Inebriety has sometimes a curious effect upon the memory. Actions committed during intoxication may be forgotten on a recovery from that state.
Drunkenness differs materially according to the nature of the intoxicating potation. Wine in general may be considered as less injurious, and its effects more transient than spirituous liquors, that produce great excitement, followed by indirect debility and visceral obstruction. The inebriety produced by alcoholic preparations, moreover, is attended with a delirious state, furious and uncontrollable, or followed by congestion and torpor. Malt liquors render their victims heavy, stupid, and more obstinate than violent, and a long continuance in their use produces a state of imbecility, observed so early as Aristotle.
Similar differences are observable in the effects of different liquors on the imagination. Wine most undoubtedly produces a greater vivacity of ideas and a more brilliant scintillation of wit and fancy. Hoffmann, indeed, considered the juice of the grape as indispensable to poetic inspiration, and it is very doubtful whether Pegasus was ever benefited by a draught of beer. But, alas! of what avail are the considerations regarding the effects of the pernicious habit of drinking? When once accustomed to the cheering stimulus of liquor, it matters not what the drunkard takes, and if Champagne or Burgundy are not at hand, gin or rum will prove a substitute, perhaps less grateful, but still not unwelcome. Drinking becomes the only refuge from those cares which owe their very origin to excesses, and they must be drowned in any bowl that can be filled to drive away the blue devils.
Vina parant animos, faciuntque caloribus aptos,
Cura fugit, multo diluiturque mero:
Tunc veniunt risus, tunc pauper cornua sumit;
Tunc dolor et curæ, rugaque frontis abit,
Tunc aperit mentis ævo, rarissima nostro
Simplicitas, artes excutiente Deo.
DECAPITATION.
As I have observed in a preceding article, much doubt exists whether decapitation puts an end to our sufferings, as it has not and most probably will never be ascertained, whether the body or the head are first deprived of sensation or vitality. Galvanic experiments had been resorted to, but were warmly opposed by Professor Ferry on the plea of humanity, as he maintained that unless we were certain that sensation had ceased, we had no right to submit the unfortunate culprits who had been decapitated to this trial. Guillotin (whose name was given to the terrific machine so closely connected in our recollection with the horrors of the French Revolution, which he introduced from the East and Germany) maintained that the moment the head was severed from the body all sensation ceased. Cabanis and Petit were of a similar opinion. Sue, Aldini, Mojon, Weicard, Liveling, Castel, and other physiologists, founded their belief in a contrary doctrine, upon numerous experiments on various animals. Sue grounded his arguments upon two chief points: first, the sudden effect produced by decapitation upon the two most powerful regulators of the functions of life, the brain and the heart; and secondly, on the consideration that the section of the neck was often uneven and jagged, splinters of bones irritating the bruised nerves, vessels, and spinal marrow.
According to this view of the matter, existence was not immediately destroyed by decollation. Castel thought that this principle was extinguished in the head sooner than the body. Sue and Julia de Fontenelle were of a different opinion. Dubois of Amiens endeavoured to prove the non-existence of pain after decapitation, by showing that convulsive movements, epileptic and hysteric attacks, were not accompanied by any painful sensations. In decapitation, he thinks that the suddenness and violence of the blow must produce insensibility, for we cannot imagine that the section of the spinal marrow thus violently performed can occasion pain; and if any sensations were experienced in that awful moment, it is more than probable that the violent perturbation would render them obtuse. As to any feelings of the separated head, he does not think that any muscular convulsions observed in it can indicate the existence of pain.
To these arguments of the Amiens physiologist, Julia de Fontenelle replied that it was never maintained that convulsive movements were expressive of pain, although it was not impossible that epileptic and hysterical patients may have experienced painful sensations during their attacks that might be forgotten upon their recovery, as somnambulists bear no recollection of what passed during their disturbed slumbers. The convulsive affections alluded to by Dubois were frequently expressive both of pleasure and of pain, or marked with a character of stupor or of indifference, whereas the convulsive movement observed in the features of the decapitated invariably expressed anguish; in support of his firm belief in the existence of the power of sensation after execution, he refers to the observations of Sœmmering, Mojou, and Sue, who had remarked that when the head was turned towards the solar rays, the eyes instantly closed,—a phenomenon that could not take place if the eyes were dead. Dr. Montault jocosely observes that it is to be regretted that, to decide this controversy, recourse cannot be had to the experiments, recorded by Bacon, of an inquisitive person who hanged himself for the purpose of ascertaining if strangulation was a painful operation. One of his friends very fortunately cut him down ere it was too late, when the curious experimentalist was quite satisfied that hanging was by no means painful or unpleasant, and that the moment strangulation took place, he had been struck with a flickering light, that was instantly followed by utter darkness.
Various cases are recorded of individuals thus cut down, when hanged by accident, or executed. In most instances they stated that they had experienced a pleasurable sensation as strangulation took place. I have already alluded to the curious fate of the well-known composer of the “Battle of the Prague.”