Mr.

ence any mental disturbance, when he thought the vomitus was the head of a hippopotamus, and again a bunch of earthworms. He noticed that, if anything ludicrous were said or done, or any idea suggested, which required more than common exercise of the mind, the spasms were considerably intensified. The senses of seeing and feeling were somewhat diminished. Had tinnitus aurium. Conjunctivæ congested. Pulse, at 8.30, about 140, somewhat irregular in character and frequency,.-At 11 o'clock three persons had taken the liquid; on the expiration of two hours no sensible effect being produced, another dose was administered. The following are the phenomena which occurred in two of the gentlemen in the course of another half hour: Mr. A. K. resisted the action of the substance, and, as he said, experienced a slight oppression of the head and epigastrium; perhaps, also, the second repast which he took, all these gentlemen having already breakfasted, may have entirely neutralized the substance; an examination of the state of the pulse was neglected at the beginning of the experiment; its acceleration subsequently and the state of the pupil sufficiently demonstrated the effect of the substance. Mr. B., on whom the medicine first took effect, experienced a dryness of the throat and twitching of the limbs. The pulse was 96 in the minute, the face flushed. B. soon closed his eyes in order to collect himself; his ideas appeared to develop with extreme rapidity. At one moment he offered the singular phenomena of a double man; he said he heard music on one side and conversation on the other; but this symptom did not continue. The music, which was performed by M. C., did not appear to act in any particular manner on the subject of experiment. At this time his pupils were much dilated. Interrogated as to his sensations, M. B. said they were very voluptuous. He felt particularly gay and happy; he wished to be alone in a quiet place; he had great repugnance to speak or to move; all countenances appear to him ridiculous. Until now Mr. B. had conversed; he moved about, and sometimes laughed violently, but all his actions resembled those of a person excited by alcoholic liquor. Suddenly he flung himself on a couch, refused to answer any more questions, and begged to be left alone, and not disturbed in the delicious sensations he experienced; he had spasmodic movements in his members, and in the diaphragm; he sighed, moaned, laughed, and wept by turns; the pulse 120 a minute, the face much flushed. The persons present began to feel uneasy, but were reassured on hearing Mr. B. repeat several times that he was happy and did not suffer. Dr. Cottereau watched the symptoms with the greatest minuteness. Mr. B. appeared the whole time to have the most agreeable symptoms proceeding from the epigastrium. All the phenomena presented were those of ecstasy; his features bespoke the greatest happiness; he could not find language to express his feelings; he would not wish to leave his present condition he is so happy. "How much I thank those who gave me that delicious drink." Tell me what you feel," said one of the party, "I cannot express it." The influence of Mr. B.'s temperament was remarked throughout the experiment; he is possessed of great sensibility. In speaking of gay subjects, and pointing out lively and agreeable objects, his ideas harmonized instantly; he shouted with laughter, and evinced the greatest gayety. It was evident in this case that he was under the influence of the person who spoke to him, who could direct his ideas as he chose. Mr. B.'s sense of hearing had become extremely acute; he very distinctly heard what was said far off and in a low voice. In the midst of his ecstasy he neither lost consciousness of persons nor things. He replied

correctly to all questions addressed to him, and knew those who surrounded him; but it was evidently painful to him to speak; he seemed to wish to enjoy his ecstasy undisturbed. At half past four, the pulse is 90; his ecstatic reveries continue; he is not conscious of anything relating to earth; his mind is perfectly free, and yet he has some delicious sensations. Mr. A. De G. proposes to give him an antidote and bring him back to his natural state; he says that the sensation of happiness will last a day or two. All whom I have interrogated, who have tried the experiment, have assured me that they have not felt any distress on the following days, but, on the contrary, a great sensation of happiness. M. D., the second subject, came to the meeting with the conviction that the substance could not produce any effect upon him, and with the firm intention to resist its action. No symptoms occurred for two hours and a half. The physiog nomy of M. D. is grave. His character is serious, he rarely laughs, and devotes himself to metaphysical studies. Towards 2 o'clock his pulse was 100; his heart beat rapidly; several persons felt its pulsations. M. D., who until now had been very calm, and conversed with the company on various subjects, exclaimed that he was delirious; he began to sing, took out his pencil, and endeavored to write down what he felt. Here are some fragments of his notes: "It is droll; my feelings are very vivid; the idea of being useful without fear, made me decide on taking this excellent drink. I am singular; they are laughing at me; I will not write any inore." He threw away his paper; his delirium increased. The features of M. D. became very flexible; he laughs sardonically; the expression of his eye is animated, his face red, his pulse 120, his pupils dilated. Like Mr. B., he looks extremely happy; laughs, sings, gesticulates, and speaks with extreme volubility. His ideas follow one another with rapidity; it is the derangement of gay mania. But in the midst of this abundance, mobility, and variableness of ideas, those which form the basis of his studies predominate. These serious subjects are intermixed with pleasantries, bon mots, and puns. His tongue is dry; he spits frequently; his inferior extremities are slightly convulsed. This is a very singular delirium. Like Mr. B., his hearing and sight are very acute. He has no notion of time and space, but recognizes every one present, and replies correctly to questions put to him. He draws out his watch, and says with the greatest calmness, "It is such an hour." A multitude of ideas seem to fill his head, which he cannot express; he says, "You might take an ear, or an eye, if you could give me another tongue to make known what I feel." The pulse lowers; it is softer, and beats but 90 in a minute. The delirium continues; water is given to him; he exclaims: "That will make the frogs come, who will drink up the liquor." Incoherent sentences follow with inconceivable rapidity. The character of the delirium changes. He seats himself in a corner, closes his eyes, and talks to himself; he looks inspired. We surround him; he talks of sciences and gives definitions; then, like a man trying his powers, he pronounces a few words, and immediately recites some twenty very harmonious verses. Being under the impression that they were some well-known stanzas, we omitted to note them down; but on some one asking him if they were not by Victor Hugo, he replied, "No!" "They are then your own?" He gave a sign of assent. His countenance expressed gayety and satisfaction; his skin became very pallid; his pulse 100; his eyes closed, which he opened on the request of his brother; the pupils less dilated. He left off improvising to speak of foreign countries. We had been told that in these experiments the phenomena

