第83章

T he study of Aphasia (see p.54) has of late years shown how unexpectedly great are the differences between individuals in respect of imagination.And at the same time the discrepancies between lesion and symptom in different cases of the disease have been largely cleared up.In some individuals the habitual 'thought-stuff,' if one may so call it, is visual; in others it is auditory, articulatory, or motor; in most, perhaps, it is evenly mixed.The same local cerebral injury must needs work different practical results in persons who differ in this way.In one it will throw a much used brain-tract out of gear; in the other it may affect an unimportant region.A particularly instructive case was published by Charcot in 1883. The patient was Mr.X., a merchant, born in Vienna, highly educated, master of German, Spanish, French, Greek, and Latin.Up to the beginning of the malady which took him to Professor Charcot, he read Homer at sight.He could, starting from any verse out of the first book of the Iliad, repeat the following verses without hesitating, by heart.Virgil and Horace were familiar.He also knew enough of modern Greek for business purposes.Up to within a year (from the time Charcot saw him) he enjoyed an exceptional visual memory, He no sooner thought of persons or things, but features, forms, and colors arose with the same clearness, sharpness, and accuracy as if the objects stood before him.When he tried to recall a fact or a figure in his voluminous polyglot correspondence, the letters themselves appeared before him with their entire content, irregularities, erasures and all.At school he recited from a mentally seen page which be read off line by line and letter by letter.In making computations, he ran his mental eye down imaginary columns of figures, and performed in this way the most varied operations of arithmetic.He could never think of a passage in a play without the entire scene, stage, actors, and audience appearing to him.He had been a great traveller.Being a good draughtsman, he used to sketch views which pleased him; and his memory always brought back the entire landscape exactly.If lie thought of a conversation, a saying, an engagement, the place, the people, the entire scene rose before his mind.

His auditory memory was always deficient, or at least secondary.He had no taste for music.

A year and a half previous to examination, after business-anxieties, loss of sleep, appetite, etc., he noticed suddenly one day ail extraordinary change in himself.After complete confusion, there came a violent contrast between his old and his new state.Everything about him seemed so new and foreign that, at first he thought he must be going mad.He was nervous and irritable.Although he saw all things distinct, he had entirely lost his memory for forms and colors.On ascertaining this, he became reassured as to his sanity.He soon discovered that he could carry on his affairs by using his memory in an altogether new way.He can now describe clearly the difference between his two conditions.

Every time he returns to A., from which place business often calls him, he seems to himself as if entering a strange city.He views the monuments, houses, and streets with the same surprise as if he saw them for tile first time.Gradually, however, his memory returns, and he finds himself at home again.When asked to describe the principal public place of the town, he answered, "I know that it is there, but it is impossible to imagine it, and I can tell you nothing about it." He has often drawn the port of A.To-day he vainly tries to trace its principal outlines.Asked to draw a minaret, lie reflects, says it is a square tower, and draws, rudely, four lines, one for ground, one for top, and two for sides.Asked to draw an arcade, he says, " I remember that it contains semi-circular arches, and that two of them meeting at an angle make a vault, but how it looks I am absolutely unable to imagine." The profile of a man which he drew by request was as if drawn by a little child; and yet he confessed that he had been helped to draw it by looking at the bystanders.

Similarly lie drew a shapeless scribble for a tree.

He can no more remember his wife's and children's faces than he can remember the port of A.Even after being with them some time they seem unusual to him.He forgets his own face, and once spoke to his image in a mirror, taking it for a stranger.He complains of his loss of feeling for colors."My wife has black hair, this I know;

but I can no more recall its color than I can her person and features."

This visual amnesia extends to dating objects from his childhood's years -- paternal mansion, etc., forgotten.

No other disturbances but this loss of visual images.Now when he seeks something in his correspondence, he must rummage among the letters like other men, until he meets the passage.He can recall only the first few verses of the Iliad, and must grope to read Homer, Virgil, and Horace.Figures which he adds he must now whisper to himself.He realizes clearly that he must help his memory out with auditory images, which he does with effort.The words and expressions which he recalls seem now to echo in his ear, an altogether novel sensations for him.If he wishes to learn by heart anything, a series of phrases for example, he must read them several times aloud, so as to impress his ear.When later he repeats the thing in question, the sensation of in- ward hearing which precedes articulation rises up in his mind.This feeling was formerly unknown to him.He speaks French fluently;

but affirms that he call no longer think in French; but must get his French words by translating them from Spanish or German, the languages of his childhood.He dreams no more in visual terms, but only in words, usually Spanish words.A certain degree of verbal blindness affects him -- he is troubled by the Greek alphabet, etc.