and I get the name of Stephens/'
If he was indeed unknown, this would seem
fairly evidential.

I was struck by one remark of Mr. Moors, which
was that he had not only seen the natives ride
turtles in the South Sea lagoons, but that he had
actually done so himself, and that it was by no
means difficult. This was the feat which was
supposed to be so absurd when De Rougemont
claimed to have done it. There are, of course,
some gross errors which are probably pure misuse
of words in that writer's narrative, but he places
the critic in a dilemma which has never been
fairly faced. Either he is a liar, in which case he
is, beyond all doubt, the most realistic writer of
adventure since Defoe, or else he speaks the truth,
in which case he is a great explorer. I see no
possible avoidance of this dilemma, so that which
ever way you look at it the man deserves credit
which he has never received.

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We set off, four of us, to visit Mr. Clement
Wragge, who is the most remarkable personality
in Auckland — dreamer, mystic, and yet very
practical adviser on all matters of ocean and of air.

On arriving at the charming bungalow, buried
among all sorts of broad-leaved shrubs and trees,
I was confronted by a tall, thin figure, clad in
black, with a face like a sadder and thinner
Bernard Shaw, dim, dreamy eyes, heavily pouched,
with a blue turban surmounting all. On repeat-
ing my desire he led me apart into his study. I
had been warned that with his active brain and
copious knowledge I would never be able to hold
him to the point, so, in the dialogue which
followed, I perpetually headed him off as he
turned down bye paths, until the conversation
almost took the form of a game.

" Mr. Wragge, you are, I know, one of the
greatest authorities upon winds and currents."

" Well, that is one of my pursuits. When I
was young I ran the Ben Nevis Observatory in
Scotland and "

" It was only a small matter I wished to ask
you. You'll excuse my directness as I have so
little time/'

" Certainly. What is it ? "

" If the Maoris came, originally, from Hawaii,
what prevailing winds would their canoes meet in
the 2,000 miles which they crossed to reach New
Zealand ? "

The dim eyes lit up with the joy of the problem,
and the nervous fingers unrolled a chart of the
Pacific. He flourished a pair of compasses.

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" Here is Hawaii. They would start with a
north-westerly trade wind. That would be a fair
wind. I may say that the whole affair took place
far further back than is usually supposed. We
have to get back to astronomy for our fixed date.
Don't imagine that the obliquity of the ecliptic
was always 23 degrees/'

" The Maoris had a fair wind then ? "

The compasses stabbed at the map.

" Only down to this point. Then they would
come on the Doldrums — the calm patch of the
equator. They could paddle their canoes across
that. Of course, the remains at Easter Island
prove "

" But they could not paddle all the way."

" No ; they would run into the south-easterly
trades. Then they made their way to Rarotonga
in ^Tahiti. It was from here that they made for
New Zealand."

" But how could they know New Zealand was
there ? "

" Ah, yes, how did they know ? "

" Had they compasses ? "

" They steered by the stars. We have a poem
of theirs which numbers the star-gazer as one of
the crew. We have a chart, also, cut in the rocks
at Hawaii, which seems to be the plot of a voyage.
Here is a slide of it." He fished out a photo of
lines and scratches upon a rock.

" Of course," said he, " the root of the matter is
that missionaries from Atlantis permeated the
Pacific, coming across Central America, and left
their traces everywhere."

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Ah, Atlantis ! I am a bit of an Atlantean
myself, so off we went at scratch and both enjoyed
ourselves greatly until time had come to rejoin
the party and meet Mr. Wragge's wife, a charming
Brahmin lady from India, who was one of the
most gracious personalities I have met in my
wanderings. The blue-turbaned, eager man, half
western science, half eastern mystic, and his dark-
eyed wife amid their profusion of flowers will
linger in my memory. Mrs. Wragge was eager
that I go and lecture in India. Well, who knows ?

I was so busy listening to Mr. Wragge's Atlan-
tean theories that I had no chance of laying
before him my own contribution to the subject,
which is, I think, both original and valid. If the
huge bulk of Atlantis sank beneath the ocean,
then, assuredly, it raised such a tidal wave as has
never been known in the world's history. This
tidal wave, since all sea water connects, would be
felt equally all over the world, as the wave of
Krakatoa was in 1883 felt in Europe. The wave
must have rushed over all flat coasts and drowned
every living thing, as narrated in the biblical
narrative. Therefore, since this catastrophe was,
according to Plato's account, not very much more
than 10,000 years ago there should exist ample
evidence of a wholesale destruction of life,
especially in the flatter lands of the globe. Is
there such evidence ? Think of Darwin's account
of how the pampas of South America are in places
one huge grave-yard. Think, also, of the mam-
moth remains which strew the Tundras of Siberia,
and which are so numerous that some of the Arctic

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

islands are really covered with bones. There is
ample evidence of some great flood which would
exactly correspond with the effect produced by
the sinking of Atlantis. The tragedy broadens as
one thinks of it. Everyone everywhere must
have been drowned save only the hill-dwellers.
The object of the catastrophe was, according to
some occult information, to remove the Atlantean
race and make room for the Aryan, even as the
Lemurian had been removed to make room for
the Atlantean. How long has the Aryan race to
run ? The answer may depend upon themselves.
The great war is a warning bell perhaps.

I had a talk with a curious type of psychic
while I was in Auckland. He claimed to be a
psychologist who did not need to be put en
rapport with his object by any material starting
point. A piece of clothing is, as a rule, to a
psychometrist what it would be to a blood-
hound, the starting point of a chase which runs
down the victim. Thus Van Bourg, when he
discovered by crystal gazing the body of Mr.
Foxhall (I quote the name from memory) floating
in the Thames, began by covering the table with
the missing man's garments. This is the usual
procedure which will become more familiar as the
public learn the full utility of a psychic.

This gentlemen, Mr. Pearman, was a builder
by trade, a heavy, rather uneducated man with
the misty eye of a seer. He told me that if he
desired to turn his powers upon anything he had
only to sit in a dim room and concentrate his
thought upon the matter, without any material

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

nexus. For example, a murder had been done in
Western Australia. The police asked his help.
Using his power, he saw the man, a stranger, and
yet he knew that it was the man, descending the
Swan River in a boat. He saw him mix with the
dockmen of Fremantle. Then he saw him return
to Perth. Finally, he saw him take train on the
Transcontinental Railway. The police at once
acted, and intercepted the man, who was duly
convicted and hanged. This was one of several
cases which this man told me, and his stories
carried conviction with them. All this, although
psychic, has, of course, nothing to do with
spiritualism, but is an extension of the normal,
though undefined, powers of the human mind and
soul.

The reader will be relieved to hear that I did not
visit Rotorua. An itinerant lecturer upon an
unpopular cause has enough hot water without
seeking out a geyser. My travels would make
but an indifferent guide book, but I am bound to
put it upon record that Wellington is a very
singular city plastered upon the side of a very
steep hill. It is said that the plan of the city
was entirely drawn up in England under the
impression that the site was a flat one, and that
it was duly carried out on the perpendicular
instead of the horizontal. It is a town of fine
buildings, however, in a splendid winding estuary
ringed with hills. It is, of course, the capital, and
the centre of all officialdom in New Zealand, but
Auckland, in the north, is already the greater
city.

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I had the opportunity of spending the day after
my arrival with Dr. Morrice, who married the
daughter of the late Premier, Sir R. Seddon,
whom I had known in years gone by. Their
summer house was down the Bay, and so I had a
long drive which gave me an admirable chance of
seeing the wonderful panorama. It was blowing
a full gale, and the road is so exposed that even
motors are sometimes upset by the force of the
wind. On this occasion nothing more serious
befell us than the loss of Mr. Smythe's hat, which
disappeared with such velocity that no one was
able to say what had become of it. It simply was,
and then it was not. The yellow of the foreshore,
the green of the shallows, the blue mottled with
purple of the deep, all fretted with lines of foam,
made an exhilarating sight. The whole excursion
was a brief but very pleasant break in our round
of work. Another pleasant experience was that
I met Dr. Purdey, who had once played cricket
with me, when we were very young, at Edinburgh
University. Eheu fagaces ! I had also the plea-
sure of meeting Mr. Massey, the Premier, a bluff,
strong, downright man who impresses one with
his force and sincerity.

I had the privilege when I was at Wellington
of seeing the first edition of " Robinson Crusoe/ '
which came out originally in three volumes. I
had no idea that the three-decker dated back to
1719. It had a delightful map of the island
which would charm any boy, and must have been
drawn up under the personal guidance of Defoe
himself. I wonder that map has not been taken

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

as an integral part of the book, and reproduced
in every edition, for it is a fascinating and a
helpful document.

I saw this rare book in the Turnbull Library,
which, under the loving care of Mr. Anderson
(himself no mean poet), is a fine little collection
of books got together by a Wellington man of
business. In a raw young land such a literary
oasis is like a Gothic Cathedral in the midst of a
suburb of modern villas. Anyone can come in to
consult the books, and if I were a Wellingtonian I
would certainly spend a good deal of time there.
I handled with fitting reverence a first edition
of " Lyrical Ballads/' where, in 1798, Coleridge
and Wordsworth made their entry hand in hand
into poetical literature. I saw an original
Hakluyt, the book which has sent so many
brave hearts a-roving. There, too, was a precious
Kelmscott " Chaucer,' ' a Plutarch and Mon-
taigne, out of which Shakespeare might have done
his cribbing ; Capt. Cook's manuscript " Diary,"
written in the stiff hand of a very methodical
man ; a copy of Swinburne's " Poems and
Ballads," which is one of twenty from a recalled
edition, and many other very rare and worthy
volumes carefully housed and clad. I spent a
mellow hour among them.

I have been looking up all the old books upon
the Maoris which I could find, with the special
intent of clearing up their history, but while doing
so I found in one rather rare volume " Old New
Zealand," an account of a Maori seance, which
seems to have been in the early forties, and,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

therefore, older than the Hydesville knockings.
I only wish every honest materialist could read it
and compare it with the experiences which we
have, ourselves, independently reported. Surely
they cannot persist in holding that such identical
results are obtained by coincidence, or that fraud
would work in exactly the same fashion in two
different hemispheres.

A popular young chief had been killed in battle.
The white man was invited to join the solemn
circle who hoped to regain touch with him. The
seance was in the dark of a large hut, lit only by
the ruddy glow of a low fire. The white man, a
complete unbeliever, gives his evidence in grudg-
ing fashion, but cannot get past the facts. The
voice came, a strange melancholy sound, like the
wind blowing into a hollow vessel. " Salutation !
Salutation to you all ! To you, my tribe !
Family, I salute you ! Friends, I salute you ! "
When the power waned the voice cried, " Speak
to me, the family ! Speak to me!" In the
published dialogue between Dr. Hodgson after his
death and Professor Hyslop, Hodgson cries,
" Speak, Hyslop ! " when the power seemed to
wane. For some reason it would appear either by
vibrations or by concentrating attention to help
the communicator. "It is well with me," said
the chief. " This place is a good place." He was
with the dead of the tribe and described them, and
offered to take messages to them. The in-
credulous white man asked where a book had been
concealed which only the dead man knew about,
The place was named and the book found. The

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

white man himself did not know, so there was no
telepathy. Finally, with a " Farewell ! " which
came from high in the air, the spirit passed back
to immaterial conditions.

This is, I think, a very remarkable narrative.
If you take it as literally true, which I most
certainly do, since our experience corroborates it,
it gives us some points for reflection. One is that
the process is one known in all the ages, as our
Biblical reading has already told us. A second
is that a young barbarian chief with no ad-
vantages of religion finds the next world a very
pleasant place, just as our dead do, and that they
love to come back and salute those whom they
have left, showing a keen memory of their earth
life. Finally, we must face the conclusion that
the mere power of communication has no elevating
effect in itself, otherwise these tribes could not
have continued to be ferocious savages. It has
to be united with the Christ message from beyond
before it will really help us upon the upward path.

Before I left Wellington the spiritualists made
me a graceful presentation of a travelling rug,
and I was able to assure them that if they found
the rug I would find the travelling. It is made of
the beautiful woollen material in which New
Zealand is supreme. The presentation was made
by Mrs. Stables, the President of the New Zealand
Association, an energetic lady to whom the cause
owes much. A greenstone penholder was given
to me for my wife, and a little charm for my small
daughter, the whole proceedings being marked
with great cordiality and good feeling. The

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

faithful are strong in Wellington, but are much
divided among themselves, which, I hope, may
be alleviated as a consequence of my visit.
Nothing could have been more successful than
my two meetings. The Press was splendidly
sympathetic, and I left by a night boat in high
heart for my campaign in the South Island.

197

CHAPTER IX

The Anglican Colony. — Psychic dangers. — The learned dog. —
Absurd newspaper controversy. — A backward commu-
nity.— The Maori tongue. — Their origin. — Their treat-
ment by the Empire. — A fiasco. — The Pa of Kaiopoi. —
Dr. Thacker. — Sir Joseph Kinsey. — A generous collector.
— Scott and Amundsen. — Dunedin. — A genuine medium.
— Evidence. — The shipping strike. — Sir Oliver. — Fare-
well.

I am afraid that the average Britisher looks upon
New Zealand as one solid island. If he had to
cross Cook's Strait to get from the northern to
the southern half, he would never forget his
lesson in geography, for it can be as nasty a bit of
water as is to be found in the world, with ocean
waves, mountain winds and marine currents all
combining into a horrible chaos. Twelve good
hours separate Wellington in the north from
Lyttelton, which is the port of Christchurch in
the south. A very short railway joins the two
latter places. My luck held good, and I had an
excellent passage, dining in Wellington and break-
fasting in Christchurch. It is a fine city, the
centre of the famous Canterbury grazing country.
Four shiploads of people calling themselves the
Canterbury Pilgrims arrived here in 1852, built
a cathedral, were practically ruled over by Bishop

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Selwyn, and tried the successful experiment of
establishing a community which should be as
Anglican as New England is Nonconformist.
The distinctive character has now largely dis-
appeared, but a splendid and very English city
remains as a memorial of their efforts. When
you are on the green, sloping banks of the river
Avon, with the low, artistic bridges, it would not
be hard to imagine that you were in the Backs at
Cambridge.

At Christchurch I came across one of those
little bits of psychic evidence which may be taken
as certainly true, and which can be regarded,
therefore, as pieces which have to be fitted into
the jig-saw puzzle in order to make the com-
pleted whole, at that far off date when a
completed whole is within the reach of man's
brain. It concerns Mr. Michie, a local Spiritualist
of wide experience. On one occasion some years
ago, he practised a short cut to psychic power,
acquired through a certain method of breathing
and of action, which amounts, in my opinion, to
something in the nature of self-hypnotisation. I
will not give details, as I think all such exercises
are dangerous save for very experienced students
of these matters, who know the risk and are pre-
pared to take it. The result upon Mr. Michie,
through some disregard upon his part of the
conditions which he was directed to observe, was
disastrous. He fell into an insidious illness with
certain psychic symptoms, and within a few
months was reduced to skin and bone. Mr.
Michie's wife is mediumistic and liable to be

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controlled. One day an entity came to her and
spoke through her to her husband, claiming to be
the spirit of one, Gordon Stanley. He said : " I
can sympathise with your case, because my own
death was brought about in exactly the same way.
I will help you, however, to fight against it and to
recover/' The spirit then gave an account of his
own life, described himself as a clerk in Cole's
Book Arcade in Melbourne, and said that his
widow was living at an address in Melbourne,
which was duly given. Mr. Michie at once wrote
to this address and received this reply, the original
of which I have seen :

" Park Street,

" Melbourne.

" Dear Sir, — i" have just received your strange
— / must say, your very strange letter. Yes, I
am Mrs. Stanley. My husband did die two
years ago from consumption. He was a clerk
in Coles Arcade. I must say your letter gave
me a great shock. But I cannot doubt after
what you have said, for I know you are a complete
stranger to me."

Shortly afterwards Mr. Stanley returned again
through the medium, said that his widow was
going to marry again, and that it was with his
full approbation. The incident may be taken by
our enemies as illustrating the danger of psychic
research, and we admit that there are forms of it
which should be approached with caution, but I
do not think that mankind will ever be warned off

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by putting a danger label upon it, so long as
they think there is real knowledge to be gained.
How could the motor-car or the aeroplane have
been developed if hundreds had not been ready
to give their lives to pay the price ? Here the
price has been far less, and the goal far higher,
but if in gaining it a man were assured that he
would lose his health, his reason, or his life, it is
none the less his duty to go forward if he clearly
sees that there is something to be won. To meet
death in conquering death is to die in victory —
the ideal death.

Whilst I was at Auckland Mr. Poynton, a
stipendiary magistrate there, told me of a dogin
Christchurch which had a power of thought com-
parable, not merely to a human being, but even,
as I understood him, to a clairvoyant, as it would
bark out the number of coins in your pocket and
other such questions. The alternative to clair-
voyance was that he was a very quick and accurate
thought-reader, but in some cases the power
seemed to go beyond this. Mr. Poynton, who
had studied the subject, mentioned four learned
beasts in history : a marvellous horse in Shake-
speare's time, which was burned with its master in
Florence ; the Boston skipper's dog ; Hans, the
Russian horse, and Darkie of Christchurch. He
investigated the latter himself, as one of a com-
mittee of three. On the first occasion they got
no results. On the second, ninety per cent, of the
questions were right, and they included sums of
addition, subtraction, etc. " It was uncanny/'
he wrote.

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I called, therefore, upon Mrs. McGibbon, the
owner, who allowed me to see the dog. He was
a dark, vivacious fox terrier, sixteen years old,
blind and deaf, which obviously impaired his
powers. In spite of his blindness he dashed at
me the moment he was allowed into the room,
pawing at me and trembling all over with excite-
ment. He was, in fact so excited that he was of
little use for demonstration, as when once he
began to bark he could not be induced to stop.
Occasionally he steadied down, and gave us a
touch of his true quality. When a half-crown was
placed before him and he was asked how many
sixpences were in it, he gave five barks, and four
for a florin, but when a shilling was substituted he
gave twelve, which looked as if he had pennies in
his mind. On the whole the performance was a
failure, but as he had raised by exhibiting his
gifts, £138 for war charities, I took my hat off to
him all the same. I will not imitate those psychic
researchers who imagine that because they do not
get a result, therefore, every one else who has
reported it is a cheat or a fool. On the contrary,
I have no doubt that the dog had these powers,
though age and excitement have now impaired
them.

The creature's powers were first discovered
when the son of the house remarked one day:
" I will give you a biscuit if you bark three times."
He at once did it. " Now, six times." He did so.
" Now, take three off." He barked three times
once again. Since then they have hardly found
any problem he could not tackle. When asked

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how many males in the room he always included
himself in the number, but omitted himself when
asked how many human beings. One wonders
how many other dogs have human brains without
the humans being clever enough to detect it.

I had an amusing controversy in Christchurch
with one of the local papers, The Press, which
represents the clerical interest, and, also, the
clerical intolerance of a cathedral city. It issued
an article upon me and my beliefs, severe, but
quite within the limits of legitimate criticism,
quoting against me Professor Hyslop, " who/'
it said, " is Professor of Logic at Columbia, etc/'
To this I made the mild and obvious retort in the
course of my lecture that as Professor Hyslop
was dead, The Press went even further than I
in saying that he is Professor at Columbia/ '
Instead of accepting this correction, The Press
made the tactical error of standing by their
assertion, and aggravated it by head-lines which
challenged me, and quoted my statement as
" typical of the inaccuracy of a Spiritualist." As
I rather pride myself on my accuracy, which has
seldom been challenged, I answered shortly but
politely, as follows :

" Sir, — / am surprised that the news of the
death of Professor Hyslop has not reached New
Zealand, and even more surprised that it could
be imagined that I would make such a statement
on a matter so intimately connected with the
subject upon which I lecture without being sure
of my fact. I am reported as saying ' some

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

years,' but, if so, it was a slip of the tongue for
* some time.' The Professor died either late last
year or early in the present one!1

I should have thought that my answer was
conclusive, and would have elicited some sort of
apology ; but instead of this, The Press called
loudly upon me in a leading article to apologise,
though for what I know not, save that they
asserted I had said " some years/' whereas I
claim that I actually said " some time/' This
drew the following rather more severe letter from
me :

" Sir, — I am collecting New Zealand curiosities,
so I will take your leading article home with me.
To get the full humour of it one has to remember
the sequence of events. In a leading article you
remarked that Professor Hyslop is Professor of
Logic. I answered with mild irony that he
certainly is not, as he had been dead ' some years '
or ' some time ' — which of the two is perfectly
immaterial, since I presume that in either case
you would agree that he has ceased to be Professor
of Logic. To this you were rash enough to reply
with a challenging article with large head-lines,
declaring that I had blundered, and that this
was typical of the inaccuracy of Spiritualists. I
wrote a gentle remonstrance to show that I had
not blundered, and that my assertion was
essentially true, since the man was dead. This
you now tacitly admit, but instead of expressing
regret you ask for an apology from me. I have

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engaged in much newspaper controversy , but I
can truly say that I can recall no such instance of
effrontery as this!'

