In considering the anomalies of the secretions, it must be remembered that the ingestion of certain kinds of food and the administration of peculiar drugs in medicine have a marked influence in coloring secretions. Probably the most interesting of all these anomalies is the class in which, by a compensatory process, metastasis of the secretions is noticed.
Colored Saliva.—Among the older writers the Ephemerides contains an account of blue saliva; Huxham speaks of green saliva; Marcellus Donatus of yellow, and Peterman relates the history of a case of yellow saliva. Dickinson describes a woman of sixty whose saliva was blue; besides this nothing was definitely the matter with her. It seemed however, that the color was due to some chemic-pencil poisoning rather than to a pathologic process. A piece of this aniline pencil was caught in the false teeth. Paget cites an instance of blue saliva due to staining the tongue in the same manner. Most cases of anomalous coloring of this kind can be subsequently traced to artificial substances unconsciously introduced. Crocker mentions a woman who on washing her hands constantly found that the water was stained blue, but this was subsequently traced to the accidental introduction of an orchid leaf. In another instance there was a woman whose linen was at every change stained brown; this, however, was found to be due to a hair-wash that she was in the habit of using.
Among the older writers who have mentioned abnormal modes of exit of the urine is Baux, who mentions urine from the nipples; Paullini and the Ephemerides describe instances of urination from the eyes. Blancard, the Ephemerides, Sorbalt, and Vallisneri speak of urination by the mouth. Arnold relates the history of a case of dysuria in which urine was discharged from the nose, breasts, ears, and umbilicus; the woman was twenty-seven years old, and the dysuria was caused by a prolapsed uterus. There was an instance of anomalous discharge of urine from the body reported in Philadelphia many years ago which led to animated discussion. A case of dysuria in which the patient discharged urine from the stomach was reported early in this century from Germany. The patient could feel the accumulation of urine by burning pain in the epigastrium. Suddenly the pain would move to the soles of the feet, she would become nauseated, and large quantities of urine would soon be vomited. There was reported the case of an hysterical female who had convulsions and mania, alternating with anuria of a peculiar nature and lasting seven days. There was not a drop of urine passed during this time, but there were discharges through the mouth of alkaline waters with a strong ammoniacal odor.
Senter reports in a young woman a singular case of ischuria which continued for more than three years; during this time if her urine was not drawn off with the catheter she frequently voided it by vomiting; for the last twenty months she passed much gravel by the catheter; when the use of the instrument was omitted or unsuccessfully applied the vomitus contained gravel. Carlisle mentions a case in which there was vomiting of a fluid containing urea and having the sensible properties of urine. Curious to relate, a cure was effected after ligature of the superior thyroid arteries and sloughing of the thyroid gland. Vomiting of urine is also mentioned by Coley, Domine, Liron, Malago, Zeviani, and Yeats. Marsden reports a case in which, following secondary papular syphilis and profuse spontaneous ptyalism, there was vicarious secretion of the urinary constituents from the skin.
Instances of the anomalous exit of urine caused by congenital malformation or fistulous connections are mentioned in another chapter. Black urine is generally caused by the ingestion of pigmented food or drugs, such as carbolic acid and the anilines. Amatus Lusitanus, Bartholinus, and the Ephemerides speak of black urine after eating grapes or damson plums. The Ephemerides speaks of black urine being a precursor of death, but Piso, Rhodius, and Schenck say it is anomalous and seldom a sign of death. White urine, commonly known as chyluria, is frequently seen, and sometimes results from purulent cystitis. Though containing sediment, the urine looks as if full of milk. A case of this kind was seen in 1895 at the Jefferson Medical College Hospital, Philadelphia, in which the chyluria was due to a communication between the bladder and the thoracic duct.
Ackerman has spoken of metastasis of the tears, and Dixon gives an instance in which crying was not attended by the visible shedding of tears. Salomon reports a case of congenital deficiency of tears. Blood-stained tears were frequently mentioned by the older writers. Recently Cross has written an article on this subject, and its analogy is seen in the next chapter under hemorrhages from the eyes through the lacrimal duct.
The Semen.—The older writers spoke of metastasis of the seminal flow, the issue being by the skin (perspiration) and other routes. This was especially supposed to be the case in satyriasis, in which the preternatural exit was due to superabundance of semen, which could be recognized by its odor. There is no doubt that some people have a distinct seminal odor, a fact that will be considered in the section on "Human Odors."
The Ephemerides, Schurig, and Hoffman report instances of what they call fetid semen (possibly a complication of urethral disease). Paaw speaks of black semen in a negro, and the Ephemerides and Schurig mention instances of dark semen. Blancard records an instance of preternatural exit of semen by the bowel. Heers mentions a similar case caused by urethral fistula. Ingham mentions the escape of semen through the testicle by means of a fistula. Demarquay is the authority on bloody semen.
Andouard mentions an instance of blue bile in a woman, blue flakes being found in her vomit. There was no trace of copper to be found in this case. Andouard says that the older physicians frequently spoke of this occurrence.
Rhodius speaks of the sweat being sweet after eating honey; the Ephemerides and Paullini also mention it. Chromidrosis, or colored sweat, is an interesting anomaly exemplified in numerous reports. Black sweat has been mentioned by Bartholinus, who remarked that the secretion resembled ink; in other cases Galeazzi and Zacutus Lusitanus said the perspiration resembled sooty water. Phosphorescent sweat has been recorded. Paullini and the Ephemerides mention perspiration which was of a leek-green color, and Borellus has observed deep green perspiration. Marcard mentions green perspiration of the feet, possibly due to stains from colored foot-gear. The Ephemerides and Paullini speak of violet perspiration, and Bartholinus has described perspiration which in taste resembled wine.
Sir Benjamin Brodie has communicated the history of a case of a young girl of fifteen on whose face was a black secretion. On attempting to remove it by washing, much pain was caused. The quantity removed by soap and water at one time was sufficient to make four basins of water as black as if with India ink. It seemed to be physiologically analogous to melanosis. The cessation of the secretion on the forehead was followed by the ejection of a similar substance from the bowel, stomach, and kidney. The secretion was more abundant during the night, and at one time in its course an erysipelas-eruption made its appearance. A complete cure ultimately followed.
Purdon describes an Irish married woman of forty, the subject of rheumatic fever, who occasionally had a blue serous discharge or perspiration that literally flowed from her legs and body, and accompanied by a miliary eruption. It was on the posterior portions, and twelve hours previous was usually preceded by a moldy smell and a prickly sensation. On the abdomen and the back of the neck there was a yellowish secretion. In place of catamenia there was a discharge reddish-green in color. The patient denied having taken any coloring matter or chemicals to influence the color of her perspiration, and no remedy relieved her cardiac or rheumatic symptoms.
The first English case of chromidrosis, or colored sweat, was published by Yonge of Plymouth in 1709. In this affection the colored sweating appears symmetrically in various parts of the body, the parts commonly affected being the cheeks, forehead, side of the nose, whole face, chest, abdomen, backs of the hands, finger-tips, and the flexors, flexures at the axillae, groins, and popliteal spaces. Although the color is generally black, nearly every color has been recorded. Colcott Fox reported a genuine case, and Crocker speaks of a case at Shadwell in a woman of forty-seven of naturally dark complexion. The bowels were habitually sluggish, going three or four days at least without action, and latterly the woman had suffered from articular pains. The discolored sweat came out gradually, beginning at the sides of the face, then spreading to the cheeks and forehead. When seen, the upper half of the forehead, the temporal regions, and the skin between the ear and malar eminence were of a blackish-brown color, with slight hyperemia of the adjacent parts; the woman said the color had been almost black, but she had cleaned her face some. There was evidently much fat in the secretion; there was also seborrhea of the scalp. Washing with soap and water had very little effect upon it; but it was removed with ether, the skin still looking darker and redder than normal. After a week's treatment with saline purgatives the discoloration was much less, but the patient still had articular pains, for which alkalies were prescribed; she did not again attend. Crocker also quotes the case of a girl of twenty, originally under Mackay of Brighton. Her affection had lasted a year and was limited to the left cheek and eyebrow. Six months before the patch appeared she had a superficial burn which did not leave a distinct scar, but the surface was slightly granular. The deposit was distinctly fatty, evidently seborrheic and of a sepia-tint. The girl suffered from obstinate constipation, the bowels acting only once a week. The left side flushed more than the right In connection with this case may be mentioned one by White of Harvard, a case of unilateral yellow chromidrosis in a man. Demons gives the history of a case of yellow sweat in a patient with three intestinal calculi.
