the sign of the cross was made on her brow, and a kiss impressed on her lips, as she wakened one night.  She thought this was mere illusion, but presently, when she got up, she heard, ‘comme soubs ses pieds frapper aucuns petis coups,’ ‘rappings,’ as if at the depth of four inches underground.  This was exactly what occurred to Miss Hetty Wesley, at Epworth, in 1716, and at Rio de Janeiro to a child named ‘C.’ in Professor Alexander’s narrative. {112} Montalembert says, in 1528, ’I have heard these rappings many a time, and, in reply to my questions, so many strokes as I asked for were given’.  Montalembert received information (by way of raps) from the ‘spirit,’ about matters of importance, qui ne pourroient estre cogneus de mortelle creature.  ‘Certainly,’ as he adds, ’people have the best right to believe these things who have seen and heard them.’

The rites of the Church were conferred in the most handsome manner on the body of Sister Alix, which was disinterred and buried in her convent.  Exorcisms and interrogations of the spirit were practised.  It merely answered questions by rapping ‘Yes,’ or ‘No’.  On one occasion Sister Anthoinette was ‘levitated’.  Finally, the spirit appeared bodily to her, said farewell, and disappeared after making an extraordinary fracas at matins.  Montalembert conducted the religious ceremonies.  One case of hysteria was developed; the sufferer was a novice.  Of course it was attributed to diabolical possession The whole story in its pleasant old French, has an agreeable air of good faith But what interests us is the remarkable analogy between the Lyons rappings and those at Epworth, Tedworth, and countless other cases, old or of yesterday.  We can now establish a catena of rappings and pour prendre date, can say that communications were established, through raps, with a so-called ‘spirit,’ more than three hundred years before the ’Rochester knockings’ in America.  Very probably wider research would discover instances prior to that of Lyons; indeed, Wierus, in De Praestigiis Daemonum, writes as if the custom was common.

It is usual to explain the raps by a theory that the ‘medium’ produces them through cracking his, or her, knee-joints.  It may thus be argued that Sister Anthoinette discovered this trick, or was taught the trick, and that the tradition of her performance, being widely circulated in Montalembert’s quarto, and by oral report, inspired later rappers, such as Miss Kate Fox, Miss ‘C.’  Davis, Miss Hetty Wesley, the gentlewoman at Mr. Paschal’s, Mr. Mompesson’s ‘modest little girls,’ Daniel Home, and Miss Margaret Wilson of Galashiels.  Miss Wilson’s uncle came one day to Mr. Wilkie, the minister, and told him the devil was at his house, for, said he, ‘there is an odd knocking about the bed where my niece lies’.  Whereupon the minister went with him, and found it so.  ’She, rising from her bed, sat down to supper, and from below there was such a knocking up as bred