Among Sam’s other attributes was the gift of divination. He was the primitive man, a part of nature’s self, and he looked upon the truth unblinded, undimmed by the veil of knowledge formalized. In this respect he was absolutely uncanny, a person to be discussed and analyzed in remote rooms or upon quiet walks. Sam never talked about these supernatural powers, and so far as I know the Society for Psychical Research never had him under inspection, but he had these powers, abnormally, unhumanly developed, not only had them, but used them, nightly… Sam had but to cast one searching, secret-revealing glance at the luminaries of the college heaven, and there was nothing that would fain be hid that was not revealed, revealed not merely in broad outline, but in tiniest detail, threatening disorders forecast to the very quarter of an hour.

from Samuel Osborne, Janitor by Frederick Morgan Padelford (c. 1913)