14 



ANTI-TOBACCO. 



administered in the same manner to a dog, was followed 

 by the same result." 



Dr. Drysdale reports ("Tobacco, and the Diseases it pro- 

 duces,") that "The analyses made by Eulenberg and Vohl 

 ("Ann. d'Hygiene," April, 1873, from " Vierteljahrsch fur 

 ger. Med.") seem to controvert the old theory that the inju- 

 rious effects of tobacco-smoking are due directly to the pres- 

 ence of nicotine in the smoke. They attribute them rather 

 to the alkaloids produced by its decomposition, and which 

 have many similar physiological properties. The smoke 

 from tobacco, in pipes and cigars, was passed first through 

 a solution of potassic hydrate, and then through one of 

 dilute sulphuric acid. The former solution was found to 

 contain a mixture of carbonic, hydrocyanic, sulphuric, 

 acetic, formic, metacetonic, butyric, valeric, and carbolic 

 acids, creosote, and several hydrocarbons. The acid 

 solution contained rosohc acid, ammonia, traces of ethy- 

 lamine and many of the pyridine bases, to the last of 

 which the injurious action is due. The bases found were 

 pyridine, C 5 H 5 N, which is more abundant in pipe than 

 in cigar smoke ; picoline, C ^ H ^N ; lutidine, C ^H ^N ; col- 

 lidine, C g H ^^ N, which is more abundant in cigar than 

 in pipe smoke ; parvoline, C ^ H ^3 N ; coridine, C ^oH 15 N ; 

 rubidme, C^ H ^^ N ; and a residue corresponding to viri- 

 dine, C12H19N. As will be seen, the most volatile of 

 the bases, as pyridine, were most abundant in pipe-smoke, 

 while the less volatile, as colhdine, were most abundant in 

 cigar- smoke. 



" The physiological action of these bases was not tested 

 separately, but only that of a mixture of those which 

 volatilize under 320° F., and of those which volatilize 

 between 320° F. and 482° F. Both of these sets of bases, 



