The condition of hypnotism, mesmerism, etc,, is a mental condition - a condition of disturbed equilibrium of the nervous system and brain apparatus of the person operated on. With that key to unlock this curious cabinet of mysteries, delusions, and veritable phenomena, we shall be able the more easily to understand the interpolated illustrations of hypnotic and pseudo-hypnotic patients and conditions. They represent patients in the Salpetriere Hospital who present all the conditions usually spoken of as due to the mysterious power of the hypnotiser or the mesmerist, and associated with the exercise of some mysterious influence by that sinister personage, by his command of the imaginary fluid, magnetic, electric or telepathic, supposed to issue from his finger ends, or to emanate from his body. These phenomena are the induction of sleep or partial sleep, of cataleptic lethargy, of the loss or temporary abolition of ordinary sensation, of incapacity for feeling pain on being pricked or cut, and loss of taste, so that neither pepper, salt, nor any nauseous substance produces any impression on the palate, or any one substance may at the suggestion of the operator be mistaken for any other, as paraffin for champagne, salt for sugar, cayenne pepper for sweetmeats.