Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1875-12-31
Daytime Turned Into Night
Two Hours Among
the Spirits.
A Noble Red Man After q Re-
porter's Scalp.
A Ledger Commissioner
Experience In Search
of Truth.
What Was Done, and What Was
NOt-EspeclaIIy the Latter.

----@-~-
II the readers of the LEDGER are not
out with this spirit business we
will give the results Of one more visit to
the black cabinet in a dark room. Every
body cannot 90 to these well and freely
advertised seances, but everybody can
read the LEDGER at a nickel a copy, or
fifteen cents q week, while it costs
usually one dollar to see and hear the
performance about to be described.
Members Of the press, when admitted at
all, are not expected to pay. No seanee
has yet been given exclusively for the
benefit Of newspaper men, and only two
have been present at a time. Their
presence in q body, we fear, would
greatly disturb the conditions essen
tial to harmony and good developments.
Good camp meeting singing always
pleases the spirits, and in this line we
fear our reporterisl brethren would
prove q failure. They have been known
at a Scotch banquet on St. Andrews
day, when led by David NJ. Philip, Esq,
at two o'clock the next morning to join
in the chorus, He is a jolly
good fellow, jolly good fellow" etc.,
with great zest, but no two ever hap
pened to be on the same key, as if each
good fellow was bearing in mind the
peculiar style Of his journal. This was
a daytime seance, but the room was
eFectually darkened. The room is the
one formerly occupied by B: F. Coleman
as Clerk of the Second Circuit Court,
within the building d~iagonally across
Union street from the Courthouse. 1t ia
on the third floor, and we have 20 idea
that there is shy secret communication
With the outside. That is not necessary.
Knowing there would be a crowd, the
LEDGER representative presented himself
at o'clock yesterday afternoon. Twenty
or thirty persons had already assembled
and we're talking in groups in the hall,
or curiously exsming a portable cabinet
being made by carpenters ont OF soft
pine wood. 1t is SO constructed as Ia
be essiiy taken to pieces, from which il
Is inferred that the Millers propose, in
due course of time, to travel when this
field has been worked.
Doctor Watson came along ieisnrely,
linpiDg and smiling, at % O'Clock
and gave our representative a cordisI
welcome. he announced at the door
that preference would be given to visit
ors from fernando and Cold Water, Mis-
sissippi, Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and Nash
vile. The most Of the Memphis crowd
had to go away disappointed, The couu
try folks, ladies and gentlemen, filed in
followed by three or FIVE Memphis pee
pie and the LEDGER man. Going fror
daylight into a darkened room had
binding effect, but in a few moments, q
the pupil became dilated, objects an
persons became visible, but no spirit
just then. Doctor Watson had given o.
ders, from Red Face" or some sublim
and unquestioned authority, to seat th
ladies and gentlemen in pairs or altsI
nAtely. This was q most sstisfactor
arrangement to the LEDGER man, as h
presently discovered himself seated i
the center Of the semi-circle which curve
around the room in almost the shape
a horseshoe, between two very interes
ing and charming ladies, but whether b
LEVERS or not, they failed to take side
There it was-a little, rickety, old ca
met, covered with army blankets, FOL
deep in front and a breathing.hole in Il
middle, which was used very little, il
all, for any other purpose, and.even th
had a flap Of cloth over it.
The platform on which the cabinet 81
against the wall is fenced Of most efe
tuslly except at one end, and this ope
ing was occupied and carefully guard,
by T. W. Miller, the husband Of Il
young Squaw, as Red Face" ca.
her, who does the business inside. Th
fence is a curiosity. 1t was made 4
business, and looks more like g catl
fence than 3 mere check to morbid c
riosity. Red Face is bolligerent
tines. aud threatens to scalp people al
do other ugly things. Now, the fen
may be 70 keep tho ob~streperOus Spir
on their own ground, but it certainly b