The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1900-05-31
BELIEVED In GHOSTS
oR. ELLIOTT couEs SAID THAT He
OFTEN SAW THEM.

The Fa4leous 0rnithologist's Descriy-
ton of the Spirit Of q Dead Friend
Who Appeared to nnd Conversed
With Him In FIis Room.
DR.. Elliott Coues, the famous orni-
biologist and member OF the Ameri-
can Academy Of Sciences. was long
recognized as the foremost advocate of
belief in the existence Of ghosts. He
had promised several of his friends
that. if able to do so, he would appear
to them after his own demise, and they
are still waiting, with no little inter-
est, to see If he can carry out the
! agreement
Il have myself seen the ghosts of
good many dead persons" said the
doctor one day. II remember one oc-
casion when l had just gone to bed,
the light being turned out, l was com.
posing myself to slumber when l sud
denly became aware Of a presence in
the room. The impression conveyed
to my mind was that it was the pres
ence Of a certain person lately deceas-
ed, with whom had been on very in
innate terms. In fact, felt an over
powering sense Of the nearness Of the
individual in question.
About the same moment there
arose slowly from the floor nebulous
mass Of what looked like shining
white vapor, which began to take
shape, as did the smoke from the cas-
ket opened by the fisherman in the
Arabian Nights tales. Gradually it
assumed a more distinct outline, un-
til it presented a radiant image of my
friend. The lips appeared to move,
and from them came an Ineligible ut.
terance, message in short, from the
departed. l do not care to say what
that message was.
II can assure you that the vision was
no dream, and the nature Of the mes
sage was such as to eliminate, to my
own satisfaction at all events, the the
DRY of hallucination. What, then, was
this shape Of shining white vapor?
Was it human soul? 1t is a question
pregnant with intense interest
Each of us, 1 believe, has in him a
ghost, which ordinarily is confined to
the precincts of the body When
die. my ghost leaves my body perma-
nently, and, having done so, perhaps it
may continue to be the vehicle and
means of expression of conscious will,
memory and understanding. St. Paul
says, There is a natural body and q
spiritual body 1t is of the spiritual
body that l am speaking.
"Our senses take cOgnizance of no
forms of matter except those which
are in a certain degree Of condensa-
ton. but the spiritual body may be of
a more rarefied and tenuous substance.
The nonappearance Of ghosts to us
may be question not of the existence
of specters, but Of the acuteness of our
perceptive faculties.
MY own experience is that the COM
ing Of an apparition is always preced-
ed by curious sensation which / call
the ghost chill When this symptom
arrives, the threshold of consciousness
seems to be shifted to the extent of
rendering possible a perception of
something ordinarily invisible The
change is usually very brief, lasting
only a few seconds, during which the
manifestation occurs.
Zone reason that l have for believing
the evidence Of my own senses in this
matter is that on several occasions the
apparition of my own personality has
presented itself to other persons in
places where my body was not at the
time. Some years ago I was in Chica-
go, at an ordinary evening party with
about 40 friends, when an individual
in Washington, who did not even know
where was, was visited by my phan-
tasm and received from it a brief mes
sage stating where l was at the time
and giving the names Of two or three
of the guests present-persons with
whom the observer was unacquainted.
This was one of the rare cases where
a ghost made itself audible.
"You ask what would happen it one
should approach ghost such as have
described and try to touch it. My re-
ply is that there would certainly be no
danger in doing so, for specters never
do anybody any harm, the fear Of them
entertained by most people being SIM
ply a dread of that which is unknown
and not understood. Whatever is un-
known is always terrible. But the
phantom is composed Of matter too
tenuous to present any obstacle, and
I do not doubt that it would dissolve
and disappear if you attempted to
walk through t."-Washington Post.
Fish Living In Hot Water.
| There is nOnd at GOIconda which Is