This led to another leader and considerable
abuse.

The controversy was, however, by no means
one-sided, in spite of the shadow of the Cathedral.
Mr. Peter Trolove is a man of wit as well as
knowledge, and wields a pretty pen. A strong
man, also, is Dr. John Guthrie, whose letter
contains words so kindly that I must quote
them :

" Sir Arthur Conan Doyle stands above it all,
not only as a courteous gentleman, but as a fair
controversialist throughout. He is, anyhow, a
chivalrous and magnanimous personality, whether
or not his beliefs have any truth. Fancy quoting
authorities against a man who has spent great
part of his life studying the subject, and who
knows the authorities better than all his opponents
put together — a man who has deliberately used
his great gifts in an honest attempt to get at
truth. I do think that Christchurch has some
need to apologise for its controversialists — much
more need than our distinguished visitor has to
apologise for what we all know to be his honest
convictions."

I have never met Dr. John Guthrie in the flesh,
but I would thank him here, should this ever
meet his eye, for this kindly protest.

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It will be gathered that I succeeded at Christ-
church in performing the feat of waking up a
Cathedral City, and all the ex-sleepers were pro-
testing loudly against such a disturbing inrush
from the outer world. Glancing at the head
lines I see that Bishop Brodie declared it to be
" A blasphemy nurtured in fraud," the Dean of
Christchurch writes it down as " Spiritism, the
abrogation of Reason," the Rev. John Patterson
calls it " an ancient delusion," the Rev. Mr.
North says it is "a foolish Paganism," and the
Rev. Mr. Ready opines that it is "a gospel
of uncertainty and conjecture." Such are the
clerical leaders of thought in Christchurch in the
year 1920. I think of what the wise old Chinese
Control said of similar types at the Melbourne
Rescue Circle. " He good man but foolish man.
He learn better. Never rise till he learn better.
Plenty time yet." Who loses except themselves ?

The enormous number of letters which I get upon
psychic subjects — which I do my best to answer
— give me some curious sidelights, but they are
often confidential, and would not bear publication.
Some of them are from devout, but narrow
Christians, who narrate psychic and prophetic
gifts which they possess, and at the same time
almost resent them on the ground that they are
condemned by the Bible. As if the whole Bible
was not psychic and prophetic ! One very long
letter detailed a whole succession of previsions of
the most exact character, and wound up by the
conviction that we were on the edge of some great
discovery. This was illustrated by a simile which

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seemed very happy. " Have you noticed a tree
covered in spider webs during a fog ? Well, it
was only through the law of the fog that we saw
them. They were there all the time, but only
when the moisture came could we see them." It
was a good illustration. Many amazing expe-
riences are detailed to me in every town I visit,
and though I have no time to verify them and go
into details, none the less they fit so accurately
with the various types of psychic cases with which
I am familiar that I cannot doubt that such
occurrences are really very common. It is the
injudicious levity with which they are met which
prevents their being published by those who
experience them.

As an amateur philologist of a superficial type, I
am greatly interested in studying the Maori
language, and trying to learn whence these
wonderful savages came before their twenty-two
terrible canoes came down upon the unhappy
land which would have been safer had as many
shiploads of tigers been discharged upon its beach.
The world is very old, and these folk have wandered
from afar, and by many devious paths. Surely
there are Celtic traces both in their appearance,
their character and their language. An old
Maori woman smoking her pipe is the very image
of an old Celtic woman occupied the same way.
Their word for water is wei, and England is full
of Wye and Way river names, dating from the
days before the Germans arrived. Strangest of
all is their name for the supreme God. A name
never mentioned and taboo among them, is Io.

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" J " is, of course, interchangeable with " I," so
that we get the first two letters of Jove and an
approximation of Jehovah. Papa is parent.
Altogether there is good evidence that they are
from the same root as some European races,
preferably the Celts. But on the top of this
comes a whole series of Japanese combinations of
letters, Rangi, Muru, Tiki, and so forth, so that
many of the place names seem pure Japanese.
What are we to make of such a mixture ? Is it
possible that one Celtic branch, far away in the
mists of time, wandered east while their racial
brethren wandered west, so that part reached far
Corea while the others reached Ireland ? Then,
after getting a tincture of Japanese terms and
word endings, they continued their migration,
taking to the seas, and finally subduing the
darker races who inhabited the Polynesian Islands,
so making their way to New Zealand. This wild
imagining would at least cover the observed facts.
It is impossible to look at some of the Maori faces
without realising that they are of European stock.
I must interpolate a paragraph here to say that
I was pleased, after writing the above, to find that
in my blind gropings I had come upon the main
conclusions which have been put forward with
very full knowledge by the well-known authority,
Dr. McMillan Brown. He has worked out the
very fact which I surmised, that the Maoris are
practically of the same stock as Europeans, that
they had wandered Japan-wards, and had finally
taken to the sea. There are two points of interest
which show the date of their exodus was a very

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ancient one. The first is that they have not the
use of the bow. The second is that they have no
knowledge of metals. Such knowledge once
possessed would never have been lost, so it is safe
to say that they left Asia a thousand years (as a
minimum) before Christ, for at that date the use
of bronze, at any rate, was widespread. What
adventures and vicissitudes this remarkable race,
so ignorant in some directions and so advanced in
others, must have endured during those long
centuries. If you look at the wonderful ornaments
of their old war canoes, which carry a hundred men,
and can traverse the whole Pacific, it seems almost
incredible that human patience and ingenuity
could construct the whole fabric with instruments
of stone. They valued them greatly when once
they were made, and the actual names of the twenty-
two original invading canoes are still recorded.

In the public gallery of Auckland they have a
duplicate of one of these enormous canoes. It is
87 feet in length and the thwarts are broad enough
to hold three or four men. When it was filled
with its hundred warriors, with the chief standing
in the centre to give time to the rowers, it must,
as it dashed through the waves, have been a truly
terrific object. I should think that it represented
the supreme achievement of neolithic man. There
are a series of wonderful pictures of Maori life in
the same gallery by Goldie and Steele. Of these
I reproduce, by permission, one which represents
the starving crew of one canoe sighting the distant
shore. The engraving only gives a faint indication
of the effect of the vividly-coloured original.

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Reference has been made to the patient industry
of the Maori race. A supreme example of this is
that every man had his tikki, or image of a little
idol made of greenstone, which was hung round his
neck. Now, this New Zealand greenstone is one of
the hardest obj ects in nature, andyet it is worn down
without metals into these quaint figures. On an
average it took ten years to make one, and it was
rubbed down from a chunk of stone into an image
by the constant friction of a woman's foot.

It is said that the Tahungas, or priests, have
much hereditary knowledge of an occult sort.
Their oracles were famous, and I have already
quoted an example of their seances. A student
of Maori lore told me the following interesting
story. He was a student of Maori words, and on
one occasion a Maori chief let slip an unusual word,
let us say " bum," and then seemed confused and
refused to answer when the Englishman asked the
meaning. The latter took it to a friend, a Tohunga,
who seemed much surprised and disturbed, and
said it was a word of which a paheka or white man
should know nothing. Not to be beaten, my
informant took it to an old and wise chief who
owed him a return for some favours. This chief
was also much exercised in mind when he heard
the word, and walked up and down in agitation.
Finally he said, " Friend, we are both Christians.
You remember the chapter in the Bible where
Jacob wrestled with an angel. Well, this word
1 buru ' represents that for which they were
wrestling." He would say no more and there it
had perforce to be left.

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The British Empire may be proud of their
treatment of the Maoris. Like the Jews, they
object to a census, but their number cannot be
more than 50,000 in a population of over a million.
There is no question, therefore, of our being con-
strained to treat them well. Yet they own vast
tracts of the best land in the country, and so un-
questioned are their rights that when they forbade
a railway to pass down the centre of the North
Island, the traffic had to go by sea from Auckland
until, at last, after many years, it was shown to
the chiefs that their financial interests would be
greatly aided by letting the railway through.
These financial interests are very large, and many
Maoris are wealthy men, buying expensive motor
cars and other luxuries. Some of the more edu-
cated take part in legislative work, and are
distinguished for their eloquence. The half-castes
make a particularly fine breed, especially in their
youth, for they tend as they grow older to revert
to the pure Maori type. New Zealand has no
national sin upon its conscience as regards, the
natives, which is more, I fear, than can be said
whole-heartedly for Australia, and even less for
Tasmania. Our people never descended to the
level of the old Congo, but they have something
on their conscience none the less.

On December 18th there was some arrangement
by which I should meet the Maoris and see the
historic Pa of Kaiopoi. The affair, however, was,
I am sorry to say, a fiasco. As we approached the
building, which was the village school room, there
emerged an old lady — a very old lady — who uttered

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a series of shrill cries, which I was told meant
welcome, though they sounded more like the other
thing. I can only trust that my informants were
right. Inside was a very fine assemblage of
atmospheric air, and of nothing else. The ex-
planation was that there had been a wedding the
night before, and that the whole community had
been — well, tired,- Presently a large man
in tweeds of the reach-me-dowTn variety appeared
upon the scene, and several furtive figures, including
a row of children, materialised in corners of
the big empty room. The visitors, who were more
numerous than the visited, sat on a long bench
and waited developments which refused to develop.
My dreams of the dignified and befeathered savage
were drifting away. Finally, the large man, with
his hands in his pockets, and looking hard at a
corner of the rafters, made a speech of welcome,
punctuated by long stops and gaps. He then, at
our request, repeated it in Maori, and the children
were asked to give a Maori shout, which they
sternly refused to do. I then made a few feeble
bleats, uncertain whether to address my remarks
to the level of the large man or to that of the row
of children. I ended by handing over some books
for their library, and we then escaped from this
rather depressing scene.

But it was a very different matter with the Pa.
I found it intensely interesting. You could still
trace quite clearly the main lines of the battle
which destroyed it. It lay on about five acres of
ground, with deep swamp all round save for one
frontage of some hundreds of yards. That was

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

all which really needed defence. The North
Island natives, who were of a sterner breed than
those of the South, came down under the famous
Rauparaha (these Maori names are sad snags in
a story) and besieged the place. One can see the
saps and follow his tactics, which ended by piling
brushwood against the palings — please observe
the root " pa " in palings — with the result that
he carried the place. Massacre Hill stands close
by, and so many of the defenders were eaten that
their gnawed bones covered the ground within
the memory of living men. Such things may have
been done by the father of the elderly gentleman
who passes you in his motor car with his race
glasses slung across his chest. The siege of
Kaiopoi was about 1831. Even on a fine sunlit
day I was conscious of that heavy atmosphere
within the enclosure which impresses itself upon
me when I am on the scene of ancient violence.
So frightful an episode within so limited a space,
where for months the garrison saw its horrible
fate drawing nearer day by day, must surely have
left some etheric record even to our blunt senses.
I was indebted to Dr. Thacker, the mayor, for
much kind attention whilst in Christchurch. He
is a giant man, but a crippled giant, alas, for he
still bears the traces of an injury received in a
historic football match, which left his and my old
University of Edinburgh at the top of the tree in
Scotland. He showed me some curious, if ghastly,
relics of his practice. One of these was a tumour
of the exact size and shape of a boxing glove,
thumb and all, which he cut out of the back of a

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

boxer who had lost a glove fight and taken it
greatly to heart. Always on many converging
lines we come back to the influence of mind over
matter.

Another most pleasant friendship which I made
in Christcfmrch was with Sir Joseph Kinsey, who
has acted as father to several successive British
Arctic expeditions. Scott and Shackleton have
both owed much to him, their constant agent,
adviser and friend. Scott's dying hand traced a
letter to him, so unselfish and so noble that it
alone would put Scott high in the gallery of
British worthies. Of all modern men of action
Scott seems to me the most lofty. To me he was
only an acquaintance, but Kinsey, who knew him
well as a friend, and Lady Kinsey, who had all
Arctic exploration at her finger ends, were of the
same opinion.

Sir Joseph discussed the action of Amundsen in
making for the pole. When it was known that
Amundsen was heading south instead of pursuing
his advertised intentions, Kinsey smelled danger
and warned Scott, who, speaking from his own
noble loyalty, said, " He would never do so dis-
honourable a thing. My plans are published and
are known to all the world.' ' However, when he
reached the ice, and when Pennell located the
" Fram," he had to write and admit that Kinsey
was right. It was a sad blow, that forestalling,
though he took it like the man that he was. None
the less, it must have preyed upon the spirits of all
his party and weakened their resistance in that cruel
return journey. On the other hand Amundsen's

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

expedition, which was conducted on rather less
than a sixth of the cost of the British, was a
triumph of organisation, and he had the good luck
or deep wisdom to strike a route which was clear
of those great blizzards which overwhelmed Scott.
The scurvy was surely a slur upon our medical
preparations. According to Stefansson, who
knows more of the matter than any living man,
lime juice is useless, vegetables are of secondary
importance, but fresh animal food, be it seal,
penguin, or what you will, is the final preventive!

Sir Joseph is a passionate and discriminating
collector, and has but one fault in collecting,
which is a wide generosity. You have but to
visit him often enough and express sufficient
interest to absorb all his treasures. Perhaps my
protests were half-hearted, but I emerged from
his house with a didrachm of Alexander, a tetra-
drachm of some Armenian monarch, a sheet of
rare Arctic stamps for Denis, a lump of native
greenstone, and a small nugget of gold. No
wonder when I signed some books for him I
entered the date as that of " The Sacking of
Woomeroo," that being the name of his dwelling
The mayor, in the same spirit of hospitality,
pressed upon me a huge bone of the extinct Moa,
but as I had never failed to impress upon my wife
the extreme importance of cutting down our
luggage, I could not face the scandal of appearing
with this monstrous impediment um.

Leaving Christchurch in the journalistic uproar
to which allusion has been made, our engagements
took us on to Dunedin, which is reached by rail

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in a rather tiring day's journey. A New Zealand
train is excellent while it is running, but it has a
way of starting with an epileptic leap, and stopping
with a bang, which becomes wearisome after a
while. On the other hand this particular journey
is beguiled by the fact that the line runs high for
two hours round the curve of the hills with the
Pacific below, so that a succession of marvellous
views opens out before you as you round each spur.
There can be few more beautiful lines.

Dunedin was founded in 1848 by a group of
Scotsmen, and it is modelled so closely upon
Edinburgh that the familiar street names all re-
appear, and even Portobello has its duplicate
outside the town. The climate, also, I should
judge to be about the same. The prevailing tone
of the community is still Scottish, which should
mean that they are sympathetic with my mission,
for nowhere is Spiritualism more firmly established
now than in Scotland, especially in Glasgow,
where a succession of great mediums and of earnest
workers have built up a considerable organisation.
I soon found that it was so, for nowhere had I
more private assurances of support, nor a better
public reception, the theatre being filled at each
lecture. In the intervals kind friends put their
motors at my disposal and I had some splendid
drives over the hills, which look down upon the
winding estuary at the head of which the town is
situated.

At the house of Mr. Reynolds, of Dunedin, I
met one of the most powerful clairvoyants and
trance mediums whom I have tested. Her name

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

is Mrs. Roberts, and though her worldly circum-
stances are modest, she has never accepted any
money for her wonderful psychic gifts. For this
I honour her, but, as I told her, we all sell the
gifts which God has given us, and I cannot see
why, and within reason, psychic gifts should not
also be placed within the reach of the public,
instead of being confined to a favoured few. How
can the bulk of the people ever get into touch
with a good medium if they are debarred from
doing so in the ordinary way of business ?

Mrs. Roberts is a stout, kindly woman, with a
motherly manner, and a sensitive, expressive face.
When in touch with my conditions she at once gave
the names of several relatives and friends who have
passed over, without any slurring or mistakes.
She then cried, " I see an elderly lady here — she
is a beautifully high spirit — her name is Selina."
This rather unusual name belonged to my wife's
mother, who died nearly two years ago. Then,
suddenly, becoming slightly convulsed, as a
medium does when her mechanism is controlled
by another, she cried with an indescribable inten-
sity of feeling, " Thank God ! Thank God to get
in touch again ! Jean ! Jean ! Give my dear love
to Jean ! ,J Both names, therefore, had been got
correctly, that of the mother and the daughter.
Is it not an affront to reason to explain away such
results by wild theories of telepathy, or by any-
thing save the perfectly plain and obvious fact
that spirit communion is indeed true, and that I
was really in touch with that dead lady who was,
even upon earth, a beautifully high and unselfish

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

spirit. I had a number of other communications
through Mrs. Roberts that night, and at a second
interview two days later, not one of which erred
so far as names were concerned. Among others was
one who professed to be Dr. Russell Wallace. I
should be honoured, indeed, to think that it was
so, but I was unable to hit on anything which
would be evidential. I asked him if his further
experience had taught him anything more about
reincarnation, which he disputed in his lifetime.
He answered that he now accepted it, though I am
not clear whether he meant for all cases. I
thanked him for any spiritual help I had from
him. His answer was " Me ! Don't thank me !
You would be surprised if you knew who your
real helpers are." He added, " By your work I
rise. We are co-workers ! ' I pray that it be
so, for few men have lived for whom I have greater
respect ; wise and brave, and mellow and good.
His biography was a favourite book of mine
long before I understood the full significance of
Spiritualism, which was to him an evolution of the
spirit on parallel lines to that evolution of the
body which he did so much to establish.

Now that my work in New Zealand was drawing
to a close a very grave problem presented itself
to Mr. Smythe and myself, and that was how we
were to get back to our families in Australia.
A strike had broken out, which at first seemed a
small matter, but it was accentuated by the
approach of Christmas and the fact that many of
the men were rather looking for an excuse for
a holiday. Every day things became blacker.

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Once before Mr. Smythe had been held up for
four months by a similar cause, and, indeed, it
has become a very serious consideration for all
who visit New Zealand. We made a forced
march for the north amid constant rumours that
far from reaching Australia we could not even get
to the North Island, as the twelve-hour ferry
boats were involved in the strike. I had every
trust in my luck, or, as I should prefer to say, in
my helpers, and we got the Maori on the last ferry
trip which she was sure to take. Up to the last
moment the firemen wavered, and we had no
stewards on board, but none the less, to our
inexpressible relief we got off. There was no food
on the ship and no one to serve it, so we went into
a small hostel at Lyttleton before we started, to
see what we could pick up. There was a man
seated opposite to me who assumed the air of
laboured courtesy and extreme dignity, which is
one phase of alcoholism.

" 'Scuse me, sir ! " said he, looking at me with
a glassy stare, " but you bear most 'straordinary
resemblance Olver Lodge."

I said something amiable.

" Yes, sir — 'straordinary ! Have you ever seen
Olver Lodge, sir ? "

" Yes, I have."

" Well, did you perceive resemblance ? "

" Sir Oliver, as I remember him, was a tall man
with a grey beard."

He shook his head at me sadly.

" No, sir — I heard him at Wellington last week.
No beard. A moustache, sir, same as your own."

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" You're sure it was Sir Oliver ? "

A slow smile came over his face.

" Blesh my soul — Conan Doyle — that's the
name. Yes, sir, you bear truly remarkable
resemblance Conan Doyle."

I did not say anything further so I daresay
he has not discovered yet the true cause of the
resemblance.

