Do animals have souls? (Translated) E-Book

Frank Buzan

• Herausgeber: David De Angelis
• Kategorie: Ratgeber
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

What was stated with regard to paranormal manifestations in which humans are "agents" or "percipients", namely that such manifestations were observed at all times and among all people, must also be stated for the complementary branch of the same manifestations, in which animals are "agents" or "percipients". Of course, the paranormal manifestations in which animals are the protagonists are confined within more modest limits of extrinsic manifestation compared to those in which human beings are the protagonists, limits that correspond to the intellectual capacity of the animal species in which they are extrinsic, but, in any case, are more remarkable than at first one would have assumed. In them, in fact, we contemplate telepathic episodes in which animals act not only as "percipients" but also as "agents"; as well as episodes of animals perceiving, collectively with man, ghosts or other supernormal manifestations occurring outside of any telepathic coincidence, and episodes in which animals perceive, collectively with man, the manifestations that take place in haunted localities.

Leseprobe

DO ANIMALS HAVE SOULS?

Frank Buzan

Translation and Edition 2021 by ©David De Angelis

All rights are reserved

Index

INTRODUCTION

CATEGORY I - TELEPATHIC HALLUCINATIONS WHERE AN ANIMAL IS THE AGENT

CATEGORY II - TELEPATHIC HALLUCINATIONS INVOLVING AN ANIMAL AS PERCIPIENT

CATEGORY III - TELEPATHIC HALLUCINATIONS COLLECTIVELY PERCEIVED BY ANIMALS AND HUMANS

CATEGORY IV - VISIONS, NO LONGER TELEPATHIC, OF HUMAN GHOSTS PERCEIVED COLLECTIVELY BY ANIMALS AND HUMANS

CATEGORY V - CASES WHERE ONLY ANIMALS GAVE SIGNS OF PERCEIVING PARANORMAL MANIFESTATIONS

CATEGORY VI - ANIMALS AND PESTS

CATEGORY VII - APPARITIONS OF IDENTIFIED ANIMAL GHOSTS

CATEGORY VIII - POST-MORTEM MANIFESTATIONS OF ANIMALS WITH UNUSUAL WAYS OF EXTRINSICATION

CATEGORY IX - ANIMALS AND PREMONITIONS

CATEGORY X - MATERIALISATION OF ANIMALS

CONCLUSIONS

INTRODUCTION

What was affirmed with regard to paranormal manifestations in which man is the "agent" or "percipient", namely that such manifestations have been observed at all times and by all peoples, must also be affirmed for the complementary branch of the same manifestations, in which animals are "agents" or "percipients". Naturally, the paranormal manifestations in which animals are the protagonists are circumscribed within limits of extrinsicity which are more modest in comparison with those in which human beings are the protagonists, limits which correspond to the intellectual capacities of the animal species in which they are extrinsic; but, in any case, they are more remarkable than would at first have been presumed. There are, in fact, telepathic episodes in which the animals act not only as "percipients" but also as "agents"; there are also episodes in which the animals perceive, collectively with man, ghosts or other supernormal manifestations that have occurred outside of any telepathic coincidence; and there are also episodes in which the animals perceive, collectively with man, the manifestations that take place in haunted localities. In addition, there are episodes of premonitory order, episodes of materialization of identified animal ghosts; the latter circumstance is theoretically very important, since it would tend to validate the hypothesis of the survival of the animal psyche. The investigation of this branch of the metapsychic disciplines was completely forgotten until the present day, although in the metapsychic journals, and especially in the collections of the Proceedings and the Journal of the well-deserving "Society for Psychical Research" of London, there are numerous cases of the nature indicated; which, however, were never collected, classified and analyzed by anyone, as very little was written and discussed about them. There remains, therefore, very little to be summarized in regard to the theories formulated on the subject. I will only note that in the commentaries on a few individual cases belonging to the most numerous class of phenomena under consideration, which is that in which animals collectively perceive manifestations of a telepathic and haunting order to man, the hypothesis was put forward that psychic perceptions of this nature originate in a hallucinatory phenomenon originating in the centres of ideation of a human agent, and then transmitted unconsciously to the homologous centres of the present and percipient animal. As will be seen, this hypothesis is contradicted by the facts, which show that in numerous episodes of this nature the animals perceive the supernormal manifestations previously to man, a circumstance which suddenly annuls the hypothesis in question. For another class of the phenomenology under consideration, and more precisely for that of the apparitions of animal phantoms, a phenomenon of pure and simple hallucination on the part of the percipient individual was assumed. This hypothesis is untenable on the basis of a comparative analysis of the facts, which show that animal phantoms are often perceived collectively or successively by several persons; and, what is more important, they are identified with animals that lived and died in the same locality, and all this while the percipients were unaware that the displayed animals existed. On the basis of these results, it must be concluded that, in general, the two hypotheses set forth above must be considered insufficient to give an account of the facts; a conclusion which is of great importance, since it is equivalent to admitting the existence of an animal subconsciousness which is the repository of the same supernormal faculties existing in human subconsciousness; as well as, it is equivalent to recognising the possibility of the existence of veridical apparitions of animal ghosts. Having said this, the whole scientific and philosophical value of this new branch of metapsychic research is evident, in regard to which it is already permissible to predict that the day will not be far off when it will be recognised as indispensable in order to establish on firm foundations the new "Science of the Soul", which would appear incomplete, to the point of proving inexplicable, without the necessary complement that analytical investigation and synthetic conditions concerning the animal psyche bring to it; which I reserve the right to demonstrate in due course. It can already be understood that with the present classification - which is the first of its kind - I am far from presuming to have thoroughly explored a theme so vast and of such metapsychic, scientific, and philosophical importance. I only flatter myself that I have made a first effective contribution to new research, and with that I have awakened the interest of scholars on the subject, thus favouring the further accumulation of raw material and facts, which seems indispensable for the completion of investigations into this young branch of metapsychic disciplines. Finally, if we wish to fix the date when paranormal manifestations in relation to animals began to be taken into serious consideration, then we should indicate the date of a famous incident of canine telepathy in which the well-known English novelist Rider Haggard was a participant, a telepathic accident which occurred in circumstances which cannot be doubted, but which, owing to one of those providential conditions of time, place, and environment, such as are often to be found in the early history of new branches of knowledge, aroused in England an unexpected and almost exaggerated interest; So that political newspapers, magazines of varieties and metapsychical ones discussed it at length, determining the favourable environment for investigations of this kind. It is therefore proper to begin the classification of "metapsychic manifestations in animals" with the telepathic case in which the novelist Rider Haggard was a participant. E. B.

