The drummer of the Berezina.

— Several persons having gathered at our home with a view to observing certain manifestations, the facts that follow occurred in the course of several sessions, giving rise to the conversation that we are going to relate, which presents great interest from the standpoint of study. The Spirit manifested itself by raps, which were not given by the leg of the table, but in the very depth of the wood. The exchange of ideas that then took place, between those present and the invisible being, did not allow doubting the intervention of a hidden intelligence. Besides the answers to various questions, whether by yes, or by no, or else by means of alphabetical typtology, the raps would beat at will any march whatsoever, the rhythm of an air, would imitate the musketry and cannonade of a battle, the noise of the cooper and of the shoemaker; they made echoes with admirable precision, etc. Then occurred the movement of a table and its translation without any contact of the hands, since the assistants kept themselves at a distance; placed upon the table, instead of turning a salad bowl began to slide in a straight line, likewise without contact with the hands. The raps were heard in the same way, in the various pieces of furniture in the room, sometimes simultaneously; at others, as if they were answering. The Spirit seemed to have a marked predilection for the drum roll, for it repeated them at every instant without being asked. Many times, instead of answering certain questions, it would beat the general call or sound the assembly. Questioned about various particulars of its life, it said it was named Célima, was born in Paris, died at the age of forty-five, and had been a drummer.

— Among the assistants, besides the special medium for physical effects who produced the manifestations, there was an excellent psychographic medium who served as interpreter to the Spirit, which allowed us to obtain more explicit answers. Having confirmed, by writing, what it had said by typtology concerning its name, place of birth, and time of death, the following series of questions was addressed to it, whose answers offer several characteristic features that corroborate certain essential parts of the theory.

Write anything, whatever you wish.

Answer. – Rat-a-plan plan plan, rat, plan, plan.

Why did you write that?

Answer. – I was a drummer.

Had you received any instruction?

Answer. – Yes.

Where did you do your studies?

Answer. – With the Ignorantines [1]

You seem jovial.

Answer. – I am quite so.

You once told us that, in life, you very much liked to drink; is that true?

Answer. – I liked everything that was good.

Were you a soldier?

Answer. – Of course, since I was a drummer.

Under what government did you serve?

Answer. – Under Napoleon the Great.

Can you cite for us one of the battles in which you took part?

Answer. – That of the Berezina. [2]

Was it there that you died?

Answer. – No.

Were you in Moscow?

Answer. – No.

Where did you die?

Answer. – In the snow.

In what corps did you serve?

Answer. – In the fusiliers of the guard.

Did you love Napoleon the Great very much?

Answer. – How we all loved him, and without knowing why!

Do you know what became of Napoleon after his death?

Answer. – After my death I occupied myself only with myself.

Are you reincarnated?

Answer. – No, since I come to converse with you.

Why do you manifest yourself by raps, without having been called?

Answer. – It is necessary to make noise for those whose heart believes nothing. If you do not have enough, I will give you still more.

Is it of your own will that you came to rap, or did another Spirit compel you to do so?

Answer. – I come by my will; there is another, whom you call Truth, who can force me to this as well. But for a long time I had wished to come.

With what aim did you wish to come?

Answer. – To converse with you; that was what I wished; there was, however, something that prevented me from it. I was forced by a Spirit familiar to the house, who exhorted me to make myself useful to the persons who would ask me questions. a — This Spirit, then, has much power, seeing that it commands other Spirits?

Answer. – More than you imagine, and it employs it only for the good.

Observation. – The Spirit familiar to the house made itself known under the allegorical name of Truth, a circumstance unknown to the medium.

What prevented you from coming?

Answer. – I do not know; something that I do not understand.

Do you regret life?

Answer. – No; I regret nothing.

Which existence do you prefer: the present one or the terrestrial one?

Answer. – I prefer the existence of the Spirit to that of the body.

Why?

Answer. – Because we are far better off than on Earth. The Earth is a purgatory; during all the time that I lived on it, I always desired death.

