Yearning for the New Age: Laura Holloway-Langford and Late Victorian Spirituality

7. The Lady Mrs. X

136 7 The Lady Mrs. X S During 1884, Helena Blavatsky came under increasing scrutiny fromboththosewhowishedtoprovetherealityofpsychicpower and skeptics who doubted her claims. By late that summer, she decided that it would be prudent to avoid transmitting letters from the Masters. Yet the Adept Brotherhood was not ready to forego all communication with disciples. In a letter, probably written to Francesca Arundale, Master Morya puzzled over how “Esoteric Teachings” might be conveyed to A. P. Sinnett, who had been the “chosen correspondent.” The obvious channel was Mohini Chatterji, but Morya judged that he had “not reached that stage of physiological development that enables a chela to send and receive letters. His evolution has been more upon the intellectual plane.” Additionally,hepredictedthatChatterjiwouldsuccumbtothe“seductive influences” of the Western world, destroying his inspiration and resulting in his failure as a chela. But, said Morya, there was someone else who mighttakeBlavatsky’splace,and“ifgivensuchpowers,”thispersonwould “conceal it to the last.”1 MasterMoryaapparentlyreferredtoLauraHolloway-Langford,whom Blavatsky had decided to try as a mediator for occult communications. Holloway-Langford was acknowledged to be clairvoyant, and she proclaimed her willingness to sacrifice for the movement. Even though she was not so advanced in her chelaship as Chatterji, she possessed important advantages. She was socially adroit, moving easily among the better classes in British society. She could be counted upon not to make a fool front/backmatter 137 The Lady Mrs. X 137 of herself in the way that Henry Steel Olcott had done. Long skilled in keeping secrets, she knew how to be discreet. Additionally, while Europeans tended to view Indian “natives” as irrational and untrustworthy, they assumed that she was a person of honor and integrity. It is impossible to know how deeply Laura Holloway-Langford was involved in the production of occult phenomena, but the evidence strongly suggests that for a short time she was privy to some of its mysteries. MRS. X TESTIFIES Laura Holloway-Langford proved her usefulness to the Theosophical Society when she testified before a committee of the Society for Psychical Research. The presence of Blavatsky, Olcott, and their Indian followers in England presented an opportunity for the Society for Psychical Research to interrogate Theosophists who claimed to have seen the Mahatmas. In December 1884, a “Private and Confidential” document was sent to Society members and associates. It contained forty-two appendices with the texts of the interviews that had taken place the previous summer and fall. Among those interviewed was Laura Holloway-Langford, who was designated “theladyhereafterstyledMrs.X.”2 NotonlydidHolloway-Langford request that the committee disguise her identity, but she also asked that her testimony not be made public. The committee honored this request, and her statements were omitted from the report that Richard Hodgson made to the S. P. R. in 1885.3 As a respectable “lady,” Holloway-Langford was granted the privilege of privacy accorded few Theosophists. Even though unpublished, her testimony supporting the existence of the Adept Brotherhood was important, because members of the Society for Psychical Research deemed it more credible than that of either A. P. Sinnett or Mohini Chatterji. Sinnett’s experiences with the Masters were attributed to “an accidental hallucination” caused by an “abnormal state of mind.”4 Chatterji’s testimony was also judged worthless, even though in England he had become the spokesperson for all things Hindu. As an Indian, he was considered gullible and easy to deceive. Humiliated and angered by the report, Chatterji later crafted a rebuttal, stating that neither the Mahatmas, nor occult phenomena, nor even Blavatsky herself 138 front/backmatter 138 Yearning for the new age was central to theosophy.5 In contrast to the other witnesses, HollowayLangford was considered “an exceptionally conscientious, accurate, and trustworthy informant,” who had not been contaminated by “oriental superstition.” The report details Laura Holloway-Langford’s description of a Tibetan Master who had appeared in Brooklyn and instructed her in occult teachings . She stated that he had directed her to travel to Europe and offer herself to Blavatsky as a student. The confidential report continued: She reports herself to have distinctly and repeatedly seen Koot Hoomi in “astral body,” in a country distant from India, before she had even seen his picture (which she subsequently recognised), and without discovering who he was; that she acted on communications made to her in these interviews; and that these communications were afterwards confirmed by letters in the Koot Hoomi handwriting, addressed not only to...