CATEGORY I - TELEPATHIC HALLUCINATIONS WHERE AN ANIMAL IS THE AGENT

CASE 1 - This is the Haggard case, which for the sake of brevity I shall only relate as it was faithfully summarized in the August 1904 issue of the Journal of Psychical Studies, referring for further details to the October 1904 issue of the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research. Mr. Rider Haggard relates that he had gone to bed quietly about one o'clock in the morning of July 10, 1904. An hour later, Mrs. Haggard, who was sleeping in another bed in the same room, awoke with a start, hearing her husband groaning and making inarticulate sounds similar to the moaning of a wounded beast. She called out to him in fright; her husband heard her voice as in a dream, but could not at once free himself from the nightmare that oppressed him. When fully awakened, he narrated to his wife that he had dreamed of Bob, the old Bracco dog of their first-born, and that he had seen him struggling in a terrible struggle as if he were about to die. The dream had had two distinct parts. Of the first the novelist remembered only that he felt a sense of breathless oppression, as if he were in danger of drowning, but between the moment when he heard his wife's voice and that when he regained full consciousness of himself, the dream became much more vivid. "I could see," he said, "good old Bob lying on his side among the reeds of a pond. It seemed to me that my own personality was coming mysteriously out of the body of the dog who was lifting his head strangely towards my face. Bob was trying to speak to me, and, not being able to make himself understood by sound, he transmitted to me in some other indefinable way the notion that it was dying". The couple went back to sleep, and the novelist was no longer disturbed in his sleep. In the morning, at breakfast, he told his daughter what he had dreamed, and laughed with her for the fear her mother had felt: she attributed the nightmare to bad digestion. As for Bob, no one worried about him, for the previous evening he had been seen with the other numerous dogs in the villa, and had given the usual party to his mistress. But the hour of the daily meal passed without Bob appearing. The mistress was worried and the novelist began to suspect that the dream had been true. Active searches began, which lasted four days; finally, the novelist himself found the poor dog floating in a pond, two kilometers from the villa, with its skull smashed and its paws broken. An initial examination by the veterinary surgeon led to the supposition that the beast had been caught in a trap; but then indisputable traces were found that the dog had been struck by a train over a bridge crossing the pond, and thrown by the impact among the reeds of the water. On the morning of July 10, a railway worker had found Bob's bloody collar on the bridge, so there was no doubt that the dog had died on the night of the dream. By chance an extraordinary train had passed that night just before midnight and had to carry out the misdeed. All the preceding circumstances are proved by the novelist with a series of testimonial documents. According to the vet, death must have been almost instantaneous, so that it would have preceded Haggard's dream by a couple of hours or more. Such in brief is the case of the English writer, in which there are many circumstances that contribute to exclude categorically any other explanation than that of direct telepathic transmission between the animal and the man. It could not have been the result of a telepathic impulse originating in the mind of a person present, for no one had witnessed the drama or had been informed of it, as is evident from the investigation conducted by Haggard himself, and as it was easy to assume, considering the late hour at which the event took place. It could not have been a common form of hallucinatory nightmare with a chance coincidence, for there were too many truthful circumstances found in the vision, besides the fact itself of the coincidence between the dream and the death of the animal. It could not be a question of a case of telesthesia by virtue of which the novelist's spirit had a remote perception of the drama, since in such a case the percipient would have had to remain a passive spectator, which was not the case. He - as we have seen - had to undergo a remarkable phenomenon of "identification", or incipient "possession". This phenomenon - as the editor of the Journal of the S.P.R. well observes - presents an interesting parallel with the "immedesimations" and "dramatizations" so frequent in psychics or "mediums" during the state of trance. Finally, it could not have been a premonitory dream by which Haggard learned not the event at the moment in which it took place, but the circumstance of the discovery of the corpse in the pond, which was to take place a few days later, and this because such a solution does not give any reason for anything: neither of the fact of the veridical coincidence between the dream and the event, nor of the phenomenon of the equally veridical dramatization of the event itself, nor of the very remarkable case of "identification" or "possession". These are the principal considerations which concur in demonstrating in an incontestable manner the reality of the phenomenon of direct telepathic transmission between animal and man. I thought it necessary to formulate them in order to reply to certain objections timidly put forward by various parties after the Society for Psychical Research had accepted and commented on the case in question. At the same time the same considerations may serve as a rule for the readers in order to judge as to the reliability or otherwise of the telepathic hypothesis in regard to the cases that follow.

