WCP4335

[1]

Rosehill, Dorking.

Dec[embe]^r. 25th. 1876

My dear Sir

Your account of the sèance[sic] at Lord Radstock’s¹ is very interesting, and shows that the lady is a medium of most exceptional power. It is well known that the manifestations are greatly aided or checked by the persons present, — not at all by their mere belief or disbelief but by the character of their minds & the way in which they affect the medium. Persons of active and positive mental nature [2] always check the phenomena at first, quite independent of their belief or disbelief. To this I impute it that you have not had much success either with this lady or with Slade². In a letter just received from Mrs. De Morgan³ she mentions that in her own house & with her own children as mediums the Professor’s presence totally stopped the phenomena at first, — but that after they had occurred strongly he could come without much interfering with them.

"Rob Roy" & Lord Elcho are I should [3] imagine more physically thatn mentally active, & thus their presence may have aided the physical manifestations. With most people it takes months of observation with the same medium to get anything half so satisfactory as these gentlemen appear to have got the first time. I wonder how D^r. Carpenter⁴ would account for such persons having "dominant ideas" sufficiently powerful to make theym believe, what he of course "knows" never took place!

Yours very faithfully | Alfred R. Wallace [signature]

Dr. C. M. Ingleby Esq.⁵