On Prolonged Fasting, with reference to a particular Class of Insane Persons,

Extract

Most of the well-authenticated instances of long-continued fasting on record are such as have arisen from physical incapacity to take food into the stomach, or to retain it for the support of the system when taken, —from a peculiar condition of the mind, which induces in the individual a disregard or disinclination for food,—or, lastly, from accidental circumstances, as shipwreck, burial in mines, and such like. Those cases which have their origin in either of the two former causes, or in a combination of them, are important to the medical attendant on the insane, inasmuch as they not unfrequently occur in persons under treatment in lunatic asylums, are sources to him of great trouble and anxiety, and are fraught with considerable danger to the life of the patient under his care.