The fellow frowned as darkly as a thunder-cloud, and quitted me hastily. I remember I was attacked that very night with an erysipelas, which I did not get rid of till I saw him again, and made the amende." The civilian now became anxious to change the subject of conversation. He reverted to the subject of the jugglers of India, and mentioned some further instances of their art. He asked the barrister whether it was possible to explain such performances upon natural principles, or to reconcile them with the doctrine that they were merely illusions of the senses. "If we consider," replied the barrister, “the resources which these men possess in the knowledge of many physical secrets unknown to us, in the phenomena which we know, and presume them to be ignorant of, in their wonderful proficiency in sleight of hand, in the fallibility of senses supposed to be infallible, in the aid derived from the collusion of bystanders, and from the exaggerations of relators, we shall find that they have more advantages than we imagine at first sight they possess. I have hitherto seen no performance of theirs which I could not believe attributable to natural means, and beg therefore to retain my opinion." The colonel was about to open a fresh budget of supernatural stories, when the barrister, pleading an engagement, deferred the pleasure of hearing them till another opportunity; and the old civilian looked approbation. END OF VOL. II. Printed by J. L. Cox and Sons, 75, Great Queen Street, Lincoln's-Inn Fields. |