Page:The Naturalisation of the Supernatural.pdf/202

182 test would have been by opening the book then and there and writing the word. We know from other accounts that the trick was occasionally performed in this way. But with two not uncritical observers this method may have seemed too hazardous. It seems probable that the word had been written beforehand, and that the choice of book, page, and line were successively "forced" on the experimenters.

But all that Hodgson's analysis could in most cases demonstrate was that the accounts of the performance given even by intelligent witnesses were frequently inaccurate; and that from these inaccuracies it might legitimately be inferred that if Eglinton had practised trickery, that trickery would not have been detected. To many intelligent persons this method of argument seemed unsatisfactory. They felt that they, in witnessing the phenomena, had not been guilty of similar errors of observation, nor, in recording them, of similar lapses of memory. It was urged that Eglinton had abundantly demonstrated his possession of occult powers; and that trickery, even if the proof were admitted as sufficient, was only resorted to on occasions when his genuine powers failed him. A more conspicuous demonstration of the fraudulent nature of the whole performance was needed, and was forthcoming. One of the Society's members, the late Mr. S. Davey, himself in the first instance a victim of Eglinton's wiles, ultimately detected the cheat and set himself to imitate the performance. Mr. Davey