Telepathy, Genuine and FraudulentBaggally, W. W. (William Wortley)
Science
Telepathy, Genuine and Fraudulent
Baggally, W. W. (William Wortley)
Parapsychology -- Investigation; Telepathy
I signed my letter W. W. B. A fortnight after, the following letter
appeared in _Light_:--
"SIR,--With reference to the communication by W. W. B.
referring to the supposed thought transference, and
mentioned by another correspondent, C. A. M., in connection
with the entertainments of Professor Baldwin (an American
conjurer and brother mason), whom I met in Cape Town on two
separate occasions, permit me to state that (1) if it is the
same Baldwin, he is one of the cleverest illusionists in
his special line of trick thought transference, and W. W. B.
is quite right. (2) I know that Mr. and Mrs. Baldwin did
most of their experiments by trick, because, being one of
the chosen committee to test the so-called thought reading,
I fixed it absolutely as trickery on the lines indicated by
W. W. B.
(Signed) "BERKS HUTCHINSON"
I was gratified to read this letter and to find that my conjecture was
correct that the Baldwin performance was a mere exhibition of
conjuring.
PART III
THE ZANCIGS
Some years ago there appeared at the Alhambra Theatre, London, two
entertainers--Mr. and Mrs. Zancig--whose performances were of so
puzzling a nature that to many who had witnessed them the only
explanation of the results obtained appeared to be that genuine
telepathy was at play. The _Daily Mail_ newspaper arranged that Mr. and
Mrs. Zancig should be subjected to a series of severe tests at its
office, and on the 30th November 1906 these were carried out.
On the 1st December the _Daily Mail_ published a full account of these
experiments. The publication of this and of other accounts by persons
who had witnessed the remarkable performances of the Zancigs led to a
heated controversy between the correspondents of the _Daily Mail_ and
the _Daily Chronicle_. Those of the first paper mostly asserted that the
performance was an exhibition of true telepathy, while those of the
second paper declared that codes--visual and verbal--would account for
the phenomena. Previously to the experiment carried out by the _Daily
Mail_ I had obtained a letter of introduction to the Zancigs from a
friend of mine who had had private tests with them, but as it was
necessary to have the permission of the manager of the Alhambra before
an interview with the Zancigs could be arranged, I called at the offices
of that theatre, and saw Mr. Scott, the manager. I informed him that I
was a member of the Society for Psychical Research, which body I told
him took the deepest interest in telepathy. I handed him a letter that I
had written to Mr. Zancig, and on the 29th November 1906 I received the
following communication from the last-named gentleman:--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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