[Footnote 33:  “Studies,” pp. 315, 326.]

[Footnote 34:  “Haunting of B——­ House,” p. 167.]

[Footnote 35:  Ibid., pp. 205, 207.]

The fact that the dog that appeared to Miss Freer was a spaniel like
Major S.’s, shows familiarity with the house on the part of the gang.

That they moved about early near the house is shown by Mr. C. hearing the caw of the rooks at 5.35 on March 6; they would not start cawing so early unless disturbed.  There is thus abundant evidence (1) that rascals were at work; (2) accounting for certain of the phenomena observed; (3) pointing out their resemblance to cases of experimental hallucinations or thought transfer; (4) that such hypnotic operations could be traced by due vigilance.  No. 2 is based in part on the writer’s experience.

If the roads and neighbourhood had been patrolled, and exposure to possible hypnotists avoided, the phenomena would have ceased.  The gentleman who wrote to the Times made a point or two that were too petty to notice, and was probably disagreeable to Miss Freer, but detective work would have been useful.  The gentleman’s connection with a class of men, the mad doctors whom the late Sir William Gull so rightly despised, and whose observations have been so unscientific, may perhaps have unduly prejudiced Miss Freer against him.  Yet people have listened to a Maudsley against an Esher, and gone to the other extreme.  Perhaps Miss Freer will reconsider her opinion, that hypnotism is for doctors only to study.

To wind up with a statement of what the writer believes to have been the object of the rascals about B——­; ordinary thought-transfer probably precedes audible speech by hypnotic influence.

The many people who hear their names called, and find that no death or other striking occurrence coincides in time with this, are perhaps being experimented on by hypnotists, who somehow or other, perhaps by community of feeling, have hit upon the precise moment of a state of subconscious expectation that makes transfer of an actual word easier.

Of course people, friends or others, about the victim are an antidote to influences.  The inevitable tendency of pious natures, sensitive people who are indispensable to society, is to self-blame.  In misfortune they would always blame themselves as sinners who deserved punishment, probably from having paid previously an undeserved attention to the censorious.  Their frame of mind is very contrary to the gospel teaching, and to science; but the division of labour is moral as well as material; one man takes the kicks undeservedly, another the halfpence undeservedly.  These gentle people can thus be driven into apparently insane acts, if they have fools about them.

The fact of the name Ishbel being transferred to the inquirers assembled at Ballechin, may indicate whose was the spirit that should profess to preach to victims.  Women are often said to be worse, if evil, than men, and they play this ugly role better.