790 Dynamic Theory. 



would simply produce intense and rapid, but not abnormal, thinking; 

 and this is really the case in many instances of fever. But in delirium, 

 the disease has reached a stage in which a portion of the brain cells are, 

 through excessive stimulation, abnormally erethised, and their action 

 being unmodified by that of the rest of the cells, the balance between 

 different ideas is destroyed. Suggestions which happen to influence 

 the cerebrum at such a time are apt to have an abnormal power. All 

 sorts of sights and sounds near the bedside of the patient produce in- 

 tense effects in the imagination. A case is cited in which, during an 

 epidemic of fever in Edinburgh, many of the patients of a certain 

 doctor seemed to show a tendency to throw themselves out of the win- 

 dow. Investigation showed that one patient having first made such an 

 attempt, the doctor in question thought proper to caution the attend- 

 ants upon his patients, to use extra precautions against such attempts 

 on their part. When he gave such instructions in the hearing of the 

 patients, the idea of doing the thing took possession of them, which, 

 but for the suggestion, it might not have done. 



There are many well authenticated cases of the "marking "of un- 

 born infants through the senses and nervous system of the mother. The 

 unborn babe is, in a certain sense, an appendage or outgrowth of the 

 mother, and is connected with her nervous and vascular system. Any- 

 thing, therefore, which affects the blood or excites the nerves of the 

 mother is apt to affect the child. In like manner it is, that any part of 

 the body proper, may, at any time, receive the effects of extreme emo- 

 tion. Thus, < < a lady who was watching her little girl at play saw a 

 heavy window sash fall upon its hand, cutting off three of the fingures, 

 and she was so much overcome by fright and distress as to be unable to 

 render it any assistance. A surgeon was speedily obtained, who, having 

 dressed the wounds, turned himself to the mother, whom he found 

 seated, moaning, and complaining of a pain in her hand. On examina- 

 tion, three fingers corresponding to those injured in the child, were dis- 

 covered to be swollen and inflamed, although they had ailed nothing 

 prior to the accident. In four and twenty hours, incisions were made 

 into them and pus evacuated. Sloughs were afterwards discharged and the 

 wounds ultimately healed." Another case related by Dr. Tuke, is of an 

 intelligent lady, who, passing a public institution, saw a little boy in 

 whom she was interested, coming through the iron gate. She saw him 

 let go the gate and allow it to swing shut with great force, and she 

 thought it was about to strike his ankle, and crush it. Although this 

 did not happen, she instantly experienced a severe pain in the ankle, 

 corresponding to the one belonging to the boy, which she expected to 

 see injured. She had difficulty in walking home, a quarter of a mile, 

 and then she found a circle round the ankle as if it had been painted 



