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anger, blush for shame, turn white with fear, glow with ambition, or be stirred by religious ardour. All this the biologiser can do with a susceptible subject; and all this has been repeatedly witnessed by thousands of intelligent persons, and is altogether beyond the possibility of doubt. Now it must be observed, that there is no particular virtue in the metallic disc, or other object held in the hand; for it matters not what that object may be; nay, it will generally suffice if the person gazes only at the tips of his own fingers, or at the eye of another person as in ordinary mesmerism. The chief end of the operation seems to be the withdrawal of the attention from surrounding objects, and the disposing of the mind to receive more readily, and more fixedly, the ideas about to be impressed upon it by the experimenter. It is a state in some degree analogous to that of reverie.

It is important that we should remember that this biologic state of mind arises in some persons spontaneously; that it sometimes is found to exist without any previous artificial preparation. Thus a biologiser may sometimes present to a person, to whom he has only the moment before been introduced, a penny piece, and ask him if he does not admire that beautiful bouquet. A very susceptible individual will take the copper coin, hold it to his nose, and reply that it has indeed a delicious fragrance. The observation of these phenomena teaches us that there exists a class of persons, of sane and sound mind, but of so highly impressible a character, that if they fall under the influence of others of a firmer and more constant will, they may readily be made to believe even what is preposterous and impossible, and to act in perfect innocence of heart, as tools in the perpetration of almost any nefarious business. An idea confidently presented to these persons (we speak only of those who are extremely susceptible), however false and ridiculous, has to them all the force of reality, and determines their conduct as much as genuine occurrences guide the actions of ordinary men. But persons of this biological mind are equally affected by ideas, not purposely offered to them by another, but accidentally picked up, particularly if the idea

received be of an unusually exciting nature. For example, it happened once that a person committed suicide by precipitating himself from the top of the Monument in Fish Street Hill, London. This occurrence created a great sensation

it was talked about everywhere, in all companies, and was in itself an occurrence likely powerfully to arrest the attention.

Shortly afterwards, another individual killed herself in precisely the same manner! Now there can be no doubt but that this second suicide was a person, possessed of the biologic mind, who had heard so much of the first horrible accident, that it became permanently impressed upon her mind. The idea of self-murder by throwing one's self from the top of the monument, haunted her, and she was irresistibly impelled to realise the dreadful conception. She might be said to be spontaneously biologised. These reflections have been forced upon us by the perusal of a short paragraph in The Times of January 25th ult., which we proceed to lay before the reader: It has often been remarked that in this country a public execution is generally followed closely by instances of death by hanging, either suicidal or accidental, in consequence of the powerful effect which the execution of a noted criminal produces upon morbid (?) and unnatural (?) minds. The ignominious death on the gallows of Barbour and Waddington, the Sheffield murderers, has been succeeded by two cases of hanging, both occuring this week at Sheffield, one of them at least having a clearly traceable connexion with the strange fascinating influence alluded to above. On Sunday last, the day after the execution of James Barbour, the inmates of the lunatic ward at the Sheffield Union Workhouse, conversed together for some time on the subject of that event, and the hanging of Alfred Waddington. Among those who entered earnestly into the conversation, was a person named George Palfrey, by trade a white-metal smith, and who has been to the lunatic asylum at Wakefield, and in the retreat ward at Sheffield for about 30 years. He was in such a stage of convalesence, that he was entrusted with the care of a patient, who

required frequent attention. Palfrey's imagination appears to have been inflamed by the exciting conversation, and such was its effect upon him, that during Sunday night he slipped out of the retreat ward, and having attached his neckerchief to a beam, he placed his neck within the sling, and throwing himself off a slight elevation upon which he was standing, hung suspended, with his feet just clear of the floor, until life was extinct. In that posture the dead body was found at an early hour on Monday morning.'

Cases of this nature suggest to our minds many important considerations, which we cannot here specify in full; but it is easy to see that they ought to convince parents of the supreme necessity of guarding their children (particularly if their children be at all weak

brained) against the influence which the persuasion of evil companions or the witnessing of evil scenes may exert upon them. These considerations will also render us more accessible to persons who grieve for past misdeeds, for they exhibit to us in a stronger light than we had seen it in before, the almost resistless power of the strong over the weak, and the occasional insuperable attraction of example. They will furnish an additional argument to those who assert that the spectacle of a public execution, if it deter some from the perpetration of crime, causes crime to be perpetrated by others, who without it would have remained innocent; and that therefore the abolition of our public hangings, if not of capital punishment altogether, is one of the requirements of these enlightened times.

