Intercourse of nations with us is not bounded by the obstacles that exist on earth.  Prominent ideas prevailing among the most intelligent masses of spirits become the views of the whole.  This your own world exemplifies.  As the means of communication become more facile, as the various arts of locomotion obliterate distance, the remote and barbarous nations, brought into proximity with the civilized, assume their habits, adopt their modes of action, and follow their form of government.

I can safely predict for you a similar result.  In the spirit world those nations once most tenacious of kingly rights and of the majesty of the throne, lay quietly down their regal crowns, and assume the unostentatious cap of the republic.  So will all the nations of earth follow their spiritual leaders and hurl out from the round globe the crumbling thrones and sceptres of kings and emperors and the tottering papal chair of Rome, down, down, into the vast tomb of antiquity!

FREDERIKA BREMER

FLIGHT TO MY STARRY HOME.

I was in Stockholm when the ambassador, who is sent by the all-wise Father to pilot his children to the unknown land of roses, called for me, and I was obliged to part with the body which, though homely and unattractive, like the dear, good “family roof,"[A] had rendered me service in many a stormy day.

[Footnote A:  Swedish term for umbrella.]

The feeling I experienced in taking my departure was like that of going out into a pitiless storm, and it was followed by an intense prickling sensation, similar to that familiarly known as the “foot asleep.”  This, I afterwards understood, was occasioned by the electrical current passing through my spirit as it assumed shape upon emerging from its old frame.

Some twenty minutes perhaps elapsed after the breath leaving the body before I became perfectly conscious in my new form.  Upon recovering the use of my senses, my whole attention was drawn from myself to the friends who had gathered in the room which had so recently been my sick chamber.

As I watched them combing the hair and attiring the white, stiff figure that lay so solemnly stretched upon the couch, my emotions were indescribable.  I endeavored to speak, but my voice gave but a faint sound, which they evidently did not hear—­as a spirit, I attracted no attention.  This caused me deep grief, for I desired them all to see me still living.

My sad emotions were presently dispelled by the sound of most mellifluous music bursting upon my senses; and as I turned my eyes to discover the source from whence it proceeded, I beheld, resurrected before me, a group of dear old friends, whose bodies were already dust and ashes in the Swedish grave-yards, and in the cemeteries of the old and new worlds.  A hearty burst of joy escaped from my lips as I recognized them.  We laughed, cried, shook hands, and kissed first on one cheek and then on the other, with the same enthusiasm and naturalness we would have shown had we been inhabitants of dear old mother Earth.