The daily morning journal and courier., 1896-10-13
GHOSTS HAILED INTO COURT.


 Fruitless Investigations of Devils
 Tricks-The Psychic Societies in the
 Dark-The Wicked Butterflies of the
 Black Lady"-Strange Testimony of
 Forty Witnesses.
 Haunted houses, open-air ghosts, mind readers, miracle workers, Luci- ferian ladies, and gossiping Gabriels continue to puzzle the learned, espec- ially in France. It was bad enough for them to have their brains racked over the high jinks of hypnotism without being compelled to deal with the devil, but that is where they are at just now. The psychic societies are getting sick of their laborious duties, and some of their members have resigned in horror. The testimony is indeed startling, and quite sufficient to belittle the story of Jack and the Beanstalk. From lilly we have had reports of apparitions of the Virgin, and of the doings of the wicked 'lady In black" who, among other things, amuses herself by sending big black butterflies to put out with their wings the wax tapers around the holy tree where the apparition is seen. But the most astounding thing about all this devilish nonsense is that it is vouched for by hosts of witnesses of in telligence, honesty, responsibility and sanity. After dealing with the subject repeatedly the Figaro drops it now to take up the devils doings in other places. Here is it's hair-lifting article, and if any fellow wants more lauthen- tic specimen of lurid literature, he can go to the library of Sheel and look for it:
 Everybody knows the facts. All the journals have told with a perfect luxu- " of details the story of that house of l Valenee-en-B Erie. where the furniture dances; where stones are thrown by in- | visible hands and the windows smashed; where the partitions rattle, and where the eloquence of Cambronne, constantly repeated, makes the police men blush. The latter, it should be re- membered were ordered to the estab- | lishment to catch the mysterious de- linquents. Sensible men in this en- | frightened age are almost angry when 1 they consider that people become inter- ested in such nonsense. Others who were proud of their agnosticism and of l their delivery from the yoke of super- l stition, have become convinced that the devil is in the thing, or, at least, that it is a genuine spiritualistic manifesto | tion.
 | We offer no explanation for these | strange phneomena. All that we want | to say is that the thing is not new. h. deed, the sameness of all these mani 1 festations points to the tricks of a trade which the investigators fail to reveal, probably because they bend | most of their energies to the capture of l ghosts instead of fakirs. Among the hundreds of stories that one can recall upon this subject the following is the most reliable because 1t is supported by plenty of evidence:
 I In the month of February, 1851,, a case whose astounding details seem to | bring the audience back three hundred years, was tried before one of the jus LlCeS Ol LIe peace OI StlIle 1lllelteuiS. It was a case of sorcery, and was pre- sented in court in the form of an indict- ment for conspiracy, persecution, mali cious mischief, and all-round disorderly conduct When we consider that it is the record of a court of justice in the | nineteenth century, and that over forty intelligent and respectable witnesses were examined, brief abstract of the l testimony becomes interesting. The | scene was laid in a rectory, and the characters were a priest and boy, plaintiffs, and shepherd, defendant At the beginning of the month of | March, 1S49, the plaintiff, cure of Cide- vile, near Yvetot, met among his sick parishioners man named Gilbert, who had the reputation of being both a healer and a sorcerer. Some time af- terward this man was arrested, tried, and sentenced to two years imprison- ment for illegally practising as a phy- sician. He suspected that 1t was the priest who had denounced him, and, before going to jail. left the care of his revenge to his friend and disciple. Thorel, the accused shepherd.