DEATH IN LIFE.

Auckland Examiner, Volume 1, Issue 3, 25 December 1856, Page 3

DEATH IN LIFE.

The principal incident in the anecdote we are about to relate is so startling and singular, that we must, at the outset, assure the reader of its absolute truth. As the persons concerned are still living, we have, for obvious reasons, adopted a form in which the real circumstances are disguised, and only the important experience preserved. The story was told us at dinner by one of the medical men emengaged in the affair. “We live surrounded with mystery and horror,” said Captain Hurst, “ and, by George! the more we strive to explain the mystery, the more does its dim ghastliness reveal itself, “

“ What reference has that magnificent aphorism, so magniloquently expressed, to mesmerism ? ” We asked.

“ Little enough. Mesmerism brings one of the mysteries of our being into evidence, viz., the power of inducing a complete insuation of one part of our organization from the other ; so that the mesmerised patent shall be absolutely insensible to pain, and yet not insensible to other sensations.”

“ And the mystery ?” “ The mystery is how, in an organi - zation so marvellously complex as ours, wherein the parts are so independent, there should be a violent interruption of one portion of the organic action, without a corresponding interruption of the other. Men have stupidly talked of the vital mechanism, as if the frame of man were like the works of a watch, But you cannot so interrupt the action of a watch.” “ Well, we grant that you have made out a mystery ; but what of it ? Is not every thing about us a mystery ? And wherin lies the peculiar horror of which you spoke ?”

“ Did I never tell you my famous story of Death in Life ?” he inquired. “No. But let us have it now. “ Ay, let’s have it 1” exclaimed the other guest. And we drew closer round the fire as Captain Hurst, filling his glass and placing in on the mantelpiece, passed the claret round.

“ Our conversation about mesmerism,” he began, “ recalled to me one of my early experiences, and was so horrible that I seldom think of it without some prosy, reflection, such as I favoured you with just now. In the mesmeric state—as that induced by the inhalation of ether —the sensations of pain are wholly deadened. I have experienced the reverse. I once had paralysis of the nerves of motion only. Every nerve of sensation was uninfluenced ; but every nerve of muscular action was completely deadened. “I was with my regiment at the time. The attack was so sudden, that, seated on the sofa, I fell back as one asleep. I tried to call for assistance, but it was in vain. I could not stir ; I could not move my arm ; I could not even open my eyes. I heard the sounds of merriment above me; I heard every footstep on the stairs ; but I was as if perfectly lifeless, except as to my sense of hearing. It was most horrible ! I might perish there, if no one came unasked, without a chance of get’

ting assistance Ths sense of imprisonment was absolutely overwhelming! “ How long I lay thus I know not. Time was ‘ leaden-footed’ indeed to me. Every footstep I heard was interpreted into a lucky omen of speedy assistance. But not a soul came into my room. The footsteps all passed my door in cruel indifference. After a many ‘ hope deferred,’ I heard at last to my infinite satisfaction, the noisy accent of my cousin Charles and a brother officer named Thresher. They, at least, were coming to me ! Yes —the lock turned—and the two came boisterously into the room. “ Now then, Harry !” exclaimed my cousin, “up with you ! Ullo ! pretending to be asleep—won’t do !’ “‘Trim his moustache!’ exclamed Thresher.

“ They shook me. Of course I gave no signs of waking. They pulled my hair: I was immovable. They ran pins into me; I should have winced if I could, but was fixed in immovability. They began at length to suspect that something was the matter with me. But I was warm. Could I be shamming ? After many ineffectual attempts to rouse me, they sent for the army surgeon. He came, examined me, and, to my horror, I heard him say — “ ‘ It’s very extraordinary. I’m afraid he’s no more.’ “ Then I shall be buried alive! Conceive my feelings at such a thought; conceive my struggles to tell them I was not dead—that I heard all they were saying these struggles being totally ineffectual, because I could not move a muscle !

“ All sorts of remedies were applied, but I remained as insensible a* before. A second surgeon was called in, who thought that I had, possibly, only an attack of paralysis. I had hopes again! “ Vainly should I endeavour to convey to you any idea of the moral and physical torture to which I was subjected. The surgeons thought it necessary to stimulate my nerves, and restore them to their sensibility, but their sensibility was frightfully acute I and the pain I suffered in the attempts to restore my sensation was indiscribable. And then to hear them consulting ! One proposing a mustard bath, another saying, ‘ Oh! that will not be half strong enough !’ and I unable even by wincing to express that their remedies were not only already too violent, but absolutely applied to an imaginary evil. It was the nerves of muscular action which needed stimulating. But they could not know it.

