NARCOTIC PLANTS 299 



intoxication being somewhat like that induced by 

 opium, the habit is dangerous in the extreme. 

 Slaves to the coca or cocaine habit are short-lived. 



Do not confute the shrub coca, with the useful 

 coco-nut, a palm, nor the cacao tree, from whose 

 seeds cocoa and chocolate are made. 



The Cola, or Kola, is a tropical African tree, 

 whose fleshy nuts, like horse-chestnuts, have much 

 the same effect on* the nerves as the leaves of the 

 coca. The two are combined in a summer 

 beverage that physicians condemn, knowing the 

 two drugs it contains, and the billboards extol as 

 harmless and delightful. 



