50 FUNCTIONAL INERTIA 



other emotional and intellectual alterations are only 

 partly explained by reflex irritation from the hyper- 

 aemic internal genitalia." That is to say, affect- 

 ability alone will not give a full account of this 

 general phasic disturbance we need not search in 

 the environment for " sufficient causes " of it. The 

 pulse in respect of fulness and rate undergoes a 

 monthly rhythm (Cullen), the blood-pressure is at a 

 maximum from one to seven days before the onset of 

 the discharge (Jacobi), and falls to a minimum two 

 days after its cessation, the monthly temperature 

 curve is highest a few days before the illness, and 

 during the flow the urea is diminished and the uric 

 acid increased (Haig). All this is expressed by 

 saying that there is in the female a great metabolic 

 28-day rhythm, a waxing and a waning alternately 

 in the intensity of the tissue-changes ; the meaning 

 and purpose of which does not at present concern us. 

 Is there anything analogous in the male metabolism ? 

 Dr. Harry Campbell * in his suggestive work has 

 a chapter entitled : ' Is the menstrual rhythm 

 peculiar to the female sex ? " and he answers it in 

 the negative. He quotes cases in the male of periodic 

 bleedings from ulcers, haemorrhoids and kidney 

 (recurrent haematuria), and endeavours from the 

 rhythmicality observed in attacks of hemicrania 

 in the male to corroborate his negative. Now the 

 periodicity of this last-mentioned ailment is the 

 most peculiar thing about it. Professor Osier, f 



* Harry Campbell, " Differences in the Nervous Organisation of 

 Man and Woman." (London: Lewis, 1891.) 



I Osier, " Text-book of Medicine," p. ion. (Pentland, 1895.) 