“For two whole days —they seemed years —did I remain in this insensiblesensible state. I despaired of being rescued. I knew not how my medical men were to discover their mistake and my malady; and the fear of being given over and buried alive still haunted me.

“ A still more ghastly thought pursued me. I began to ask myself, ‘ls this death ?’ Am I really alive ? Do the dead hear and feel ?

“ I then thought of the imperishable nature of my soul. It, of course, preserves itself through all bodily decay. It is imprisoned in the body as long as the body holds together ? and shall I be liberated only on the utter falling away of these fleshy walls that enoempass me ? Am I to be buried, sensible of all that is going on around me ? And this soul which survives, how long is it to remain on earth 1 Is the grave its purgatory ? “ Such was the nature of the thoughts which ‘harassed me. Neither sleep nor cessation of fears had I. The weary hours slowly rolled on, but to me they brought me no repose; one incessant rush of horrible ideas tormented me, at those times when I was not suffering agonies from the attempts to restore my sensibility. “ Suddenly I opened my eyes. “ My rapture was so great, that, fearing it might be some illusion, and anxious not to dispel it, I continued for some moments to look steadily, and with intense pleasure, at the furniture of the bed, and the bottles on the mantlepiece. I then moved my hand. It obeyed me, although feebly. I moved my head. I opened,my lips. I spoke,!

“ The astonishment of the nurse, the astonishment of every one, except the surgeon, who with professional coolness took it quite as an expected occurrence, was unbounded. And the surgeon also deigned to be surprised when I repeated to him certain things I had heard him say to his colleague respecting my state. “ I recovered. My illness interested the ‘ faculty’ very much ; because it was

to them a novel case. But, as usual, they pretended to see no mystery in it. They explained it by saying that the nerves of motion had been paralysed, and the nerves of sensation had been untouched. Yet that is surely no explanation. It is simply a technical expression of the fact. But men always fancy when they have named any thing they have explained it. Like a friend of mine, who, on his child asking him how it was that crystal, which was heavier than wood, could be seen through ? exclaimed, somewhat patronisingly, ‘ Why, my dear boy, you can see through the crystal because it is a transparent substance.’ Of this sort seems the explanation of my case. Captain Hurst finished his story with an anecdote, like an accomplished narrator who is unwilling to leave a painful effect on the minds of his audience.

We laughed at his anecdote, and the laugh certainly took away some of the unpleasnt effect of his story. But we all remained silent and thoughtful for some minutes.

I broke sileuce at last by saying, “ Doubtless the many instances of persons being buried alive, which we read of, especially in Italian anecdotes, are to be mostly explained as the fate of persons affected as you were, captain. The horror of the unfortunates, aware of what was coming, must have been terrific. Conceive also the feelings of a man in that state overhearing the undisguised sentiments of those who, while he was alive, treated him with such hypocritical tenderness ! How he would curse his inability to awake and confound them !’*

“ I don’t put much faith in those cases,” observed my right-hand neighbonr,“ People have been on the point of being buried alive, we know; but authenticated cases are few.”

“ But remember,” said I,” that of all those who have been buried alive, none have come back to tell the tale ! ” “ Yes, in some cases they have escaped. In the Observatore Florentino there is a tale told of a lady who was buried, and who awoke in the vault and escaped. Leigh Hunt dramatised the story in his Legend of Florence. “There’s a good anecdote,” said the captain, “ in Tallemant des Reaux, of a man whose wife was supposed to be dead, but who was brought to life again by the shock of the bier against a house, the bearers having stumbled in turning a corner. Some time afterwards she died in earnest. As the funeral procession was about to set forth, the disconsolate husband approached the priest, and between his sobs said, ’ Be careful in turning the corners, will you f ”

“ To return to your own case, captain. It suggest unpleasant reflections. It absolutely throws a doubt upon that which hitherto has been acknowledged as indisputable, namely, that the dead feel no pain. But do they not ? lam not at all sure of that. How are we to prove they do not ? The mere absence of any of the sighs which, in a normal condition of the body, indicate pain, is no proof; because death is abnormal. In your case, there was a concomitance of keen sensibility, with a complete absence of all outward indications thereof. How am I to know that the dead man whom I am dissecting does not feel every incision of the knife, though he be utterly unable to give any indication thereof. And what a fearful thought is even the suspicion of such a thing ! ”

