NEURALGIA. 41 3 



or anything approaching them, that they infinitely prefer to be left perfectly quiet* 

 than tormented with useless measures." 



NERVOUSNESS. 



For information on this subject and on NERVOUS DEBILITY, the articles ANAEMIA, 

 p. 92, and DEBILITY, p. 207, may be consulted. 



NEURALGIA. 



In neuralgia, of whatever form, the pain is more or less intermittent. The patient 

 never suffers from it continuously with equal severity ; there are times when it 

 is either considerably better or altogether absent, and this is an essential feature of 

 the complaint. 



Another characteristic is that depressing influences of all kinds favour the induc- 

 tion of an attack of acute pain, and distinctly aggravate it when already existent. 



In the vast majority of cases neuralgia arises by itself, as we say that is, as the 

 result of constitutional causes ; but in exceptional instances it has a mechanical 

 origin, and of this we will adduce an example. A sailor was wounded by a musket- 

 ball in the arm. The wound healed ; but the patient remained affected with 

 agonising pain, beginning in the tips of the thumb and fingers, except the little 

 finger, and extending up the fore-arm. His sufferings were so great that he 

 willingly submitted to have the limb amputated ; and the operation gave him 

 complete and immediate relief. When the severed limb was dissected a small 

 portion of lead, which doubtless had been detached from the ball when it struck 

 against the bone, was found embedded in the substance of one of the nerves. Neu- 

 ralgia may be produced by a shock, such as results from a bad fall or a railway 

 accident, or even by severe mental emotion acting on a delicate organism. 

 Under these circumstances the development of the affection seldom occurs at 

 once, but ensues after a variable interval, during which the patient exhibits 

 symptoms of general depression, with perhaps loss of appetite and strength. 

 When once fully developed, there is nothing to distinguish this from the more 

 ordinary forms which result from purely constitutional disturbance. Sometimes 

 a cut, which perchance has severed a nerve, may be the starting-point of neu- 

 ralgia. In one case paroxysms of excruciating pain in the little finger followed 

 a gash with a tolerably sharp bread-knife at a point a little above the wrist. These 

 attacks recurred for more than a month, long after the original wound had com- 

 pletely healed. Curiously enough, injury to a nerve may set up neuralgia in quite 

 a different part of the body, and the removal of a small piece of glass from the 

 cicatrix of an old wound has been known to cure neuralgia in a distant situation, 

 for which remedies had long been tried in vain. 



Neuralgia sometimes arises as the result of ague, and in this country this variety 

 was formerly far more prevalent than at present. We often meet with it in 

 people who have suffered from ague abroad. The term " brow ague," is to this 

 day applied by many to that variety of neuralgia which is experienced just over 



