and sisters of the far-off eastern lands; as a general rule, with occasional exception, they are unable to reach the magnificent goals of soul-vision and magic power easily attainable by the sallow devotees of Sachthas and Saiva; and therefore cannot realize the intense passional furore, essential both to the successful invocation of correspondent Ærial Potentialities, and the charging of mirrors with the divine spiritual reflective powers which characterize them. I here alluded to a profound mystery connected with their construction, known only to the initiate, but which is vaguely hinted at in the subjoined quotation;—a mystery at which dolts and fools may laugh—provided they sense its nature, but which higher souls must reverence, honor, and adore.
Says Colonel Stephen Fraser, in his glorious volume entitled "Twelve Years in India," a magnificent book, which was kindly lent me by Mr. W. G. Palgrave, of London, who called on me in August, 1873, while on his overland route to China, via San Francisco, and whom I had known in England fifteen years before, as a polished gentleman and scholar, and one of the deepest mystics on the globe outside of the Orient:—
"We joyfully, gladly went,—five of us, her Majesty's Officers, on a tour of military inspection, the toils of which were likely to be rewarded by an opportunity of witnessing the dance of Illumination, of the Muntra-Wallahs, or Magic-working Brahmuns, whose strange miracles, worked apparently by the triple agency of Battasahs (rice), Gookal (red-powder), and, strangest of all, by means of oval glasses or crystals, but black as night, in which it is reported, some very strange things were to be seen. We were all prepared to witness skilful jugglery, for which the residents of Muttra[1] are renowned, but fully resolved to ascertain, if possible, how it was all done, rejecting, of course, everything claimed to be either supra-mortal or hyper-natural, so far as the underlying principles were
- ↑ Muttra, a town in the province of Agra (India), on the west bank of the river Jumma, in latitude 27 deg. 31 min. North; longitude 77 deg. 33 min. East;—a place famous for the manufacture of Magical apparatus; and one of the only two places on earth where the Parappthaline gum is prepared, wherewith the adepts smear the backs of these extraordinary mirrors, so celebrated by the various authorities named in the text."—Twelve Years in India. Vol 2, p. 286.
