1869.] -^^ ' [Wood. 



I had only been a very few minutes. About 7^ r. m. I returned home. I 

 Avas by this time quite excited, and the feeling of hilarity now rapidly in- 

 creased. It was not a sensuous feeling, in the ordinary meaning of the 

 term ; it was not merely an intellectual excitation, it was a sort of Men- 

 etre — the very opposite to malaise. It did not come from without ; 

 it was not connected with any passion or sense. It was simply a feeling 

 of inner joyousness; the heart seemed buoyant beyond all trouble; the 

 whole system felt as though all sense of fatigue were forever banished ; 

 the mind gladly ran riot, free constantly to leap from one idea to another, 

 apparently unbound from its ordinary laws. I was disposed to laugh ; to 

 make comic gestures — one very frequently recurrent fancy, was to imitate 

 with the arms the motions of a fiddler, and with the lips the tune he was 

 supposed to be playing. There was nothing like wild delirium, nor any 

 hallucinations that I remember. At no time had I any visions, or at least 

 any that I can now call to mind ; but a person, who was with me at that 

 time, states that once I raised my head and exclaimed, "Oh, the moun- 

 tains ! the mountains!" Whilst I was performing the various antics, 

 already alluded to, I knew very well I was acting exceedingly foolishly 

 but could not control myself. 



I think it was about 8 o'clock, when I began to have a feeling of numb- 

 ness in my limbs, also a sense of general uneasiness and unrest, and a fear 

 lest I had taken an overdose. I now constantly walked about the house, 

 my skin to myself was warm, in fact my whole surface felt flushed; m.y 

 mouth and throat were very dry ; my legs put on a strange, foreign feeling, 

 as though they were not a i^art of my body. I counted my pulse and 

 found it 120, quite full and strong. A foreboding, an undefined, horrible 

 fear, as of impending death, now commenced to creep over me ; in haste 

 I sent for Dr. H. Allen, and he being out, directly afterAvards for Dr. 

 Thomas. The curious sensations in my limbs increased. My legs felt as 

 though they were waxen pillars beneath me. I remember feeling them 

 Avith my hand and iinding them, as I thought at least, very firm, the 

 muscles all in a state of tonic contraction. About 8 o'clock, I began to 

 have marked "spells" — periods when all connection seemed to be severed 

 betAveen the external world and myself. I might be said to have been 

 unconscious during these times, in so far that I was oblivious to all external 

 objects, but on coming out of one, itAvas not a blank, dreamless void upon 

 which I looked back, a mere einpty space, but rather a period of active 

 but aimless life. I do not think there was any connected thought in them ; 

 they seemed simj)ly wild reveries, without any binding cord ; each a 

 mere chaos of disjointed ideas. The mind seemed freed from all its ordi- 

 nary laAvs of association so that it passed from idea to idea, as it were, 

 perfectly at random. 



The duration of these spells to me was very great, although they really 

 lasted but from a fcAv seconds to a minute or two. Indeed I noAV entirely 

 lost my poAver of measuring time. Seconds seemed hoars ; minutes 

 seemed days ; hours seemed infinite. Still I Avas perfectly conscious during 

 the intermissions between the paroxysms. I would look at my Avatch, and 

 then after an hour or tAvo, as I thought, Avould look again and 



