of these points.  In process mathematics particularly, this aid had been of singular service, and it was now invariably invoked by such players of chess and games of manual dexterity as were still to be found.  In fact, all operations conducted under finite rules, of a quasi-mechanical sort that is, were now systematically relieved from the wanderings of imagination and emotion, and brought to an unexampled pitch of accuracy.  Little children of the labouring classes, so soon as they were of sufficient age to be hypnotised, were thus converted into beautifully punctual and trustworthy machine minders, and released forthwith from the long, long thoughts of youth.  Aeronautical pupils, who gave way to giddiness, could be relieved from their imaginary terrors.  In every street were hypnotists ready to print permanent memories upon the mind.  If anyone desired to remember a name, a series of numbers, a song or a speech, it could be done by this method, and conversely memories could be effaced, habits removed, and desires eradicated—­a sort of psychic surgery was, in fact, in general use.  Indignities, humbling experiences, were thus forgotten, widows would obliterate their previous husbands, angry lovers release themselves from their slavery.  To graft desires, however, was still impossible, and the facts of thought transference were yet unsystematised.  The psychologists illustrated their expositions with some astounding experiments in mnemonics made through the agency of a troupe of pale-faced children in blue.

Graham, like most of the people of his former time, distrusted the hypnotist, or he might then and there have eased his mind of many painful preoccupations.  But in spite of Lincoln’s assurances he held to the old theory that to be hypnotised was in some way the surrender of his personality, the abdication of his will.  At the banquet of wonderful experiences that was beginning, he wanted very keenly to remain absolutely himself.

The next day, and another day, and yet another day passed in such interests as these.  Each day Graham spent many hours in the glorious entertainment of flying.  On the third, he soared across middle France, and within sight of the snow-clad Alps.  These vigorous exercises gave him restful sleep; he recovered almost wholly from the spiritless anemia of his first awakening.  And whenever he was not in the air, and awake, Lincoln was assiduous in the cause of his amusement; all that was novel and curious in contemporary invention was brought to him, until at last his appetite for novelty was well-nigh glutted.  One might fill a dozen inconsecutive volumes with the strange things they exhibited.  Each afternoon he held his court for an hour or so.  He found his interest in his contemporaries becoming personal and intimate.  At first he had been alert chiefly for unfamiliarity and peculiarity; any foppishness in their dress, any discordance with his preconceptions of nobility in their status and manners had jarred