Message #179650

[Sandra]

Evidently the first cause started the whole affair. We, ourselves, paid a visit and a dollar to the women known as the Rochester rappers. We were greatly amused - not by the jugglery itself; which was not to be compared to the tricks of a professed wizard - but by the sublime gravity of our companions, of whom there were six; we, ourselves, being the seventh. Of these seven, four were gentlemen connected with influential journals, one was a celebrated artist and an occasional writer, and all present were more or less versed in the natural sciences. All were moreover usually regarded as shrewd men of the world.

We have been thus careful in specifying these facts; because the circumstance that only one other gentleman of the party unequivocally sided with us in our opinion, expressed as soon as we were out of the "haunted" house, is to our mind a strong proof of the facility with which even the higher order of intellects may be deluded in such cases.