BRAIN PARALYSIS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume L, Issue 5459, 21 August 1878, Page 3

BRAIN PARALYSIS.

i There'-have-bedn -ieveM Wstahces in'tlil*' polony of girls injuring their brains by overstudy. It was only 1 the -other day that an instance of this .occurred in Canterbury, and to those young ladies’ ftuclylhit Jiard to fit. (hemselveg for positions-demanding higher iducation than the ordinary paths of life wo Commend the following from thoNe to York »f? the graduating, I f&rmaT Sohohl, 5 died on Wednesday of last WCek,’ and was buried on Friday; h inrregard totho-cause of her death- discussion, but, careful investigation seems. to4pave ho doubt that it was an undue : applicatioa ;to her studies. Miss Hamilton Was'the daughter, of Mr William E; Dodge’s coachman, and being bright, ambitious, and. clever, had. formedsorneypars ago. the design of obtaining Jaa good on education as tbe public schools 6f New York afford, and, .of devoting, herself to teaching after she'hod completed her course qf study.. She was .rather, tall and slender, having grown very rapidly for tho post few years, with a.. pretty .and .very pleasing face and intellectual features. Slio ' graduated from the Twenty-eighth .-street public school before she was fourteen-years old, and as. fourteen years, However, is the limit,of youtlpbeyohd which the'Normal College will not" go in admitting students, she was obliged to wait, although 5 unwilling, and enter that institute with tbe next class following, ; At this time, even, she was less than fourteen and a half years old, and from. the : accounts given was far too immature to .enter on such a curriculum as that of tho'Normal College,. No objection under, the rule can, however, be urged against students who' have completed their fourteenth year,, and she was. admitted, as three girls of the same ago have J bech admitted this week. Her father, although he knew that she 'studied hard, did ‘hot suppose that she was seriously injuring herself thereby, and it; was a surprisetd him when die was prostrated by her last Illness. She .would very often, ho said, pore over her. hookS constahtly front three o’clock in the” afternoon till, ten at .night. When she was . taken with convulsions and intense pain in tpe head last month' he took her’to Hr. Belafiold, who had-ordered her to give up her study at once and to rest. There was -no doubt in his mind that l the system of' the Normal College was blamable, and that by the arduousness of tho Course of study there Were many broken down -in health. A call was .next made on President Hunter, of the Normal College, for tllh-purposo of learning what he knew of the caser' ExrMayqr, Wickham, the Chairman "of the Board of Education’s Committee qn the-Normal College, was; talking with the President and listened quietly/ while.the latter-replied to a question' about Miss Hamilton’s! case*. President ■ Hunter said: “It does not: at all appear- that Miss Hamilton died'of overwork. Paralysis of the -birain is a disease that labouring men often have. But the fact of oho of our girls dying i* made the text for accusation against the Normal College, and physicians, when they cannot give a diagnosis of a case, at once say ’that the trouble was too-much;wtwfctO ;

“I don’t agree with you,” said Mr Wiok.ham. “I think it is very probable■ that Vtoong the girls .we have heft,-there .are a good many who work too hard, and. who" suffer (from it 5 and it fir vbryprpbable that (his one died from the effects of it., But Ido not see that the school isifco blame. The parents whp, push their children of ■’ tho students .themselves, are the > ones who are to blame. Wo take all the: pains we can to keep thorn from over-study, but we cannot watch them at home.” —...