Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1879-11-02
A Musical Idiot.

The Gazette Medicaze, presented to the
Academy some years since, contains the
following notice of case of musical SEN
sibility highly developed in an idiot:
A female, about sixty years OF age,
who; when quite young, was entered
among the insane OF the Saltpetriero, was
afterward placed in the service of N.
Mitivle. She never possessed more than
exceeding limited intellect, was incapable
OF dressing herself, Of doing any kind of
work, or even Of uttering an articulate
sound. When she wished to express her
self she made kind Of grunting or hoarse
noise, and repeated it till her meaning
was understood. Nevertheless she is
musician, and her skill IN sounds goes a
very considerable extent.
The first circumstance that led us to
observe this talent was of a nature to fix
our attention. A young woman, an infer
lor dancer or actress at one OF the minor
theaters of Paris, not long since was ad-
mitted in the hospital and placed under
restraint. While there her theatrical
habits returned at intervals; she sang,
declaim ed, gesticulated and danced, sup
porting the characters which she filed.
One day she extended her hands to the
ola idiot and sang song to which she
jumped in time. The idiot followed the
air, not the words, for she could not
speak. with her voice; she jumped also
in time and appeared to- enjoy great
pleasure. It then occurred to us that
she might be able to sing anything we
should propose. Having allowed her
to finish her dance, we begged her
to sing certain airs that we de-
scribed- Our collection was sooner ex-
hausted than hers. It was sufficient, we
were told, that she should hear an air
once to remember it ever after, and we
found that she could repeat it Whenever
desired. NJ. Query, who was present,
composed an air on the spot. The idiot
followed him, and at our desire sang it.
He then began another melody; she
again followed him, but instead of STOP
ping as he did, she completed the air
that had been begun, finishing it by an
addition of her own which agreed we'll
with the beginning. Wishing to ascer-
tain what effect would be produced upon
her by a musical instrument. one of the
party played on flute; she was all eyes
and ears, and repeated the airs that were
performed. Mr.. List was requested to
attend; he touched the piano-forte in her
presence. I cannot express her delight;
she was immovable, and with her eyes
fixed on the fingers of the performer, at
the same time biting her fin gers, she was
in a state impossible to be described.
1t may he said that she almost viprated
with each of the chords Of the instru-
ment-that she felt all that passed in the
soul Of the musician. The sudden change
from grave to acute sounds acted on her
with prodigious violence, producing an
effect similar to an electric shock. The
same passage of low and high notes was
executed more than twenty times and
always with the same result. She liked
and desired fruit. Wishing to see If she
preferred that to the music, we gave her
some apricots, which she utterly disre-
garded while List continued to touch
the p1ane-forte, and only thought of them
and began to eat when she ceased to
hear the music.