THE ZANCIGS
Some years ago there appeared at the Alhambra Theatre, London, two
entertainers--Mr. and Mrs. Zancig--whose performances were of so
puzzling a nature that to many who had witnessed them the only
explanation of the results obtained appeared to be that genuine
telepathy was at play. The _Daily Mail_ newspaper arranged that Mr. and
Mrs. Zancig should be subjected to a series of severe tests at its
office, and on the 30th November 1906 these were carried out.
On the 1st December the _Daily Mail_ published a full account of these
experiments. The publication of this and of other accounts by persons
who had witnessed the remarkable performances of the Zancigs led to a
heated controversy between the correspondents of the _Daily Mail_ and
the _Daily Chronicle_. Those of the first paper mostly asserted that the
performance was an exhibition of true telepathy, while those of the
second paper declared that codes--visual and verbal--would account for
the phenomena. Previously to the experiment carried out by the _Daily
Mail_ I had obtained a letter of introduction to the Zancigs from a
friend of mine who had had private tests with them, but as it was
necessary to have the permission of the manager of the Alhambra before
an interview with the Zancigs could be arranged, I called at the offices
of that theatre, and saw Mr. Scott, the manager. I informed him that I
was a member of the Society for Psychical Research, which body I told
him took the deepest interest in telepathy. I handed him a letter that I
had written to Mr. Zancig, and on the 29th November 1906 I received the
following communication from the last-named gentleman:--
"DEAR SIR,--I received a letter from Miss H. A. Dallas,
telling me that you would like to meet us. Now, my dear sir,
we would be pleased to make your acquaintance, and have you
call for a visit, but if it is for any private show and to
be tried and judged if our work is, as we represent, 'two
minds with but a single thought,' I will have to say No. We
have done nothing since we arrived in London but have
callers to test and try us every day, from three to four
ladies and gentlemen. My wife and I agreed to all tests they
put to us, and all was quite satisfactory. Personally I do
not care, but it has been quite a strain on my wife. Should
you care to witness our show, you would be able to see us at
ten p.m. on the Alhambra stage, but if you care to call and
see us, and have a little talk, we both would be pleased to
meet you.--Trusting that I am understood, I remain, yours
sincerely,
(Signed) "JULIUS ZANCIG"
Although the contents of the above letter were of a discouraging nature,
I determined to strike the iron while it was hot; therefore, on the
evening of the same day I called, accompanied by my wife, at the flat
where the Zancigs resided. They were at the time partaking of their
evening meal. We apologized for our intrusion, but by the kind way that
they received us we were soon put at our ease. I informed Mr. Zancig
that I was much interested in telepathy, and that I had personally
carried out experiments in this branch of psychical research, and that I
was assured of the truth of its existence through the successes that I
had obtained.
Mr. and Mrs. Zancig impressed my wife and myself most favourably by
their unaffected and simple manner. After a conversation which lasted
about ten minutes, Mr. Zancig very kindly spontaneously offered to try
some experiments. I will now describe these. Madame Zancig went to the
other end of the room farthest away from where Mr. Zancig, my wife, and
I sat. She faced the wall with her back to us; Mr. Zancig then wrote
with a chalk a line of figures on a slate which he held in his left
hand, and called out the word "Ready." Madame Zancig immediately named
the figures correctly and in their proper order. The same kind of
experiment was tried successfully three times. The results might have
been due to telepathy, but I was not satisfied, as it could have been
possible that the figures were prearranged, or that Madame Zancig could
tell by the sound of the chalk what figures were being written. I also
had in my mind the fact that there is a method of communicating figures
by time-coding.
Mr. Zancig then asked me to write a double line of figures. I handed the
slate to him, and after he had called out "Ready" Madame Zancig
proceeded to cast them up correctly.