CASE 2 - I get this from the Journal of the S.P.R. , vol. II, p. 22. Mr. E.W. Phibbs relates: "On the first Monday in August, 1883 (trading holiday), I was at Ilfracombe. About 10 o'clock in the afternoon I went to bed, and soon fell asleep. I was awakened about half-past ten by my wife coming into the room, to whom I related how I had at that time had a dream in which I saw my dog Fox lying wounded and dying at the foot of a wall. I had no exact idea of the locality, but happened to observe, that it was one of the usual dry stone walls peculiar to the province of Gloucester. From this I inferred, that the dog must have fallen from the top of the wall, as he had a habit of climbing up it. The next day, Tuesday, I received a letter from the servant, informing me that Fox had not been seen for two days. I immediately replied, ordering him to make the most minute inquiries. I was answered on Saturday by a letter which I received the following day, Sunday. I was informed that the dog had been attacked and killed by two bull-dogs in the evening of the previous Monday. "When I returned home a fortnight afterwards, I immediately commenced a rigorous investigation, by which I was able to ascertain that about five o'clock in the afternoon of the Monday in question, a lady had seen the two bull-dogs viciously attack and tear my dog to pieces. Another woman, who lived in the neighbourhood, informed me, that about nine o'clock in the afternoon of the same day, she had seen my dog lying dying at the foot of a wall, which she pointed out to me, and which I saw for the first time. The next morning the dog was no longer there. I learned afterwards, that the owner of the bull-dogs, as soon as he had heard of the fact, and fearing the consequences, had arranged to have him buried about half-past ten o'clock the same evening. The time of the event coincides with the vision of my dream." (Mrs. Jessie Phibbs, wife of the said speaker, confirms the narrative of her husband.) This case was repeatedly quoted by Professor Richet in his Traité de Métapsychique, with the intention of showing that it could be explained by "cryptesthesia", without the need of assuming a phenomenon of telepathy in which the animal was the agent and its master the percipient. He observes in this connection: "It would be more rational to suppose that it was the nature of the fact which affected the mentality of Mr. Phibbs, and not that the spirit of the dog made his master's cerebral centres vibrate" (p. 330). By "the nature of the fact" he refers to his own hypothesis of "cryptesthesia," according to which existing things, and the performance of all actions in the animate and inanimate worlds, emit sui generis vibrations perceptible to the senses, who are thus theoretically able to become aware of everything that happens, has happened, and will happen in the whole world. I replied with a long article in the Revue Spirite (1922, p. 256), which sought to challenge this alleged omniscience of the subconscious faculties, showing on the basis of the facts that the faculties in question were instead conditioned - and therefore limited - by the unavoidable necessity of the "psychic relationship"; that is to say, if there were no prior emotional ties, or even, in very rare circumstances, relationships of simple knowledge, between the agent and the recipient, telepathic manifestations could not take place. Then, referring to the case under consideration, I continued: "If we exclude the possibility that the dog's thought, directed with anxious intensity towards his distant protector, was the determining agent of the telepathic phenomenon, or, in other words, if we exclude the possibility that it could have taken place by virtue of the existence of an "affective relationship" between the dog and his master, then the question arises: why did Mr. Phibbs see on that night his own dog in agony, and not all the other animals that on that same night were certainly agonizing a bit 'everywhere? This question cannot be answered except by recognizing that Mr. Phibbs did not see the dying animals at the slaughterhouse or elsewhere, because there were no psychic relations of any kind between them and him, and he saw instead the agony of his own dog because there were emotional ties between it and him, and because at that moment the dying animal was intensely thinking of its distant protector; This latter circumstance is not at all improbable, and indeed is logically presumable in a poor animal in agony, and therefore in urgent need of rescue". And it seems to me that such conclusions cannot be doubted. In any case the readers will find in the present classification numerous examples of various nature which exuberantly confirm this point of view, while they inexorably contradict the hypothesis of an omniscient cryptesthesia.

