Page:The Galaxy, Volume 5.djvu/45

Rh It was weeks before I fully recovered my health and strength; but, when I did, I was found again among the mediums. However, I did not again neglect my customary pursuits, nor again engage tn the investigation with the absorbing interest which had before so nearly wrecked my nervous system.

I saw many mediums, and conversed with many spirits—spirits of high and low degree—from the seventh heaven, and, for aught I know, from the seventh hell; but only on two or three occasions did I again receive word or sign from the counterfeit Franklin.

On one of these occasions I had gone to keep an appointment with the Broadway medium I have already mentioned. It was just in the edge of the evening, and I found his office closed; but seeing an open door near by, on which was the name of another medium, I rapped at it, and inquired if the gentleman would soon return to his apartment. I was told that he undoubtedly would, and was asked to walk in and await his coming. I did so. Two women were in the room, and, after a little conversation, one of them told me that she had the gift of spirit-sight, and asked if I would like to know what spirits she saw about me. I answered that I would, and the medium then went on to describe a man and a woman; the man tall, dark, wearing black clothes and a white cravat, and evidently a clergyman, and the woman young, graceful, with large, dark eyes, wavy, brown hair, and a most exquisite complexion. I asked who they were, and then the medium said that over my head, coming out in letters of fire, she saw a certain name, which she mentioned. I remarked that it could not be the name of either of the spirits. "No," she answered; "it is your own name; but coming out now, in the same letters, are the words 'Charlotte Brontë.

I waited for no more, but took up my hat and left the apartment.

Some time after this, I was again in New York, and while there visited a medium who was a total stranger to me. She was an uneducated woman, but she gave me a masterly disquisition on the principles of fictitious writing—analyzing most ably Scott, Bulwer, Dickens, Hawthorne, and Charlotte Bronte, and pointing out their agreements and differences, and the sources of their power. At the close of the séance, I asked the name of the spirit communicating, and the answer was "Charlotte Brontë."

"TheThe [sic] same evening, I called again upon the Christian spiritualist, whom I had now come to regard more as a friend than as an acquaintance. As I entered his library he said to me, "I had an engagement out this evening; but I have staid at home, because I knew you were coming. I have made an interesting appointment for you."

"With whom?"