174 NATURE AND LIFE. 



ent motor nerves most commonly excited are the facial 

 nerves, the nervous branches of the forearm or the fingers, 

 which are affected in " writer's cramp," * and the branches 

 of the spinal nerve, whose irritation occasions tic-doulou- 

 reux, chronic wryneck, etc. Now, electricity cures, or at 

 least noticeably benefits, these different morbid states, and 

 exerts the like influence over neuralgic and neuritic affec- 

 tions, wherever these disorders are not the symptoms of 

 other deeper maladies. Currents restore the normal ac- 

 tivity of nutrition in the diseased nerves, and the corre- 

 sponding muscles ; they act on rheumatism, too, in the most 

 beneficial way, modifying the local circulation, quieting the 

 pain, and stimulating reflex phenomena, which are followed 

 by muscular contractions. Erb, Remak, Hiffelsheim, and 

 Onimus, have proved beyond question this salutary action 

 on swellings of the joints, either in acute or chronic cases. 

 The discoveries respecting the influence of electricity 

 over the spinal marrow have been used with advantage in 

 the treatment of such disorders as arise from unduly-ex- 

 cited activity in this organ, such as chorea, St. Vitus's dance, 

 hysteria, and other nervous convulsions, more or less simi- 

 lar. We cite two instances of this sort published by Dr. 

 Onimus, giving an idea of the mode of applying the cur- 

 rent in such cases. A child, twelve years old, was seized 

 with a frightful attack. Every five or six minutes it lost 

 consciousness, rolled on the ground ; its eyes turned upward, 

 then grew so rigid that none of its limbs could be bent. 

 The attack over, it regained its senses, but the least im- 

 pression, at all vivid, sufficed to bring on a new attack. 

 Ascending currents were first applied to the spinal mar- 

 row. The child was at once seized with a violent crisis. 



1 Writer's cramp consists of a kind of spasm of the finger-muscles, 

 preventing their regular contraction in holding or guiding a pen or play- 

 ing the piano, while the muscles of the hand and forearm preserve all 

 their normal strength. 



