Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 49.djvu/370

352, of Boston, reports four cases of eczema and one of dermatitis cured or improved by suggestion. One, for example, was that of a boy of eleven, who had suffered from eczema since he was eighteen months old; his body was nearly covered by the eruption and consequent scabs, and the itching was intolerable. He had been treated by many dermatologists without the least success. Dr. Osgood hypnotized him and told him the itching would cease and the skin would become sound. The itching was immediately relieved, and the eruption was nearly gone in a fortnight and quite gone in a month.

The most extraordinary case of the kind, however, that I have yet seen comes from Moscow, and is vouched for by Prof. Kozhevnikoff, the most eminent neurologist of Russia. The account which I transcribe is from the British Medical Journal, November 16, 1895.

"A 'miraculous' cure has recently occurred in Moscow, where it has caused considerable excitement. It is perhaps a more than usually interesting instance, and therefore deserving of the permanent record given to it by Prof. Kozhevnikoff, who gave the details of the case at the last meeting of the Society of Neuropathologists in Moscow. The professor had not had the patient under his treatment, but had seen him more than once both before and after the 'cure.' The patient, N D, was a lecturer in the Moscow University. He had suffered from a severe form of sycosis menti since June, 1894, for which he underwent treatment at the hands of various specialists—among others, of Profs. Kaposi, of Vienna; Schwimmer, of Buda-Pesth; Lassar, of Berlin; Pospiélof, of Moscow; and Stukovenkof, of Kief. In April last he returned to Moscow. His chin was then covered with a freely suppurating eruption. He now sought the advice of a 'wise woman,' an attendant at the baths, who was in the habit of giving herbs and 'simples' to her clients. In this case no such remedy was employed. N D was told to meet the woman next morning

at five o'clock in the Temple of the Saviour, the colossal church on the Moskva River, which has been building all the century and is yet incomplete, in memory of the famous events of 1812. He came as told, and while he remained a passive onlooker, the woman prayed for three or four minutes; the same thing was repeated that evening and again the following morning. But in the meantime the eruption of N D's face had begun to improve; the discharge ceased, the swelling subsided, and in twenty-four hours scarcely a sign of disease was left. Such are the facts as given by the patient himself, and confirmed by Prof.