CASE 3 - I get it from the book of Camillus Flammarion: L'Inconnu (page 413). Madame R. Lacassagne, born Durant, writes to Flammarion: "I can still quote you a personal case that struck me greatly when it happened to me; however, since this time it is about a dog, perhaps I am wrong to abuse your time: I will excuse myself by asking where the problems to be solved ever stop. "I was then a young girl, and it happened often enough to me to have in my dreams a surprising lucidity. We had a bitch of superior intelligence, who was particularly fond of me, although I cared for her very little. One night I dreamed of our dying dog, and saw her looking at me with human eyes. As soon as I awoke, I said to my sister, "Lionne is dead; I dreamed it. The thing is certain." My sister laughed, and did not believe it at all. The bell was rung, and they begged the maid who came in to send for the bitch. They called for her, but she did not answer; they looked for her everywhere, and finally found her dead in a corner. Now, as she was not ill at all the day before, it is evident that in me there were no predisposing causes for such a dream". (Signed: Mad. R. Lacassagne, née Durant, Castres). Also in the case described, the most likely hypothesis is that the agonized animal has anxiously turned its thoughts to its mistress, thus determining the telepathic impression that the mistress had to undergo in her sleep. The episode, however, turns out to be theoretically much less demonstrative in this sense than the preceding one; all the more so because this time there are no details capable of eliminating the other hypothesis of a presumable phenomenon of clairvoyance in sleep.

CASE 4 - I get it from Light (1921, p. 187). The speaker is F.W. Percival, who writes: "Mr. Everard Calthrop, a great breeder of "pure blood" horses, in his book entitled: The Horse as Camarade and Friends, tells how years ago he owned a beautiful mare, named "Windemers", to which he was deeply attached, and by which he was reciprocated with such affectionate transport, that the case was even moving. As fate would have it, the poor mare drowned in a pond near Mr. Calthrop's farm; and he tells in these terms the impressions he felt at that moment: "At 3.20 a.m. on March 18, 1913, I woke up with a jolt from a deep sleep, and not because of some noise or some neighing, but because of a call for help transmitted to me - I don't know how - by my mare "Windemers". I listened, and could not perceive the least noise in the quiet night; but when I was fully awake, I felt the desperate appeal of my mare vibrate in my brain and nerves, and learned that she was in the utmost danger, and urgently called for help. I put on an overcoat, put on my boots, opened the door, and took a run across the park. There was no whining or moaning, but in an incomprehensible and prodigious way I knew where I was getting that "wireless telegraph" signal; though it was rapidly weakening. I ran and ran, but felt the vibratory waves of "wireless telegraphy" grow weaker and weaker in my brain; and when I came to the shore of the pond, they had ceased. As I looked out over the water, I saw that the surface was still rippling with small concentric waves coming ashore, and in the middle of the pond I saw a black mass standing out ominously in the early morning dawn. I knew at once that this was the body of my poor mare, and that unfortunately I had been late in answering her call; she was dead. This is the fact. Mr. F.W. Percival, who reported it in Light (1921, p. 187), observes: "It is true that in cases like the one described above, we lack the testimony of the agent; but this does not prevent the three rules of Myers, designed to screen telepathic events from those that are not, from being equally applicable to our case. These rules are: 1°, that the agent has found himself in an exceptional situation (and here the agent was struggling with death) - 2°, that the percipient has experienced something psychically exceptional, including a revealing impression of the agent (and here the revealing impression of the agent is evident) - 3°, that the two events coincide in time (and this third rule is also fulfilled)". In addition to Mr. Percival's arguments, it would perhaps be useful to dwell on the fact that the telepathic impulse was so precise and energetic as to awaken the recipient from a deep sleep, to make him immediately aware that it was a plea for help from his mare, and to direct his steps without hesitation towards the theatre of the drama. This being so, it does not seem logically permissible to question the genuinely telepathic origin of the event.

