One Sunday evening, in the late nineties, I visited the spiritist church on Bedford Avenue, Brooklyn, of which the late Ira Moore Corliss was then pastor. In his day Mr. Corliss was probably the most prominent medium in Brooklyn, a city where spiritism has always flourished. He was an obviously religious-minded man, and one who sincerely believed that it was his mission to act as an intermediary between this world and the next. That evening the usual order of services in spiritist churches was followed--a prayer, some hymn singing, a sermon, or "inspirational discourse," and, lastly, the giving of "test messages," in which the medium passed rapidly up and down the aisles, pausing here and there to deliver oral communications alleged to come from the world of spirits. Seated next to me was an elderly gentleman of dignified appearance, who watched the proceedings with a quiet smile of contempt. It was evident that this was the first time he had ever seen anything of the kind, and that he was both amused and disgusted. Suddenly Mr. Corliss, halting directly in front of him, said, in the quick, nervous way common to him when under "spirit control": "I have a message for you, sir." "For me?" repeated the elderly gentleman, incredulously. "Yes, sir, for you. There is a spirit here that wants to thank you for your kindly thought of him to-day. It is the spirit of a rather tall man, heavily built, clean-shaven, with bright, tender eyes. He says his name is Henry Ward Beecher." The smile faded from the other's face. He bent forward, listening intently. "Go on," he said. "This spirit," continued the medium, "says that he is glad to know you have not forgotten him. He says that he was with you this afternoon, when you went to the cemetery and took this flower from his grave." With a dramatic gesture Mr. Corliss drew from the lapel of his astonished auditor's coat a sprig of geranium, and held it up so that all could see it. "Am I not right?" he demanded. "You are. Quite right." Afterward I joined the elderly gentleman on the sidewalk, and plied him with questions. I found him greatly mystified. "This is too much for me," said he. "I am a stranger to Brooklyn, and had never attended a spiritualist meeting until to-night. I only dropped in out of curiosity. But it is true that this afternoon I visited the cemetery where Henry Ward Beecher is buried, and picked this flower from near his grave, as a memento of my visit. Mr. Beecher was a very good friend to me in my younger days. How the medium could know these facts I cannot imagine. I had told nobody of my trip to the cemetery, and I am positive that no one saw me pick the flower."