CASE OF STRUMOUS DISEASE OF THE KNEE-JOINT, WITH EXTENSIVE ULCERATION AND CONTRACTION OF THE LEG, TREATED SUCCESSFULLY

BY HYDROPATHY.

The increased frequency in the number of sudden deaths among the better classes of society within the last twenty-five years is truly striking. Among its causes I reckon homœopathy, or the prolonged use of poisonous substances; hydropathy, or the act of rudely interfering with the natural functions of the heart and brain; also the burning of gas in sleeping apartments, lately introduced; and the mistaken horror of cupping, due to a most dangerous publication, entitled Fallacies of the Faculty.'-From an interesting pamphlet on the Sumbul, p. 26, by A. B. Granville, M.D., F.R.S.

JOHN BAYLIS, aged 18, residing at Lower Heyford, seven miles from Northampton, came to Dunstable on September 22nd, 1848, to pursue the Water Treatment. On January 1st, 1848, he was seized with rheumatic fever, attended with delirium, which lasted five weeks, and settled in the right leg, which became much swollen, and was three times the size of the other leg.

He was then confined to his bed sixteen weeks.

By the surgeon in attendance, the leg was bandaged daily for a week, tighter each time, till he could bear it no longer, from the excessive swelling and tenderness produced by the bandage at the knee. Large abscesses then appeared the whole length of the leg.

Early in March, the surgeon desired him to be sent to the infirmary at Northampton, to have the leg amputated at the thigh. A medical friend concurred in this opinion, as the only chance of saving the boy's life; but neither the boy nor his friends would consent to it. Linseed meal poultices and fomentations were then applied for about a fortnight; and bark, a quart of ale per day, and as much

wine as his father, a poor man, could procure for him, were administered, with no improvement, either to the constitution or the leg. He then gave up medicine, and discontinued the ale and the wine, and began to use Holloway's pills and ointment, which he continued during twenty-eight weeks, but derived no benefit. At this time a benevolent lady introduced him to my attention, but soon afterwards she wrote to me, saying that she regretted having sent him, as she had learnt from the medical attendant that his case was absolutely hopeless, unless amputation were resorted to.

On examining him, I found two-thirds of the right leg, at the inner part of the calf, presenting a deep and wide wound, penetrating in two or three places to the bone, which was distinctly visible.

It had the appearance of a deep ravine, and the odour from it was so fœtid as to be insupportable to himself and others.

There was a frequent discharge of thin blood, and also an acrid, sanious, purulent discharge.

The knee-joint was more than twice its natural size, extremely red, and so much

bent that he could scarcely put his toe to the ground, and could not raise it without the assistance of his hands. The joint was so excessively tender, that he could not bear the weight of the bed-clothes upon it. He had no appetite, but was always sick on attempting to take food. He seldom slept at night. The third day after commencing the watertreatment, he began to eat and sleep. He daily gained flesh and strength, and the leg began to heal. In about six weeks a piece of bone exfoliated from the leg.

In a fortnight, another piece, an inch and a quarter in length and three quarters of an in inch wide, presented itself, and subsequently some smaller pieces. He has now, January 11th, been under the treatment sixteen weeks; is able to walk on the ball of the foot, and can manage to go a few yards without his crutches. His diseased knee, from being double the size of the other, is at the present time but two inches larger in circumference, and he can bear to have it well rubbed without any uneasiness.

The water-cure has by some of its opponents been termed merely a palliative system; this case, however, proves it to be a truly curative method.

When the leg was sufficiently consolidated, and the health restored, I recommended him to take a long walk, and he walked ten miles

with perfect impunity at one time, and has done so more than once since.

I may now (February 5th, 1853) remark that he has been perfectly sound and well, both as regards the leg and the general health, ever since.

I cannot for a moment think, that had Dr. Granville seen this case, he would have spoken of hydropathy as the act of rudely interfering with the natural functions of the heart and brain.

How could the water-cure act in this disease otherwise than by aiding nature, and putting the nervous system and blood vessels in such a good condition, as to lead to a thorough renewal of the bodily health, a reproduction of new material in place of the diseased soft tissues, and a more rapid formation of healthy bone than could have taken place under any other known means of cure?

So satisfied am I as to the number of limbs that might be saved in our hospitals were this plan adopted, that I wrote a letter at the time to one of our leading hospital surgeons upon the subject, enclosing an account of the cure, but never received a reply.

Any person who doubts my veracity in detailing this case may see the young man, and may also see the large sequestra of diseased bone which exfoliated, which I have in my possession.

I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

Hydropathic Establishment, Dunstable, Bedfordshire. W. FORBES LAURIE, M.D., Edin.

