ousands, was now possessed
only occasionally by unfortunate individuals. It might, therefore, not
unreasonably be maintained that the tarantism of modern times bears
nearly the same relation to the original malady as the St. Vitus's dance
which still exists, and certainly has all along existed, bears, in
certain cases, to the original dancing mania of the dancers of St. John.

To conclude. Tarantism, as a real disease, has been denied in toto, and
stigmatised as an imposition by most physicians and naturalists, who in
this controversy have shown the narrowness of their views and their utter
ignorance of history. In order to support their opinion they have
instituted some experiments apparently favourable to it, but under
circumstances altogether inapplicable, since, for the most part, they
selected as the subjects of them none but healthy men, who were totally
uninfluenced by a belief in this once so dreaded disease. From
individual instances of fraud and dissimulation, such as are found in
connection with most nervous affections without rendering their reality a
matter of any doubt, they drew a too hasty conclusion respecting the
general phenomenon, of which they appeared not to know that it had
continued for nearly four hundred years, having originated in the
remotest periods of the Middle Ages. The most learned and the most acute
among these sceptics is Serao the Neapolitan. His reasonings amount to
this, that he considers the disease to be a very marked form of
melancholia, and compares the effect of the tarantula bite upon it to
stimulating with spurs a horse which is already running. The reality of
that effect he thus admits, and, therefore, directly confirms what in
appearance only he denies. By shaking the already vacillating belief in
this disorder he is said to have actually succeeded in rendering it less
frequent, and in setting bounds to imposture; but this no more disproves
the reality of its existence than the oft repeated detection of
imposition has been able in modern times to banish magnetic sleep from
the circle of natural phenomena, though such detection has, on its side,
rendered more rare the incontestable effects of animal magnetism. Other
physicians and naturalists have delivered their sentiments on tarantism,
but as they have not possessed an enlarged knowledge of its history their
views do not merit particular exposition. It is sufficient for the
comprehension of everyone that we have p