CASE 5 - I get this from the Journal of the S.P.R. (vol. XII, p. 21). Lady Carbery, wife to Lord Carbery, sends from Freke Castle, County Cork, on July 23, 1904, the following report: "On a hot Sunday afternoon in the summer of 1900, I went after breakfast to make the usual visit to the stables, to distribute sugar and carrots to the horses, among whom was a favourite mare of mine, shady, nervous, named Kitty. A great and uncommon fondness existed between us. I rode her every morning, before breakfast, and in all weathers. They were quiet and solitary excursions along the hills above the sea, and it always seemed to me that Kitty rejoiced as much as the mistress of these morning rides, in the freshness of the hour. "On the afternoon in question, on leaving the stables, I set out alone into the park, walking about a quarter of a mile, and sat down in the shade of a tree with an interesting book to read, intending to remain there a couple of hours. After about twenty minutes, a sudden influx of painful sensations came to interpose between me and my reading, and at the same time I was sure that something painful had happened to my mare Kitty. I tried to chase away that untimely impression by continuing my reading, but the impression grew so great that I was forced to give up and hurry to the stables. When I arrived there, I went without fail to Kitty's stall, and found her lying on the ground, suffering, and in urgent need of help. I immediately went in search of the grooms, who were in another section away from the stables, who rushed to offer the assistance that the case required. The surprise of the grooms was great when they saw me appear in the stables for the second time, which was very unusual. (Signed: Lady Carbery). The coachman who assisted in such contingencies, confirms in these terms: "At that time I was coachman at Freke Castle, and her ladyship came to the stables in the afternoon to distribute, as usual, sugar and carrots to the horses. Kitty was free in her stall, and in excellent health. I soon after returned to my apartment above the stables, and the grooms went up to their rooms. After half an hour, or three quarters of an hour, I was surprised to see his lordship return, and rush in to call me and the grooms to assist Kitty, who was lying on the ground from a sudden illness. In the interval, none of us had entered the stables." (Signed: Edward Nobbs). This second case is less emotional than the first, and the impression which Lady Carbery underwent was also less detailed and more vague; but nevertheless it was always strong enough to instil in the recipient the conviction that the sensations she felt indicated that Kitty was in urgent need of assistance, and to determine her to rush to the spot without delay. Such circumstances, of an exceptional order and of precise and suggestive significance, are sufficient to warrant the conclusion that the case is genuine telepathy.

CASE 6 - I get it from Light (1915, p. 168). Mr. Mildred Duke, a well-known psychic and author of profound articles on the subject of the metapsychic, relates the following incident which occurred to himself: "I was writing late one night, and was totally absorbed in the subject, when I was literally invaded by the idea that my kitten needed me. I had to get up and go in search of her. After wandering about the house in vain, I went into the garden, and as the darkness prevented me from seeing, I began to call her. At last I heard a faint meow at a distance, and every time I repeated the call, the faint meow was repeated, but the cat did not come. So I went back to get a lantern, and then I crossed the garden and went into a field, where the mewing seemed to be coming from, and after a short search I found my cat in a hedge, caught in a snare made for rabbits, with a slip-knot round her neck. If she had tried to extricate herself, she would undoubtedly have strangled herself, but fortunately she had the intelligence not to move any more, and to send her master a message of help. "This is a kitten to whom I am deeply attached, and it is not the first time that a telepathic relationship has been established between her and me. A few days ago she seemed to be lost, because she was nowhere to be found, and her relatives were scrambling to call her from every corner of the garden. Suddenly, in a sort of mental photograph, I saw her as a prisoner in an empty attic room, which was almost always closed. And the vision turned out to be true: no one knew how she had been locked up there. Did she send me a telepathic message to warn me of her imprisonment?" Even in this third case, in which the telepathic phenomenon is expressed in the form of "impressions" and nothing more, it is not possible to raise doubts as to the telepathic genesis of the sensory impressions to which the speaker was subjected. Readers will have noted that in the three cases in question - as in many others that follow - the protagonists are unanimous in making the same observation, namely, that between them and the animals with which they entered into telepathic intercourse there existed affective relations of an exceptional order; and this circumstance is worthy of note, since it is identical in telepathic communications between human beings; so that it may be affirmed that a condition of exceptional mutual affectivity is the fulcrum of every telepathic intercourse. In other words, it is always the great "law of affinity" that governs the entire range of telepathic communications, whether between living persons, between living and dead persons, or between human beings and animals; just as, in the final analysis, the same law prevails throughout the universe - physical and psychic - in the form of "vibratory attunements" that are increasingly refined and sublimated in an endless series.

