USE OF THE CANNABIS INDICA IN TETANUS. 581 
When boiled in alcohol the gunjah yields as much as one- 
fifth of its weight of resinous extract, and hence this method 
of preparing the drug in a pure state has been recommended 
as the most efficient and economical. I am not aware, how- 
ever, that it is anywhere adopted in the East. 
Forms in which Hemp is used. — Among the ancient 
Saracens and the modern Arabs, in some parts of Turkey, 
and generally throughout Syria, the preparations of hemp in 
common use were, and are still, known by the names of 
haschisch , hashash , or husheesli . The most common form of 
haschiseh, and that which is the basis of all others, is pre- 
pared by boiling the leaves and flowers of the hemp with 
water to which a certain quantity of fresh butter has been 
added, evaporating the decoction to the thickness of a syrup, 
and then straining it through cloth. The butter thus be- 
comes charged with the active resinous principle of the plant, 
and acquires a greenish colour. This preparation retains its 
properties for many years, only becoming a little rancid. Its 
taste, however, is very disagreeable, and hence it is seldom 
taken alone, but is mixed with confections and aromatics — 
camphor, cloves, nutmegs, mace, and not unfrequently am- 
bergris and musk — so as to form a sort of electuary. The 
confection used among the Moors is called el mogen , and is 
sold at an enormous price. 
Antiquity and extent of its use. — The ancient Scythians are 
said by Herodotus to have excited themselves by “ inhaling 
its vapour.” Homer makes Helen administer to Telemachus, 
in the house of Menelaus, a potion prepared from the nepen- 
thes, which made him forget his sorrows. This plant had 
been given to her by a woman of Egyptian Thebes; and 
Diodorus Siculus states that the Egyptians laid much stress 
on this circumstance, arguing that Homer must have lived 
among them, since the women of Thebes were actually noted 
for possessing a secret by which they could dissipate anger or 
melancholy. This secret is supposed to have been a know- 
ledge of the qualities of hemp. Under the name of beng it is 
also mentioned in the Arabian Nights , translated by Lane, as 
the narcotic used by Haroun al Raschid and other heroes of 
the tales. 
Nor is the use of hemp less extended than it is ancient. 
In the plains of India it is consumed in every form, and on 
the slopes of the Himalayas, it is cultivated for smoking, as 
high up as the valleys of Sikkim. In Persia, in the east of 
Europe, and in Mahommedan countries, it is in extensive use. 
In Northern Africa it is largely employed by the Moors. In 
central and tropical Africa it is almost everywhere known as 
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