in the complex of symptoms, the tendency among neurologists is to revert to the term employed by Romberg—tabes dorsalis. “Locomotor ataxia,” although it expresses a very characteristic feature of the disease, has this objection: it is a symptom which does not occur in the first (preataxic) stage of the disease; indeed a great number of years may elapse before ataxy comes on, and sometimes the patient, after suffering a very long time from the disease, may die from some intercurrent complication, having never been ataxic.
It is generally recognized by neurologists that persons who are not the subjects of acquired or hereditary syphilis do not suffer from this disease; and the average time of onset after infection is ten years (see Neuropathology). There are three stages: (1) The preataxic, (2) the ataxic, (3) the bed-ridden paralytic. The duration of the first stage may be from one or two years, up to twenty years or even longer. In this stage various symptoms may arise. The patient usually complains of shooting, lightning-like pains in the legs, which he may attribute to rheumatism. If a physician examines him he will almost certainly find the knee-jerks absent and Argyll Robertson pupils present; probably on inquiry he will ascertain that the patient has had some difficulty in starting urination, or that he is unable to retain his water or to empty his bladder completely. In other cases, temporary or permanent paralysis of one or more muscles of the eyeball (which causes squint and double vision), a failure of sight ending in blindness, attacks of vomiting (or gastric crises), painless spontaneous fractures of bones and dislocations of joints, failing sexual power and impotence, may lead the patient to consult a physician, when this disease will be diagnosed, although the patient may not as yet have had locomotor ataxy. All cases, however, if they live long enough, pass into the second ataxic stage. The sufferer complains now of difficulty of walking in the dark; he sways with his eyes shut and feels as if he would fall (Romberg’s symptom); he has the sensation of walking on wool, numbness and formication of the skin, and many sensory disturbances in the form of partial or complete loss of sensibility to pain, touch and temperature. These disturbances affect especially the feet and legs, and around the trunk at the level of the fourth to the seventh ribs, giving rise to a “girdle sensation.” There may be a numbed feeling on the inner side of the arm, and muscular incoordination may affect the upper limb as well as the lower, although there is no wasting or any electrical change. The ataxic gait is very characteristic, owing to the loss of reflex tonus in the muscles, and the absence of guiding sensations from all the deep structures of the limbs, muscles, joints, bones, tendons and ligaments, as well as from the skin of the soles of the feet; therefore the sufferer has to be guided by vision as to where and how to place his feet. This necessitates the bending forward of the body, extension of the knees and broadening of the basis of support; he generally uses a walking stick or even two, and he jerks the leg forward as if he were on wires, bringing the sole of the foot down on the ground with a wide stamping action. If the arm be affected, he is unable to touch the tip of his nose with the eyes shut. Sooner or later he passes into the third bed-ridden stage, with muscles wasted and their tonus so much lost that he is in a perfectly helpless condition.
The complications which may arise in this disease are intercurrent affections due to septic conditions of the bladder, bedsores, pneumonia, vascular and heart affections. About 10% of the cases, at least, develop general paralysis of the insane. This is not surprising seeing that it is due to the same cause, and the etiology of the two diseases is such as to lead many neurologists to consider them one and the same disease affecting different parts of the nervous system. Tabes dorsalis occurs with much greater frequency in men than in women (see Neuropathology).
The avoidance of all stress of the nervous system, whether physical, emotional or intellectual, is indicated, and a simple regular life, without stimulants or indulgence of the sexual passion, is the best means of delaying the progress of the disease. Great attention should be paid to micturition, so as to avoid retention and infection of the bladder. Drugs, even anti-syphilitic remedies, appear to have but little influence upon the course of the disease.
LOCO-WEEDS, or Crazy-Weeds, leguminous plants, chiefly
species of Astragalus and Lupinus, which produce a disease in
cattle known as “loco-disease.” The name is apparently taken
from the Spanish loco, mad. The disease affects the nervous
system of the animals eating the plants, and is accompanied by
exhaustion and wasting.
LOCRI, a people of ancient Greece, inhabiting two distinct
districts, one extending from the north-east of Parnassus to
the northern half of the Euboean channel, between Boeotia
and Malis, the other south-west of Parnassus, on the north
shore of the Corinthian Gulf, between Phocis and Aetolia.
The former were divided into the northern Locri Epicnemidii,
situated on the spurs of Mount Cnemis, and the southern Locri
Opuntii, so named from their chief town Opus (q.v.): and the
name Opuntia is often applied to the whole of this easterly
district. Homer mentions only these eastern Locrians: their
national hero in the Trojan war is Ajax Oileus, who often
appears afterwards on Locrian coins. From Hesiod’s time onwards,
the Opuntians were thought by some to be of “Lelegian”
origin (see Leleges), but they were Hellenized early (though
matriarchal customs survived among them)—, and Deucalion,
the father of Hellen himself, is described as the first king of Opus.
The westerly Locri “in Ozolae” on the Corinthian Gulf, a rude
and barbarous people, make no appearance in Greek history till
the Peloponnesian war. It was believed that they had separated
from the eastern Locrians four generations before the Trojan
war; yet Homer has no hint of their existence. Probably
the Locrians were once a single people, extending from sea
to sea, till subsequent immigrations forced them apart into two
separate districts. The Locrian dialect of Greek is little known,
but resembles that of Elis: it has στ for σθ; uses α; and has
οις in dat. plur. 3rd decl. A colony of Locrians (whether from
Opus or Ozolae was disputed in antiquity) settled, about the
end of the 8th century B.C., at the south-west extremity of Italy.
They are often called Locri Epizephyrii from Cape Zephyrion
15 m. S. of the city. Their founder’s name was Euanthes.
Their social organization resembled that of the Opuntian Locri,
and like them they venerated Ajax Oileus and Persephone.
Aristotle (ap. Polyb. xii. 5 sqq.) records a tradition that these
western Locrians were base-born, like the Parthenians of
Tarentum; but this was disputed by his contemporary Timaeus.
See Locri (town) below. (J. L. M.)
LOCRI, an ancient city of Magna Graecia, Italy. The original
settlers took possession of the Zephyrian promontory (Capo
Bruzzano some 12 m. N. of Capo Spartivento), and though after
three or four years they transplanted themselves to a site 12 m.
farther north, still near the coast, 2 m. S. of Gerace Marina
below the modern Gerace, they still retained the name of Locri
Epizephyrii (Λοκροὶ οἱ ἐπιζεφύριοι), which served to distinguish
them from the Ozolian and Opuntian Locri of Greece itself
(see preceding article). The foundation of Locri goes back to
about 683 B.C. It was the first of all Greek communities to have
a written code of laws given by Zaleucus in 664 B.C. From
Locri were founded the colonies of Meisma and Heiponium
(Hipponium). It succeeded in repelling the attacks of Croton
(battle on the river Sagras, perhaps sometime in the 6th century),
and found in Syracuse a support against Rhegium: it was
thus an active adversary of Athenian aggrandisement in the
west. Pindar extolls its uprightness and love of the heroic
muse of beauty, of wisdom, and of war, in the 10th and 11th
Olympian Odes. Stesichorus (q.v.) was indeed of Locrian origin.
But it owed its greatest external prosperity to the fact that
Dionysius I. of Syracuse selected his wife from Locri: its territory
was then increased, and the circuit of its walls was doubled, but
it lost its freedom. In 356 B.C. it was ruled by Dionysius II.
From the battle of Heraclea to the year 205 (when it was captured
by P. Cornelius Scipio Africanus Maior, and placed under the
control of his legate Q. Pleminius), Locri was continually changing
its allegiance between Rome and her enemies; but it remained
