thorax, &c., these must be treated on general principles, and it, as one of their symptoms, will depart so soon as they are removed.

Some persons recommend opium for the cure of night-mare, but this medicine I should think more likely to aggravate than relieve the complaint. The late Dr. Polydori, author of "The Vampyre," and of an "Essay on Positive Pleasure," was much subject to incubus, and in the habit of using opium for its removal. One morning he was found dead, and on a table beside him stood a glass, which had evidently contained laudanum and water. From this, it was supposed he had killed himself by his own treatment; but whether the quantity of laudanum taken by him would have destroyed life in ordinary circumstances, has never been ascertained.

CHAPTER VI.

DAY-MARE.

I HAVE strong doubts as to the propriety of considering this affection in any way different from the incubus, or night-mare. It seems merely a modification of the latter, only accompanied by no aberration of the judgment. The person endures precisely many of the same feelings, such as difficult respiration, torpor of the voluntary muscles, deep sighing, extreme terror, and inability to speak. The only difference which seems to exist between the two states is, that, in day-mare, the reason is always unclouded-whereas in incubus it is generally more or less disturbed.

Dr. Mason Good, in his "Study of Medicine," takes notice of a case, recorded by Forestus, "that

returned periodically every third day, like an intermittent fever. The patient was a girl, nine years of age, and at these times was suddenly attacked with great terror, a constriction of both the lower and upper belly, with urgent difficulty of breathing. Her eyes continued open, and were permanently continued to one spot; with her hands she forcibly grasped hold of things, that she might breathe the more easily. When spoken to, she returned no answer. In the meantime, the mind seemed to be collected; she was without sleep; sighed repeatedly; the abdomen was elevated, the thorax still violently contracted, and oppressed with laborious respiration and heavy panting: she was incapable of utterance."

During the intensely hot summer of 1825, I experienced an attack of day-mare. Immediately after dining, I threw myself on my back upon a sofa, and, before I was aware, was seized with difficult respiration, extreme dread, and utter incapability of motion or speech. I could neither move nor cry, while the breath came from my chest in broken and suffocating paroxysms. During all this time, I was perfectly awake; I saw the light glaring in at the windows in broad sultry streams; I felt the intense heat of the day pervading my

frame; and heard distinctly the different noises in the street, and even the ticking of my own watch, which I had placed on the cushion beside me. I had, at the same time, the consciousness of flies buzzing around, and settling with annoying pertinacity upon my face. During the whole fit, judg ment was never for a moment suspended. I felt assured that I laboured under a species of incubus. I even endeavoured to reason myself out of the feeling of dread which filled my mind, and longed with insufferable ardour for some one to open the door, and dissolve the spell which bound me in its fetters. The fit did not continue above five minutes: by degrees I recovered the use of speech and motion; and as soon as they were so far restored as to enable me to call out and move my limbs, it wore insensibly away.

Upon the whole, I consider day-mare and nightmare identical. They proceed from the same causes, and must be treated in a similar manner.

CHAPTER VII.

SLEEP WALKING.

IN simple dreaming, as I have already stated, some of the cerebral organs are awake, while others continue in the quiescence of sleep. Such, also, is the case in somnambulism, but with this addition, that the dream is of so forcible a nature as to stimulate into action the muscular system as well as, in most cases, one or more of the organs of the senses. If we dream that we are walking, and the vision possesses such a degree of vividness and exciting energy as to arouse the muscles of locomotion, we naturally get up and walk. Should we dream that we hear or see, and the impression be so vivid as to stimulate the eyes and ears, or, more properly speaking, those parts of the brain which