"Other ministrations and gifts, original and perfectly illustrative of the inspirations of crude and uncivilized spirits, continued as usual to exist. They were truly ludicrous. I have seen female instruments in uncouth habits, and in imitation of squaws, and a few males acting as suneps, glide in groups on a stiffly frozen snow, shouting, dancing, yelling, and whooping, and others acting precisely the peculiar traits of a Negro, an Arab, a Chinese, an Italian, or even the polite gayety of a Frenchman. And, what is still more astounding, speaking the vernacular dialects of each race. Their confabulation, aided by inspired interpreters, was truly amusing and interesting. On one occasion I saw a sister, inspired by a squaw, her head mounted with an old hat of felt, cocked, jammed, and indented in no geometrical form, rush to a pan containing a collection of the amputated legs of hens, seize a handful of the raw delicacy, and devour them with as much alacrity as a Yankee woman would an omelet or a doughnut." In general, Elkins relates: "I have myself seen males, but more frequently females, in a superinduced condition, apparently unconscious of earthly things, and declaring in the name of departed spirits important and convincing revelations. Speaking in foreign tongues and prophesying were the most common gifts. In February, 1848, a medium became abstracted from earthly scenes, and announced the presence of an angel of God. The angel declared, through her, that he was sent on a mission to France, and that before many days we should hear of his doings in that nation. This announcement was in presence of the whole family, and it was then and there noted down. France at that time was, for aught we knew, resting upon a permanent political basis; or as nearly in that condition as she ever was. In a few days the revolution of the 24th of February precipitated the monarchy into an interregnum, which philanthropists hoped was bottomless. "Turning rapidly upon the toes, bowing, bending, twisting, and reeling like one a victim to the fumes of intoxication; swooning and lying prostrate with limbs stiff and unyielding, like a corpse, and to all outward appearance the vital spark extinct; then suddenly resuscitating--the mind still abstracted from scenes below--and rising to join in the jubilancy of the dance, in company with and in imitation of the angels around the throne of God, singing extemporaneous anthems and songs, or those learned direct of seraphs in the regions of bliss--such are the many exercises, effusions of devotion, and supernatural elapses of which I was for fifteen years at intervals an eye and ear witness. Also the exposure of sin, designating in some cases the transgressor, the act, and the place of perpetration, of which the accused was most generally found culpable.