Portion of the ' uninfluenced ' but little larger, and the experience of Berillon in Paris, Moll in Berlin, Wetter-strand in Stockholm, Bramwell, Betts Taplin, Creed, Kingsbury, Wingfield, Cruise, Wright, Woods, and other observers all over the world, is of a similar nature. The proportion of somnambulists, however, is undoubtedly much greater at Nancy than we could expect to find it in England. Among over 500 patients I found only about fifty.

And here a word on the subject of somnambulism. Though Liebeault and his followers do not seek to enforce the somnambulic state, but find a state of gentle lethargy or drowsiness sufficient for ordinary curative purposes, he considers that it is well to induce in the patient the most advanced state of hypnosis to which he is susceptible; for the more complete the hypnosis, the less liable are the patient's morbid auto-suggestions to interfere with the curative processes. Natural somnambulism is nearly always associated with mental or bodily weakness, but the artificial variety is not dependent on defective health, mental or physical. Private soldiers and agricultural labourers are not generally considered neurotic, but they are 'good subjects' for hypnotism, and a large proportion - perhaps a fourth - will be found to become somnambulic.

Strong muscular and intelligent men and women are, in my experience, the best subjects for hypnotism. This was what Dr. Hugh Wingfield found when he was assistant demonstrator of physiology at Cambridge. He experimented on a great number of undergraduates, and the majority of them proved extremely good subjects. A few years ago, during a visit to the University, I was asked to hypnotize a party of undergraduates in a friend's rooms. Ten out of twelve were easily influenced, two or three to the extent of somnambulism. Now, we know that these young men constitute the pick of the nation, intellectually and physically, and such experience proves the fallacy of the contention which one sometimes hears urged against hypnotism, that it is only applicable to fools and weaklings. In my practice I have found schoolmasters and schoolmistresses most satisfactory patients, and my experience is shared by other physicians. Their training assists mind-concentration, and the same may be said of Roman Catholic priests, many of whom I have treated. *

I understand that persons who make a public show of hypnotism always express a preference for muscular subjects. Probably strong, healthy people are more trustful and less fidgety than the weak and neurotic.

But I think the most interesting psychical results are likely to be achieved with neurotic subjects whose nervous systems are highly strung. I am not, however, at all sure on this point, seeing that some of the most interesting series of experiments in advanced hypnotism, including thought transference and second personality, have been made by Professor Janet at Havre with a strong-framed fisherwoman as the subject; and the Brighton experiments of the Society for Psychical Research were made on a young healthy tradesman.

* There is an idea still prevalent in certain quarters that the Catholic Church forbids the practice of hypnotism. Such is not the case. The late Sir Francis Cruise was a devout son of the Church, and many priests have been sent to me for treatment by high ecclesiastics. The Church very wisely insists that the treatment shall only be carried out by medical men and by permission of the authorities.

Somnambulism is not an essential product of hypnotism, and, interesting though its phenomena may be from a pathological and psychological point of view, they are no more a part of suggestive treatment than an exhibition of the poisonous effects of drugs is a part of ordinary medical practice. They help to elucidate points in the treatment, and therefore must be studied, but experimentation upon them is outside the scope of the physician, as such.*

* See Appendix. Hypnotism being a new thing in England, the knowledge of it seems chiefly confined to theory, and one has to hear many fanciful and exaggerated statements. For instance, in an article on the subject in the Saturday Review of December 8, 1888, a propos of a paper of mine in the Nineteenth Century for December, the writer, evidently a medical man, states that a person once hypnotized is at the mercy of the operator, who can repeat the operation at will, even without the consent of the patient. Further, that anyone can easily hypnotize a person who has once submitted to hypnotism; and again, that a person once hypnotized is unable to look people in the face without feeling an irresistible desire to sleep. I have made inquiries among my patients of both sexes, some of whom have been hypnotized many times, and have fallen into the profounder degrees of sleep. They can all certainly look me in the face for any length of time without feeling in the least degree sleepy; and they all tell me that 'until they entirely give up their minds to the operation no soporific • effect is produced.

Most misleading conclusions have been drawn from exceptional cases, such as that of the ' Soho sleeper.' These 'belong in no sense to hypnotism as a therapeutic system, but are [examples of hysteria. Constantly hypnotizing a weak-minded person for experimental purposes will probably bring about a morbid state !of brain, and such abuse of a therapeutic agent can only be depre-cated and discouraged. Du Maurier's clever novel ' Trilby is responsible for a good deal of popular misunderstanding. Of course the novelist has drawn quite a fancy picture, and the hypnotism of fiction altogether is very much a stage product.