themselves with knives and lancets till the blood gushed out upon them," and then they prophesied. It has already been mentioned that in India the glance was fixed upon the navel, until the divine light began to shine before the mind's eye--in other words, until a trance is induced, and visions begin to appear. The changes which immediately precede dissolution seem, finally, to be most favorable to a development of prophetic powers. Already Aretæus, the Cappadocian, said that the mind of many dying persons was perfectly clear, penetrating and prophetic, and mentions a number of cases in which the dying had begun to converse with the dead, or foretold the fate of those who stood by their bedside. Thus Homer also makes dying Hector warn Achilles of his approaching end, and Calanus, when in the act of ascending the funeral pile, replies to Alexander's question if he had any request to make: "No, I have nothing to ask, for I shall see you the day after to-morrow!" And on that day the young conqueror died. Suetonius reports that the Emperor Augustus was passing away almost imperceptibly, when he suddenly shuddered and said that forty youths were carrying him off. It so happened that when the end came, forty men of his body-guard were ordered to raise and convey the body to another room in the palace. There are a few cases known in which apparently dying persons, after delivering such prophecies, have recovered and retained the exceptional gift during the remainder of their lives, but these instances are rare and require confirmation.