As Madame Zancig named all my figures aloud as she was summing them up,
this experiment was of a more complicated nature than the previous ones;
nevertheless, I was not entirely satisfied, as time-coding in putting
down the resultant figures by Mr. Zancig, and the hearing of the sound
of the chalk by Madame Zancig when I was writing my own figures, might
have accounted for the favourable result.
To prevent the possibility of communicating by an electrical or other
apparatus concealed under the carpet, I requested Mr. Zancig to raise
his feet from the floor. He immediately complied by sitting on the
table, where he remained to the last experiment.
Madame Zancig then retired into an adjoining bedroom with a slate in her
hand; the door was closed, but not entirely. My wife wrote down two
lines of figures, the slate was handed by her to Mr. Zancig, who called
out "Ready," and he then proceeded without speaking to add them up.
Madame Zancig then came into the room with the correct result written by
herself on her slate. This was a more crucial test than the last, but
still, although visual-coding was excluded, sound-coding while Mr.
Zancig was writing the resultant sum was not entirely so.
Then followed the experiment of transmitting a selected line in a book.
Mr. Zancig handed me a book and asked me to open it at any page and to
point out a line. After I had done so I handed the book to him. He
called out "Ready." Then his wife opened a duplicate book at the proper
page, and read the line which I had selected. Doubtless the words of the
line were not communicated telepathically or otherwise by Mr. Zancig,
but only the number of the page and the number of the line counting from
the top of the page. Nevertheless, it was difficult to discover by what
method this was done, as Mr. Zancig simply called out "Ready." There did
not appear to be time for the numbers of the page and line to be
transmitted by time-coding. The reader will observe that as the
experiments proceeded they appeared to present increasing evidence that
true telepathy was at work.
The following and last experiment that I tried on this occasion was the
most crucial. I requested Mr. Zancig to go out with me on to the landing
outside the door of the flat. I did not previously inform Madame Zancig
nor Mr. Zancig of the nature of the test that I was about to put. Madame
Zancig remained in the room with my wife. The door was closed, but not
completely. When we were on the landing I suddenly drew my cheque-book
out of my pocket, tore out a cheque, and handed it to Mr. Zancig,
requesting him to transmit the number. Mr. Zancig observed to me in a
whisper that the noise of the traffic in the street was very disturbing.
This was true, as the hall door to the street was open. He then remained
silent while he looked at the cheque. My wife then came out on to the
landing, and handed me a slate upon which Madame Zancig had during the
experiment written the words, "In the year 1875." Mr. Zancig then said
aloud, "This is not what we want; it is the number." My wife returned
into the room with the slate, and the door was closed, but not
completely. It was impossible, however, for Madame Zancig to see her
husband. The suspicion arose in my mind that the number on the cheque
might have been communicated to Madame Zancig by the words that Mr.
Zancig had spoken aloud. I therefore took the cheque that he had in his
hand and substituted another one with a different number that I tore
from the bottom of my cheque-book. Mr. Zancig remained absolutely silent
during the whole time that this second experiment lasted. My wife again
came out of the room with the slate, upon which Madame Zancig had
written quite correctly, in their proper order, four of the five numbers
of the second cheque, with the exception of the last figure, which was
wanting, but just as we were returning to the room Madame Zancig said,
"There was another figure; it was four"--which was correct. This
impressed me as a good test, with regard to the three last numbers of
this cheque, which were different from the corresponding ones of the
first cheque. Madame Zancig could not see her husband, and he remained
absolutely silent while the experiment was being carried out.
I insert here a note by Sir Oliver Lodge in which he gives an account of
an experiment of a similar nature, and also of other experiments which
he tried with the Zancigs.
"Independently of the more thorough investigations of Mr.
