The nervous system of the human body. Embracing the papers delivered to the Royal Society on the subject of the nerves.

  • Bell, Charles, Sir.
Date:
1830
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The nervous system of the human body. Embracing the papers delivered to the Royal Society on the subject of the nerves. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by UCL Library Services. The original may be consulted at UCL (University College London)

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    ixlii Was this a defect arising from the disorder of nerves, or an accom- modated action to the opacity of the centre of the cornea? No. XIV. Case communicated hy Mr. Alexander Shaw. Sophia Walker, aet. 17, has an incessant motion in both her eyes. The left eye is slirunk; she lost it during infancy, when she had the small- pox. In the right eye there is a leucomatous spot upon the inner side of the cornea, nearly opposite the pupil, and to this part the iris adheres, but she sees objects distinctly with it. The remarkable circumstance is, that her eyes are not for a moment at rest, and yet this motion does not disturb her vision. There is a constant tremulous motion in them, which her mother says has continued since her infancy; it is not so much upwards and downwards, as in a transverse direction, but it is irregular in this respect. When she was requested to take her book and read, she read with perfect ease, and yet there w^as no cessation of the motion in her eye. She threaded her needle without any apparent difficulty, and then showed how she could sew, which was with the usual nimbleness; she gained her living, indeed, by her needle-work. She also looked steadily at various objects in the room, but the motion of her eye continued the same in all these attempts. She was asked to look as far upwards as her eye could be directed, and in the same manner to strain her eye in all the various directions, but by no means could the tremulous motion be arrested. She was not sensible of there being any defect of this kind in her eye, or at least it did not produce any inconvenience; all objects seemed in their natural state either of rest or of motion. When she looked at herself in the glass, she saw her eye rapidly moving. In order to ascertain whether any change took place while the eye-ball was involuntarily rolled upwards, the eye-lids were held apart, and she was told to wink forcibly: the cornea was elevated, so as almost to be hid, and during the time that it remained in that position it was quite fixed and steady. It was next desirable to know whether the eye-ball remained fixed during sleep. When the eye-lids were gently closed, the eye-ball continued