CASE 7 - I take this from the Journal of the S.P.R. (vol. XI, p. 323). Mr. J. F. Young communicates the following incident which is personal to him: "New Road, Lanelly, Nov. 13, 1904. - I own a 'terrier' dog of the age of 5 years, bred by me. I was always a great lover of animals, but especially of dogs. The dog in question returns my affection to such an extent that I cannot go anywhere, not even to leave my room, without him following me constantly. He is a terrible hunter of mice, and as the back-kitchen is occasionally frequented by such rodents, I had placed a comfortable kennel there for Fido. In the same room was a hearth, with an oven for baking bread, and a boiler for laundry, with a pipe leading into the chimney. It was my constant custom to take him in the evening to the kennel before retiring for the night. I had undressed, and was about to go to bed, when I was suddenly seized with an inexplicable feeling of imminent danger. I could think of nothing but fire; and the impression was so strong that I gave way. I put on my clothes again, went downstairs, and went room by room to make sure that everything was in order. When I came to the back of the kitchen, I could not see Fido, and thinking he had slipped away to go upstairs, I called to him, but to no avail. I went to my sister-in-law's house to ask for news, but she knew nothing. I began to feel uneasy. I immediately went back to the back of the kitchen, and called repeatedly for the dog, but to no avail. I didn't know what to do. Suddenly it occurred to me that if there was one thing that could make him answer, it was the phrase: "Let's go for a walk, Fido!", a phrase that always put him in great festivity. I said it aloud, and a stifled moan, as if faded by distance, reached my ear this time. I quickly replied, and heard a distinct groan of a dog in distress. I had time to ascertain that it came from within the pipe which connects the boiler with the chimney. I did not know how to get the dog out of it; the moments were precious, and his life was in danger. I took a club, and set about breaking the wall there. I came at last, with some difficulty, to take him out of the wall, half alive, and panting, and in the throes of vomiting, with his tongue and whole body blackened with soot. If I had been a few moments longer, my little favourite would have died; and as the boiler is seldom used, I should never have known the fate of the dog. My sister-in-law had rushed at the noise. Together we found a rat-hole in the fire-place from which the pipe starts. Fido had evidently chased a mouse into the interior of the pipe, so that he was caught in it, and could neither turn around nor retreat. "All this happened some months ago, and was published in the local papers of the time, but I should never have thought of communicating it to this Society, had not the case of Mr. Haggard occurred in the meantime. (Signed: J. F. Young). Miss E. Bennett, sister-in-law of the petitioner, confirms what the relative tells. (For further particulars on this subject I refer to the publication referred to above.) This fourth case of telepathy by "impression" differs considerably from the other two above, in which the essential feature of the telepathic impulse consisted in the exact perception of an urgent appeal from the animal in distress, as well as in the intuitive localization of the animal's whereabouts. Here, on the contrary, the "impression" to which the percipient is subjected suggests to him the idea of imminent danger in relation to the fire. However, the "impression" is so strong that it induces him to get dressed in a hurry and to go and inspect the house; so that reaching the kitchen, and perceiving the absence of the dog, he is led to call him, look for him and save him. It follows that in this case the telepathic message is expressed in an imperfect way, assuming a symbolic form; which in no way detracts from its intrinsic value, since this circumstance does not constitute a theoretical perplexity. For it is well known that telepathic manifestations, in their transit from the subconscious to the conscious, follow the "path of least resistance", which is determined by the special idiosyncrasies of the agent and the percipient taken together. These, from the human point of view, consist first of all in the "sensory type" to which each individual belongs (mental, visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory, emotional); then they consist in the conditions of the environment in which he lives (habits, customs, reiteration of the same incidents in daily life). It follows that when the telepathic impulse is not expressed directly, it is transformed into a mode of indirect or symbolic perception, which more or less faithfully translates the thought of the telepathising agent, although it is always in some kind of relationship with the thought of the agent himself. This being so, it might be said that in the case under consideration the anxious appeal of the dog in danger had indeed succeeded in impressing the subconscious of the percipient, but in order to emerge in his consciousness it had had to lose a great deal of its clarity, transforming itself into a vague impression of imminent danger in relation to the fire; which still corresponded to the truth, considering that the animal was effectively a prisoner, and in danger of death by asphyxiation, in the pipe of the hearth.

