performed on the same individual in the mesmeric state, a circumstance that may lend it additional interest with those who are disposed to collect facts on an interesting subject. AUGUSTA, 1st July, 1845."

The following private letter was written to a gentleman in London, who was anxious to have the characters of the parties.

'Mayor's Office, City of Augusta, Georgia, U. S. A. "December 26, 1845.

"Dear Sir,-Your favour of the 29th November is before me. I have great pleasure in replying, to say the Dr. Dugas, the operator in the case you allude to, is a gentleman of the very highest character, both as a man and a physician; and that the most entire confidence may be placed in his statements, being not exaggerated in the slightest degree.

"The professors mentioned as present during the first operation are professors in the Medical College of Georgia, located here. An institution of the highest respectability.

"The Rev. Mr. Ford, mentioned as present during the second operation, is a clergyman of the episcopal church, who would not have sanctioned any representation which was not strictly true.

"I have pleasure in sending you two numbers of the Southern Medical and Surgical Journal,-a journal issued by the faculty of the college, containing these two cases, and am gratified to perceive that they contain besides these, articles from Professors Means and Ford, by which you may be able to judge of their professional character.

"I have requested Dr. Dugas to furnish me a short statement of a third operation, still more wonderful, performed recently upon the same patient, which if I receive in time I will inclose; and if not, I will send the number of the journal that may hereafter contain it, to your address.

"I have neglected to say that the professors and other gentlemen present are men of the highest character.

"To Robert H. Gould,

"M. M. DYE, Mayor, C. A.

"26, Henrietta Street, Covent Garden,

"London."

"State of Georgia, U.S.A.

City of Augusta.

"I, W. Milo Olin, Clerk of the City Council of the City of Augusta, truly certify that the Hon. M.

M. Dye, whose name is affixed to the forgoing communication, is the Mayor of the City of Augusta, and that said signature is genuine.

"In testimony, whereof, I have signed my name, and affixed the Corporate Seal of said City, this 26th day of December, 1845.

"W. MILO OLIN.

"Clerk of the City Council,

"City of Augusta, Georgia.

"[Seal of the City Council, Augusta.]”

Unhappily the disease returned a second time, and the following private account of the third operation was received early enough for transmission to Mr. Gould with the preceding letter by the Honourable the Mayor of Augusta.

"To his Honor Martin M. Dye, Mayor of the City of Augusta.

"Dear Sir,-In compliance with your desire, I furnish you a brief statement of the third and last operation performed on Mrs. Clarke, whilst under the mesmeric influence. A more detailed account of it will be inserted probably in the next number of the Southern Medical and Surgical Journal, a copy of which I will cheerfully present you.

"The subject of these remarks is one whose name has already been twice before the public. About the middle of November last, Mrs. Clarke came to the city, and I found that she was suffering considerable annoyance from pain in the right mammary region, which sometimes darted towards the armpit of the same side; that there were two indurated lumps to be felt beneath the skin in the neighbourhood of the cicatrix resulting from the last operation, and that one of the axillary glands was considerably enlarged. Her general health not as good as usual; irregular febrile paroxysms occurring frequently, especially at night; very low-spirited and apprehensive that another operation would certainly prove fatal, particularly if the arm-pit had to be attacked.

"Perceiving, however, that the removal of the tumors was all that could be done with the slightest possibility of averting their rapid development, she consented to have those removed from the mammary region first, and, after the wound had healed, she would submit to the more formidable operation on the axilla, if she bore the first without pain. With this understanding, she was daily mesmerised by Mr. Kenrick with as much facility as heretofore. Whilst in this state I tested her sensibility and became satisfied that she would not feel the operation. I then determined to operate on the

19th day of November, to remove the mammary tumors first, and if she proved to be insensible, to go on immediately to the extirpation of the axillary gland. This determination was carefully concealed from the patient and her friends.

“ On the appointed day, Mrs. C. was mesmerised at about half-past 9 o'clock, a.m., and the operation commenced at about half-past 10. Mr. Kenrick, still preferring to be blindfolded, lest he might be affected, a handkerchief was placed over his eyes, and he held the hands of the patient in his own during the operation. The two tumors on the chest were included between two elliptic incisions, each about three inches long, and dissected out. It was then perceived that some of the adjacent tissue had a bad appearance, and this was removed along with another small portion of skin.

"No evidence of sensibility having been evinced, I announced my intention to proceed to the axilla, and did so after some delay in arresting the bleeding of the wound just made. An incision about four inches long was made through the skin and subcutaneous cellular tissue of the axilla, and the tumor gradually detached by lacerating the surrounding tissues with an ordinary grooved director. The nervous filaments, so numerous in this region, were broken either with a director or with forceps in such a manner as PURPOSELY to produce the GREATEST POSSIBLE PAIN. The tumor was globular, about an inch and a half in diameter, and much softer than the normal tissue of these glands. It was very easily torn by the hooks used in elevating it, which, together with the great depth of its position, the use of blunt instead of cutting instruments, and the conviction on the part of the surgeon that as he gave his patient no pain haste was unnecessary, all combined to consume much more time than is usually required for such operations. About an hour elapsed from the commencement of the first extirpation to the termination of the last. The wounds were allowed to remain open about an hour more and then dressed with adhesive strips. The patient's dress was then adjusted, and she was permitted to sleep until half-past 2 o'clock, p.m., when her mesmeriser aroused her by an effort of volition, without word or contact.

