496 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



notable instance, and in one or two less notable, nitrous-oxide gas, the 

 gas now so commonly used by dentists as an anaesthetic, has been re- 

 sorted to as an habitual stimulant and narcotic ; but the rarity of its 

 use prevents the necessity of doing more than referring to it in this 

 place, and once perhaps again in the sequel. Of the other agents it 

 may be said, in limine, respecting the extent of their use, that the 

 alcohols and tobacco stand first on the list in our civilized life. Next 

 after these come opium, absinthe, chloral hydrate, chlorodyne, ether, 

 and chloroform. The other substances are local in the range of their 

 employment. Hasheesh is an Eastern luxury ; amanitine a Kamtchat- 

 kan luxury ; arsenic a Styrian luxury ; red-thorn apple a luxury of 

 the Indians of the Andes, under the sweet influence of which they 

 enter into communion, as they believe, with the spirits of their de- 

 parted dead the best excuse I have ever heard given for the use of 

 any of these indulgences whatsoever. 



As we cast our minds back upon this long list of toxical instru- 

 ments for the delight of man, we are struck with the widely apparent 

 difference that seems to exist between them. The difference, however, 

 is not so great as it may seem, for between the physiological action of 

 one and the other there is an analogy of action in certain particulars 

 which is singularly striking. As a rule, the key-note of the action 

 of these agents, if I may use such a simile, is through one particular 

 element where many elements enter into their composition. Where 

 nitrogen is present as an element, a definite line of action of the agent 

 is marked out ; when a hydrocarbon radical is dominant that is to 

 say, when such a radical forms the chief part of the compound the 

 influence of that is most definite ; while the influence of one disturbing 

 principle on another may be most clearly traced in other cases as a neu- 

 tralizing influence, one influence reacting upon the other. 



We have at hand many instances of this kind for illustration. Al- 

 cohol and tobacco are the most ready examples. In the alcohols, which- 

 ever one of the family of alcohols we may take, from the least danger- 

 ous wood-spirit, through the more dangerous grain-spirit, up to the 

 much more dangerous potato-spirit, there is one agency at work, a hy- 

 drocarbon radical, methyl, ethyl, amyl, according to the alcohol used, 

 which, with different degrees of intensity, plays the same part, pro- 

 ducing similar series of phenomena. In tobacco we have a less deci- 

 sively known combination at work, but we have in that combination 

 the element nitrogen, the introduction of which causes a new develop- 

 ment of nervous phenomena, the analogous action of which can be 

 traced through some other complex organic compounds containing the 

 same element nitrogen. In chloroform, again, we have a hydrocar- 

 bon radical playing nearly the same part as the radical methyl of 

 methylic alcohol, but with chlorine interposing to modify the simple 

 narcotic action of the radical, and greatly to increase the danger of 



