Wild Talents

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Book: Read Wild Talents for Free Online
Authors: Charles Fort
with one another—or not so circumstanced as to “mass” their psychologies—and all narrowly localized in one small neighborhood, were similarly affected, it seemed clear that here was a case of common exposure to something that was poisonous, or otherwise injurious. Of course an escape of gas was thought of; but there was no odor of gas. No leakage of gas was found. There was the usual searching investigation that precedes forgetfulness. It was somebody’s suggestion that the “mysterious malady” had been caused by fumes from a nearby factory chimney. I think that the wedding party was the central circumstance, but I don’t think of a factory chimney, which had never so expressed itself before, suddenly fuming at a wedding party. An Argus reporter wrote that the Health Officers had rejected this suggestion, and that he had investigated, and had detected no unusual odor in the neighborhood.
    In this occurrence at Bradford, there was no odor of gas. I have noted a case in London, in which there was an odor of gas; nevertheless this case is no less mysterious. In the Weekly Dispatch (London), June 12, 1910, it is called “one of the most remarkable and mysterious cases of gas poisoning that have occurred in London in recent years.” Early in the morning of June 10th, a woman telephoned to a police station, telling of what she thought was an escape of gas. A policeman went to the house, which was in Neale Street (Holborn). He considered the supposed leakage alarming, and rapped on doors of another floor in the house. There was no response, and he broke down a door, finding the occupants unconscious. In two neighboring houses, four unconscious persons were found. A circumstance that was considered extraordinary was that between these two houses was one in which nobody was affected, and in which there was no odor of gas. The gas company sent men, who searched for a leak, but in vain. Fumes, as if from an uncommon and easily discoverable escape of gas, had overcome occupants of three houses, but according to the local newspaper (the Holborn Guardian) the gas company, a week later, had been unable to discover its origin.
    In December, 1921, there was an occurrence in the village of Zetel, Germany (London Daily News, Jan. 2, 1922). This was in the streets of a town. Somebody dropped unconscious and, whether in an epidemic of fright, accounted for in terms of “mass psychology,” or not, other persons dropped unconscious. “So far no light has been thrown on the mystery.” It was thought that a “current of some kind” had passed over the village. This resembles the occurrence at El Paso, Texas, June 19, 1929 (New York Sun, Dec. 6, 1930). Scores of persons, in the streets, dropped unconscious, and several of them died. Whatever appeared here was called a “deadly miasma.” And the linkage goes on to the scores of deaths in a fog, in the Meuse Valley, Belgium, Dec. 5, 1930—so that one could smoothly and logically start with affairs in a girls’ school, and end up with a meteorological discussion.
    Lloyd’s Weekly News (London) Jan. 17, 1909—story from the Caucasian city of Baku. M. Krassilrukoff, and two companions, had gone upon a hunting trip to Sand Island, in the Caspian Sea. Nothing had been heard from them, and there was an investigation. The searchers came upon the bodies of the three men, lying in positions that indicated that they had died without a struggle. No marks of injuries; no disarrangement of clothes. At the autopsy, no trace of poison was found. “The doctors, though they would not commit themselves to an explanation, thought the men had been stifled.”
    The Observer (London) Aug. 23, 1925—“A mysterious tragedy is reported from the Polish Tatra Mountains, near the health resort of Zakopane. A party, composed of Mr. Kasznica, the judge of the Supreme Court, his wife, a twelve-year-old son, and a young student of Cracow University, started in fine weather for a short excursion in the

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