The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1873-04-04
Wonderful Surgery.

A DEAD MANS BRAIN PLACED IN A LIVING
MANS sKULL-THE NEW BRAIN PRoDU-
CEs A NEW CHARACTER.
We often hear of one man using another
mans brains but if we are to accept as true
q story that we find gcing the rounds, this
expression may come to represent fact
instead of q metaphor.
Virhoao's ArchigeS, q medical journal
published in Berlin, tells the story of
transfer of the brain from a dead to q liv-
ing man as follows:
1t was at Leipzig that the experiment
was performed. A soldier who had killed
the colonel of his regiment in cold blood,
and whom the severity of Prussian military
discipline would have caused to die O hun
dred deaths had it been possible, was de-
liberately handed over to the surgeons, by
sentence of court. martial, and was confined
in a strong room in the military hospital,
entirely in the dark as to to the fate which
awaited him. He was kept there ready
for an emergency, which did not fail to oc
cur. A keeper of beer cellar in Leipzig,
man resembling, in many respects, the
condemned soldier, and who had been seiz-
cd with acute inflammation of the heart, or
rather of its investing membrane, was
brought to the hospital to die of that in
durable and promptly fatal malady. No
sooner had the anticipated death taken
place than the dead saloonKeeper was pla-
ced on table by the side of another oper-
ating table, on which was the chloroform-
ed but living body of the soldier.
The skulls of both were opened and the
brain of the living soldier was carefully re-
moved and that of the dead saloonkeeper,
which was sound, the heart disease having
left it intact, he having been sensible to the
last; was transferred to the skull of the
soldier, and by an ingenious continuance,
fully detailed in the Gazette, the continuity
of the arterial and venous tubes was estab-
lished. The greatest care was taken in Sc
curing the natural adaptation of the parts
to fraction of line, and the skull, having
ben replaced simply, was held down and
in position by the scalp, which was drawn
over, and its edges confined by strips of
adhesive plaster, and over all was placed
bandage. No inflammation ensued and
the full flow of blood which had been
checked by pressure on the carotid arteries,
was permitted In about six days. There
was from the first no difficulty in feeding
the patient, nor was difficulty anticipated,
~ we'll known that in puppies and
"a ZRiEkwhiclI the entire brain has been
-',-4"Teu sucking and swallowing go on as
well as before the operation, and in this
case the nerves which preside over deglu-
tition and digestion were far below the
point of section.
The patient remained in sound sleep
ior two weeks, as in a case ofapoplexy, the
circulation, digestion, and all the vereta-
tive functions of life being uninterrupted.
The gradual union of the parts was shown
by faint, but gradually increasing move
mcnts OF the limbs, of the jaws, and of the
muscles ofeXpression in the face Speech
did not become possible until the close of
the third week, and then it was hesitating,
rs a child learns. Although it was evident
that the patient tried to utter words and
sentences, it was very gradually that the
power OF Ineligible articulation returned.
When speech became ineligible it was
found that the soldier, as he seemed, had
forgotten entirely his military training and
discipline; on the other hand he told, at q
formal examination, in the presence of
number of witnesses, the prices of all the
wines and beers, such as the saloonkeeper
had been in the habit of buying and selling
manittsting the unimpaired cerebral activ.
ity ofthe latter. His memory recalled the
aloon-keeper's relatives, friends, and Gus
toners, whom he called by name.
The soldier had been ugly, taciturn, re-
yongeful; he now had the saloon keepers
irankness and even garrulity, in spite of
his stammering utterancv. He was totally
blind. Although the nerves of smell and
sight had been approximated in the oper-
alton, they failed to unite. 1t was both
IA and strange to see and hear the soldier
cropping in his infirmity Of blindness and
giving proof of all the patient endurance
and goodness of heart which had made the
saloon keeper deservedly esteemed and
prosperous. These are the main facts in the
cases rs far as detailed in the A1chieces, but
the subject ofexperiment presents so many
important problems of the relation between
blood and brain, of heart-power and ner-
vous energy, but we may be well assured
that no facts Of interes, in the changed con.
dition of the cnlprit will be permitted to
r~s'ce and record. = A grave point
of discussion is whether he must still be
considered criminal and suffer execu-
ton as a guilty soldier or shall be pension
ca and literally cared for in his infrmitv
~ asgnlltiess and much suffering beer-sei