extraordinary scene, and suddenly, without warning, the whole pageant vanished into the limbo from which it had come. He was once more alone upon a country road, in the bright sunshine of a June forenoon. It was his wedding morning, and, the vision or whatever it might properly be called having vanished, there was obviously nothing to do but to drive on and be married,—a course of action which he carried out to the letter.

I have fancied, although it is a point upon which I am doubtful, that John made some beginning of a confidence to his bride during the honeymoon of this extraordinary occurrence, and that the levity with which she received his first suggestions prevented his going further in his disclosures. The reason is, however, of no great consequence, but at least the fact is that he did not tell her. He gave a good deal of thought to the matter,[148] corresponded with the Psychical Society, of London, not relating his own experience, but endeavoring to learn of a parallel case. He had, too, some communication with the Theosophical Society, of London, and even with the parent society, of Madras; and he at one time contemplated making a confidant of Madame Blavatsky, concerning whom, at that time, the European papers were full of marvellous tales.

[148]

He does not seem, so far as I am able to gather from what he has told me, to have hit upon any theory which afforded him a clue to the mystery of his own case; and just as he had made up his mind that the whole was a mere optical delusion, he had a second visitation.

He was in a Fifth Avenue car on the elevated road, returning home at night. The car was compactly filled, but before him, as he sat facing the middle of the car, was an open space, two or three feet square. Looking up, as the train started after stopping at the Twenty-third street station, John saw standing before him the same oriental figure which had greeted him on his wedding day. The stranger’s face beamed with joy, and he scarcely waited to finish his profound salutation before exclaiming, “It is a propitious[149] hour, Great Master. The young prince is a pearl beyond price.”

[149]

Vantine’s first instinct was to look at his neighbors, to see whether they too beheld the apparition, if apparition it were. The man on his right was looking up from his newspaper with the air of one who had heard the strange words and wished to discover whence they came. The man on the left was gazing at Vantine with an expression of bewildered curiosity. John turned his eyes again to the 

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