MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 285 



I cannot speak from experience of the ultimate fate of any 

 Latah of the imitative diss. But I can say confidently that the 

 exhibition of this peculiarity is unaccompanied by any other mental 

 ii regularity, except those which I have attempted to describe as 

 pertaining to Latah. And in those cases which I have had the 

 opportunity of observing for any length of time, I have satisfied 

 myself that the malady is not progressive. 



Further, I have seen many oldish men thus Lntali who, accord- 

 ing to the testimony of their elders, have been so afflicted from the 

 age of puberty. 



And lastly, I have never heard an "' orang latah" called an 

 " orang gila." Nor have I ever heard any man say of one so 

 diseased, "He will become mad," or '• He will die." 



For these and other reasons, apart from my own theory on the 

 subject, I am led to believe that this propensity in Lcitahs is an 

 anomaly, distinct from a not uncommon mental disease in other 

 parts of the world, to which it bears some superficial resemblance. 



And, until proof is given to the contrary, I rest content with my 

 belief that the peculiarity is one in which the Chinese have no 

 share. 



It must be, at all times, dangerous for the unscientific to argue 

 from apparent similarities, the causes of which must be hidden 

 from them. 



As I have written as a non-scientist, I must add that I am 

 quite alive to the parallel danger I am running in pointing out 

 differences which stand merely upon the basis of my own unlearned 

 and limited observation. 



"What Latah really is, it remains for some future pathologist to say. 



But until " the man has spoken with authority," I trust that' 

 no half formed and rash generalization will be suffered to class the 

 imitative Malay with the microcephalic idiot : our snake seer with 

 the victim of alcohol; the rarely found Malay girl-sufferer with 

 the ordinary nympho-maniac ; in a word, the unexplained Latali 

 with the Lunatic, whose mental disorders have now formed the 

 subject of the specialist's investigations for several generations. 



H. A. O'BEIEN. 



