Glimpses Of The Next State.Pdf - Spiritualists' National Union

101talk to be my father and mother. She also saw two young men (probably my brothers in spiritlife).She now began, sentence by sentence, to give me the exact questions in my letter. Presentlyshe said : “Is this the name ?” and handed me, from the pad she held, a piece of paper upon whichwas written quite plainly the Christian and surname of Iola when in earth life, the same name I hadwritten on the piece of paper now on the slates close under my hand. She also said : “Your paperwith the name has gone in between the slates.”All this time May Bangs was sitting one foot away from the table on the opposite side to me,with a writing-pad and pencil in her hands, which were two feet from the slates. The gas wasburning brightly.Three-quarters of an hour had passed from the time of our sitting down, when three taps onthe slates announced that the reply was finished. I took off the bristol-board and found my pieceof paper gone. When I opened the slates I found the paper inside by the letter. The letter was slitopen from the top, and four pages of reply were found inside. I examined it, and found that it wasthe same paper I had put in at the Toledo hotel with my private mark on it.The letter of reply contained private messages which I am unable to make public. I wassigned correctly, and answered nearly all my questions.During the sitting May Bangs saw the form of some Eastern queen surrounded byattendants. It was obviously Cleopatra, who came to redeem her promise given the day before atToledo.January 18, 11 to 12.30. Atmospheric conditions good. A slight thaw underfoot, but theair dry.(67) I asked for a picture to be precipitated of my guide “as she is now in spirit life.” Insidemy waistcoat I had a pocket, used for dollar bills, into which I put two full-faced photographs(cartes-de-visite) of Iola. One was taken in 1857, the other in a867. Two thin canvases stretchedon wooden frames and covered with thin paper were placed face to face and held up in the window.The blind was drawn to the top of the canvases, and curtains were hung up in my presence oneither side. The window has a southern aspect, and the light coming through the two semitransparentcanvases is sufficient for the purposes of taking notes and seeing everything that goeson. The small oak table was lengthways in the window ; the bottom of the canvases rests upon it.May Bangs sat on my right side, facing me, and pinching together with her right hand one side ofthe canvases ; Lizzie Bangs on my left side facing me, and pinching together the other side of thecanvases with her left hand. I faced the middle of the canvases, my nose between two feet and twofeet six inches from them. We had to wait some time. After a few minutes the canvas assumedvarious hues, rosy, blue, and brown ; it would become dark and light independently of the sunbeing cloudy or not.Dim outlines of faces occasionally appeared in different parts of the canvas. When we hadbeen sitting about twenty-five minutes May Bangs got up from her seat and said ; “Hold on to this,please ; I want to get something for my sister’s cold.” I then took her place, pinching the canvasestogether with my right hand. In five minutes or so she returned with a small bottle for her sisterto sniff, and we resumed our original seats. We had been sitting forty minutes when the right andleft edges of the canvas began to darken, and the face and bust suddenly appeared. It was finishedin thirty-five minutes—i.e.., one hour and fifteen minutes from the time we first sat down. Onseparating the two canvases, it was found that the picture was on the further side of the one nearestto me, and the material was quite damp ; the other canvas, which had been pressing against it allthe time, was unsoiled. The stuff comes off on the finger, a smutty oily substance. This must beremembered, as it negatives the supposition that chalks or pastels only are used.The actual picture, therefore, took thirty-five minutes to precipitate. It is richer in tonenow than it was when put on a sofa after the sitting, but in other respects just the same. Thelikeness to the cartes-de-visite in my dollar pocket is not remarkable, but there are points about itwhich show that the invisible workers had access to these photographs.We now wanted to find out which one of the other photographs in my possession it was thewish of my guide I should bring on the 20 th , the day appointed for my next picture. Without the