——“In this borrow’d likeness of shrunk death,
Thou shalt remain full two and forty hours,
And then awake, as from a pleasant sleep.”
ROMEO AND JULIET.
CAST. Evelyn, you have again bewildered my thoughts. Sleep, that should
be the _anodyne_ of the mind, has awakened afresh my curiosity. I am in
a mood for mystery. Any more wonders?
EV. The prototypes of sleep, dear Castaly, are _all_ “mysteries,” as
_you_ call them, and marked by ever-varying shades.
The most impressive conditions of the mind are these:
Unconscious and passive, as in _sound sleep_.
Conscious yet passive, as in _dreaming_.
Conscious and willing, yet powerless, as in _night-mare_.
Unconscious yet active, as in _somnambulism_.
If we go deeper in our analysis, we shall discover a state more wondrous
still than all we have unravelled, in which mind is unconscious,
sensationless, unwishing, motionless, powerless, as in _trance_ or
_catalepsy_; an absolute apathy of body and complete oblivion of mind.
_And yet life is there!_
In the dream of night-mare, you remember, there is a will, but no power.
In the absolute senselessness of trance, all sympathy between the brain
or spinal marrow, or the influence of the nerves of motion, or of the
will on muscle, _altogether cease_.
I will not fatigue you with _varieties_, such as _carus_, _catalepsy_,
and the like, or with mere medical definitions, as _syncope_ or
fainting, epilepsy, apoplexy, and _their_ analogies.
By the term trance I would define all those conditions in which there is
protracted _derangement of volition_ or the will; sensibility and
voluntary action being suspended, while the _vital functions_ are
performed, yet with diminished energy; the “deep sleep” of Paracelsus,
Hieronymus Fabricius, Celsus, and other writers of antiquity.
In some the rosy colour of the lips and cheeks will not fade; in others,
they are pale and bloodless; the body becomes cold as marble, the pulse
often imperceptible, and the vapour of breathing on a polished surface
alone distinguishes the still living being from the perfect work of the
sculptor. I have, however, had patients who were rosy when they fell
asleep, but became pale about the end of the second day.
Girls often smile sweetly in full catalepsy, but the countenance will
become anxious as waking approaches; and this must ever excite
suspicion. The body indeed is, to the external world, _dead_; for
although the cataleptic will often swallow food, while all the other
muscles are in spasm, this may, I believe _does_, depend on mere
_irritability_, by which, as I before told you, the brain is first
excited, and then directs a movement without the mind’s feeling.
Catalepsy is so peculiar to young females of extreme sensibility, that
it may be considered an intense _hysteria_, depending on certain
_sympathies_, or resulting from sudden or powerful influences on the
passions. The form of catalepsy marked by _hysteria_ is least dangerous;
but it is very stubborn. Probably this is the form so common in Germany.
Previous to the _cataleptic acme_ girls are often maniacally violent,
and will then suddenly regain their temper and their reason. They will
sit and play with their fingers in a sullen mood, and the power of
motion and speech and other acts of volition may be alternately impaired
or lost. In some, the sleep has been preceded by fits of lethargy, by
lassitude, and inaptitude to exertion, and perhaps a propensity to
sleep-walking. The decided state of catalepsy has begun in an epileptic
convulsion. In all, I think, I have seen combined with this disorder,
irregular determination of blood; in one case, where the taste and smell
were gone for four or five months, the climax was suicide by arsenic.
The countenance is almost always placid in cataleptic sleep; the eyes
being turned up, the pupils dilated, but the eyelids closed. If the fit
be the result of _sudden_ fright, the features will remain as they were
at that moment—the eyelid fixed, but the pupil usually sensible. The
joints and muscles are pliable, and may be moulded to any form, but they
remain in that position as rigidly fixed as the limbs of a clay figure,
or the _anchylosed_ joints of the self-torturing fakir; insensible to
all stimuli, beating, tickling, or pricking.
