The daily morning journal and courier., 1905-06-10

book she had seen and forgotten, for that would be to explain strange phenomenon by another phenomenon equally strange and inexPlicahle. Pro- lesser Richet suggested comparisons with mathematical and musical pre- digies, but found them uncOnvincing. 4 wonderful child can remember the whole Of a musical score which is con- tained ia large book, but then he is dealing with a language he knows thoroughly. So it is with the lightning character; he is thoroughly versed in figures. Here, on the contrary, is a lady who writes pages of Greek, more or less correctly without any knowledge whatsoever of Greek. Professor Richet then suggested spirtualistic, but found them unsatisfactory. In the end he had to admit that there was no ex- planation.
 In the discussion which followed, Sir Oliver Lodge summed up the position as set before the audience in the presi- ! dents address. but he could not quite accept, without reserve the question of the genuineness of Mime. X. The so- GitLg Iclu pGElEtL llh1AIl HI T AbANSoOl Richet and Professor Richet had per feet faith in Mime. K; but the conclu- sion did not follow that the society must have perfect in Mime. X.
 Then the comparison of the infant ! prodigy could not be altogether re- jected. There was the wonderful Span- | ish child of two years old, who had ap- peared before the King of Spain and ! before Professor Richet himself. The mother of this child once played over an intricate piece of music, and, on going afterwards into the next room she heard some one repeating the per formance. Returning, sEe saw to her consterEation, her infant child playing 1 the music quite correctly. Obviously the child could have no previous know ledge because it was hardly old enough to have any knowledge at all. Here, then, was a sort of parallel.
 Other speakers produced strange cases of automatic writing, but none were of quite such a definite and ex. | traordinary nature as the case pre- scented by Professor Richet. Mrs. Yer rall, for example, told the society how her daughter and 6 friend of hers pro. duced by table rapping a Creek story (which the table enormously attributed to Pausanias, but afterwards gave tlt correct chaper and verse in Hellodorus The story was not quoted word fol word, but the substance was correctly given. In this case, however. both tn, mediums knew Greek, and probabl! had chapters of Heliodorous stored away in the subliminal consciousness. Then came MT. Harris with stor! told by Huxley thirty years ago, of : soldier wounded in a battle who wrot' in unknown languages from dictatior while in a state of trance; and lastl. Professor Barrett produced an authen
 tic story of a lady who was hypnotize( by clergyman. On one occasion th' clergyman asked her to write down thu contents of a letter which had just ar rived by post and was unopened. Sh
 wrote most of the contents correctly. In the discussion it was general. taken for granted that Mime. x had ex hibited only the powers of a copyist fo
 as Professor Richet explained. she hal made mistakes in spelling which couli only be made by a person completel. ignorant of the language. And so Mrs Verrall believed, that Mme. X. mus
 have been under Some sort of hypnoti control, but was influenced through he
 eye only and not though her intelli gence But there were other instances overlooked in the discussion, wher
 Mime x. had written sentences with meaning applicable to the immediat
 circumstances; for example, when sh
 wrote her sentence about the shadows In such a case she must have beel controlled through her intelligence. Il
 fact, the discussion did not carry tn
 matter any further than the presiden
 brought 1t in his address.
 A lady writes Greek who does no
 know Greek, and quotes sentences iron
 a Greek book which she has never seen
 How can it be explained? AS tn
 famous matter of Balliol once said
 "There are questions which can neve
 be answered, but are still worth tn
 asking" and this appears to be one o
 them'-London Standard, May F.