We were highly delighted, and repeated this pretty experiment many times. Without touching it in any way, we ordered the whole table to rise into the air, and to resist the witnesses, who had to put forth effort to bring it down to the floor. We commanded it to turn bottom side up, and it fell over with its feet in the air, although we never touched it with our fingers, but kept them in advance of it as it fell, at the distance agreed upon.
Such were the essential results of this meeting. They are such that I hesitate to mention in the same connection incidents of secondary importance.
I will only say, in passing, that the séance was very discouraging at the start; for, not only was it found necessary to remove certain new operators, but several of the old ones did not bring to it their usual high spirits. The table responded poorly; raps were made faintly and as if with reluctance; the telepathic reading of numbers did not succeed. Then we took a resolution from which we derived much benefit: we persevered, and persevered gaily; we sang, we made the table dance; we gave up all thoughts of new experiments and persisted in easy and amusing ones. After a while conditions changed; the table fairly bounded, and hardly waited for our orders; we were now in condition to try more serious things.
A long meeting, and very fatiguing. It was principally devoted to the trial of various mechanical devices which had no success whatever,--such as metal rings; frameworks of canvas or of paper placed upon the table; plates on pivots and spring-keys. Whether the sight of all this gear hindered the radiation of the fluidic force from the operators, whether the contrivances themselves stopped its circulation in the table, or whether, in fine, the natural conditions of the phenomenon were disturbed in some other way, it is certain that the results amounted to nothing or were doubtful.
One new experiment succeeded. A plate turning on a pivot held a tub. I filled this tub with water, and two of my collaborators and I plunged our hands into it. We formed the chain and began a circular walk, being careful not to touch the tub. This at once imitated our movement. We repeated the thing several times in succession.