All the nerve-wracking fears of being held up
which we endured at Lyttleton were repeated at
Wellington, where we had taken our passages in
the little steamer Paloona. In any case we had
to wait for a day, which I spent in clearing up
my New Zealand affairs while Mr. Smythe inter-
viewed the authorities and paid no less than
£141 war tax upon the receipts of our lectures —
a heavy impost upon a fortnight's work. Next
morning, with our affairs and papers all in order,
we boarded our little craft.

Up to the last moment we had no certainty of
starting. Not only was the strike in the air, but
it was Christmas Eve, and it was natural enough
that the men should prefer their own homes to
the stokehole of the Paloona. Agents with offers
of increased pay were scouring the docks. Finally
our complement was completed, and it was a
glad moment when the hawsers were thrown off,
and after the usual uncomfortable preliminaries
we found ourselves steaming in a sharp wind
down the very turbulent waters of Cook's Strait.

The place is full of Cook's memory. Every-
where the great man has left his traces. We
passed Cook's Island where the Endeavour

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actually struck and had to be careened and
patched. What a nerve the fellow had ! So
coolly and deliberately did he do his work that
even now his charting holds good, I understand,
in many long stretches of coast. Tacking
and wearing, he poked and pried into every
estuary, naming capes, defining bays, plotting out
positions, and yet all the while at the mercy of
the winds, with a possible lee shore always before
him, with no comrade within hail, and with
swarms of cannibals eyeing his little ship from the
beach. After I have seen his work I shall feel
full of reverence every time I pass that fine
statue which adorns the mall side of the great
Admiralty building.

And now we are out in the open sea, with
Melbourne, Sydney and love in front of our
prow. Behind the sun sets in a slur of scarlet
above the olive green hills, while the heavy night
fog, crawling up the valleys, turns each of them
into a glacier. A bright star twinkles above.
Below a light shines out from the gloom. Fare-
well, New Zealand ! I shall never see you again,
but perhaps some memory of my visit may
remain — or not, as God pleases.

Anyhow, my own memory will remain.
Every man looks on his own country as God's
own country if it be a free land, but the New
Zealander has more reason than most. It is a
lovely place, and contains within its moderate
limits the agricultural plains of England, the lakes
and hills of Scotland, the glaciers of Switzerland,
and the fiords of Norway, with a fine hearty

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people, who do not treat the British newcomer
with ignorant contempt or hostility. There are
so many interests and so many openings that it is
hard to think that a man will not find a career in
New Zealand. Canada, Australia and South
Africa seem to me to be closely balanced so far
as their attractions for the emigrant goes, but
when one considers that New Zealand has neither
the winter of Canada, the droughts of Australia,
nor the racial problems of Africa, it does surely
stand supreme, though it demands, as all of them
do, both labour and capital from the newcomer.

222

CHAPTER X

Christian origins. — Mithraism. — Astronomy. — Exercising
boats. — Bad news from home. — Futile strikes. — Labour
Party. — The blue wilderness. — Journey to Brisbane. —
Warm reception. — Friends and foes. — Psychic experience
of Dr. Doyle. — Birds. — Criticism on Melbourne.—
Spiritualist Church. — Ceremony. — Sir Matthew Nathan.
— Alleged repudiation of Queensland. — Billy tea. — The
bee farm. — Domestic service in Australia. — Hon. John
Fihilly. — Curious photograph by the state photographer.
—The " Orsova."

The voyage back from New Zealand to Melbourne
was pleasant and uneventful, though the boat was
small and there was a sea rough enough to upset
many of the passengers. We were fortunate in
our Captain, Doorby, who, I found, was a literary
confrere with two books to his credit, one of them
a record of the relief ship Morning, in which he had
served at the time of Scott's first expedition, the
other a little book, " The Handmaiden of the
Navy," which gave some of his adventures and
experiences in the merchant service during the
great war. He had been torpedoed once, and
had lost, on another occasion, nearly all his crew
with plague, so that he had much that was
interesting to talk about. Mr. Blake, of the
Strand Magazine, was also on board. A Unitarian
Minister, Mr. Hale, was also a valuable com-
panion, and we had much discussion over the

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origins of Christianity, which was the more
interesting to me as I had taken advantage of the
voyage to re-read the Acts and Paul's Epistles.
There are no documents which can be read so
often and yet reveal something new, the more so
when you have that occult clue which is needful
before Paul can be understood. It is necessary
also to know something of Mythra worship and
the other philosophies which Paul had learned, and
woven into his Christianity. I have stated else-
where my belief that all expressions about
redemption by blood, the blood of the lamb, etc.,
are founded upon the parallel of the blood of
the bull which was shed by the Mythra- worship-
pers, and in which they were actually baptised.
Enlarging upon this, Mr. Hale pointed out on the
authority, if I remember right, of Pfleiderer's
" Christian Origins/ ' that in the Mythra service
something is placed over the candidate, a hide
probably, which is called " putting on Mythra,"
and corresponds with Paul's expression about
" putting on Christ." Paul, with his tremendous
energy and earnestness, fixed Christianity upon
the world, but I wonder what Peter and those
who had actually heard Christ's words thought
about it all. We have had Paul's views about
Christ, but we do not know Christ's views about
Paul. He had been, as we are told by himself, a
Jewish Pharisee of the strictest type in his youth
at Jerusalem, but was a Roman citizen, had
lived long at Tarsus, which was a centre of
Mithraism, and was clearly famous for his learning,
since Festus twitted him with it. The simple

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

tenets of the carpenter and the fishermen would
take strange involved forms in such a brain as
that. His epistles are presumably older than the
gospels, which may, in their simplicity, represent
a protest against his confused theology.

It was an enjoyable voyage in the little Paloona,
and rested me after the whirlwind campaign of
New Zealand. In large liners one loses in romance
what one gains in comfort. On a small ship one
feels nearer to Nature, to the water and even to
the stars. On clear nights we had magnificent
displays of the Southern heaven. I profited by
the astronomical knowledge of Mr. Smythe. Here
first I was introduced to Alpha Centauri, w7hich is
the nearest fixed star, and, therefore, the cobber
to the sun. It is true that it is distant 3 J years
of light travel, and light travels at about 182,000
miles a second, but when one considers that it
takes centuries for average starlight to reach us,
we may consider Alpha as snuggling close up to
us for companionship in the lonely wastes of space.
The diamond belt of Orion looks homely enough
with the bright solitaire Sirius sparkling beside
it, but there are the Magellanic clouds, the
scattered wisps torn from the Milky Way, and
there is the strange black space called the Coal-
sack, where one seems to look right past all
created things into a bottomless void. What
would not Galileo and all the old untravelled
astronomers have given to have one glimpse of
this wondrous Southern display ?

Captain Doorby, finding that he had time in
hand, ran the ship into a small deserted bay upon

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

the coast, and, after anchoring, ordered out all
the boats for the sake of practice. It was very
well done, and yet what I saw convinced me that
it should be a Board of Trade regulation, if it is
not one already, that once, at least, near the
beginning of every long voyage, this should be
compulsory. It is only when you come to launch
them that you really realise which of the davits
is rusted up, and which block is tangled, or which
boat is without a plug. I was much impressed
by this idea as I watched the difficulties which
were encountered even in that secluded anchorage.
The end of my journey was uneventful, but my
joy at being reunited with my family was clouded
by the news of the death of my mother. She was
eighty-three years of age, and had for some years
been almost totally blind, so that her change was
altogether a release, but it was sad to think that
we should never see the kind face and gracious
presence again in its old material form. Denis
summed up our feelings when he cried, " What a
reception Grannie must have had ! ' There was
never any one who had so broad and sympathetic
a heart, a world-mother mourning over everything
which was weak or oppressed, and thinking
nothing of her own time and comfort in her
efforts to help the sufferers. Even when blind
and infirm she would plot and plan for the benefit
of others, thinking out their needs, and bringing
about surprising results by her intervention. For
my own psychic work she had, I fear, neither
sympathy nor understanding, but she had an
innate faith and spirituality which were so natural

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

to her that she could not conceive the needs of
others in that direction. She understands now.

Whilst in the Blue Mountains I was forced to
reconsider my plans on account of the strike which
has paralysed all coastal trade. If I should be
able to reach Tasmania I might be unable to
return, and it would, indeed, be a tragic situation
if my family were ready to start for England in
the N alder a, and I was unable to join them.
I felt, therefore, that I was not justified in going
to Tasmania, even if I were able, which is very
doubtful. It was sad, as it spoiled the absolute
completeness of my tour, but on the other hand
I felt sure that I should find plenty of work to
do on the mainland, without taking so serious a
risk.

It is a terrible thing to see this young country,
which needs every hour of time and every ounce of
energy for its speedy development frittering itself
away in these absurd conflicts, which never give
any result to compare with the loss. One feels
that in the stern contests of nations one will arise
which has economic discipline, and that none
other could stand against it. If the training of
reorganised Germany should take this shape she
will conquer and she will deserve to conquer. It
is a monstrous abuse that Compulsory Arbitration
Courts should be established, as is the case in
Australia, and that Unions should either strike
against their decisions, or should anticipate their
decisions, as in the case of these stewards, by
forcing a strike. In such a case I hold that the
secretary and every other official of the Union

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

should be prosecuted and heavily fined, if not

imprisoned. It is the only way by which the

community can be saved from a tyranny which is

quite as real as that of any autocrat. What

would be said, for example, of a king who cut off

the islands of Tasmania and New Zealand from

communication with the outer world, deranging

the whole Christmas arrangements of countless

families who had hoped to reunite ? Yet this is

what has been done by a handful of stewards

with some trivial grievance. A fireman who objects

to the cooking can hold up a great vessel.

There is nothing but chaos in front of a nation

unless it insists upon being master in its own

house, and forbids either employed or employer

to do that which is for the common scathe. The

time seems to be coming when Britons, the world

over, will have to fight for liberty against licence

just as hard as ever they fought for her against

tyranny. This I say with full sympathy for the

Labour Party, which I have often been tempted

to join, but have always been repelled by their

attempt to bully the rest of the State instead of

using those means which would certainly ensure

their legitimate success, even if it took some years

to accomplish. There are many anomalies and

injustices, and it is only a people's party which

can set them right. Hereditary honours are an

injustice, lands owned by feudal or royal gift are

an injustice, increased private wealth through

the growth of towns is an injustice, coal royalties

are an injustice, the expense of the law is a glaring

injustice, the support of any single religion by

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

the State is an injustice, our divorce laws are an
injustice — with such a list a real honest Labour
Party would be a sure winner if it could persuade
us all that it would not commit injustices itself,
and bolster up labour artificially at the expense of
every one else. It is not organised labour which
moves me, for it can take care of itself, but it is
the indigent governesses with thirty pounds a
year, the broken people, the people with tiny
pensions, the struggling widows with children —
when I think of all these and then of the man
who owns a county I feel that there is something
deeply, deeply wrong which nothing but some
great strong new force can set right.

One finds in the Blue Mountains that oppor-
tunity of getting alone with real Nature, which is
so healing and soothing a thing. The wild scrub
flows up the hillsides to the very grounds of the
hotels, and in a very few minutes one may find
oneself in the wilderness of ferns and gum trees
unchanged from immemorial ages. It is a very
real danger to the young or to those who have no
sense of direction, for many people have wandered
off and never come back alive — in fact, there is a
specially enrolled body of searchers who hunt for
the missing visitor. I have never in all my
travels seen anything more spacious and wonder-
ful than the view from the different sandstone
bluffs, looking down into the huge gullies beneath,
a thousand feet deep, where the great gum trees
look like rows of cabbages. I suppose that in
water lies the force which, in the course of ages,
has worn down the soft, sandy rock and formed

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these colossal clefts, but the effects are so enor-
mous that one is inclined to think some great
earth convulsion must also have been concerned
in their production. Some of the cliffs have a
sheer drop of over one thousand feet, which is
said to be unequalled in the world.

These mountains are so precipitous and tor-
tuous, presenting such a maze to the explorer,
that for many years they were a formidable
barrier to the extension of the young Colony.
There were only about forty miles of arable land
from the coast to the great Hawkesbury River,
which winds round the base of the mountains.
Then came this rocky labyrinth. At last, in 1812,
four brave and persevering men — Blaxland,
Evans, Went worth and Lawson — took the matter
in hand, and after many adventures, blazed a
trail across, by which all the splendid hinterland
was opened up, including the gold fields, which
found their centre in the new town of Bathurst.
When one reflects that all the gold had to be
brought across this wilderness, with unexplored
woodlands fringing the road, it is no wonder that
a race of bushrangers sprang into existence, and
the marvel is that the police should ever have
been able to hunt them down. So fresh is all
this very vital history in the development of a
nation, that one can still see upon the trees the
marks of the explorers' axes, as they endeavoured
to find a straight trail among the countless
winding gullies. At Mount York, the highest
view-point, a monument has been erected to

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them, at the place from which they got the first
glimpse of the promised land beyond.

We had been told that in the tropical weather
now prevailing, it was quite vain for us to go to
Queensland, for no one would come to listen to
lectures. My own belief was, however, that this
subject has stirred people very deeply, and that
they will suffer any inconvenience to learn about
it. Mr. Smythe was of opinion, at first, that my
audiences were drawn from those who came from
curiosity because they had read my writings, but
when he found that the second and the third meet-
ings were as full as the first, he was forced to admit
that the credit of success lay with the matter
rather than with the man. In any case I reflected
that my presence in Brisbane wrould certainly
bring about the usual Press controversy, with a
free ventilation of the subject, so we determined
to go. Mr. Smythe, for once, did not accompany
us, but the very capable lady who assists him,
Miss Sternberg, looked after all arrangements.

It was a very wearisome train journey of
twenty-eight hours ; tropically hot, rather dusty,
with a change in the middle, and the usual stuffi-
ness of a sleeper, which was superior to the ordinary
American one, but below the British standard.
How the Americans, with their nice sense of
decency, can stand the awful accommodation
their railway companies give them, or at any rate,
used to give them, is incomprehensible, but public
opinion in all matters asserts itself far less directly
in America than in Britain. Australia is half-way
between, and, certainly, I have seen abuses there

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

in the management of trains, posts, telegrams
and telephones, which would have evoked loud
protests at home. I think that there is more
initiative at home. For example, when the
railway strike threatened to throttle the country,
the public rose to the occasion and improvised
methods which met the difficulty. I have not
heard of anything of the kind in the numerous
strikes with which this community is harassed.
Any individual action arouses attention. I
remember the amusement of the Hon. Agar
Wynne when, on arriving late at Melbourne, in
the absence of porters, I got a trolley, placed my
own luggage on it, and wheeled it to a cab. Yet
we thought nothing of that when labour was
short in London.

The country north of Sydney is exactly like
the Blue Mountains, on a lesser scale — riven ranges
of sandstone covered with gum trees. I cannot
understand those who say there is nothing worth
seeing in Australia, for I know no big city which
has glorious scenery so near it as Sydney. After
crossing the Queensland border, one comes to
the Darling Downs, unsurpassed for cattle and
wheat. Our first impressions of the new State
were that it was the most naturally rich of any
Australian Colony, and the longer we were in it,
the more did we realise that this was indeed so.
It is so enormous, however, that it is certain,
sooner or later, to be divided into a South, Middle,
and North, each of which will be a large and
flourishing community. We observed from the
railway all sorts of new vegetable life, and I was

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

especially interested to notice that our English
Yellow Mullein was lining the track, making its
way gradually up country.

Even Sydney did not provide a warmer and
more personal welcome than that which we both
received when we at last reached Brisbane. At
Toowoomba, and other stations on the way, small
deputations of Spiritualists had met the train,
but at Brisbane the platform was crowded. My
wife was covered with flowers, and we were soon
made to realise that we had been misinformed in
the south, when we were told that the movement
was confined to a small circle.

We were tired, but my wife rose splendidly to
the occasion. The local paper says : " Carefully
concealing all feelings of fatigue and tiredness
after the long and wearisome train journey from
Sydney, Lady Doyle charmed the large gathering
of Spiritualists assembled at the Central Railway
Station on Saturday night, to meet her and her
husband. In vivacious fashion, Lady Doyle re-
sponded to the many enthusiastic greetings, and
she was obviously delighted with the floral gifts
presented to her on her arrival. To a press
representative, Lady Doyle expressed her ad-
miration of the Australian scenery, and she referred
enthusiastically to the Darling Downs district
and to the Toowoomba Range. During her
husband's absence in New Zealand, Lady Doyle
and her children spent a holiday in the Blue
Mountains (New South Wales), and were delighted
with the innumerable gorgeous beauty spots there/'

After a short experience, when we were far from

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

comfortable, we found our way to the Bellevue
Hotel, where a kindly old Irish proprietress,
Mrs. Finegan, gave us greater attention and luxury
than we had found anywhere up to then on the
Australian continent.

The usual press discussion was in full swing.
The more bigoted clergy in Brisbane, as elsewhere,
were very vituperative, but so unreasonable and
behind their own congregations in knowledge
and intelligence, that they must have alienated
many who heard them. Father Lane, for example,
preaching in the cathedral, declared that the
whole subject was " an abomination to the Lord."
He does not seem to have asked himself why the
Lord gave us these powers if they are an abomina-
tion. He also declared that we denied our moral
responsibility to God in this life, a responsibility
which must have weighed rather lightly upon
Father Lane when he made so false a statement.
The Rev. L. H. Jaggers, not to be outdone in
absurdity by Father Lane, described all our
fellow-mortals of India, China and Japan as
" demoniacal races." Dr. Cosh put forward the
Presbyterian sentiment that I was Anti-Christ,
and a serious menace to the spiritual life of
Australia. Really, when I see the want of all
truth and charity shown by these gentlemen, it
does begin to convince me of the reality of
diabolical interference in the affairs of mankind,
for I cannot understand why, otherwise, such
efforts should be made to obscure, by falsehood
and abuse, the great revelation and comfort which
God has sent us. The opposition culminated

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

in an open letter from Dr. Cosh in the Mail,
demanding that I should define my exact views
as to the Trinity, the Atonement, and other such
mysteries. I answered by pointing out that all
the religious troubles of the past had come from
the attempt to give exact definitions of things
which were entirely beyond the human power of
thought, and that I refused to be led along so
dangerous a path. One Baptist clergyman,
named Rowe, had the courage to say that he was
on my side, but with that exception I fear that I
had a solid phalanx against me.

On the other hand, the general public were
amazingly friendly. It was the more wonderful
as it was tropical weather, even for Brisbane.
In that awful heat the great theatre could not
hold the people, and they stood in the upper
galleries, packed tightly, for an hour and a half
without a movement or a murmur. It was a really
wonderful sight. Twice the house was packed
this way, so (as the Tasmanian venture was now
hopeless, owing to the shipping strike) I deter-
mined to remain in our very comfortable quarters
at the Bellevue Hotel, and give one more lecture,
covering fresh ground. The subject opens up
so that I am sure I could lecture for a week
without repeating myself. On this occasion the
house was crowded once more. The theatrical
manager said, " Well, if it was comic opera in
the season, it could not have succeeded better ! "
I was rather exhausted at the end, for I spoke, as
usual, with no chairman, and gave them a full
ninety minutes, but it was nearing the end of my

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

work, and the prospect of the quiet time ahead
of us helped me on.

I met a kinsman, Dr. A. A. Doyle, who is a
distinguished skin specialist, in Brisbane. He
knew little of psychic matters, but he had met
with a remarkable experience. His son, a splendid
young fellow, died at the front. At that moment
his father woke to find the young soldier stooping
over him, his face quite close. He at once woke
his wife and told her that their son, he feared,
was dead. But here comes a fine point. He
said to the wife, " Eric has had a return of the
acne of the face, for which I treated him years
ago. I saw the spots." The next post brought a
letter, written before Eric's death, asking that
some special ointment should be sent, as his acne
had returned. This is a very instructive case,
as showing that even an abnormal thing is
reproduced at first upon the etheric body. But
what has a materialist to say to the whole story ?
He can only evade it, or fall back upon his
usual theory, that every one who reports such
occurrences is either a fool or a liar.

