The appearance of nervous troubles in the course of parotitis did not escape the attention of the older observers. Hamilton in 1758 recorded a case of death in a man of 22 years from meningitis complicating mumps; Astley Cooper the case of an infant who died after an illness of eight days; French in 1812, Malsbrouche in 1867 and Niemeyer have described these conditions without detail. Trousseau relates cases of men 17 and 35 years of age with severe meningitis which disappeared when orchitis supervened.
Gailbard in 1877 compared the meningitis and cerebral complications of mumps to rheumatism of the brain. He reported six cases with stupor, feebleness, slowness of pulse, rigidity of neck, headaches, hyperesthesia, photophobia, delirium and coma. In 1885 Lannois and Lemoine published an important memoir on this subject. They reported a case in which the meningeal complication of mumps was followed by aphasia and right hemiplegia,