EPILEPSY. 461 



transversal section of a lateral half, the side of the face and 

 neck which, when irritated, may produce the fit, is on the 

 side of the injury ; i.e., if the lesion is on the right side of 

 the cord, it is the right side of the face and neck which are 

 able to cause convulsions, and vice versa. If the two sides 

 of the cord have been injured, the two sides of the face and 

 neck have the faculty of producing fits when they are irri- 

 tated. No other part of the body but a portion of the face 

 and neck has this faculty. In the face, the parts of the 

 skin animated by the ophthalmic nerve cannot cause the 

 fits ; and of the two other branches of the trigeminal nerve, 

 only a few filaments have the property of producing con- 

 vulsions. Among these filaments, the most powerful, in 

 this respect, seem to be some of those of the suborbitary 

 and of the auriculo-temporalis. A few filaments of the 

 second, and perhaps of the third cervical nerves, have also 

 this property of producing fits. In the face, the following 

 parts may be irritated without inducing a fit : the nostrils, 

 the lips, the ears, and the skin of the forehead and that of 

 the head. In the neck, there is the same negative result 

 when an irritation is brought upon the parts in the neigh- 

 bourhood of the median line, either in front or behind. On 

 the contrary, a fit always follows an irritation of some 

 violence when it is made in any part of a zone limited by 

 the four following lines : one uniting the ear to the eye ; a 

 second from the eye to the middle of the length of the 

 inferior maxillary bone ; a third which unites the inferior 

 extremity of the second line to the angle of the inferior 

 jaw ; and a fourth which forms half a circle, and goes from 

 this angle to the ear, and the convexity of which approaches 

 the shoulder." 



Dr Brown -Sequard further on adds : " The following 

 description of these convulsions will show that, if they are 