Wilson says that cases of green, yellow, and blue perspiration have been seen, and Hebra, Rayer, and Fuchs mention instances. Conradi records a case of blue perspiration on one-half the scrotum. Chojnowski records a case in which the perspiration resembled milk.
Hyperidrosis occurs as a symptom in many nervous diseases, organic and functional, and its presence is often difficult of explanation. The following are recent examples: Kustermann reports a case of acute myelitis in which there was profuse perspiration above the level of the girdle-sensation and none at all below. Sharkey reports a case of tumor of the pons varolii and left crus cerebri, in which for months there was excessive generalized perspiration; it finally disappeared without treatment. Hutchinson describes the case of a woman of sixty-four who for four years had been troubled by excessive sweating on the right side of the face and scalp. At times she was also troubled by an excessive flow of saliva, but she could not say if it was unilateral. There was great irritation of the right side of the tongue, and for two years taste was totally abolished. It was normal at the time of examination. The author offered no explanation of this case, but the patient gave a decidedly neurotic history, and the symptoms seem to point with some degree of probability to hysteria. Pope reports a peculiar case in which there were daily attacks of neuralgia preceded by sweating confined to a bald spot on the head. Rockwell reports a case of unilateral hyperidrosis in a feeble old man which he thought due to organic affection of the cervical sympathetic.
Dupont has published an account of a curious case of chronic general hyperidrosis or profuse sweating which lasted upward of six years. The woman thus affected became pregnant during this time and was happily delivered of an infant, which she nursed herself. According to Dupont, this hyperidrosis was independent of any other affection, and after having been combated fruitlessly by various remedies, yielded at last to fluid extract of aconitin.
Myrtle relates the case of a man of seventy-seven, who, after some flying pains and fever, began to sweat profusely and continued to do so until he died from exhaustion at the end of three months from the onset of the sweating. Richardson records another case of the same kind. Crocker quotes the case of a tailor of sixty-five in whom hyperidrosis had existed for thirty-five years. It was usually confined to the hands and feet, but when worst affected the whole body. It was absent as long as he preserved the horizontal posture, but came on directly when he rose; it was always increased in the summer months. At the height of the attack the man lost appetite and spirit, had a pricking sensation, and sometimes minute red papules appeared all over the hand. He had tried almost every variety of treatment, but sulphur did the most good, as it had kept the disease under for twelve months. Latterly, even that failed.
Bachman reports the history of a case of hyperidrosis cured by hypnotism.
Unilateral and localized sweating accompanies some forms of nervous disturbance. Mickle has discussed unilateral sweating in the general paralysis of the insane. Ramskill reports a case of sweating on one side of the face in a patient who was subject to epileptic convulsions. Takacs describes a case of unilateral sweating with proportionate nervous prostration. Bartholow and Bryan report unilateral sweating of the head. Cason speaks of unilateral sweating of the head, face, and neck. Elliotson mentions sweat from the left half of the body and the left extremities only. Lewis reports a case of unilateral perspiration with an excess of temperature of 3.5 degrees F. in the axilla of the perspiring side. Mills, White, Dow, and Duncan also cite instances of unilateral perspiration. Boquis describes a case of unilateral perspiration of the skin of the head and face, and instances of complete unilateral perspiration have been frequently recorded by the older writers,—Tebure, Marcellus Donatus, Paullini, and Hartmann discussing it. Hyperidrosis confined to the hands and feet is quite common.
Instances of bloody sweat and "stigmata" have been known through the ages and are most interesting anomalies. In the olden times there were people who represented that in their own persons they realized at certain periods the agonies of Gethsemane, as portrayed in medieval art, e.g., by pictures of Christ wearing the crown of thorns in Pilate's judgment hall. Some of these instances were, perhaps, of the nature of compensatory hemorrhage, substituting the menses or periodic hemorrhoids, hemoptysis, epistaxis, etc., or possibly purpura. Extreme religious frenzy or deep emotions might have been the indirect cause of a number of these bleeding zealots. There are instances on record in which fear and other similar emotions have caused a sweating of blood, the expression "sweating blood" being not uncommon.
Among the older writers, Ballonius, Marcolini, and Riedlin mention bloody sweat. The Ephemerides speaks of it in front of the hypochondrium. Paullini observed a sailor of thirty, who, falling speechless and faint during a storm on the deck of his ship, sweated a red perspiration from his entire body and which stained his clothes. He also mentions bloody sweat following coitus. Aristotle speaks of bloody sweat, and Pellison describes a scar which periodically opened and sweated blood. There were many cases like this, the scars being usually in the location of Christ's wounds.
De Thou mentions an Italian officer who in 1552, during the war between Henry II of France and Emperor Charles V, was threatened with public execution; he became so agitated that he sweated blood from every portion of the body. A young Florentine about to be put to death by an order of Pope Sixtus V was so overcome with grief that he shed bloody tears and sweated blood. The Ephemerides contains many instances of bloody tears and sweat occasioned by extreme fear, more especially fear of death. Mezeray mentions that the detestable Charles IX of France, being under constant agitation and emotion, sank under a disorder which was accompanied by an exudation of blood from every pore of his body. This was taken as an attempt of nature to cure by bleeding according to the theory of the venesectionists. Fabricius Hildanus mentions a child who, as a rule, never drank anything but water, but once, contrary to her habit, drank freely of white wine, and this was soon followed by hemorrhage from the gums, nose, and skin.
There is a case also related of a woman of forty-five who had lost her only son. One day she fancied she beheld him beseeching her to release his soul from purgatory by prayers and fasting every Friday. The following Friday, which was in the month of August, and for five succeeding Fridays she had a profuse bloody perspiration, the disorder disappearing on Friday, March 8th, of the following year. Pooley says that Maldonato, in his "Commentaries of Four Gospels," mentions a healthy and robust man who on hearing of his sentence of death sweated blood, and Zacchias noted a similar phenomenon in a young man condemned to the flames. Allusion may also be made to St. Luke, who said of Christ that in agony He prayed more earnestly, "and His sweat was, as it were, great drops of blood falling down to the ground."
Pooley quotes the case of a young woman of indolent habit who in a religious fanatical trance sweated blood. The stigmatists were often imposters who artificially opened their scars, and set the example for the really peculiar cases of bloody sweat, which among ignorant people was considered evidence of sympathy with the agony of the Cross.
Probably the best studied case on record is that of Louise Lateau of Bois d'Haine, which, according to Gray, occurred in 1869 in a village of Belgium when the girl was at the age of twenty-three; her previous life had offered nothing remarkable. The account is as follows: "One Friday Louise Lateau noticed that blood was flowing from one side of her chest, and this recurred every Friday. On each Thursday morning an oval surface about one inch in length on the back of each hand became pink in color and smooth, whilst a similar oval surface on the palm of each hand became of the same hue, and on the upper surface of each foot a pinkish-white square appeared. Examined under a magnifying glass, the epidermis appeared at first without solution of continuity and delicate. About noon on Thursday a vesicle formed on the pink surfaces containing clear serum. In the night between Thursday and Friday, usually between midnight and one o'clock, the flow of blood began, the vesicle first rupturing. The amount of blood lost during the so called stigmata varied, and some observers estimated it at about one and three-quarter pints. The blood itself was of a reddish color, inclining to violet, about the hue therefore, of capillary blood, coagulating in the usual way, and the white and red corpuscles being normal in character and relative proportion. The flow ceased on Saturdays. During the flow of the blood the patient was in a rapt, ecstatic condition. The facial expression was one of absorption and far-off contemplation, changing often to melancholy, terror, to an attitude of prayer or contrition. The patient herself stated that at the beginning of the ecstasy she imagined herself surrounded by a brilliant light; figures then passed before her, and the successive scenes of the crucifixion were panoramically progressive. She saw Christ in person—His clothing, His wounds, His crown of thorns, His cross—as well as the Apostles, the holy women, and the assembled Jews. During the ecstasy the circulation of the skin and heart was regular, although at times a sudden flash or pallor overspread the face, according with the play of the expression. From midday of Thursdays, when she took a frugal meal, until eight o'clock on Saturday mornings the girl took no nourishment, not even water, because it was said that she did not feel the want of it and could not retain anything upon her stomach. During this time the ordinary secretions were suspended."