“We must alter our definition of death !” said my neighbour. “We must call death that state of the body wherein it is no longer able to obey the volitions.” “ Then paralysis is death ! ” “ A paralysed limb so long as it remains paralysed. When the whole frame is paralysed, the man is dead ! ” “ Let us,” interposed the captain, “ compare the two opposite conditions of a mesmerised patient, and a patient affected as I was affected, In the one case paralysis of the nerves of sensation ”

“ Nay, captain, not exactly—only of those nerves which administer to the sensation of pain ; the senses are not affected; the patient hears, sees, and smells.” “Well, then, I will be more precise, and say that, in the mesmeric state, the nerves which minister to the sensation of the pain are paralysed, while the nerves which minister to muscular action are in full play. In which case, the nerves of motion are paralysed, and the nerves of sensation are in full play. In which case would you call the man a dead man ?” “ In either case,” exclaimed one of the guests.

“ Why not in the latter ?” “ Because only the niotory nerves are dead ; all that is essentially human lives. “ How is that to be ascertained ?”

“ Why —you just now assumed it,” “ I did. But inasmuch as each patient can only know his own case, and cannot make it known to others, my assumption falls to the ground,” “ I don’t understand you ?”

“If your niotory nerves are paralysed, haw am I to know that your sensory-nerves are not likewise paralysed ? You give me no clue. To a spectator there is absolutely no indication of the sensory nerves being in a normal condition. How then is it to be known?” 1 hereby interposed, and called attention to the singular eflects of galvanism upon the dead body.

“ If,” said I, we accept the hypothesis of some modern physiologist, and regard the brain as a voltaic battery, and all muscular movement as the effect of an electrical current upon the nerves, our views of life and death will be wondrously altered.” “ How so ?”

“ Why, you must all admit that sensation and thought are not electrical phenomena ; you cannot suppose them vital phenomena ; that is to say, a peculiar class of phenomena quite apart from all others.

“Well; conclude.” But it is by no means necessary to suppose that muscular motion is anything more than galvanism, or something analogous. Indeed, we know the effects of contractility can be produced in a most arbitrary manner, and even upon things not endowed with muscular fibre. Therefore, I say, if we accept life, z.<?., sensation and thought, as immaterial, as sui generis, and all other muscular action, which is the most obvious indication of life as material—as belonging to a class of phenomena similar to those of galvanism then we are led, by the captain’s strange revelation, to new views of death. Life is indestructible ; breath is the cessation of muscular action. And then comes the ghastly reflection alluded to, that life may be imprisoned in a corpse, and a painful consciousness may attend the total paralysis of muscular action we call death.”

“ But this is all mere supposition.” “ Pardon me. The captain’s experience is a warrant for regarding it as something more. Let me also call to your recollection the experiments made upon the corpse of Clydesdale, the murderer, some years ago. He was executed, and remained hanging for nearly an hour, lie was then brought to the anatomical theatre, when the president Dr. Ure experimented upon him. “ A large incision was first made in the nape of his neck below the occiput. The vertebrae were laid open, and the spinal marrow brought into view. At the same time anothe large incision was made in the Left hip, to lay bare the sciatic nerve. The pointed rod connected with one end of the battery was now placed in contact with the spinal marrow, while the other rod was applied to the sciatic nerve. Every muscle of the body was instantly agitated with horrible convulsions. Among the experiments there was one to make the diaphragm move, which succeeded admirably: laborious breathing was thus induced ! A breathing corpse - -fancy that I

“But more horrible still, the supraorbital nerve was laid bare, and the most extraordinary grimaces were produced; every muscle in his countenance was simultaneously thrown into fearful action ; rage, horror, despair, anguish, and ghastly smiles alternated on the murderer’s face. The spectators were terribly agitated-— some were ill—others left the room.

“ Suppose- —and the supposition is not altogether gratuitous —the murderer really felt every incision of the knife, every shock of the battery, and that those fearful expressions were only too feeble indications of his sufferings- —indications permitted, owing to the momentary power over muscular motion which galvanism gave him! 1 know of nothing more horrible.” There was a long pause.

My neighbour broke it by saying, “ Have you been inventing these horrors by way of disturbing our digestion?” “ Kot I,” replied the captain, “ I have given )ou my simple and veritable experience.” And Dr. Ure’s ‘ Dictionary of Chemistry, f “ 1 rejoined, “is the authority for yhat 1 have mentioned.” ” 1 prefer not believing it.”

“ Believing what ?” “ That the dead feel.” “ Can you prove the contrary,?’’ “ No. But I ask you to define what death really is.” “ 1 cannot.” ” Then you confess be know nothing about it ?”

“ I confess it. Death is a name we give to the Unknown. We name it, and fancy we have explained."