Darley and Mr. Thurgood
corroborating as to their presence during the trance and as to Mr.
Cleave's statement when he awoke. Mr. Cleave added that he made
experiments "for five nights running" before seeing the lady. The
young lady's letter of 19th January, 1886, is also produced (postmark,
Portsmouth, 20th January). But the lady mentions her _first_ vision
of Mr. Cleave as on last _Tuesday_ (not Friday), and her second, while
she was alone with her little brother, at supper on Monday. "I was so
frightened that I nearly fainted."
These are all young people. It may be said that all five were
concerned in a complicated hoax on Mr. Gurney. Nor would such a hoax
argue any unusual moral obliquity. Surtees of Mainsforth, in other
respects an honourable man, took in Sir Walter Scott with forged
ballads, and never undeceived his friend. Southey played off a hoax
with his book The Doctor. Hogg, Lockhart, and Wilson, with Allan
Cunningham and many others, were constantly engaged in such
mystifications, and a "ghost-hunter" might seem a fair butt.
But the very discrepancy in Miss ---'s letter is a proof of fairness.
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