THE OLD PHRENOLOGY AND THE NEW. 489 



brain-substance itself is utterly non-sensitive, as every hospital-surgeon 

 can tell us. Persons may actually recover from serious injuries of the 

 brain in which several ounces of brain-substance may have been lost, 

 and recover with good effect, and in many cases without any percepti- 

 ble alteration of their mental peculiarity. The most notorious case of 

 this kind is known as " the American crow-bar case." A bar of iron 

 accidentally shot off from a blast passed through the top of a young 

 man's head at the left side of the forehead, having traversed the front 

 part of the left hemisphere or side of the brain. The iron bar measured 

 three feet in length, and weighed fourteen pounds. After the accident 

 he felt no pain, and was able to walk without help in a few hours' time. 

 The man made a good recovery, and for twelve years made a livelihood 

 by exhibiting himself in the United States, his skull being now pre- 

 served in the museum of Harvard University. This patient undoubtedly 

 lost a relatively large portion of his brain-substance. At one fell swoop 

 there must have been a considerable destruction of phrenological organs. 

 Yet he suiFered from no deprivation of intelligence ; and few would 

 dream of associating the drinking habits which finally beset him with 

 his accident and with his loss of brains, or otherwise maintain that he 

 was less rational before than after the accident. Thus the misfortunes 

 of existence and the experimentation of the physiologist positively 

 contradict the old phrenology, and assert that localization of function 

 does exist, it is true, but that the " organs " of the phrenologist are 

 mere theoretical nonentities, without a trace of substance to insure 

 their stability or real nature. 



What amount of localization, then, can be safely assumed to exist 

 in the human brain as revealed by recent experimentation ? It may be 

 known to the generality of readers that the movements, acts, and prob- 

 ably ideas relating to one side of the body are regulated by the oppo- 

 site side or hemisphere of the brain. Thus, convulsions affecting one 

 side of the body were shown by Dr. Hughlings Jackson to be caused 

 by disease of the opposite side, and the idea of the duality of the 

 brain's action followed in a natural sequence on the observation of facts 

 like the preceding. Thus, as a general rule, it may be affirmed that 

 brain-disease itself, or the ideas of natural existence, are so far localized 

 that their perfect effects are only visible and appreciated when the same 

 parts in both halves or hemispheres of the brain are affected. To illus- 

 trate what the new phrenology has to say regarding the localization of 

 the brain-functions, let us inquire what is known regarding the exceed- 

 ingly curious condition known as " aphasia." Persons affected with 

 this lesion understand perfectly what is said to them, but they are ab- 

 solutely speechless, and can not utter a single word. Now, it is a per- 

 fectly well-ascertained fact that aphasia is associated with disease of 

 the front part of the left half or hemisphere of the brain — a part which 

 may therefore be called the " speech-center." The curious fact must 

 thus be emphasized that aphasia is invariably associated with disease 

 \ou xiv. — 32 



