The insane notoriously give way to all their emotions with little or
no restraint; and I am informed by Dr. J. Crichton Browne, that nothing
is more characteristic of simple melancholia, even in the male sex,
than a tendency to weep on the slightest occasions, or from no cause.
They also weep disproportionately on the occurrence of any real
cause of grief. The length of time during which some patients weep
is astonishing, as well as the amount of tears which they shed.
One melancholic girl wept for a whole day, and afterwards confessed
to Dr. Browne, that it was because she remembered that she had once
shaved off her eyebrows to promote their growth. Many patients
in the asylum sit for a long time rocking themselves backwards
and forwards; "and if spoken to, they stop their movements, purse up
their eyes, depress the corners of the mouth, and burst out crying."
In some of these cases, the being spoken to or kindly greeted appears
to suggest some fanciful and sorrowful notion; but in other cases an effort
of any kind excites weeping, independently of any sorrowful idea.
Patients suffering from acute mania likewise have paroxysms of violent
crying or blubbering, in the midst of their incoherent ravings.
We must not, however, lay too much stress on the copious shedding
of tears by the insane, as being due to the lack of all restraint;
for certain brain-diseases, as hemiplegia, brain-wasting, and
senile decay, have a special tendency to induce weeping.
Weeping is common in the insane, even after a complete state
of fatuity has been reached and the power of speech lost.
Persons born idiotic likewise weep;[9] but it is said that this
is not the case with cretins.


[8] `The Origin of Civilization,' 1870, p. 355.