"I'm sure that's wrong," said my cousin, "because the men are never called out at this time of the day." It was then four o'clock, as we had been careful to ascertain. My cousin returned to camp the same evening, and the next day I received a note from him to say, "That fellow Powles is a brick. It was quite right. R---- was unexpectedly ordered to turn out his company yesterday afternoon, and he returned to barracks and changed his things for the grey tweed suit exactly at four o'clock." But I have always found my friend Powles (when he _will_ condescend to do anything for strangers, which is seldom) remarkably correct in detailing the thoughts and actions of absentees, sometimes on the other side of the globe. I went one afternoon to pay an ordinary social call on a lady named Mrs. W----, and found her engaged in an earnest conversation on Spiritualism with a stout woman and a commonplace man--two as material looking individuals as ever I saw, and who appeared all the more so under a sultry August sun. As soon as Mrs. W---- saw me, she exclaimed, "O! here is Mrs. Ross-Church. She will tell you all about the spirits. Do, Mrs. Ross-Church, sit down at the table and let us have a _séance_." A _séance_ on a burning, blazing afternoon in August, with two stolid and uninteresting, and worse still, _uninterested_ looking strangers, who appeared to think Mrs. W---- had a "bee in her bonnet." I protested--I reasoned--I pleaded--all in vain. My hostess continued to urge, and society places the guest at the mercy of her hostess. So, in an evil temper, I pulled off my gloves, and placed my hands indifferently on the table. The following words were at once rapped out-- "I am Edward G----. Did you ever pay Johnson the seventeen pounds twelve you received for my saddlery?" The gentleman opposite to me turned all sorts of colors, and began to stammer out a reply, whilst his wife looked very confused. I asked the influence, "Who are you?" It replied, "_He_ knows! His late colonel! Why hasn't Johnson received that money?" This is what I call an "awkward" coincidence, and I have had many such occur through me--some that have driven acquaintances away from the table, vowing vengeance against me, and racking their brains to discover _who_ had told me of their secret peccadilloes. The gentleman in question (whose name even I do not remember) confessed that the identity and main points of the message were true, but he did _not_ confide to us whether Johnson had ever received that seventeen pounds twelve.