The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1896-01-11
HE WAS NOT BURIED
Those Who Had Confded in Professor
TyndaTl Were Disappointed.
THE POLICE INTERPRETED
There Was to Have Eeen a Grand
Exhibition of BuryIne a Man
Alive and Allowing Him to Re-
main Inferred for 80 Days.

Butte several years ago and unsucces
fully tried to exercise his hypnoti
powers over the notorious one legge,
Burkhardt: Il
Professor Alexander ]. McIvor Tyn
dali was not "buttered" this morning
nor was he planted in the cold ground
as he proposed to be. The facts of TIL,
case are that Tyndall did not becom,
| dead" enough to warrant the com
mittee, charged with that pleasan
duty. to bury him, even IL they wer,
disposed to do so, which was far from
| being the case. Furthermore, the Prof
essor's wife. who is in San Francisco
did not intend that her mystic spouse
should leave the earth's surface fol-
even the space Of thirty days, and ir
this the health and police official:
agreed with her. re
For some weeks past Professor Tyn-
dali, who is known from one end OF
| the continent to the other as a mind
reader and mystic. has announced that
he proposed to be buried underground
| for thirty days while in a cataleptio
trance, in order to NANTES to the
world that a Scotch fakir is as good as
an Indian one at such uncanny prac-
| tices. He was Immediately besieged by
| coffin makers, undertakes, real estate
men, tailors and even restaurant keep
ment, the latter class OF advertisers
| postponing the delivery of their goods
until the professor should have emerged
from his underground fast, when 1t
was supposed that he would be in a
| condition to appreciate the beauties of
beefsteak and onions or quail on toast.
The daily newspapers teemed with
glowing notices of tn e forthcoming
wonderful undertaking at the usual
rates. and the only thing that disturb
ed the equanimity of both public and
professor was the apprehension that
some mistaken individual would en-
deavor to prevent the mystic from
carrying out his laudable design. on
Sunday evening, at Illinois hall, having
previously been equipped with coffin,
grave-clotbes and other paraphernalia,
and having left his property by will to
the newspaper men of this city, Tyn-
dali gave the final reel over backward
in the presence of great audience,
and his trance-like condition was be-
gun. The professor was removed by a
chosen committee to his apartments at
Ramona hotel, where he was to lie I'M
til he became dead" enough to inter,
which state he had announced would
be reached this morning. ne
The public who had wondered over
his ind-reading tricks were all agog.
1t cannot be said they had explicit con-
fdence in the professor. but they did
not understand how he could afford to
back out after his flaming announce
ments, and they also failed to perceive
how he could escape the consequences
of his act. But they had not reckoned
on Mrs. Tyndall. In fact, probably not
one man in a thousand knew that there
was Mrs. Tyndall. But the police
know, for scarcely had the professor
entered into his alleged trance than a
telegram was handed to Chief Glass,
enjoining him to prevent the burial
alive of the sender's husband. Chief
Glass kept the telegram to himself. and
as the health authorities failed TO get
out an injunction against the inter
ment without burial permit. 1t really
looked as though the professor would
surely have to be buried. -f
Perhaps 1t was his apprehension of
this, or perhaps ii was owing to the
circumstance that the committe wilful-
ly or otherwise violated his instruction
to keep him secluded from all intr1Iders
who might disturb his physical repose
that the professors temperature and
respiration persisted in remaining
about normal. At all events the strain
on the committee was too great and
the prospect of Indictment for man
slaughter too vivid for them, for late
last night they weakened. and about
four hours before they were TO coat the
professors body with paraffine and
take him to his undug grave on Boyle
Heights, one of the members tele-
phoned to the morning papers that
council had been held and something
might happen In the morning"
The rest of the story is told in a few
words. About o'clock. in the presence
of Police Detective Steele, a blanket
was spread on the floor i'm the middle
of the room and the mystic stretched
out upon 1t. His pulse was about So
the lowest point reached during the en-
tire experiment being "A. A course of
rubbing and slapping was commenced
by the physicians of the committee, and
Professor Bell uttered cabalistic words
and made passes around TyndaHs
head. while the mystic was requested
by the rest of the party in more or less
energetic style to wake up. Finally
Tyndall gasped. sleepily opened his
eyes, and asked. WAS 1 buried?"
This was the first question and when
he was assured by some sympathetic
person that he had been he closed his
eyes and seemed to be going into a
trance again. But that was not what
the party went there for, and he was
jostled out of his dreamy state, put On
bed. covered up and given half a glass
of milk TO drink. the first nourishment
he had taken since he went into his
trance. 1t was a long time before the
news was broken to the professor. and
he apparently took IL to heart, but he
is not more sorry that he was not bur-
led than is the public who confided in
him. Later Tyndall was seen by a re-
porter and said that he had no remark
able sensations during his trance but
il was his impression" that the COM
mittee had not carried out their in
structions.