CASE OF TYPHUS FEVER, WITH ACTIVE CONGESTION OF

THE

To the Editor of the Journal of Health. SIR-I have thought that a brief notice of the efficacy of the water-cure in acute diseases might not be unacceptable in your columns; especially as in most hydropathic treatises, attention is almost exclusively devoted to the application of its various methods of treatment in cases of a chronic kind. My own experience, however, for several years past, has convinced me that in many of the acute diseases, the result of which is so more than doubtful under allopathic treatment, a judicious employment of the means which hydropathy places at our disposal, will not less than in chronic ones, prove a very important addition to the curative art.

Of this, the following case will serve as some illustration.

This patient, a young lady, came under my care in November, 1845. Her brother and sister had just fallen victims to typhus, but not under hydropathic treatment. Her age was twenty-four, and the symptoms were as follows: Delirious, with incessant and

BRAIN.

incoherent talking, great excitement, anxious expression of countenance; constant movement and restlessness; complained of intense burning and distracting sensation within and at the top of the head, which was accompanied by general heat of the skin, more especially in the abdominal region.

Treatment.-For the general symptoms, successive entire damp-sheet packings, but each for only a short duration, were had recourse to. This was accomplished three times during the first twelve hours of the treatment, though not without some difficulty, owing to the extreme restlessness of the patient.

At the same time, thick diaper bandages several times doubled, and scarcely wrung out from fresh spring water, to which a freezing mixture was added, were applied to the scalp and forehead, and changed every few minutes as they became warm.

The packings were followed by tepid ablutions, and after the first of them the patient became cooler, soothed, and tranquil; and whenever the febrile exacerbation recurred,

the treatment was repeated, and in addition, a wet bandage was occasionally applied to the abdomen.

In this way, at the end of twelve hours, and after three packings, and the other means mentioned above, the fever was completely subdued, the head cool and comfortable, and the pulse, which previously could not be counted, was reduced to sixty.

Delicious and refreshing sleep, attended by agreeable perspiration, followed. From this time the treatment was modified, with the view of inducing a restorative and tonic rather than sedative effect; the damp sheet packings, which had been previously each only of a quarter of an hour's duration, were now prolonged, but were applied less frequently; the subsequent ablutions or baths were changed from tepid to cold, as circumstances indicated; and more and colder

water was given internally, and in a few weeks the patient was restored to her usual health. Thus, by the suitable adaptation of the simple means of hydropathy alone, we have been enabled to meet and check the various symptoms of this dangerous disease throughout its progress in an unusually aggravated case; and it may reasonably be questioned whether any other known methods of treatment could have been employed which would have had equally rapid effect in the earlier and more active stages of the disease, and at the same time have conduced to so speedy a restoration of health and strength.

I may add, that I have met with similar success in the use of the varied appliances of the water-cure in several other severe cases of this disease, as also in small-pox, croups, bronchitis, and other acute affections.

I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

Hydropathic Establishment, Dunstable, Bedfordshire. W. FORBES LAURIE, M.D., EDIN.

OVER-APPLICATION TO BUSINESS.

To the Editor of the Journal of Health. SIR-One cannot but have one's thoughts painfully drawn to the slavery which exists in this land of freedom. Such reflections are more especially brought before the mind by the recent reply of the American ladies to the English ladies on the subject of slavery. I am sorry to say that slaves of the needle are not the only slaves who present themselves to our notice in this country. I have had my attention painfully drawn to this matter, by having to undertake on several occasions the care of invalids who have been positively used up by their wealthproducing employers in the large cities. It is the custom, if a house of business meets with a person of integrity, talent, and activity of mind, to give him the work of two persons to perform, stimulating his acquisitiveness by awarding a salary which is commensurate in amount exactly to half of that which they would give to three persons in their employ.

This is looked upon as a more profitable method than to engage an individual to do a fair day's work for a fair day's wages, and puts one very strongly in mind of the remarks made by Legree, the slave dealer in Uncle Tom's Cabin, so ably depicted by Mrs. Stowe, where he says, 'That to use up the slaves, in fact, to shorten their lives by excessive exertions under the stimulus of the whip, and then to buy fresh slaves as he wants them, is the cheaper plan.

Though I would not for a moment attribute such intentions to houses of business in large cities, yet I have had too many

instances under my own eye of the practical results of their infringement of the laws of nature, which I impute to ignorance upon the subject, and a too keen desire for the speedy accumulation of wealth.

One patient who placed himself under my care, had occupied a very responsible situation in a large wholesale house in London, for which he had received a very liberal salary, but it was on consideration that he did the work of two persons. The consequence was, that he was able to retire at about forty-five years of age, with a worn-out constitution.