of second sight would be developed. M. D. described countries and cities which he had visited with as much correctness as though they were then before him; he perfectly recollected the peculiarities which he had noticed in his travels; in like manner he told us that he saw the stones of the Pantheon at Naples, raised, and drew a very practical picture of the scene which had struck him. But notwithstanding all our questions, he could not describe places with which he was unacquainted. He saw objects which had no existence. His brother inquired if he could look into his brain. "No, it is empty;" then he added: How do you think I can see into your brain? It is veiled, there are objects between it and me." He then arose, saying, "All this is a dream; this state of aberration has given a livelier impulse to my ideas, but has not added to my knowledge." The delirium, which for some time had been confined to a series of ideas, now became general again; he sang, laughed, and talked with great vivacity; he experienced no suffering, and said he was very happy. This state lasted for four hours and a half, when I left the party. The pulse at 90; the spitting frequent, and a constant desire to drink,.-One of our companions, Dr., who had travelled much in the East, and was a determined opium eater, was the first to yield to its influence, having taken a much larger dose than the others; he saw stars in his plate, and the firmameut in his soup dish; then turning his face to the wall, talked to himself, and burst into fits of laughter, with eyes flashing, and in the highest state of glee. I felt perfectly calm until dinner was over, although the pupils of the eyes of my other friends began to sparkle strangely and acquire a most singular turquoise tint. The tables being cleared, I (still having my senses) arranged myself comfortably with cushions on a divan to await the ecstasy. In a few minutes a general lethargy overcame me. My body appeared to dissolve and become transparent. I saw the hasheesh which I had eaten, distinctly within me, under the form of an emerald, from which thousands of little sparks were emitted; my eyelashes lengthened indefinitely, twisting themselves like golden threads around little ivory wheels, which whirled about with inconceivable rapidity. Around me were figures and scrolls of all colors, arabesques, and flowing forms in endless variety, which I can only compare to the variations of the kaleidoscope. I still occasionally saw my companions; but they appeared disfigured, half men, half plants; now with the pensive air of an ibis, standing on one leg, and again as ostriches, flapping their wings, and wearing so strange an appearance that I shook with laughter in my corner; and, as if to join in the buffoonery of the scene, I commenced tossing up my cushions, catching them as they descended, and twisting them round with all the dexterity of an Indian juggler. One of the gentlemen addressed a discourse to me in Italian, which the hasheesh by its extraordinary power delivered to me in Spanish. Questions and answers were most rational, and touched on different matters, such as the theatres and literature. The first stage drew towards its termination. After some minutes I recovered my calmness, without headache, or any of the symptoms which accompany the use of wine, and feeling very much astonished at what had occurred, when I again fell under the influence of the hasheesh. The vision this time was more complicated and extraordinary. Millions of butterflies, whose wings rustled like fans, flew about in the midst of a confused kind of light. Gigantic flowers, with crystal calyxes, enormous hollyhocks, gold and silver lilies arose, and burst into flowers around me with a crackling sound like that of bouquets of fireworks. My hearing was prodigiously developed. I heard the sound

