42 A LECTURE ON TOBACCO. 



but, unless applied with judgment, dreadful consequences 

 have ensued. Dr. Clay says (p. 12) : "I have been 

 called to children writhing in horrid convulsions from 

 having had the decoction of tobacco applied for the itch 

 and scald-head, and I have always experienced great 

 difficulty in restoring them ; three instances in my own 

 recollection were attended with fatal results." Soldiers, 

 wanting to disable themselves from duty, have applied a 

 moistened tobacco-leaf to the armpit, inducing extreme 

 prostration and sickness. The physician of a government 

 tobacco-factory at Iglau, in Moravia, reported that " of a 

 hundred boys who entered the works, seventy-two fell 

 sick in the first six months ; " and deaths are not infrequent 

 there from narcotic poisoning. 



The ill effects of a poison are not to be measured by 

 the number of deaths of which it is the obvious cause. 

 It is not easy to estimate the amount of sickness and in- 

 jury resulting from tobacco ; but medical men warn us of 

 its tendencies. All smoke is injurious to the eyes ; but 

 tobacco, which acts on the optic nerve, frequently causes 

 blindness, and color-bHndness, so dangerous in railway 

 signalmen. The eminent London oculist, Mr. Critchett, 

 says that he is constantly consulted by gentlemen for com- 

 mencing blindness, caused solely by great smoking. Others 

 bear a similar testimony.^ If not too far advanced, 

 the malady has been removed by total abstinence from 

 tobacco. The smoker's sore throat and diseases of the 

 tongue and gums are also notorious. " Nicotine enters 

 the body by the stomach, the lungs, and the skin ; and its 

 effects are uniform by whatever gate it enters." " The 



1 See Dr. Drysdale, p. 9 ; and *' Narcotism," No. 31, p. 3, No. 

 55, &c., published by the Anti-Tobacco Society. 