CASE 8 - Professor Emilio Magnin communicates to the Anuales des Sciences Psychiques (1912, p. 347) the following case: "I read with great interest in the Annales the report of the telepathic case of the dog Bobby. Another case, quite analogous, was told me years ago by my friend P.M., one of the greatest lawyers of the Parisian Bar, and I communicate it to you, convinced that I am doing something agreeable to the readers. Mr. P.M. of our Court of Appeal owned a Spanish bitch named Creola. He kept her constantly with him in Paris, and had placed her kennel in the passage leading into his room, near the door of the room itself. Every morning, as soon as the bitch sensed any movement in her master's room, she would begin to rasp at the door and yelp, until it was opened for her. "One day P.M. entrusted the bitch to the gamekeeper of Rambouillet for a game of hunting. "On the morning of a Saturday, quite on time, the lawyer in question suddenly heard a rasping at his door and a yelp. Surprised to learn in that manner of the presence of his bitch, he promptly got up, convinced that the gamekeeper had returned to Paris for some important communication. He opened the door, and to his immense astonishment saw neither bitch nor gamekeeper. "Two hours later, a telegram from the latter was delivered to him, informing him that his bitch Creole had been accidentally killed by a hunter." Also in this episode, in which the veridical hallucination was of an "auditory" nature, it does not seem possible to doubt the genuinely telepathic origin of the manifestation. With regard to the manner in which the episode unfolded, it must be noted that the telepathic impulse was also of an indirect or symbolic nature. Recalling, therefore, the considerations made above, we shall say that as the deceased dog had in life the habitual characteristic of rasping at her master's door and of yelping until it was opened, it follows that the telepathic impulse, unable to express itself directly, did so in an indirect and symbolic manner, assuming those modes of expression that were most familiar to the agent and the percipient together. I note in this connection that the circumstance of a fundamental law of telepathic manifestations being scrupulously realised even when it is a question of an animal agent, presents a high theoretical value, since it cannot but be inferred that if animal telepathic manifestations conform to the same laws as human ones, this demonstrates the identity of nature of the manifestations themselves, and consequently the identity of nature of the spiritual element in operation in both circumstances.

CASE 9 - I reproduce from the Journal of the S.P.R. (vol. IV, p. 289), the following case, reported by Mrs. Beauchamp, of Hont Lodge, Twiford; who thus expresses herself in the passage of a letter reproduced here, and addressed to Mrs. Wood, Colchester: ".... Megatherium is the name of a little Indian dog of mine, who sleeps in my daughter's room. Last night I was suddenly awakened by hearing him hopping about the room. I know his characteristic prancing very well. My husband, too, was not long in awaking. I asked him, "Do you hear that?" To which he replied: "There's Meg." We lit a candle, looked everywhere but found nothing in the room, and found that the door was firmly closed. Then I got the idea that something bad had happened to Meg: I had the feeling that he had died at that very moment. I looked at my watch to see what time it was, and thought I must go downstairs and ascertain what had happened. I stood there for a moment undecided, and my sleep returned. Not long after, someone came knocking at the door: it was my daughter, and with an expression of great anxiety she said, "Mamma, mamma, Meg is dying. We all took the stairs in flight, and found Meg lying on his side, his legs stretched out and stiffened as if he were dead. My husband lifted him off the ground and ascertained that the dog was still alive, but for a moment he couldn't realize what had happened. At last he found that Meg, who knew not how, had twisted the strap of her coat round her neck, and was almost strangled by it. We released him at once, and as soon as the dog could breathe, he was not long in reviving and recovering himself. "Henceforth, if I should happen to experience any other precise similar sensation about any one, I propose to rush without delay. I can swear that I heard Meg's characteristic hopping around the bed, and so can my husband. (For further particulars on this subject I refer to the Journal, place cited). In this case also, about whose genuinely telepathic origin it is not licit to doubt (all the more so since this time there were two persons who underwent the same auditory impressions), also in this case, I say, the telepathic manifestation is expressed in a symbolic form, that is to say that an urgent invocation of help formulated in the mentality of the little dog agent, arrives to the percipients transformed into the characteristic echo of the usual hopping that the little dog performed every morning around the bed of his masters. Now it is unquestionable that a perception of this nature, given the conditions in which it took place, could not be the faithful expression of the agent's thought, but only a symbolic-veridical translation of the same thought; since if it seems logical and natural to assume that an animal about to die strangled, has directed intensely the thought towards those who alone could save it, it would be neither logical nor admissible to assume that the animal itself, at that supreme moment, has instead thought serenely of the tripping he himself made every morning around the bed of his masters.