of color; green, red, blue, and yellow sounds struck me with perfect distinctness. A glass upset, the creaking of a chair, or word spoken, however low, vibrated and resounded like rolling thunder; my own voice appeared so loud that I dared not speak for fear of throwing down the walls or bursting like a bomb; more than five hundred clocks chimed the hour with their flutelike voices. Every object gave forth a note of the harmonica or Eolian harp. I swam in an ocean of sound, wherein some passages of the Lucia and Barbiere floated like little isles of light. Never before had I bathed in such beatitude; I was so encircled by its waves, so transported from all things earthly, so lost to self, that odious, ever-present witness, that I comprehended for the first time what might be the existence of elementary spirits and angels, and souls released from this mortal coil. I was as a sponge in the midst of the sea; every instant waves of happiness washed over me, entering and departing through the pores; for I had become permeable, and even to the smallest capillary vessel my whole being was filled with the color of the fantastic medium in which I was plunged. Sounds, perfumes, and light reached me by multitudes of beams, delicate as a hair, through which I heard the magnetic current pass. According to my calculation this state must have lasted for three hundred years, for the sensations succeeded each other so numerously and powerfully that the real appreciation of time was impossible. When the attack was over, I perceived that it had lasted a quarter of an hour. What is very curious in the intoxicating effect of the hasheesh is that it is not continuous; it comes and goes suddenly, raises you to heaven and places you again on earth, without any gradual transition; like madness, it has its lucid intervals. A third attack, the last and strangest, terminated my Oriental soirée. In this my sight was doubled. Two images of each object were reflected on my retina, and produced a complete symmetry; but soon, the magic paste being entirely digested, acted with more power on my brain, and I became completely mad for the space of an hour. All kinds of Pantagruelic dreams passed through my fancy; goat-suckers, storks, striped geese, unicorns, griffins, nightmares, all the menageries of monstrous dreams, trotted, jumped, flew, or glided through the room. These wore horns terminating in foliage, webbed hands; whimisical beings, with the feet of the arm-chair for legs, and dial-plates for eyeballs; enormous noses dancing the Cachuca, mounted on chickens' legs. For myself, I imagined I was the paroquet of the Queen of Sheba, and imitated, to the best of my ability, the voice and cries of that interesting bird. The visions became so grotesque that I was seized with a desire to sketch them, which I did in five minutes, with inconceivable rapidity, on the backs of letters, cards, or any pieces of paper on which I could lay my hands. One of them is the portrait of Dr. as he appeared to me seated at the piano, dressed as a Turk, with a sun painted on the back of his vest. The notes are represented escaping from the instrument in the form of guns and spirals, capriciously intertwisted. Another sketch bears this inscription; "An animal of hereafter." It represents a living locomotive, with a swan's neck terminating in the jaws of a serpent, whence issue jets of smoke, with two monstrous paws composed of wheels and pulleys; each pair of paws has a pair of wings, and on the tail of the animal is seated the Mercury of the ancients, who is confessing himself to be conquered, notwithstanding his heels. Thanks to hasheesh, I have painted from nature the portrait of a goblin. Even now I fancy I hear them whining and mowing at night in my old buffet,.-For two hours no results at all were experienced. At

this time a dryness seemed to commence at a particular spot in the throat, and a feeling of warmth throughout the abdomen. These were not the results of disordered sensation, for a clammy mucus soon began to be secreted, though the huskiness of the throat still remained. Up to this time there was not the slightest excitement or confusion of thought. Suddenly, however, an idea, having no connection with the train of thought passing in the mind at the time, appeared, as though suggested by another person, and then was gone again as suddenly as it came, leaving upon the mind the same feeling as when one escapes from a dream or a deep revery. The same thing was repeated two or three times, at intervals rapidly diminishing in length. Even now I can hardly believe but it was the result of strained attentions to my physical sensations, for the gentle warmth of the abdomen was rapidly becoming a burning heat; still, however, not by any means unpleasant, and the dryness of the throat extended to the tongue. I had taken this drug with great skepticism as to its reputed action, or at any rate, that it was greatly exaggerated, and I accordingly made up my mind not to be "caught napping" in this way again, and to keep careful watch over my thoughts. But while enforcing this resolution, as I supposed, I found myself, to my own astonishment, waking from a revery longer and more profound than any previous. From skepticism to the fullest belief of all I had read, was but a step. Its effects so far surpassed anything which words can convey, that I began to think I was on the verge of narcotic poison; yet, strange to say, there was not the slightest feeling of inquietude on that account. I resolved to walk into the street. While rising from the chair, another lucid interval showed that another dream had come and gone. While passing through the door, I was aware of having wandered again, but how or when I had permitted myself to fall into the revery, I was perfectly unconscious, and knew only that it seemed to have lasted an interminable length of time. These singular attacks of mental disturbance recurred often, and lasted longer, till the lucid interval between them was reduced to a mere instant's conscious duration of thought. This condition came on so rapidly, that in less than fifteen minutes from the time of my being aware of the first mental disturbance, the power of controlling the thoughts was almost completely lost. All ideas of time and space were especially bewildered, and I realized completely for the first time the idea of some metaphysicians, that time, properly speaking, has no existence except in connection with a succession of mental operations or sensations. The most trivial circumstance, the slightest noise, gave rise to trains of thought, which went bounding from subject to subject, completely emancipated from the rules which ordinarily govern mental operations, till suddenly some other circumstance would give an entirely new direction to them, and the last series of imaginations would seem to have lasted from eternity, even while the eye was fixed upon the clock, the hand of which had not perceptibly moved. Now a phenomenon still more singular, began to exhibit itself. I felt that, in spite of all exertions, I was beginning to receive the suggestions of a disordered fancy for real objective facts. Intellectually, I know that the spinal column. could not be a barometer, in which mercury had usurped the place of the spinal cord. Yet in another sense, over which the operations of the intellect were entirely powerless, I felt that it was a barometer. An unpleasant sensation in the lumbar region suggested the idea of a heavy column of mercury pressing upon it, and at the time, and under the circumstances, the transition to the idea of a barometer was easy and natural. There was