Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1884-05-09

Hen Who Want to Kill Somebody.
Considering the number of diseases
of homic;dal and suicidal impulse that
come under the notice of experts in
nervous diseases" distinguished
specialist remarked, ..it is a wonder to
me that so few tragedies from that
source really happen. Last week .
business man in this city, who owns .
handsome country residence on the
Hudson, and would be regarded by his
acquaintance rs the last person in the
world to be possessed by such within,
came to me in great worry of mind and
told me he had something to commune
cate that must be held strictly inviolate.
The story was typical. have heard it
with tri6ing variations q thousand times
in five years. He had not been feeling
very well-rather nervous and ill at
ease-for some days. That morning.
as he left the house to take the train Tor
New York. he happened to pass his gar
dener who was at work on the grounds,
and stopped to talk to him a minute
The man was STOPPING over a clump of
ornamental shrubbery, thinning out the
dead stalks with pruning knife. A
spade was leaning against the trunk of
tree at his feet. L had never had any
quarrel or misunderstanding with the
man. said this patient. telling his story.
But the impulse was upon me in an in
slant to seize that spade and brain the
poor fellow on the spot. / trembled all
over like q leaf, with kind of nervous
terror that can scarcely describe 10
you, Doctor. Finally, not daring to
trust myself longer, 1 turned and walked
away as fast as my legs could conven-
iently carry me. telicve, sir, that /
should have killed the man if had lin
gered five minutes longer. Now, what
is to be donep's"
The doctor advised his patient to
avoid temptation for few days, turn
his mind resolutely to something else,
and gave him sedative prescription
bromides, of course-with instructions
to call again in day or two. The
man was sensible enough to act on the
advice, and on the fourth day he
dropped in and told the doctor that the
trouble had passed of and he felt like
himself once more. And SO q tragedy
was averted, probably.
The physician went on to say that he
had no less than nine cases of homi-
cidal or suicidal impulse then under
treatment, Of these, seven were sui
cidal and the other two homicidal. One
OF the latter had been on his hands for
three weeks. The patient, man OF
some note in literature, had been Sleep
less for several weeks before the i'm
pulse manifested itself. He was a
married man, and loved his wife de-
vote lily. One night, after doing a
few minutes with terrible dreams, he
awoke with a strange presentiment OF
impending disaster. His wife was
sleeping quietly. The moonlight strug-
Cling through the window pane fell up
on her face and white, shapely throat.
As sudden as the leap of tiger, the
impulse seized him to cut the woman S
throat, and he was actually out of bed
and hunting for his razor in the bureau
drawer before any realizing sense OF
the enormity of the deed !. at he was
about to perpetrate interposed to pre-
vent the tragedy. He returned to bed
and lay in a tremble till daylight. His
wife never knew how near she had been
to death. He had no wish to kill
anybody else as yet.
lone Of my suicidal patients" con.
tinued the doctor, ''was first seized with
the impulse on a Brooklyn ferry boat
He had been across the river on bust
ness, and was on his way back. He
went on board one of the boats at the
Fulton ferry and stood gazing listlessly
at the rampant of business houses ex-
tending far to the right on Furman
street. The boat started suddenly as
he stood Illuminating. He insists that
the impulse had its origin in irritation
of the retina caused by the movement
of the sunshine-fooded surfaces OF
brick across the optic field, and very
likely he is right. For an instant he
myself my hand was on the railing and
couple OF stalwart passengers had COL
Jared me. / had never thought of such
thing as committing suicide except as
a coward resource Now" added the
doctor, ''this man was no moro mad
than l am; it was a typical case of sui.
cidal impulse, caused, perhaps, by long
nervous tension"
In point of fact, both suicidal and
homicidal impulses appear to be far less
frequent with women than men. In all
his experience, the doctor has treated
only five cases of the impulse in women.
while of the sterner sex his patients
have been numbered by scores. He in
clines &c the belief that the habit con-
tracted by men of business of always
being in a hurry. engaged, occupied, il
one of the principal instrumentalities,
next to malaria poisoning, in producing
this type of nervous disturbance. land
imagine" he concluded, "that our
former Commissioner of Lunacy, DIR.
Ordronnaux, was not far out of the way
when he declared that one man in every
hundred who walks the streets is poten-
italy a murderer or q suicide; start
ling declaration, but one that my OWL
practice during the last ten years has
abundantly verified"
Sometimes the impulse is accompanied
by voices in the ears, urging the patient
20 kill; sometimes a red light-lurid,
dismal. weird suffuses the eyes, and
with one of the Doctors patients the
attack Is announced invariably by 9
premonitory SILVER or shudder of mo
mentary duration only, which precedes
it by a second or two. 1t is curiou.
fact, also, that serious organic trouble
with the brain and spinal tract seldom
gives rise to these strange paroxysms.-
| N. y. Sun.
| At Dinner.