120 THE TREATMENT OF DISEASES. 



obtained by steeping the leaves in a decoction of the seeds, and then drying and 

 smoking them. Often enough when the ordinary stramonium (Datura stramonium) 

 has failed, the stronger species (Datura talula) will succeed admirably. There is 

 one point in connection with stramonium-smoking that cannot be dismissed without 

 a word of notice, and that is that in a very bad asthmatic attack the patient may be 

 really so ill that he cannot smoke. He makes one or two ineffectual attempts at a 

 whiff, but he is so short of breath that he cannot draw sufficient air into his mouth 

 to keep it alight, and finally has to give it up as a bad job. 



The Cigares anti-asthmatiques de Joy, a French preparation, often prove useful. 

 They are said to contain arsenic of some form or other. They are sold now by most 

 chemists. 



Coffee is a very excellent remedy for asthma. If you don't know how to cut 

 short your attacks, and have not tried coffee, do so by all means. It often suc- 

 ceeds admirably, when almost everything else has failed. There are one or two 

 little points to be attended to in taking coffee for asthma. In the first place, it 

 should be very strong in fact, perfectly black. Weak coffee does more harm than 

 good. If made very strong you need not take much of it ; a large quantity is a 

 positive disadvantage, for it is less rapidly absorbed, and only distends the stomach. 

 Then it should be given without sugar or milk pure cafe noir. It should be given 

 on an empty stomach, for when taken on a full stomach it often does harm, by 

 putting a stop to the process of digestion. There is no doubt that with some people 

 coffee taken at meal-times especially late in the day is very apt to produce 

 asthma. Finally, it should be given very hot. 



Nitre-papers. Of nitre-papers we can speak in the very highest terms in the treat- 

 ment of asthma. It is an old-fashioned remedy, but it is one of the best. A London 

 physician has a son who almost from his infancy has been very subject to asthma, which, 

 however, is readily controlled by the fumes of smouldering nitre-paper. They sleep 

 in adjoining rooms. At that time in the early morning when the attack is wont to 

 come on, the wakeful, anxious father listens for and hears in his son's altered manner 

 of breathing the earliest intimation of the coming trouble ; he rises immediately, and 

 lights his nitre-paper in the son's chamber, and in five or ten minutes the threatened 

 or incipient paroxysm is extinguished, the sleeper sleeping on in blissful ignorance 

 of what has happened. This is by no means an isolated case. A lady obtained so 

 much relief from this mode of treatment that she never went anywhere without 

 taking some nitre-paper with her in her pocket. If an attack came on at any 

 time she would at once resort to it. Sometimes, when making a morning call, she 

 would find her asthma coming on ; she would put up with the inconvenience as 

 long as she could, and then when she could bear it no longer, she would ask to 

 be allowed to retire to some room to use her remedy, and in ten minutes would 

 return to her friends as well as ever. Many asthmatics habitually burn nitre- 

 paper in their rooms before retiring to rest, and by this means invariably insure 

 a good night's rest. Every one should make his own nitre-paper the home- 

 made is always the best. The best paper to use is ordinary blotting-paper, it 

 must not be very thin, or it will not take up sufficient nitre, nor yet too thick, or 

 it will make the fumes too carbonaceous ; but it must be moderately thick and very 