I have seen patients lapse into a state of catalepsy, _in a moment_,
without a struggle. I remember, during one of my visits to the asylum in
Hoxton, a maniac, who often in the midst of his occupation became
instantaneously _a statue_; leaning a little forward, one arm lifted up,
and the _index_ finger pointed as at some interesting object; the eye
staring and ghastly, and the whole expression as of one rapt in an
ecstacy of thought or vision.
The waking from a trance, like the recovery from the _asphyxia_ of
drowning, is painful. It is attended with a struggle, and the hand is
almost invariably placed firmly _over the heart_, as if its actions were
a painful effort to overcome _congestion_.
In some cases, indeed, a purple hue will suddenly suffuse the cataleptic
body; the limbs are then extremely rigid, but become pliant when the
healthy tint is restored.
The sensation in the brain of the cataleptic, as of those recovering
from drowning, resembles the pricking of needles, the circulation soon
becoming accelerated. Hunger is usually intense when the patient awakes.
The usual duration of catalepsy is from twenty to forty hours. The
return of volition is commonly marked by perspiration; this premonitory
sign is often followed by a piercing shriek, as in the case of
night-mare, and, indeed, in a _slight_ degree, of an infant’s cry as
soon as it is born.
It has appeared to me that the cataleptic is marked by _extremes_ of
feeling and disposition. The sensibility either being too dull for the
feeling of joy, or so intensely excited by pleasure, as to approach the
confine of delirium. One of my patients, in particular, who was an
eighty-hour sleeper, endured a metamorphosis from religious enthusiasm
to theatrical mania. Her Bible was discarded for romances and
play-books, and even the most licentious volumes.
CAST. I have read, (I suppose in some moth-eaten tomes enshrined I know
not where,) of a scholar of Lubeck, who slept seven years; in Diogenes
Laertius, of Epimenides, who slept fifty-one years in a cave; in Ricaut,
of the seven devoted sleepers of Ephesus (the same, I presume, as the
seven illustrious sleepers of Mahomet’s tale in the Koran); and of the
_Leucomorians_, who fall asleep with the swallows early in November, and
wake at the end of April.
One moment more among the legends of romance. In the “Hierarchie of the
Blessed Angels” it is written, that in a dark cavern of the Baltic,
there were discovered five men in Roman habits, so deeply sleeping, that
all efforts to awaken them were unavailing.
Ogier the Dane is _now_ sleeping in the dungeon of Cronenburg
Castle—(so recordeth the “_Danske Folk Saga_.”)
Prince Arthur, too, was lying, when a chronicle was writ, in a trance at
Avelon; and the Britons, with implicit belief, were watching for his
awaking.
Years have passed since these mysterious legends were penned, and I dare
not say that the spells are broken yet.
EV. If they _then_ slept, sweet Castaly, they are surely sleeping _now_.
Tales lose nothing by telling, and nature is often thus magnified into a
miracle. You may however _believe_ this, that a _periodical_ catalepsy
with intervals may last even for years. The “Memoirs of the Academy of
Berlin” record the case of a woman, who sunk into catalepsy twice a day
for many years; during which period she was married, and became the
almost unconscious mother of children.
Nay, there is a story of Mynheer Vander Gucht, of Bremen, who, with very
brief intermissions, slept and dreamt for thirty years; so that, on the
return of travellers by sea or land, the primal question was, if _Mr.
Vander Gucht was up_!
IDA. Catalepsy, I believe, has been often _feigned_; and, although it is
astonishing with what apathy pain may be endured, the imposture, I
presume, may be usually discovered by the proposition of some horrible
remedy.
EV. Frequently; but many impostors have withstood the test, and
triumphed in their deception. Yet it is true that the perfect state of
catalepsy has been, in very rare instances, voluntarily produced; thus
exhibiting the complete influence of will over an _involuntary muscle,
the heart_.
The case of Colonel Townsend I adduce, as one of undoubted authority.
This officer was able to suspend the action both of his heart and lungs,
after which he became motionless, icy cold, and rigid,—a glassy film
overspreading his eyes. As there was no breathing, there was no vapour
_apparent_ on the glass, when held to his mouth. During the many hours
in which this voluntary trance existed, there was a total absence of
consciousness, yet a _faculty of self-reanimation_!
