Mesnet relates some interesting experiments
made upon a French sergeant in a condition of somnambulism,
demonstrating the excitation of ideas in the mind through the
sense of touch in the extremities. This soldier touched a table,
passed his hands over it, and finding nothing on it, opened the
drawer, took out a pen, found paper and an inkstand, and taking a
chair he sat down and wrote to his commanding officer speaking of
his bravery, and asking for a medal. A thick metallic plate was
then placed before his eyes so as to completely intercept vision.
After a few minutes, during which he wrote a few words with a
jumbled stroke, he stopped, but without any petulance. The plate
was removed and he went on writing. Somnambulism may assume such
a serious phase as to result in the commission of murder. There
is a case of a man of twenty-seven, of steady habits, who killed
his child when in a state of somnambulism. He was put on trial
for murder, and some of the most remarkable facts of his
somnambulistic feats were elicited in the evidence. It is said
that once when a boy he arose at night while asleep, dressed
himself; took a pitcher and went for milk to a neighboring farm,
as was his custom.
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