DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.70302#0019
BIRTH OF A CHILD WITHOUT BRAINS. /
perfect health; her limbs were plump, fine, and well
proportioned, and she moved them with apparent agility:
the external organs of sense were also perfect. She took
a sufficient quantity of nourishment for several days ; but
sometimes during the action of swallowing, started a
little. She lived till five o’clock on Sunday morning,
June the first, when she expired; but some time before
her death was affected with slight convulsions. During
the three or four days preceding her death, there was a
constant discharge of a thin watery fluid, somewhat
tinged with blood, from the excrescence, which greatly
diminished its bulk; for at her death, it was only about
half the size of what it had been when she was born, and
the surface was in some places beginning to put on the
appearance of mortification.”
A few hours after her death, Dr. Heysham, and two
other professional gentlemen, dissected the head, and
removed the whole of the substance from the bones : the
greatest part of the frontal, the temporal, the occipital,
and the whole of the parietal bones were wanting. The
substance removed was then examined, and, to the ut-
most astonishment of the operators, found to consist of
membranes, blood-vessels, and principally of small
bags of different sizes, but all filled with a brownish co-
loured fluid. The spinal marrow had a natural appear-
ance, yet did not seem to have been connected with the
above parts; but there was not the least indication of
either “ cerebrum, cerebellum, or any medullary substance
whatever!” Among the inferences deduced by Dr. Hey-
sham from this extraordinary conformation, but advanc-
ed with modest diffidence, is, “ That the living principle,
the nerves of the trunk and extremities, sensation, and
motion, may exist independent of a brain I and that the
natural, vital, and animal functions may be performed
without one.”
REMARK-
perfect health; her limbs were plump, fine, and well
proportioned, and she moved them with apparent agility:
the external organs of sense were also perfect. She took
a sufficient quantity of nourishment for several days ; but
sometimes during the action of swallowing, started a
little. She lived till five o’clock on Sunday morning,
June the first, when she expired; but some time before
her death was affected with slight convulsions. During
the three or four days preceding her death, there was a
constant discharge of a thin watery fluid, somewhat
tinged with blood, from the excrescence, which greatly
diminished its bulk; for at her death, it was only about
half the size of what it had been when she was born, and
the surface was in some places beginning to put on the
appearance of mortification.”
A few hours after her death, Dr. Heysham, and two
other professional gentlemen, dissected the head, and
removed the whole of the substance from the bones : the
greatest part of the frontal, the temporal, the occipital,
and the whole of the parietal bones were wanting. The
substance removed was then examined, and, to the ut-
most astonishment of the operators, found to consist of
membranes, blood-vessels, and principally of small
bags of different sizes, but all filled with a brownish co-
loured fluid. The spinal marrow had a natural appear-
ance, yet did not seem to have been connected with the
above parts; but there was not the least indication of
either “ cerebrum, cerebellum, or any medullary substance
whatever!” Among the inferences deduced by Dr. Hey-
sham from this extraordinary conformation, but advanc-
ed with modest diffidence, is, “ That the living principle,
the nerves of the trunk and extremities, sensation, and
motion, may exist independent of a brain I and that the
natural, vital, and animal functions may be performed
without one.”
REMARK-