CLASS III. 1. 2. 1. OF VOLITION. 307 



her in greater or less degree for about two years; she then re- 

 covered perfectly, and is now a cheerful old woman. 



Mrs. , a farmer's wife, going up stairs to dress, found 



the curtains of her bed drawn, and on undrawing them, she be- 

 lieved that she saw the corpse of her sister, who was then ill at 

 the distance of twenty miles, and became from that time insane; 

 and as her sister died about that time, she could not be produced 

 to counteract the insane hallucination, but she perfectly recovered 

 in a few months. 



Mrs. , a most elegant, beautiful, and accomplished lady, 



about twenty-two years of age, had been married about two 

 months to an elegant, polished, and affluent young man, and it 

 was well known to be a love-match on both sides. She sud- 

 denly became melancholy, and yet not to so great a degree, but 

 that she could command herself to do the honours of her table 

 with grace and apparent ease. After many days entreaty, she 

 at length told me, that she thought her marrying her husband 

 had made him unhappy; and that this idea she could not efface 

 from her mind day or night. I withstood her being confined, 

 as some had advised, and proposed a sea- voyage to her, with ex- 

 pectation that the sickness as well as change of objects, might 

 remove the insane hallucination by introducing other energetic 

 ideas; this was not complied with, but she travelled about Eng- 

 land with her friends and her husband for many months, and 

 at length perfectly recovered, and is now I am informed in health 

 and spirits. 



These cases are related to shew the utility of endeavouring to 

 investigate the maniacal idea, or hallucination; as it may not 

 only acquaint us with the probable designs of the patient, from 

 whence may be deduced the necessity of confinement; but also 

 may some time lead to the most effectual plan of cure. 



I received good information of the truth of the following case, 

 which was published a few years ago in the newspapers. A 

 young farmer in Warwickshire, finding his hedges broke, and 

 the sticks carried away during a frosty season, determined to 

 watch for the thief. He lay many cold hours under a hay- 

 stack, and at length an old woman, like a witch in a play, ap- 

 proached, and began to pull up the hedge; he waited till she had 

 tied up her bottle of sticks, and was carrying them off, that he 

 might convict her of the theft, and then springing from his con- 

 cealment, he seized his prey with violent threats. After some 

 altercation, in which her load was left upon the ground, she 

 kneeled upon her bottle of sticks, and raising her arms to Heaven 

 beneath the bright moon then at the full, spoke to the farmer al- 

 ready shivering with cold, u Heaven grant, that thou never mayest 



