href="@public@vhost@g@gutenberg@html@files@43887@[email protected]#f_25" id="fna_25" class="pginternal" tag="{http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml}a">[25] relates the case of Dr. Edward Daniel Clark, the celebrated traveler, who on one occasion came very near losing his life by cold. He had performed divine service at a church near Cambridge, and was returning home on horseback, when he felt himself becoming very cold and sleepy. Knowing the danger of yielding to the influence which was creeping over him, he put his horse into a fast trot, hoping thereby to arouse himself from the alarming torpor. This means proving unavailing, he got down and led his horse, walking as fast as he could. This, however, did not long succeed. The bridle dropped from his arm, his legs became weaker and weaker, and he was just sinking to the ground when a gentleman who knew him came up in a carriage and rescued him.

I have often myself noticed this effect of cold in producing numbness and drowsiness, and on one occasion was nearly overcome by it. I was crossing the mountain ridge between Cebolleta and Covero, in New Mexico, when the thermometer fell in about two hours from 52° to 22° Fahrenheit. So great was the effect upon me that if I had had much farther to go I should probably have succumbed. As it was, I reached a rancho in time to be relieved, though several minutes elapsed before I was able to speak. The sensations experienced were rather agreeable than otherwise. There was a great desire to rest and to yield to the languor which was present, and there was a feeling of recklessness which rendered me perfectly indifferent to the consequences. I should have dismounted from my horse and given way to the longing for repose if I had been able to do so. I have several times experienced very similar effects from change of air. A few years since I was so drowsy at the sea-coast, whither I had gone from a hot city, that it was with difficulty I could keep awake, even when engaged in active physical exercise.

Another potent cause of sleep, and one of which we generally avail ourselves, is the diminution of the power of the attention. To bring this influence into action generally requires only the operation of the will under circumstances favorable to the object in view. Shutting the eyes so as to exclude light, getting beyond the sound of noises, refraining from the employment of the other senses, and avoiding thought of all kind, will generally, when there is no preventing cause, induce sleep. To think, and to maintain ourselves in connection with the outward world by means of our senses requires that the circulation of blood in the brain shall be active. When we isolate ourselves from external things, and restrain our thoughts, we lessen the amount of blood in the brain, and sleep results. It is not, however, always easy for us to do this. The nervous system is excited, ideas follow each other in rapid succession, and we lie awake hour after hour vainly trying to forget that we exist. The more the will is brought to bear upon the subject the more rebellious is the brain, and the more it will not be forced by such means into a state of quietude. We must then either let it run riot till it is worn out by its extravagancies, or we must fatigue it by requiring it to perform labor which is disagreeable. Just as we might do with an individual of highly destructive propensities, who was going about pulling down his neighbors’ houses. We might, if we were altogether unable to stop him, let him alone till he had become thoroughly wearied with his exertions, or we might divert him from his plan by guiding him to some tough piece of work which would exhaust his strength sooner than would his original labor.

Many ways of thus tiring the brain have been proposed. The more irksome they are, the more likely they are to prove effectual. Counting a hundred backward many times, listening to monotonous sounds, thinking of some extremely disagreeable and tiresome subject, with many other devices, have been suggested, and have proved more or less effectual. Boerhaave[26] states that he procured sleep by placing a brass pan in such a position that the patient heard the sound of water which was made to fall into it, drop by drop. In general terms, monotony predisposes to sleep. Dr. Dickson[27] quotes Southey’s experience as related in the Doctor,[28] and I also cannot do better than lay it before the reader, particularly as it indicates several methods which may be more efficacious with others than the one he found to succeed so admirably.

“I put my arms out of bed; I turned the pillow for the sake of applying a cold surface to my cheek; I stretched my feet into the cold corner; I listened to the river and to the ticking of my watch; I thought of all sleepy sounds and of all soporific things—the flow of water, the humming of bees, the motion of a boat, the waving of a field of corn, the nodding of a mandarin’s head on the chimney-piece, a horse in a mill, the opera, Mr. Humdrum’s conversations, Mr. Proser’s poems, Mr. Laxative’s speeches, Mr. Lengthy’s sermons. I tried the device of my own childhood, and fancied that the bed rushed with me round and round. At length Morpheus reminded me of Dr. Torpedo’s Divinity Lectures, where the voice, the manner, the matter, even the very atmosphere and the streamy candlelight were all alike somnific; when he who, by strong effort, lifted up his head and forced open the reluctant eyes never failed to see all around him asleep. Lettuces, cowslip wine, poppy syrup, mandragora, hop pillows, spider’s web pills, and the whole tribe of narcotics, up to bang and the black-drop, would have failed,—but this was irresistible; and thus, twenty years after date, I found benefit from having attended the course.”

Frequently the power of the attention is diminished by natural causes. After the mind has been strained a long time in one particular direction, and during which period the brain was doubtless replete with blood, the tension is at last removed, the blood flows out of the brain, the face becomes pale, and sleep ensues. It is thus, as Macnish[29] says, that “the finished gratification of all ardent desires has the effect of inducing slumber; hence after any keen excitement the mind becomes exhausted and speedily relapses into this state.”

A gentleman recently under my care for a paralytic affection, informed me that he could at any time render himself sleepy by looking for a few minutes at a bright light, so as to fatigue the eyes, or by paying particular attention to the noises in the street, so as to weary the sense of hearing. It is well known that sleep may be induced by gentle frictions of various parts of the body, and doubtless the other senses are capable of being so exhausted, if I may use the expression, as to diminish the power of the attention, and thus lessen the demand for blood in the brain. As a consequence, sleep ensues.

The cutting off of sensorial impressions aids in lessening the power of the attention and thus predisposes to sleep. Stillness,