TOBACCO AND ITS EFFECTS. 83 



basis of his treatise on tobacco. Richardson declares 

 " that in the confirmed smoker there is a constant func- 

 tional disturbance which extends to the blood, the 

 stomach, the heart, the lungs, the brain, and the nerves." 

 That does not leave much of the man except his hair and 

 his bones. He says further that *^the use of tobacco 

 gives a doubtful pleasure for a certain penalty, — that so 

 long as the practice is continued the smoker is out of 

 health ; his stomach only partially digests ; his heart 

 labors unnaturally ; his blood is not fully oxygenized." 



Dr. Hassall says : " Tobacco owes its chief properties 

 to the presence of two principles, both of which produce 

 the worst possible effects upon the human system, when 

 taken pure." Both of these active principles have been 

 shown by Zeise and Milsens to be present in the smoke of 

 tobacco ; they are therefore not destroyed by the com- 

 bustion of tobacco, whether in the form of cigars or when 

 used in a pipe. They are inhaled in the act of smoking, 

 and thus are taken into the lungs and stomach ; especially 

 is this the case when the saliva, impregnated with smoke, 

 is swallowed. That these active constituents are actually 

 absorbed, and make their way into the system, is further 

 proved by the sickness, giddiness and death-like faintness 

 experienced by those unaccustomed to smoking; the 

 difference in the effects in the case of habitual smokers 

 being caused by the fact that the system becomes inured 

 to the use of tobacco, and therefore grows less susceptible 

 to its influence. 



Dr. Prout says : " Tobacco disorders the assimilative 

 functions in general, but particularly, as I beHeve, the 

 assimilation of the saccharine principles. I have never 

 been able, indeed, to trace the development of oxalic 