We had a pleasant Sunday among the birds of
Queensland. Mr. Chisholm, an enthusiastic bird-
lover, took us round to see two very large aviaries,
since the haunt of the wild birds was beyond our
reach. Birds in captivity have always saddened
me, but here I found them housed in such great
structures, with every comfort included, and every
natural enemy excluded, that really one could
not pity them. One golden pheasant amused us,
for he is a very conceited bird when all is well

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

with him, and likes to occupy the very centre of
the stage, with the spot light upon him, and a
chorus of drab hens admiring him from the rear.
We had caught him, however, when he was moult-
ing, and he was so conscious of his bedraggled
glories that he dodged about behind a barrel,
and scuttled under cover every time we tried to
put him out. A fearful thing happened one day,
for a careless maid left the door ajar, and in the
morning seventy of the inmates were gone. It
must have been a cruel blow to Mr. Baldwin,
who is devoted to his collection. However, he
very wisely left the door open, after securing the
remaining birds, and no less than thirty-four of
the refugees returned. The fate of the others
was probably tragic, for they were far from the
mountains which are their home.

Mr. Farmer Whyte, the very progressive editor
of the Daily Mail, who is miles ahead of most
journalists in psychic knowledge, took us for an
interesting drive through the dense woods of
One Tree Hill. Here we were courteously met
by two of the original owners, one of them an
iguana, a great, heavy lizard, which bolted up a
tree, and the other a kangaroo, who stood among
the brushwood, his ears rotating with emotion,
while he gazed upon our halted car. From the
summit of the hill one has a wonderful view of
the ranges stretching away to the horizon in all
directions, while at one's feet lies the very wide
spread city. As nearly every dwelling house is
a bungalow, with its own little ground, the
Australian cities take up great space, which is

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

nullified by their very excellent tram services. A
beautiful river, the Brisbane, rather wider than
the Thames, winds through the town, and has
sufficient depth to allow ocean steamers to come
within cab-drive of the hotels.

About this time I had the usual experience
which every visilor to the States or to the
Dominions is liable to, in that his own utterances
in his letters home get into print, and boomerang
back upon him. My own feelings, both to the
Australian people and their country, have been
so uniformly whole-hearted that I should have
thought no mischief could be made, but at the
same time, I have always written freely that
which I was prepared to stand by. In this case,
the extract, from a private letter, removed from
all modifying context, came through as follows :

" Sir Conan Doyle, quoted in the International
Psychic Gazette, in referring to his ' ups and
downs ' in Australia, says : ' Amid the "downs"
is the Press boycott, caused partly by ignorance
and want of proportion, partly by moral
cowardice and fear of finding out later that
they had backed the wrong horse, or had given
the wrong horse fair play. They are very back-
ward, and far behind countries like Iceland and
Denmark in the knowledge of what has been
done in Spiritualism. They are dear folk,
these Australians, but, Lord, they want
Spirituality, and dynamiting out of their
grooves ! The Presbyterians actually prayed
that I might not reach the country. This is

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rather near murder, if they thought their rotten
prayers would avail. The result was an excel-
lent voyage, but it is the spiritual deadness of
this place which gets on my nerves. ' ,:

This was copied into every paper in Australia,
but it was soon recognised that " this place "
was not Australia, but Melbourne, from which
the letter was dated. I have already recorded
how I was treated by the leading paper in that
city, and my general experience there was faith-
fully reflected in my remarks. Therefore, I had
nothing to withdraw. My more extended ex-
perience taught me that the general level of
intelligence and of spirituality in the Australasian
towns is as high as in the average towns of Great
Britain, though none are so far advanced as towns
like Manchester or Glasgow, nor are there the
same number of professional and educated men
who have come forward and given testimony.
The thirst for information was great, however,
and that proved an open mind, which must now
lead to a considerable extension of knowledge
within the churches as well as without.

My remarks had been caused by the action of
the Argus, but the Age, the other leading Mel-
bourne paper, seemed to think that its honour
was also touched, and had a very severe leading
article upon my delinquencies, and my alleged
views, which was, as usual, a wild travesty of my
real ones. It began this article by the assertion
that, apparently, I still thought that Australia
was inhabited by the aborigines, before I ventured

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

to bring forward such theories. Such a remark*
applied to a subject which has won the assent in
varying degrees of every one who has seriously
examined it, and which has its foundation resting
upon the labours of some of the greatest minds
in the world, did not help me to recover my
respect for the mentality and breadth of view of
the journals of Melbourne. I answered, pointing
out that David Syme, the very distinguished
founder of the paper, by no means shared this
contempt to Spiritualism, as is shown by two
long letters included in his published Life.

This attitude, and that of so many other
objectors, is absolutely unintelligible to me. They
must know that this cult is spreading and that
many capable minds have examined and endorsed
it. They must know, also, that the views we
proclaim, the continuance of happy life and the
practical abolition of death are, if true, the
grandest advance that the human race has ever
made. And yet, so often, instead of saying,
" Well, here is some one who is supposed to know
something about the matter. Let us see if this
grand claim can possibly be established by
evidence and argument,' ' they break into insults
and revilings as if something offensive had been
laid before them. This attitude can only arise
from the sluggish conservatism of the human
brain, which runs easily in certain well-worn
grooves, and is horrified by the idea that some-
thing may come to cause mental exertion and
readjustment.

I am bound to add that the general public went

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

out of their way to show that their Press did
not represent their views. The following passage
is typical of many : " The criticism which you
have so justly resented is, I am sure, not in keeping
with the views of the majority of the Australian
people. In my own small sphere many of my
friends have been stirred deeply by your theories,
and the inspiration in some cases has been so
marked that the fact should afford you satisfac-
tion. We are not all spiritually defunct. Many
are quite satisfied that you are giving your best for
humanity, and believe that there is a tremendous
revelation coming to this weary old world."

The Spiritualists of Brisbane, greatly daring,
have planned out a church which is to cost
£10,000, trusting to those who work with us on
the other side to see the enterprise through.
The possible fallacy lies in the chance that those
on the other side do not desire to see this immense
movement become a separate sect, but are in
favour of the peaceful penetration of all creeds
by our new knowledge. It is on record that early
in the movement Senator Talmadge asked two
different spirit controls, in different States of the
Union, what the ultimate goal of this spiritual
outburst might be, and received exactly the same
answer from each, namely, that it was to prove
immortality and to unify the Churches. The first
half has been done, so far as survival implies
immortality, and the second may well come to
pass, by giving such a large common platform to
each Church that they will learn to disregard the
smaller differences.

H1 Q

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Be this as it may, one could not but admire the
faith and energy of Mr. Reinhold and the others
who were determined to have a temple of their
own. I laid the foundation stone at three in the
afternoon under so tropical a sun that I felt as if
the ceremony was going to have its immemorial
accompaniment of a human sacrifice and even
of a whole-burned offering. The crowd made
matters worse, but a friendly bystander with an
umbrella saved me from heat apoplexy. I felt
the occasion was a solemn one, for it was certainly
the first Spiritual Church in the whole of Queens-
land, and I doubt if we have many anywhere in
Australia, for among our apostolic gifts poverty
is conspicuous. It has always amazed me how
Theosophists and Christian Scientists get their fine
halls and libraries, while we, with our zeal and
our knowledge, have some bare schoolroom or
worse as our only meeting place. It reflects
little credit upon the rich people who accept the
comforts we bring, but share none of the burdens
we bear. There is a kink in their souls.

I spoke at some length, and the people listened
with patience in spite of the great heat. It was
an occasion when I could, with propriety, lay
emphasis upon the restraint and charity with
which such a church should be run. The Brisbane
paper reports me as follows : "I would emphasise
three things. Mind your own business ; go on
quietly in your own way ; you know the truth,
and do not need to quarrel with other people.
There are many roads to salvation. The second
point I would urge is that you should live up to

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

your knowledge. We know for certain that we
live on after death, that everything we do in this
world influences what comes after ; therefore, we
can afford to be unselfish and friendly to other
religions. Some Spiritualists run down the Bible,
whereas it is from cover to cover a spiritual book.
I would like to see the Bible read in every
Spiritualistic Church with particular attention
paid to the passages dealing with occultism.
The third point I would emphasise is that you
should have nothing to do with fortune-telling of
anything of that kind. All fortune-telling is
really a feeling out in the dark. If good things
are going to happen to you be content to wait for
them, and if evil is to come nothing is to be
gained by attempting to anticipate it. My
sympathies are with the police in their attitude to
fortune-tellers, whose black magic is far removed
from the services of our mediums in striving to
bring comfort to those whose loved ones have
gone before. If these three things are lived up to,
this church will be a source of great brightness
and happiness/ '

Our work was pleasantly broken by an invita-
tion to lunch with Sir Matthew Nathan, at
Government House. Sir Matthew impresses one
as a man of character, and as he is a financial
authority he is in a position to help by his advice
in restoring the credit of Queensland. The matter
in dispute, which has been called repudiation,
does not, as it seems to me, deserve so harsh a
term, as it is one of those cases where there are
two sides to the question, so equally balanced that

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

it is difficult for an outsider to pronounce a judg-
ment. On the one hand the great squatters
who hold millions of acres in the State had received
the land on considerable leases which charged
them with a very low rent — almost a nominal one
— on condition of their taking up and developing
the country. On the other hand, the Government
say these leases were granted under very different
circumstances, the lessees have already done very
well out of them, the war has made it imperative
that the State raise funds, and the assets upon
which the funds can be raised are all in the hands
of these lessees, who should consent to a revision
of their agreements. So stands the quarrel, so
far as I could understand it, and the State has
actually imposed the increased rates. Hence the
cry that they have repudiated their own contract.
The result of the squatters' grievance was that
Mr. Theodore, the Premier, was unable to raise
money in the London market, and returned home
with the alternative of getting a voluntary loan
in the Colony, or of raising a compulsory loan
from those who had the money. The latter has
an ugly sound, and yet the need is great, and if
some may be compelled to serve with their bodies
I do not see why some may not also be compelled
to serve with their purses. The assets of the
Colony compare very favourably, I believe, with
others, for while these others have sold their
lands, the Government of Queensland has still
the ownership of the main tracts of the gloriously
fertile country. Therefore, with an issue at 6| per
cent., without tax, one would think that they

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

should have no difficulty in getting any reason-
able sum. I was cinemaed in the act of applying
for a small share in the issue, but I think the
advertisement would have been of more value to
the loan, had they captured some one of greater
financial stability.

The more one examines this alleged " repudia-
tion " the less reason appears in the charge, and
as it has assuredly injured Queensland's credit,
it is well that an impartial traveller should touch
upon it. The squatters are the richer folk and in
a position to influence the public opinion of the
world, and in their anxiety to exploit their own
grievance they seem to have had little regard for
the reputation of their country. It is like a man
burning down his house in the hope of roasting
some other inmate of whom he disapproves. A
conservative paper (the Producer's Review , January
ioth, 1921), says : " No living man can say how
much Queensland has been damaged by the
foolish partisan statements that have been uttered
and published/' The article proceeds to show
in very convincing style, with chapter and verse,
that the Government has always been well within
its rights, and that a Conservative Government on
a previous occasion did the same thing, framing a
Bill on identical lines.

On January 12th my kinsman, Dr. Doyle, with
his charming wife, took us out into the bush for
a billy tea — that is, to drink tea which is prepared
as the bushmen prepare it in their tin cans. It
was certainly excellent, and we enjoyed the drive
and the whole experience, though uninvited guests

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

of the mosquito tribe made things rather lively for
us. I prayed that my face would be spared, as I
did not wish to turn up at my lecture as if I had
been having a round with Dr. Cosh, and I react
in a most whole-hearted way to any attentions
from an insect. The result was certainly remark-
able, be it coincidence or not, for though my
hands were like boxing-gloves, and my neck all
swollen, there was not a mark upon my face. I
fancy that the hardened inhabitants hardly realise
what new chums endure after they are bitten by
these pests. It means to me not only disfigure-
ment, but often a sleepless night. My wife and
the children seem to escape more lightly. I found
many objects of interest in the bush — among
others a spider's web so strong that full-sized
dragon flies were enmeshed in it. I could not see
the creature itself, but it must have been as big
as a tarantula. Our host was a large landowner
as well as a specialist, and he talked seriously of
leaving the country, so embittered was he by
the land-policy of the Government. At the same
time, the fact that he could sell his estate at a
fair price seemed to imply that others took a less
grave view of the situation. Many of the richer
classes think that Labour is adopting a policy of
deliberate petty irritation in order to drive them
out of the country, but perhaps they are over-
sensitive.

So full was our life in Brisbane that there was
hardly a day that we had not some memorable
experience, even when I had to lecture in the
evening. Often we were going fourteen and

246

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

fifteen hours a day, and a tropical day at that.
On January 14th we were taken to see the largest
bee-farm in Australia, run by Mr. H. L. Jones.
Ever since I consigned Mr. Sherlock Holmes to
a bee farm for his old age, I have been supposed to
know something of the subject, but really I am so
ignorant that when a woman wrote to me and said
she would be a suitable housekeeper to the retired
detective because she could " segregate the
queen," I did not know what she meant. On this
occasion I saw the operation and many other
wonderful things which make me appreciate
Maeterlinck's prose-poem upon the subject. There
is little poetry about Mr. Jones however, and he
is severely practical. He has numbers of little
boxes with a store of bee-food compressed into
one end of them. Into each he thrusts a queen
with eight attendants to look after her. The
food is enough to last two months, so he simply puts
on a postage stamp and sends it off to any one in
California or South Africa who is starting an
apiary. Several hives were opened for our inspec-
tion with the precaution of blowing in some
smoke to pacify the bees. We were told that
this sudden inrush of smoke gives the bees the idea
that some great cataclysm has occurred, and their
first action is to lay in a store of honey, each of
them, as a man might seize provisions in an
earthquake so as to be ready for whatever the
future might bring. He showed us that the
queen, fed with some special food by the workers,
can lay twice her own weight of eggs in a day, and
that if we could find something similar for hens

247

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

we could hope for an unbroken stream of eggs.
Clever as the bee is it is clearly an instinctive
hereditary cleverness, for man has been able to
make many improvements in its methods, making
artificial comb which is better than the original, in
that it has cells for more workers and fewer drones.
Altogether it was a wonderful demonstration,
which could be viewed with comfort under a veil
with one's hands in one's pockets, for though we
were assured they would not sting if they knew we
would not hurt them, a misunderstanding was
possible. One lady spectator seemed to have a
sudden ambition to break the standing jump
record, and we found that she had received two
stings, but Mr. Jones and his assistants covered
their hands with the creatures and were quite im-
mune. A half- wild wallaby appeared during our
visit, and after some coyness yielded to the fascina-
tion which my wife exercises over all animals, and
fed out of her hand. We were assured that this had
never before occurred in the case of any visitor.

We found in Brisbane, as in every other town,
that the question of domestic service, the most
important of all questions to a householder, was
very acute. Ladies who occupied leading posi-
tions in the town assured us that it was impossible
to keep maids, and that they were compelled now
to give it up in despair, and to do all their own
house work with such casual daily assistance as
they could get. A pound a week is a common
wage for very inefficient service. It is a serious
matter and no solution is in sight. English maids
are, I am sorry to say, looked upon as the worst

248

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

of all, for to all the other faults they add constant
criticism of their employers, whom they pronounce
to be " no ladies " because they are forced to do
many things which are not done at home. In-
efficiency plus snobbishness is a dreadful mixture.
Altogether the lot of the Australian lady is not an
easy one, and we admired the brave spirit with
which they rose above their troubles.

This servant question bears very directly upon
the Imperial puzzle of the northern territory. A
white man may live and even work there, but a
white woman cannot possibly run a household
unless domestic labour is plentiful. In that
climate it simply means absolute breakdown in a
year. Therefore it is a mad policy which at
present excludes so rigorously the Chinese, Indians
or others who alone can make white households
possible. White labour assumes a dog in the
manger policy, for it will not, or cannot, do the
work itself, and yet it shuts out those who could
do it. It is an impossible position and must be
changed. How severe and unreasonable are the
coloured immigrant laws is shown by the fact that
the experienced and popular Commander of the
Naldera, Captain Lewellin, was fined at Sydney
a large sum of money because three Goa Indians
deserted from his ship. There is a great demand
for Indian camel drivers in the north, and this no
doubt was the reason for the desertion, but what
a reductio ad absurdum of the law which comes
between the demand and the supply, besides
punishing an innocent victim.

As usual a large number of psychic confidences

249

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

reached us, some of which were very interesting.
One lady is a clairaudient, and on the occasion of
her mother falling ill she heard the words " Wed-
nesday—the fifteenth/' Death seemed a matter
of hours, and the date far distant, but the patient,
to the surprise of the doctors, still lingered. Then
came the audible message " She will tell you
where she is going." The mother had lain
for two days helpless and comatose. Suddenly
she opened her eyes and said in a clear strong
voice, " I have seen the mansions in my father's
house. My husband and children await me
there. I could not have imagined anything so
exquisitely lovely." Then she breathed her last,
the date being the 15th.

We were entertained to dinner on the last
evening by the Hon. John Fihilly, acting Premier
of the Colony, and his wife. He is an Irish
labour leader with a remarkable resemblance to
Dan O'Connell in his younger days. 1 was
pleased to see that the toast of the King was
given though it was not called for at a private
dinner. Fihilly is a member of the Government,
and I tackled him upon the question of British
emigrants being enticed out by specious promises
on the part of Colonial Agents in London, only
to find that no work awaited them. Some de-
plorable cases had come within my own observa-
tion, one, an old Lancashire Fusilier, having
walked the streets for six months. He assured
me that the arrangements were now in perfect
order, and that emigrants were held back in the
old country until they could be sure that there

250

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

was a place for them. There are so many out of
work in Australia that one feels some sympathy
with those labour men who are against fresh
arrivals.

And there lies the great problem which we
have not, with all our experience, managed to
master. On the one side illimitable land calling
for work. On the other innumerable workers
calling for land. And yet the two cannot be
joined. I remember how it jarred me when I
saw Edmonton, in Western Canada, filled with
out-of-workers while the great land lay unin-
habited. The same strange parodox meets one
here. It is just the connecting link that is
missing, and that link lies in wise prevision. The
helpless newcomer can do nothing if he and his
family are dumped down upon a hundred acres
of gum trees. Put yourself in their position.
How can they hope with their feeble hands to
clear the ground ? All this early work must be
done for them by the State, the owner repaying
after he has made good. Let the emigrant move
straight on to a cleared farm, with a shack-house
already prepared, and clear instructions as to the
best crops, and how to get them. Then it seems
to me that emigration would bring no want of
employment in its train. But the State must
blaze the trail and the public follow after. Such
arrangements may even now exist, but if so they
need expansion and improvement, for they do not
seem to work.

Before leaving Brisbane my attention was
drawn to the fact that the State photographer,

251

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

when he took the scene of the opening of the loan,
had produced to all appearance a psychic effect.
The Brisbane papers recorded it as follows : —

'"It is a remarkable result, and I cannot offer
any opinion as to what caused it. It is abso-
lutely mystifying/ Such was the declaration
made yesterday by the Government photographer,
Mr. W. Mobsby, in regard to the unique effect
associated with a photograph he took on Thurs-
day last of Sir A. Conan Doyle. Mr. Mobsby,
who has been connected with photography since
boyhood, explained that he was instructed to
take an official photograph of the function at
which Sir A. Conan Doyle handed over his sub-
scription to the State Loan organiser. When he
arrived, the entrance to the building was thronged
by a large crowd, and he had to mount a step-
ladder, which was being used by the Daily
Mail photographer, in order to get a good view
of the proceedings. Mr. Mobsby took only one
picture, just at the moment Sir A. Conan Doyle
was mounting the steps at the Government
Tourist Bureau to meet the Acting Premier,
Mr. J. Fihilly. Mr. Mobsby developed the film
himself, and was amazed to find that while all
the other figures in the picture were distinct the
form of Sir A. Conan Doyle appeared enveloped
in mist and could only be dimly seen. The
photograph was taken on an ordinary film with a
No. 3a Kodak, and careful examination does not
in any way indicate the cause of the sensational
result." I have had so many personal proofs of
the intervention of supernormal agencies during

252

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

the time that I have been engaged upon this task
that I am prepared to accept the appearance of
this aura as being an assurance of the presence of
those great forces for whom I act as a humble
interpreter. At the same time, the sceptic is
very welcome to explain it as a flawed film and a
coincidence.