"During the whole time the patient remained perfectly quiet, and gave no indication whatever of sensibility nor of muscular contraction. Lying in the horizontal position, her right arm was raised and placed over the head and remained so during the entire operation, no other person touching her but the mesmeriser and surgeon. There were present Professors Ford and Means, of the Med. College of

Georgia; Doctors J. Carter, J. A. Hammond, H. F. Campbell, W. H. Tutt, E. Barry, Hitchcock (of the U. S. Army); and Messrs. Wright (Judge of the Superior Court of Georgia), J. Harris, jun., and L. C. Dugas, Esq., also Dr. Wilson. "I am, very respectfully,

"Your obedient Servant,

"L. A. DUGAS, M.D.,

Prof. Physiol. and Path. Anat. in the
Med. Col. of Georgia.

"Augusta, Georgia, 26th December, 1845."

For these accounts I am indebted to Mr. Gould, late of the United States' Legation, from whom they were kindly brought to me by Dr. Brabant, of Devizes.

I shall be pardoned for expressing my extreme regret that mesmerism was not daily employed after each operation by these enlightened gentlemen to prevent or retard the return of the disease. The surgical removal of cancer of the breast or uterus very rarely prevents a return of the disease. Surgeons sometimes operate upon those parts when there is no cancer, and then boast of the permanent success of their operation. I have known very many examples of this; and I have known operations proposed, have prevented them, and cured the disease by hydriodate of potass, employed externally and internally, being satisfied it was not cancerous. A lady at Leicester, where the medical men have witnessed such results of mesmerism that it is a very great disgrace to them, as mere men, not as professedly scientific and medical men, not to employ it extensively instead of being contented with making their daily rounds to write for only draughts, lotions, ointments, &c., well remembers that some years ago a great city operator of one of the borough hospitals assured her that her safety required her breast to be cut away within a very few days, and that I assured her she had no cancer at all, and cured her to this hour by one prescription for hydriodate of potass, internally and externally. Mild diseases are sometimes pronounced dangerous, and mild and curable diseases called by the names of severe and incurable ones, and a cure is afterwards declared to have been effected; and this is the habitual rascality of professed quacks. We have no remedy for cancer. But I am treating an instance of it in the breast with astonishing advantage by mesmerism. A single person, nearly forty years old, had a genuine scirrhous tumor of the right breast. It was of stony hardness, and the seat of severe stabbing pains which prevented her from sleep

ing except by snatches, and for more than five hours altogether in the night, and the pain went as low as the elbow: the nipple was drawn in, and the surrounding surface puckered. Her frame was grown very feeble, her flesh wasted, her appetite impaired, and her pulse was quick and weak,—like the American lady, "she began to suffer almost daily with slow fever." I began in March, 1843, to mesmerise her with the view of enabling her to go through the extirpation of her breast without suffering. After mesmerising her daily half an hour for a month, sleep was induced: but for six months the sleep did not increase, and the faintest word spoken to her always woke her up, and she felt pinching and was awakened by it. In September I left town for a continental holiday of six weeks. The family general practitioner, Mr. Powel, of Coram Street, who had nothing to do with her case, and, notwithstanding he had witnessed the facts at University College Hospital, followed the worthy doctors and surgeons of the place in considering mesmerism all a humbug, though he is now converted, assured her in my absence that, if the breast was not removed immediately, it would be as big as his hat before Christmas and she would then soon die. He took her to Mr. Samuel Cooper, Professor of Surgery at University College, who thought the operation might be deferred till my return, but could not with safety be deferred any longer. She wisely and honestly disregarded what they said, considering herself under the care of me alone. I had left her in charge of a person to be mesmerised for me; but, on my return, found she had retrograded in her health and sufferings. However, I myself took her in hand again, and in a few weeks by my again devoting half an hour daily to her she presently improved in all respects; and, in about eight months from the time I first took her in hand, went into sleep-waking, answering questions in a whisper without waking, and bearing any pinching or pricking without notice. In March (1844) she had a severe pleurisy on the same side as the cancer. I had her bled in the mesmeric state without her knowledge, and she bore efficient blisters without the slightest sensation; for, as any one could send her to sleep by a few passes, she was kept asleep nearly all day and night by her family mesmerising her whenever she had been awoke spontaneously for a very short time; and had abundance of the sweetest repose without any narcotic, and only four doses of medicine were taken.* I was not then aware of the power of local mesmerism over inflammation, and therefore did not employ it. Her recovery was rapid, and the renewal

See this little history in The Zoist, Vol. II., p. 91; April, 1844.