Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 17.djvu/174

162 cast about in every way, in obedience to the exaggerated excitation of the spinal marrow. Cerebral life, which has been suspended since the beginning of the attack, has returned, and consciousness has, at least partially, appeared again. Now, hallucinations of every kind arise, sometimes gay, sometimes sad, sometimes amorous, sometimes religious or ecstatic. Whenever any image rises in the mind, the movements of the limbs, the expression of the face, the general attitude of the body, respond at once to its character. These poses, these passional attitudes, have a vivacity, a vigor of expression, that can not be found anywhere else. The most skillful actor would never be competent to represent fear, menace, anger, with as much truthfulness and power as these poor hysterical girls, whose demeanor is influenced by the agitations of a raving and changeable delirium. One crosses her arms and raises her eyes to heaven in an attitude of religious admiration, as if she saw the clouds opening to show her the saints or God. Another talks in tender words to her little girl, from whom she has been separated for a long time. Another sees monstrous animals, lizards with red snouts and blood-shot eyes, or enormous bats, and her features express unspeakable horror. Generally there are two types of delirium, gay and melancholy, answering to corresponding forms of hallucination. The two frequently appear in combination, taking each other's place with marvelous rapidity. M., says M. Paul Richer, "is with Ernest at a pleasure-party in a restaurant near Paris, where the tables are set under trellises adorned with flowers and climbing plants. At the right is a negress surrounded with strong-armed black men who are tattooed, and entirely naked, who seize her by the hair and are about to scalp her. The blood runs in streams over the face of the unfortunate woman, who utters lamentable cries, and calls for help. On the left is a very different spectacle: Ernest has a throng of friends who accompany other young women. All the personages have no other clothing than a broad, red girdle, except Ernest, who wears a Spanish costume. They sit at the table, eat oysters, drink of a white wine, sing, and laugh." Each patient generally has a form of delirium peculiar to herself, so that the different attacks in the same subject always bear a resemblance to one another. The same personages appear, the same scenes are repeated in all the attacks. The order in which the hallucinations come on does not vary, and one who has witnessed a few attacks suffered by the same patient can always judge when the end of the fit is near from the nature of these hallucinations. With one, it is indicated by a flourish of military music; with another, by the noise of a railroad-train; with another, by the appearance of monstrous animals—vipers, crows, frogs, rats. The regularity of these mad deliria is indeed surprising. Listening to the vociferations, the howlings of the sufferers, it would seem as if chance alone directed the