We returned from Brisbane to Sydney in the
Orient Liner " Orsova," which is a delightful
alternative to the stuffy train. The sea has
always been a nursing mother to me, and I sup-
pose I have spent a clear two years of my life
upon the waves. We had a restful Sunday aboard
the boat, disturbed only by the Sunday service,
which left its usual effect upon my mind. The
Psalms were set to some unhappy tune, very
different from the grand Gregorian rhythm, so
that with its sudden rise to a higher level it
sounded more like the neighing of horses than the
singing of mortals. The words must surely offend
anyone who considers what it is that he is
saying — a mixture of most unmanly wailing and
spiteful threats. How such literature has been
perpetuated three thousand years, and how it can
ever have been sacred, is very strange. Alto-
gether from first to last there was nothing, save
only the Lord's Prayer, which could have any
spiritual effect. These old observances are like
an iron ball tied to the leg of humanity, for ever
hampering spiritual progress. If now, after the
warning of the great war, we have not the mental
energy and the moral courage to get back to
realities, we shall deserve what is coming to us.

253

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

On January 17th we were back, tired but
contented, in the Medlow Bath Hotel in the heart
of the Blue Mountains — an establishment which
I can heartily recommend to any who desire a
change from the summer heats of Sydney.

254

CHAPTER XI

Medlow Bath. — Jenolan Caves. — Giant skeleton. — Mrs.
Foster Turner's mediumship. — A wonderful prophecy. —
Final results. — Third sitting with Bailey. — Failure of
State Control.— Retrospection. — Melbourne presentation.
— Crooks. — Lecture at Perth. — West Australia. —
Rabbits, sparrows and sharks.

We recuperated after our Brisbane tour by
spending the next week at Medlow Bath, that
little earthly paradise, which is the most restful
spot we have found in our wanderings. It was
built originally by Mr. Mark Foy, a successful
draper of Sydney, and he is certainly a man of
taste, for he has adorned it with a collection of
prints and of paintings — hundreds of each —
which would attract attention in any city, but
which on a mountain top amid the wildest
scenery give one the idea of an Arabian Nights
palace. There was a passage some hundreds of
yards long, which one has to traverse on the way
to each meal, and there was a certain series of
French prints, representing events of Byzantine
history, which I found it difficult to pass, so that
I was often a late comer. A very fair library is
among the other attractions of this remarkable
place.

Before leaving we spent one long day at the

255

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

famous Jenolan Caves, which are distant about
forty-five miles. As the said miles are very up-
and-down, and as the cave exploration involves
several hours of climbing, it makes a fairly hard
day's work. We started all seven in a motor, as
depicted by the wayside photographers, but Baby
got sick and had to be left with Jakeman at the
half-way house, where we picked her up, quite
recovered, on our return. It was as well, for the
walk would have been quite beyond her, and yet
having once started there is no return, so we
should have ended by carrying her through all
the subterranean labyrinths. The road is a
remarkably good one, and represents a consider-
able engineering feat. It passes at last through
an enormous archway of rock which marks the
entrance to the cave formations. These caves
are hollowed out of what was once a coral reef
in a tropical sea, but is now sixty miles inland
with a mountain upon the top of it — such changes
this old world has seen. If the world were formed
only that man might play his drama upon it,
then mankind must be in the very earliest days
of his history, for who would build so elaborate a
stage if the play were to be so short and
insignificant ?

The caves are truly prodigious. They were
discovered first in the pursuit of some poor devil
of a bushranger who must have been hard put to
it before he took up his residence in this damp
and dreary retreat. A brave man, Wilson, did
most of the actual exploring, lowering himself
by a thin rope into noisome abysses of unknown

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depth and charting out the whole of this devil's
warren. It is so vast that many weeks would
be needed to go through it, and it is usual at one
visit to take only a single sample. On this
occasion it was the River Cave, so named because
after many wanderings you come on a river about
twenty feet across and forty-five feet deep which
has to be navigated for some distance in a punt.
The stalactite effects, though very wonderful,
are not, I think, superior to those which I have
seen in Derbyshire, and the caves have none of
that historical glamour which is needed in order
to link some large natural object to our own com-
prehension. I can remember in Derbyshire how
my imagination and sympathy were stirred by
a Roman lady's brooch which had been found
among the rubble. Either a wild beast or a
bandit knew best how it got there. Jenolan has
few visible links with the past, but one of them
is a tremendous one. It is the complete, though
fractured, skeleton of a very large man — seven
foot four said the guide, but he may have put it
on a little — who was found partly imbedded in
the lime. Many ages ago he seems to have fallen
through the roof of the cavern, and the bones of
a wallaby hard by give some indication that he
was hunting at the time, and that his quarry
shared his fate. He was of the Black fellow type,
with a low-class cranium. It is remarkable the
proportion of very tall men who are dug up in
ancient tombs. Again and again the bogs of
Ireland have yielded skeletons of seven and eight
feet. Some years ago a Scythian chief was dug

257 k

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

up on the Southern Steppes of Russia who was
eight feet six. What a figure of a man with his
winged helmet and his battle axe ! All over the
world one comes upon these giants of old, and one
wonders whether they represented some race,
further back still, who were all gigantic. The
Babylonian tradition in our Bible says: "And
there were giants in those days." The big
primeval kangaroo has grown down to the smaller
modern one, the wombat, which was an animal as
big as a tapir, is now as small as a badger, the
great saurians have become little lizards, and so
it would seem not unreasonable to suppose that
man may have run to great size at some unexplored
period in his evolution.

We all emerged rather exhausted from the
bowels of the earth, dazed with the endless suc-
cession of strange gypsum formations which we
had seen, minarets, thrones, shawls, coronets,
some of them so made that one could imagine
that the old kobolds had employed their leisure
hours in fashioning their freakish outlines. It
was a memorable drive home in the evening.
Once as a bird flew above my head, the slanting
ray of the declining sun struck it and turned it
suddenly to a vivid scarlet and green. It was
the first of many parrots. Once also a couple of
kangaroos bounded across the road, amid wild cries
of delight from the children. Once, too, a long snake
writhed across and was caught by one of the wheels
of the motor. Rabbits, I am sorry to say, abounded.
If they would confine themselves to these primeval
woods, Australia would be content.

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

This was the last of our pleasant Australian
excursions, and we left Medlow Bath refreshed
not only by its charming atmosphere, but by
feeling that we had gained new friends. We made
our way on January 26th to Sydney, where all
business had to be settled up and preparations
made for our homeward voyage.

Whilst in Sydney I had an opportunity of
examining several phases of mediumship which
will be of interest to the psychic reader. I called
upon Mrs. Foster Turner, who is perhaps the
greatest all-round medium with the highest
general level of any sensitive in Australia. I
found a middle-aged lady of commanding and
pleasing appearance with a dignified manner and
a beautifully modulated voice, which must be
invaluable to her in platform work. Her gifts
are so many that it must have been difficult for
her to know which to cultivate, but she finally
settled upon medical diagnosis, in which she has,
I understand, done good work. Her practice
is considerable, and her help is not despised by
some of the leading practitioners. This gift is, as
I have explained previously in the case of Mr.
Bloomfield, a form of clairvoyance, and Mrs.
Foster Turner enjoys all the other phases of that
wonderful power, including psychometry, with its
application to detective work, the discerning of
spirits, and to a very marked degree the gift of
prophecy, which she has carried upon certain
occasions to a length which I have never known
equalled in any reliable record of the past.

Here is an example for which, I am told, a

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hundred witnesses could be cited. At a meeting
at the Little Theatre, Castlereagh Street, Sydney,
on a Sunday evening of February, 1914, Mrs.
Turner addressed the audience under an inspira-
tion which claimed to be W. T. Stead. He ended
his address by saying that in order to prove that
he spoke with a power beyond mortal, he would,
on the next Sunday, give a prophecy as to the
future of the world.

Next Sunday some 900 people assembled,
when Mrs. Turner, once more under control,
spoke as follows. I quote from notes taken at
the time. " Now, although there is not at present
a whisper of a great European war at hand, yet I
want to warn you that before this year, 1914, has
run its course, Europe will be deluged in blood.
Great Britain, our beloved nation, will be drawn
into the most awful war the world has ever known.
Germany will be the great antagonist, and will
draw other nations in her train. Austria will
totter to its ruin. Kings and kingdoms will fall.
Millions of precious lives will be slaughtered, but
Britain will finally triumph and emerge victorious.
During the year, also, the Pope of Rome will pass
away, and a bomb will be placed in St. Paul's
Church, but will be discovered in time and re-
moved before damage is done/'

Can any prophecy be more accurate or better
authenticated than that ? The only equally exact
prophecy on public events which I can recall is
when Emma Hardinge Britten, having been
refused permission in i860 to deliver a lecture on
Spiritualism in the Town Hall of Atlanta, declared

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that, before many years had passed, that very
Town Hall would be choked up with the dead and
the dying, drawn from the State which persecuted
her. This came literally true in the Civil War a
few years later, when Sherman's army passed
that way.

Mrs. Foster Turner's gift of psychometry is one
which will be freely used by the community
when we become more civilised and less ignorant.
As an example of how it works, some years ago
a Melbourne man named Cutler disappeared,
and there was a considerable debate as to his fate.
His wife, without giving a name, brought Cutler's
boot to Mrs. Turner. She placed it near her
forehead and at once got en rapport with the
missing man. She described how he left his
home, how he kissed his wife good-bye, all the
succession of his movements during that morning,
and finally how he had fallen or jumped over a
bridge into the river, where he had been caught
under some snag. A search at the place named
revealed the dead body. If this case be compared
with that of Mr. Foxhall, already quoted, one can
clearly see that the same law underlies each.
But what an ally for our C.I.D. !

There was one pleasant incident in connection
with my visit to Mrs. Foster Turner. Upon my
asking her whether she had any psychic impression
when she saw me lecturing, she said that I was
accompanied on the platform by a man in spirit
life, about 70 years of age, grey-bearded, with
rugged eyebrows. She searched her mind for a
name, and then said, " Alfred Russell Wallace."

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Doctor Abbott, who was present, confirmed that
she had given that name at the time. It will be
remembered that Mrs. Roberts, of Dunedin, had
also given the name of the great Spiritualistic
Scientist as being my coadjutor. There was no
possible connection between Mrs. Turner and
Mrs. Roberts. Indeed, the intervention of the
strike had made it almost impossible for them
to communicate, even if they had known each
other — which they did not. It was very helpful
to me to think that so great a soul was at my
side in the endeavour to stimulate the attention
of the world.

Two days before our departure we attended
the ordinary Sunday service of the Spiritualists
at Stanmore Road, which appeared to be most
reverently and beautifully conducted. It is in-
deed pleasant to be present at a religious service
which in no way offends one's taste or one's
reason — which cannot always be said, even of
Spiritualistic ones. At the end I was presented
with a beautifully illuminated address from the
faithful of Sydney, thanking me for what they
were pleased to call " the splendidly successful
mission on behalf of Spiritualism in Sydney/'
" You are a specially chosen leader," it went on,
" endowed with power to command attention
from obdurate minds. We rejoice that you are
ready to consecrate your life to the spread of our
glorious gospel, which contains more proof of
the eternal love of God than any other truth yet
revealed to man." So ran this kindly document.
It was decorated with Australian emblems, and as

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there was a laughing jackass in the corner, I was
able to raise a smile by suggesting that they had
adorned it with the picture of a type of opponent
with whom we were very familiar, the more so
as some choice specimens had been observed in
Sydney. There are some gentle souls in our
ranks who refrain from all retort — and morally,
they are no doubt the higher — but personally,
when I am moved by the malevolence and ignor-
ance of our opponents, I cannot help hitting back
at them. It was Mark Twain, I think, who said
that, instead of turning the other cheek, he
returned the other's cheek. That is my un-
regenerate instinct.

I was able, for the first time, to give a bird's-eye
view of my tour and its final results. I had, in all,
addressed twenty-five meetings, averaging 2,000
people in each, or 50,000 people in all. I read aloud a
letter from Mr. Carlyle Smythe, who, with his father,
had managed the tours of every lecturer of repute
who had come to Australia during the past thirty
years. Mr. Smythe knew what success and failure
were, and he said : " For an equal number of
lectures, yours has proved the most prosperous
tour in my experience. No previous tour has
won such consistent success. From the push-off
at Adelaide to the great boom in New Zealand
and Brisbane, it has been a great dynamic pro-
gression of enthusiasm. I have known in my
career nothing parallel to it."

The enemies of our cause were longing for my
failure, and had, indeed, in some cases most
unscrupulously announced it, so it was necessary

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that I should give precise details as to this great
success, and to the proof which it afforded that
the public mind was open to the new revelation.
But, after all, the money test was the acid one.
I had taken a party of seven people at a time
when all expenses were doubled or trebled by
the unnatural costs of travel and of living, which
could not be made up for by increasing the price
of admission. It would seem a miracle that I
could clear this great bill of expenses in a country
like Australia, where the large towns are few.
And yet I was able to show that I had not only
done so, after paying large sums in taxation,
but that I actually had seven hundred pounds
over. This I divided among Spiritual funds in
Australia, the bulk of it, five hundred pounds,
being devoted to a guarantee of expenses for the
next lecturer who should follow me. It seemed
to me that such a lecturer, if well chosen, and
properly guaranteed against loss, might devote
a longer time than I, and visit the smaller towns,
from which I had often the most touching appeals.
If he were successful, he need not touch the guar-
antee fund, and so it would remain as a perpetual
source of active propaganda. Such was the
scheme which I outlined that night, and which
was eventually adopted by the Spiritualists of
both Australia and New Zealand.

On my last evening at Sydney, I attended a
third seance with Charles Bailey, the apport
medium. It was not under test conditions, so
that it can claim no strict scientific value, and yet
the results are worth recording. It had struck

264

DENIS WITH A BLACK SNAKE AT MEDLOW BATH.

See page 258.

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

me that a critic might claim that there was phos-
phorescent matter inside the spectacle case, which
seemed to be the only object which Bailey took
inside the cabinet, so I insisted on examining it,
but found it quite innocent. The usual incon-
clusive shadowy appearance of luminous vapour
was evident almost at once, but never, so far as I
could judge, out of reach of the cabinet, which
was simply a blanket drawn across the corner of
the room. The Hindoo control then announced
that an apport would be brought, and asked that
water be placed in a tin basin. He (that is, Bailey
himself, under alleged control) then emerged,
the lights being half up, carrying the basin over
his head. On putting it down, we all saw two
strange little young tortoises swimming about in
it. I say " strange/' because I have seen none
like them. They were about the size of a half-
crown, and the head, instead of being close to
the shell, was at the end of a thin neck half as
long as the body. There were a dozen Australians
present, and they all said they had never seen any
similar ones. The control claimed that he had
just brought them from a tank in Benares. The
basin was left on the table, and while the lights
were down, the creatures disappeared. It is only
fair to say that they could have been removed by
hand in the dark, but on examining the table,
I was unable to see any of those sloppings of
water which might be expected to follow such an
operation.

Shortly afterwards there was a great crash in
the dark, and a number of coins fell on to the

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table, and were handed to me by the presiding
control as a parting present. They did not,
I fear, help me much with my hotel bill, for they
were fifty-six Turkish copper pennies, taken " from a
well," according to our informant. These two
apports were all the phenomena, and the medium,
who has been working very hard of late, showed
every sign of physical collapse at the close.

Apart from the actual production in the seance
room, which may be disputed, I should like to
confront the honest sceptic with the extraordinary
nature of the objects which Bailey produces on
these occasions. They cannot be disputed, for
hundreds have handled them, collections of them
have been photographed, there are cases full at
the Stanford University at California, and I am
bringing a few samples back to England with me.
If the whole transaction is normal, then where
does he get them ? I had an Indian nest. Does
anyone import Indian nests ? Does anyone im-
port queer little tortoises with long, thin necks ?
Is there a depot for Turkish copper coins in
Australia ? On the previous sitting, he got ioo
Chinese ones. Those might be explained, since
the Chinaman is not uncommon in Sydney, but
surely he exports coins, rather than imports them.
Then what about ioo Babylonian tablets, with
legible inscriptions in Assyrian, some of them
cylindrical, with long histories upon them ?
Granting that they are Jewish forgeries, how do
they get into the country ? Bailey's house was
searched once by the police, but nothing was found.
Arabic papers, Chinese schoolbooks, mandarins'

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

buttons, tropical birds — all sorts of odd things
arrive. If they are not genuine, where do they
come from ? The matter is ventilated in papers,
and no one comes forward to damn Bailey for ever
by proving that he supplied them. It is no use
passing the question by. It calls for an answer.
If these articles can be got in any normal way,
then what is the way ? If not, then Bailey has
been a most ill-used man, and miracles are of
daily occurrence in Australia. This man should
be under the strict, but patient and sympathetic,
control of the greatest scientific observers in the
world, instead of being allowed to wear himself out
by promiscuous seances, given in order to earn a
living. I magine our scientists expending themselves
in the examination of shells, or the classification oi
worms, when such a subject as this awaits them.
And it cannot await them long. The man dies,
and then where are these experiments ? But if
such scientific investigation be made, it must be
thorough and prolonged, directed by those who
have real experience of occult matters, otherwise
it will wreck itself upon some theological or other
snag, as did Colonel de Rochas' attempt at
Grenoble.

The longer one remains in Australia, the more
one is struck by the failure of State control.
Whenever you test it, in the telephones, the
telegraphs and the post, it stands for inefficiency,
with no possibility that I can see of remedy.
The train service is better, but still far from good.
As to the State ventures in steamboat lines and
in banking, I have not enough information to

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guide me. On the face of it, it is evident that
in each case there is no direct responsible master,
and that there is no real means of enforcing dis-
cipline. I have talked to the heads of large
institutions, who have assured me that the conduct
of business is becoming almost impossible. When
they send an urgent telegram, with a letter con-
firming it, it is no unusual thing for the letter
to arrive first. No complaint produces any re-
dress. The maximum compensation for sums
lost in the post is, I am told, two pounds, so that
the banks, whose registered letters continually
disappear, suffer heavy losses. On the other
hand, if they send a messenger with the money,
there is a law by which all bullion carried by train
has to be declared, and has to pay a commission.
Yet the public generally, having no standard of
comparison, are so satisfied with the wretched
public services, that there is a continued agitation
to extend public control, and so ruin the well
conducted private concerns. The particular in-
stance which came under my notice was the ferry
service of Sydney harbour, which is admirably
and cheaply conducted, and yet there is a clamour
that it also should be dragged into this morass
of slovenly inefficiency. I hope, however, that
the tide will soon set the other way. I fear, from
what I have seen of the actual working, that it is
only under exceptional conditions, and with very
rigorous and high-principled direction, that the
State control of industries can be carried out.
I cannot see that it is a political question, or that
the democracy has any interest, save to have the

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public work done as well and as economically as
possible. When the capitalist has a monopoly,
and is exacting an undue return, it is another
matter.

As I look back at Australia my prayers — if
deep good wishes form a prayer — go out to it.
Save for that great vacuum upon the north,
which a wise Government would strive hard to
fill, I see no other external danger which can
threaten her people. But internally I am
shadowed by the feeling that trouble may be
hanging over them, though I am assured that the
cool stability of their race will at last pull them
through it. There are some dangerous factors
there which make their position more precarious
than our own, and behind a surface of civilisation
there lie possible forces which might make for
disruption. As a people they are rather less
disciplined than a European nation. There is no
large middle or leisured class who would represent
moderation. Labour has tried a Labour Govern-
ment, and finding that politics will not really
alter economic facts is now seeking some fresh
solution. The land is held in many cases by large
proprietors who work great tracts with few hands,
so there is not the conservative element which
makes the strength of the United States with its
six million farmers, each with his stake in the
land. Above all, there is no standing military
force, and nothing but a small, though very
efficient, police force to stand between organised
government and some wild attempt of the ex-
tremists. There are plenty of soldiers, it is true,

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and they have been treated with extreme
generosity by the State, but they have been
reabsorbed into the civil population. If they
stand for law and order then all is well. On the
other hand, there are the Irish, who are fairly
numerous, well organised and disaffected. There
is no Imperial question, so far as I can see, save
with the Irish, but there is this disquieting internal
situation which, with the coming drop of wages,
may suddenly become acute. An Australian
should be a sober-minded man for he has his
difficulties before him. We of the old country
should never forget that these difficulties have
been partly caused by his splendid participation
in the great war, and so strain every nerve to help,
both by an enlightened sympathy and by such
material means as are possible.

