Edmond About, to be present at this curious operation.
Among the mammifera we find appearances of death in their winter sleep;
but these are incomplete, since the temperature of hibernating animals
remains greater by one degree than that of the surrounding air, and the
motions of the heart and respiration are simply retarded. Dr. Preyer has
observed that a hamster sometimes goes five minutes without breathing
appreciably after a fortnight's sleep.
In man himself a suspension of life, or at least phenomena that seem
inseparable therefrom, has been observed many times. In the _Journal des
Savants_ for 1741 we read that a Col. Russel, having witnessed the
death of his wife, whom he tenderly loved, did not wish her buried, and
threatened to kill any one who should attempt to remove the body before
he witnessed its decomposition himself. Eight days passed by without the
woman giving the slightest sign of life, "when, at a moment when he was
holding her hand and shedding tears over her, the church bell began to
ring, and, to his indescribable surprise, his wife sat up and said, 'It
is the last stroke, we shall be too late.' She recovered."
At a session of the Academy of Sciences, Oct.
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