she lives know her infirmity,
watch her while she is in their shops, and respectfully and kindly
relieve her of her pilferings when she starts to leave. She expresses
great sorrow for her unfortunate insane impulse, and has often begged
her husband to have her placed in an asylum. This he refuses to do, as
she is perfectly sane otherwise. The husband was called away for several
weeks, and, on his return, took me to his house and showed me her room.
In the room were the objects stolen during his absence. It was the most
miscellaneous collection of valuables and trash I ever saw. She had
gathered together everything from a darning-needle to a tombstone, a
small specimen of the latter forming a unit of this heterogeneous whole.
This form of mental dyscrasia is much more frequent than people suppose,
and the antecedents of shop-lifters and the like should be carefully
examined before a judgment on their criminality is passed.

"Eccentricity is certainly not always insanity, but there can be no
question that it is often the outcome of insane temperament, and may
approach very near to, or actually pass into, insanity." Alienists rely
on the eccentric and peculiar changes which take place in the characters
of their patients, who either present themselves or are brought to them
for treatment, to establish their diagnosis. If a modest and truthful
man suddenly becomes a braggart and a liar; or, if a humane man becomes
cruel, or a neat man slovenly, there is reason to suspect brain trouble.
The intellect may appear intact, so also the reasoning powers, but these
eccentricities indicate a deviation which may lead to mental
destruction. The last faculty to develop in the mind of man is the moral
faculty; this faculty is the one first lost by diseased brains. If a
man, who suddenly becomes dissolute and licentious (who, heretofore, has
led a virtuous, moral life), be examined, in nine cases in ten his brain
will be found to be diseased. The little cloud, which at first is no
larger than a man's hand, grows ever larger and larger, and in the end
overspreads the entire mental sky!

GENIUS AND DEGENERATION.

That the psychical function or intellectuality is frequently developed
at the expense of the physical organism is well known, and that genius
is seldom or never unaccompanied by physical and mental degeneration is
a fact that can be no longer denied. I use the word degeneration in its
broadest sense, and intend it to inc