Fournier mentions a statesman of forty-five who, following great Cabinet labors during several years and after some worriment, found that the day after indulging in sexual indiscretions he would be in a febrile condition, with pains in the thighs, groins, legs, and penis. The veins of these parts became engorged, and subsequently blood oozed from them, the flow lasting several days. The penis was the part most affected. He was under observation for twenty months and presented the same phenomena periodically, except that during the last few months they were diminished in every respect. Fournier also mentions a curious case of diapedesis in a woman injured by a cow. The animal struck her in the epigastric region, she fell unconscious, and soon after vomited great quantities of blood, and continued with convulsive efforts of expulsion to eject blood periodically from every eight to fifteen days, losing possibly a pound at each paroxysm. There was no alteration of her menses. A physician gave her astringents, which partly suppressed the vomiting, but the hemorrhage changed to the skin, and every day she sweated blood from the chest, back of the thighs, feet, and the extremities of the fingers. When the blood ceased to flow from her skin she lost her appetite, became oppressed, and was confined to her bed for some days. Itching always preceded the appearance of a new flow. There was no dermal change that could be noticed.
Fullerton mentions a girl of thirteen who had occasional oozing of blood from her brow, face, and the skin under the eyes. Sometimes a pound of clots was found about her face and pillow. The blood first appeared in a single clot, and, strange to say, lumps of fleshy substance and minute pieces of bone were discharged all day. This latter discharge became more infrequent, the bone being replaced by cartilaginous substance. There was no pain, discoloration, swelling, or soreness, and after this strange anomaly disappeared menstruation regularly commenced. Van Swieten mentions a young lady who from her twelfth year at her menstrual periods had hemorrhages from pustules in the skin, the pustules disappearing in the interval.
Schmidt's Jahrbucher for 1836 gives an account of a woman who had diseased ovaries and a rectovesicovaginal fistula, and though sometimes catamenia appeared at the proper place it was generally arrested and hemorrhage appeared on the face. Chambers mentions a woman of twenty-seven who suffered from bloody sweat after the manner of the stigmatists, and Petrone mentions a young man of healthy antecedents, the sweat from whose axillae and pubes was red and very pungent. Petrone believes it was due to a chromogenic micrococcus, and relieved the patient by the use of a five per cent solution of caustic potash. Chloroform, ether, and phenol had been tried without success. Hebra mentions a young man in whom the blood spurted from the hand in a spiral jet corresponding to the direction of the duct of the sweat-gland. Wilson refers to five cases of bloody sweat.
There is a record of a patient who once or twice a day was attacked with swelling of the scrotum, which at length acquired a deep red color and a stony hardness, at which time the blood would spring from a hundred points and flow in the finest streams until the scrotum was again empty.
Hill describes a boy of four who during the sweating stage of malaria sweated blood from the head and neck. Two months later the skin-hemorrhages ceased and the boy died, vomiting blood and with bloody stools.
Postmortem sweating is described in the Ephemerides and reported by Hasenest and Schneider. Bartholinus speaks of bloody sweat in a cadaver.
In considering the anomalies of lactation we shall first discuss those of color and then the extraordinary places of secretion. Black milk is spoken of by the Ephemerides and Paullini. Red milk has been observed by Cramer and Viger. Green milk has been observed by Lanzonius, Riverius, and Paullini. The Ephemerides also contains an account of green milk. Yellow milk has been mentioned in the Ephemerides and its cause ascribed to eating rhubarb.
It is a well-known fact that some cathartics administered to nursing mothers are taken from the breast by their infants, who, notwithstanding its indirect mode of administration, exhibit the effects of the original drug. The same is the case with some poisons, and instances of lead-poisoning and arsenic-poisoning have been seen in children who have obtained the toxic substance in the mother's milk. There is one singular case on record in which a child has been poisoned from the milk of its mother after she had been bitten by a serpent.
Paullini and the Ephemerides give instances of milk appearing in the perspiration, and there are numerous varieties of milk-metastasis recorded Dolaeus and Nuck mention the appearance of milk in the saliva. Autenreith mentions metastasis of milk through an abdominal abscess to the thigh, and Balthazaar also mentions excretion of milk from the thigh. Bourdon mentions milk from the thigh, labia, and vulva. Klein speaks of the metastasis of the milk to the lochia. Gardane speaks of metastasis to the lungs, and there is another case on record in which this phenomenon caused asphyxia. Schenck describes excretion of milk from the bladder and uterus. Jaeger in 1770 at Tubingen describes the metastasis of milk to the umbilicus, Haen to the back, and Schurig to a wound in the foot. Knackstedt has seen an abscess of the thigh which contained eight pounds of milk. Hauser gives the history of a case in which the kidneys secreted milk vicariously.
There is the history of a woman who suffered from metastasis of milk to the stomach, and who, with convulsive action of the chest and abdomen, vomited it daily. A peculiar instance of milk in a tumor is that of a Mrs. Reed, who, when pregnant with twins, developed an abdominal tumor from which 25 pounds of milk was drawn off.
There is a French report of secretion of milk in the scrotum of a man of twenty-one. The scrotum was tumefied, and to the touch gave the sensation of a human breast, and the parts were pigmented similar to an engorged breast. Analysis showed the secretion to have been true human milk.
Cases of lactation in the new-born are not infrequent. Bartholinus, Baricelli, Muraltus, Deusingius, Rhodius, Schenck, and Schurig mention instances of it. Cardanus describes an infant of one month whose breasts were swollen and gave milk copiously. Battersby cites a description of a male child three weeks old whose breasts were full of a fluid, analysis proving it to have been human milk; Darby, in the same journal, mentions a child of eight days whose breasts were so engorged that the nurse had to milk it. Faye gives an interesting paper in which he has collected many instances of milk in the breasts of the new-born. Jonston details a description of lactation in an infant. Variot mentions milk-secretion in the new-born and says that it generally takes place from the eighth to the fifteenth day and not in the first week. He also adds that probably mammary abscesses in the new-born could be avoided if the milk were squeezed out of the breasts in the first days. Variot says that out of 32 children of both sexes, aged from six to nine months, all but six showed the presence of milk in the breasts. Gibb mentions copious milk-secretion in an infant, and Sworder and Menard have seen young babes with abundant milk-secretion.
Precocious Lactation.—Bochut says that he saw a child whose breasts were large and completely developed, offering a striking contrast to the slight development of the thorax. They were as large as a stout man's fist, pear-shaped, with a rosy areola, in the center of which was a nipple. These precocious breasts increased in size at the beginning of the menstrual epoch (which was also present) and remained enlarged while the menses lasted. The vulva was covered with thick hair and the external genitalia were well developed. The child was reticent, and with a doll was inclined to play the role of mother.
Baudelocque mentions a girl of eight who suckled her brother with her extraordinarily developed breasts. In 1783 this child milked her breasts in the presence of the Royal Academy at Paris. Belloc spoke of a similar case. There is another of a young negress who was able to nourish an infant; and among the older writers we read accounts of young virgins who induced lactation by applying infants to their breasts. Bartholinus, Benedictus, Hippocrates, Lentilius, Salmuth, and Schenck mention lactation in virgins.
