646. And we now come to other cases, where the percipience has been collective, although it has not been repeated. Here is a case where two persons at one moment - a moment of no stress or excitement whatever - see the phantasm of a third; that third person being perhaps occupied with some supraliminal or subliminal thought of the scene in the midst of which she is phantasmally discerned. Both the percipients supposed at the moment, naturally enough, that it was their actual sister whom they saw: and one can hardly fancy that a mere act of tranquil recognition of the figure by one percipient would communicate to the other percipient a telepathic shock such as would make her see the same figure as well.

The account is taken from the "Report on the Census of Hallucinations" (Proceedings S.P.R., vol. x. p. 306).

From Miss C. J. E.

March 1892.

I was playing the harmonium in the church of------at about 4 p.m., August 1889, when I saw my eldest sister walk up the church towards the chancel with a roll of papers under her arm. When I looked up again she had disappeared, and I thought she had just come in for a few minutes and gone out again; but when I asked her afterwards what she wanted in the church, she was much surprised, and told me she had been in the rectory library all the afternoon, studying genealogical tables. I am not sure of the exact date, but it was about the time I mention.

I was practising on the harmonium; as far as I remember I was quite well and not worried about anything. I was eighteen years old. A younger sister was the only other person in the church with me at the time. She was standing beside me on an old stone coffin, and also noticed my eldest sister walk up the church with papers under her arm, but thought it nothing unusual and looked away, and when she looked back again my sister had disappeared.

My eldest sister looked just as usual and wore her hat and jacket, as I and my younger sister both noticed. She walked rather briskly, looking straight before her. She assures us that she was sitting alone in the rectory library (the rectory is within a stone's throw of the church) all the afternoon.

In answer to the question whether she has had any other hallucinations Miss E. says: -

I have seen dark forms in my room at night when there was no one in the room but myself, but as I am nervously inclined I am not very positive about it, as it may have been partly imagination. But the apparition [of my sister] I positively saw.

Miss E. writes further: -

April 14th, 1892.

I am quite sure that the figure could not have been any one else looking like K., for I saw distinctly every detail of her face and figure and dress, and noticed that she was looking straight before her. My sight is excellent, and I know I could not have been mistaken. When I looked up, the figure was about three yards from me, I should say. The figure may have gone back past me without my noticing it, but I think it very improbable, as I was sitting with my face towards the aisle through which it must have passed.

The other percipient, Miss H. E., writes: -

My sisters and I were spending the day with our uncle at------; as he is the rector his garden leads into the churchyard. In the course of the afternoon C. and I went into the church; she began to play the harmonium and I stood on a stone coffin beside her with my hand on her shoulder; my sister was playing a hymn, and I was looking down at the book to read the words. C. casually looked up; I did the same, and following the direction of her eyes saw K. walking to us up the church with - and this rather surprised me - a long bundle of papers in her hand. We made no remark and took no further notice of her movements, for when we go to------we often just wander in to see the church. It was certainly K. herself; I could see her face quite well. C. and I finished our hymn and found that she had gone. C. and I soon after went in to tea. At tea we were surprised to hear K. say, "I am so sorry I did not see the church, but part of the afternoon I was looking at pedigrees in the study; before that I passed the church gate; I was going in, but turned back to the study instead," or words to that effect. C. and I exchanged glances, but said nothing.

However, next morning we attacked K. on the subject; she was much surprised, had certainly not been in church at all, but had first been in the library studying the family pedigree, and then gone to the church gate and returned. My sister and I both have perfectly good eyesight. It seems impossible that K. can have visited the church, but my sister and I are both positively certain that we saw K. or her likeness. The day after we both described the details of her dress, so far as we could recollect them, and K. said that it was a correct account of her dress the day before. I saw the pedigree papers before I went out, and both C. and I thought them very like the papers the figure had in her hand. These are, as far as I remember, the details of the case without exaggeration or diminution.

It was possible, but rather improbable, that K. should have left the church without our notice, because she must have passed back the same way close to us.

Miss K. E. writes: -

Upon the afternoon during which this curious incident happened, I wandered about my uncle's garden for a while, and half thought of going into the church, but changed my mind and did not. I went into the library, and being interested in genealogy, studied my uncle's family pedigree until tea-time, when I remarked to my sisters that I had not been to the church all the afternoon, and they told me that they had seen me there. I felt no unusual sensations during the afternoon, and am much mystified by the incident.