No. 9.—By DR. VON SCHRENK-NOTZING.
Baron von Schrenk-Notzing, M.D., of Munich, whose work in hypnotism is well known, carried on a series of experiments with diagrams and numbers, etc., in the course of the year 1890.[24] Space will not permit of our quoting these results in full. The following experiments are selected as being the only three in which the agent and percipient were in different rooms. The percipient, Fräulein A., was a patient of Dr. von Schrenk-Notzing's, of rather hysterical temperament; throughout the experiments she was in a normal condition and fully awake. In these three trials, which took place between 10.12 P.M. and 10.23 P.M. on the 15th October 1890, Fräulein A. sat on a chair in the agent's study about a yard from the door leading into the adjoining room, and with her back towards it; paper and pencil were on the table before her. In the adjoining room, about 12 feet in a direct line from the percipient, with the door of communication closed, Dr. von Schrenk-Notzing stood, beside a small table, and drew a rough diagram representing the staff of Æsculapius and the Serpent. When the drawing was complete, to quote Dr. Schrenk-Notzing,
"I call 'Ready?' The percipient says, 'Yes.' We have been drawing at the same time in different rooms. On returning to the study I compare the drawings and see with astonishment that Fräulein A. has drawn a serpent. Even the open mouth and the thickened end of the tail in the reproduction agree with the original. The experiment has succeeded in its essential part, and as regards strictness of conditions I think it quite unassailable. Unconscious suggestion is absolutely excluded, when agent and percipient are in different rooms. Any corresponding association of ideas seems to me also impossible, for the idea of the staff of Æsculapius first occurred to me in the other room. In the study there is no object which could have led up to the idea—no indication which could have pointed out the way."
The percipient had, in fact, drawn a spiral figure apparently intended to represent a serpent.
The two other experiments here referred to were performed in immediate succession, and under precisely similar conditions, the time allowed in each case being about two minutes.
In the second experiment the agent drew an arrow; the percipient drew another spiral, with intersecting loops. In this case, as the agent points out, the original idea of the serpent appears to have persisted in the percipient's mind.
In the third experiment the agent drew a triangle inscribed in a circle; also two diameters to the circle, crossing each other at right angles, the vertical diameter bisecting the upper angle of the triangle. The agent writes:—
"The drawing was done in the following way. I began with the triangle, and then drew the perpendicular on the base. The idea that thereupon occurred to me, that the figure was too simple, induced me to add a circle and to prolong the perpendicular to the circumference; finally I added the horizontal diameter. The percipient was drawing at the same time at table b, sitting on chair 5, with her back to the closed door of communication. Question from the next room, 'Are you ready?' Answer, 'Stop,' as I am about to open the door. Then, 'Now.' I open the door and enter the room. The two drawings agree except that the circle and the horizontal diameter are wanting. Even the perpendicular of the triangle, which has become obtuse angled, is prolonged beyond the base, just as in the original. This prolongation and addition of the perpendicular cannot be explained by any tendency of ideas to recur (diagram-habit). Only the fact that a triangle was drawn might, taken alone, be explained in some such way."
Figures of the original diagrams in this case are given in the Proceedings of the S.P.R.
Some experiments with diagrams, conducted in July 1890 by Drs. Grimaldi and Fronda, have been published by Lombroso.[25] The subject was a young man of twenty, subject to hysterical attacks and spontaneous somnambulism. The first experiments were made in the hypnotic state, with numbers, and met with only moderate success. Later, however, the trials were made in the normal state. At the first sitting diagrams were tried. The subject had his eyes firmly bandaged and his ears plugged with cotton wool. The diagrams were drawn at a certain distance (ad una certa distanza) from the subject, and behind him. Under these conditions the first five experiments were completely successful; the subject reproduced in turn a rhomb, a circle, a triangle, an irregular pentagon, shaped something like the profile of a barn, and a cone. The next experiment failed, only a formless scribble being obtained. The subject was much exhausted, and fell into a semi-cataleptic state as soon as the bandage was removed.