Do you suffer in your new situation?

Answer. – No; but I am not yet happy.

Would you be satisfied if you had a new bodily existence?

Answer. – Yes, because I know that I must rise.

Who told you that?

Answer. – I know it well.

Will you reincarnate soon?

Answer. – I do not know.

Do you see other Spirits around you?

Answer. – Yes; many.

How do you know that they are Spirits?

Answer. – Among ourselves, we see one another just as we are.

Under what appearance do you see them?

Answer. – As Spirits can be seen; but not with the eyes.

And you, under what form are you here?

Answer. – Under the one I had when living, that is, as a drummer.

And the other Spirits? Do you see them under the form they possessed when they were incarnated?

Answer. – No; we take on an appearance only when we are evoked, otherwise we see one another without form.

Do you see us as clearly as if you were alive?

Answer. – Yes, perfectly.

Is it through the eyes that you see us?

Answer. – No; we have a form, but we have no senses; our form is only apparent.

Observation. – Surely Spirits have sensations, since they perceive; if it were not so, they would be inert; nevertheless, their sensations are not localized, as when they have a body, but inherent to the whole being.

Tell us positively in what place you are here.

Answer. – Near the table, between you and the medium.

When you rap, are you under the table, on top of it, or in the depth of the wood?

Answer. – I am at the side; I do not put myself into the wood: it is enough for me to touch the table.

How do you produce the noises that you make heard?

Answer. – I believe it is by means of a kind of concentration of our force.

Could you explain to us the manner in which the different noises that you imitate are produced, the scratchings, for example? Answer. – I would not know how to specify very well the nature of the noises; it is difficult to explain. I know that I scratch, but I cannot explain how I produce that noise which you call scratching.

Could you produce the same noises with any other medium?

Answer. – No; there is specialty in all mediums; not all can act in the same way.

Do you see among us, besides young S… (the medium of physical effects through whom the Spirit manifests itself), anyone who could help you to produce the same effects? Answer. – At the moment I see no one; with him I would be quite disposed to do so.

Why with him and not with another?

Answer. – Because I know him better; then, because he is more apt than any other to this kind of manifestation.

Did you know him for a long time? Before his present existence?

Answer. – No; I have known him only for a very short time; in some manner I was drawn to him so that he might become my instrument.

When a table rises into the air, without a point of support, who sustains it?

Answer. – Our will, which ordered it to obey and, also, the fluid that we transmit to it.

Observation. – This answer comes to support the theory that was given to us on the cause of physical manifestations and that we related in numbers 5 and 6 of this Review.

Could you do it?

Answer. – I believe so; I will try when the medium comes (at that moment he was absent).

On what does that depend?

Answer. – It depends on me, for I make use of the medium as of an instrument.

But the quality of the instrument counts for something, does it not?

Answer. – Yes, it helps me very much; so much so that I said I could not do it today with other mediums.

Observation. – In the course of the session an attempt was made to lift the table, but no success was obtained, perhaps because there had not been enough perseverance; there were evident efforts and movements of translation without contact or imposition of the hands. Among the experiments made, that of the opening of the table stood out, which was extensible; because it offered much resistance, owing to a defect of construction, it was set aside, while the Spirit took another and succeeded in opening it.

Why, the other day, did the movements of the table stop each time one of us took a light to look beneath it? Answer. – Because I wished to punish your curiosity.

With what do you occupy yourself in your existence as a Spirit, considering that you must not spend all your time only rapping? Answer. – Many times I have missions to fulfill; we must obey superior orders and, above all, do good to the human beings who are under our influence.

Surely your terrestrial life was not free of faults; do you acknowledge them, now?

Answer. – Yes; and for that reason I expiate them, remaining stationary among the inferior Spirits; I will be able to purify myself enough only when I take another body.

When you applied the raps on the table and, at the same time, on another piece of furniture, was it you who produced them, or was it another Spirit? Answer. – It was I myself.

