of a heart, i.e. roughly speaking, of an isosceles triangle. This mahogany is of course highly smoothed and polished, that it may be fit to put in an appearance on a drawing-room table, and generally measures about nine inches in length, and seven or so at the broadest part, or base of the triangle. This sheet of wood is raised off the ground by three supports of the following nature. The base of the triangle is supported by two little legs, say an inch and a half in height, one at each corner, with castors of ivory or bone, running very easily. The third support, at the apex of the figure, is the point of a lead-pencil. Two or three inches of wooden pipe or tubing are inserted into the mahogany, and through the pipe an ordinary cedar-wood or other lead-pencil is thrust. As only its point touches the table, or whatever the instrument may be standing on, the friction is very small, and the smallest impulse causes the whole arrangement to run along on the castors. Of course, if a white surface be under the pencil point, a mark is left by it as it runs along. For this purpose it is generally stood on a large sheet of paper. It is now ready for use, and our readers can judge for themselves how very simple the whole affair is..

Anything like an ordinary social gathering is certain to contain (we speak from mournful experience!) one or more persons of somewhat less than average intelligence. And, accordingly, persons have not been wanting, on those occasions when we have seen Planchette performing at parties, and other such meetings, to conjecture aloud, and almost to go the length of asserting, that the instrument contained "springs" (!). With these sons of folly and daughters of foolishness we find it impossible to argue; and we are content, as well on the present occasion as when we have met such people in the flesh, to refer them to a more diligent and prolonged use of their senses.

We read in the printed directions sold with the instrument that two or more persons should put their hands upon it at the same time. (It is surely rather a mistake to issue printed directions with it,—as if Planchette were avowedly a toy or puzzle, or were one of those unfailing sources of social amusement which the Stereoscopic Company is always bringing out.) We have, ourselves, often found one person sufficient, and never more than two necessary.

The two hands, or the one hand, (it is perfectly indifferent,) of each person being placed on the mahogany surface, a trial of patience is very likely to follow. The duty of the instrument is to start off and write, that is, write answers to questions propounded by the holders or the bystanders. But it is sometimes extraordinarily slack in discharging this duty. Of how it discharges it, we will speak presently. Sometimes an interval of as much as twenty minutes elapses before any movement manifests itself in the wheels or castors, sometimes it commences without a moment's delay; different holders affect differently the rapidity of

commencement—a fact which is not difficult of explanation. The present writer has sometimes had to wait a long while, sometimes felt motion set in immediately. When Planchette does begin to move, it is invariably away from the holders, in the direction of the apex of the triangle. Sometimes the line thus drawn is gently curved round and passes into writing; at other times it runs straight on, is "produced for ever," without change or further effect. There are some persons under whose hands the machine never makes the faintest stir. There are others for whom it will move with cheerful promptitude, but only moves to run straight off the paper or other white surface, in an exasperating and disheartening manner. Under the hands of the third and least numerous class of persons, it produces writing, which is however, we are bound to say, seldom so legible or intelligible as could be wished. Of course the mode of production, too, is in some respects also a mystery.

A series of Planchette's performances generally reveal two little human weaknesses, from which the intelligent observer of mankind may derive some little amusement, and which will while away the time which, if he be cynical and a total disbeliever in what is going on, would otherwise lie heavily on his hands. Indeed, such a cynical one is likely to affirm cheerfully that while an affair affording so beautiful a view of the heights and the depths of human folly and credulity is going forward, he cannot possibly lack entertainment. But as this remark may possibly take too much for granted, we will waive it for the moment, and point out the tendencies of which we spoke first.

The difficulty that many persons find in placing their hands lightly on the surface is very noticeable. They probably do their best, but their hands weigh heavy as lead or as the hands of corpses. This absurd inability to master their own muscles is not, as we might expect, confined to old people; and those who are most guilty are generally those who are most indignant at the accusation of touching heavily. Of course, before we can expect to get anything out of Planchette, all such people must be artfully discovered and decently removed.

Observe again the extraordinary sterility, or barrenness of invention, displayed by all men's wits when they are suddenly invited to propound questions for Planchette to answer. Most men and women, too, immediately become possessed of a burning desire to know their own names. And if they can be gently led past this stage, there will yet be a great and general difficulty in devising questions; and those that are put are generally marked by extreme foolishness. A very favourite class of questions is such as this, "Who gave me this ring, or this brooch ?” matters which in a "family circle" must be known to every one present, while even in other places conjecture, or the acquisition of information, is not difficult. But a still more favourite query is "Whom shall I marry? Whom will A, B, and C marry?" and "When will it come off?"

This is a terribly vulgar species of curiosity; it is so painfully similar to the questions for which maid-servants find a solution in the grouts at the bottom of a tea-cup. It is also very unsatisfactory as a testing question, for either the answer is known, and so good faith may be suspected, or else, by the very nature of the case, the answer is unsusceptible of verification for an indefinite period. Revolving tables and writing Planchettes have promised the present writer at least four wives, names and dates being given; having every desire to know how far he may really count upon such exceptional fortune, he has consulted a table of averages, and parted therefrom with the disheartening conviction that all these promises are very unlikely to be fulfilled.

