clxiv Journal of Comparative Neurology. 



Anatomical researches on the central nervous system seem also 

 to support this theory, an internal course for the auditory roots, sim- 

 ilar to that of the optic nerves being demonstrated by the observations 

 of such investigators as Flechsig, Bechtereu, Monakow, Zacher, &c. 



Ferrier cites two cases which confirm these researches, the con- 

 clusion being that the acoustic nerves have their terminations in the 

 temporal lobes and that bilateral lesions of these same lobes cause 

 complete deafness." 



Seppilli then reviews these observations and presents a new case 

 which came under his direct observation — a case of a woman who 

 was a deaf-mute from infancy. Lesion and atrophy were discovered 

 upon autopsy, the medullary substance of the temporal lobes being 

 almost entirely transformed into cicatricial tissue. Other adjacent 

 parts were normal. The patient showed evidences of having been 

 the victim of an encephalitic process from birth. In such cases the 

 relation of deaf-mutism to lesions of the temporal lobes is evident. 



Now it is natural that when the temporal lobes which preside over 

 the acoustic functions of language undergo a destructive lesion in 

 early infancy, the formation of verbal acoustic ideas is entirel)' pre- 

 vented, and in consequence of thus lacking the elements which serve 

 for the development and elaboration of motor verbal ideas, mutism is 

 necessarily produced. 



It has been affirmed with regard to motor aphasia that spoken 

 language is a function of the left cerebral hemisphere, that is, a man 

 in the act of speaking, as tar as his brain is concerned, is left-handed. 



This theory is justified by the results of the investigation into 

 several cases which can not be here detailed. Two sets of facts have 

 been thus established : 



First, that a lesion of the right temporal lobe gives origm in left- 

 handed people to verbal deafness, and that this is not caused in right- 

 handed individuals. 



Second, that left-handed people are not the subjects of verbal deaf- 

 ness unless the right temporal lobe is affected. 



From all which observations we may conclude that in left-handed 

 people the acoustic center of language has its seat, not in the left, but 

 in the right hemisphere. 



Nerve-endings iu the Auditory Organs 



Professor Lenhossek has applied Golgi's method to the Maculae 



1 M. V. Lenhossek. Die Nervendigungen im Gehororgan. Anat. Anz. 

 Erganzungsheff , VIII, 1893. 



