1870.] On Idiocy. 59 



in consequence of a grave nervous defect, and we owe the diagnostic 

 to Seguin. It is very remarkable how writers who scribble about 

 idiocy, without ever having had an opportunity of spending days 

 and weeks with the unfortunates, and who display such arrogant 

 ignorance of their subject when they review the labours of practical 

 observers, invariably neglect to notice this great physiological de- 

 fect. The idiot hears, but as a rule cannot enunciate a syllable 

 correctly, and there is always a defect in the voice. Yet he may 

 open and shut his mouth well, move his tongue properly, expand 

 his chest, and cause some vibration of his vocal cords. But the 

 complex association of movements to the common end of the pro- 

 duction of voice is impossible from defective co-ordination. Again, 

 no idiot walks or runs perfectly. The defective combination of the 

 great number of muscles employed to produce graceful locomotion 

 is evident. The greater the idiot, the more defective is the co- 

 ordination of his muscles. 



Automatic movements are also common to all the cases, and 

 they bear a direct relation to the profundity of the idiocy. Such are 

 balancing the body and waving the hands to and fro, moving the 

 head from side to side, see-sawing with the body, moving like a pair 

 of open compasses, first on one foot, then on the other, and going 

 through all these unintentional gymnastics, one after the other, 

 with fidgety regularity. The movements will go on hour after 

 hour, and even for days. Fixity and wandering of the eyes and 

 of vision are common. The child stares, in the first instance, upon 

 vacancy, and the attention is not to be attracted ; but in the last, 

 the child moves its eyes listlessly hour after hour. The mental 

 defects, want of regard of consequences, and want of foresight, are 

 as evident as the absence of imagination and of all notion about 

 abstract ideas. In idiocy there is not a weakened condition of a 

 perfect mind, but many of the mental phenomena are not possible. 

 The children have ears, and hear, but they do not listen. The 

 memory of things is slight, but the recollection of events, and of 

 time in respect to events, is rarely observed. 



Sometimes one faculty is brighter than the others, and, dim as 

 it is, it strikes the superficial thinker ; but really the most brilliant 

 gift of an idiot is far below the corresponding average of the perfect 

 man of the same age. 



The phenomena of idiocy are occasionally developed, in conse- 

 quence of disease of the brain, in children and adolescents who were 

 born in perfect possession of their faculties ; but an amount of in- 

 anity is usually superadded, and of wild, odd wit also. 



