Popular Superstitions, and the Truths Contained Therein / With an Account of Mesmerism

by Herbert Mayo

And now the patient—beginning to wake in trance, hearing and answering the questions of the operator, moving each limb, or rising even, as the operator’s hand is raised to draw him into obedient following—enters into a new relation with his mesmeriser. He adopts sympathetically every voluntary movement of the other. When the latter rises from his chair, he rises; when he sits down, he sits down: if he bows, he bows; if he makes a grimace, he makes the same. Yet his eyes are closed. He certainly does not see. His mind has interpenetrated to a small extent the nervous system of the operator; and is in relation with his voluntary nerves and the anterior half of his cranio-spinal chord. (These are the organs by which the impulse to voluntary motion is conveyed and originated.) Further into the other’s being he has not yet got. So he does not what the other thinks of, or wishes him to do: but only what the other either does, or goes through the mental part of doing. So Victor sang the air which M. de Puységur only mentally hummed.

The next strange phenomenon marks that the mind of the entranced patient has interpenetrated the nervous system of the other a step farther, and is in relation besides with the posterior half of the cranio-spinal chord and its nerves. For now the entranced person, who has no feeling, or taste, or smell of his own, feels, tastes, and smells every thing that is made to tell on the senses of the operator. If mustard or sugar be put in his own mouth, he seems not to know that they are there; if mustard is placed on the tongue of the operator, the entranced person expresses great disgust, and tries as if to spit it out. The same with bodily pain. If you pluck a hair from the operator’s head, the other complains of the pain you give him.

To state in the closest way what has happened: The phenomena of sympathetic motion and sympathetic sensation thus displayed are exactly such as might be expected to follow, if the mind or conscious principle of the entranced person were brought into relation with the cranio-spinal chord of the operator and its nerves, and with no farther portion of his nervous system. Later, it will be seen, the interpenetration can extend farther.

But, before this happens, a new phenomenon manifests itself, not of a sympathetic character. The operator contrives to wake the entranced person to the knowledge that he possesses new faculties. He develops in him new organs of sensation, or rather helps to hasten his recognition of their possession.

It is to be observed, however, that several who can be entranced cannot be brought as far as the present step. Others make a tantalizing half-advance towards reaching it thus, and then stop. They are asked,—“Do you see any thing?” After some days, at length they answer “Yes.” “What?” “A light.” “Where is the light?” Then they intimate its place to be either before them, or to one side, or above or behind them. And they describe the colour of the light, which is commonly yellowish. And each day it is pointed to in the same direction, and is seen equally whether the room be light or dark. Their eyes in the mean time are closed. And here with many the phenomenon stops. Others in this light now begin to discern objects held in the direction in which they see it. The range of this new visual organ, and the conditions under which it acts, are different in different instances. Sometimes the object must be close, sometimes it is best seen at a short distance; but seen it is. The following experiment, which is decisive, was made at my suggestion: A gentleman standing behind the entranced person held behind him a pack of cards, from which he drew several in succession, and, without seeing them himself, presented them to the new visual organ of the patient. In each case she named the card right. The degree of light suited to this new mode of vision is variable: sometimes bright daylight is best; sometimes they prefer a moderate light. Some distinguish figure and colour when the room is so dark that the bystanders can distinguish neither.

These observations, which are, however, only in conformity with similar evidence from many other quarters, I give on the authority of Mr. J. W. Williamson of Wickham, the gentleman to whom I have before alluded. The following accidental features, attending the manifestation of transposed senses, were further observed by Mr. Williamson:—

In most of the persons in whom Mr. Williamson has brought out transposed vision, the faculty has been located in a small surface of the scalp behind the left ear; and to see objects well, the patient has held them at the distance of five or six inches from and opposite to this spot. One young woman, who had been temporarily set aside under affliction for the loss of a relative, on the experiments being resumed, saw from all parts of the head, but confusedly, a broken and incomplete picture. On a subsequent day, she saw with the right side of her head. Afterwards the visual sense returned to its first place.

In one young person, the new sentient organ was on the top of her head, and to see objects she required them to be brought into contact with it. Once that she had a rheumatic cold and tenderness of the scalp, she said, when entranced, putting her hand to the crown of her head, that the cold had made her eyes sore.

One person saw objects best when placed behind her at the distance of seven or eight feet.

The governess in a neighbouring family was mesmerised for tic-doloureux. In seven sittings she was cured. At the second sitting, in her trance she exhibited displaced sensation. She could read with her finger-ends; her way was to hold the book open against her chest, the back of the book towards her, with one hand; then she passed a finger of the other hand slowly over each word, to read it.