DR CARR ON HIS DEFENCE.

Westport Times, Volume III, Issue 593, 14 December 1869, Page 2

DR CARR ON HIS DEFENCE.

The Shortland Times says:—" A young man of the name of "William Wetherall was brought to the police station the other morning, on account of his being of unsound mind. It was stated by his brother that since he had heen under the influence of Dr Carr, the mesniei'ist, he has never

been the same man he was formerly. The unfortunate young man has never been a taker of strong drink, but has been gradually losing his power of mind without any assignanbe reason. Dr Carr has written to the same paper to state that he did not mesmerise the young man Wetherall, who has been sent to the Lunatic Asylum. He says:—' I remember the young man well, of a strong robust but very excitable temperament. He told me he did not think I could mesmerise him. For a long time I exerted all the power I could command, but it was of no avail. I failed to mesmerise him. He told his brother the next morning that Dr Carr had tried to mesmerise him, but that it was all nonsense, he could not do it. This ia his brother's statement. My essay with W. Wetherall was a conflict of will and antagonistic temperaments. He gave me attention, but exercised every faculty of resistance. It was a concentrated effort on his part to defy me in spite of the powerful influences I brought to bear upon him ; and he left the stage a3 convinced of the fallacy of mesmerism as any sceptic could wish to be. His triumph of resistance was the subject of his boasting the next day; but the result of this extreme tension of the Jmind combined with all the concentrated forces of the nervous system was a headache. The disease may have been in an incipient state; such conduct on the part of W. Wetherall was in every respect sufficient to develop it. I lament the result deeply; indeed, everyone with an average share of humanity could not do otherwise. Meantime I reject the allegations, and submit that there has been nothing done by me to hold me responsible for a misfortune so painful. The history of mesmerism nowhere shows that it has induced insanity. My experience is great. I have mesmerised thousands. The patients have not experienced pain, and, although the moat intense state of mesmeric anaesthesia has been induced, there has been no madness, insanity, or aberration of any kind.'