62 HYPNOTISM AND ALLIED PHENOMENA. 



sensory disturbances. Suicidal ideas and mania had dis- 

 appeared under the use of the method. He had succeeded in 

 curing dipsomania and morphinomania, as well as obstinate 

 cases of juvenile depravity. Some of his patients had been 

 put to sleep for from six to eight days. He had been able to 

 transform his patients' habits of thought, and had brought 

 them to love the good, whereas they before had only loved 

 the evil. Dr. Yellowlees expressed amazement at these asser- 

 tions, and remained incredulous, but Dr. Tuckey confirmed 

 them from his experience of the practice of Dr. Liebault, who 

 had successfully treated dipsomania and neuralgia. He cited 

 the institution at Croydon, conducted by the Eev. Arthur 

 Tooth, for the treatment of inebriates, where hypnotism was 

 employed with much success, but he had beoii disappointed in 

 the results of its application to the cure of melancholia, only 

 6 per cent, of the patients having proved susceptible. In the 

 majority of cases it was not true that a patient after 

 hynotism remained a mere tool in the hands of the operator. 

 Dr. Ireland remarked that Braid hud made claims as 

 startling as those of Dr. Voisin. In one instance which he 

 had published a flow of milk had been brought into one 

 breast of a woman, while the Other remained flaccid. Dr. 

 Robertson said he had visited the Salpe'triere Asylum, and 

 could corroborate Dr. Voisin. Dr. Percy Smith, of Bethlem 

 Hospital, concurred with Dr. Yellowlees. He had made trial 

 of the method with the assistance of a professional hypnotiser, 

 and the results had been almost entirely negative ; in feet, he 

 had not been able to get insane patients into the hypnotic 

 state. It seemed impossible to secure the necessary attention. 

 This view of the question was confirmed by Dr. Goodall and 

 others. Dr. Tumbull Smith asserted that in his experience 

 nineteen patients out of every twenty had proved to be sus- 

 ceptible, but in some cases only alter repeated attempts. 

 Exhaustion of the optic nerve by means of staring had been 

 found most efficacious. 



This divergence of opinion extends to the methods recom- 

 mended. Dr. Forel, of Zurich, states that he had noticed 

 very ill-effects from using what he terms " the old bad method 

 of fixation of vision." 



Last year the attention of the medical profession in Eu gland 

 was aroused by the report of a meeting held at Leeds, on 

 March 28, of some sixty medical men and dentists assembled, 

 at the invitation of Messrs. Carter Brothers, to witness a 

 series of operations under the hypnotic influence of Dr. Milne 

 Bramwell. 



The first case was hypnotised at a word, and three teeth 

 extracted without the operation having been felt. 



The next case was that of a servant girl, M. A. W., aged 

 19, on whom, under the hypnotic influence induced by Dr. 



