The Wonderful Yogis

1901

Dr. Peebles tells some tall, strong stories of wonderful yogis in The Humanitarian. One of these yogis came one day to surprise Peebles. He did. The yogi said he could hypnotize an inanimate object. "Make the book lying on that stand move," said the incredulous western man. "Pointing his long, bony finger to it, he exclaimed: 'Come! Come!' The stand trembled; the book fell upon the floor and slid to his feet."

"While in Madjura," the good doctor goes on, "I spent considerable time in casting out demons — that is, in demagnetizing and dispossessing those hypnotically influenced by the ignorant, demoniac denizens of the invisible regions, known, among other names, as pitris, bhutas, manes, pissellas, demons, devas, etc. Certain eminent physicians conclude that the majority of the insane are in some way the subject of hypnotism, of obsessing demons."

The yogis are queer ducks. If you want to be one, you get into a quiet place and fix the thought on the point of the nose ten minutes, then on the bridge of the nose ten minutes. Then close the ears with the middle fingers, pronouncing audibly 12,000 times the sacred syllable "om," or put the left ankle on the right side of the chest, and vice versa, so you look like a cow's mouth, and say "om" 144,000 times. Amusing to try it sometime.

—The Portsmouth Herald, Portsmouth, New Hampshire, January 31, 1901, page 2.