ON THE ORGANIC FUNCTIONS. 877 



under such circumstances, than the fear that her own beloved child should 

 be taken from her, as that of her friend had been ; and it is probable that 

 she had been particularly dwelling on it, at the time of nursing the infant 

 on that morning. Another instance, in which the maternal influence was 

 less certain, but in which it was not improbably the immediate cause of the fatal 

 termination, occurred in a family nearly related to the Author's. The mother 

 had lost several children in early infancy from a convulsive disorder ; one 

 infant, however, survived the usually fatal period ; but whilst nursing him 

 one morning, she had been strongly dwelling on the fear of losing him also, 

 although he appeared a very healthy child. In a few minutes after the in- 

 fant had been transferred into the arms of the nurse, and whilst she was 

 urging her mistress to take a more cheerful view, directing her attention to 

 his thriving appearance, he was seized with a convulsion fit, and died almost 

 instantly. Now although there was here unquestionably a predisposing 

 cause, of which there is no evidence in the other cases, it can scarely be 

 doubted that the exciting cause of the fatal disorder is to be referred to the 

 mother's anxiety. This case offers a valuable suggestion, which, indeed, 

 would be afforded by other considerations, that an infant under such cir- 

 cumstances should not be nursed by its mother, but by another woman of 

 placid temperament, who has reared healthy children of her own. 



724. There is abundant evidence that a sudden and violent excitement of 

 some depressing Emotion, especially Terror, may produce a severe and even 

 a fatal disturbance of the Organic functions; with general symptoms (as 

 Guislain : has remarked) so strongly resembling those of sedative Poisoning, 

 as to make it highly probable that the blood is directly affected by the Emo- 

 tional state, through Nervous agency ; and, in fact, the emotional alteration 

 of various secretions, just alluded to ( 721, 723), seems much more prob- 

 ably attributable to some such affection of the blood, than to a primary 

 disturbance of the secreting process itself. Although there can be no doubt 

 that the habitual state of the Emotional sensibility has an important influ- 

 ence upon the general activity and perfection of the Nutritive processes, 

 as is shown by the well-nourished appearance usually exhibited by those 

 who are free from mental anxiety as well as from bodily ailment, contrasted 

 with the " lean and hungry look " of those who are a prey to continual dis- 

 quietude, yet it is not often that we have the opportunity of observing the 

 production of change in the nutrition of any specific part, by strong emo- 

 tional excitement. In the two following cases, the correspondence of the 

 effects to their alleged causes may have been only casual ; and a much larger 

 collection of facts would be needed to establish the rationale here advanced 

 as probable. But so many analogous though less strongly-marked phenom- 

 ena are presented in the records of medical experience, and the influence of 

 the Emotions upon the products of Secretion is so confirmatory, that there 

 does not seem any reasonable ground for hesitation, in admitting that the 

 same explanation may apply here also. The first of these cases, cited by 

 Guislaiu (loc. cit.) from Kidard, is that of a woman who, after seeing her 

 daughter violently beaten, was seized with great terror, and suddenly became 

 affected with gangrenous erysipelas of the right breast. But a still more 

 remarkable example of local disorder of nutrition, occasioned by powerful 

 emotion, and determined as to its seat by the intense direction of the atten- 

 tion to a particular part of the body, is narrated by Mr. Carter. 2 " A lady 

 who was watching her little child at play, saw a heavy window-sash fall upon 

 its hand, cutting off three of the fingers ; and she was so much overcome by 



1 Le9ons Orales sur les Phrenopathies, torn, iii, pp. 165-168. 



2 On the Pathology and Treatment of Hysteria, p. 24. 



