The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1881-01-27
Mechanism OF the Brain.

We are not left to the unaided study
of our mental processes for proof that
the human brain is q mechanism. In the
laboratory of Professor Goltz, in Stras
burg, l saw terrier from which he had
removed, by repeated experiments, all
the surface of the brain, thereby reduc-
ing the animal to a simple automaton.
Looked at while lying in his stall he
seemed at first in no wise different from
other dogs; he took food when offered
to him, was fat, sleek and very quiet.
When approached him he took no no.
tice OF me. but when the assistant caught
him by the tail he instantly became the
embodiment of fury. He had not sutfi-
clent perceptive power to recognize the
point of assault, so that his keeper,
standing behind him, was not in danger.
With flashing eyes and hair all erect the
dog howled and barked furiously, in
cessantly swapping and biting, first on
this side and then on that, tearing with
his forelegs and in everywav manifest
ing rage. When his tail was dropped
by the attendant and his head touched,
the storm at once subsidized, the fury
was turned into calm, and the animal,
few seconds before so rageful, was pur-
ring like cat and stretching out its
head for carresses. This curious process
could be repeated indefinitely. Take
hold of his tail, and instantly the storm
broke out afresh; pat his head and all
was tenderness. 1t was possible to play
at will with the passions of the animal
by the slightest touches.
During the Franco-German contest a
French soldier was struck in the head
with bullet and left on the field for
dead, but subsequently, showed suffi-
clent life to cause him to be carried to
the hospital, where he finally recovered
his general health, but remained in a
mental state very similar to that of Pro-
fessor Goltz's dog. AS he walked about
the rooms and corridors of the Soldiers
Home in Paris, he appeared to the
stranger like an ordinary man, unless it
were in his apathetic manner. When
his comrades were called to the dinner
table he followed, sat down with them,
and. the food being placed upon his
plate and knife and fork in his hands,
would commence to eat. That this was
not done in obedience to thought or
knowledge was shown by the fact that
his dinner could be at once interrupted
by awakening a new train of feeling by
new external impulse. Put a crooked
stick resembling gun into his hand,
and at once the man was seized with a
rage comparable to that produced in
the Strasburg dog by taking hold of his
tail. The fury of conflict was on him;
with a loud yell he would recommence
the skirmish in which he had been
wounded, and, crying to his comrades,
would make rush at the supposed as
sailant. Take the stick out of his hand
and at once his apathy would settle
upon him, give him a knife and fork,
and, whether at the table or elsewhere,
he would make the motions of eating;
hand him spade, and he would begin
to dig. 1t is plain that the impulse
produced by seeing his comrades move
to the dining room started the chain of
automatic movements which resulted in
his seating himself at the table. The
weapon called into new life the we'll
known acts of the battle field. The
spade brought back the day when, in
nocent of blood, he cultivated the vine-
yards of sunny France.
In both the dog and the man Just
spoken of the control of the will over
the emotions and mental acts was evil
IDENTIFY lost, and the mental functions
were performed only in obedience to
impulses from without. e., were auto
matte. The human brain is a complex
and very delicate mechanism, so uni
form in its actions, so marvellous in its
creation, that it is able to measure the
rapidity of its own processes. There
are scarcely two brains which work ex-
actly with the same rapidity and ease.
One man thinks faster than another
man for reasons as purely physical as
those which give to one man faster
gait than that of another.-Dr. H. C.
WOOn I'm LinnincatE 8 Mnnnzine