This is wonderful enough, but far more fantastic is what has
still to be told. The most marked property of this ectoplasm,
very fully illustrated in the photographs, is that it sets or
curdles into the shapes of human members--of fingers, of hands,
of faces, which are at first quite sketchy and rudimentary, but
rapidly coalesce and develop until they are undistinguishable
from those of living beings. Is not this the very strangest and
most inexplicable thing that has ever yet been observed by human
eyes? These faces or limbs are usually the size of life, but
they frequently are quite miniatures. Occasionally they begin by
being miniatures, and grow into full size. On their first
appearance in the ectoplasm the limb is only on one plane of
matter, a mere flat appearance, which rapidly rounds itself off,
until it has assumed all three planes and is complete. It may be
a mere simulacrum, like a wax hand, or it may be endowed with
full power of grasping another hand, with every articulation in
perfect working order.
The faces which are produced in this amazing way are worthy
of study. They do not appear to have represented anyone who
has ever been known in life by Doctor Geley.[8] My impression
after examining them is that they are much more likely to be
within the knowledge of the subject, being girls of the French
lower middle class type, such as Eva was, I should imagine, in
the habit of meeting.
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