234 MARRIAGE AND DISEASE. 



Between rheumatism and chorea, or St. Vitus's Dance, 

 a disease which attacks great numbers of children 

 between the ages of seven and fifteen, though not 

 by any means confined to that period of life, there 

 is a most remarkable connection. Children who 

 have suffered from rheumatic fever, or whose parents 

 are rheumatic, are eminently prone to this disease. 

 M. See found that 56 per cent, of all the cases 

 of rheumatism admitted into the Hopital des Enfans 

 were complicated with chorea, and the late Dr. Hillier 

 stated that in 60 per cent, of his cases of chorea, 

 either the patients themselves, or one of their parents, 

 had been rheumatic. Dr. Copland first pointed out 

 this remarkable connection between rheumatism and 

 chorea, and many attempts have since been made 

 to explain it. Drs. Kirkes and Hughlings Jackson 

 have advanced a theory which is applicable in some 

 cases, but no one has yet advanced a theory which is 

 applicable to all. 



Here, then, we have positive evidence of an intimate 

 relationship existing between rheumatism and chorea. 

 Now let us see what chorea is. Chorea is a purely 

 nervous disease, whose symptoms are convulsive mus- 

 cular movements, hysterical mental disorder, and, in 

 chronic cases, permanent impairment of the intellect. 

 It generally comes on suddenly, and when any cause 

 is given by the child's friends, it is usually " fright," 

 which simply means that the child is of a nervous 

 temperament. One writer on chorea says: "It is 

 admitted that in a large proportion of cases there 



