t limb. It itched or pained, or
was cramped, but never felt hot or cold. If they had painful sensations
referred to it, the conviction of its existence continued unaltered
for long periods; but where no pain was felt in it, then by degrees the
sense of having that limb faded away entirely. I think we may to some
extent explain this. The knowledge we possess of any part is made up
of the numberless impressions from without which affect its sensitive
surfaces, and which are transmitted through its nerves to the spinal
nerve-cells, and through them, again, to the brain. We are thus kept
endlessly informed as to the existence of parts, because the impressions
which reach the brain are, by a law of our being, referred by us to
the part from which they come. Now, when the part is cut off, the
nerve-trunks which led to it and from it, remaining capable of being
impressed by irritations, are made to convey to the brain from the stump
impressions which are, as usual, referred by the brain to the lost parts
to which these nerve-threads belonged. In other words, the nerve is like
a bell-wire. You may pull it at any part of its course, and thus ring
the bell as well as if you pulled at the end of the wire; but, in any
case, the intelligent servant will refer the pull to the front door,
and obey it accordingly. The impressions made on the severed ends of
the nerve are due often to changes in the stump during healing, and
consequently cease when it has healed, so that finally, in a very
healthy stump, no such impressions arise; the brain ceases to correspond
with the lost leg, and, as les absents ont toujours tort, it is no
longer remembered or recognized. But in some cases, such as mine
proved at last to my sorrow, the ends of the nerves undergo a curious
alteration, and get to be enlarged and altered. This change, as I have
seen in my practice of medicine, sometimes passes up the nerves toward
the centers, and occasions a more or less constant irritation of the
nerve-fibers, producing neuralgia, which is usually referred by
the brain to that part of the lost limb to which the affected nerve
belonged. This pain keeps the brain ever mindful of the missing part,
and, imperfectly at least, preserves to the man a consciousness of
possessing that which he has not.

Where the pains come and go, as they do in certain cases, the subjective
sensations thus occasioned are very curious, since in such cases the
man loses and gains, and loses an