ON CERTAIN PHENOMENA OF HYPNOTISM. 99 



When he spoke she did not answer his questions ; when he laid 

 his hand on her shoulder she was unconscious of the contact ; 

 and when he stood in her way she walked on and was alarmed to 

 encounter an invisible object. On another occasion a patient was 

 terrified when a gentleman, who had been rendered invisible by 

 suggestion, took off his hat. She saw a hat describing circles in 

 the air, without anything apparent to set it in motion. M. M. 

 Binet and Fere say they are utterly unable to account for these 

 phenomena. Yet, is there anything in the above facts differing 

 greatly from what occurs in everyday life, especially to those 

 among us who possess the rather doubtful gift of abstraction ? 

 Are we not every day of our lives utterly deaf and blind to loud 

 sounds and conspicuous objects, either from habit, from not 

 expecting to see or hear anything, or from pre-occupation with 

 some train of thought which makes the highest centres of the 

 brain utterly oblivious of everything passing outside ? If we think 

 some object we require is in the next room, we probably go to 

 fetch it, even if it is lying exactly in front of our noses ; if an 

 express train goes by, or a cannon is fired within a few yards of us, 

 we notice neither the one nor the other if we are accustomed to 

 the sound ; and many of us can read and write in the midst of all 

 the noise a young and healthy family is capable of making. There 

 seems nothing particularly wonderful in the fact that a highly 

 sensitive subject should not see some object in front of her eyes if 

 she is told she will not see it. 



Dr. Carpenter tells many odd incidents with regard to the 

 absence of mind of Dr. R. Hamilton, a distinguished professor at 

 Aberdeen. He would give lectures, with a white stocking of his 

 wife's on one leg and a black stocking of his own on the other ; 

 he did not recognise his wife if he met her in the street, and 

 would apologise for not having the pleasure of her acquaintance ; 

 and if he ran against a cow in the road he would beg her pardon, 

 call her " Madam,'' and hope she was not hurt. 



Amongst the curious facts attending suggestion which I hope 

 to show are also not unparallelled in ordinary life, is the obedience 

 of subjects to commands directing them to do or to feel something 

 at a given hour and at some distant date ; and the utter 

 want of recollection on the part of the subject that he is not acting 



