The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1910-03-16
GREAT MYSTERY OF SLEEP.
Why Our Brain Lighter and Legs Heavier When We SnOre
Brain May Be Awake and Its Owner Asleep.

Sleep is one of the many scientific
mysteries that still await solution.
What it is exactly nobody knows.
But many curious facts have recent
ly been discovered about it, says a
writer in Answers.
For instance, when we sleep the
lower half of us weighs more than
the upper half The brain is lighter
and the legs are heavier. Expert
ments have shown that if a man goes
to sleep on a bed suspended exactly
at the middle point of his weight hi
head begins to tip slowly up and his
feet to go down. When he wakes
he finds his head getting nearer the
floor and his feet nearer the ceiling.
This is due to the fact that when
we are asleep the blood in the brain
goes off to other parts of the body.
The moment the brain wakes to life
again it draws the blood back. In
fact, a doctor can bring the me-
restless of individuals sleep in few
seconds by tightly COMPRISING the
great arteries in the neck which car
ry blood to the brain.
So, in sleep the brain is lighter
and the feet are heavier. Perhaps
that is why policemen have been
known to sleep on their beats But
then, cases have been known of long
distance cyclists sleeping on the sad
die, of infantrymen sleeping on the
march, of wearied pianists doing as
they struck the keys. In fact, almost
any part of the brain may be awake.
several parts, indeed, at once, and
yet its owner may be fast asleep.
A man may talk, walk, sing, type,
solve mathematical problems, and
yet be safely in the land of Nod.
One of Coleridge's finest poems
'Khubla Khan"-was the work of
a sleeping brain. The famous "Dev-
lis Sonata" came as a pleasant sur
prise to its composer, Tartini. He
found it on the table when he got
up one morning. He had written it
in the night.
In fact, exactly what part of the
brain it is that does sleep it is hard
to decide. Our sense of time, for
instance, is stronger when we are
asleep than when we are awake.
Experiments conducted some years
ago on number of men and women
between the ages of 20 and 30I
showed that So per cent of them
were able to wake up in the morning
at any time they had decided upon
the night before. The resolve seems
to wind up a little clock on the sub
conscious brain.
When the hour has arrived the
clock gives in some mysterious way
the alarm to the day shift of the
brain and the eyelids open. And
then the night shift goes to sleep in
turn. At any rate that clock does
,nnr se..s..,. 4. work in the daytime.
Resolve Sons = - -cpthe office
to pull out your watch when 20 min
utes past II comes around. You
won't, except by chance.
Another curious fact about sleep
is that the farther a part of the body
is away from the brain the less
soundly it sleeps. A touch on the
toe will awaken you much more
readily than a touch on the shoulder
Some scientists hold that we do not
really need sleep at all; that it is
a relic of primeval times when there
do no SuCu tHIHS do dl llliCidl llSHI'
Some way had to be found of passing
the blank time of night.
Of Edison, the great American in
ventor-who, by the way, is Of Scot
fish descent on the mothers side
it is said that he never sleeps more
than two hours at stretch. When
engaged on some Of his great sc!en-
tific experiments he and his assistants
have been known to so on for 70
hours without sleep.
That tendency which most Of us
have felt at some time or other,
when we are awakened by the pres
ence of somebody in the room-how-
ever well we know that somebody
to pretend that we are still asleep,
is said by scientists to be a legacy
from the days when man lived the
savage life of any other animal and
was liable to sudden attack either
from his fellow-man or from wild
beasts. He preferred to recOnnOiter
his position in case there was danger
near. To get up suddenly might
have been to betray his presence t.
some proving enemy.