672 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



stream of the circulation. These facts are of considerable impor- 

 tance in view of practical consequences, and go far to explain the 

 accidents that sometimes occur after one has passed several hours 

 in a medium saturated with tobacco, even without smoking, and 

 the phenomena of intoxication which are produced by eating food 

 that has remained for a long time in a similar atmosphere. 



Tobacco is a poison, as are most of the Solanacecz and many 

 plants which medicine daily utilizes. Its properties have been 

 studied in our time with all the rigor of the experimental method, 

 verified by clinical observation. We can no more than present 

 the principal results of the investigation here. The decoction of 

 tobacco destroys animal life in a time short in proportion to the 

 strength of the dose. The phenomena preceding death are like 

 those produced by other toxic alkaloids, and are identical with 

 those exhibited by man in a similar condition, which doctors have 

 had too frequent occasion to observe. Sometimes convicts or 

 sailors swallow their quids, or fools drink on a wager a glass or 

 two of the empyreumatic juice that flows from old pipes, or the 

 poison is swallowed by mistake, as when snuff is taken for coffee 

 or tobacco leaves are mixed with orange leaves. Cases of mali- 

 cious poisoning are more rare ; but the poet Sauteuil died, accord- 

 ing to Merat, in horrible suffering after having drunk a glass of 

 wine in which Spanish tobacco leaves had been put. Mortal poi- 

 soning is, however, rarely brought about when tobacco is taken 

 by the mouth, for it is nearly always rejected by vomiting before 

 it can produce its worst effects ; but the results of intestinal 

 administration are different. The intoxication is then most usu- 

 ally the result of a medical error. The decoction of tobacco is 

 still given sometimes as an injection in cases of asphyxia by sub- 

 mersion or of strangled hernia, and, if the dose is too large, death 

 may result. Orfila cites four cases that were fatal in doses ranging 

 from eight to sixty-four grammes. One patient died in fifteen 

 minutes, and the one who held out longest at the end of two 

 hours. Eight grammes do not form a toxic dose, but the case cited 

 by Orfila was one of an infant. From fifteen to thirty grammes 

 are required to kill an adult. Tobacco may also poison through 

 the lungs. Cases are mentioned of persons who died from sleep- 

 ing in a room filled with fermenting leaves ; others, worthy rivals 

 of the bettors just now spoken of, died after executing wagers 

 that they could smoke an improbable number of pipes without 

 intermission. The skin itself may serve as a channel for the in- 

 troduction of the toxic principle. Accidents of this kind were 

 not rare when diseases of the skin were treated with pomades or 

 liniments of which tobacco was the base. Murray reports an ob- 

 servation of three infants who were taken with vomitings and 

 vertigos, and died in convulsions within twenty-four hours after 