De la Coide describes a case in which lactation was present, though menstruation had always been deficient. Dix, at the Derby Infirmary, has observed two females in whom there was continued lactation, although they had never been pregnant. The first was a chaste female of twenty-five, who for two years had abundant and spontaneous discharge of milk that wetted the linen; and the other was in a prostitute of twenty, who had never been pregnant, but who had, nevertheless, for several months an abundant secretion of healthy milk. Zoologists know that a nonpregnant bitch may secrete milk in abundance. Delafond and de Sinnety have cited instances.
Lactation in the aged has been frequently noticed. Amatus Lusitanus and Schenck have observed lactation in old women; in recent years Dunglison has collected some instances. Semple relates the history of an elderly woman who took charge of an infant the mother of which had died of puerperal infection. As a means of soothing the child she allowed it to take the nipple, and, strange to say, in thirty-six hours milk appeared in her breasts, and soon she had a flow as copious as she had ever had in her early married life. The child thrived on this production of a sympathetic and spontaneous lactation. Sir Hans Sloane mentions a lady of sixty-eight who though not having borne a child for twenty years, nursed her grandchildren one after another.
Montegre describes a woman in the Department of Charente who bore two male children in 1810. Not having enough milk for both, and being too poor to secure the assistance of a midwife, in her desperation she sought an old woman named Laverge, a widow of sixty-five, whose husband had been dead twenty-nine years. This old woman gave the breast to one of the children, and in a few days an abundant flow of milk was present. For twenty-two months she nursed the infant, and it thrived as well as its brother, who was nursed by their common mother—in fact, it was even the stronger of the two.
Dargan tells of a case of remarkable rejuvenated lactation in a woman of sixty, who, in play, placed the child to her breast, and to her surprise after three weeks' nursing of this kind there appeared an abundant supply of milk, even exceeding in amount that of the young mother.
Blanchard mentions milk in the breasts of a woman of sixty, and Krane cites a similar instance. In the Philosophical Transactions there is an instance of a woman of sixty-eight having abundant lactation.
Warren, Boring, Buzzi, Stack, Durston, Egan, Scalzi, Fitzpatrick, and Gillespie mention rejuvenation and renewed lactation in aged women. Ford has collected several cases in which lactation was artificially induced by women who, though for some time not having been pregnant themselves, nursed for others.
Prolonged lactation and galactorrhea may extend through several pregnancies. Green reports the case of a woman of forty-seven, the mother of four children, who after each weaning had so much milk constantly in her breasts that it had to be drawn until the next birth. At the time of report the milk was still secreting in abundance. A similar and oft-quoted case was that of Gomez Pamo, who described a woman in whom lactation seemed indefinitely prolonged; she married at sixteen, two years after the establishment of menstruation. She became pregnant shortly after marriage, and after delivery had continued lactation for a year without any sign of returning menstruation. Again becoming pregnant, she weaned her first child and nursed the other without delay or complication. This occurrence took place fourteen times. She nursed all 14 of her children up to the time that she found herself pregnant again, and during the pregnancies after the first the flow of milk never entirely ceased; always after the birth of an infant she was able to nurse it. The milk was of good quality and always abundant, and during the period between her first pregnancy to seven years after the birth of her last child the menses had never reappeared. She weaned her last child five years before the time of report, and since then the milk had still persisted in spite of all treatment. It was sometimes so abundant as to necessitate drawing it from the breast to relieve painful tension.
Kennedy describes a woman of eighty-one who persistently menstruated through lactation, and for forty-seven years had uninterruptedly nursed many children, some of which were not her own. Three years of this time she was a widow. At the last reports she had a moderate but regular secretion of milk in her eighty-first year.
In regard to profuse lacteal flow, Remy is quoted as having seen a young woman in Japan from whom was taken 12 1/2 pints of milk each day, which is possibly one of the most extreme instance of continued galactorrhea on record.
Galen refers to gynecomastia or gynecomazia; Aristotle says he has seen men with mammae a which were as well developed as those of a woman, and Paulus aegineta recognized the fact in the ancient Greeks. Subsequently Albucasis discusses it in his writings. Bartholinus, Behr, Benedictus, Borellus, Bonet, the Ephemerides, Marcellus Donatus, Schenck, Vesalius, Schacher, Martineau, and Buffon all discuss the anomalous presence of milk in the male breast. Puech says that this condition is found in one out of 13,000 conscripts.
To Bedor, a marine surgeon, we owe the first scientific exposition of this subject, and a little later Villeneuve published his article in the French dictionary. Since then many observations have been made on this subject, and quite recently Laurent has published a most exhaustive treatise upon it.
Robert describes an old man who suckled a child, and Meyer discusses the case of a castrated man who was said to suckle children. It is said that a Bishop of Cork, who gave one-half crown to an old Frenchman of seventy, was rewarded by an exhibition of his breasts, which were larger than the Bishop had ever seen in a woman. Petrequin speaks of a male breast 18 inches long which he amputated, and Laurent gives the photograph of a man whose breasts measured 30 cm. in circumference at the base, and hung like those of a nursing woman.
In some instances whole families with supernumerary breasts are seen. Handyside gives two instances of quadruple breasts in brothers. Blanchard speaks of a father who had a supernumerary nipple on each breast and his seven sons had the same deformities; it was not noticed in the daughters. The youngest son transmitted this anomaly to his four sons. Petrequin describes a man with three mammae, two on the left side, the third being beneath the others. He had three sons with accessory mammae on the right side and two daughters with the same anomaly on the left side. Savitzky reports a case of gynecomazia in a peasant of twenty-one whose father, elder brother, and a cousin were similarly endowed. The patient's breasts were 33 cm. in circumference and 15 cm. from the nipple to the base of the gland; they resembled normal female mammae in all respects. The penis and the other genitalia were normal, but the man had a female voice and absence of facial hair. There was an abundance of subcutaneous fat and a rather brpelvis.
Wiltshire said that he knew a gynecomast in the person of a distinguished naturalist who since the age of puberty observed activity in his breasts, accompanied with secretion of milky fluid which lasted for a period of six weeks and occurred every spring. This authority also mentions that the French call husbands who have well-developed mammae "la couvade;" the Germans call male supernumerary breasts "bauchwarze," or ventral nipples. Hutchinson describes several cases of gynecomazia, in which the external genital organs decreased in proportion to the size of the breast and the manners became effeminate. Cameron, quoted by Snedden, speaks of a fellow-student who had a supernumerary nipple, and also says he saw a case in a little boy who had an extra pair of nipples much wider than the ordinary ones. Ansiaux, surgeon of Liege, saw a conscript of thirteen whose left mamma was well developed like that of a woman, and whose nipple was surrounded by a large areola. He said that this breast had always been larger than the other, but since puberty had grown greatly; the genital organs were well formed. Morgan examined a seaman of twenty-one, admitted to the Royal Naval Hospital at Hong Kong, whose right mamma, in size and conformation, had the appearance of the well developed breast of a full-grown woman. It was lobulated and had a large, brown-colored areola; the nipple, however, was of the same size as that on the left breast. The man stated that he first observed the breast to enlarge at sixteen and a half years; since that time it had steadily increased, but there was no milk at any time from the nipple; the external genital organs were well and fully developed. He complained of no pain or uneasiness except when in drilling aloft his breast came in contact with the ropes.
Gruger of St. Petersburg divides gynecomazia into three classes:—
(1) That in which the male generative organs are normal;
(2) In which they are deformed;
(3) In which the anomaly is spurious, the breast being a mass of fat or a new growth.
The same journal quotes an instance (possibly Morgan's case) in a young man of twenty-one with a deep voice, excellent health, and genitals well developed, and who cohabited with his wife regularly. When sixteen his right breast began to enlarge, a fact that he attributed to the pressure of a rope. Glandular substance could be distinctly felt, but there was no milk-secretion. The left breast was normal. Schuchardt has collected 272 cases of gynecomazia.
