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up smoking and enjoyed a roomful of tobacco smoke. He did not know 
until I examined that he had developed a high blood pressure. When I tell 
you. that my own pressure under good air conditions runs from 100 to 110 
m. m. while his under bad air runs about 200, you will realize that the life 
of such a man hangs on a mere thread and that at any time he may break 
a blood vessel, resulting in an apoplexy, or, if that does not occur, the kidneys 
will give out. Such men die suddenly as a rule and prematurely. 
But the most interesting phase of the subject is the mental reactions, 
especially such as go under the terms irritability, nervousness and overwork. 
The efforts some men make to feel better are pathetic. For instance, I have 
in mind a captain of industry who did his planning in the early morning 
hours, usually from four to five, in bed. He saw things very clearly at that 
time. Then he would go down town and soon begin to feel dull and irritable, 
but would feel better by smoking, and he smoked one cigar after another. 
The single evening cigar and the postprandial cigar in time increased in 
number (as the blood pressure went up) until he wanted to smoke all the 
time. If alcohol were not taboo he would of course use that. When | 
examined I found he had a blood pressure of nearly 200 m. m. I pointed 
out that his pressure was due to the life down town, and that if he would 
reduce that to a minimum, and offset bad air by good air, likely he would 
have twenty-four hours a day for mental work, so to speak, rather than only 
one or two hours in the early morning, and that instead of tobacco being a 
stimulant to him during the day, which enab'ed him to think, it really did 
nothing of the sort; what it did was to lower the tension and the mind no 
longer ran riot. It enables him to pick out thoughts and ideas that he had 
seen very clearly in the early morning, after he had had no tobaeco at all 
for a number cf hours. 
The newspaper cartoons, such as of ‘“Abe Martin’ and ‘‘Roger Bean,” 
are interesting. The one might represent the low pressure type in the 
country with a family of children; he is seen only occasionally with a cigar. 
The other, Roger Bean, might represent the high pressure city man, with a 
cigar in his mouth almost constantly and usually childless. Race suicide 
and the use of tobacco under crowded conditions go hand in hand. 
In early days Uncle Sam was represented as a lean, lank country man. 
The cartoonists nowadays are filling him out, in other words, making a hearty, 
robust Uncle, one is almost inclined to say grandfather. To the initiated he 
is a “high blood pressure case,’ with attendant ills, including race suicide. 
5084—6 