Avicenna speaks of one that could “cast himself into a palsie when he
list;” and Celsus, of a priest that could “separate himself from his
senses when he list, and lie like a dead man, void of life and sense.”
Cardan, the Pavian astrologer, brags of himself that _he_ could do as
much, and that “when he list.”
Dr. Cleghorn, of Glasgow, relates the case of a man who could stop the
pulse at his wrist, and reduce himself to the condition of syncope, _by
his will_, of course.
Barton, the holy maid of Kent, was enabled thus to “absorb her
faculties.”
Restitutus, a presbyter, could also throw himself into a trance,—being
insensible, except to the very loudest sounds. So says Augustin.
ASTR. So that there may not be much imposture in the case, recorded in
the “Spectator,” of Nicholas Hart, a professor of somnolency, who _lived
by sleeping_. The following is his advertisement in the “Daily Courant,”
of that time:—
“Nicholas Hart, who slept last year in Saint Bartholomew’s Hospital,
intends to sleep this year at the ‘Cock and Bottle,’ in Little Britain.”
I will freely confess to you, Evelyn, my scepticism as to these _ultra_
romantic legends; but may my own memory fail me not, while I relate a
few strange stories, and demand of yourself confirmation.
Euphemia Lindsay, of Forfarshire, slept eight weeks, having taken
nothing but (possibly) a little cold water. In the eighth week she died.
Angelica Vlies, of Delft, had fasted in a state of insensibility from
1822 to 1828. She took nothing but water, tea, and whey, and these in
the most minute quantities.
In a record, A.D. 1545, I read that “William Foxley, a pot-maker to the
Mint in London, slept in the Tower of London (not being by any means to
be waked) fourteen days and fifteen nights; and, when he waked, it
seemed to him that the interval was but as one night.”
Samuel Clinton, of Timbury, near Bath, often slept for a month; and
once, from April to August. He would, during this period, suddenly wake,
but ere food could be administered to him, he lapsed again into a
trance.
Margaret Lyall (of Edinburgh) slept from the morning of June 27th to the
evening of the 30th, then from July 1st to August 8th. Her breathing was
scarcely perceptible, and her pulse low; one arm was sensitive, the
other senseless, to the pricking of pins. She had never any subsequent
cognizance of this sleep.
A lady, at Nismes, had periodical attacks of trance; and it is curious
that the intervals of waking were always of the same duration as the
previous time of sleeping, however these might vary.
In the year 1738, Elizabeth Orvin slept for four days; and, for the
period of ten years afterwards, passed seventeen hours of the
twenty-four in sleep. No stimuli were powerful enough to rouse her:
_acupuncturation_, flagellation, and even the stinging of bees were
ineffectual. Like many other somnolents, she was morose and irritable,
especially previous to the sleeping-fit.
“Elizabeth Parker, of Morley Saint Peter, in Norfolk, for a considerable
time was very irregular in her times of waking, which was once in seven
days; after which they became irregular and precarious, and though of
shorter duration, they were equally profound; and every attempt at
keeping her awake, or waking her, was vain. Various experiments were
tried, and an itinerant empiric, elated with the hope of rousing her
from what he called _counterfeit sleep_, blew into her nostrils the
powder of white hellebore; but the poor creature remained insensible to
the inhumanity of the deed, which, instead of producing the boasted
effect, excoriated the skin of her nose, lips, and face.”
The records of medicine, I doubt not, may add a volume to these simple
stories, and, perchance, may unfold to us something of the exciting
causes which have induced these strange conditions; yet they seem to me
so various, in some the effect being so sudden, in others so gradual,
that it were vain for _me_ to conjecture.
EV. The influence of fear, and fright, and extreme joy, will often
produce instantaneous _paralysis_; while that of intense study, or
anxiety, will steal on by degrees; and then, while in some cases the
senses will be entirely _apathetic_, in others, they will be acutely
_excited_.
Mendelssohn almost every evening immediately fell into a trance whenever
“philosophy” was even _named_ in his presence; and so acutely deranged
was then his conception of sound, that a voice of stentorian force
seemed to ring in his ears, repeating to him any impressive conversation
he had heard during the day.
