SUSPENDED CONSCIOUSNESS.
[To THE EDITOR OP THE "SPECTATOR.")
your notice of Professor Stokes's lecture, allusion is made to the suspended consciousness of a bricklayer struck down by a falling brick, &c. May I give another instance ? A collier was at work in the Lightmon coalfield, in Shropshire, whose business was to hook the loaded trolly on to the pit- chain. He had just done it, and was about to give the signal, "Pull up the load," when a brick from the pit-shaft struck him on the head, and he fell unconscious. He was brought up at once, but the injury was considered so serious that the doctors decided that nothing could be done, for they feared there was a fatal injury to the brain. But after several days, finding no unfavourable symptoms set in, the surgeon, Mr. James Row- lands, of the Ironbridge, decided to perform the operation of trepanning. As soon as the crushed part of the skull was raised, the man became conscious, and shouted out in a loud voice, "Pull up the load." The brain began its work again from the moment of suspension, and the interval of several days had not obliterated the thought which had signalled to the will, but all started into action at once again and completed the intended act.—I am, Sir, &c.,
W. H. E. McKmonT.
The Rectory, Silk Willoughby, Sleaford.
Previous page