Instances of Men Suckling Infants.—These instances of gynecomazia are particularly interesting when the individuals display ability to suckle infants. Hunter refers to a man of fifty who shared equally with his wife the suckling of their children. There is an instance of a sailor who, having lost his wife, took his son to his own breast to quiet him, and after three or four days was able to nourish him. Humboldt describes a South American peasant of thirty-two who, when his wife fell sick immediately after delivery, sustained the child with his own milk, which came soon after the application to the breast; for five months the child took no other nourishment. In Franklin's "Voyages to the Polar Seas" he quotes the instance of an old Chippewa who, on losing his wife in childbirth, had put his infant to his breast and earnestly prayed that milk might flow; he was fortunate enough to eventually produce enough milk to rear the child. The left breast, with which he nursed, afterward retained its unusual size. According to Mehliss some missionaries in Brazil in the sixteenth century asserted that there was a whole Indian nation whose women had small and withered breasts, and whose children owed their nourishment entirely to the males. Hall exhibited to his class in Baltimore a negro of fifty-five who had suckled all his mistress' family. Dunglison reports this case in 1837, and says that the mammae projected seven inches from the chest, and that the external genital organs were well developed. Paullini and Schenck cite cases of men suckling infants, and Blumenbach has described a male-goat which, on account of the engorgement of the mammae, it was necessary to milk every other day of the year.
Ford mentions the case of a captain who in order to soothe a child's cries put it to his breast, and who subsequently developed a full supply of milk. He also quotes an instance of a man suckling his own children, and mentions a negro boy of fourteen who secreted milk in one breast. Hornor and Pulido y Fernandez also mention similar instances of gynecomazia.
Human Odors.—Curious as it may seem, each individual as well as each species is in life enveloped with an odor peculiarly its own, due to its exhaled breath, its excretions, and principally to its insensible perspiration. The faculty of recognizing an odor in different individuals, although more developed in savage tribes, is by no means unknown in civilized society. Fournier quotes the instance of a young man who, like a dog, could smell the enemy by scent, and who by smell alone recognized his own wife from other persons.
Fournier also mentions a French woman, an inhabitant of Naples, who had an extreme supersensitiveness of smell. The slightest odor was to her intolerable; sometimes she could not tolerate the presence of certain individuals. She could tell in a numerous circle which women were menstruating. This woman could not sleep in a bed which any one else had made, and for this reason discharged her maid, preparing her own toilet and her sleeping apartments. Cadet de Gassieourt witnessed this peculiar instance, and in consultation with several of the physicians of Paris attributed this excessive sensitiveness to the climate. There is a tale told of a Hungarian monk who affirmed that he was able to decide the chastity of females by the sense of smell alone. It is well known that some savage tribes with their large, open nostrils not only recognize their enemies but also track game the same as hounds.
Individual Odors.—Many individuals are said to have exhaled particularly strong odors, and history is full of such instances. We are told by Plutarch that Alexander the Great exhaled an odor similar to that of violet flowers, and his undergarments always smelled of this natural perfume. It is said that Cujas offered a particular analogy to this. On the contrary, there are certain persons spoken of who exhaled a sulphurous odor. Martial said that Thais was an example of the class of people whose odor was insupportable. Schmidt has inserted in the Ephemerides an account of a journeyman saddler, twenty-three years of age, of rather robust constitution, whose hands exhaled a smell of sulphur so powerful and penetrating as to rapidly fill any room in which he happened to be. Rayer was once consulted by a valet-de-chambre who could never keep a place in consequence of the odor he left behind him in the rooms in which he worked.
Hammond is quoted with saying that when the blessed Venturni of Bergamons officiated at the altar people struggled to come near him in order to enjoy the odor he exhaled. It was said that St. Francis de Paul, after he had subjected himself to frequent disciplinary inflictions, including a fast of thirty-eight to forty days, exhaled a most sensible and delicious odor. Hammond attributes the peculiar odors of the saints of earlier days to neglect of washing and, in a measure, to affections of the nervous system. It may be added that these odors were augmented by aromatics, incense, etc., artificially applied. In more modern times Malherbe and Haller were said to diffuse from their bodies the agreeable odor of musk. These "human flowers," to use Goethe's expression, are more highly perfumed in Southern latitudes.
Modifying Causes.—According to Brieude, sex, age, climate, habits, ailments, the passions, the emotions, and the occupations modify the difference in the humors exhaled, resulting in necessarily different odors. Nursing infants have a peculiar sourish smell, caused by the butyric acid of the milk, while bottle-fed children smell like strong butter. After being weaned the odors of the babies become less decided. Boys when they reach puberty exhibit peculiar odors which are similar to those of animals when in heat. These odors are leading symptoms of what Borden calls "seminal fever" and are more strongly marked in those of a voluptuous nature. They are said to be caused by the absorption of spermatic fluid into the circulation and its subsequent elimination by the skin. This peculiar circumstance, however, is not seen in girls, in whom menstruation is sometimes to be distinguished by an odor somewhat similar to that of leather. Old age produces an odor similar to that of dry leaves, and there have been persons who declared that they could tell approximately the age of individuals by the sense of smell.
Certain tribes and races of people have characteristic odors. Negroes have a rank ammoniacal odor, unmitigated by cleanliness; according to Pruner-Bey it is due to a volatile oil set free by the sebaceous follicles. The Esquimaux and Greenlanders have the odors of their greasy and oily foods, and it is said that the Cossacks, who live much with their horses, and who are principally vegetarians, will leave the atmosphere charged with odors several hours after their passage in numbers through a neighborhood. The lower race of Chinamen are distinguished by a peculiar musty odor, which may be noticed in the laundry shops of this country. Some people, such as the low grade of Indians, have odors, not distinctive, and solely due to the filth of their persons. Food and drink, as have been mentioned, markedly influence the odor of an individual, and those perpetually addicted to a special diet or drink have a particular odor.
Odor after Coitus.—Preismann in 1877 makes the statement that for six hours after coitus there is a peculiar odor noticeable in the breath, owing to a peculiar secretion of the buccal glands. He says that this odor is most perceptible in men of about thirty-five, and can be discerned at a distance of from four to six feet. He also adds that this fact would be of great medicolegal value in the early arrest of those charged with rape. In this connection the analogy of the breath immediately after coitus to the odor of chloroform has been mentioned. The same article states that after coitus naturally foul breath becomes sweet.
The emotions are said to have a decided influence on the odor of an individual. Gambrini, quoted by Monin, mentions a young man, unfortunate in love and violently jealous, whose whole body exhaled a sickening, pernicious, and fetid odor. Orteschi met a young lady who, without any possibility of fraud, exhaled the strong odor of vanilla from the commissures of her fingers.
Rayer speaks of a woman under his care at the Hopital de la Charite affected with chronic peritonitis, who some time before her death exhaled a very decided odor of musk. The smell had been noticed several days, but was thought to be due to a bag of musk put purposely into the bed to overpower other bad smells. The woman, however, gave full assurance that she had no kind of perfume about her and that her clothes had been frequently changed. The odor of musk in this case was very perceptible on the arms and other portions of the body, but did not become more powerful by friction. After continuing for about eight days it grew fainter and nearly vanished before the patient's death. Speranza relates a similar case.
Complexion.—Pare states that persons of red hair and freckled complexion have a noxious exhalation; the odor of prussic acid is said to come from dark individuals, while blondes exhale a secretion resembling musk. Fat persons frequently have an oleaginous smell.
The disorders of the nervous system are said to be associated with peculiar odors. Fevre says the odor of the sweat of lunatics resembles that of yellow deer or mice, and Knight remarks that the absence of this symptom would enable him to tell whether insanity was feigned or not. Burrows declares that in the absence of further evidence he would not hesitate to pronounce a person insane if he could perceive certain associate odors. Sir William Gull and others are credited with asserting that they could detect syphilis by smell. Weir Mitchell has observed that in lesions of nerves the corresponding cutaneous area exhaled the odor of stagnant water. Hammond refers to three cases under his notice in which specific odors were the results of affections of the nervous system. One of these cases was a young woman of hysterical tendencies who exhaled the odor of violets, which pervaded her apartments. This odor was given off the left half of the chest only and could be obtained concentrated by collecting the perspiration on a handkerchief, heating it with four ounces of spirit, and distilling the remaining mixture. The administration of the salicylate of soda modified in degree this violaceous odor. Hammond also speaks of a young lady subject to chorea whose insensible perspiration had an odor of pineapples; a hypochondriac gentleman under his care smelled of violets. In this connection he mentions a young woman who, when suffering from intense sick headache, exhaled an odor resembling that of Limburger cheese.