Baggally, I myself was favoured with a private interview
with the Zancigs, who were friendly and considerate and
helpful; and I tried the experiment of having Mrs. Zancig
outside the room, though with door open, and Mr. Zancig with
me and quite silent. I wrote five or six figures on a slate,
taking care to make no noise, and Mrs. Zancig failed to get
them correctly. Zancig seemed distressed at that, and after
a little time groaned out, 'Oh, surely you can do this';
almost immediately after which Mrs. Zancig came into the
room with the correct figures written on her slate. It was
difficult to see how the sentence had conveyed the figures,
but it was instructive to find that utterance of some kind
seemed necessary. It was partly this, and partly the
manifest difficulty of eliminating all possibilities of code
between a pair of performers accustomed to go about
together, with years of experience behind them, that
prevented me from doing what I probably ought to have done,
though circumstances did not render it very easy, namely, to
make a serious study of the Zancig phenomena.
"Moreover, I questioned Mr. Zancig about codes, and found
that he was familiar with a great many. He was quite frank
about it, and rather implied, as I thought, that at times he
was ready to use any code or other normal kind of assistance
that might be helpful, though he assured me that he found
that he and his wife did possess a faculty which they did
not in the least understand, but which was more efficient
and quicker than anything they could get by codes. On the
whole, I think this extremely likely, but the rapidity and
the certainty and dependableness of the power went far
beyond anything that I could imagine as possible between
people who depended on supernormal faculty alone. But if
there was a mixture of devices between people so skilled, I
despaired of bringing the genuine part of the phenomenon to
a definite issue.
"I do not think that either this or the weight of my other
avocations are a sufficient excuse for this neglect, but it
certainly was not easy to get opportunities for careful
investigation. One of the main difficulties was that they
were not free agents, having entered into contracts with
managers whose financial interests partly depended upon the
continued uncertainty of the public as to the causes
underlying their very remarkable performance. Moreover, I
knew that so skilled an investigator as Mr. Baggally was
more favourably impressed with them than I was myself, and
was able to give to them some considerable time and
attention.
"The extraordinary and rapid success with which Mrs. Zancig
named one thing after another, handled or seen by her
husband as he went through the hall in their public
performances, is familiar to everybody who attended those
exhibitions; but one episode which I have not put on record
did impress me as rather exceptionally good, though entirely
unsensational and unnoticeable at the time. I relate it
here:--
"The Zancigs happened to come to Birmingham for a week
during the University Vacation when I was away. On the last
day of their performance I happened unexpectedly to return
to Birmingham, and was dining at the club with some other
men. Some one remarked that the Zancigs were performing, and
suggested that we should cut dessert and go and see them; so
we went in the middle of the performance and sat at the back
of the gallery. Everything went on as usual. Mrs. Zancig was
on the stage, blindfolded, I think, though I attach no
importance to that. Mr. Zancig had been through the body of
the hall, and was coming along the side gallery, taking
objects from members of the audience as he went, and having
them described quickly one after the other as usual, when he
caught sight of me at the back of the gallery, and indicated
recognition by a little start. The next object that he took
in hand (a purse or what not) he said, 'What is this?' and
Madame Zancig on the stage said 'Oliver.' Zancig shook his
head and muttered, 'No, that's what I was thinking of, but
what's this?' On which she said whatever it was correctly,
and the performance went on as usual; my friends in due time
getting their tests efficiently done. Nobody noticed the
incident in particular; it was over in a second. It
conveyed no impression of anything except of a slight
confusion,--an error, in fact, immediately corrected,--but I
could not fail to notice that the very unimportant incident
tended in favour of the view that a power of sympathy or
communication between them was genuine, since she got an
undesired and unintended impression which certainly was at
the moment in Mr. Zancig's mind.
"O. J. L."
Later, on the same evening of the experiment with the numbers on my
cheque-book which I have described above, my wife and I attended the
public performance at the Alhambra. We were seated at a distance from
the stage. When Mr. Zancig came amongst the audience my wife handed him
a piece of something black, the nature of which it was difficult to tell
at first sight. He stooped down and asked in a whisper, "What is that?"
