6oz THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



given, such as " Open your eyes," " Sit up," etc., and to answer simple ques- 

 tions by writing. lie could be made to write anything to dictation ; but when- 

 ever ordered to indite a letter, he constantly reproduced one ho had written 

 shortly before this attack. 



Finally, be was found to have lost sensation in the left side ; and the appli- 

 cation of magnets to the skin produced some of the alterations of feeling char- 

 acteristic of hysterical hemianaesthesia. Powerful electrization, though it failed 

 to rouse him up, induced convulsions and spasms, typical of tbe regular hystero- 

 epilectic seizure. 



There is thus no doubt left us as to the nature of the case of " the 

 Soho sleeper." Among other instances of attacks of sleep in the course 

 of hystero-epilepsy, I may mention a patient whom Professor Charcot 

 has had under his observation for many years : 



She first came to the Salpetriere Hospital in 1862, and presented many of 

 tbe alterations of sensation and movement characteristic of tbe disorder. On 

 April 7, 1875, she was seized with somnolency, which persisted with temporary 

 awakenings till tbe 27th. There occurred then a violent outburst of paroxys- 

 mal laughter and weeping. From that moment the patient passed into a cata- 

 leptic condition, with occasional hysterical fits of the same description. She had 

 to be fed with a spoon ; she swallowed as if automatically, with a noise, but 

 without any signs of consciousness. She awoke quite abruptly on the 7th of 

 June, and affirmed that she had no recollection of what had taken place during 

 the past two months. There occurred in 187G another fit of the same kind, that 

 lasted about a fortnight. 



In order to illustrate further the intimate connection between cer- 

 tain morbid forms of sleep and the hysterical state, I shall briefly allude 

 to the so-called "hysterogenic" and "hypnogenic" pressure-points 

 discovered by Professors Charcot and Pitres. 



A very remarkable phenomenon connected with grave hysteria is 

 the artificial production and arrest of attacks by pressure on certain 

 points on the surface of the body. The number and distribution of 

 these points are very variable, and they differ in every case. They 

 usually can only be found out by careful search, the patients themselves 

 ignoring the existence of them. 



On pressure being exerted upon one of these " hysterogenic " spots, 

 the patient falls into a convulsive or tetanic spasm, and the various 

 phases of the attack succeed one another much in the same order as 

 in a spontaneous fit. Now it is a curious fact that a repetition of the 

 pressure on the same spot, or on some other spot experimentally dis- 

 covered, will often abruptly modify or arrest the attack. The great 

 theoretical and practical importance of this singular property of cer- 

 tain circumscribed cutaneous areas, has directed the investigations of 

 several careful observers, and led to the discovery of similar spots, 

 called "hypnogenic," pressure upon which determines, not a muscular 

 spasm or convulsion, but an attack of hypnotic sleep. 



These hypnogenic areas are likewise irregular in their number and 