Personally, I have every sympathy with all
reasonable and practical efforts to uphold the
standard of living in the working classes. At
present there is an almost universal opinion among
thoughtful and patriotic Australians that the
progress of the country is woefully hampered by
the constant strikes, which are declared in defiance
of all agreements and all arbitration courts. The
existence of Labour Governments, or the State
control of industries, does not seem to alleviate
these evil conditions, but may rather increase
them, for in some cases such pressure has been
put upon the Government that they have been
forced to subsidise the strikers — or at least those
sufferers who have come out in sympathy with
the original strikers. Such tactics must de-

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

moralise a country and encourage labour to make
claims upon capital which the latter cannot
possibly grant, since in many cases the margin of
profit is so small and precarious that it would be
better for the capitalist to withdraw his money
and invest it with no anxieties. It is clear that
the tendency is to destroy the very means by
which the worker earns his bread, and that the
position will become intolerable unless the older,
more level-headed men gain control of the unions
and keep the ignorant hot-heads in order. It is the
young unmarried men without responsibilities
who create the situations, and it is the married
men with their women and children who suffer.
A table of strikes prepared recently by the Man-
chester Guardian shows that more hours were lost
in Australia with her five or six million inhabitants
than in the United Kingdom with nearly fifty
million. Surely this must make the Labour
leaders reconsider their tactics. As I write the
stewards' strike, which caused such extended
misery, has collapsed, the sole result being a loss
of nearly a million pounds in wages to the working
classes, and great inconvenience to the public.
The shipowners seem now in no hurry to resume
the services, and if their delay will make the
strikers more thoughtful it is surely to be defended.
On February ist we started from Sydney in our
good old "Naldera" upon our homeward voyage,
but the work was not yet finished. On reaching
Melbourne, where the ship was delayed two days,
we found that a Town Hall demonstration had
been arranged to give us an address from the

271

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Victorian Spiritualists, and wish us farewell. It
was very short notice and there was a tram strike
which prevented people from getting about, so the
hall was not more than half full. None the less,
we had a fine chance of getting in touch with our
friends, and the proceedings were very hearty.
The inscription was encased in Australian wood
with a silver kangaroo outside and beautiful
illuminations within. It ran as follows :

" We desire to place on permanent record our
intense appreciation of your zealous and self-
sacrificing efforts, and our deep gratitude for the
great help you have given to the cause to which
you have consecrated your life. The over-flowing
meetings addressed by you bear evidence of the
unqualified success of your mission, and many
thousands bless the day when you determined to
enter this great crusade beneath the Southern
Cross. ... In all these sentiments we desire
to include your loyal and most devoted partner,
Lady Doyle, whose self-sacrifice equals or exceeds
your own."

Personally, I have never been conscious of any
self-sacrifice, but the words about my wife were
in no way an over-statement. I spoke in reply
for about forty minutes, and gave a synopsis of
the state of the faith in other centres, for each
Australian State is curiously self-centred and
realises very little beyond its own borders. It
was good for Melbourne to know that Sydney,
Brisbane, Adelaide and New Zealand were quite as
alive and zealous as themselves.

At the end of the function I gave an account of

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

the financial results of my tour and handed over
£500 as a guarantee fund for future British
lecturers, and £100 to Mr. Britton Harvey to
assist his admirable paper, The Harbinger of Light.
I had already expended about £100 upon spiritual
causes, so that my whole balance came to £700,
which is all now invested in the Cause and should
bring some good spiritual interest in time to come.
We badly need money in order to be able to lay
our case more fully before the world.

I have already given the written evidence of
Mr. Smythe that my tour was the most successful
ever conducted in his time in Australia. To this
I may add the financial result recorded above.
In view of this it is worth recording that Life,
a paper entirely under clerical management, said :
" The one thing clear is that Sir Conan Doyle's
mission to Australia was a mournful and com-
plete failure, and it has left him in a very ex-
asperated state of mind/' This is typical of the
perverse and unscrupulous opposition which we
have continually to face, which hesitates at no
lie in order to try and discredit the movement.

One small incident broke the monotony of the
voyage between Adelaide and Fremantle, across
the dreaded Bight.

There have been considerable depredations in
the coastal passenger trade of Australia, and since
the State boats were all laid up by the strike it
was to be expected that the crooks would appear
upon the big liners. A band of them came on
board the Naldera at Adelaide, but their methods
were crude, and they were up against a discipline

V3 S

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

and an organisation against which they were
helpless. One ruffian entered a number of cabins
and got away with some booty, but was very
gallantly arrested by Captain Lewellin himself,
after a short hand-to-hand struggle. This fellow
was recognised by the detectives at Fremantle
and was pronounced to be an old hand. In the
general vigilance and search for accomplices
which followed, another passenger was judged to
be suspicious and he was also carried away by the
detectives on a charge of previous forgery. Alto-
gether the crooks came out very badly in their
encounter with the Naldera, whose officers deserve
some special recognition from the Company for the
able way in which the matter was handled.

Although my formal tour was now over, I had
quite determined to speak at Perth if it were
humanly possible, for I could not consider my
work as complete if the capital of one State had
been untouched. I therefore sent the message
ahead that I would fit in with any arrangements
which they might make, be it by day or night, but
that the ship would only be in port for a few
hours. As matters turned out the Naldera
arrived in the early morning and was announced
to sail again at 3 p.m., so that the hours were
awkward. They took the great theatre, however,
for 1 p.m., which alarmed me as I reflected that
my audience must either be starving or else in
a state of repletion. Everything went splendidly,
however. The house was full, and I have never
had a more delightfully keen set of people in front
of me. Of all my experiences there was none

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

which was more entirely and completely satis-
factory, and I hope that it brought a very sub-
stantial sum into the local spiritual treasury.
There was quite a scene in the street after-
wards, and the motor could not start for the
crowds who surrounded it and stretched their
kind hands and eager faces towards us. It was
a wonderful last impression to bear away from
Australia.

It is worth recording that upon a clairvoyante
being asked upon this occasion whether she saw
any one beside me on the platform she at once
answered " an elderly man with very tufted eye-
brows/' This was the marked characteristic
of the face of Russell Wallace. I was told before
I left England that Wallace was my guide. I have
already shown that Mrs. Roberts, of Dunedin,
gave me a message direct from him to the same
effect. Mrs. Foster Turner, in Sydney, said she
saw him, described him and gave the name.
Three others have described him. Each of these
has been quite independent of the others. I
think that the most sceptical person must admit
that the evidence is rather strong. It is naturally
more strong to me since I am personally conscious
of his intervention and assistance.

Apart from my spiritual mission, I was very
sorry that I could not devote some time to ex-
ploring West Australia, which is in some ways
the most interesting, as it is the least developed,
of the States in the Federation. One or two
points which I gathered about it are worth record-
ing, especially its relation to the rabbits and to

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

the sparrows, the only hostile invaders which it
has known. Long may they remain so !

The battle between the West Australians and
the rabbits was historical and wonderful. After
the creatures had become a perfect pest in the
East it was hoped that the great central desert
would prevent them from ever reaching the West.
There was no water for a thousand miles. None
the less, the rabbits got across. It was a notable
day when the West Australian outrider, loping
from west to east, met the pioneer rabbit loping
from east to west. Then West Australia made a
great effort. She built a rabbit-proof wire screen
from north to south for hundreds of miles from
sea to sea, with such thoroughness that the
northern end projected over a rock which fringed
deep water. With such thoroughness, too, did
the rabbits reconnoitre this obstacle that their
droppings were seen upon the far side of that very
rock. There came another day of doom when
two rabbits were seen on the wrong side of the
wire. Two dragons of the slime would not have
alarmed the farmer more. A second line was
built, but this also was, as I understand, carried
by the attack, which is now consolidating, upon
the ground it has won. However, the whole
situation has been changed by the discovery
elsewhere that the rabbit can be made a paying
proposition, so all may end well in this curious
story.

A similar fight, with more success, has been
made by West Australia against the sparrow,
which has proved an unmitigated nuisance else-

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

where. The birds are slowly advancing down the
line of the Continental Railway and their forward
scouts are continually cut off. Captain White,
the distinguished ornithologist, has the matter
in hand, and received, as I am told, a wire a few
weeks ago, he being in Melbourne, to the effect
that two sparrows had been observed a thousand
miles west of where they had any rights. He set
off, or sent off, instantly to this way-side desert
station in the hope of destroying them, with what
luck I know not. I should be inclined to back
the sparrows.

This Captain White is a man of energy and
brains, whose name comes up always when one
enquires into any question of bird or beast. He
has made a remarkable expedition lately to those
lonely Everard Ranges, which lie some distance
to the north of the desolate Nularbor Plain,
through which the Continental Railway passes.
It must form one of the most dreadful wastes
in the world, for there are a thousand miles of
coast line, without one single stream emerging.
Afforestation may alter all that. In the Everard
Ranges Captain White found untouched savages
of the stone age, who had never seen a white man
before, and who treated him with absolute courtesy
and hospitality. They were a fine race physically,
though they lived under such conditions that
there was little solid food save slugs, lizards and
the like. One can but pray that the Australian
Government will take steps to save these poor
people from the sad fate which usually follows
the contact between the higher and the lower.

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From what I heard, West Australian immigrants
are better looked after than in the other States.
I was told in Perth that nine hundred ex-service
men with their families had arrived, and that
all had been fitted into places, permanent or
temporary, within a fortnight. This is not due
to Government, but to the exertions of a peculiar
local Society, with the strange title of " The Ugly
Men." " Handsome is as handsome does/' and
they seem to be great citizens. West Australia
calls itself the Cinderella State, for, although it
covers a third of the Continent, it is isolated
from the great centres of population. It has a
very individual life of its own, however, with its
gold fields, its shark fisheries, its pearlers, and
the great stock-raising plain in the north. Among
other remarkable achievements is its great water
pipe, which extends for four hundred miles across
the desert, and supplies the pressure for the
electric machinery at Kalgurli.

By a coincidence, the Narkunda, which is
the sister ship of the Naldera, lay alongside
the same quay at Fremantle, and it was an
impressive sight to see these two great shuttles
of Empire lying for a few hours at rest. In their
vastness and majesty they made me think of a
daring saying of my mother's, when she exclaimed
that if some works of man, such as an ocean-going
steamer, were compared with some works of God,
such as a hill, man could sustain the comparison.
It is the divine spark within us which gives us
the creative power, and what may we not be
when that is fully developed !

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The children were fishing for sharks, with a
line warranted to hold eighteen pounds, with the
result that Malcolm's bait, lead, and everything
else was carried away. But they were amply
repaid by actually seeing the shark, which played
about for some time in the turbid water, a brown,
ugly, varminty creature, with fine lines of speed
in its tapering body. " It was in Adelaide,
daddy, not Fremantle," they protest in chorus,
and no doubt they are right.

279

CHAPTER XII

Pleasing letters. — Visit to Candy. — Snake and Flying Fox.—
Buddha's shrine. — The Malaya. — Naval digression. —
Indian trader. — Elephanta. — Sea snakes. — Chained to a
tombstone. — Berlin's escape. — Lord Chetwynd. — Lecture
in the Red Sea. — Marseilles.

It was on Friday, February nth, that we drew
away from the Fremantle wharf, and started
forth upon our long, lonely trek for Colombo — a
huge stretch of sea, in which it is unusual to see
a single sail. As night fell I saw the last twink-
ling lights of Australia fade away upon our
starboard quarter. Well, my job is done. I
have nothing to add, nor have I said anything
which I would wish withdrawn. My furrow
gapes across two young Continents. I feel,
deep in my soul, that the seed will fall in due
season, and that the reaping will follow the
seed. Only the work concerns ourselves — the
results lie with those whose instruments we
are.

Of the many kindly letters which bade us fare-
well, and which assured us that our work was
not in vain, none was more eloquent and thought-
ful than that of Mr. Thomas Ryan, a member of
the Federal Legislature. " Long after you leave
us your message will linger. This great truth,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

which we had long thought of as the plaything
of the charlatan and crank, into this you breathed
the breath of life, and, as of old, we were forced
to say, ' We shall think of this again. We shall
examine it more fully.' Give us time — for the
present only this, we are sure that this thing
was not done in a corner. Let me say in the
few moments I am able to snatch from an
over-crowded life, that we realise throughout
the land how deep and far-reaching were the
things of which you spoke to us. We want
time, and even more time, to make them part of
ourselves. We are glad you have come and
raised our thoughts from the market-place to the
altar."

Bishop Leadbeater, of Sydney, one of the most
venerable and picturesque figures whom I met
in my travels, wrote, " Now that you are leaving
our shores, let me express my conviction that
your visit has done great good in stirring up the
thought of the people, and, I hope, in convincing
many of them of the reality of the other life."
Among very many other letters there was none
I valued more than one from the Rev. Jasper
Calder, of Auckland. " Rest assured, Sir Arthur,
the plough has gone deep, and the daylight will
now reach the soil that has so long been in
the darkness of ignorance. I somehow feel
as if this is the beginning of new things for us
all."

It is a long and weary stretch from Australia
to Ceylon, but it was saved from absolute mono-
tony by the weather, which was unusually

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

boisterous for so genial a region. Two days
before crossing the line we ran into a north-western
monsoon, a rather rare experience, so that the
doldrums became quite a lively place. Even our
high decks were wet with spindrift and the edge
of an occasional comber, and some of the cabins
were washed out. A smaller ship would have
been taking heavy seas. In all that great stretch
of ocean we never saw a sail or a fish, and very
few birds. The loneliness of the surface of the sea
is surely a very strange fact in nature. One
would imagine, if the sea is really so populous as
we imagine, that the surface, which is the only
fixed point in very deep water, would be the
gathering ground and trysting place for all life.
Save for the flying fish, there was not a trace in
all those thousands of miles.

I suppose that on such a voyage one should
rest and do nothing, but how difficult it is to do
nothing, and can it be restful to do what is
difficult ? To me it is almost impossible. I was
helped through a weary time by many charm-
ing companions on board, particularly the
Rev. Henry Howard, reputed to be the best
preacher in Australia. Some of his sermons
which I read are, indeed, splendid, depending
for their effect upon real thought and knowledge,
without any theological emotion. He is ignorant
of psychic philosophy, though, like so many men
who profess themselves hostile to Spiritualism,
he is full of good stories which conclusively prove
the very thing he denies. However, he has
reached full spirituality, which is more important

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

than Spiritualism, and he must be a great
influence for good wherever he goes. The rest
he will learn later, either upon this side, or the
other.

At Colombo I was interested to receive a
Westminster Gazette, which contained an article
by their special commissioner upon the Yorkshire
fairies. Some correspondent has given the full
name of the people concerned, with their address,
which means that their little village will be
crammed with chars-a-banc, and the peace of
their life ruined. It was a rotten thing to do.
For the rest, the Westminster inquiries seem to
have confirmed Gardner and me in every par-
ticular, and brought out the further fact that the
girls had never before taken a photo in their life.
One of them had, it seems, been for a short time
in the employ of a photographer, but as she was
only a child, and her duties consisted in running
on errands, the fact would hardly qualify her, as
Truth suggests, for making faked negatives which
could deceive the' greatest experts in London.
There may be some loophole in the direction of
thought forms, but otherwise the case is as com-
plete as possible.

We have just returned from a dream journey
to Candy. The old capital is in the very centre
of the island, and seventy-two miles from Colombo,
but, finding that we had one clear night, we all
crammed ourselves (my wife, the children and
self) into a motor car, and made for it, while
Major Wood and Jakeman did the same by train.
It was a wonderful experience, a hundred and

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

forty miles of the most lovely coloured cinema
reel that God ever released. I carry away the con-
fused but beautiful impression of a good broad red-
tinted road, winding amid all shades of green,
from the dark foliage of overhanging trees, to the
light stretches of the half-grown rice fields. Tea
groves, rubber plantations, banana gardens, and
everywhere the coconut palms, with their grace-
ful, drooping fronds. Along this great road
streamed the people, and their houses lined the
way, so that it was seldom that one was out of
sight of human life. They were of all types and
colours, from the light brown of the real Singalese
to the negroid black of the Tamils, but all shared
the love of bright tints, and we were delighted by
the succession of mauves, purples, crimsons,
ambers and greens. Water buffaloes, with the
resigned and half-comic air of the London landlady
who has seen better days, looked up at us from
their mudholes. and jackal-like dogs lay thick on
the path, hardly moving to let our motor pass.
Once, my lord the elephant came round a corner,
with his soft, easy-going stride, and surveyed us
with inscrutable little eyes. It was the unchanged
East, even as it had always been, save for the neat
little police stations and their smart occupants,
who represented the gentle, but very efficient,
British Raj. It may have been the merit of that
Raj, or it may have been the inherent virtue of
the people, but in all that journey we were never
conscious of an unhappy or of a wicked face.
They were very sensitive, speaking faces, too, and
it was not hard to read the thoughts within.

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

As we approached Candy, our road ran through
the wonderful Botanical Gardens, unmatched for
beauty in the world, though I still give Melbourne
pride of place for charm. As we sped down one
avenue an elderly keeper in front of us raised his
gun and fired into the thick foliage of a high tree.
An instant later something fell heavily to the
ground. A swarm of crows had risen, so that we had
imagined it was one of these, but when we stopped
the car a boy came running up with the victim,
which was a great bat, or flying fox, with a two-foot
span of leathery wing. It had the appealing
face of a mouse, and two black, round eyes, as
bright as polished shoe buttons. It was wounded,
so the boy struck it hard upon the ground, and
held it up once more, the dark eyes glazed, and
the graceful head bubbling blood from either
nostril. " Horrible ! horrible ! " cried poor
Denis, and we all echoed it in our hearts. This
intrusion of tragedy into that paradise of a garden
reminded us of the shadows of life. There is
something very intimately moving in the evil
fate of the animals. I have seen a man's hand
blown off in warfare, and have not been conscious
of the same haunting horror which the pains of
animals have caused me.

And here I may give another incident from our
Candy excursion. The boys are wild over snakes,
and I, since I sat in the front of the motor, was
implored to keep a look-out. We were passing
through a village, where a large lump of concrete,
or stone, was lying by the road. A stick, about
five feet long, was resting against it. As we flew

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

past, I saw, to my amazement, the top of the
stick bend back a little. I shouted to the driver,
and we first halted, and then ran back to the spot.
Sure enough, it was a long, yellow snake, basking
in this peculiar position. The village was alarmed,
and peasants came running, while the boys, wildly
excited, tumbled out of the motor. " Kill it ! "
they cried. " No, no ! " cried the chauffeur.
" There is the voice of the Buddhist," I thought,
so I cried, " No ! no ! " also. The snake, mean-
while, squirmed over the stone, and we saw it
lashing about among the bushes. Perhaps we
were wrong to spare it, for I fear it was full of
venom. However, the villagers remained round
the spot, and they had sticks, so perhaps the story
was not ended.

Candy, the old capital, is indeed a dream city,
and we spent a long, wonderful evening beside the
lovely lake, where the lazy tortoises paddled
about, and the fireflies gleamed upon the margin.
We visited also the old Buddhist temple, where,
as in all those places, the atmosphere is ruined by
the perpetual demand for small coins. The few
mosques which I have visited were not desecrated
in this fashion, and it seems to be an unenviable
peculiarity of the Buddhists, whose yellow-robed
shaven priests have a keen eye for money. Beside
the temple, but in ruins, lay the old palace of the
native kings.

I wish we could have seen the temple under
better conditions, for it is realty the chief shrine
of the most numerous religion upon earth, serving
the Buddhist as the Kaaba serves the Moslem,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

or St. Peter's the Catholic. It is strange how the
mind of man drags high things down to its own
wretched level, the priests in each creed being the
chief culprits. Buddha under his boh tree was a
beautiful example of sweet, unselfish benevolence
and spiritual^ . And the upshot, after two
thousand years, is that his followers come to adore
a horse's tooth (proclaimed to be Buddha's, and
three inches long), at Candy, and to crawl up
Adam's Peak, in order to worship at a hole in the
ground which is supposed to be his yard-long
footstep. It is not more senseless than some
Christian observances, but that does not make it
less deplorable.

