After the beginning of the war, however, when interest in the possible survival of the individual was so suddenly and pathetically increased, and one heard on every hand of attempts to establish communication with those gone before, I resolved to experiment again with planchette; but it was not until our friend V—— expressed a desire to try it with me, sometime in 1917, that I really bought one. For almost a year it lay untouched in its box, and when finally we found opportunity to test it we had no success. It did not move from the spot where we placed it, and I made no attempt to try it alone. Several weeks later, two friends, Mrs. Wylie and Miss Gaylord, told me that they had been making efforts, through some one near their home, to get into touch with their brother Frederick, with results they thought promising. A day or two later we tried planchette together, with some success. It moved briskly, wrote “Frederick ... mother ... love ... happy ...” and other detached words. It also persisted in making little circles, perhaps two inches in diameter, the pencil tracing the circumference again and again. This was so often repeated that Mrs. Wylie thought it might be a symbol, but could obtain no satisfactory reply to questions about it. My friends went home without renewing the experiment, and my interest was not greatly stimulated. It seemed quite probable that the words written had reflected the thoughts and desires of Frederick’s sisters, and that the whole episode could be explained by the theory of unconscious response by the muscles of the hand to the prompting of the subconscious mind. I had dismissed the matter, as far as my own participation in it was concerned, when a letter came from Mrs. Gaylord, saying that her daughters had told her I had “mediumistic power,” and suggesting that I might be able to help her. I knew that the exceeding bitterness of her grief lay, not in the separation from her only son, but in her inability to believe that his identity and development continued, and that the assurance that he had not “gone out, like a snuffed candle,” as she afterward expressed it, would bring her the greatest—indeed, the only possible comfort. Therefore I replied at once that while I had no reason to believe that I possessed “mediumistic power” to the slightest degree, I would make further experiments, at the same time warning her that the attempt would probably prove fruitless.