produced, for this reason:  no two persons, you say, have ever told you that they experienced exactly the same thing.  Well, observe, no two persons ever experience exactly the same dream.  If this were an ordinary imposture, the machinery would be arranged for results that would but little vary; if it were a supernatural agency permitted by the Almighty, it would surely be for some definite end.  These phenomena belong to neither class; my persuasion is, that they originate in some brain now far distant; that that brain had no distinct volition in anything that occurred; that what does occur reflects but its devious, motley, ever-shifting, half-formed thoughts; in short, that it has been but the dreams of such a brain put into action and invested with a semisubstance.  That this brain is of immense power, that it can set matter into movement, that it is malignant and destructive, I believe; some material force must have killed my dog; the same force might, for aught I know, have sufficed to kill myself, had I been as subjugated by terror as the dog,—­had my intellect or my spirit given me no countervailing resistance in my will.”

“It killed your dog,—­that is fearful!  Indeed it is strange that no animal can be induced to stay in that house; not even a cat.  Rats and mice are never found in it.”

“The instincts of the brute creation detect influences deadly to their existence.  Man’s reason has a sense less subtle, because it has a resisting power more supreme.  But enough; do you comprehend my theory?”

“Yes, though imperfectly,—­and I accept any crotchet (pardon the word), however odd, rather than embrace at once the notion of ghosts and hobgoblins we imbibed in our nurseries.  Still, to my unfortunate house, the evil is the same.  What on earth can I do with the house?”

“I will tell you what I would do.  I am convinced from my own internal feelings that the small, unfurnished room at right angles to the door of the bedroom which I occupied, forms a starting point or receptacle for the influences which haunt the house; and I strongly advise you to have the walls opened, the floor removed,—­ nay, the whole room pulled down.  I observe that it is detached from the body of the house, built over the small backyard, and could be removed without injury to the rest of the building.”

“And you think, if I did that—­”

“You would cut off the telegraph wires.  Try it.  I am so persuaded that I am right, that I will pay half the expense if you will allow me to direct the operations.”

“Nay, I am well able to afford the cost; for the rest allow me to write to you.”