You were alone, then?

Answer. – No, but I carried out alone the work of rapping.

Did the other Spirits who were there not assist you in something?

Answer. – Not to rap, but to speak.

Then they were not rapping Spirits?

Answer. – No; Truth had permitted only me to rap.

Did the rapping Spirits not sometimes gather in greater number, with the aim of there being more force in the production of certain phenomena? Answer. – Yes, but for those that I was able to do, I alone sufficed.

Are you always on the Earth, in your spiritual existence?

Answer. – More frequently in space.

Do you go sometimes to other worlds, that is, to other globes?

Answer. – Not to the more perfect ones, but to the inferior worlds.

Do you sometimes amuse yourself in seeing and hearing what men do?

Answer. – No; nevertheless, sometimes I have pity on them.

By preference, which are those whom you seek?

Ans. – Those who wish to believe in good faith.

Could you read our thoughts?

Answer. – No; I do not read in souls; I am not perfect enough for that.

Yet you must know our thoughts, since you come among us; otherwise, how could you know whether we believe in good faith? Answer. – I do not read, but I understand.

Observation. – Question 58 had as its object to know to whom, spontaneously, it directed its preference in the life of a Spirit, without being evoked; through evocation, as a Spirit of an order little elevated, it could be constrained to come to an environment that displeased it. On the other hand, without properly reading our thoughts, it could surely see that the persons gathered there did so only with a serious object and, by the nature of the questions and of the conversation that it heard, it would be capable of judging whether the assembly was composed of persons sincerely desirous of enlightening themselves.

Did you find some of your old companions of the Army in the world of Spirits?

Answer. – Yes, but their positions were so different that I did not recognize them all.

In what did that difference consist?

Answer. – In the happy or unhappy situation of each one.

— What was it that you said in those encounters?

— I said to them: Let us rise toward God, who permits it.

How did you understand that rising toward God?

Answer. – Each step crossed is one step more toward Him.

You said that you died in the snow; was it in consequence of the cold?

Answer. – Of cold and of want.

Did you have immediate consciousness of your new existence?

Answer. – No, but I no longer felt cold.

Did you ever return to the place where you left your body?

Answer. – No, it made me suffer too much.

We thank you for the explanations that you had the kindness to give us. They furnished us with very useful material for observation toward our perfecting in the Spiritist science. Answer. – I am entirely at your orders.

Observation. – Little advanced in the spiritual hierarchy, as is seen, the Spirit itself acknowledged its inferiority. Its knowledge is limited; but it has good sense, praiseworthy sentiments, and benevolence. As a Spirit, its mission lacked significance, since it played the role of a rapping Spirit to call the incredulous to faith; yet, even in the theater, can the humble garb of an extra not enclose an honest heart? Its answers have the simplicity of ignorance; nevertheless, by the fact that they do not possess the elevation of the philosophical language of the superior Spirits, they are not for that reason any the less instructive, above all for the study of Spiritist customs, if we may so express ourselves. It is only by studying all the classes of that world which awaits us that we can come to know it and mark in it, in some manner, by anticipation, the place that each one of us will be given to occupy. Seeing the situation which, by their vices and virtues, men, our equals here on Earth, have created, we feel encouraged to rise as rapidly as possible from this very life: it is the example alongside the theory. To know something well, and to form of it an idea free of illusions, it is necessary to dissect it in all its aspects, just as the botanist cannot know the vegetable kingdom except by observing from the humblest cryptogam, which the moss conceals, up to the lofty oak, which rises into the air. [1] Translator's note: Our emphasis. [Name given in France to a religious order that devoted itself to primary education. Julio de Abreu F.] [2] The Berezina (in Russian: Березина, Berezina; Belarusian: Бярэзіна, Biarezina) is a river of Belarus, a tributary of the Dnieper. [It became famous for two crossings of invading troops: that of Charles XII, in 1708, and that of Napoleon Bonaparte, on November 26-28, 1812.]