WCP2570

[1]

30 Cheyne Row

July 23 [1878]¹

I hesitate to send so long a letter, but I beg you to read it at your leisure.

Dear M^r. Wallace,

Many thanks for your note² & the powerful "Reply" to Dr. C³ of whose inaccuracies I will give you another instance. First, as to Major Buckley,⁴ I have referred to D^r. Gregory's⁵'Letters', and find that the experiments with nuts were more numerous and I suppose more carefully made than I imagined ^remembered them to have been. Of course, I only mentioned to you the cases which had come under my [2] own observation. The fact of a man who has had wide experience being imposed on once or twice certainly does not necessarily invalidate his testimony, as he may have tested so carefully in the first hundred expet^s [experiments] as to feel sure of his results, & then relax his vigilance in subsequent trials. This was probably the case with Major B. for he was certainly taken in by Miss Gx x x x x x x and the Miss B's. The latter indeed confessed the whole[.]

I must have explained very badly if you did not understand that in the instances that I know of, the supposed clairvoyante had already procured, opened & [3] read ^{& fastened up} a nut, so as to have it ready to give to Major B. instead of the one he gave her. When I went with Miss G to the Opera, & gave her mine, she must have had one ready, as Major B had not given her one. She gave the one she had prepared to Major B. from whom I had the shells, and I suppose she put the one I gave her into her pocket. The Miss B's described all this and said they bought the nuts at a confectioners[.]

Do not if you please publish my account without letting me see it. I was very tired when I wrote to you & the statement was perhaps not clear. I have not the slightest [4] doubt of Major Buckleys very great mesmeric power and thorough honesty.

I hope that the extract from Notes & Queries with the authentic account of the Tower Ghost sent by my husband,⁶ will be published at length in the Spiritualist[.] I have not got N & Q, but it was in 1860 and 1861. see Spirit^t July 20.

Professor Gregory told us the story exactly as it is printed in his book, and as he ^{said he} had it from Sir D. Brewer who certainly did not always keep au pied de la lettre. In connection with Prof. Gregorys presence at the a séances at one house, I must now refer to D^r Carpenter & his misstatement.

At p. 105 of Mesmerism & Spiritualism¹⁴[5] I had written thus far & more when my son begged me to retain the other part of my letter until a correspondence in which he is now engaged with D^r Carpenter is terminated. I shall hope to tell you all at some future time[.]

yours very sincerely | S. E. De Morgan⁷ [signature]

Let me just add that Lady Milbanke⁸ was not double[.] She was the wife of Sir Ralph Milbanke,⁹ a Leicestershire baronet.

I hope that someone whose [sic] will be held more competent to observe than I have been considered by those who do not know [6] me will repeat the experiments with mesmerised water described in the Spiritualist of June 22, in the article on the Divining Rod — To make sure of your seeing it I send the number containing it which can be thrown away, if you have the paper[.]