The phenomenon is explained by spiritists by referring it to the agency of spirits of the dead. Others explain it on the theory of psychometry. That the latter explanation is not the true one is evidenced by the fact that psychometry itself is explicable on the well-known principles of telepathy. That the spirit hypothesis is not the true one is evidenced by the fact that the influence is felt when there has been no death on the premises,--when all the former inhabitants of the house are still alive. Nor is the influence necessarily a bad one. Thus, a lady of my acquaintance, who is peculiarly sensitive to psychic impressions, informs me that in one house, which she occupied some years ago, she was seized with an intense longing to study art. She had passed the age at which people usually take up a new profession, and she had never been particularly interested in art. She had no acquaintances who were artists, and there was nothing in her environment specially to attract her attention to the subject. Nevertheless, her desire to become an artist grew stronger and stronger, until she felt forced to yield. She finally employed a teacher, and eventually became very proficient. It was afterwards ascertained that the tenant who occupied the house before she took possession was an enthusiastic devotee of art. He was not a particularly good artist, but his whole soul was bound up in his profession. The same lady occupied a house some years later which she felt obliged to leave, on account of the evil influence which it seemed to exert upon her. It was an almost ideal house in its appointments and in the arrangement of its rooms; and when she first entered it she was enthusiastic in her admiration of it. But she never spent a comfortable day in that house. Naturally of a cheerful and happy disposition, she became gloomy and despondent, without any apparent cause, and was at last forced to yield to her feelings and vacate the premises. An inquiry into the history of the house revealed the fact that it had formerly been occupied by a lady whose husband had ill-treated her, and had finally deserted her, under circumstances of peculiar atrocity, to live with a mistress. The history of that house from the time when the afflicted lady left it has been one of constant change of tenants. Other houses in the same row, built upon the same plan and owned by the same person, have no such history. No death has ever occurred in the house, either tragic or otherwise, and consequently it cannot be said to be haunted in the ordinary acceptation of the term; that is, by spirits of the dead. But is it not haunted, nevertheless? Is it not haunted by the thoughts engendered from the mental agony of that poor woman whose life was blasted by the perfidy of an unfaithful husband,--a man whose subsequent career was one of disgrace and infamy?