Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. II.djvu/202

Rh Some believed in them, but the greater number did not, considering the young women to be cunning impostors who themselves produced these noises and strange occurrences.

As these sisters, the Misses Fish, received payment for letting the public see and hear them, it appears all the more probable that this may be the case. Nevertheless they had themselves solicited investigation, had consented to be bound hand and foot in the presence of a committee, consisting of some of the most respectable people of the city; and during the whole time the noises and knockings were heard around them, and the committee published in the newspaper a declaration, signed by their names, stating that nothing had been discovered which gave reason to suspect these young women of imposture. Since then they have been left at peace; but the better class of townspeople seem to regard it as a proof of bad taste and want of judgment to visit these ghostly ladies. I have, from my earliest youth, heard so much about spectral affairs, and have myself heard such things as I cannot explain by the ordinary, well-known powers of nature,—and I had so frequently, during my travels in America, heard and read in the newspapers of “The Western Knockings and Rappings,” that I was very curious to hear them with my own ears. The young Lowells partook of my curiosity, and our friends in Rochester conducted us therefore to the place where, for the present, they were to be heard. The first glance however of the two sisters convinced me that whatever spirits they might be in communication with, they were not of a spiritually respectable class. Very different must be the appearance of such persons as have communion with the higher spiritual beings. For the rest, I came to the conclusion, from what occurred during this visit, and which in certain respects was extraordinary enough,