"Undoubtedly the imaginative faculty was brought extensively into play, as well as the volitional; for I endeavoured to translate myself, spiritually, into the room, and to attract her attention, as it were, while standing there. My effort was sustained for perhaps 8 minutes, after which I felt tired, and was soon asleep.

"The next thing I was conscious of was meeting the lady next morning, (i.e., in a dream, I suppose?) and asking her at once if she had seen me last night. The reply came 'Yes.' How? ' I inquired. Then in words strangely clear and low, like a well-audible whisper, came the answer, ' I was sitting beside you.' These words, so clear, awoke me instantly, and I felt I must have been dreaming; but on reflection, I remembered what I had been ' willing' before I fell asleep; and it struck me, 'This must be a reflex action from the percipient'.

"My watch showed 3.40 a.m. The following is what I wrote immediately in pencil, standing in my night-dress: - ' As I reflected upon those clear words, they struck me as being quite intuitive - I mean subjective, and to have proceeded from within, as my own conviction, rather than a communication from anyone else.1 And yet I can't remember her face at all, as one can after a vivid dream! '

"But the words were uttered in a clear, quick tone, which was most remarkable, and awoke me at once.

"My friend, in the note with which she sent me the enclosed account of her own experience, says: 'I remember the man put all the lamps out soon after I came upstairs, and that is only done about a quarter to 4.' "

Mr. Godfrey went next morning to see someone who resided in the same house as Mrs. -, and was leaving, when "she called out to me from the window that she had something special to tell me; but being very busy, I could not return again into the house, and replied to the effect that it would keep. I am not,quite certain now2 whether it was on the afternoon of the same day, or later in the morning, that she called. I asked her, as usual [for she suffered from neuralgia], if she had had a good night, and she at once commenced to narrate as I have told you. When she had told me all, I begged her at once to go home and write it down. The account which I sent to you was the result; and it compared accurately with a few scribbled notes in pencil which I had hastily jotted down as she was relating it to me originally".

1At first sight, this seems inconsistent with the idea of the "reflex"or reciprocal action in the preceding paragraph. But Mr. Godfrey explains what he means as follows: "I was dreaming: reflection convinced me that the particular words were not uttered in course of natural dream, but by reflex [reciprocal] action: also that they proceeded from myself, and not from any one standing over my bed in the room. It was ' from any one else ' that confused my meaning. 1 meant any one in the room, not any one in another house: from her they clearly did proceed." There does not seem, however, to be any such proof of reciprocal action as Mr. Godfrey supposes; no reason appears why his dream should not have been purely subjective.

2The letter here quoted was written to me on Jan. 13, 1887. Mr. Podmore says that it entirely accords with Mr. Godfrey's and Mrs. - 's independent viva voce accounts given on the previous Nov. 22. The reason why these details were not included in Mr. Podmore's notes was that at the moment he was under the impression that they had been mentioned in Mr. Godfrey's first letter, which was in my possession.

The following is the percipient's account: -

"Yesterday, viz., the morning of Nov. 16, 1886, about half-past 3 o'clock, I woke up with a start, and an idea that someone had come into the room. I also heard a curious sound, but fancied it might be the birds in the ivy outside. Next I experienced a strange, restless longing to leave the room and go downstairs. This feeling became so overpowering that at last I rose, and lit a candle, and went down, thinking if I could get some soda-water it might have a quieting effect. On returning to my room, I saw Mr. Godfrey standing under the large window on the staircase. He was dressed in his usual style, and with an expression on his face that I have noticed when he has been looking very earnestly at anything. He stood there, and I held up the candle and gazed at him for 3 or 4 seconds in utter amazement; and then, as I passed up the staircase, he disappeared. The impression left on my mind was so vivid that I fully intended waking a friend who occupied the same room as myself; but remembering I should only be laughed at as romantic and imaginative, refrained from doing so.

" I was not frightened at the appearance of Mr. Godfrey, but felt much excited and could not sleep afterwards".

In conversation with Mrs. - (Nov. 22, 1886), Mr. Podmore learnt that she is a good sleeper, and not given to waking at nights. She does not remember ever before having experienced anything like the feeling which she had on first waking up. She was at the bottom of the stairs when she saw Mr. Godfrey's figure, which appeared on the landing, about 11 steps up. It was quite distinct and life-like at first, - though she does not remember noticing more than the upper part of the body; as she looked, it grew more and more shadowy, and finally faded away. It must be added that she has seen in her life two other phantasmal appearances, which represented a parent whom she had recently lost. But a couple of experiences of this sort, coming at a time of emotional strain, cannot be regarded as a sign of any abnormal liability to subjective hallucinations (see p. 330); and even if she was destined anyhow to experience one other, the chances against its representing one particular member of her acquaintance, at the very time when he happened for the first time in his life to be making the effort above described, would be at least many hundreds of thousands to 1.