Barbier met a case of disordered innervation in a captain of infantry, the upper half of whose body was subject to such offensive perspiration that despite all treatment he had to finally resign his commission.
In lethargy and catalepsy the perspiration very often has a cadaverous odor, which has probably occasionally led to a mistaken diagnosis of death. Schaper and de Meara speak of persons having a cadaveric odor during their entire life.
Various ingesta readily give evidence of themselves by their influence upon the breath. It has been remarked that the breath of individuals who have recently performed a prolonged necropsy smells for some hours of the odor of the cadaver. Such things as copaiba, cubebs, sandalwood, alcohol, coffee, etc., have their recognizable fragrance. There is an instance of a young woman taking Fowler's solution who had periodic offensive axillary sweats that ceased when the medicine was discontinued.
Henry of Navarre was a victim of bromidrosis; proximity to him was insufferable to his courtiers and mistresses, who said that his odor was like that of carrion. Tallemant says that when his wife, Marie de Medicis, approached the bridal night with him she perfumed her apartments and her person with the essences of the flowers of her country in order that she might be spared the disgusting odor of her spouse. Some persons are afflicted with an excessive perspiration of the feet which often takes a disgusting odor. The inguinoscrotal and inguinovulvar perspirations have an aromatic odor like that of the genitals of either sex.
During menstruation, hyperidrosis of the axillae diffuses an aromatic odor similar to that of acids or chloroform, and in suppression of menses, according to the Ephemerides, the odor is as of hops.
Odors of Disease.—The various diseases have their own peculiar odors. The "hospital odor," so well known, is essentially variable in character and chiefly due to an aggregation of cutaneous exhalations. The wards containing women and children are perfumed with butyric acid, while those containing men are influenced by the presence of alkalies like ammonia.
Gout, icterus, and even cholera (Drasch and Porker) have their own odors. Older observers, confirmed by Doppner, say that all the plague-patients at Vetlianka diffused an odor of honey. In diabetes there is a marked odor of apples. The sweat in dysentery unmistakably bears the odor of the dejecta. Behier calls the odor of typhoid that of the blood, and Berard says that it attracts flies even before death. Typhus has a mouse-like odor, and the following diseases have at different times been described as having peculiar odors,—measles, the smell of freshly plucked feathers; scarlatina, of bread hot from the oven; eczema and impetigo, the smell of mold; and rupia, a decidedly offensive odor.
The hair has peculiar odors, differing in individuals. The hair of the Chinese is known to have the odor of musk, which cannot be washed away by the strongest of chemicals. Often the distinctive odor of a female is really due to the odor of great masses of hair. It is said that wig-makers simply by the sense of smell can tell whether hair has been cut from the living head or from combings, as hair loses its odor when it falls out. In the paroxysms of hysteroepilepsy the hair sometimes has a specific odor of ozone. Taenia favosa gives to the scalp an odor resembling that of cat's urine.
Sexual Influence of Odors.—In this connection it may be mentioned that there is a peculiar form of sexual perversion, called by Binet "fetichism," in which the subject displays a perverted taste for the odors of handkerchiefs, shoes, underclothing, and other articles of raiment worn by the opposite sex. Binet maintains that these articles play the part of the "fetich" in early theology. It is said that the favors given by the ladies to the knights in the Middle Ages were not only tokens of remembrance and appreciation, but sexual excitants as well. In his remarkable "Osphresiologie," Cloquet calls attention to the sexual pleasure excited by the odors of flowers, and tells how Richelieu excited his sexual functions by living in an atmosphere ld with these perfumes. In the Orient the harems are perfumed with intense extracts and flowers, in accordance with the strong belief in the aphrodisiac effect of odors.
Krafft-Ebing quotes several interesting cases in which the connection between the olfactory and sexual functions is strikingly verified.
"The case of Henry III shows that contact with a person's perspiration may be the exciting cause of passionate love. At the betrothal feast of the King of Navarre and Margaret of Valois he accidentally dried his face with a garment of Maria of Cleves which was moist with her perspiration. Although she was the bride of the Prince of Conde, Henry immediately conceived such a passion for her that he could not resist it, and, as history shows, made her very unhappy. An analogous instance is related of Henry IV, whose passion for the beautiful Gabrielle is said to have originated at the instant when, at a ball, he wiped his brow with her handkerchief."
Krafft-Ebing also says that "one learns from reading the work of Ploss ('Das Weib') that attempts to attract a person of the opposite sex by means of the perspiration may be discerned in many forms in popular psychology. In reference to this a custom is remarkable which holds among the natives of the Philippine Islands when they become engaged. When it becomes necessary for the engaged pair to separate they exchange articles of wearing apparel, by means of which each becomes assured of faithfulness. These objects are carefully preserved, covered with kisses, and smelled."
The love of perfumes by libertines and prostitutes, as well as sensual women of the higher classes, is quite marked. Heschl reported a case of a man of forty-five in whom absence of the olfactory sense was associated with imperfect development of the genitals; it is also well known that olfactory hallucinations are frequently associated with psychoses of an erotic type.
Garnier has recently collected a number of observations of fetichism, in which he mentions individuals who have taken sexual satisfaction from the odors of shoes, night-dresses, bonnets, drawers, menstrual napkins, and other objects of the female toilet. He also mentions creatures who have gloated over the odors of the blood and excretions from the bodies of women, and gives instances of fetichism of persons who have been arrested in the streets of Paris for clipping the long hair from young girls. There are also on record instances of homosexual fetichism, a type of disgusting inversion of the sexual instinct, which, however, it is not in the province of this work to discuss.
Among animals the influence of the olfactory perceptions on the sexual sense is unmistakable. According to Krafft Ebing, Althaus shows that animals of opposite sexes are drawn to each other by means of olfactory perceptions, and that almost all animals at the time of rutting emit a very strong odor from their genitals. It is said that the dog is attracted in this way to the bitch several miles away. An experiment by Schiff is confirmatory. He extirpated the olfactory nerves of puppies, and found that as they grew the male was unable to distinguish the female. Certain animals, such as the musk-ox, civet-cat, and beaver, possess glands on their sexual organs that secrete materials having a very strong odor. Musk, a substance possessing the most penetrating odor and used in therapeutics, is obtained from the preputial follicles of the musk-deer of Thibet; and castor, a substance less penetrating, is obtained from the preputial sacs of the beaver. Virgin moths (Bombyx) carried in boxes in the pockets of entomologists will on wide commons cause the appearance of males of the same species.
Bulimia is excessive morbid hunger, also called canine appetite. While sometimes present in healthy people, it is most often seen in idiots and the insane, and is a symptom of diabetes mellitus. Mortimer mentions a boy of twelve who, while laboring under this affliction, in six days devoured food to the extent of 384 pounds and two ounces. He constantly vomited, but his craving for food was so insatiable that if not satisfied he would devour the flesh off his own bones. Martyn, Professor of Botany at Cambridge in the early part of the last century, tells of a boy ten years old whose appetite was enormous. He consumed in one week 373 pounds of food and drink. His urine and stools were voided in normal quantities, the excess being vomited. A pig was fed on what he vomited, and was sold in the market. The boy continued in this condition for a year, and at last reports was fast failing. Burroughs mentions a laborer at Stanton, near Bury, who ate an ordinary leg of veal at a meal, and fed at this extravagant rate for many days together. He would eat thistles and other similar herbs greedily. At times he would void worms as large as the shank of a clay-pipe, and then for a short period the bulimia would disappear.
