CHAPTER VI.
VARIOUS MEDIUMS AND MANIFESTATIONS.
“Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same spirit. . . . Have all the gifts of
healing? do all speak with tongues? do all interpret?“ — St. Paul.
THE number of persons in the United States through whom
phenomena similar to those in the case of Mr* Home and
of Mr. Foster have taken place, is now so large, that to mention
them all would almost require a volume. Charles Colchester,
young and of a fine personal appearance, but wayward and infirm
of purpose, like many similar sensitives, gave us several sittings,
at which he manifested remarkable powers, not unlike those of
Mr. Foster.
We know not how true it is, but Mr. Colchester told us, that
on his meeting Hermann, the celebrated prestidigitateur, the
latter said to him, “ If you can give me the name of my father,
I will believe that your intelligence is preternatural ; for no per¬
son in America, I am convinced, knows that name/' Colchester
at once wrote out the name, Samuel Hermann Radesky ; and
Hermann said it was right.
Mr. William Ambisy Colby relates (July 6, 1861) that he
called on Colchester ip New York. “I first asked him,” says
Mr, Colby, “ if he could tell me what I had lost. He told me I
had lost a pocket-book with papers in it of no value; that it was
picked from my pocket in a Broadway stage. I then told him
that he was mistaken; for there was a paper amongst them
of value. 1 Oh, no ! ’ said Colchester, ‘ I am not mistaken ; but it
is you who are mistaken. The paper you have reference to is a
check for $315, which, instead of putting in your wallet, you put