By degrees, as the pleasurable sensation
increased, I lost all connexion with external
things; trains of vivid visible images rapidly
passed through my mind, and were connected
with words in such a manner as to produce
perceptions perfectly novel. I existed in a
world of newly connected and newly modified
ideas. When I was awakened from this semi-
delirious trance by Dr. Kinglake, who took the
bag from my mouth, indignation and pride
were the first feelings produced by the sight
of the persons about me. My emotions were
enthusiastic and sublime; and for a moment I
walked round the room, perfectly regardless of
what was said to me. As I recovered my
former state of mind, I felt an inclination to
commununicate the discoveries I had made during
the experiment. I endeavoured to recal the
ideas—they were feeble and indistinct."

Inhalation of nitrous oxide increases fulness
of the pulse, expands the blood. A like effect is
produced by the febrile miasma of Cadiz, in
which the spectral impressions are of a painful
character. Suppose we say, then, that expansion
of the blood is favourable to the producing of
spectral impressions. If not that, some other
fact as natural, accounts for the appearance of
spectres in hectic and other fevers. The ghosts
seen by Nicolai, the philosophical bookseller of
Berlin, disappeared gradually on the application
of leeches. Spectral impressions may result
also from direct irritation of the brain, or from
a high state of nervous irritability acting upon
the body generally. The spectres will agree
mostly with the mind they spring from. A
philosophical man like Nicolai has visions of
men, dogs, and horses, such as he would see in
daily life. Others, who have their minds full
of supernatural tales, and who associate with
darkness, instead of nature's rest, the spirit's
unrest, will see the sort of ghosts they occupy
their minds with. Others, again, whose philosophy
leads to a faith in visible intercourse
between the living and the dead, will not fail to
obtain excellent corroborations of their doctrine.

When supernatural forms are not repetitions
of familiar shapes, but follow current
superstitions, it has been always observed that they
correspond to the forms adopted by popular
belief from familiar paintings and sculptures.
The witches of Lorraine, who professed to be
familiar with devils, were questioned particularly
as to the appearance of these devils by
M. Rémy, the commissioner for their trial.
They had simply realised them by the rude
allegorical painting and sculpture of the middle
ages. They said they were black-faced, with
sunk but fiery eyes, their mouths wide and
smelling of sulphur, their hands hairy, with
claws, their feet horny and cloven. The cloven
foot comes of a tradition that the devil was in
the habit of appearing to the Jews in the form
of a hairy goat. Saints, when they appear,
correspond in the same way with the conventional
form of church painting and sculpture.
Visions seen in the ecstasies of saints
themselves were commonly true visions; natural, as
results of an overstrained mind in a wasted
and often tortured body. The visions seen by
the dying may be explained also by the
condition of the body in the last stage of many
diseases, when the commonness of spectral
delusions has given rise to a strong faith in
our frequent visible communion with angels
and departed spirits in the hour of death.

Next to sight, hearing is the sense most
frequently imposed on, and no sound is so
commonly imagined as the call of a familiar
companion. Dr. Johnson fancied he heard his
mother call "Sam," when she was a hundred
miles away, and was much disappointed when
nothing ensued. That call by a familiar voice
was a frequent experience of the present
writer. It was commonly a home voice, and a
loud, clear, and abrupt monosyllabic call. But
he has heard the voice of a brother miles away,
speaking as from behind his shoulder in a
college library, and turned to answer in a voice
itself so insensibly subdued to harmony with
the impression, as considerably to surprise a
fellow-student who was standing near. But
the delusions of hearing were, in his case, not
confined to voices; the sound of opening doors
within the bedroom at night, when there was
no door opened, and other such tricks on the
ear, were also not uncommon, but these
(though not the sudden voices, which seemed
to be connected with some momentary leap of
the blood, as in the sensation that one has
sometimes when going to sleep, of falling
suddenly with a great jolt), were always to be
explained by traceable relation to a thought
within the mind.

Next to hearing, touch is said to be the
sense most frequently imposed on; as when
people have fancied themselves beaten by
invisible or visible fiends, and felt considerable
pain from it. The present writer can
remember in his own ghostly experience but one
delusion of the sense of touch. It was
associated with delusion of hearing, and repeated
nightly for a week or ten days. Sometimes
the sense of smell is deceived, as when the
spectral sight of a demon is joined to a spectral
smell of brimstone. Considering how often
people are saying that they "fancy they smell"
something, one might think play upon this
sense to be more common than it is. Least
liable to delusion is said to be the sense of taste.
Thus, a lunatic mentioned by Sir Walter Scott,
fancied his porridge dinner to consist of every
delicacy, but complained that everything he ate
tasted of porridge.

THE PRINCESS YOLKA.

[THE following story, which, towards its
close, somewhat resembles Cinderella, is
based upon one of the popular tales of
Esthonia (or Revel), the inhabitants of
which province constitute a portion of the
Finnish race. The egg, which may remind
classical readers of the myth of Leda,
connects it with the national Esthonian poern
Kalewpoëg, lately brought to light by the
Esthonian scholar, Dr. Kreuzwald.]