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Show SECRETS OF THE MEDIUMS TOLD I "Behind the Scenes With the Medi-I Medi-I urns," is a book written by David P. i Abbott of Omaha, which gives a full expose of all tho tricks performed by a spirit mediums, necromancers, astrol-j astrol-j ogers, seers, clairvoyants, second sight I readers, fortune tellers and other Im H posters of the same kind H Mr Abbott asserts that every per-B per-B son who pretends to reveal tho past or the future is an Impostor and that he can perform any feat done by any medium in the world. Mr. Abbott's investigations have taken him into all 1 parts of tho country, he has attended ' thousands of seances given by tho I greatest mediums and ho has novor f yet seen a performance that was not a trick. One of the most wonderful mediums he ever met was a man, who, when a victim entered his room, directed him to write a question on a slip of paper four by five inches in size and fold it in halves three times with tho writing writ-ing inside. The Burned Envelope and Slate Tricks I "He took this from me and placed It In an envelope and, holding it to- wards the window, called my attention ' to the fact that as the envelope was I partly transparent that I could see my I paper within it and that it was actual-l actual-l 1 there He now took a match, and lighting it, applied the flame to this Identical envelope without It leaving my sight, and burned the last vestlgo of it, and the paper within, allowing the ashes to drop Into a small vessel on the table. There "was no doubt that he did not exchange envelopes and that he burned It before my eyes. He now took the ashes and emptied them into a bowl of water. He now brought from a drawer a number of slates abont eight or ten slates with padded edges. They were the smallest size of slates, and with them he brought another slate, a tri-flo tri-flo larger, two inches longer and wider. wid-er. He requested me to examine thoroughly thor-oughly or to clean them all to my own satisfaction, and to stack the small ones on the table, one on top of the other; and to place tne large slate on top. He took a seat at the table opposite me and placed one of my hands and one of his on top of the slates. In due time he took up the slates and he found nothing. He replaced them and waited for a few moments; then, seeming dissatisfied with conditions, he took up the top slate in his left hand, and with his right hand began writing a message for me, with his eyes half closed. lie then opened his eyes and read aloud what he had written, writ-ten, asking me If it answered my question. ques-tion. I said It did not and, moistening moisten-ing his fingers, he rubbed It out and placed the slate again, and after a time examined it. but it was still free from writing. He lifted up some of the other Blates, but as there was no writing, he scattered the slates around on the table and asked me to spread a large cloth over them. This I did, and under his direction placed my arms and hands over this He immediately imme-diately Informed me that he was certain cer-tain I now had a message. He remained re-mained at a distance while I examined exam-ined the slates one by one. On one of them I found a message, neatly i written and covering the entire slate. I This was all nicely done and I am I sure would have greatly Impressed nearly everyone. j How It Was Done. 3 Mr. Abbott explains how It was 1 done. The envelope In which the me-D me-D dium placed the folded paper had a f folded paper already In It and a slit - In the back. The performer slipped I the folded paper through this slit into I his hand, sealed the cnvolopo and 1 when he reached in his pocket for a 1 match left the paper there. After jj burning tho envelope he pretended to I hear someone at thd door, Btepped a moment Into the hall, read the ques-I ques-I Hon and came back. Then ho knew 9 what question had been asked and was ready with a message in answer As to the slate writing all was fair until he picked up the top slate, wroto a message, apparently read it aloud and rubbed it out. What he really did was to pick up the large lop slate, bottom bot-tom side toward himself, and at the same time carry with it a small slate pressed tightly against its under side. He hold the large slate with Its under side tilted from mo, so 1 could not see this small slate. There being so many small slates on the stack, tho temporary tempo-rary absence of one from the stack attracted at-tracted no notice. lie kept this small slate next to him out of my view, and really wrote the message on the small slate which was next to him and which was concealed from my view by the larger slate. Ho did not road j aloud what ho had actually writton but merely pretended to do so, repeating re-peating something entirely foreign to the subject instead. When he appeared appear-ed to erase the message his moe ments were but a pretense, and he did not eraso it at all. When he replaced the large slate on the stack of slates he, of course, replaced tho small one, which was concealed under it, mes sage side down, and I found it afterward. after-ward. Mr Abbott tolls of another medium who produced phenomena" -thnt astounded as-tounded all who went to hor. She would sit facing the subject with her knees between his, a slate across their knees, the subject's hands close to gether, palm down on the slate and tho palms of her two hands pressed down on the backs of his hands Then the light would go out and mysterious hands would tap the subject, brush across his face, rap on the chair upon which he sat and a luminous light would float around and a trumpet on the floor would bump around and voices would come from It. This trick was performed In this way: While it seemed that both th medium's hands were pressed down upon the backs of tlie hunject's hands, she deftly removed one of them as soon ns the lights were out, and her left hand rested one-half on each hand of the subject, feeling to him as if both hands were there This gave hor one free hand with which to work. A Trap in the Baseboard. Some mediums who give seances in their homes have a trap in the