Pathology of Lying [59]
talk quite incoherently and at random for a time (she is a great talker anyhow), but later she said she realized what she had done, and said not to mind her--she had just let her tongue rattle on and did not mean anything by it.
On two or three occasions Amanda has started to school in the morning and wandered off and kept going all day. She had been immoral with boys, but not to any great extent. She undertook to be religious for a time, but her sincerity was always in question. She knows the character of her own mother and threatens at times to follow in her tracks.
The racial heredity of this girl is a strange mixture. Her father was a Scandinavian and her mother colored. The maternal grandfather was colored, and the maternal grandmother was an alcoholic Irish woman and died in an insane hospital. It is possible, also, that there is Indian blood in the family. The mother kept an immoral resort and drank at times. The father is said, even by his wife's relative, to have died some years ago of a broken heart about her career. She died of tuberculosis a few years after him. Amanda was the only child. About the early developmental history we have no reliable information. The girl was taken by relatives before her mother died, but was allowed to visit her, and there was evidently real affection between mother and daughter. Long contention over religious affairs in the family led to some bickering about placing the girl.
We found Amanda to be rather a good looking girl with very slight evidences of colored blood. Quiet and normal in her attitude and expression. Slightly built--weight 93 lbs.; height 4 ft. 10 in. Vision R. 20/80, L. 20/25. Coarse tremor of outstretched hands. No evidence of specific disease. All other examination negative. The girl complains of occasional sick headaches with photophobia. Pelvic examination by a specialist negative.
On the mental side we quickly found we had to deal with a girl of decidedly good general ability. Tests were almost uniformly done well. Memory processes decidedly good-- span for eight numbers auditorily and for seven numbers visually. No evidence whatever of aberration.
Results on the ``Aussage'' test: Amanda on free recital gave 12 details of the picture; on questioning she mentioned 32 more items, but a dozen of these were incorrect. Of 7 suggestions offered she accepted 6. This was an exceptionally inaccurate performance.
In the course of our study of this case we obtained from Amanda a very good account of her own life, deeply tragic in its details, and a probably correct analysis of her beginnings in lying. It seems that she remembers well her mother, particularly in the later visits which the relatives allowed. These must have been when she was about 5 or 6 years old. ``I know a lot. There isn't anything bad that I have not seen and heard. I try to forget it, but I can't. What's the use anyhow? When I think of my mother it all comes up again. When I was very little I would sit in a room with my mother and a crowd of her friends and they would say everything in front of me. I would see men and women go into rooms and I kept wondering what they did in there. I think I was quicker and sharper then than I am now. I think I was about 3 when I used to see them smoking and drinking. Then I used to think it was all right. I thought it was swell and that I would like to do it too. I thought about it a lot. Mother, you see, would tell me to be good one minute and the next would teach me how to swear. I remember once when I was about 7 they brought her home drunk. She looked terrible. I can close my eyes and see her just as plainly as if it is there before me. A protective society once found me and took me to their place. Then I lived with my grandfather. Mother stole me from them and then my uncle took me. I lived around in lots of places. I have done lots of bad things. . . . .
``I picture these things too--I can't help it. The pictures come up in my mind as plain as can be--not just at night, but in the daytime
On two or three occasions Amanda has started to school in the morning and wandered off and kept going all day. She had been immoral with boys, but not to any great extent. She undertook to be religious for a time, but her sincerity was always in question. She knows the character of her own mother and threatens at times to follow in her tracks.
The racial heredity of this girl is a strange mixture. Her father was a Scandinavian and her mother colored. The maternal grandfather was colored, and the maternal grandmother was an alcoholic Irish woman and died in an insane hospital. It is possible, also, that there is Indian blood in the family. The mother kept an immoral resort and drank at times. The father is said, even by his wife's relative, to have died some years ago of a broken heart about her career. She died of tuberculosis a few years after him. Amanda was the only child. About the early developmental history we have no reliable information. The girl was taken by relatives before her mother died, but was allowed to visit her, and there was evidently real affection between mother and daughter. Long contention over religious affairs in the family led to some bickering about placing the girl.
We found Amanda to be rather a good looking girl with very slight evidences of colored blood. Quiet and normal in her attitude and expression. Slightly built--weight 93 lbs.; height 4 ft. 10 in. Vision R. 20/80, L. 20/25. Coarse tremor of outstretched hands. No evidence of specific disease. All other examination negative. The girl complains of occasional sick headaches with photophobia. Pelvic examination by a specialist negative.
On the mental side we quickly found we had to deal with a girl of decidedly good general ability. Tests were almost uniformly done well. Memory processes decidedly good-- span for eight numbers auditorily and for seven numbers visually. No evidence whatever of aberration.
Results on the ``Aussage'' test: Amanda on free recital gave 12 details of the picture; on questioning she mentioned 32 more items, but a dozen of these were incorrect. Of 7 suggestions offered she accepted 6. This was an exceptionally inaccurate performance.
In the course of our study of this case we obtained from Amanda a very good account of her own life, deeply tragic in its details, and a probably correct analysis of her beginnings in lying. It seems that she remembers well her mother, particularly in the later visits which the relatives allowed. These must have been when she was about 5 or 6 years old. ``I know a lot. There isn't anything bad that I have not seen and heard. I try to forget it, but I can't. What's the use anyhow? When I think of my mother it all comes up again. When I was very little I would sit in a room with my mother and a crowd of her friends and they would say everything in front of me. I would see men and women go into rooms and I kept wondering what they did in there. I think I was quicker and sharper then than I am now. I think I was about 3 when I used to see them smoking and drinking. Then I used to think it was all right. I thought it was swell and that I would like to do it too. I thought about it a lot. Mother, you see, would tell me to be good one minute and the next would teach me how to swear. I remember once when I was about 7 they brought her home drunk. She looked terrible. I can close my eyes and see her just as plainly as if it is there before me. A protective society once found me and took me to their place. Then I lived with my grandfather. Mother stole me from them and then my uncle took me. I lived around in lots of places. I have done lots of bad things. . . . .
``I picture these things too--I can't help it. The pictures come up in my mind as plain as can be--not just at night, but in the daytime