Page:Leaves from my Chinese Scrapbook - Balfour, 1887.djvu/154

 cheered his heart with copious libations of wine, and devoted himself to the practice of what may be called the convivial phase of Taoist philosophy. Numbers of disciples followed in his footsteps, convinced that the world was very vain; and from this time Lü Tsû became a shining light of the school whose doctrines he had embraced. His mystically conceived interpretation of the great Taoist classic we have already referred to; but what gave him the widest celebrity he enjoyed was his wonderful talent in working the planchette. He became, in fact, a sort of planchette professor. There are very few of our readers, we suppose, who have witnessed a planchette séance in China. The board is suspended over a tray of clean sand, and through a hole in it hangs a pencil. Incense is burnt, prostrations are performed, and the passing spirit is invoked. Then the planchette begins slowly to wave to and fro, and the pencil traces characters in the sand, which are of a somewhat obscure and oracular signification. A capital description of a fu luan or planchette séance, is given in the novel P'in Hua Pao Chien, or "Precious Mirror of Choice Beauties," a translation of which appeared in the China Review a few years ago. Through the medium of the planchette Lü Tsu was enabled to purvey much highly-prized information, and his success in the art was such that he is invoked to this very day in Peking, and probably elsewhere, whenever the native mediums can be prevailed upon to give a séance. Among the most valued revelations vouchsafed through the mediumship of Lü Tsû were directions with regard to the cure of diseases. In fact, his fame became so great in this department of spiritualistic art, that he has since been canonised as the Patron