Now a word as to the writing itself. Those who have followed the description of the instrument given above will not fail to perceive that from any holder or holders who stand fairly behind their Planchette the portion of paper on which the pencil is tracing characters must always be concealed by the intervention of the flat mahogany surface. Thus they cannot immediately see what is being written, and can only tell what it is by various uncertain tactual perceptions; while, if we suppose one or both to be "cheating," we must admit that such conduct is burdened by the difficulty of writing with an invisible pencil on paper that they cannot see, as well as by that of writing at all with such an unfamiliar arrangement. These difficulties of course apply equally to the very favourite theory of unconscious guiding. But to this theory we do ourselves, on the whole, still incline; although there is, as will presently appear, a certain narrow margin of cases of phenomena for which that theory apparently fails to account.

The character of the writing is generally execrable. Sometimes it is very large, the letters measuring as much as two inches in height; or, again, it may be almost too small to read. It deserves notice that the same person holding generally produces writing of the same size. Its size has not generally any clear correspondence with the average size of the holder's own handwriting; and other points of similarity, though sometimes asserted, are we suspect very doubtful. But whatever the size of the writing, it is always very bad, and the difficulty of making it out is increased by the obvious incapacity of the machine to dot its i's or to cross its t's. Sometimes a piece of writing well begun is never finished, the pencil suddenly ceasing to advance, and winding round and round, and over and over the same ground. It has been observed that this is often the case when neither of the holders has the faintest idea of what the answer should be.

Many of the most earnest and quasi-scientific students of the Planchette affirm the necessity of "willing" to make the machine go at all. Personally, we do not know what "willing" means in a case like this, and their explanations on the point are not as lucid as we could wish.

So our own experience contains no element of willing. Others, again, have assured us that they can will any particular answer and get it, the Planchette then writing more speedily than if left to its own devices. As this, however, has never come under our own direct consciousness or experience, we have nothing to say on it.

It may be mentioned in praise of this particular machine that we know of no genuine instance in which it has become addicted to bad language, as is sometimes the case with tables.

The great majority of facts and cases that we have actually seen may be explained on the hypothesis that the holders unconsciously and involuntarily influence and direct the pencil. In working out this view there are many different stages and modifications, which we cannot now pursue in detail. But there are three little facts that give us some difficulty.

(i.) The general formality and courtliness of the instrument. Never under any circumstances have we known it mention an individual without the formal prefix of Mr., Mrs., or Miss. The question may require for answer the name of a person whose intimates never call him or her anything but Bob Jones or Jennie Smith. The holders know the answer, and never even think of the person save by this informal title. Yet the answer is absolutely certain to be thrown into the form of "Mr. Robert Jones," &c., a form never used by the parties practically concerned.

(ii.) Our general theory of explanation is borne out by the fact that where the question has a real answer, known to some persons present, but unknown to the holders, and beyond the scope of their conjecture, either no answer is obtained, or it is irrelevant. But if we take, e.g., such a question as" Whom shall I marry?" the answer being equally unknown to all present, the issue is often different. A fancy name is written down in answer, no one owning it having been heard of before. Thus, I may be warned that I am the destined prey of "Fanny Hodges." I never heard of Fanny before, and the holders have no reason, even in joke, to offer me up to her. Now, in such cases, where the faith of the holders is beyond suspicion, it is difficult to see what is the principle that guides the selection of a name, what is the source of information. The old difficulty of Buridan's Ass was nothing to this.

(iii.) Cases of the following sort are frequent. We ask, "Of whom are we thinking?" We fix our thoughts on a definite person. We get an answer. It is wrong. But it is generally the name of some other person known to us. The ready explanation of the shallow ones is, that if you put the question the holders attribute to you at random any person with whom they know you have any acquaintance, however slight. But a wider induction from cases will reveal the fact that the name so given is, perhaps as often as not, unknown to the holders, though known to

you. Here we speak from a great deal of personal experience, as this has often occurred to us during the manipulation of both tables and Planchettes.

We could write a good deal more if we wished to theorize, and were careless of theorizing on insufficient grounds. A great many of these tripods have been sold in England during the last twelve months; some of the buyers must have something to tell, in the way either of success or of notable failure; and we hope some of them may be tempted to cast their experience into a readable form. We have no intention of opening our columns to the old stock narratives of heavy bedsteads moved by "the laying on of hands" of a young lady, or of stout gentlemen jammed up against the wall by active writing tables; the "Times" and the "Standard" always do that when the season is dull; but we shall not be sorry to hear from correspondents any authentic instances of what believers might call manifestations of reason in inanimate and inorganic bodies.