The accumulated numbers of the “Archivio Italiano per le Malatie Nervose,” for 1866 and 1867, contain so many valuable papers that I am most reluctantly compelled to choose only the best, or those most interesting to tne readers of the “Journal of Mental Science,” and to omit much that is good.

The volume of the Irrenfrennd commences with an article on the writing of the insane. The following conclusions are quoted from a pamphlet by Dr. Th. Güntz :— “1. The writing of the insane exhibits various deviations from what is normal, both as regards quantity and quality. 2. These deviations are important in so far as they frequently give the first indication of the commencement of insanity. 3. They often give the best key to the aetiology, genesis, and duration of the disease. 4. They frequently complete or correct our conception of the nature of the disease. 5. They furnish a certain test of the advent and progress of convalescence.”

Pathology of the Brain in Cholera.—Dr. E. Mesnet devotes a paper to the consideration of the cerebral lesions observed in this disease. With the first period of the disease, that of prostration and enfeeblement, are associated functional disorders of the ganglionic nervous system; with the second, or reactive period, are associated those cerebral complications to which Mesnet directs our attention. In the cases of three persons who were seized with choleraic symptoms, while under the influence of alcoholic intoxication, the algidity and cyanotic symptoms did not come on. But about the tenth day of the disease a condition undistinguishable from delirium tremens made its appearance, and, after continuing three days, gave place to convalescence, which was inaugurated by an abundant and apparently critical perspiration. In general, he says, the discord between the nervous functions of animal life and those connected with relational existence is very striking. “There is nothing more affecting than the appearance of the asphyxie stage of collapse when the patient is in continual movement, when his features and skin are corpse-like, and visceral innervation appears to be extinguished, when all organic functions appear to have ceased, and when, nevertheless, his intellect is preserved and he can converse with us up to the last moment. The mind has no longer its natural vivacity; the con ceptions are languid; the memory requires to be stimulated; but when the patient is roused and the attention fixed, correct answers are obtained to questions put. The semi-comatose condition in which he is found is not the coma of cerebral disease, but a sort of drowsiness, which results from the general exhaustion of organic life. The benumbed condition of the senses is, in part, the cause of slowness of cerebral action; less sensitive to external stimuli, they transmit imperfect impressions, which are followed by obscure sensation. The hearing is almost lost, vision enfeebled, and sensi bility in general obtuse. As soon as the collapse begins to pass off, and reaction supervenes, the intellectual faculties recover from the torpidity to which we have referred, and the patient, who is more or less aware of his condition, becomes conscious of what is going on around him, and directs a restless attention to it.

In the remarks which I am about to address to you, my aim is not to contribute any new facts to the clinical history and the pathology of the condition known as aphasia, but to weigh the bearing of the facts already recorded, to examine how far these support the theories that have been based upon them, and to set forth as definitely as may be possible the kind of conclusions warranted by the state of our knowledge. It appears to me that inquiry into this obscure subject has arrived at a stage when little or no further profit can accrue from an aimless accumulation of observations, and that what is now needed is a digestion of the material which lies at hand.

AGENDA:—I. Meeting of the General Committee, at 10.30 a.m.