It may be that the premature death of the mother's
children has some significance in connection with Oscar's
phenomenal development. There is certainly a hypernutrition of
the parietal brain with atrophy of the optic tract, both of which
conditions could arise from abnormal vascular causes, or the
extra growth of the auditory memory region may have deprived of
nutrition, by pressure, the adjacent optic centers in the
occipital brain. The otherwise normal motion of the eyes
indicates the nystagmus to be functional.
"Sudden exaltation of the memory is often the consequence of
grave brain disease, and in children this symptom is most
frequent. Pritchard, Rush, and other writers upon mental
disorders record interesting instances of remarkable
memory-increase before death, mainly in adults, and during fever
and insanity. In simple mania the memory is often very acute.
Romberg tells of a young girl who lost her sight after an attack
of small-pox, but acquired an extraordinary memory. He calls
attention to the fact that the scrofulous and rachitic diatheses
in childhood are sometimes accompanied by this disorder. Winslow
notes that in the incipient state of the brain disease of early
life connected with fevers, disturbed conditions of the cerebral
circulation and vessels, and in affections of advanced life,
there is often witnessed a remarkable exaltation of the memory,
which may herald death by apoplexy.
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