Daily Kennebec Journal

Miscellaneous.

A HORRIBLE STORY

A Sister Found on a Dissecting Table BY A Young Medical Student.

A prominent physician of Northern Ohio yesterday related to a Herald reporter the particulars of a horrible occurrence which happened some little time ago, but which has heretofore been kept from the public through the exertions of the parties concerned. For obvious reasons the names will be withheld, but the rest of the facts are given as received from the lips of the reporter's informant.

Last fall a young gentleman, son of a prominent resident of a town not 100 miles from Cleveland, went to New York for the purpose of attending a course of medical lectures at one of the most widely known medical colleges in the country.

After a sojourn in New York of two months the young man was suddenly called to his home in Ohio by a telegram announcing the severe illness of his only sister, a beautiful young maiden just budding into womanhood, and justly celebrated not only for her beauties of face and form, but as well for her lovable and amiable disposition.

On receipt of the message from home the young man lost no time, but traveled night and day until at the bedside of his loved one. Although nursed by loving hands and watched over with the tenderest solicitude, three days after her brother's arrival home the young lady died. Her gentle spirit peacefully took its flight and returned to the Maker who gave it.

Words fail to depict the anguish and inconsolable sorrow and grief that the bereaved family felt for the loss of their beloved one. The mother, worn and exhausted by long continued worry and sleepless nights passed at the side of her dear one's couch of pain and suffering, succumbed to nature's mandate, and was, soon after the daughter's funeral, herself tossing in an agony of delirium. For two weeks her spirit hovered between life and death, but finally science triumphed, and the light of consciousness shone from her eyes again.

As soon as his mother's convalescence was sufficiently assured to warrant his leaving home, the young man returned to the pursuit of his medical studies in New York.

Shortly thereafter the young man was directed by the Demonstrator of Anatomy of the college to commence the work of dissection, and with that in view he was assigned a portion of the subject on which to commence operations. The young man made his first visit to the dissecting room in the college building, and was initiated by some of the older students into the mysteries of the use of the scalpel and dissecting knife. After the first shock incident to the horrible sights which greeted his gaze had passed away, he wandered curiously through the long room, with its saw-dust covered floor and plain deal tables covered by human bodies in the various stages of decomposition and mutilation. Faint and almost overcome by the deathly odor which permeated the room, he was about to take his departure, when his attention was attracted by the ribald remarks of two of the students, who were busily hacking away at the subject before them. One of the students noticing his expression of surprise, accosted him, and requested that he give them his opinion as to whether the teeth in the mouth of the body were genuine or false.

Shuddering at the thought of touching the inanimate clay, yet disliking to be regarded as a coward by his fellows, the young man hastily stepped to the side of the table at which the others were working. As his eyes rested on the table his cheek paled, his countenance grew livid, and with an unearthly shriek he fell swooning to the floor. There before him, with her fair white flesh cut and bleeding, lay the body of his loved sister, whom he had so recently seen laid to rest in the earth. Can a more agonizing sight be imagined? Well may the reader shudder at the bare thought and utter silent prayer that he may be delivered from such an awful experience.

The young man was picked up by his amazed and startled companions and carried to his boarding-house, where at last he gained consciousness, but only to glare wildly around him for an instant and then swoon again. His parents were telegraphed for, and when they arrived at the sufferer's bedside he was rolling and tossing in the midst of a severe attack of brain fever.

For six long weeks were the vigils kept up, the young man failing to recognize the countenances of the almost heart-broken father and mother, who constantly hovered over him, and endeavoring to obtain some sign of recognition, but all in vain. At times it required the united strength of three men to hold him on the bed, as he endeavored in his maniacal fury to escape his nurses. At such times he would sink back exhausted after the struggle, and piteously exclaim, "Why don't you let me rescue my darling sister?"

At the end of six weeks a change was noticeable. That a crisis was imminent seemed apparent to all. The young man's physical condition was fearfully reduced. He was so emaciated that his bones seemed almost to protrude from the flesh, and his hands and fingers were more like the claws of a bird than anything else. On the day in question he calmly looked around him and, observing his mother in the room, gently requested her to hand him a drink of water. The overjoyed mother hastened to comply with the wishes and proffered him the glass, whereat he disclaimed any desire for anything to drink which, of course, caused her to observe him carefully, which she did, and, alas! it was but too easily discernible that what she feared the most had come true, and her son was a maniac. All though quiet and subdued in demeanor, there was that in his eyes which told the fearful story that reason had left her throne, perhaps forever.

The services of a distinguished specialist in mental diseases were engaged, but he could do naught for the mind diseased, and with sorrow-laden hearts the anguished parents were compelled to place their stricken child into a private asylum for the insane, where he now is, and the prospect is that there he will remain the remainder of his life. Most of the time he is quiet and docile, but at times his eyes dilate with an expression of great fear, and he calls aloud the name of his dead sister, and assures her that he will save her from all harm. The aged and grief stricken parents visit their unfortunate son quite often, and although he recognizes and calls them by name, yet he always upbraids them for not allowing him to leave the asylum and rescue his sister from some impending danger which he imagines menaces her.-Cleveland Herald