AND ANIMAL LIFE. 



their ordinary dress, and who were afterwards 

 taken, and found to have been exposed for many 

 hours to the bitter wind of the season, without 

 suffering from the exposure. The explanation 

 of this and similar phenomena will not be diffi- 

 cult, if we consider that, in a violent fit of insa- 

 nity, the disposition of the patient promotes mus- 

 cular exertion of almost every kind. Incessant 

 speaking, constant pacing to and fro, and repeat- 

 ed attempts to break all restraints, are a few of 

 those efficient causes that excite the action of the 

 lungs and heart, and which are every way calcula- 

 ted to sustain the augmented stimulus of the blood 

 and its general distribution. The insensibility of 

 the mind to disagreeable impressions is probably 

 another important cause, tending to protect the 

 system from the effects of cold. Respiration is 

 much disordered by two grand classes of sensa- 

 tions, the exciting and depressing. The influence 

 of the former is illustrated by the paroxysm it- 

 self; but when an individual, whose intellectual 

 faculties are undisturbed, is subjected to a pain- 

 ful degree of cold, the various organic derange- 

 ments awaken certain sensations in the mind of 

 a depressing description, and these react upon the 

 function of respiration, destroying its regularity 

 by sighs and deep inspirations, and induce altera- 

 tions in the properties of the blood and the mode 

 of its circulation. But, in a fit of insanity, im- 

 pressions of this kind are not communicated to 



