relating to B----, was made elsewhere, and one or two occasions of
automatic writing. This latter method of inquiry displayed all the
weakness to which it is usually, and apparently, inherently liable,
and is only mentioned here as explaining other matters. Its chief
interest was that it supplied a name marked by a certain peculiarity
which afterwards became familiar, and that it led to a hypothesis as
to at least one of the personalities by whom certain phenomena were
professedly caused.

In the afternoon an experiment was made with the apparatus known as a
_Ouija_ board, and this, as is very often the case, resolved itself,
after a time, into automatic writing. There is in the library a
portrait of a very handsome woman, to which no name is attached, but
which shows the costume of the last century. Her name was asked, and
the word _Ishbel_ was given several times. It is not certain whether
this word was meant as an answer to the question, or whether, as often
happens in such cases, it was intended merely as an announcement of
the name of the informant supposed to communicate.

The word, as given, possesses the following peculiarity. In the
Gaelic language the vowels _e_ and _i_ have the effect of aspirating
an _s_ immediately preceding them, in the same way in which they
effect the _c_ in Italian, or the _g_ in Spanish, so that, as in
Italian _ce_ and _ci_ are pronounced _chay_ and _chee_, so in Gaelic
_se_ and _si_ are pronounced _shay_ and _shee_. The name Isabel is
written in Gaelic _Iseabal_, but the _e_ is absorbed in its effect
upon the _s_ (like the _i_ in the Italian _cìo_) and the first _a_ is
so slurred as to be almost inaudible, so that the word is pronounced
"Ish-bel."