My wife answered, also in a whisper, "Liquorice." Madame Zancig
immediately called out from the stage, "Liquorice." No word had been
spoken by Mr. Zancig after my wife had whispered the word "Liquorice." I
then handed a visiting-card with a double name. Zancig read to himself
in a low voice the last name, which was Hutchinson, and said, "What is
the first name?" Madame Zancig called out "Berks"; this was correct. It
appeared to me suspicious, however, that the question, "What is the
first name?" although appropriate and natural, should contain the same
number of words as there are letters in the name Berks--namely, five.
Therefore some months after, at another performance, I wrote the same
name, Berks Hutchinson, on a piece of paper and handed it to Mr. Zancig.
This time he asked, "What is this?" Madame Zancig replied, "A piece of
paper with a name." Mr. Zancig said, "Give the name." She replied,
"Berks Hutchinson."
I attended a series of performances at the Alhambra, and took down the
questions and answers in order, if possible, to discover the code. On
witnessing a first performance the spectator might be led to believe
that word-coding alone is at the bottom of the mystery, but if notes are
taken at a number of performances he will find that the same question
is answered differently time after time.
From my experiments with the Zancigs I came to the conclusion that
although the alleged transmission of thought might possibly depend on a
code or codes which I was unable to unravel, yet their performance was
of such a nature that it was worthy of serious scientific examination.
On the assumption that they possessed genuine telepathic powers it would
be a pity that the opportunity of investigating their claim should be
missed. I therefore set myself to work to arrange with Mr. Alfred Moul,
managing director of the Alhambra, and Mr. Zancig for some experiments
to be tried before a Committee of the members of the Society for
Psychical Research.
An article appeared in the _Daily Mail_, inspired evidently by Mr. Moul,
from which I now quote:--
"We have suggested to Mr. Zancig that in preference to
inquiries into telepathy by unskilled persons he should
place himself in the hands of the Society for Psychical
Research, of which Mr. Gerald Balfour is the President, and
of which Sir Oliver Lodge, Sir William Crookes, and other
distinguished scientists are leading members. Mr. Zancig has
informed us that he has already received a communication
from that Society, and that he was entirely willing to place
himself and Madame Zancig at the disposal of the Society for
a thoroughly scientific series of tests."
The investigation by the Society for Psychical Research, at which I was
present, took place on the 18th January 1907. I regret that I cannot
give an account of what took place at this meeting, as it was mutually
arranged between Mr. Moul and the S.P.R. that the results should not be
divulged. They appeared, however, sufficiently favourable to some of the
members present (though not to all) to induce them to subsequently form
an unofficial Committee to carry out further tests. These unofficial
experiments did not take place till 26th July 1907.
In the meantime I continued my own private experiments. A striking one
is the following. I was in the balcony of the Alhambra on the 19th
January 1907, and when Mr. Zancig came to that part of the house I
handed him a piece of paper on which I had written the word
"Istapalapan." I took care that he should not see the word previously to
my giving him the paper. Zancig remarked to me in a whisper, "This is a
long word." Owing to the distance from his wife it could not have been
possible for her to overhear these words. Then Mr. Zancig called out,
"Spell this." Madame Zancig immediately wrote on the blackboard which
was on the stage "Istapala," and when she came to the second "p" she
wrote "f" and then "san." I have often noticed that when Madame Zancig
makes a mistake in a letter or number there is a similarity in the form
of the letter or number to that which was to be transmitted; thus, she
would put down "f" for "p," "7" for "9." "fsan" in this case is very
like "pan," and Mr. Zancig may have mistaken the letters. I fail to
understand how in this experiment he was able to code such a long word
as "Istapalafsan" by the simple words "Spell this." It would appear as
if Madame Zancig really saw what Mr. Zancig was looking at. The reader
will recollect that in his preliminary remarks at each of his
performances Zancig says, "What I see, Madame Zancig sees."
