PREMATURE BURIAL,
AND
HOW IT MAY BE PREVENTED.
PREMATURE BURIAL
AND
HOW IT MAY BE PREVENTED
WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO TRANCE, CATALEPSY, AND
OTHER FORMS OF SUSPENDED ANIMATION
BY
WILLIAM TEBB, F.R.G.S.
Corresponding Member of the Royal Academy of Medical Sciences, Palermo;
Author of “The Recrudescence of Leprosy and its Causation”
AND
Col. EDWARD PERRY VOLLUM, M.D.
Late Medical Inspector, U.S. Army; Corresponding Member of the
New York Academy of Sciences
LONDON
SWAN SONNENSCHEIN & CO., LIM.
1896
“What if in the tomb I awake!”—Romeo and Juliet.
“How comes it about that patients, given over as dead by their physicians, sometimesrecover, and that some have even returned to life in the very time of theirfunerals?”—Celsus.
“Such is the condition of humanity, and so uncertain is men’s judgment, that theycannot determine even death itself.”—Pliny.
PREFACE.
A distressing experience in the writer’s family manyyears ago brought home to his mind the danger ofpremature burial, and led ultimately to the careful studyof a gruesome subject to which he has a strong naturalrepugnance. His collaborator in the volume has himselfpassed through a state of profound suspended animationfrom drowning, having been laid out for dead—an experiencewhich has induced him in like manner to investigatethe various death-counterfeits. The results of theindependent inquiries carried on by both of us in variousparts of Europe and America, and by one of us duringa sojourn in India in the early part of this year, are nowlaid before the reader, with such practical suggestionsas it is hoped may prepare the way for bringing aboutcertain needed reforms in our burial customs.
The danger, as I have attempted to show, is veryreal—to ourselves, to those most dear to us, and to thecommunity in general; and it should be a subjectof very anxious concern how this danger may beminimised or altogether prevented. The duty oftaking the most effective precautions to this end is[2]one that naturally falls to the Legislature, especiallyunder a Government professing to regard social questionsas of paramount importance. Fortunately, this is a non-partyand a non-contentious question, it imperils nointerest, so that no formal obstruction or unnecessarydelay need be apprehended; and it should be urgedupon the Government to introduce and carry an effectivemeasure at the earliest opportunity, not only