In the next example the percipients, though near together, were not actually in one another's company. The case is of special interest, inasmuch as the two percepts were slightly different, - the figure being seen by one observer with a hat on, and by the other without, and the difference corresponding with the associations natural to each in their respective positions. A clergyman writing to us from Lincoln, on April 29th, 1885, describes an afternoon call of the preceding January.

(319) "I was ushered into the drawing-room, and was asked to take a low arm-chair in the middle of the room; but I preferred sitting on a couch drawn up at right angles to the side of the fireplace, where I could command a view, through the window, of the garden. Facing me, with her back to this window, sat one lady; to my left, seated not far from the arm-chair mentioned, was another lady, fronting the hearth. While we sat chatting upon the subject of my visit, an old man, of somewhat sad appearance, dressed in a dark blue overcoat - somewhat shabby - and with a flat-topped felt hat, and remarkable for a white beard, passed the window; and immediately after the front door bell rang. The lady of the house was expecting a visit from some lady friend, and remarked 'This must be - .' I said, 'No, it's an old man with a white beard.' At which both ladies present expressed surprise, and began wondering who it could be. Just then the door of the room opened, and in walked a well-known local practitioner.

As soon as he had shaken hands all round, the lady of the house said, 'But where is the old man with the white beard?' To which the doctor replied, ' Yes; where is he? '

"Our friend, the doctor, had happened to be passing the gate a short time before, and had, without premeditation as he says, suddenly turned in, struck with the idea of paying an afternoon call. He came up the walk towards the hall door, and, in passing the window mentioned, looked into the room where we were sitting, and saw, seated in the low arm-chair, an old man exactly answering to the description of the old man I had seen passing the window (doubtless when the doctor passed), with this exception, that the person he saw had, of course, no hat on. The doctor was surprised not to find the old gentleman in the room; hence his strange reply to the lady's question.

"Now observe: I saw the old man exactly at the time the doctor was passing the window. I did not see the doctor, whom I know well, who is much shorter than the figure I saw, and who wore a brown top-coat, a silk hat, and no beard. And the doctor saw the figure in the room, sitting down and without a hat.

"I am not, as far as I know, subject to similar hallucinations, if the affair may be rightly so called".

Dr. Cant writes to us as follows: -

" Silver Street, Lincoln.

"May 7th, 1885.

' I have seen Mr. - [the clergyman], and quite agree with all he said. The old man was sitting down in the room, and I felt certain of his presence, and was greatly astonished not to find him in the room. The reports we have given are absolutely true, without any doubts in either of our minds. "W. T. Cant".

Dr. Cant was asked whether he had ever had any other hallucinations; and also whether he would have been certain to see any real person occupying the position where the clergyman saw the figure. He replied: -

"In answer to your questions these phenomena are quite new to me, and I never remember having one of the sort before. It was quite impossible for the figure that Mr. - saw to have been there, as I must have seen it when passing, and he only saw one figure, and did not see me at all".

Both witnesses are positive that the case was not one of mere illusion; though it was dusk, there was enough light for the clergyman to observe that the figure outside was rather badly dressed, besides differing from Dr.

Cant in being considerably stouter and wearing a beard. They discussed the matter the same evening at about n p.m. In the interval, something had occurred by which Dr. Cant tells us that he was a good deal impressed. At about 8 p.m. he was called to visit a stranger, who was dying, and who had expressly desired his attendance; and he was startled by the close (though not exact) resemblance of this man to the hallucinatory figure.