to a logical outcome than are others, equally distinguished in other directions and equally able, if you will, but who have not these special qualifications. It follows that it is not fair for you to set up what you think you have seen as overthrowing their authority; even if you happen to be an unprejudiced and accurate observer and have weighed the probability of your observations being vitiated by one or other of the many sources of error in such observation, it is only a small fact, though of course one worthy of notice. There is no good reason why the average man should set so much store by his own impressions of sense, when the fallibility of other witnesses is so readily demonstrable. Whatever of seeming dogmatism there is in this view is removed by the experimental demonstration furnished by Messrs. Hodgson and Davey, that the kind and amount of mal-observation and faulty description which an average observer will introduce into the account of a performance such as the medium gives, is amply sufficient to account for the divergence between his report of the performance and what really occurred. The success of a large class of tricks depends upon diverting the observer's attention from the points of real importance, and in leading him to draw inferences perfectly valid under ordinary circumstances but entirely wrong in the particular case. It must be constantly remembered that the judging powers are at a great disadvantage in observing such performances, and that it is a kind of judgment in which they have little practice. In the intercourse of daily life a certain amount of good faith and of confidence in the straightforwardness of the doings of others prevents us from exercising that close scrutiny and suspicion here necessary. We know that most of our neighbors have neither the intention nor the sharpness to deceive us, and do not live on the principle of the detective, who regards every one as dishonest until proven to be otherwise. This attitude of extreme suspicion is indispensable in dealing with the phenomena now under discussion. It follows, therefore, that the layman cannot serve as a pilot for himself or for others in such troubled waters. This, however, if duly recognized, need not be a matter of concern. "This unpreparedness and inobservancy of mind in the presence of a conjurer," says Mr. Hodgson, is not "a thing of which any one who is not familiar with the tricks already need be ashamed." Even a professional may be nonplussed by a medium's performance, if he have no experience in the special kind of sleight-of-hand required for the trick. This is the experience of Mr. Harry Kellar; he at first declared himself unable to explain slate-writing as a trick, but now can repeat the process in a variety of ways, and with far greater skill than is shown by the mediums. We may therefore approach Mr. Davey's investigation with the assurance that, in all probability, we too should have failed