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Hokitika Guardian, 23 August 1933, Page 4

Like many other affections, comments Dr Harris Campbell, in the- Londo n “Times,” claustrophobia is no more than an exaggeration of a normal condition in this case the instinct of selfpreservation. Nature has endued the higher animals with an instinctive dread of capture or any interference with the free movements of the limbs, such as might be caused by handcuffs or impaction i n a dense crowd. \The pillory and the stocks must have had a special terror for the confirmed claustrophobiac.) He craves for liberty to move freely in wide open spaces. Shakespeare, with his unparalleled gift of seizing upon essentials, realised this; it will h? r'lnombered that one of Lear’s wicked daughter, in her endeavour to outbid her sisters for the father’s goodwill, could think of no more precious possessions than ‘eyesight. space and liberty.’ The instinct of which claustrophobia is an exaggerated expression has for its object the avoidance of capture and the call-ing-up <?f all the energies of the captured animal in an effort to secure ' r 4 fi.T' A m+ir r "

escape: many a timid animal when iat hay will, in obedience to the instinct in question, light to the death in the effort for freedom. When the self-pre-servation instinct passes the normal limit in intensity the condition is one of claustrophobia of which there aro many degrees. In a pronounced form ' confinement in a closed space (the equivalent of capture) excites panic sometimes amounting to frenzy, which may prove fatal. There is an abhorrence of any closed space from which escape is impossible; underground and even overground trains are avoided; tunnels and deep oaves are equally dreaded. Any prisoner affected even with a slight degree of claustrophobia should receive special consideration. Mr Bottomley in his memoirs described the misery he suffered from being locked up within the narrow’ compass of a cell. RejpTKloubiteclly suffered from a minor degree of claustrophobia. All such •prisoners should be treated with the utmost leniency.