The question may fairly be asked, Cannot the fourth personality in that strange group--composed of the inquirer on this side, the medium, the medium’s control, and the spirit communicator--speak directly from within the veil? Sir Oliver Lodge, while admitting that an exceptional more direct privilege is occasionally vouchsafed to persons in extreme sorrow, gives his answer, on the whole, in the negative. The normal process “involves the activity of several people,” and we conclude from his writings that he desires to uphold professional mediumship. FOOTNOTES: [9] At Denison House, Vauxhall Bridge Road, on June 11th, 1919. [10] “Raymond,” p. 86. [11] _ibid._, p. 357. [12] _ibid._, p. 235. [13] _ibid._, p. 166. [14] “Spiritualism,” p. 74. [15] “On the Threshold of the Unseen,” p. 33. [16] _ibid._, p. 240. [17] “Spiritualism,” p. 172. [18] “Raymond,” p. 357. _Chapter V_ TABLE PHENOMENA Table-turning, as we meet it in literature, belongs to the older class of parlour games. Sir W. F. Barrett quotes the testimony of Delitzsch that it was practised in Jewish circles in the seventeenth century: “the table springs up even when laden with many hundred-weight.” Zebi, in 1615, defended the practice as not due to magic, but to the power of God, “for we sing to the table sacred psalms and songs, and it can be no devil’s work where God is remembered.” I Mrs. De Morgan, in that curious book, “From Matter to Spirit,” describes her experience in table-turning circles about the year 1853. The medium was Mrs. Hayden, whose séances in West London were attended by such men as Professor Huxley and Robert Chambers. Mrs. Hayden was an educated lady, the wife of W. R. Hayden, editor of the _Star-Spangled Banner_. Her rooms were crowded with visitors, at a minimum fee of half a guinea each, and her services were in great demand for evening parties and private sittings. According to Mrs. De Morgan, the circle gathered round an old Pembroke table. The illustrations in the book show a spirit appearing to a man and woman who are seated at a rather large round table. Very strange and absurd communications, as Mrs. De Morgan admitted, were given by table-tipping, “as, indeed, by all methods.” “I have seen instances,” she writes, “and been told of others, in which long incongruous strings of names and titles have been spelt out, such as Richard Cœur de Lion, Pythagoras, Byron, Cheops, and Mr. Fauntleroy, the list, perhaps, ending with T. Browne or J. Smith. The givers of these names seem to delight only in buffoonery and abuse; and, perhaps, after playing absurd and mischievous tricks for days or even weeks, will seem to come in a body, giving all their names, with the information that they are come to say good-bye for ever.”