Hersman--having met with a case in which a school-girl with chorea, after
having dreamed of an assault, accused the principal of a school of
assault, securing his conviction--obtained the opinions of various
American alienists as to the frequency with which such dreams in unstable
mental subjects lead to delusions and criminal accusations. Dercum, H.C.
Wood, and Rohe had not personally met with such cases; Burr believed that
there was strong evidence "that a sexual dream may be so vivid as to make
the subject believe she has had sexual congress"; Kiernan knew of such
cases; C.H. Hughes, in persons with every appearance of sanity, had known
the erotic dreams of the night to become the erotic delusions of the day,
the patient protesting violently the truth of her story; while Hersman
reports the case[242] of a young lady in an asylum who had nightly
delusions that a medical officer visited her every night, and had to do
with her, coming up the hot-air flue. I am acquainted with a similar case
in a clever, but highly neurotic, young woman, who writes: "For years I
have been trying to stamp out my passional nature, and was beginning to
succeed when a strange thing happened to me last autumn. One night, as I
lay in bed, I felt an influence so powerful that a man seemed present with
me. I crimsoned with shame and wonder. I remember that I lay upon my back,
and marveled when the spell had passed.
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