SPURIOUS WORMS. 129 



tozoa in their interior without ever so much as 

 dreaming of their presence. Again, as regards a 

 whole group of other creatures, which I have else- 

 where called pseudhelminths, you must be prepared 

 for all sorts of odd statements and persistent as- 

 surances. In some cases the pseudhelminths are 

 veritable creatures, such as bots, maggots, and all 

 sorts of insect larvae ; whilst in others the morbid 

 imagination alone has had to do with the patient's 

 distress. Some of these forms of affliction are 

 amongst the most troublesome and vexatious ma- 

 ladies with which any physician can have to deal j 

 nevertheless, in one or two instances the hap- 

 piest results have attended the mere delivery 

 of an honest opinion. The record of one or 

 two of these unrealities will probably excite your 

 astonishment at least, they are likely to appear 

 strange to those of you who have not already 

 paid attention to the phenomena of hysteria and 

 other allied nervous affections. If the following 

 cases cannot be said to be entirely unique, they 

 are not on that account the less devoid of in- 

 struction : 



CASE LXXI. R. E., an elderly lady, resident in 

 London, sought my advice in November, 1866. 

 Mentally troubled by some misfortune, she had 

 taken up the notion that she was harbouring a 

 truly formidable parasite, the creature in question 

 giving rise to all sorts of strange feelings, especially 