baseboard base-board behind a cabinet, or in the ceiling, ceil-ing, marking it by a heavy border in the paper on the coiling In such cases, as soon ns the room Is darkened for the seance a confederate opens the trap, lets down a padded ladder and comos down and perform his part in appearing as a materialized npirlt. A famous medium uses for his "spirits" many elegant costumes of finest silk and so thin that they can be hidden In a small space. He has one piece of twenty-one yards of the finest white French bridal veiling so thin It can be contained In a pint cup. It is two yards wide and very gauzy. This Is prepared by rinsing it in a solution so-lution of luminous pnint nnd dried and when this has been exposed to the light it will shine for a long time In the dark and appear as a soft, luminous lum-inous vapor. This piece is used for the hair, which reaches to the floor, when he impersonates the spirit of Cleopatra in a dark room. A Costume of Luminous Paint. "It was a beautiful sight in the darkness dark-ness to see him in this costume, while with his finely modulated voice he Impersonated Im-personated the voice of the Egyptian queen In a spirit whisper and In her native tongue," writes Mr Abbott When made up as an Indian chief, his costume was fantastic His "head-dress feathers, etc , were covered with the luminous paint. It looked grotesque to see him In the darkness doing a war dance for ardent believers, while in a deep voice he chanted in the old chief's native tongue "When he was materializing as Queen Oria.ua I could first notice a small, vapory light near the floor, which gradually grew to the size of a human form. Then a few feet from it another appeared gradually. These waved about as vapory, willowy ghosts. They were the gauze fabric which he had gradually uncovered to our view." The book tells how Slade, the medium, medi-um, became so expert that he could write messages with his toes Ho wore a shoo that could be easily kicked off and the toe of his stocking was cut away. A blank slate was thrown upon the floor under the table, the medium made a noise by repeating an incantation, incanta-tion, and in a minute the slate was picked up with a message on it. Other mediums write with a small piece of pencil hold on the end of a finger by a little piece of floBh colored court plaster with a hole In the center. This writes? a message while the medium holds the siato in his hand waving It about Voices, Now Here, Now There. Speaking tubes aro used to produce independent whispers and voices In a room where a seanco Is held By the use of switches the voices appear first here and then there. One of tho most puzzling tricks met with by Mr. Abbott was worked by n medium who appeared in Kansas City several years ago and created astonishment aston-ishment This soer would nppenr seated seat-ed on the stage while his manager made an opening address. Then a boy was called from the audience and given cards to pass around and the audionce was asked to write questions on tho cards and seal them' In envelopes envel-opes which wore also distributed. Then a committee was Invited to the stage to blindfold the medium and his manager seated him at the rear of the stage bohind a table on which were some flowera and a music box. The boy was then sent Into the audience au-dience with a hat to collect the sealed envelopes In it. After doing this the boy sat at the front end of the stage with the hat In his lap and a handkerchief handker-chief over It while the manager gave a lecture of fifteen minutes or so. After the lecture tho manager requested re-quested the boy to give him one of the envelopes, which the boy did The manager did not look toward It in any manner, but took it in the tip of his right fingers, held it In the air and asked the medium to give the writer of this question an answer. The medium shivered a few times and gave an answer which was immediately imme-diately identified bj a person in the audience. In this way evory question was answered and when all were done the medium gave some cabinet manifestations mani-festations and then the manager collected col-lected the sealed envelopes from the table and returned them to the audience. audi-ence. Another Hat Juct Like It. This trick was done in this way: When the boy handec the hat full of sealed envelopes to tho manager there was one little move that escaped the eyes of the spectators The spectators specta-tors did not know what was to happen, hap-pen, neither did the boy As the boy went on the stage with the hat tho manager received it in his right hand and directed the boy to take the seat at the front of the singe facing the i audience. While the boy was doing this, the manager turned to the table, ! which was somewhae back on the j stage, and apparently took a large handkerchief from It. xnd with the hat still apparently in his hand, ho stepped to the boy. giving him the hat of envelopes and the handkerchief, a: the same time instructing him how to cover the hat and how to deliver the envelopes one at a time. All this maneuvering ma-neuvering seemed so natural that the audience thought nothing whatever of it, As the manager turned to the table to get the handkerchief and while most eyes were on the boy, the manager deftly exchanged tho hat In his right hand for another hat just like It that was filled with dummy envelopes and which was behind the flowers and music mu-sic box. As he Immediately turned with the hat In his hand everything appeared natural. The committee then blindfolded tho medium and returned to the audience, the manager seated the medium behind be-hind the table and, while the manager talked to the audience the medium tilted the hat over, tore open the envelopes, en-velopes, piled the cards in front of him and, when he was ready looked down beneath the bandage and read each one In turn, and as the manager hold an envelope from the hat aloft the medium me-dium gave an answer. When all the cards had been answered an-swered they were passed to an assistant assist-ant behind the scenes, who scaled them in envelopes and exchanged them for the dummy envelopes on a table near the wings |