Jeanne replies that she had only fasted since the morning, and Maître Beaupère proceeds to ask:
Q. "In what direction did you hear the voice?"
A. "I heard it on the right, towards the church."
Q. "Was the voice accompanied by any light?"
A. "I seldom heard it without there being a light. This light appeared in the direction whence the voice came."[1153]
We might wonder whether by the expression "à droite" (a latere dextro) Jeanne meant her own right side or the position of the church in relation to her; and in the latter case, the information would have no clinical significance; but the context leaves no doubt as to the veritable meaning of her words.
"How can you," urges Jean Beaupère, "see this light which you say appears to you, if it is on your right?"
If it had been merely a question of the situation of the church and not of Jeanne's own right side, she would only have had to turn her face to see the light in front of her, and Jean Beaupère's objection would have been pointless.
Consequently at about the age of thirteen, at the period of puberty, which for her never came, Jeanne would appear to have been subject on her right side to unilateral hallucinations of sight and hearing. Now Charcot[1154] considered unilateral hallucinations of sight to be common in cases of hysteria.[1155] He even thought that in hysterical subjects they are allied to a hemianæsthesia situated on the same side of the body, and which in Jeanne would be on the right side. Jeanne's trial might have proved the existence of this hemianæsthesia, an extremely significant symptom in the diagnosis of hysteria, if the judges had applied torture or merely had examined the skin of the subject in order to discover anæsthesia patches which were called marks of the devil.[1156] But from the merely oral examination which took place we can only draw inferences concerning Jeanne's general physical condition. In case excessive importance should be attached to such inferences I should add that in the diagnosis of hysteria contemporary neurologists pay less attention than did Charcot to unilateral hallucinations of sight.
The other characteristics of Jeanne's hallucinations revealed by her examinations during the trial are no less interesting than these, although they do not lead to any more certain conclusions.