"I am glad that you say this," Professor Gray remarked. "I am subject to the prejudice, foolish enough but common, of being more impressed by experiments of my own contriving. Do you mind, sir, if Dr. Taunton and I loop handkerchiefs together, and let you separate them while we hold the ends?" "Certainly not," was the reply. The experiment was instantly successful, and was repeated for double assurance. "If we had nothing else to do," the stranger observed, "we might go on in this line indefinitely; but this is enough of the 'fourth dimension,' so called. Now we will try development." III The flower-pot filled with earth was placed upon the slab at the feet of the magician. The orange seed was laid upon the earth. "So ingenious an explanation has recently been given--or, more exactly, recently revived--of the development of a plant from a seed, that you may suppose me to have all the different pieces of an orange grove concealed about me, despite the fact that my dress is not adapted to the concealment of a needle. However, you may judge for yourselves." He leaned forward, and with the point of his finger pushed the seed into the earth. "Will some one cover the pot with a handkerchief?" he said. "Please be careful not to touch me or it. Hold the handkerchief out, and drop it." One of the members followed the directions, and for a moment the stranger sat quiet, his eyes fixed on the covered flower-pot. The centre of the handkerchief was seen gradually to rise, and when the cloth was lifted, the astonished eyes of the Club beheld a glossy shoot, three or four inches in height. Without again covering it, the magician continued to gaze fixedly upon the plant. Before the eyes of the spectators the shoot became a shrub, the shrub a tree; the fragrance of orange blossoms filled the air, and among the shining leaves began to swell the golden fruit. The time had been numbered only in minutes, yet there stood a tree higher than a man's head, and laden with golden globes. "Take it away," the wonder-worker said, "and let me rest a little before I try anything more. You will find the tree to-morrow, and I think you will concede that it is too bulky to have been concealed under these fleshings. If you think it only an optical delusion or the result of hypnotism, try to-morrow by the senses of persons who do not know how it was produced." He sat for some moments with his head bowed in his hands. Then at his direction a globe about a foot in diameter was filled with clear water and placed on the table. The lights were then turned down so as to leave all the room in shadow except the platform. "I must ask you to be as quiet as possible," the magician requested. "The experiment is a difficult one, and from living in the atmosphere which surrounds my daily life I am out of the proper condition."