MEN WHO HYPNOTISE GIRLS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 87, 8 May 1909, Page 3

MEN WHO HYPNOTISE GIRLS.

Hypnotism, said a doctor to the writer in a Home pape r recently, is a force which we are now bound to consider in medicine, and 1 can assure you that at times it is very dillicult to combat. The power of hypnotism, of course, is not possessed by everyone, and it would be a mighty hud tiling for medical science if it were. Many persons doubtless are hypnotists without knowing it, and the power of hypnotism n«i/ lie latent iu them without ever being called to life. Hypnotism is a power which may be used for good or ill, and I -am sorry to say that the majority of cases which have come under my notice confirm me in the belief that usually it is the unworthy motive which prompts the exercise of hypnotic power. HYPNOTISED IN A RAILWAY CARBIAGE. Take a recent case, for instance—ouo which has caused a good deal of discussion among medical men—in which a young lady was, or says she was, hyp- j liotised ,by a man she met on the train. I to her belief she had never seen the 1 man before, yet sh c felt the power of 1 his presence before ever her eyes met f his. She stated that she was reading g in a corridor carriage of an express I when the door opened and a stranger i entered. She did not look up, but in- P stantly left a contraction around hel j heart and the tightening of every fibre 7, in her being. She endeavored to concen- A trate her attention on her book, but it 8 was useless, ami finally she raised hci I eyes and stared him full in the face. \ ■lhe man was smiling, and, without h\ the least desiring to do so, the girl smiled back. Tims encouraged, the stranger took a seat .beside her and ft talked imallcctedly and interestingly on S many subjects. OJ \)f

On the stopping of the train she, ac-' cording to her testimony, desired to tell the stranger that she alighted there, but, instead, made no apparent attempt to do so. At the next station the stronger asked if it were her destination as well as his, and she replied that it was, though she realised fully that she was telling a he. To make a long story ~tT '. Uc • VoUng M * m completely under the -power of a man whose uamo even she did not know. She never returned to tli e Memls ivho were waiting for her; and it was only after s,f s ' l hy the ' ,olice tl.at On was at last discovered living in a single loom in « low part of a big city. The man had deserted her, ' st,!rv V , aS |J'T'-'= U ' OSc wl, ° lmri ««r "oiJ nlatcd in a sane and simple man--I;a"<li',i,™«« the slightest doubt t • t the villain who brought on her so much sorrow was a past-master' in the ait ot hypnotic inlluence. and that he is even now »orking Ids baleful s'pells on other women; lor the police, so fir,have tailed to arrest him.

IXDER A SI'ELL. Son,,: tune ago a well-known society oinan brought her daughter to me and Magically demanded that 1 save her rom the nacanny imluencr of a man l at both she and her daughter utterly mite,, the young girl openly expressed "er detestation tor the man, and yet fording lo the mother, she performed without questioning every demand he jm.de. She would keep .very appointment -jo matter what engagement she ;;" to put off to do so, a „d was, in a »«'<!, completely under his spell. There • nothing known against the man, . he «as pleasant and amiable in «>. 111 'J, but the unhappy mother could ove?he"dlu'ght > er! erW!Ud ' feuXt ' Ait,,, goill g |, t0 t , le j a lou e IIT n° Uia ]K forbi(ld «' «'<•' h , tl ; e I cld i c , r . w <>man replied that she could not do this as she would have to giv 0 some explanation, and the doim* so might compromise her dain'hter° Lvery suggestion I made for getting rid of the objectionable hypnotist was met w.ti s o,,,e excuse, until!lost my temp n exclamied; "It seems to me that 1,,* eH > n »rc» and .1 daughter had been married to the Whethe 1 rn m ": md to d Hhethei he still exercises his hypnotic '"fluence. over her 1 do not know P

l-'UUKTUATLVG A SCOUNDREL. An extraordinary case hailing from America interested me greatly, as a friend uf mine was called as a witness against the man whose power of persuasion, if you can call it that, led to so much that was tragic. His name was Keller, and he was accused of "inllucueing'' no fewer than seventeen voting and wealthy girls, whose names'were, however, kept from the papers. This man's |.ioceduie was lu obtain an introduction to any young lady whose parents were wealthy, and 'then, bv exercising the power of hypnotism which he undoubtedly possessed, extract from her not only her own money, but also thousand* of dollars which he compelled her to obtain from her father or mother.

'Tins man's hypnotic progress was onlv stayed through suspicion aroused in the niiiid of a wealthy wheat broker of Chicago, who noticed that his iullucnec ow r Ids daughter seemed stronger than circumstances warranted. So he kept a strict watch, and actually secured the svoundrel •as he wag eloping with'his daughter, who was barely, seventeen. He wuri banded over to the police, who gathered such a mass of evidence against him, involving the reputations of manv prominent families, that it was considered wiser to hush the matter up. The "hypnotist" received several years' imprisonment, and would be m'gaol now only hj,. brought matters to a hasty conclusion through the medium of a »tron» nail and a pair of suspenders.