Because of the particular qualifications and aptitude of magicians to detect fraud it is not surprising that Spiritualistic publications seize eagerly any word coming from them favorable to the cause of Spiritualism. With the comment, “it is well worth preserving and placing beside that of Belachini, the German conjuror, as an answer to those of our opponents, who, ignorant of legerdemain, declare our phenomena to be of that character,” “The Spiritualist” of September 9, 1881, quoted from the Paris “_Revue Spirits_” the following statement of E. Jacobs, a French prestidigitator: “Relating to phenomena which occurred in Paris in 1865, through the Brothers Davenport, spite of the assertions, more or less trustworthy, of the French and English journalists, and spite of the foolish jealousies of ignorant conjurors, I feel it my duty to show up the bad faith of one party, and chicanery of the other.... All that has been said or done adverse to these American mediums is absolutely untrustworthy. If we should judge rightly of a thing we must understand it, and neither the journalists nor the conjurors possess the most elementary knowledge of the science that governs these phenomena. As a Prestidigitator of repute and a sincere Spiritualist, I affirm that the mediumistic facts demonstrated by the two Brothers were absolutely true, and belong to the Spiritualistic order of things in every respect.... Messrs. Henri Robin and Robert Houdin, when attempting to imitate these said feats, never presented to the public anything beyond an infantine and almost grotesque parody of the said phenomena, and it would be an ignorant and obstinate person who could regard the question seriously as set forth by these gentlemen. If, as I have reason to hope, the psychical studies to which I am applying myself at this time, succeed, I shall be able to establish clearly (and that by public demonstration) the immense line of demarcation which separates mediumistic phenomena from conjuring proper, and then equivocation will be no longer possible, and persons will yield to evidence, or deny through predetermination. (Signed) “E. Jacobs.[32] “Experimenter and President of Conference to the Psychological Studies at Paris.”