A Strange Disorder.

Waikato Times, Volume XXIV, Issue 1973, 28 February 1885, Page 6 (Supplement)

A Strange Disorder.

A very curious disorder of the nervous system ia described in the Revue Scientijique, being taken from the Archives de Ntuiologie It appears that, in the U.S. State of Maine, there are some persons in apparent health except bo far as related to nervous excitability, which is excessive. The least irritation causes them to jump. They also feol compelled to execute anything they aie ordered to do, and they repeat the command in a loud voice. Dr. Beard reports that one '■ jumper," as they are called, was sitting on a chair cutting tobacco. lie went up to him, struck him suddenly on the shoulder, and said, " Throw it away." He repeated the words in a voioe of terror, and threw his knife, bo that it stuck in a door opposite to him. Two other jumpers struck themselves violently on being told to do it. This disorder appears to be hereditary. In one family Dr. Beard found the father, his son, and two little girls of four and seven affected by it ; and in another case three brothers were its victims. A similar complaint occurs in the Malay region of Asia, and it has been observed amongst various races, Tamils, Bengalcße, Sikhs, and Nubians. The Malays call the patient a latah, a word of wide significance, applied to various degrees of nervous excitability. Mr. OBrien states that when travelling in the Malay Peninsula he had as a servant a young Malay whom his comrades called a latah, though his conduot and conversation indicated nothing irrational. Four-and-twenty hours elapsed before his peculiarity was displayed. A signal fuse was then lired by way of rejoicing, and the doctor was about to ignite another when the young man pushed him violently on one aide, seized the torch, lit the fuse, and fell to the ground face downward, uttering a strange cry. The next day he seemed all right, but when the doctor waved his hand as an adieu on leaving the shore, he imitated the movements with frenzy. He also imitated him as he whistled a European tune. On another occasion the doctor had introduced to him an old and highly respectable woman, with whom he talked for ten minutes without noticing anything abnormal. All of a sudden tho person who brought her took off his coat, upon which she began to undress, and would soon have been quite naked, it he had not stopped her. She was furious against the man who incited her to this indecency, and while she wus taking off her clothes abused him as "an abandoned pig," and wanted him killed. Another case ended tragically. The cook of a steamer was hit ah, aud one day was nursing a child, when a sailor came near him with a billet of wood in his arms. He rolled the wood on the top of an awning, and loosening it let the wood fall. The cook did the same with the child, and

killed it. At Singapore another latah, seeing hia mißtress tear a letter and throw the pieces out of the window, did the same with a bundle of new clothes ho was carrying. Th"s di"ordw is not con lined to warm climates. It is known in Siberia, and a case is mentionad of the pilot of a ship on tho Udsar who could not refrain from irritating actions r-r noiies made by thn pmsemjers to try him. The captain had a fall while clapping hi 3 hand^, whereupon the pilot clappsd his, and fell in the atime way. The P-Übsians call the complaint miryachil, ana it ia said to be common near Yakutsk in ncvare- winters. — Knowledge.