Sleep : its physiology, pathology, hygiene, and psychology / by Marie de Manaceine.

Date:
1897
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Sleep : its physiology, pathology, hygiene, and psychology / by Marie de Manaceine. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    by Hammond/ who has devoted special attention to this subject, include groaning, flushing of the face, neck, and chest, cold perspiration, especially on the forehead, sometimes a general trembling of the whole body ; the respiration is particularly disturbed and the breathing sometimes stertorous. It is remarkable that, except for some slight irregularity due to re- spiratory disturbance, the pulse is rarely affected. The psychic symptoms are chiefly made up of fear together with a feeling of utter helplessness. The dreamer is engaged in a struggle and is seeking to bring his muscles into action, but they are powerless, and he feels helpless to escape from his foes. These foes consist of all sorts of animals or demons. One dreamer is mentioned who was visited almost nightly by a great black walrus which appeared to roll off a huge block of ice, crawl on to the bed, and throw itself on his chest. Another was tormented by an animal, half lion and half monkey, which seated itself on his breast and fastened its claws into his throat In other cases there are no images, but only the sense of being placed in a dangerous position, or subjected to a torturing operation. Thus one lady imagines that she is poised on the top of a high mast and in extreme danger of falling ofT, while another thinks that she is being dragged through a keyhole by some invisible power. After all that has been said in previous pages with regard to the large dependence of the phenomena of sleeping consciousness on the state of the organs and tissues, it is easy to understand thaTwhen a group of persons are placed under uniform conditions their dreams also may be more or less uniform. Such 1 Op. cit., pp. 250 el seq.