Each Medium, generally, has some peculiar mode of manifesting Spiritualistic power; it is a peculiarity of this Medium, as has been before stated, that the completion of the Spirit message within the slates is indicated not by raps, as is frequently the case with other Mediums, but by the sudden and marvelous appearance on the top of the slate of the little fragment of pencil, which had been securely fastened up within. The fact, therefore, that the pencil was no longer inside of our slates was presumptive evidence that the Medium's control had been true to his word, and had written us a message. The slates were received from the Medium most carefully, and a meeting of the Commission hastily called. It is scarcely worth while to enter here at length on the details of that session, of the careful scrutiny to which the slates were subjected, of the unmutilated seals, of the untouched screws, etc., etc.; but it is worth while to record the feeling of grave responsibility, almost akin to solemnity, with which we all approached what, for aught we knew, might prove to be a revelation of a power as wonderful as any with which, as yet, we had ever been brought into acquaintance. Just before we opened the slates it was noticed that at one corner, owing to the flexibility of the wooden frames, it was quite possible to stretch the slates far enough apart to permit the insertion of the blade of a knife, and an examination of the edges at this point revealed only too plainly discolored abrasions. When the slates were finally opened, not a stroke of writing nor a scratch was to be found, but at the suspected corner were the discolored marks, visible to this day, of the knife which had been inserted to extract the pencil, which, in its enforced outward passage, had left behind, in its scratches on the wood, a tell-tale trail of dust which the microscope revealed to be of the same substance as the pencil. The Spirits had not taken even the precaution to wipe the broad knife clean from rust or dirt. The slates are preserved in our sad museum of specimens of misdirected ingenuity. We are continually confronted with statements wherein the narrator claims a Spiritual solution as the only possible one of the enigma involved in the phenomena, as he observed them. To all such statements we have, first, the plain and ready answer, that we do not attempt to pass judgment on manifestations which we ourselves have not observed. All that we can vouch for is the result of our own observation. More cannot be demanded of us.