I was very anxious to visit one of the buried
cities further inland, and especially to see the
ancient Boh tree, which must surely be the doyen
of the whole vegetable kingdom, since it is un-
doubtedly a slip taken from Buddha's original
Boh tree, transplanted into Ceylon about two
hundred years before Christ. Its history is certain
and unbroken. Now, I understand, it is a very
doddering old trunk, with withered limbs which
are supported by crutches, but may yet hang on
for some centuries to come. On the whole, we
employed our time very well, but Ceylon will
always remain to each of us as an earthly paradise,
and I could imagine no greater pleasure than to
have a clear month to wander over its beauties.
Monsieur Clemenceau was clearly of the same
opinion, for he was doing it very thoroughly
whilst we were there.

From Colombo to Bombay was a dream of blue

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

skies and blue seas. Half way up the Malabar
coast, we saw the old Portuguese settlement of
Goa, glimmering white on a distant hillside.
Even more interesting to us was a squat battle-
ship making its way up the coast. As we came
abreast of it we recognised the Malaya, one of
that famous little squadron of Evan Thomas',
which staved off the annihilation of Beatty's
cruisers upon that day of doom on the Jutland
coast. We gazed upon it with the reverence
that it deserved. We had, in my opinion, a
mighty close shave upon that occasion. If
Jellicoe had gambled with the British fleet he
might have won a shattering victory, but surely
he was wise to play safety with such tremendous
interests at stake. There is an account of the
action, given by a German officer, at the end of
Freeman's book " With the Hercules to Kiel,"
which shows clearly that the enemy desired
Jellicoe to close with them, as giving them their
only chance for that torpedo barrage which they
had thoroughly practised, and on which they
relied to cripple a number of our vessels. In
every form of foresight and preparation, the
brains seem to have been with them — but that
was not the fault of the fighting seamen. Surely
an amateur could have foreseen that, in a night
action, a star shell is better than a searchlight,
that a dropping shell at a high trajectory is far
more likely to hit the deck than the side, and that
the powder magazine should be cut off from the
turret, as, otherwise, a shell crushing the one will
explode the other. This last error in construction

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

seems to have been the cause of half our losses,
and the Lion herself would have been a victim,
but for the self-sacrifice of brave Major Harvey of
the Marines. All's well that ends well, but it was
stout hearts, and not clear heads, which pulled
us through.

It is all very well to say let bygones be by-
gones, but we have no guarantee that the old
faults are corrected, and certainly no one has been
censured. It looks as if the younger officers had
no means of bringing their views before those in
authority, while the seniors were so occupied with
actual administration that they had no time for
thinking outside their routine. Take the really
monstrous fact that, at the outset of a war of
torpedoes and mines, when ships might be expected
to sink like kettles with a hole in them, no least
provision had been made for saving the crew!
Boats were discarded before action, nothing
wooden or inflammable was permitted, and the
consideration that life-saving apparatus might be
non-inflammable does not seem to have presented
itself. When I wrote to the Press, pointing this
out with all the emphasis of which I was capable —
I was ready to face the charge of hysteria in such
a cause — I was gravely rebuked by a leading naval
authority, and cautioned not to meddle with
mysteries of which I knew nothing. None the
less, within a week there was a rush order for
swimming collars of india rubber. Post hoc non
propter, perhaps, but at least it verified the view
of the layman. That was in the days when
not one harbour had been boomed and netted,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

though surely a shark in a bathing pool would be
innocuous compared to a submarine in an anchor-
age. The swimmers could get out, but the ships
could not.

But all this comes of seeing the white Malaya,
steaming slowly upon deep blue summer seas,
with the olive-green coast of Malabar on the
horizon behind her.

I had an interesting conversation on psychic
matters with Lady Dyer, whose husband was
killed in the war. It has been urged that it is
singular and unnatural that our friends from the
other side so seldom allude to the former occasions
on which they have manifested. There is, I think,
force in the objection. Lady Dyer had an excellent
case to the contrary — and, indeed, they are not
rare when one makes inquiry. She was most
anxious to clear up some point which was left
open between her husband and herself, and for
this purpose consulted three mediums in London,
Mr. Vout Peters, Mrs. Brittain, and another. In
each case she had some success. Finally, she
consulted Mrs. Leonard, and her husband, speaking
through Feda, under control, began a long con-
versation by saying, " I have already spoken to
you through three mediums, two women and a
man." Lady Dyer had not given her name upon
any occasion, so there was no question of passing
on information. I may add that the intimate
point at issue was entirely cleared up by the
husband, who rejoiced greatly that he had the
chance to do so.

Bombay is not an interesting place for the

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

casual visitor, and was in a state of uproar and
decoration on account of the visit of the Duke of
Connaught. My wife and I did a little shopping,
which gave us a glimpse of the patient pertinacity
of the Oriental. The sum being 150 rupees, I
asked the Indian's leave to pay by cheque, as
money was running low. He consented. When
we reached the ship by steam-launch, we found
that he, in some strange way, had got there
already, and was squatting with the goods outside
our cabin door. He looked askance at Lloyd's
Bank, of which he had never heard, but none the
less he took the cheque under protest. Next
evening he was back at our cabin door, squatting
as before, with a sweat-stained cheque in his hand
which, he declared, that he was unable to cash.
This time I paid in English pound notes, but he
looked upon them with considerable suspicion.
As our ship was lying a good three miles from the
shore, the poor chap had certainly earned his
money, for his goods, in the first instance, were
both good and cheap.

We have seen the Island of Elephanta, and may
the curse of Ernulphus, which comprises all other
curses, be upon that old Portuguese Governor
who desecrated it, and turned his guns upon the
wonderful stone carvings. It reminds me of
Abou Simbel in Nubia, and the whole place has an
Egyptian flavour. In a vast hollow in the hill,
a series of very elaborate bas reliefs have been
carved, showing Brahma, Vishnu and Siva, the
old Hindoo trinity, with all those strange satellites,
the bulls, the kites, the dwarfs, the elephant-

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

headed giants with which Hindoo mythology has
so grotesquely endowed them. Surely a visitor
from some wiser planet, examining our traces,
would judge that the human race, though sane in
all else, was mad the moment that it touched
religion, whether he judged it by such examples
as these, or by the wearisome iteration of expres-
sionless Buddhas, the sacred crocodiles and hawk-
headed gods of Egypt, the monstrosities of Central
America, or the lambs and doves which adorn our
own churches. It is only in the Mohammedan faith
that such an observer would find nothing which
could offend, since all mortal symbolism is there
forbidden. And yet if these strange conceptions
did indeed help these poor people through their
journey of life — and even now they come from far
with their offerings — then we should morally be
as the Portuguese governor, if we were to say or
do that which might leave them prostrate and
mutilated in their minds. It was a pleasant
break to our long voyage, and we were grateful to
our commander, who made everything easy for
us. He takes the humane view that a passenger
is not merely an article of cargo, to be conveyed
from port to port, but that his recreation should,
in reason, be considered as well.

Elephanta was a little bit of the old India,
but the men who conveyed us there from the
launch to the shore in their ancient dhows were
of a far greater antiquity. These were Kolis,
small, dark men, who held the country before
the original Aryan invasion, and may still be
plying their boats when India has become Turanian

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

or Slavonic, or whatever its next avatar may
be. They seem to have the art of commerce
well developed, for they held us up cleverly
until they had extracted a rupee each, count-
ing us over and over with great care and
assiduity.

At Bombay we took over 200 more travellers.

We had expected that the new-comers, who
were mostly Anglo-Indians whose leave had been
long overdue, would show signs of strain and
climate, but we were agreeably surprised to find
that they were a remarkably healthy and alert
set of people. This may be due to the fact that
it is now the end of the cold weather. Our new
companions included many native gentlemen,
one of whom, the Rajah of Kapurthala, brought
with him his Spanish wife, a regal-looking lady,
whose position must be a difficult one. Hearne
and Murrell, the cricketers, old playmates and
friends, were also among the new-comers. All
of them seemed perturbed as to the unrest in
India, though some were inclined to think that
the worst was past, and that the situation was
well in hand. When we think how splendidly
India helped us in the war, it would indeed be
sad if a serious rift came between us now. One
thing I am very sure of, that if Great Britain
should ever be forced to separate from India, it
is India, and not Britain, which will be the chief
sufferer.

We passed over hundreds of miles of absolute
calm in the Indian Ocean. There is a wonderful
passage in Frank Bullen s " Sea Idylls," in which

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

he describes how, after a long-continued tropical
calm, all manner of noxious scum and vague evil
shapes come flickering to the surface. Coleridge
has done the same idea, for all time, in " The Ancient
Mariner," when " the very sea did rot." In our
case we saw nothing so dramatic, but the ship
passed through one area where there was a great
number of what appeared to be sea-snakes,
creatures of various hues, from two to ten feet
long, festooned or slowly writhing some feet below
the surface. I cannot recollect seeing anything
of the kind in any museum. These, and a couple
of Arab dhows, furnished our only break in a
thousand miles. Certainly, as an entertainment
the ocean needs cutting.

In the extreme south, like a cloud upon the
water, we caught a glimpse of the Island of Socotra,
one of the least visited places upon earth, though
so near to the main line of commerce. What a
base for submarines, should it fall into wrong
hands ! It has a comic-opera Sultan of its own,
with 15,000 subjects, and a subsidy from the
British Government of 200 dollars a year, which
has been increased lately to 360, presumably on
account of the higher cost of living. It is a curious
fact that, though it is a great place of hill and plain,
seventy miles by eighteen, there is only one wild
animal known, namely the civet cat. A traveller,
Mr. Jacob, who examined the place, put forward
the theory that one of Alexander the Great's
ships was wrecked there, the crew remaining,
for he found certain Greek vestiges, but what
they were I have been unable to find out.

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

As we approached Aden, we met the China on
her way out. Her misadventure some years ago
at the Island of Perim, has become one of the
legends of the sea. In those days, the discipline
aboard P. & O. ships was less firm than at present,
and on the occasion of the birthday of one of the
leading passengers, the officers of the ship had been
invited to the festivity. The result was that,
in the middle of dinner, the ship crashed, no great
distance from the lighthouse, and, it is said,
though this is probably an exaggeration, that the
revellers were able to get ashore over the bows
without wetting their dress shoes. No harm was
done, save that one unlucky rock projected, like a
huge spike, through the ship's bottom, and it cost
the company a good half-million before they were
able to get her afloat and in service once more.
However, there she was, doing her fifteen knots,
and looking so saucy and new that no one
would credit such an unsavoury incident in her
past.

Early in February I gave a lantern lecture upon
psychic phenomena to passengers of both classes.
The Red Sea has become quite a favourite
stamping ground of mine, but it was much more
tolerable now than on that terrible night in August
when I discharged arguments and perspiration to
a sweltering audience. On this occasion it was
a wonderful gathering, a microcosm of the world,
with an English peer, an Indian Maharajah',
many native gentlemen, whites of every type
from four great countries, and a fringe of stewards,
stewardesses, and nondescripts of all sorts, includ-

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

ing the ship's barber, who is one of the most
active men on the ship in an intellectual sense.
All went well, and if they were not convinced
they were deeply interested, which is the first
stage. Somewhere there are great forces which
are going to carry on this work, and I never
address an audience without the feeling that
among them there may be some latent Paul
or Luther whom my words may call into
activity.

I heard an anecdote yesterday which is worth
recording. We have a boatswain who is a fine,
burly specimen of a British seaman. In one of
his short holidays while in mufti, in Norfolk, he
had an argument with a Norfolk farmer, a stranger
to him, who wound up the discussion by saying :
" My lad, what you need is a little travel to
broaden your mind."

The boatswain does his 70,000 miles a year. It
reminded me of the doctor who advised his
patient to take a brisk walk every morning before
breakfast, and then found out that he was talking
to the village postman.

A gentleman connected with the cinema trade
told me a curious story within his own experience.
Last year a psychic cinema story was shown in
Australia, and to advertise it a man was hired
who would consent to be chained to a tombstone
all night. This was done in Melbourne and
Sydney without the person concerned suffering
in any way. It was very different in Launceston.
The man was found to be nearly mad from terror
in the morning, though he was a stout fellow of

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

the dock labourer type. His story was that in the
middle of the night he had heard to his horror the
sound of dripping water approaching him. On
looking up he saw an evil-looking shape with
water streaming from him, who stood before him
and abused him a long time, frightening him
almost to death. The man was so shaken that
the cinema company had to send him for a
voyage. Of course, it was an unfair test for any
one's nerves, and imagination may have played
its part, but it is noticeable that a neighbouring
grave contained a man who had been drowned
in the Esk many years before. In any case, it
makes a true and interesting story, whatever the
explanation.

I have said that there was an English peer on
board. This was Lord Chetwynd, a man who
did much towards winning the war. Now that
the storm is over the public knows nothing, and
apparently cares little, about the men who brought
the ship of State through in safety. Some day
we shall get a more exact sense of proportion, but
it is all out of focus at present. Lord Chetwynd,
in the year 1915, discovered by his own personal
experiments how to make an explosive far more
effective than the one we were using, which was
very unreliable. This he effected by a particular
combination and treatment of T.N.T. and am-
monia nitrate. Having convinced the authorities
by actual demonstration, he was given a free
hand, which he used to such effect that within a
year he was furnishing the main shell supply of
the army. His own installation was at Chilwell,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

near Nottingham, and it turned out 19,000,000
shells, while six other establishments were
erected elsewhere on the same system. Within
his own works Lord Chetwynd was so complete
an autocrat that it was generally believed that he
shot three spies with his own hand. Thinking
the rumour a useful one, he encouraged it by
creating three dummy graves, which may, perhaps,
be visited to this day by pious pro-Germans. It
should be added that Lord Chetwynd's explosive
was not only stronger, but cheaper, than that in
previous use, so that his labours saved the country
some millions of pounds.

It was at Chilwell that the huge bombs were
filled which were destined for Berlin. There
were 100 of them to be carried in twenty-five
Handley Page machines. Each bomb was capable
of excavating 350 tons at the spot where it fell,
and in a trial trip one which was dropped in the
central courtyard of a large square building left
not a stone standing around it. Berlin was saved
by a miracle, which she hardly deserved after the
irresponsible glee with which she had hailed the
devilish work of her own Zeppelins. The original
hundred bombs sent to be charged had the tails
removed before being sent, and when they were
returned it was found to be such a job finding the
right tail for the right bomb, the permutations
being endless, that it was quicker and easier to
charge another hundred bombs with tails attached.
This and other fortuitous matters consumed
several weeks. Finally, the bombs were ready
and were actually on the machines in England,

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whence the start was to be made, when the Armis-
tice was declared. Possibly a knowledge of this
increased the extreme haste of the German
delegates. Personally, I am glad it was so, for
we have enough cause for hatred in the world
without adding the death of 10,000 German
civilians. There is some weight, however, in
the contention of those who complain that
Germans have devastated Belgium and France,
but have never been allowed to experience
in their own persons what the horrors of war
really are. Still, if Christianity and religion
are to be more than mere words, we must be
content that Berlin was not laid in ruins at
a time when the issue of the war was already
decided.

Here we are at Suez once again. It would
take Loti or Robert Hichens to describe the
wonderful shades peculiar to the outskirts of
Egypt. Deep blue sea turns to dark green,
which in turn becomes the very purest, clearest
emerald as it shallows into a snow-white frill
of foam. Thence extends the golden desert
with deep honey-coloured shadows, stretching
away until it slopes upwards into melon-tinted
hills, dry and bare and wrinkled. At one point a
few white dwellings with a group of acacias mark
the spot which they call Moses Well. They say
that a Jew can pick up a living in any country,
but when one surveys these terrible wastes
one can only imagine that the climate has greatly
changed since a whole nomad people were able to
cross them.

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

In the Mediterranean we had a snap of real cold
which laid many of us out, myself included.
I recall the Lancastrian who complained that he
had swallowed a dog fight. The level of our lives
had been disturbed for an instant by a feud
between the children and one of the passengers
who had, probably quite justly, given one of
them a box on the ear. In return, they had fixed
an abusive document in his cabin which they had
ended by the words, " With our warmest despis-
ings," all signing their names to it. The passenger
was sportsman enough to show this document
around, or we should not have known of its
existence. Strange little souls with their vivid
hopes and fears, a parody of our own. I gave
baby a daily task and had ordered her to do a
map of Australia. I found her weeping in the
evening. " I did the map," she cried, between
her sobs, " but they all said it was a pig ! " She
was shaken to the soul at the slight upon her
handiwork.

It was indeed wonderful to find ourselves at
Marseilles once more, and, after the usual un-
pleasant douane formalities, which are greatly
ameliorated in France as compared to our own
free trade country, to be at temporary rest at the
Hoteldu Louvre.

A great funeral, that of Frederic Chevillon and
his brother, was occupying the attention of the
town. Both were public officials and both were
killed in the war, their bodies being now exhumed
for local honour. A great crowd filed past with
many banners, due decorum being observed save

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

that some of the mourners were smoking
cigarettes, which " was not handsome," as Mr.
Pepys would observe. There was no sign of
any religious symbol anywhere. It was a Sunday
and yet the people in the procession seemed very
badly dressed and generally down-at-heel and
slovenly. I think we should have done the thing
better in England. The simplicity of the flag-
wrapped coffins was however dignified and pleas-
ing. The inscriptions, too, were full of simple
patriotism.

I never take a stroll through a French town
without appreciating the gulf which lies between
us and them. They have the old Roman civilisa-
tion, with its ripe mellow traits, which have never
touched the Anglo-Saxon, who, on the other
hand, has his raw Northern virtues which make
life angular but effective. I watched a scene
to-day inconceivable under our rule. Four very
smart officers, captains or majors, were seated
outside a cafe. The place was crowded, but there
was room for four more at this table on the side-
walk, so presently that number of negro privates
came along and occupied the vacant seats. The
officers smiled most good humouredly, and remarks
were exchanged between the two parties, which
ended in the high falsetto laugh of a negro.
These black troops seemed perfectly self-respecting,
and I never saw a drunken man, soldier or civilian,
during two days.

I have received English letters which announce
that I am to repeat my Australian lectures at the
Queen's Hall, from April nth onwards. I seem

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

to be returning with shotted guns and going
straight into action. They say that the most
dangerous course is to switch suddenly off when
you have been working hard. I am little likely
to suffer from that.

302

CHAPTER XIII

The Institut Metaphysique. — Lecture in French. — Wonderful
musical improviser. — Camille Flammarion. — Test of
materialised hand. — Last ditch of materialism. — Sitting
with Mrs. Bisson's medium, Eva. — Round the Aisne
battlefields. — A tragic intermezzo. — Anglo-French Rugby
match. — Madame Blifaud's clairvoyance.

One long stride took us to Paris, where, under the
friendly and comfortable roof of the Hotel du
Louvre, we were able at last to unpack our
trunks and to steady down after this incessant
movement. The first visit which I paid in Paris
was to Dr. Geley, head of the Institut Meta-
physique, at 89, Avenue Niel. Now that poor
Crawford has gone, leaving an imperishable name
behind him, Geley promises to be the greatest
male practical psychic researcher, and he has
advantages of which Crawford could never boast,
since the liberality of Monsieur Jean Meyer has
placed him at the head of a splendid establish-
ment with laboratory, photographic room, lecture
room, seance room and library, all done in the
most splendid style. Unless some British patron
has the generosity and intelligence to do the same,
this installation, with a man like Geley to run it,
will take the supremacy in psychic advance from
Britain, where it now lies, and transfer it to

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

France. Our nearest approach to something
similar depends at present upon the splendid pri-
vate efforts of Mr. and Mrs. Hewat MacKenzie, in
the Psychic College at 59, Holland Park, which
deserve the support of everyone who realises the
importance of the subject.

I made a faux pas with the Geleys, for I volun-
teered to give an exhibition of my Australian slides,
and they invited a distinguished audience of men
of science to see them. Imagine my horror when
I found that my box of slides was in the luggage
which Major Wood had taken on with him in the
"Naldera" to England. They were rushed over by
aeroplane, however, in response to my telegram,
and so the situation was saved.

