THE FORCE OF IMAGINATION.

Inangahua Times, Volume II, 16 March 1881, Page 2

THE FORCE OF IMAGINATION.

A celebrated physician, author of an excellent work on toe force of i magma* Uod, b«»ing desirous to add experimental to bis theoretical knowledge, made application to tbe Minuter of Justice in France some time since to be allowed an opportunity of proving what he asserted by an experiment on * criminal condemned to death. The Minister complied with his request, and deliverei over to him an assassin, a man wbo bad been borne of distinguished parents. Tbs physician told him that several persons who had takeo an interest 'in bis family hsd obtained leave of tbe Minister that be should suffer death in Botne other way than on tbe scaffold, to avo ; d the disgrace of a public execution ; and that tbe easiest death be could die would be by blood letting. The criminal pgreed to the proposal, and counted himself happy in being freed from the painful exhibition which he would otherwise have been made of, and rejoiced at thus being enabled to spare the feeling" of bid friends and family. At the time appointed the physician repaired to the prisoD, and the patient having been extended on a table, bis eyes bound, and everything being ready, be was slightly pricked near tbe principal veins of the legs and arms with the point of a pin, At the four corners of the table were four little fountains, filled with water from which issued small streams falling into brains placed there to receive them; Tbe patient, thinking that is was his blood that trickled into the basins, became weaker and weaker by degrees, and the remarks of the medical men in attendance in reference to the quality and appearance of tbe blood (made with that intention) increased the delusion, and be spoke more and more faintly, until bis voice was at length scarcely audible. Tbe profound silence which reigned in the apart* meet, and tbe constant dropping of the fountain, bad so extraordinary an effect on tbe brain of the poor patient that all his vital energies were soon gone, though before a very strong man, and he died without having lost; a single drop of blood