Page:A case of double consciousness Albert Wilson 1904 MPD in a child.djvu/10

10 Was the imbecility due to the blindness, or did it coincide, due to a shutting off of higher psychic centres, as the prefrontal? How, also, can we account for the extra keenness of touch and hearing, as with those who are blind for years? This mental darkness lasted for three to four weeks from December 29th, 1896; but she returned suddenly to the normal on two occasions. On January 3rd, 1897, she suddenly regained her sight and became her normal self for about two minutes. She was quite her ordinary self, and called to her sister, "I can see you," and asked some questions. On January 17th she also returned three or four times to the normal, and told her mother she felt quite well, but sometimes felt "to be dying and to go right away." When the normal state occurs she can walk. I tried to rouse her out of this imbecility by beating a tea tray with a key; but she took absolutely no notice, though the noise was deafening and unmusical in the extreme. As time progressed her intelligence improved a little; she began to know people and things at more lucid intervals.

At the end of January she had some vision, but was short-sighted. She could discern colour and pictures four inches off, but could not see about the room. This we proved by testing her in various ways when she was able to walk and grope about. Her hearing became very acute, compensatory for the more or less complete blindness.

B 10 was a sub-stage showing decided moral degeneracy. She herself was so conscious of her wickedness that she named herself "The dreadful wicked creature." She was violent and cruel, bullying her little sister, and on one occasion would have forced her into the fire if help had not arrived. Does not this case throw a side-light on the dangerous criminal? Are not the more rudimentary brain cells, which have to do with the lower animal functions, let loose in fury and without control or guidance? To what extent, then, are such responsible? Ought not the State to care for uncontrollable unhealthy beings the same as for lunatics?

Another moral delinquency was shown in the sub-stage B 11, but of a more harmless type. This sub-stage was rather mixed. She could walk, and resembled B 2 in that she wrote and spelt backwards, but also resembled B 6 in that she understood French. Her chief characteristic was that she was bent on