CASE 10 - I take it from vol. VIII, p. 45 of the Annales des Sciences Psychiques, which deduced it from the Italian review Il Vessillo Spiritista. "Mrs. Ludow Krijanowsky (now Mrs. Semenoff), relates to us the following fact, which happened to her, and which concerns the much debated question of the soul of animals. "It concerns a little dog who was a great favourite of us all, but especially of Wera, and who somewhat because of this affection and the consequent care of which he was the object, fell ill. He suffered from fits of suffocation and coughing; however the vet who treated him did not say that the disease was dangerous. But Wera was very much worried about it, and would get up at night to give him rubs and medicine, but no one suspected that he might die. "One night Bonika's condition (such was the name of the little dog) suddenly worsened. We were very worried about it, especially thinking of Wera, and we decided to go immediately, early in the morning, to the vet, because if we had sent for him, he would not have come until evening. "When morning came, Wera and our mother went out carrying the little sick boy in their arms; I stayed at home, and began to write. I was so absorbed in my work that I forgot that my parents were not at home. All of a sudden I heard the little dog coughing in the adjoining room. That was where his kennel was, and since he had been ill, as soon as he began to cough or moan, one of us rushed to see what had to be done. We gave him a drink, gave him medicine, and adjusted the bandages around his neck. Out of habit, I got up and hurried to the kennel. It was only when I saw it that I remembered that mother and Wera had gone out carrying Bonika. I was therefore very perplexed and astonished, for the coughs had been so loud and distinct that I had to rule out any possibility of a mistake. "I was lingering pensively by the empty kennel, when suddenly there came one of those yelps with which Bonika used to greet us when we came into the house, then a second yelp that seemed to come from the adjoining room, and finally a third yelp that seemed to be lost in the distance. "I confess that I was impressed and shuddered. The idea that the little dog was dead had flashed into my mind. I looked at my watch: it was five minutes to noon. "Restless and agitated, I looked out of the window, waiting impatiently for my parents. I finally spotted Wera returning alone, and running up to her, I said point-blank, "Bonika is dead." "How do you know that?" exclaimed Wera in amazement. Instead of answering, I asked her if she knew the exact time when Bonika died, and she said, "A few minutes before noon. After that, she told me, "When they arrived at the vet's house at about 11 o'clock, the vet was not there, but the person on duty insisted that they wait for him to come back, because around noon he had to be back for visiting hours. So they stayed, but as the little dog seemed to be getting more and more agitated, Wera put him down on the sofa, then laid him on the carpet, and looked impatiently at the grandfather clock. To her great relief she saw that it was only a few minutes before noon; but at that moment the little dog was seized with a fierce attack of suffocation. Wera made to put him back on the couch, and as he did so, he saw that his hands and the little dog were illuminated by an intense and dazzling purple glow. Understanding nothing of what was happening, he began to cry out, "Fire! Fire!" Mamma had seen nothing, but as she turned her back to the fireplace, she thought the fire had stuck to her dress, and turned around frightened, finding that the fireplace was out. It was at that moment that they both realized that the little dog had died, which kept the mother from reproaching Wera for the fear that her untimely cry had caused in her". This is the interesting episode narrated by Mrs. Semenoff. I note that it also has a symbolic character. As I have said, it is common to find cases in which the telepathic impulse assumes more or less aberrant representational forms according to the particular idiosyncrasies of the percipients. However, when episodes of this nature occur among human beings in which the agent is a deceased person, it may be presumed that, although the manner in which they occur always depends on the fact that a telepathic impulse cannot but follow "the path of least resistance" in order to reach the consciousness of the percipient, they may nevertheless sometimes take place at the will of the agent, which conforms to the idiosyncrasies of the percipient. In the collections of telepathic cases published by the Society f.. P. R. there is an episode in which an entity of the deceased manifests itself simultaneously in three different modes to three persons: one of whom sees the ghost, the other hears the voice of the deceased uttering a phrase of greeting, and the third perceives a sweet perfume of violets, a perfume coinciding with the circumstance that the body of the deceased on his deathbed was literally covered with violets. In similar circumstances it would appear rational to presume that the communicating entity consciously manifested itself in different ways to the percipients, in order to necessarily conform to their personal idiosyncrasies, that is, that it manifested itself in an objective form to the person of "visual type", that it transmitted a phrase of greeting to the person of "auditory type" and generated an olfactory sensation for the person in whom "the path of least resistance" in order to impress him was constituted by the olfactory sense. The incident that makes such an explanatory variant rational is the phrase of greeting perceived by the "auditory type" person, a phrase of greeting that could hardly be considered to have originated in the transit of the subconscious to the conscious of a single telepathic impulse, where everything would be clarified assuming that the phrase in question had been thought out and transmitted by the communicating entity. Returning to the case referred to above, I note in it a factual circumstance that complicates the theoretical interpretation, and that is that the little dog Bonika had died in the arms of his own mistress; which induces us to presume that for the dying animal there should not have existed emotional reasons that would have drawn him to turn his thoughts to the other familiar person who had remained at home, thus determining a telepathic phenomenon. This being so, we should conclude that it is very probable that the same thing occurs in animals as in many cases of human beings, in which the dying animal brings about telepathic manifestations by the mere fact of directing a thought of regret to the distant environment in which he has lived so long and happily. I observe, however, that, in the case of human beings, there would be another explanation, not a telepathic one, but a spiritic one, which would be to suppose that, under special circumstances, the spirit of the deceased, not so quickly freed from corporeal bonds, returns to the environment in which he lived, and attempts every means at his disposal to make his presence known to his relatives. As for the luminous phenomenon perceived by the woman who carried Bonika in her arms at the moment of death, it does not concern the manifestations considered here, although, from another point of view, it does not fail to appear interesting and suggestive, taking into account that similar manifestations are sometimes realized at the deathbed of human creatures.