Without presuming to satisfy Astrophel in explaining the full pathology
of these curious cases, I may, by analogy, illustrate his question by
alluding to the acute influence which impressions exert on the mind,
and, through it, on the body.
Captain D——, on service in Ceylon, was ordered to march to the Kandian
territory. This district had been the grave of many officers who had
resided in it. From this circumstance, and the anticipation of a similar
fatality to himself, he became speechless, and died in fifty hours.
During the plague of Egypt, lots were drawn for a decision as to what
surgeon should remain with the sick on the departure of the troops. Mr.
Dick, the army inspector, relates that on one occasion the surgeon on
whom the lot fell dropped dead.
In the treaty with Meer Jaffier, Colonel Clive omitted the name of the
Gentoo merchant, Omichund. This man was induced to expect treasures to
the amount of one million, for his aid in deposing the Bengal nabob.
From this disappointment he became speechless, and subsequently insane.
George Grokatski, a Polish soldier, deserted. He was discovered a few
days after, drinking and merry-making. On his court-martial he became
speechless, unconscious, and fixed as a statue. For twenty days and
nights he lay in this trance, without nourishment; he then sunk and
died.
Some girls (as we read in Platerus) playing near a gibbet, one wantonly
flung stones at the criminal suspended on it. Being violently struck the
body _swung_, and the girl, believing that it was alive, and was
descending from the gibbet, fell into violent convulsions and died.
The following case, although not fatal, very powerfully displays the
paralyzing effects of imagination.
A lady in perfect health, twenty-three years of age, was asked by the
parents of a friend to be present at a severe surgical operation. On
consideration, it was thought wrong to expose her to such a scene, and
the operation was postponed for a few hours. She went to bed, however,
with the imagination highly excited, and awoke in alarm hearing, or
thinking she heard, the shrieks of her friend under the agony of an
operation. Convulsions and hysterics supervened, and, on their
subsiding, she went into a profound sleep, which continued sixty-three
hours. The most eminent of the faculty were then consulted, and she was
cupped, which awoke her; but the convulsions returned, and she again
went to sleep, and slept, with few intermissions, for a fortnight. The
irregular periods continued for ten or twelve years; the length of the
sleeping fits from thirty to forty hours. Then came on irritability, and
total want of sleep, for three months; her usual time for sleeping being
then forty-eight hours.
But if the sudden transition be _excess of joy_, its effect may be
equally melancholy.
Wescloff was detained as a hostage by the Kalmucs, and carried along
with them in their memorable flight to China. His widowed mother had
mourned him dead, and, on his sudden return, the excess of joy was
instantaneously fatal.
In the year 1544 the Jewish pirate, Sinamus Taffurus, was lying in a
port of the Red Sea, called Orsenoe, and was preparing for war, being
then engaged in one with the Portuguese. While he was there he received
the unexpected intelligence that his son (who in the siege of Tunis had
been made prisoner by Barbarossa, and by him doomed to slavery) was
suddenly ransomed, and coming to his aid with seven ships, well armed.
He was immediately struck as if with apoplexy, and expired on the spot.
A Swiss student, writes Zimmerman, yielded himself to intense
metaphysical study, which gradually produced a complete trance of the
senses; the functions of the body being not inactive. After the lapse of
a year of apparent idiocy, each sense was successively excited by its
proper stimulus; the ear by loud sounds, &c. When these were restored,
the mind was again perfect, although in this effort his strength was
nearly exhausted.
I may add that lunar influence, though it is now somewhat out of
fashion, was formerly believed even by so sage a physician as Dr. Mead
and others, and Astrophel will thank me for blending with his own
examples the following case of catalepsy in a moon-struck maiden. At the
full of the moon this damsel fell in a fit; the recurrence obeying the
regular periods of the tide. During the flood she lay in a speechless
trance, and revived from it on the ebb. Her father was engaged on the
Thames, and so struck was he with the regularity of these attacks, that
on his return from the river he correctly anticipated the condition of
his daughter; and even in the night he has arisen to his work, as her
cries on recovering from the fit were always a correct monitor to him of
the turning of the tide.