as become firmly established. It
might have been hoped that the changes of adolescence would have effected
a transformation of the perverted instinct. On the contrary, the whole
force of this instinct throws itself on the centre of inhibition, instead
of quickening the heart-beats, and sending the rush of youthful blood
with fresh life through the entire system to the throbbing finger-tips.

"Is it probable that time and circumstances will alter a habit of nervous
interactions so long established? We are disposed to think that there is
a chance of its being broken up. And we are not afraid to say that we
suspect the old gypsy woman, whose prophecy took such hold of the
patient's imagination, has hit upon the way in which the 'spell,' as she
called it, is to be dissolved. She must, in all probability, have had a
hint of the 'antipatia' to which the youth before her was a victim, and
its cause, and if so, her guess as to the probable mode in which the
young man would obtain relief from his unfortunate condition was the one
which would naturally suggest itself.

"If once the nervous impression which falls on the centre of inhibition
can be made to change its course, so as to follow its natural channel, it
will probably keep to that channel ever afterwards. And this will, it is
most likely, be effected by some sudden, unexpected impression. If he
were drowning, and a young woman should rescue him, it is by no means
impossible that the change in the nervous current we have referred to
might be brought about as rapidly, as easily, as the reversal of the
poles in a magnet, which is effected in an instant. But he cannot be
expected to throw himself into the water just at the right moment when
the 'fair lady' of the gitana's prophecy is passing on the shore.
Accident may effect the cure which art seems incompetent to perform. It
would not be strange if in some future seizure he should never come back
to consciousness. But it is quite conceivable, on the other hand, that a
happier event may occur, that in a single moment the nervous polarity may
be reversed, the whole course of his life changed, and his past terrible
experiences be to him like a scarce-remembered dream.

"This is one, of those cases in which it is very hard to determine the
wisest course to be pursued. The question is not unlike that which
arises in certain cases of dislocation of the bones of the neck. Shall
the unfortunate sufferer go all his days with his fac