I have several times observed this alleged peculiarity, notably so on
the occasion of the tests at the Gramophone offices, which took place on
the 22nd February 1907, and at which I was one of the members of the
Committee. Mr. and Mrs. Zancig were divided by a large screen. They
could not see each other. A recording trumpet was placed near each, into
which they spoke. A table was placed by the side of Mr. Zancig on which
a great number of articles had been placed by the members of the
Committee. Madame Zancig with great rapidity named the articles as Mr.
Zancig took them up in answer to his "What is this? and this?" etc. An
incident which struck me as remarkable was the following. Mr. Zancig
raised a pencil, saying, "What is this?" and after Madame Zancig had
correctly stated what it was, he took up immediately (not in the
vicinity of the pencil, but some distance from it) a case, and said,
"And this?" Instead of naming the article Madame Zancig proceeded to
enumerate in their proper order the articles that lay between the two
articles which Mr. Zancig had taken up. Thus, a pencil, a seal, a
penknife, a case. It appeared as if Madame Zancig had actually seen the
articles over which her husband had passed his hand.
An excellent test was the following. Dr. W. M'Dougall, a member of the
Council of the S.P.R., who was present at these tests, borrowed a book
from one of the members of the Committee. He came to the side of the
screen where Mr. Zancig stood, opened the book at a certain page, then
pointed to the middle of a line in the centre of the page. Mr. Zancig,
without taking the book in his hand, glanced at the line, then Dr.
M'Dougall shut the book, took it to the other side of the screen, and
handed it closed to Madame Zancig. Mr. Zancig remained absolutely
silent, placed his hand against his forehead, and appeared to make a
strong mental effort. Madame Zancig, after the lapse of a minute, opened
the book at the proper page and began reading at the word in the middle
of the line that had been chosen by Dr. M'Dougall. Some members of the
Committee and I stood quite close to Mr. Zancig. We did not hear him
utter a sound. He could not be seen by Madame Zancig owing to the
screen.
I was present at the _matinee_ performance given under the auspices of
the _Daily Mirror_ newspaper at the Alhambra. Dr. H., principal surgeon
of a well-known hospital, handed to Mr. Zancig a set of skeins of silk
of different colours. These were then passed on to Madame Zancig, who
was on the stage. Dr. H. pointed silently to a skein of silk of a
corresponding set which he had retained, and which he took care Madame
Zancig could not see. Mr. Zancig, who preserved absolute silence, and
remained motionless, looked at the colour of the skein, and in the space
of half a minute his wife picked out a skein of the corresponding colour
from the set that she had in her possession. This test was tried
successfully three times. I particularly took note that Mr. Zancig
remained silent and motionless, retaining the same position of his body
during the course of the three experiments.
I have tried tests with Mr. and Madame Zancig in the transmission of
diagrams. I took with me to a private house to which I was invited an
envelope containing cards with diagrams on them. Madame Zancig sat
behind a large screen at the end of the room. By her side sat a lady, a
friend of mine, who watched Madame Zancig and saw that she did not move
from her chair. Mr. Zancig stood close to me near the other end of the
room. I presented the envelope to him, retaining it in my hand. He drew
out one of the cards on which was a diagram not known either to him or
to me till he looked at it. He fixed his gaze intently on it, remained
motionless, and in a whisper said to me, "Please say ready." I called
out, "Ready," and his wife then drew a diagram on a piece of paper, at
the same time saying, "Something like half a moon."
[Illustration: MR. ZANCIG'S DIAGRAM]
[Illustration: MADAME ZANCIG'S DRAWING]
Mr. Zancig then drew another card from the envelope. This time he did
not speak, but nodded his head once, and I called out, "Ready." Madame
Zancig thereupon observed, "It is a square within a square." The diagram
that Mr. Zancig was looking at was this:
[Illustration]
his wife drew this:
[Illustration]
Two more cards were then drawn, but Madame Zancig did not succeed; she
got absolutely wrong drawings.
