People from the Other World by Olcott, Henry S - 1874

Hartford, CT: American Publishing Company, 1874. 2nd printing, 1875. Hardcover in full cloth. Good. Octavo (standard size). Wear to edges and corners of boards. Scuffing and some soiling to covers. Hinges a bit loose. Wear and slight darkening to endpapers. Name of former owner in pencil on flyleaf. List of illustrations notes 58 up to page 421, but there are 13 more illustrations after that page which are not listed. Numbering of pages shows no page loss between the list of illustrations and the first page of text, so I presume the list was simply incomplete. 492 p. w/ ilus., bibliography. Also, a single word in the table of contents has been carefully blacked out. A wide ranging survey of spiritualism, with reports on particular tests and research carried out by the author and others on various spiritualists. There is much focus on the Eddys of Vermont and the spirit "manifestations" that were brought forth by them, some of which the aithor weighed(!) and measured himself. Other chapters touch on : Shakers as spiritualists, rationalism, pseudo-investigations, the Katie King affar, seances,tests, and more. The author Olcott was a former soldier and the cofounder and first president of the Theosophical Society. He was also the first American or Englishman of note to convert to Buddhism. Uncommon.