Page:Complete Works of Count Tolstoy - 18.djvu/223



(smiling). Yes, yes. Here is a circumstance that puzzles me: why are the mediums always from what we would call the educated class? Both Kápchich and Márya Ignátevna. If it is a special power they possess, it ought to be met with everywhere, even among peasants.

. And so it is. This occurs quite often we have a peasant in our house who has proved to be a medium. The other day we called him in during the séance. It was necessary to move a divan, and we had all forgotten about him. He had evidently fallen asleep. And just imagine: our séance was over, Kápchich awoke, and suddenly we noticed mediumistic manifestations in the other corner of the room, near the peasant,—the table moved.

(aside). That was when I crawled out from under the table.

. Apparently he, too, is a medium,—the more so since he resembles Hume in face— Do you remember Hume? The naïve blond.

(shrugging his shoulders). I declare! This is very interesting. Then you ought to test him.

. We are testing him. But he is not the only one. There are no end of mediums. We simply do not know them. Only the other day a sickly old woman moved a stone wall.

. Moved a stone wall?

. Yes, yes. She was lying in bed and did not at all know that she was a medium. She pressed her hand against the wall, and the wall gave way.

. And did not cave in?

. And did not cave in.