At a public performance at Eastbourne I handed Mr. Zancig this diagram:
[Illustration]
He called out, "Draw this." Madame Zancig, who was on the platform,
said, "It is something like this." She made a motion with her right arm
like drawing a capital V; she then drew it on the blackboard. After
this she slowly drew a horizontal line through the V, thus:
[Illustration]
Mr. Zancig said, "Give the number." She then placed a 2 in the proper
position. He then called out, "Give the rest." She thereupon placed the
_a_ under the line, thus:
[Illustration]
Mr. Zancig said, "What more?" His wife placed the sign of + correctly,
but she rubbed it out several times as if in doubt. Finally she put down
the sign of + and a capital X, so that her drawing appeared like this:
[Illustration]
I have had many other experiments with this gifted couple, but have not
yet obtained the crucial test of getting Mr. Zancig to be in a distant
room with closed doors, while his wife was in another room. The
possibility of their using a sound code at one time and a visual code at
another is therefore not entirely precluded.
Although I have been quite unable to discover the methods by which they
can possibly communicate when a visual and a sound code are not
detected, yet I will reserve my ultimate opinion until I obtain tests
under the crucial conditions that I have named.
Not only did I personally meet with difficulties in endeavouring to
explain the performances of Mr. and Madame Zancig, but also the members
of the unofficial Committee that I have referred to. I now give an
extract from our unofficial report.
"... It must be remembered that the antecedent probabilities
in favour of a code to explain all performances of this kind
are enormous.
"While we are of opinion that the records of experiments in
telepathy made by the Society for Psychical Research and
others raise a presumption for the existence of such a
faculty at least strong enough to entitle it to serious
scientific attention, the most hopeful results hitherto
obtained have not been in any way comparable as regards
accuracy and precision with those produced by Mr. and Madame
Zancig. Further, there is, so far as we are aware, no case
of any public performers (including certain recent examples)
where the use of a code or apparatus has not been more or
less readily discoverable or clearly to be inferred. In
considering, therefore, the claim of Mr. and Madame Zancig
to the possession of a genuine telepathic faculty, one is
faced by the initial difficulty that such a faculty must be
regarded as unique in quality, and Mr. and Madame Zancig
themselves as unique in kind, a difficulty on the force of
which it is not necessary to insist. On the other hand, the
difficulty of suggesting by what method, if not by
telepathy, they communicate is considerable. Those who have
only witnessed the public theatre performances, clever and
perplexing as these are, will not appreciate how hard it is
to offer any plausible explanation of their _modus
operandi_."
In conclusion, I would wish to point out that the establishment of the
fact that telepathy is a scientific truth would have bearings of the
greatest importance.
It would show that the transmission of thought could occasionally be
effected otherwise than by the ordinary sense channels.
It would change the materialistic conception that thought only acts
within the limits of the brain.
It would modify the materialistic scientific view of the relation of
mind to matter.
I trust that what I have written will act as an incentive to some of my
readers to try experiments in this branch of psychical research.[2] It
is not enough that a few individuals by patient inquiry and experiment
should have been convinced of the reality of telepathy. What is wanted
is that scientific men generally, by the record of an overwhelming
number of experiments under the strictest test conditions, should be
convinced of its truth. Once let them be so, then public conviction will
in due time follow.
Meanwhile I feel bound to state that, in spite of initial
improbability, the experiences which I myself have had, as partly
narrated in this book, especially those briefly summarized in Part I,
have convinced me that the telepathic faculty does exist, and that its
detection is a genuine extension of scientific knowledge; though much
more will have to be done before the bare fact receives its explanation
and is permanently incorporated in a coherent system of Science.
[Footnote 2: Information relating to cases of genuine telepathy may be
sent to the Secretary of the Society for Psychical Research, 20 Hanover
Square, London, who will be pleased to investigate them.]
PRINTED BY MORRISON AND GIBB LTD., EDINBURGH
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Transcriber's Note:
Punctuation errors have been corrected without note. On p. 20, "11.5
p.m." was corrected to "11.50 p.m."
In the ASCII version, the acute accents in "matinee" and "seance" were
removed.
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