Telepathy, Genuine and FraudulentBaggally, W. W. (William Wortley)
Science
Telepathy, Genuine and Fraudulent
Baggally, W. W. (William Wortley)
Parapsychology -- Investigation; Telepathy
A few words will suffice to describe the experiments which Yoga Rama
carried out to show (1) the control he had acquired over the functions
of his body, and (2) his insensibility to pain. As has already been
stated, he asked two members of the Committee to stand by him and note
by their watches the length of time that he was able to cease breathing.
He retained his breath for fifty seconds. A member of the Committee at
the back of the stage called out, when the length of time was announced,
"That is nothing. I can stop breathing for a full minute." This
exclamation appeared to disconcert Yoga Rama a good deal. The standing
barefooted on a board studded with nails and on broken glass are common
tricks which can be seen performed by negroes at country fairs. I felt
the points of the nails and found they had been filed down and were
blunt. Mr. Marriott sat on the nails to the amusement of the audience
while Yoga Rama had gone off the stage to remove his boots. When Yoga
Rama returned he stood barefooted on these nails only for about half a
minute. He then proceeded to break some bottles on a piece of felt. He
pounded away on the glass with a hammer till he had reduced the greater
part to nearly a powder. He carefully pushed the larger pieces of glass
on one side and stood on the powdered portion.
I will now proceed to state the reasons which lead me to the conclusion
that Yoga Rama was able to see, although apparently blindfolded.
1. The bandages were removed from his eyes by Mr. Marriott, who had
blindfolded him at the commencement of the performance. While this was
being done I had my face about two feet away from Yoga Rama's face and I
carefully noted the position of each article as it was being removed.
The lower edge of the porous plaster was above the tip of the
performer's nose, and the edge of the white handkerchief above the edge
of the plaster, and above the edge of the handkerchief was the edge of
the crimson scarf. The edges of the handkerchief and scarf were
sufficiently high up, so that, had the blindfolding depended only on
these, he could have seen under them. The gloves which had been placed
on the handkerchief need not be taken into account, as the folded pieces
of paper on his eyes prevented them from pressing into the sockets of
Yoga Rama's eyes, and he, by merely closing the eyes and bringing the
eyebrows well down when he was being blindfolded and then opening his
eyes and lifting the eyebrows well up, could displace the gloves from
their original position and cause them to rise, as a conjurer well
knows; therefore the blindfolding really depended on the position of the
porous plaster. Now when Mr. Marriott placed the plaster over the pieces
of paper he took care that the lower edges of both pieces should be on
one of the lines of holes which existed in the plaster as shown in the
accompanying engraving (which is taken from a photograph).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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