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Tidal Theory of tlie Forms of Comets. By 

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" Papillo." Organ of the New York Ento- 

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 uary, 1881. Pp. 1^. ubscription, $2 per annum 

 (,ten numbers). 



Third Annual Announcement of the Normal 

 and Scientific School, Morris, Illinois. Morris. 

 1880. Pp. 2a. 



On the Constitution of the Naphthalines and 

 their Derivatives. By M. M. P. Keverdin and E. 

 Ngtting. Tra islated from the Gerraun by M. 

 Benjamin, Ph. B., and T. Tonnele, Pli. B. Pp. 8. 



Indications of Character in the Head and 

 Face. Bv U. S. Drayton, A. M. Illuati'ated. 

 New Yoi-k : Fowler & Wells. 1851. Pp. 48. 

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Pueblo Pottery. By F. W. Putnam. From the 

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The Spirit of Education. By M. I'Abbe Ama- 

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 Syracuse. New York: C. \V. Bardeen. 1881. Pp. 

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Reminiscences of Dr. Spurzheim and George 

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Drugs that enslave. The Opium, Morphine, 

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First German Book. After the Natural or 

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The Baldwin Locomotive Works. Illustrated. 

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The Human Body : An Account of its Struc- 

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POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



Au Epidemic of Hystero-Dfmonoiua- 

 nia. An Italian physician, Dr. Franzolini, 

 has published an account of an hystero-de- 

 moniac epidemic which prevailed in the ru- 

 ral district of Verzcguis, province of Friuli, 

 Italy, in 1878, and which he and Dr. Chiap 

 were commissioned by the Prefect of Udine 

 to examine. The commune contains about 

 eighteen hundred inhabitants, of whom, at 

 the time the inquest was made, sixty-two 

 women and eleven men in two of its four 

 subdivisions were sick, the majority of them 

 with nervous affections of different degrees 

 of intensity, and generally of the hysteric 

 form without convulsions or delirium. The 

 people of the commune were of infei^or in- 

 tellectual capacity and development, enjoyed 

 little communication with the world, had 

 been in the habit of intermarrying with each 

 other and often with relatives of the third 



and fourth degrees, and were uneducated, and 

 greatly under the influence of the priests. 

 In November, 1877, previous to the appear- 

 ance of the disease, the Jesuits had con- 

 ducted a mission in the commune, with ex- 

 ercises and services occupying nearly all 

 the time for several days. A general, in- 

 tense religious excitement was thus pro- 

 duced. Two months afterward, Margherita 

 Vidusson, a delicate girl twenty-six years 

 old, who had already had hysteric symp- 

 toms, supposed to arise from simple ner- 

 vous disease, for eight years, was attacked 

 v/ith convulsive fits, accompanied with lam- 

 entations and cries, which were repeated 

 with varying frequency, intensity, and dura- 

 tion. Sometimes she would have ten or 

 twelve short and quite distinct attacks in a 

 day ; at other times the attacks would con- 

 tinue through the day and night, with alter- 

 native remissions and exacerbations. The 

 most intense attacks corresponded with the 

 catamenial period. Physical remedies were 

 employed at first against the disease, but 

 the girl was at last believed to be super- 

 naturally possessed, and the priests were 

 called in to practice their exorcisms upon 

 her. The affection then seemed to become 

 more violent and its manifestations to as- 

 sume a more dramatic form after each priest- 

 ly visitation. A second person was attacked 

 in a similar manner in July, 1878, then 

 a third and a fourth. A commission of 

 priests was sent to examine into the cases, 

 a solemn mass was held, and other exercises 

 were instituted, after which the malady took 

 a new start and became epidemic. Drs. 

 Franzolini and Chiap were appointed at 

 this time to investigate the character of 

 the disease, and suggest measures for ar- 

 resting it. They found eighteen persons 

 suffering from violent attacks, all of whom 

 were of marriageable ages, from seventeen 

 to twenty-six years old ; one was forty-five, 

 another fifty-five, and a third sixty-three. 

 The symptoms of hysteria in its most sim- 

 ple form, without convulsions or mental ab- 

 erration, had been observed in all of them 

 for from one or two to five or ten years be- 

 fore the development of the morbid form. 

 In some of them the symptoms of the for- 

 mer form ceased on the appearance of those 

 of the latter. At a given moment in the 

 course of the simple form, new symptoms 



