determined to keep the matter secret, and to attempt the conversion of Renata. And, as the nuns still continued possessed, they despatched her to a remote convent. Here, under a show of outward piety, she still went on with her attempts to realize witchcraft, and the nuns remained possessed. It was decided at length to give Renata over to the civil power. She was accordingly condemned to be burned alive; but in mitigation of punishment, her head was first struck off. Four of the possessed nuns gradually recovered, with clerical assistance—the other two remained deranged. Renata was executed on the 21st January, 1749. Renata stated, in her voluntary confession, that she had often, at night, been carried bodily to witch-sabbaths, in one of which she was first presented to the Prince of Darkness, when she abjured God and the Virgin at the same time. Her name, with the alteration of Maria into Emma, was written in a black book, and she herself was stamped on the back as the Devil’s property; in return for which she received the promise of seventy years of life, and of all she might wish for. She stated that she had often at night gone into the cellar of the chateau and drank the best wine; in the shape of a sow had walked on the convent walls; on the bridge had milked the cows as they passed over; and several times had mingled with the actors in the theatre in London. LETTER X. MESMERISM.—Use of chloroform—History of Mesmer—The true nature and extent of his discovery—Its applications to medicine and surgery—Various effects produced by mesmeric manipulations—Hysteric seizures—St. Veitz’s dance—Nervous paralysis—Catochus—Initiatory trance—The order in which the higher trance phenomena are afterwards generally drawn out. Can no further use be made of the facts and principles we have thus seen verified and established, than to explain a class of delusions which prevailed in times of ignorance? The powers which we have seen successfully employed to shake the nerves and unsettle the mind in the service of superstition, can they not be skilfully turned to some purpose beneficial to society? A satisfactory answer to the question may be found in the invention of ether-inhalation, and in the history of mesmerism. The witch narcotized her pupils in order to produce in them delusive visions; the surgeon stupefies his patient to annul the pain of an operation. The fanatic preacher excites convulsions and trance in his auditory as evidence of the working of the Holy Spirit; Mesmer produced the same effects in his patients as a means of curing disease.