THE KEY OF THE MYSTERIES
Magic whose approach had been so much dreaded by the
medium. We have seen them, and here is a minute descrip-
tion of them.
They were traced forcibly, and the pencil had almost cut
the paper.
They had been dashed on to the paper without order or
alignment.
The first was the symbol which the Egyptian initiates
usually placed in the hand of Typhon. A tau with upright
double lines opened in the form of a compass; an ankh (or
crux ansata) having at the top a circular ring; below the ring,
a double horizontal line; beneath the double horizontal line,
two oblique lines, like a V upside down.
The second character represented a Grand Hierophant’s
cross, with the three hierarchical cross-bars. This symbol,
which dates from the remotest antiquity, is still the attribute
of our sovereign pontiffs, and forms the upper extremity of
their pastoral staff. But the sign traced by the pencil had
this particularity, that the upper branch, the head of the cross,
was double, and formed again the terrible Typhonian V, the
sign of antagonism and separation, the symbol of hate and
eternal combat.
The third character was that which Freemasons call the
Philosophical Cross, a cross with four equal arms, with a
point in each of its angles. But, instead of four points, there
were only two, placed in the two right-hand corners, once
more a sign of struggle, separation and denial.
The Professor, whom one will allow us to distinguish
from the narrator, and to name in the third person in order
not to weary our readers in having the air of speaking of
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