Though he has ever been of most temperate habits, he suffers much with his head, and I should by no means be surprised if the atonic congestion of the brain from which he suffers, should some day terminate in insanity.

The other case was that of a young man of healthy parents, and of previous good constitution and steady habits, and whom I had known for years. He was by the same cause thrown into a deep decline at thirty.

His salary had been ample, but the employment harassing in the extreme, with very late hours, and barely time allowed for his meals. He assured me that he was often ready to drop from exhaustion during the day, which compelled him to resort to stimulants to keep up his declining strength.

These are but specimens of many cases which I have witnessed, and which inhabitants of large cities know to be, alas, too frequent.

When we consider the impure state of the air in the metropolis, the injury to the eye

sight from the gas, and to the constitution generally, from the heat engendered thereby in shops, and the want of proper ventilation; it is only surprising that the mortality is not greater than it is. It seems as if God in his mercy had given us a knowledge of the water cure, and of the healthful and life-preserving means which follow in its train just at a time when the extreme follies of man most required it, for it is notorious that from our high state of civilization, and the artificial way in which we live, diseases of a nervous character have been gaining ground of late years, and are now more prevalent than ever they were, our lunatic asylums being an ample testimony to this fact.

Again, cannot the great increase of railway accidents be in some measure accounted for on the same principle. How can the mind and body of any man be kept week after week, and month after month, at high pressure, without giving way. What compensation can an increase of the dividends upon any line of railway be to the shareholders when they are conscious that it is at the price of blood; according to the accounts in the public journals, too few employées being kept, and dreadful accidents following as an inevitable consequence. It seems that when it is a question of profit, associations of individuals forget all about the golden rule of doing to others as they would be done by, blinding themselves to the fact, that a more liberal course would be better policy, and prove far more advantageous in the long run. One

great injury produced by this system to which I wish to draw attention is, that in consequence of persons in employment being overworked, they are prompted from time to time to take alcoholic stimulants to remove the depression of body and exhaustion of mind, produced by an excessive amount of labour, too great for the constitution. That this course gradually leads to bad habits, and Hydropathic Establishment, Dunstable.

OVERCROWDING IN CLERKENWELL.-Two persons residing in Pheasant court, Gray's - inn - lane, were charged with having more lodgers in one room than is allowed by law. It appeared from the evidence of police-serjeant No. 4, of the E division, that he had visited the rooms rented by the defendants, who are Irishmen, and in one apartment he found sixteen men and women, nearly in a state of nakedness, and swarming with vermin, lying or squatting indiscriminately on the bare boards. There were two children likewise in the same wretched place. In the room of the other

ultimately to intoxication and confirmed drunkenness, and consequent shortening of life, I have had had too many opportunities of observing.

It would be well if people would be just before they are generous; many who are now liberal donors to soup kitchens, hospitals, and charitable institutions, instead of satisfying themselves by merely contributing to these, wonld do far more good by carefully analyzing the causes of the distress they see around them, and by endeavouring to arrest its progress in the onset.

I have long thought that a society for the preservation of human life would be quite as valuable as a society for prevention of cruelty to animals. My reflections have been particularly drawn to this subject from the circumstance of a near relative having had a narrow escape of her life through the running away of a horse which was frightened in a confined street by a cart drawn by two dogs, rather more than a year since.

A motion was brought forward in the House of Cominons not long ago, the purport of which was to put a stop to these nuisances all over the country, but some gentlemen in parliament succeeded in getting the act restricted to a prohibition of this nuisance in London and fifteen miles round, urging that it would be an infringement upon the poor man's rights; so we are forsooth to have our lives endangered both by the fright of horses from this rapidly and extensively increasing annoyance, and from hydrophobia, which is sure to occur from dogs being over-driven in hot weather.

The cruelty to the dogs, which are not formed for draught, was never taken into consideration by the false philanthropy of these gentlemen, nor the circumstance that people's lives are just as valuable in the country and in the provincial towns as in London and fifteen miles thereof.

I am Sir, your obedient servant,
W. FORBES LAURIE, M. D. Edin.

HOUSES.

LODGING man, the same witness proved a like filthy scene, in language (necessary in the case) which occasioned a sickening sensation.

Mr. Tyrwhitt said, the testimony was certainly of a most revolting description, and, unhappily, too true; and he told the defendants, if the nuisances were not at once ended, he would commit them to prison for a lengthened period. They had slipped out of a country which evidently had tolerated such iniquities; but, while he would administer the law mercifully, every means should be taken to put down the vile practices described.

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