‘Under the black volcanic peak of Moreh’ (says Colonel Conder) the witch of Endor had her habitation. It seems an appropriate abode. Saul had ‘smelled out’ the witches, as Panda and Cetewayo are wont to do in Zululand, and the witch of Endor had to lurk in the hills, a persecuted seeress. The seeress is now more common in the land. But yesterday I read a long report from a lady in Boston, Mass. She was sent by the mother of two lost boys to consult a clairvoyante. The first two clairvoyantes to whom she applied were engaged in prophesying to earlier visitors; the third, though busy, proved to be a prophetess with a vengeance. Such things are done not far from Salem, where so many mediums were burned two centuries ago. London is full of seeresses; in Bond Street, not under black volcanic cones, they have their habitations. I once consulted one by proxy; I sent a young lady to ask the simple question, ‘Who was Mademoiselle Luci?’ The seeress knew no means of magic art whereby to unriddle a purely historical problem, and my guinea was wasted. But often, at dinner, ladies talk to me about wonderful Bond Street seeresses, who tell them ‘all that ever they did.’ One was tested by the Society for Psychical Research, and failed to satisfy that sceptical clan.

Modern seeresses are of two classes: the Bond Street class, who divine for the fair sex; and the class who are studied by eminent psychologists, like Professor James, Professor Richet, and Professor Flournoy. Books are published about them, full of strange words, as promnesic, subliminal, telaesthetic, and, for all I know, proparoxytonic. These are difficult phrases, and in writing about seeresses I shall shun them as far as possible. But I cannot avoid the word hallucination, which means an impression of sight, sound, or hearing, so vivid that it seems to the patient to be real, though it is the reverse. I confine myself to three examples of women having a spirit of divination. Boston (U.S.), Geneva, and Domremy have produced these three seeresses of unequal interest and reputation. Two of them are still alive, Mrs. Piper and Mademoiselle ‘Hélène Smith.’ We have to ask whether their achievements throw any light on the visions and voices of the third, the immortal Jeanne d'Arc.