to speak of her as she is i love her too much now he lay still for some time and i had hoped that the brandy had had the effect of sending him to sleep when he suddenly turned his face towards me did you ever read of wolves he asked i answered that i had there is a story he said thoughtfully in one of s books about a beautiful woman who took the form of a wolf at night and devoured her own children i wonder what put that idea into s head he pondered for some minutes and then he cried out for some more brandy there was a small bottle of upon the table and i managed by upon helping him myself to mix about half a with the spirits he drank it off and sank his head once more upon the pillow anything better than that he groaned death is better than that crime and cruelty cruelty and crime anything is better than that and so on with the monotonous refrain until at john in that sentence which followed � he had theories of the power of the human will and of the effect of mind upon matter i remember having once read a quaint which i had imagined to be mere at the time of the power of certain human minds and of effects produced by them at a distance was endowed with some exceptional power of the sort the idea grew upon me and very shortly i had evidence which convinced me of the truth of the supposition it happened that at the very time when my mind was dwelling upon this subject i saw a notice in the paper that our town was to be visited by dr the well known medium and was a man whose performance such as it was had been again and again pronounced to be genuine by competent judges he was far above and had the reputation of being the living authority upon the strange of animal and determined therefore to see what the human will could do even against all the of glaring and a public platform i took a ticket for the first night of the performance and went with several student friends we had secured one of the side boxes and did not arrive until after the performance had begun i had hardly taken my seat before i recognised with his and old mrs sitting in the third or fourth row of the they caught sight of me at almost the same moment and we john bowed to each other the first portion of the lecture was somewhat commonplace the giving tricks of pure with one or two of performed upon a subject whom he had brought with him he gave us an exhibition of too throwing his subject into a trance and then demanding particulars as to the movements of absent friends and the whereabouts of hidden objects all of which appeared to be answered satisfactorily i had seen all this before however what i wanted to see now was the effect of the s will when exerted upon some independent member of the audience he came round to that as the concluding exhibition in his performance i have shown you he said that a subject is entirely by the will of the he loses all power of and his very thoughts are such as are suggested to him by the master mind the same end may be attained without any preliminary process a strong will can simply by virtue of its strength take possession of a weaker one even at a distance and can the impulses and the actions of the owner of it if there was one man in the world who had a very much more highly developed will than any of the rest of the human family there is no reason why he should not be able to rule over them all and to reduce his fellow creatures to the condition of happily there is such a dead level of mental power or rather of mental weakness among us that such a catastrophe is not likely to occur but still within our small john it promised to be for the clouds were up in the north west and the dark was drifting across the face of the moon throwing alternate of light and shade upon the rugged surface of the island and the restless sea beyond we were standing talking close by the door of the cottage and i was thinking to myself that my friend was more cheerful than he had been since his illness when he gave a sudden sharp cry and looking round at him i saw by the light of the moon an expression of unutterable horror come over his features his eyes became fixed and staring as if upon some approaching object and he extended his long thin forefinger which quivered as he pointed look there he cried it is she i it is she i you see her there coming down the side of the he me by the wrist as he spoke there she is coming towards us who i cried straining my eyes into the darkness he screamed � she has come for me hold me fast old friend don t let me go hold up old man i said clapping him on the shoulder pull yourself together you are dreaming there is nothing to fear she is gone he cried with a gasp of relief no by heaven there she is again and nearer � coming nearer she told me she would come for me and she keeps her word come into the house i said his hand as i grasped it was as cold as ice ah i knew it i he shouted there she is waving her arms she is to me it is the signal i must go i am coming i am coming i i threw 