| Description Of Item | Illustration from the collection of Alexander Morison. Plate 63 of Morison’s 'The Physiognomy of Mental Diseases' (1840). Unsigned [Alexander Johnston].
'Portrait of E. H., aged 50; married, with a family.
This woman has experienced frequent attacks of insane excitement, occasioned by drinking strong liquors, to obtain which she has parted with almost every article belonging to herself and to her husband.
Upon her admission to the asylum in which she now is, she was under the influence of delusions of a terrifying nature; among others, she thought that she saw her child cut into pieces. She is subject to fits of violence; and, on one occasion, was committed to prison for an assault.
She is at no time free from the morbid craving for liquor; is continually asking for it, and would be in a state of constant drunkenness if she could obtain the means.' |