SD1814. Journal Entry of Elizabeth Clementine Kinney
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 21, 373 (in part).
[Florence]
May 2d [1855]
Miss B[lagden]., an English poet living here, brought us this evening a letter which Mrs Browning has received from Mr Jarves in which he gives most marvellous statements of his interview with Hume. Seven persons were present, and all saw & felt spiritual hands grasping their own; experienced earthquakes & storms got up impromptu for their terrification; talked by rappings with fifteen spirits of their departed friends; & each & all present take oath that there was no deception; no optical illusion; no human agency in all this, save that Hume is the medium thro’ which the spirits manifested themselves. Mr Jarves swallows all without choking, & is as solemn as an ass in his statements. Surely this is the age of delusion—the “golden age” of tricksters! Mrs Browning, Miss B. & others here, including Mr Powers, believe it the age of “Spiritualism”; but I confess myself unable to conceive of spiritualism materialized. Tomorrow I shall write to Mr Jarves, & pray him for Truth’s sake, & for my sake, if not for his own, to scrutinize the doings of this Hum(e)bug, or, rather, this adept juggler, whom I will not even dignify with the name of Magician. Among other things, Mr Jarves, it seems, requested “the spirits” to visit Casa del Bello, Florence, & tell him whom they found herein. They replied “a lady who attributes all we do to diabolical agency.” If they meant me, they gave more of supernatural to my opinion of things done, than I attach to them, believing the active demon to be quite a human one.
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Columbia University.
___________________