The lecture was a private one and was at-
tended by Mr. Charles Richet, Mr. Gabrielle
Delanne, and a number of other men of science.
Nothing could have gone better, though I
fear that my French, which is execrable, must
have been a sore trial to my audience. I gave
them warning at the beginning by quoting a
remark which Bernard Shaw made to me once,
that when he spoke French he did not say what
he wanted to say, but what he could say. Richet
told me afterwards that he was deeply interested
by the photographs, and when I noted the wonder
and awe with which he treated them — he, the
best known physiologist in the world — and com-
pared it with the attitude of the ordinary lay
Press, it seemed a good example of the humility
of wisdom and the arrogance of ignorance. After
my lecture, which covered an hour and a quarter,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

we were favoured by an extraordinary exhibition
from a medium named Aubert. This gentleman
has had no musical education whatever, but he
sits down in a state of semi-trance and he handles
a piano as I, for one, have never heard one handled
before. It is a most amazing performance. He
sits with his eyes closed while some one calls the
alphabet, striking one note when the right letter
sounds. In this way he spells out the name of
the particular composer whom he will represent.
He then dashes off, with tremendous verve and
execution, upon a piece which is not a known
composition of that author, but is an improvisa-
tion after his manner. We had Grieg, Mendel-
ssohn, Berlioz and others in quick succession,
each of them masterly and characteristic. His
technique seemed to my wife and me to be not
inferior to that of Paderewski. Needles can be
driven through him as he plays, and sums can be
set before him which he will work out without
ceasing the wonderful music which appears to flow
through him, but quite independently of his own
powers or volition. He would certainly cause a
sensation in London.

I had the honour next day of meeting Camille
Flammarion, the famous astronomer, who is deeply
engaged in psychic study, and was so interested
in the photos which I snowed him that I was
compelled to leave them in his hands that he
might get copies done. Flammarion is a dear,
cordial, homely old gentleman with a beautiful
bearded head which would delight a sculptor. He
entertained us with psychic stories all lunch time.

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

Madame Bisson was there and amused me with
her opinion upon psychic researchers, their den-
sity, their arrogance, their preposterous theories
to account for obvious effects. If she had not
been a great pioneer in Science, she might have
been a remarkable actress, for it was wonderful
how her face took off the various types. Certainly,
as described by her, their far-fetched precautions,
which irritate the medium and ruin the harmony
of the conditions, do appear very ridiculous, and
the parrot cry of " Fraud ! " and " Fake ! " has
been sadly overdone. All are agreed here that
spiritualism has a far greater chance in England
than in France, because the French temperament
is essentially a mocking one, and also because the
Catholic Church is in absolute opposition. Three
of their bishops, Beauvais, Lisieux and Coutances,
helped to burn a great medium, Joan of Arc, six
hundred years ago, asserting at the trial the very
accusations of necromancy which are asserted
to-day. Now they have had to canonise her.
One would have hoped that they had learned
something from the incident.

Dr. Geley has recently been experimenting
with Mr. Franek Kluski, a Polish amateur of weak
health, but with great mediumistic powers. These
took the form of materialisations. Dr. Geley
had prepared a bucket of warm paraffin, and upon
the appearance of the materialised figure, which
was that of a smallish man, the request was
made that the apparition should plunge its hand
into the bucket and then withdraw it, so that
when it dematerialised a cast of the hand would

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

be left, like a glove of solidified paraffin, so narrow
at the wrist that the hands could not have been
withdrawn by any possible normal means without
breaking the moulds. These hands I was able
to inspect, and also the plaster cast which had
been taken from the inside of one of them. The
latter showed a small hand, not larger than a
boy's, but presenting the characteristics of age,
for the skin was loose and formed transverse
folds. The materialised figure had also, unasked,
left an impression of its own mouth and chin,
which was, I think, done for evidential purposes,
for a curious wart hung from the lower lip, which
would mark the owner among a million. So far
as I could learn, however, no identification had
actually been effected. The mouth itself was
thick-lipped and coarse, and also gave an im-
pression of age.

To show the thoroughness of Dr. Geley's work,
he had foreseen that the only answer which any
critic, however exacting, could make to the
evidence, was that the paraffin hand had been
brought in the medium's pocket. Therefore he
had treated with cholesterin the paraffin in his
bucket, and this same cholesterin reappeared in
the resulting glove. What can any sceptic have
to say to an experiment like that save to ignore
it, and drag us back with wearisome iteration to
some real or imaginary scandal of the past ? The
fact is that the position of the materialists could
only be sustained so long as there was a general
agreement among all the newspapers to regard
this subject as a comic proposition. Now that

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

there is a growing tendency towards recognising
its overwhelming gravity, the evidence is getting
slowly across to the public, and the old attitude
of negation and derision has become puerile. I
can clearly see, however, that the materialists
will fall back upon their second line of trenches,
which will be to admit the phenomena, but to put
them down to material causes in the unexplored
realms of nature with no real connection with
human survival. This change of front is now
due, but it will fare no better than the old one.
Before quitting the subject I should have added
that these conclusions of Dr. Geley concern-
ing the paraffin moulds taken from Kluski's
materialisation are shared by Charles Richet and
Count de Gramont of the Institute of France, who
took part in the experiments. How absurd are
the efforts of those who were not present to contra-
dict the experiences of men like these.

I was disappointed to hear from Dr. Geley that
the experiments in England with the medium
Eva had been largely negative, though once or
twice the ectoplasmic flow was, as I understand,
observed. Dr. Geley put this comparative failure
down to the fantastic precautions taken by the
committee, which had produced a strained and
unnatural atmosphere. It seems to me that if a
medium is searched, and has all her clothes
changed before entering the seance room, that is
ample, but when in addition to this you put her
head in a net-bag and restrict her in other ways,
you are producing an abnormal self-conscious
state of mind which stops that passive mood of

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

receptivity which is essential. Professor Hyslop
has left it on record that after a long series of
rigid tests with Mrs. Piper he tried one sitting
under purely natural conditions, and received
more convincing and evidential results than in
all the others put together. Surely this should
suggest freer methods in our research.

I have just had a sitting with Eva, whom I
cannot even say that I have seen, for she was
under her cloth cabinet when I arrived and still
under it when I left, being in trance the whole
time. Professor Jules Courtier of the Sorbonne
and a few other men of science were present.
Madame Bisson experiments now in the full light
of the afternoon. Only the medium is in darkness,
but her two hands protrude through the cloth
and are controlled by the sitters. There is a
flap in the cloth which can be opened to show
anything which forms beneath. After sitting
about an hour this flap was opened, and Madame
Bisson pointed out to me a streak of ectoplasm
upon the outside of the medium's bodice. It was
about six inches long and as thick as a finger. I
was allowed to touch it, and felt it shrink and con-
tract under my hand. It is this substance which
can, under good conditions, be poured out in
great quantities and can be built up into forms
and shapes, first flat and finally rounded, by
powers which are beyond our science. We
sometimes call it Psychoplasm in England,
Richet named it Ectoplasm, Geley calls it
Ideoplasm ; but call it what you will, Crawford
has shown for all time that it is the substance

309

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

which is at the base of psychic physical pheno-
mena.

Madame Bisson, whose experience after twelve
years' j| work is unique, has an interesting theory.
She disagrees entirely with Dr. Geley's view, that
the shapes are thought forms, and she resents
the name ideoplasm, since it represents that
view. Her conclusion is that Eva acts the part
which a " detector " plays, when it turns the
Hertzian waves, which are too short for our
observation, into slower ones which can become
audible. Thus Eva breaks up certain currents
and renders them visible. According to her,
what we see is never the thing itself but always
the reflection of the thing which exists in another
plane and is made visible in ours by Eva's strange
material organisation. It was for this reason
that the word Miroir appeared in one of the
photographs, and excited much adverse criticism.
One dimly sees a new explanation of mediumship.
The light seems a colourless thing until it passes
through a prism and suddenly reveals every
colour in the world.

A picture of Madame Bisson's father hung
upon the wall, and I at once recognised him as
the phantom which appears in the photographs
of her famous book, and which formed the culmi-
nating point of Eva's mediumship. He has a
long and rather striking face which was clearly
indicated in the ectoplasmic image. Only on one
occasion was this image so developed that it
could speak, and then only one word. The word
was " Esperez."

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

We have just returned, my wife, Denis and
I, from a round of the Aisne battlefields, paying
our respects incidentally to Bossuet at Meaux,
Fenelon at Chateau Thierry, and Racine at La
Fert6 Millon. It is indeed a frightful cicatrix
which lies across the brow of France — a scar
which still gapes in many places as an open wound.
I could not have believed that the ruins were still
so untouched. The land is mostly under cultiva-
tion, but the houses are mere shells, and I cannot
think where the cultivators live. When you
drive for sixty miles and see nothing but ruin on
either side of the road, and when you know that
the same thing extends from the sea to the Alps,
and that in places it is thirty miles broad, it helps
one to realise the debt that Germany owes to her
victims. If it had been in the Versailles terms
that all her members of parliament and journa-
lists should be personally conducted, as we have
been, through a sample section, their tone would
be more reasonable.

It has been a wonderful panorama. We
followed the route of the thousand taxi-cabs
which helped to save Europe up to the place
where Gallieni's men dismounted and walked
straight up against Kluck's rearguard. We saw
Belleau Wood, where the 2nd and 46th American
divisions made their fine debut and showed
Ludendorff that they were not the useless soldiers
he had so vainly imagined. Thence we passed
all round that great heavy sack of Germans
which had formed in June, 1918, with its tip at
Dormans and Chateau Thierry. We noted Bligny,

3ii

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

sacred to the sacrifices of Carter Campbell's 51st
Highlanders, and Braithwaite's 62nd Yorkshire
division, who lost between them seven thousand
men in these woods. These British episodes seem
quite unknown to the French, while the Ameri-
cans have very properly laid out fine graveyards
with their flag flying, and placed engraved tablets
of granite where they played their part, so that in
time I really think that the average Frenchman
will hardly remember that we were in the war
at all, while if you were to tell him that in the
critical year we took about as many prisoners and
guns as all the other nations put together, he
would stare at you with amazement. Well, what
matter ! With a man or a nation it is the duty
done for its own sake and the sake of its own
conscience and self-respect that really counts.
All the rest is swank.

We slept at Rheims. We had stayed at the
chief hotel, the Golden Lion, in 1912, when we were
en route to take part in the Anglo-German motor-
car competition, organised by Prince Henry. We
searched round, but not one stone of the hotel was
standing. Out of 14,000 houses in the town,
only twenty had entirely escaped. As to the
Cathedral, either a miracle has been wrought or
the German gunners have been extraordinary
masters of their craft, for there are acres of abso-
lute ruin up to its very walls, and yet it stands
erect with no very vital damage. The same
applies to the venerable church of St. Remy. On
the whole I am prepared to think that save in one
fit of temper upon September 19th, 1914, the

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

guns were never purposely turned upon this
venerable building. Hitting the proverbial hay-
stack would be a difficult feat compared to getting
home on to this monstrous pile which dominates
the town. It is against reason to suppose that
both here and at Soissons they could not have
left the cathedrals as they left the buildings
around them.

Next day, we passed down the Vesle and Aisne,
seeing the spot where French fought his brave
but barren action on September 13th, 1914, and
finally we reached the Chemin des Dames — a good
name had the war been fought in the knightly
spirit of old, but horribly out of place amid the
ferocities with which Germany took all chivalry
from warfare. The huge barren countryside,
swept with rainstorms and curtained in clouds,
looked like some evil landscape out of Vale Owen's
revelations. It was sown from end to end with
shattered trenches, huge coils of wire and rusted
weapons, including thousands of bombs which are
still capable of exploding should you tread upon
them too heavily. Denis ran wildly about, like
a terrier in a barn, and returned loaded with all
sorts of trophies, most of which had to be dis-
carded as overweight. He succeeded, however, in
bringing away a Prussian helmet and a few other
of the more portable of his treasures. We re-
turned by Soissons, which interested me greatly,
as I had seen it under war conditions in 1916.
Finally we reached Paris after a really wonderful
two days in which, owing to Mr. Cook's organisa-
tion and his guide, we saw more and understood

313

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

more, than in a week if left to ourselves. They
run similar excursions to Verdun and other points.
I only wish we had the time to avail ourselves of
them.

A tragic intermezzo here occurred in our Paris
experience. I suddenly heard that my brother-
in-law, E. W. Hornung, the author of " Raffles "
and many another splendid story, was dying at
St. Jean de Luz in the Pyrenees. I started off at
once, but was only in time to be present at his
funeral. Our little family group has been thinned
down these last two years until we feel like a
company under hot fire with half on the ground.
We can but close our ranks the tighter. Hornung
lies within three paces of George Gissing, an
author for whom both of us had an affection. It
is good to think that one of his own race and
calling keeps him company in his Pyrennean
grave.

Hornung, apart from his literary powers, was
one of the wits of our time. I could brighten
this dull chronicle if I could insert a page of his
sayings. Like Charles Lamb, he could find
humour in his own physical disabilities — disabili-
ties which did not prevent him, when over fifty,
from volunteering for such service as he could do
in Flanders. When pressed to have a medical
examination, his answer was, " My body is like a
sausage. The less I know of its interior, the
easier will be my mind." It was a characteristic
mixture of wit and courage.

During our stay in Paris we went to see the
Anglo-French Rugby match at Coulombes. The

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

French have not quite got the sporting spirit, and
there was some tendency to hoot whenever a
decision was given for the English, but the play
of their team was most excellent, and England
only won by the narrow margin of 10 to 6. I can
remember the time when French Rugby was the
joke of the sporting world. They are certainly
a most adaptive people. The tactics of the game
have changed considerably since the days when I
was more familiar with it, and it has become less
dramatic, since ground is gained more frequently
by kicking into touch than by the individual run,
or even by the combined movement. But it is
still the king of games. It was like the old lists,
where the pick of these two knightly nations bore
themselves so bravely of old, and it was an object
lesson to see Clement, the French back, playing on
manfully, with the blood pouring from a gash in
the head. Marshal Foch was there, and I have
no doubt that he noted the incident with approval.

I had a good look at the famous soldier, who
was close behind me. He looks very worn, and
sadly in need of a rest. His face and head are
larger than his pictures indicate, but it is not a
face with any marked feature or character. His
eyes, however, are grey, and inexorable. His
kepi was drawn down, and I could not see the
upper part of the head, but just there lay the ruin
of Germany. It must be a very fine brain, for in
political, as well as in military matters, his judg-
ment has always been justified.

There is an excellent clairvoyante in Paris,
Madame Blifaud, and I look forward, at ^some

315

THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

later date, to a personal proof of her powers,
though if it fails I shall not be so absurd as to
imagine that that disproves them. The particular
case which came immediately under my notice
was that of a mother whose son had been killed
from an aeroplane, in the war. She had no details
of his death. On asking Madame B., the latter
replied, " Yes, he is here, and gives me a vision
of his fall. As a proof that it is really he, he
depicts the scene, which was amid songs, flags
and music." As this corresponded with no
episode of the war, the mother was discouraged
and incredulous. Within a short time, however,
she received a message from a young officer who
had been with her son when the accident occurred.
It was on the Armistice day, at Salonica. The
young fellow had flown just above the flags, one
of the flags got entangled with his rudder, and
the end was disaster. But bands, songs and flags
all justified the clairvoyante.

Now, at last, our long journey drew to its close.
Greatly guarded by the high forces which have,
by the goodness of Providence, been deputed to
help us, we are back in dear old London once
more. When we look back at the 30,000
miles which we have traversed, at the complete
absence of illness which spared any one of seven
a single day in bed, the excellence of our long
voyages, the freedom from all accidents, the undis-
turbed and entirely successful series of lectures,
the financial success won for the cause, the double
escape from shipping strikes, and, finally, the
several inexplicable instances of supernormal,

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THE WANDERINGS OF A SPIRITUALIST

personal happenings, together with the three-fold
revelation of the name of our immediate guide,
we should be stocks and stones if we did not
realise that we have been the direct instruments
of God in a cause upon which He has set His
visible seal. There let it rest. If He be with
us, who is against us ? To give religion a founda-
tion of rock instead of quicksand, to xemove the
legitimate doubts of earnest minds, to make the
invisible forces, with their moral sanctions, a real
thing, instead of mere words upon our lips, and,
incidentally, to reassure the human race as to
the future which awaits it, and to broaden its
appreciation of the possibilities of the present
life, surely no more glorious message was ever
heralded to mankind. And it begins visibly to
hearken. The human race is on the very eve of a
tremendous revolution of thought, marking a
final revulsion from materialism, and it is part of
our glorious and assured philosophy, that, though
we may not be here to see the final triumph of
our labours, we shall, none the less, be as much
engaged in the struggle and the victory from the
day when we join those who are our comrades in
battle upon the further side.

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" Sir Arthur Conan Doyle has given us a classic." — Sir W. Robertson Nicoll

The First Volume of Sir Arthur Con an Doyle' s
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THE BRITISH CAMPAIGN in FRANCE
and FLANDERS 1914

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The Second Volume of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle* s
History of the War

THE BRITISH CAMPAIGN in FRANCE
and FLANDERS 1915

With Maps, Plans and Diagrams. SECOND EDITION

" If any student of the war is in search of a plain statement, accurate
and chronological, of what took place in these dynamic sequences of
onslaughts which have strewn the plain of Ypres with unnumbered
dead, and which won for the Canadians, the Indians, and our own
Territorial divisions immortal fame, let him go to this volume. He
will rind in it few dramatic episodes, no unbridled panegyric, no
purple patches. But he will own himself a much enlightened man,
and, with greater knowledge, will be filled with much greater pride
and much surer confidence." — Daily Telegraph

The Third Volume of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's
History of the War

THE BRITISH CAMPAIGN in FRANCE
and FLANDERS 1916

With Maps, Plans and Diagrams

" We gave praise, and it was high, to the first and second volumes of
' The British Campaign in France and Flanders.' We can give the
same to the third, and more, too. For the whole of this volume is
devoted to the preliminaries and the full grapple of the Battle of the
Somme — a theme far surpassing everything that went before in
magnitude and dreadfulness, but also in inspiration for our own race
and in profound human import of every kind." — Observer

HODDER & STOUGHTON LTD., Warwick Square, London, E.C.4

" Sir Arthur Conan Doyle has given us a classic." — Sir W. Robertson Nicoll

The Fourth Volume of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle* s
History of the War

THE BRITISH CAMPAIGN in FRANCE
and FLANDERS 1917

With Maps, Plans and Diagrams

" If Sir Arthur can complete the remaining two volumes with the same
zest and truth as is exhibited here, it will indeed be a work which
every student who fought in France in the Great War will be proud
to possess on his shelves." — Sunday Times

" It will find with others of the series a permanent place in all military
libraries as a reliable work of reference for future students of the war."
— Observer

The Fifth Volume of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's
History of the War

THE BRITISH CAMPAIGN in FRANCE
and FLANDERS January to July, 1918

With Maps, Plans and Diagrams

" The history shows no abatement in vigour and readableness, but
rather the opposite, and a final volume describing the great counter-
attack of the Allies, leading to their final victory, will bring to a close
a series which, on its own lines, is unsurpassable." — Scotsman
" Sir Arthur Conan Doyle has stuck to his great work with admirable
assiduity. . . . He has produced an accurate and concise record of
a campaign the most glorious and the most deadly in all the history
of the British race, and a record well qualified to live among the
notable books of the language." — Edinburgh Evening Dispatch

The Sixth Volume of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's
History of the War

THE BRITISH CAMPAIGN in FRANCE
and FLANDERS July to November, 1918

With Maps, Plans and Diagrams

" Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's concluding volume of the interim history
of the British Campaign on the West Front is as good as any of its
predecessors." — Morning Post

" Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's ' History of the British Campaign in
France and Flanders' is an authoritative work, which is destined
for immortality. . . . With full confidence in the historian, with
congratulations on a noble task accomplished, we open the sixth and
final volume." — British Weekly

HODDER & STOUOHTON LTD., Warwick Square, London, E.C.4

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