SOME PECULIAR PHENOMIENA ATTENDING A CASE OF SUDDEN TEMPORARY LOSS OF HEARING AND SIGHT. By HENRY W. WILLIAMS, M.D. MAY 13th, 1875, I saw a little girl of eight years, who six weeks before had suddenly become totally deaf. Four weeks later sight was also for a time completely lost, and the child, who had until now been able to iuderstand what was said to her by watching the movements of the lips, could not be communicated with. This complete blindness seemed to continue during most of one day. After this, and until and at the time I saw her, these singular phenomena were observed: At intervals of a day or two absolute blindness for one or two hours, but during the intervening periods, although there was constalnt nystagmus when the eyes were left to themselves, and although the attention of the eyes was not arrested by a reflection of light into them from a gold watch or other bright object, yet if a person was so placed that the child's eyes were directed towards those of the other, her eyes instantly became fixed, she smiled, and seemed greatly delighted at perceiving something. Fixation continued as long as the observer's eyes were kept open; but the moment these were closed, the child's eyes began again to wander as if in search of the lost object, and continued to do so till the observer's face was placed so as to bring the eyes into the child's axis of vision, when the same look of delight, with fixation, was repeated. It made no difference whether the parents or any other person tried this experiment. There being no history of severe cerebral symptoms, which must have existed if any intracranial lesion had occurred of such extent as to affect both the organs of hearing and of sight, Dr. J. Orne Green, who examined her ears without finding any abnormal change, and I, who had obtained no other than normal appearances on ophthalmoscopic examination, arrived independently at the conclusion that the cause of the symptoms was probably due to reflex irritation of the nervous system, arising from the presence of worms in the intestines. On questioning the mother, she stated that a piece of flat, white worm, about an inch in length, had been observed in the stools. Our advice was, that the parents should take the child home and submit to renewed treatment for the expulsion of tenia, which had

326 already been attempted by the family physician; and we had the satisfaction of learning, within a few days, that the expulsion of a large amount of tape-worm had been followed by a recovery of hearing and sight. NOTE.-This case derives additional interest from the subjoined note by Dr. Green: The child had always been considered healthy. Six weeks before I saw her, being then in apparently perfect health, she called her parents' attention to the fact that she did not hear well in the right ear; no pain or noises were complained of, and but little was thought of her remark. She slept well that night, but the next morning was totally deaf in both ears; there was no pain, headache, vertigo, staggering gait, noises, or other symptom. She ate, played, and slept well, but the deafness remained total, so that the parents were unable to find any sound which she could hear; there were no marked nervous symptoms. Her mother had noticed that she had had an insatiable appetite, and once thought she had seen in the discharges something like tape-worm, for which pumpkin-seed and turpentine were administered without avail. At my examination I found the pulse 96, full and regular; respiration normal; tongue clean; the ears were in appearance perfectly normal. It was impossible to say whether she heard the tuning-fork on the head; a sharp whistle, blow, or shouting she certainly could not hear. A note from her father, after their return home, informed me that after the administration of kousoo and pumpkin-seed, she passed white, thread-like pieces from the bowels, which were thought to be macerated tape-worm, and that the next morning on waking she exclaimed, " I see, I see, and I can hear too! " Both sight and hearing remained for a week, when the sight and then the hearing were again lost, but returned in a few days as before, and continued to alternate, sometimes both of the senses being perfect, and sometimes wholly lost. During one of the attacks the memory also was wholly lost for one day. The intervals of good sight and hearing were increasing in length, and as the child was somewhat reduced in strength, further medication was stopped for a time, and since then I have heard nothing more from her.