Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 67.djvu/603

physically impossible for him to open them. With the view of proving this, I requested Mr. Walker, a young gentleman present, to sit down, and maintain a fixed stare at the top of a wine bottle, placed so much above him as to produce a considerable strain on the eyes and eyelids, to enable him to maintain a steady view of the object. In three minutes his eyelids closed, a gush of tears ran down his cheeks, his head drooped, his face was slightly convulsed, he gave a groan and instantly fell into a profound sleep, the respiration becoming slow, deep and sibilant, the right hand and arm being agitated by slight convulsive movements. At the end of four minutes, I considered it necessary, for his safety, to put an end to the experiment.

Braid became so convinced that his interpretation of the phenomena was the correct one that he used it universally, succeeding in a remarkable number of cases. His method was as follows:

He would take any bright object, most often his lancet case, and holding it about fifteen inches from the eyes and in such a position as to strain them and still allow the patient to gaze steadily at it, he would carry it slowly toward them until the eyelids closed involuntarily. After a preliminary contraction of the pupils, they would; dilate, and finally a tremulous motion of the iris would take place. If this did not succeed after a few minutes, he would try again, letting the patient understand that his eyes and mind had to be riveted on the one idea of the object before him. The primary fact was the fixation of the mind on a certain object. Nay, even the hynotist himself, if he use the method of attraction, may be hypnotized, as Braid shows in the following example. Mr. Walker, Braid's friend, offered to hypnotize a certain person. When Braid went into the room where the experiment was going on, he saw the gentleman sitting staring at Mr. Walker's finger. Mr. Walker was standing a little to the right of his patient with his eyes fixed steadily on those of the latter. Braid passed on, and when he returned he found Mr. Walker standing in the same position fast asleep, his arm and finger perfectly rigid and the patient wide awake, staring at the finger all the while.

After Braid, many men pursued the scientific investigation of the phenomena. The interest in the new science since 1875 has spread quickly over Europe. In Belgium, the eminent psychologist Delboeuf of Liège, made a path for it. In Holland such men as Van Reuterghem, VanEiden and De Jong used hypnotism for curative purposes; in Denmark, Norway and Sweden, there were Johannessen, Sell, Frankel, Calsen and Wetterstrand, of Stockholm, and finally Swedenborg. In Russia were Strembo and Tokarski; in Greece, Italy and Spain, hypnotism has greatly come into play in medical treatment. In England, Carpenter, Laydock, Sir James Simpson, Lloyd-Tuckey, Mayo and others have used it for curing the sick. In America, the science also has its advocates. It is one of the subjects constantly appearing before the Society for Psychical Re-