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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 3a
A Sensational Night.—The Medium Becomes Attired as a Chinese Mandarin
A Sensational Night.—The Medium Becomes Attired as a Chinese Mandarin.
The culminating point of Mr. Bailey's mediumship was reached on the evening of Friday, May 22nd of this year. It was a night specially set apart for a test of a very amazing character in order to bring home conviction to certain Pressmen who were present. It is pretty generally recognised that journalists are "fearful sceptics," and consequently they are sometimes singled out by these invisible operators for "a good hard knock."
There were no fewer than 26 ladies and gentlemen in attendance on this particular night, and the medium having been thoroughly searched by three gentlemen, was afterwards seated on a cane chair and placed on top of the table. All the sitters sat around the table, and each was told by the spiritual Director of Ceremonies, so to speak, to clasp the hand of the other and thus complete the chain.
the light turned up. The object of this instruction, of course, was to preclude the possibility of any accomplice assisting the medium. Every sitter, in short, was a special detective. The sensational scene that followed is thus described in the Sydney "Sunday Times," whose special representative was present:—
"The medium was dressed in an ordinary sac suit when he got on to the table, and when the light was placed in the cupboard and the lid closed complete darkness prevailed. But keen ears detected the creaking of the chair, the breathing of the medium, and minor movements he made while no his elevated platform. Ears that were not necessarily keen distinctly heard the swish of a moving body on three separate occasions in the vicinity of the medium, these noises being followed by a chuckling laugh and an exclamation in a voice said to be that of 'Abdul,' a Hindoo control, the words being, 'I got it!'"
The three swishing noises occurred within a quarter or half-minute of each other, and when the light was taken from the cupboard, after having been excluded for probably ten minutes in all—this being the longest period yet known for the bringing of an apport—the spectators beheld, to their great wonderment, a human form (that of the medium) fully dressed in a Mandarin costume—hat, pig-tail, coat, and divided skirt complete—and looking startlingly like a real Chinaman, the illusion being made all the greater and more surprising when the form got down from the table and walked round the room, talking words that appeared to be perfectly articulated Chinese.
"The control then operating, it was subsequently explained by the chief control, was the spirit of the Celestial, who had worn, this costume a few years ago, and been killed in it during a conflict with some national foe. The form felt for its sword, but that was absent. It took off the pig-tail and jabbered in a way that seemed to suggest horror and anguish of mind, and it finished up by lifting a chair in its teeth and balancing it in the air for a few seconds. This feat, though done with the medium's mouth, was so remarkable as to have been quite beyond the strength and dexterity of the medium in propria persona, who is a rather frail-built man."