The Worthington advance. [volume] (Worthington, Minn.) 1874-1908, 1894-10-18
.People Who Drop Out Of sight"

~People Who Drop Out Of sight"
This is tho somewhat odd heading Of
. still odder paper in Tho Medioo-Legal
Journal. Il is written by DR.. A. E. o.
borne of California and deals with mys.
FERROUS disappearances. There are cases
enough ON record and sufficiently we'll
authenticated of individuals who have
left their homes or places of business to
be absent q few minutes and have not
returned for years, some not at all. OF
those who returned number have been
unable to recall any particulars of their
whereabouts during their absence. So
many of them were perfectly truthful,
upright men, happily situated, with no
temptation to falsify anything, that
there is every reason to believe they tell
the truth when they say they cannot re-
call where they have been.
DIR. Osborne mentions three of these
cases. Two were known to him person
ally. The third is familiar to newspaper
readers and made stir two years ago.
One Sunday afternoon citizen of a
Philadelphia suburb remarked that he
would step out Of the house for little
fresh air. 1t was gloomy day, and he
had been at home reading, smoking and
playing with his children. he was at
the head Of fourishing business, and
his domestic relations were unusually
happy. From that moment nothing was
heard of him for nearly two years. Then
he came to himself in q southern state,
where he suddenly dropped his work in
a tinshop one day and exclaimed: "This
isn't my shop! Where am I:' His dis
tress of mind was evidently 80 real that
his employer aided him to trace his
family, and he was restored to them.
but he never was able to give any &C.
count Of his wanderings
DR.. Osborne was one day summoned
to attend jolly, FOSTERING young Irish
man who had been injured in q run.
away. He was horse breaker and
trainer. The shock Of the injury had
made him forget who he was, and it
was weeks before he recovered his mem.
DRY, even partially. After the accident
he was missed from home for "a hours,
when he suddenly appeared at his own
door in the dazed condition mentioned
He did not know his own wife or the
doctor at first, and it was weeks before
he remembered the baby. He had for
gotten there was baby.
The strangest part of the story was
that when he recovered he was an alto
gether different man from the intoxicat-
ed young devil may care hishman who
had been hurt in the runaway. He be-
came a mild, serious, middle aged ap-
pearing person, rather weak in charac-
ter and as steady as pendulum. He
never drove a horse again, but became
a gardener and worked at it for his liv-
ing. He became also total abstainer.
By degrees he remembered something of
his other life as horse trainer, but al
ways said it seemed to him unreal, like
a dream. The tones of his voice changed,
and he spoke more correctly and with
less dialect. Which is this mans real
life-the former or the present one?
One point made by DR.. Osborne in
reference to this last patient throws
light on the question why the people
who thus mysteriously disappear are
never seen or recognized by their &C.
quaintances as they go away. He says
the Irishman, after his recovery, was SO
changed in physical appearance that his
former acquaintance would not have
recognized him unless they had known
it was he. His face was longer and
sharper and more careworn, with an
ssa1,nost rhi10sonhica1 exnressiOn -