Johnston mentions a case of bulimia in a man who devoured large quantities of raw flesh. There is an instance on record of a case of canine appetite in which nearly 400 pounds of solid and fluid elements were taken into the body in six days and again ejected. A recovery was effected by giving very concentrated food, frequently repeated in small quantities. Mason mentions a woman in St. Bartholomew's Hospital in London in the early part of this century who was wretched unless she was always eating. Each day she consumed three quartern-loaves, three pounds of beef-steak, in addition to large quantities of vegetables, meal, etc., and water. Smith describes a boy of fourteen who ate continuously fifteen hours out of the twenty-four, and who had eight bowel movements each day. One year previous his weight was 105 pounds, but when last seen he weighed 284 pounds and was increasing a half pound daily. Despite his continuous eating, this boy constantly complained of hunger.
Polydipsia is an abnormal thirst; it may be seen in persons otherwise normal, or it may be associated with diseases—such as diabetes mellitus or diabetes insipidus. Mackenzie quotes a case from Trousseau, in which an individual afflicted with diabetes insipidus passed 32 liters of urine daily and drank enormous quantities of water. This patient subjected himself to severe regimen for eight months,—although one day, in his agonies, he seized the chamber-pot and drank its contents at once. Mackenzie also mentions an infant of three who had polydipsia from birth and drank daily nearly two pailfuls of water. At the age of twenty-two she married a cobbler, unaware of her propensity, who found that his earnings did not suffice to keep her in water alone, and he was compelled to melt ice and snow for her. She drank four pailfuls a day, the price being 12 sous; water in the community was scarce and had to be bought. This woman bore 11 children. At the age of forty she appeared before a scientific commission and drank in their presence 14 quarts of water in ten hours and passed ten quarts of almost colorless urine. Dickinson mentions that he has had patients in his own practice who drank their own urine. Mackenzie also quotes Trousseau's history of a man who drank a liter of strong French brandy in two hours, and habitually drank the same quantity daily. He stated that he was free from the effects of alcohol; on several occasions on a wager he took 20 liters of wine, gaining his wager without visibly affecting his nervous system.
There is an instance of a man of fifty-eight who could not live through the night without a pail of water, although his health was otherwise good. Atkinson in 1856 reported a young man who in childhood was a dirt-eater, though at that time complaining of nothing but excessive thirst. He was active, industrious, enjoyed good health, and was not addicted to alcoholics. His daily ration of water was from eight to twelve gallons. He always placed a tub of water by his bed at night, but this sometimes proved insufficient. He had frequently driven hogs from mudholes to slake his thirst with the water. He married in 1829 and moved into Western Tennessee, and in 1854 he was still drinking the accustomed amount; and at this time he had grown-up children. Ware mentions a young man of twenty who drank six gallons of water daily. He was tormented with thirst, and if he abstained he became weak, sick, and dizzy. Throughout a long life he continued his habit, sometimes drinking a gallon at one draught; he never used spirits. There are three cases of polydipsia reported from London in 1792.
Field describes a boy with bilious remittent fever who would drink until his stomach was completely distended and then call for more. Emesis was followed by cries for more water. Becoming frantic, he would jump from his bed and struggle for the water bucket; failing in this, he ran to the kitchen and drank soapsuds, dish-water, and any other liquid he could find. He had swallowed a mass of mackerel which he had not properly masticated, a fact proved later by ejection of the whole mass. There is a case on record a in which there was intolerable thirst after retiring, lasting for a year. There was apparently no polydipsia during the daytime.
The amount of water drunk by glass-blowers in a day is almost incredible. McElroy has made observations in the glass-factories in his neighborhood, and estimates that in the nine working hours of each day a glass-blower drinks from 50 to 60 pints of water. In addition to this many are addicted to the use of beer and spirits after working hours and at lunch-time. The excreta and urine never seem to be perceptibly increased. When not working these men do not drink more than three or four pints of water. Occasionally a man becomes what is termed "blown-up with water;" that is, the perspiration ceases, the man becomes utterly helpless, has to be carried out, and is disabled until the sweating process is restored by vigorously applied friction. There is little deleterious change noticed in these men; in fact, they are rarely invalids.
Hydrpsia is a lack of thirst or absence of the normal desire for water. In some of these cases there is a central lesion which accounts for the symptoms. McElroy, among other cases, speaks of one in a patient who was continually dull and listless, eating little, and complaining of much pain after the least food. This, too, will be mentioned under abstinence.
Perverted appetites are of great variety and present many interesting as well as disgusting examples of anomalies. In some cases the tastes of people differ so that an article considered by one race as disgusting would be held as a delicacy by another class. The ancients used asafetida as a seasoning, and what we have called "stercus diaboli," the Asiatics have named the "food of the gods." The inhabitants of Greenland drink the oil of the whale with as much avidity as we would a delicate wine, and they eat blubber the mere smell of which nauseates an European. In some nations of the lower grade, insects, worms, serpents, etc., are considered edible. The inhabitants of the interior of Africa are said to relish the flesh of serpents and eat grubs and worms. The very earliest accounts of the Indians of Florida and Texas show that "for food, they dug roots, and that they ate spiders, ants' eggs, worms, lizards, salamanders, snakes, earth, wood, the dung of deer, and many other things." Gomara, in his "Historia de les Indias," says this loathsome diet was particular to one tribe, the Yagusces of Florida. It is said that a Russian peasant prefers a rotten egg to a fresh one; and there are persons who prefer game partly spoiled.
Bourke recalls that the drinking of human urine has often been a religious rite, and describes the urine-dance of the Zunis of New Mexico, in which the participants drink freely of their urine; he draws an analogy to the Feast of the Fools, a religious custom of Pagan origin which did not disappear in Europe until the time of the Reformation. It is still a practice in some parts of the United States to give children fresh urine for certain diseases. It is said that the ordure of the Grand Lama of Thibet was at one time so venerated that it was collected and worn as amulets.
The disgusting habit of eating human excrement is mentioned by Schurig, who gives numerous examples in epileptics, maniacs, chlorotic young women, pregnant women, children who have soiled their beds and, dreading detection, have swallowed their ejecta, and finally among men and women with abnormal appetites. The Indians of North America consider a broth made from the dung of the hare and caribou a dainty dish, and according to Abbe Domenech, as a means of imparting a flavor, the bands near Lake Superior mix their rice with the excrement of rabbits. De Bry mentions that the negroes of Guinea ate filthy, stinking elephant-meat and buffalo-flesh infested with thousands of maggots, and says that they ravenously devoured dogs' guts raw. Spencer, in his "Descriptive Sociology," describes a "Snake savage" of Australia who devoured the contents of entrails of an animal. Some authors have said that within the last century the Hottentots devoured the flesh and the entrails of wild beasts, uncleansed of their filth and excrement, and whether sound or rotten. In a personal letter to Captain Bourke, the Reverend J. Owen Dorsey reports that while among the Ponkas he saw a woman and child devour the entrails of a beef with their contents. Bourke also cites instances in which human ordure was eaten by East Indian fanatics. Numerous authorities are quoted by Bourke to prove the alleged use of ordure in food by the ancient Israelites. Pages of such reference are to be found in the works on Scatology, and for further reference the reader is referred to on this subject, of which prominent in English literature is that of Bourke.
Probably the most revolting of all the perverted tastes is that for human flesh. This is called anthropophagy or cannibalism, and is a time-honored custom among some of the tribes of Africa. This custom is often practised more in the spirit of vengeance than of real desire for food. Prisoners of war were killed and eaten, sometimes cooked, and among some tribes raw. In their religious frenzy the Aztecs ate the remains of the human beings who were sacrificed to their idols. At other times cannibalism has been a necessity. In a famine in Egypt, as pictured by the Arab Abdullatif, the putrefying debris of animals, as well as their excrement, was used as food, and finally the human dead were used; then infants were killed and devoured, so great was the distress. In many sieges, shipwrecks, etc., cannibalism has been practiced as a last resort for sustaining life. When supplies have given out several Arctic explorers have had to resort to eating the bodies of their comrades. In the famous Wiertz Museum in Brussels is a painting by this eccentric artist in which he has graphically portrayed a woman driven to insanity by hunger, who has actually destroyed her child with a view to cannibalism. At the siege of Rochelle it is related that, urged by starvation, a father and mother dug up the scarcely cold body of their daughter and ate it. At the siege of Paris by Henry IV the cemeteries furnished food for the starving. One mother in imitation of what occurred at the siege of Jerusalem roasted the limbs of her dead child and died of grief under this revolting nourishment.
