COMMUNICATIONS AND EXTRACTS. 115 



ever, during my experience, been corroborated by others 

 of a like kind ; and I have come to the conclusion that 

 inflammation and ulceration of the larynx in men are 

 almost exclusively peculiar to the slaves of excessive 

 tobacco smoking. 



• " Haemoptoe is another morbid condition distinctly 

 traceable to this habit. The patient experiences a slight 

 tickling low down in the pharynx or trachea, and hawks 

 up rather than coughs up a dark grumous-looking blood. 

 I have not been able to ascertain whence this comes. I 

 have known it to flow out of the patient's mouth during 

 the night, or to be eff'used shortly after lying down. It 

 is a symptom worthy especial notice, however, because 

 it gives great alarm, and may be readily mistaken for 

 pulmonary haemoptysis, or an expectoration of blood. 



" The action of tobacco smoking pn the heart, so far 

 as I have observed, is depressing. * The individual who, 

 from some peculiarity of constitution, feels it in this 

 organ rather than elsewhere, usually complains of a pe- 

 culiar uneasy sensation about the left nipple — a distress- 

 ing feeling — not amounting to faintness, but allied to it 

 In such an example no morbid sound can be detected, 

 but the action of the heart is observed to be feeble, and 

 slightly irregular in rhythm ; yet not always so in the 

 same person. An uneasy feeling is also experienced in 

 or beneath the pectoral muscles ; but oftener, I tMnk, 

 on the right side than on the left. 



" On the brain the action of tobacco smoking is sedar 

 tive. It appears to diminish the rapidity of cerebral 

 action, and check the flow of ideas through the mind. 

 This, I think, is a certain result; and it is in consequence 



