Hystero-Demonojoathy in Savoy. 375 



trustworthy in ordinary affairs, declared that the devil enabled 

 the possessed to climb fir- trees like squirrels, and to stand on 

 their heads when they reached the topmost branches, which, 

 however delicate, were not bent under their weight. It was 

 also affirmed that they manifested prodigious strength and 

 remarkable eloquence, speaking Latin, German, and Arabic, 

 which they had never learnt, describing faithfully battles they 

 had never seen, and miraculously beholding from Morzine, 

 transactions that took place at Geneva. In utter contradiction 

 to their usual pious habits they blasphemed all holy things, 

 and had a horror of religious exercises. They spoke of them- 

 selves in the third person — "he or she did so," which was 

 explained to mean that the devil was speaking for them, and 

 they were believed to know the secret thoughts of individuals 

 whom they had never seen before. 



These strange stories induced M. Tissot to visit the place, 

 which he found occupied by a detachment of infantry and a 

 brigade of gensdarmerie, sent by the government to maintain 

 order, and with instructions to forward victims of the malady 

 who were attacked in church or in public, to Thonon, Nyon, 

 Cluny, and other places somewhat removed from the influences 

 operating at Morzine. Fortunately superstition decided that 

 the devil was not permitted to exercise his powers beyond 

 Morzine, and the patients soon got well under the care of the 

 government authorities. 



M. Tissot visited a woman and her daughter who were 

 said to be subject to possession. The latter, a girl of eighteen, 

 had been sent to Cluny, and since her return had not ex- 

 perienced a convulsive crisis. She seemed out of health, and 

 complained of pain in the epigastric region, and also of the 

 globus hystericus, which makes sufferers fancy their hearts are 

 coming up into their throats. Although better than she had 

 been, she was not able to go to church, nor to pray, and the 

 sound of the church bell was painful to her ! She accom- 

 panied M. Tissot to her mother, and both spoke as if quite 

 certain that they were possessed. The mother soon had an 

 attack. Her arms were thrown backwards and forwards, the 

 head thrown back on to the shoulders, and her body was 

 agitated as if by a series of violent electric shocks. The con- 

 vulsions were soon over, only lasting about a minute. 



The following day, M. Tissot paid them a second visit, 

 taking with him some wine and some pastry, in which he had 

 put a little holy water taken by himself from the vessel in the 

 church. When he arrived at the cottage, the party consisted 

 of the hysterical mother and daughter, a little girl who 

 watched their cattle up the mountain, the grandfather — an 

 •old soldier in the French armies — and his son, married to the 



