When the operation was over, Madame Pl--- was brought out of her trance: she did not remember anything, had not felt any pain and showed profound astonishment that the operation was over. The dressing was done in the usual way, and the wound showed every symptom of quick healing. At the end of a week's time Madame Pl--- drove out in a carriage. The suppuration was decreased and the wound was making rapid progress towards healing, when, about the evening of the fifteenth day, the patient complained of feeling great oppression, and swellings began to show in the lower extremities. All this is nothing but the simple truth: now comes in the marvellous. Madame Pl--- had a daughter who came from the country to nurse her mother. Dr. Chap----, having seen that she had a very clear mind, put her into a magnetic sleep and consulted her about her mother's condition. At the first attempt she made to see, her face grew troubled and tears rose to her eyes. Then she announced that the peaceful but inevitable death of her mother would take place the next morning. When questioned upon the internal state of her mother's chest, she said that the right lung was quite dead, that it was empty, suppurating on the side nearest the lower portion of the spine and bathed in serous fluid; that the left lung was sound and alone supported life. As for the abdominal viscera, the liver, according to her, was whitish and wrinkled; but the intestines were sound. These depositions were taken down in the presence of witnesses. The next day, at the given hour, Madame Pl--- died. The autopsy was made in the presence of deputies from the Académie, and the state of the body was found to conform precisely with the description given by the mesmerised girl. This was what was reported in the papers, stated in the official return, related to me and confirmed by Jules Cloquet himself, one day when we were talking together--before the discovery of chloroform--of the great mysteries of nature which baffle human intelligence. Later, when I was preparing my book _Joseph Balsamo_, being interested to fathom the often debated question of the power or impotence of magnetism, I decided to make some personal experiments, not relying upon those produced by foreigners interested in accrediting magnetism. So I studied magnetism first hand, and the result of my investigations was as follows:--