oks fixedly at the patient
till the patient is unable to take his eyes away. Then the patient will
copy every movement he makes. If he rises and goes backward the patient
will follow, and with his right hand he will imitate the movements of
the operator's left, as if he were a mirror. The attitudes of prayer,
melancholy, pain, disdain, anger or fear, may be produced in this
manner.

The experiments of Donato, a stage hypnotizer, are thus described:
"After throwing the subjects into catalepsy he causes soft music to be
played, which produces a rapturous expression. If the sound is
heightened or increased, the subjects seem to receive a shock and a
feeling of disappointment. The artistic sense developed by hypnotism is
disturbed; the faces express astonishment, stupefaction and pain. If the
same soft melody be again resumed, the same expression of rapturous
bliss reappears in the countenance. The faces become seraphic and
celestial when the subjects are by nature handsome, and when the
subjects are ordinary looking, even ugly, they are idealized as by a
special kind of beauty."

The strange part of all this is, that on awaking, the patient has no
recollection of what has taken place, and careful tests have shown that
what appear to be violent emotions, such as in an ordinary state would
produce a quickened pulse and heavy breathing, create no disturbance
whatever in the cataleptic subject; only the outer mask is in motion.

"Sometimes the subjects lean backward with all the grace of a perfect
equilibrist, freeing themselves from the ordinary mechanical laws. The
curvature will, indeed, at times be so complete that the head will touch
the floor and the body describe a regular arc.

"When a female subject assumes an attitude of devotion, clasps her
hands, turns her eyes upward and lisps out a prayer, she presents an
admirably artistic picture, and her features and expression seem worthy
of being reproduced on canvas."

We thus see what a perfect automaton the human body may become. There
appears, however, to be a sort of unconscious memory, for a familiar
object will seem to suggest spontaneously its ordinary use. Thus, if a
piece of soap is put into a cataleptic patient's hands; he will move it
around as though he thought he were washing them, and if there is any
water near he will actually wash them. The sight of an umbrella makes
him shiver as if he were in a storm. Handing such a person a pen will
not make him wri