_Secretary_.
* * * * *
The following is a stenographic report of a meeting of the Commission,
to consider the reports offered by several members of séances with Dr.
Henry Slade, who came to Philadelphia to meet the Commission. As he
refused to sit with more than three of the Commission at a time, it was
necessary to visit him in sections. Arrangements had been made to have
all the members sit with him in turn, but it was soon decided that
continuity of observation was valuable, and certain members were
appointed to do the whole work.
(A record from the notes of the Stenographer, Mr. J.I. Gilbert.)
PHILADA., February 7th, 1885.
A formal session of the Seybert Committee was held to-day at 8 o'clock
P.M., at the residence of Mr. Furness, No. 222 West Washington Square.
The session was devoted to consideration of the séances held with Dr.
Henry Slade, from January 21st to January 28th inclusive.
The following is a compilation of written notes and verbal comments upon
the séances by members of the Committee:
Mr. Coleman Sellers (referring to notes):
The Committee met on January 21st, 1885, at the Girard House,
Philadelphia, in Room 24.
There were present: Messrs. Thompson, Sellers and Furness, of the
Committee, and the Medium, Dr. Henry Slade.
The séance was conducted at a pine table prepared by the Medium, which
was supplied with two falling leaves and stationed at a point remote
from the centre of the room, and contiguous to a wall of the apartment.
Upon the table were two ordinary writing slates and fragments of slate
pencils.
The relative positions of the Medium and the Committee were as follows:
the Medium was seated in the space between the table and the wall.
Professor Thompson occupied a chair at the side of the table to the
right, and Mr. Furness one at the side to the left of the Medium. Mr.
Sellers was seated at the side directly opposite to the Medium.
After calling attention to the slates and the pencil pieces, the Medium
remarked that, as his baggage had not come to hand, he was apprehensive
that the sitting would not be a very good one. A brief, general
conversation followed, and then, complying with a direction of the
Medium, all present joined hands upon the table. Thereupon the Medium
abruptly started back, and, remarking that he had received a very severe
shock of some kind, inquired whether the gentlemen present had not
experienced a like sensation. The responses were in the negative.
The Medium next proposed to give an exhibition of "Spiritism" through
the agency of communications invisibly written upon the apparently blank
surface of one of the slates. At this point Mr. Sellers asked that the
table be examined, and, with the assent of the Medium, an examination
was accordingly made by the Committee; the only noteworthy result of
which was the discovery immediately beneath the table-top of openings
or slots into which the bars supporting the table leaves entered when
turned to permit the lowering of the leaves.
(Mr. Sellers here continued, without reference to notes):
These slots and the use to which I ascertained they might be applied are
worthy of special comment, as they played a very important part in all
the expositions that were made of the Medium Slade's manifestations. The
slot under the table into which the vibrating bar passed when the leaf
was lowered was an inch and a-quarter in depth. At a later period of the
meeting, when the opportunity was afforded, I took the slate in my hand,
and, from the table side at which I was seated (the one directly
opposite the Medium's position) passed it into the slot, allowing it to
rest there diagonally. Upon removing my hand the slate remained
suspended in its place, and in a position in which it could conveniently
be written upon. I may add that this arrangement of the slate is said to
be an essential feature of Slade's favorite method of writing. The
Medium did not fail to notice my experiment of passing the slate into
the slot, and, upon the occasion of my second attendance at the
"manifestations" (which was at the third meeting of the Committee),
having dispensed with the table I have described and prepared another,
he somewhat ostentatiously called attention to the fact that the table
then produced contained no slots such as those of which I have spoken. I
have a memorandum of the size of the slots. The dimensions of the table
last referred to are given in Mr. Fullerton's report.
(Mr. Sellers, referring again to his notes):
Taking a slate in his hand Slade held it beneath the table leaf to his
right, when almost immediately there was a succession of faintly audible
sounds such as would have been made by writing on the slate under the
table. A knock indicated that the writing had ceased. The Medium then
attempted to withdraw the slate, but in this encountered a seeming
resistance, and only succeeded by a jerk, as if wrenching the slate from
the grasp of a strong person who was below the table. Upon the slate,
which was at once inspected, appeared in a fair, running handwriting,
and as if written with a pencil held firmly in hand, the following:
"My friends,