Dr. Auber, in his work on the plague, narrates various instances of delusions occurring in the course of his administering hemp preparations as a relief in that disease. An officer in the navy saw puppets dancing on the roof of his cabin—another believed that he was transformed into the piston of a steam-engine—a young artist imagined that his body was endowed with such elasticity as to enable him to enter into a bottle, and remain there at his ease. Other writers speak of individuals similarly affected: one of a man who believed himself changed entirely into brittle glass, and in constant fear of being cracked or broken, or having a finger or toe knocked off; another, of a youth who believed himself growing and expanding to such an extent, that he deemed it inevitable that the room in which he was would be too small to contain him, and that he must, during the expansion, force up the ceiling into the room above. Dr. Moreau, on one occasion, believed that he was melting away by the heat of the sun, at another, that his whole body was inflated like a balloon, that he was enabled to elevate himself, and vanish in the air. The ideas that generally presented themselves to him of these illusions were, that objects wore the semblance of phantasmagoric figures, small at first, then gradually enlarging, then suddenly becoming enormous and vanishing. Sometimes these figures were subjects of alarm to him. A little hideous dwarf, clothed in the dress of the thirteenth century, haunted him for some time. Aware of the delusion, he entreated that the object which kept up the illusion should be removed—these were a hat and a coat upon a neighbouring table. An old servant of seventy-one, was, upon another occasion, represented by his eye to the brain as a young lady, adorned with all the grace of beauty, and his white hair and wrinkles transformed into irresistible attractions. A friend who presented him with a glass of lemonade was pictured to his disordered imagination as a furnace of hot charcoal. Sometimes the happiness was interrupted by delusions that affrighted him. Thus, having indulged himself with his accustomed dose, every object awoke his terror and alarm, which neither the conviction of his own mind nor the soothing explanations of his friends could diminish, and he was for a considerable length of time under the most fearful impressions. “Through the darkness spread Around, the gaping earth then vomited Legions of foul and ghastly shapes, which Hung upon his flight.”