V.

I have referred to spirit photography. Let me disarm any sceptical reader by admitting that nothing is more easy than to fake bogus spirit photographs, and further that an expert conjurer can almost always cheat the most vigilant observer. The use of marked plates, which I handle, expose, and develop myself, no doubt afford some protection against fraud. But my belief in the authenticity of spirit photographs rests upon a far firmer foundation than that of the fallible vigilance of the experimenter. The supreme test of an authentic spirit photograph is that a plainly recognisable portrait of a dead person shall be obtained by a photographer who knows nothing whatever of the existence of such a person, and that no visible form shall be seen by the sitter in front of the camera.

I have had such photographs not once but many times. I will here only mention one. The photographer whose mediumship enables him to photograph the Invisibles is a very old and rather illiterate man. to whom this faculty was at one time a serious hindrance to his photographic business. He is clairvoyant and clairaudient. During the late Boer war I went with a friend to have a sitting with him, wondering who would come.

I had hardly taken my seat before the old man said: "I had a great fright the other day. An old Boer came into the studio carrying a gun. He fairly frightened me, he looked so fierce, so 1 said l to him, 'Go away; I don't like guns.' And he went away. Now he's back again. He came in with you. He has not got his gun now, and he does not look so fierce. Shall we let him stay?"

"By all means," I replied. "Do you think you could get his photograph?"

"I don't know," said the old man; "I can try." So I sat down in front of the camera, and an exposure was duly made. Neither my friend nor I could see any other person in the room but the photographer and our-selves. Before the plate was removed I asked the photographer:

"You spoke to the old Boer the other day. Could you speak to him again?"

"Yes," he said; "he's still there behind you."

"Would he answer any question if you asked him?"

"I don't know," said the old man; "I can try."

"Ask him what[unclear: his] name is!"

The photographer appeared to put a mental question, and to listen for a reply. Then he said:

"He says his name is Piet Botha."

"Piet Botha," I objected. "I know Philio, Louis, Chris, and I do not know how many other Bothas. But Piet I never heard of."

"That's what he says his name is," doggedly replied the old man.

When he developed the plate there was seen standing behind me a hirsute, tall, stalwart man, who might have been a Boer or a Moujik. I said nothing, but waited till the war came to an end, and General Botha came to London. I sent the photograph to him by Mr. Fischer, who was Prime Minister of the old Orange Free State. Next day Mr. Weasels, another Free State delegate, came to see me.

"Where did you get that photograph," he asked, "the photograph you gave to Mr. Fischer?"

I told him exactly how it had come.

He shook his head. "I don't hold with superstition. Tell me, how did you get that portrait? That man did not know William Stead—that man was never in England."

"Well." I replied, "I have told you how I got it, and you need not believe me if you don't like. But why are you so excited about it?"

"Why," said he, "because that man was a near relative of mine. I have got his portrait hanging up in my house at home."

"Really,"I said. "Is he dead?"

"He was the first Boer Commandant killed in the siege of Kimberley.")

"And what was his name?"

"Pietrus Johannes Botha," he replied, "but we always called him Piet Botha for short."

I still have the portrait in my possession. It has been subsequently identified by two other Free Staters who knew Piet Botha well.

This, at least, is not a case which telepathy can explain. Nor will the hypothesis of fraud hold water. It was the merest accident that I asked the photographer to see if the spirit would give his name. No one in England, so far as I have been able to ascertain, knew that any Piet Botha ever existed.