WONDERS OF HINDOO MAGIC

Temuka Leader, Issue 2656, 8 May 1894, Page 4

WONDERS OF HINDOO MAGIC

Dr Heinrich Hensoldt, writing to the December Arena, is responsible for several most marvellous stories of Hindoo magic. He prefaces his narrative with a suggestion. As an Oriental traveller and student he concludes that Hindoo adepts have ‘ brought hypnotism to such a degree of perfection that, while under its influences, our senses are no longer a criterion of the reality around us, but can be made to deceive us iu a manner that is perfectly amazing.’ Their knowledge is kept a profound secret; for though the same marvels have been wrought for thousands of years, they still excite the same surprise. They are wrought in the open in the light of the day, with bared arms and limbs, without any visible hiding place for apparatus. The Yoghis and Rishis are the highest orders of Oriental magician. They absolutely refuse payment. They ‘ are religious enthusiasts iu the first instance, and adepts in the second.’ They perform miracles merely to gain the popular ear of their religious message. Except raising the dead, not one of the miracles recorded iu the New Testament is ‘half so wonderful as the feats performed by the average Yoghi.’ Dr Hensoldt goes on to describe how he saw, ‘in the centre of one of the largest squares iu Agra,’ a Yoghi plant a mango— ‘ an edible tropical fruit about the size of a large pear, growing on a tree which reaches a height of from forty to one hundred and twenty feet,’ The Yoghi dug a hole iu the ground about six inches deep, and placed the mango in it, and covered it with earth. . . . . [ was startled to see, iu the air above the spot where the mango had been buried, the form of a large tree, at first rather indistinct, presenting, as it were, mere hazy outlines, but becoming visibly more distinct, until at length there stood out as natural a tree as ever I had seen in my life—a mango tree about fifty feet high, and iu full foliage, with mangos on it. All this happened within five minute* of the burying of the fruit. . . And yet there was something strange about this tree . , . a weird rigidness, not one leaf moving in the breeze Another curious feature I noticed—the leaves seemed to obscure the sun’s rays, and yet . . it was a tree without a shadow. As he approached it it faded, but grew clear again as he receded to his original position; but on his retreating beyond that point it again faded. Each individual saw the tree only from where he stood. Two English officers not present from the commencement saw no thing at all.’ Then the Yoghi preached—so absorbingly that Doctor Hensoldt ‘ seemed to forget time and space.’ He consequently did not notice the disappearance of the tree. When the Yoghi ceased speaking, the tree had gone. Then he dug up the mango he had buried. This mango feat he saw five times. Once in a Kashmir valley he saw it done by a certain Ram Surash, a Rishi from Thibet. ‘ The mango tree which this Rishi produced did not vanish in the proportion as 1 approached it, but retained its full realism, and I not only touched it but actually climbed several feet up the stem.’

Before the palace of the Guicowar of Bar da, in the open air and broad daylight Dr Hen soldi declares he saw for the first time —he saw it thrice subsequently the celebrated rope trick. A Yoghi, after preaching a roost impressive sermon, ‘ took a rope 15 feet long and perhaps an inch thick One end of this rope he held in Iris loft hand, while with the righfche threw the other end up in the air. The rope, instead of coming down again, remained suspended, even after the Yoghi had removed hia other hand,and to my utter amazement, climbed up this rope, suspended all the time, iu defiance of gravity, with the lower cud at least five feet from t-ho ground. And iu proportion as he fflj.ni hod ;jp jt .seerpod as if the rope was lengthening out indeftpitely ahoye him and disappearing beneath him, fqrhP kept on climbing till he was fairly out of sight, and the last I could distinguish was his white turban and a piece of this nevergpding rope. Then my eyes could endure the glare of j : l}p s]ry no longer, and when I looked again ho was gQnp.dJ