The commonwealth. (Scotland Neck, N.C.) 1896-1929, 1896-09-24
STRANGE CASE.
WHERE JOHN HAD BEEN.
A True Story.
Hnrper's Magazine.

Harper's Magazine.
After the battle of Bull Run, whe1
the whole country was holding up it
hands In dismay and breathing hard IL
the first realization that the war wa
not, after all, to be picnic for tn
Northern troops, I, together with man,
other doctors and surgeons, rushed Int,
Washington from distant cites. wa
taken one night, by kind old Negro
woman to her cabin on the edge of tht
city. She came to me in tears. "Doc
tab, I des wisht yoh come an see my
John. He pears mon's'ous curious
an he act des like he 'stracted."
At her cabin I found her son, tire
mendous fellow, as black as coal and
evidently an athlete, with no evidence
Of a wound upon him, but with a ten
dency to bear off to one side as he walk.
ed, an apparent inability to talk, and
possessed of persistent effort to march
and keep time to martial music, which
he could not do.
Aunt Martha, as she called herself
and asked me to call her, told me that
her son had always been strong and
healthy, and when he left Washington
with the army he was perfectly sound
and ''des like de res of de folks; but
dey fetch him back to his po' ole man.
my des like yoh see him, doctah, an I
des skeered plumb outen my wits, dat
[ is." examined John carefully and
could find not the least thing the mat
ter with him, and half believed he was
shammlng.
The room was whitewashed, and I
noticed a streak entirely around 1t that
was so evenly drawn that attracted my
but in the stirring events of
those days really paid scant heed to
so trlfling a case as Johns, and so ap-
parently trivial an indication as was
that level streak on the wall. His
mother was still talking. "De reasons
dat all de table, AN cheers is inee floor,
doctah, is dat John he des runs Inter
all of 'em If dey close t. de wall. Pears
like he des 'bleeged t. skim along close
up as eber he kin. Dat dar streak is
whar his elbow scrapes along all day
an all night, 'cep' when somebody's
sittin' holding his ham er feelin' his
pulst, like you is now." Young and
as l was, even this did
not give me clew, and left Aunt
Martha and John after giving some
trif1ing advice and remedy, both of
which I knew to be wholly innocuous.
I spent severals years IN Paris and
IN Germany alter rhe war, and 1t was
not until 1SS-that was back IN Wash
ington. We had an international con-
ventlon there at the time, and were
taken to various public institutions,
among which was little asylum for
poor and insane negroes.
In one room, as we we're passing the
door, 1 happened to observe on the
wall a well-worn streak
drawn SO level and circling the room
80 perfectly that it called to my mind
4 vision which / had wholly forgotten.
Memory was coming back to me and
slowly taking up the threads of the
war days, when one of the resident
who had missed me and re-
turned, said, as he joined me at the
grated door:
"strange case. He has been like
that for years. No one knows why.
He is perfectly harmless as to taking
care of himself, and he walks and
walks, day and night, and always bears
to the left. If we let him out he'd
bear off to the left and go into the riv-
er or the fire, or lose himself In the
woods. He meyer talks, although we
have never found anything the matter
With him. He eats and sleeps pretty
we'll. Strange case"
Before noon the next day we had
Johns small room looking like a hos
pital operating-room, and the great
black frame lay on the table under the
influence of ether. Five of us stood
him, and told them my theo-
ries and plans.
My colleagues warmed to the idea
and the work.
/ cut open the right side of the thick
skull, and sure enough a splintered
piece of bone from an old depressed
fracture pressed into the brain. l lift
ed it, dressed it with aseptics, and re-
placed skull and scalp and placed him
in his bed. Then we set about reviv-
ing him. We were all intensely an
xious to know what the result would
be, and five notebooks we're ready in
five hands. Presently John opened
his ewes and stared about him. Then