St. Jerome states that he saw Scotchmen in the Roman armies in Gaul whose regular diet was human flesh, and who had "double teeth all around."
Cannibalism, according to a prominent New York journal, has been recently made a special study by the Bureau of Ethnology at Washington, D.C. Data on the subject have been gathered from all parts of the world, which are particularly interesting in view of discoveries pointing to the conclusion that this horrible practice is far more widespread than was imagined. Stanley claims that 30,000,000 cannibals dwell in the basin of the Congo to-day—people who relish human flesh above all other meat. Perah, the most peculiar form of cannibalism, is found in certain mountainous districts of northeast Burmah, where there are tribes that follow a life in all important respects like that of wild beasts. These people eat the congealed blood of their enemies. The blood is poured into bamboo reeds, and in the course of time, being corked up, it hardens. The filled reeds are hung under the roofs of the huts, and when a person desires to treat his friends very hospitably the reeds are broken and the contents devoured.
"The black natives of Australia are all professed cannibals. Dr. Carl Lumholtz, a Norwegian scientist, spent many months in studying them in the wilds of the interior. He was alone among these savages, who are extremely treacherous. Wearing no clothing whatever, and living in nearly every respect as monkeys do, they know no such thing as gratitude, and have no feeling that can be properly termed human. Only fear of the traveler's weapons prevented them from slaying him, and more than once he had a narrow escape. One of the first of them whom he employed looked more like a brute than a man. 'When he talked,' says the doctor, 'he rubbed his belly with complacency, as if the sight of me made his mouth water.' This individual was regarded with much respect by his fellows because of his success in procuring human flesh to eat. These aborigines say that the white man's flesh is salt and occasions nausea. A Chinaman they consider as good for eating as a black man, his food being chiefly vegetable.
"The most horrible development of cannibalism among the Australian blacks is the eating of defunct relatives. When a person dies there follows an elaborate ceremony, which terminates with the lowering of the corpse into the grave. In the grave is a man not related to the deceased, who proceeds to cut off the fat adhering to the muscles of the face, thighs, arms, and stomach, and passes it around to be swallowed by some of the near relatives. All those who have eaten of the cadaver have a black ring of charcoal powder and fat drawn around the mouth. The order in which the mourners partake of their dead relatives is duly prescribed. The mother eats of her children and the children of their mother. A man eats of his sister's husband and of his brother's wife. Mothers' brothers, mothers' sisters, sisters' children, mothers' parents, and daughters' children are also eaten by those to whom the deceased person stands in such relation. But the father does not eat of his children, nor the children of their sire.
"The New Zealanders, up to very recent times, were probably the most anthropophagous race that ever existed. As many as 1000 prisoners have been slaughtered by them at one time after a successful battle, the bodies being baked in ovens underground. If the individual consumed had been a redoubtable enemy they dried his head as a trophy and made flutes of his thigh bones.
"Among the Monbuttos of Africa human fat is commonly employed for a variety of purposes. The explorer Schweinfurth speaks of writing out in the evenings his memoranda respecting these people by the light of a little oil-lamp contrived by himself, which was supplied with some questionable-looking grease furnished by the natives. The smell of this grease, he says, could not fail to arouse one's worst suspicions against the negroes. According to his account the Monbuttos are the most confirmed cannibals in Africa. Surrounded as they are by a number of peoples who are blacker than themselves, and who, being inferior to them in culture, are held in contempt, they carry on expeditions of war and plunder which result in the acquisition of a booty especially coveted by them—namely, human flesh. The bodies of all foes who fall in battle are distributed on the field among the victors, and are prepared by drying for transportation. The savages drive their prisoners before them, and these are reserved for killing at a later time. During Schweinfurth's residence at the Court of Munza it was generally understood that nearly every day a little child was sacrificed to supply a meal for the ogre potentate. For centuries past the slave trade in the Congo Basin has been conducted largely for the purpose of furnishing human flesh to consumers. Slaves are sold and bought in great numbers for market, and are fattened for slaughter.
"The Mundurucus of the Upper Amazon, who are exceedingly ferocious, have been accused of cannibalism. It is they who preserve human heads in such a remarkable way. When one of their warriors has killed an enemy he cuts off the head with his bamboo knife, removes the brain, soaks the head in a vegetable oil, takes out bones of the skull, and dries the remaining parts by putting hot pebbles inside of it. At the same time care is taken to preserve all the features and the hair intact. By repeating the process with the hot pebbles many times the head finally becomes shrunken to that of a small doll, though still retaining its human aspect, so that the effect produced is very weird and uncanny. Lastly, the head is decorated with brilliant feathers, and the lips are fastened together with a string, by which the head is suspended from the rafters of the council-house."
Ancient Customs.—According to Herodotus the ancient Lydians and Medes, and according to Plato the islanders in the Atlantic, cemented friendship by drinking human blood. Tacitus speaks of Asian princes swearing allegiance with their own blood, which they drank. Juvenal says that the Scythians drank the blood of their enemies to quench their thirst.
Occasionally a religious ceremony has given sanction to cannibalism. It is said that in the Island of Chios there was a rite by way of sacrifice to Dionysius in which a man was torn limb from limb, and Faber tells us that the Cretans had an annual festival in which they tore a living bull with their teeth. Spencer quotes that among the Bacchic orgies of many of the tribes of North America, at the inauguration of one of the Clallum chiefs on the northwest coast of British America, the chief seized a small dog and began to devour it alive, and also bit the shoulders of bystanders. In speaking of these ceremonies, Boas, quoted by Bourke, says that members of the tribes practicing Hamatsa ceremonies show remarkable scars produced by biting, and at certain festivals ritualistic cannibalism is practiced, it being the duty of the Hamatsa to bite portions of flesh out of the arms, legs, or breast of a man.
Another cause of cannibalism, and the one which deserves discussion here, is genuine perversion or depravity of the appetite for human flesh among civilized persons,—the desire sometimes being so strong as to lead to actual murder. Several examples of this anomaly are on record. Gruner of Jena speaks of a man by the name of Goldschmidt, in the environs of Weimar, who developed a depraved appetite for human flesh. He was married at twenty-seven, and for twenty-eight years exercised his calling as a cow-herd. Nothing extraordinary was noticed in him, except his rudeness of manner and his choleric and gross disposition. In 1771, at the age of fifty-five, he met a young traveler in the woods, and accused him of frightening his cows; a discussion arose, and subsequently a quarrel, in which Goldschmidt killed his antagonist by a blow with a stick which he used. To avoid detection he dragged the body to the bushes, cut it up, and took it home in sections. He then washed, boiled, and ate each piece. Subsequently, he developed a further taste for human flesh, and was finally detected in eating a child which he had enticed into his house and killed. He acknowledged his appetite before his trial.
Hector Boetius says that a Scotch brigand and his wife and children were condemned to death on proof that they killed and ate their prisoners. The extreme youth of one of the girls excused her from capital punishment; but at twelve years she was found guilty of the same crime as her father and suffered capital punishment. This child had been brought up in good surroundings, yet her inherited appetite developed. Gall tells of an individual who, instigated by an irresistible desire to eat human flesh, assassinated many persons; and his daughter, though educated away from him, yielded to the same graving.
At Bicetre there was an individual who had a horribly depraved appetite for decaying human flesh. He would haunt the graveyards and eat the putrefying remains of the recently buried, preferring the intestines. Having regaled himself in a midnight prowl, he would fill his pockets for future use. When interrogated on the subject of his depravity he said it had existed since childhood. He acknowledged the greatest desire to devour children he would meet playing; but he did not possess the courage to kill them.
Prochaska quotes the case of a woman of Milan who attracted children to her home in order that she might slay, salt, and eat them. About 1600, there is the record of a boy named Jean Granier, who had repeatedly killed and devoured several young children before he was discovered. Rodericus a Castro tells of a pregnant woman who so strongly desired to eat the shoulder of a baker that she killed him, salted his body, and devoured it at intervals.
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