“Oh, a woman! That is different.”
“Nor that splendid fellow, Dr. Hall, now—”
“Bother, Rose! Don’t interrupt me. North says he has seen certain hysterical women get well as to everything except loss of sense of pain. He knows of two who are ignorant, at present, of the feeling of pain. You cannot hurt them. One of them declares that she would on no account resume the normal state.”
“I cannot imagine any one wanting to be so unnatural, and she must lose all warnings as to burns and knocks.”
“No, she substitutes intelligent watchfulness for the sentinel pain.”
“I shall never get rid of pain by having hysterics,” said Rose, confidently. “I can’t imagine that.”
“Occasion may assist imagination. Take care!”
“There is a scornful masculine note in that remark, sir! Why do not men have hysterics?”
“Ask North; he will refer you to Hamlet’s condition. Isn’t it in Act I, Scene IV, where he gets what Jack calls ‘rattled’ about the ghost? North says he was hysterical. Dr. Shakspere knew his business. But I meant to add that North says there is one case on record of a man who, in all his life, never knew what pain was,—had no pain; could not be hurt in any way!”
“How strange!”