IN SINGAPORE, 
27 
giddiness on raising the head, and sometimes head ache, are the first 
symptoms* The nervous power from being increased is soon dis¬ 
turbed, and the functions of the body become unsettled, at one time 
of a more fun ordinary power, at another much below par, the ap- 
.petite becomes capricious; sometimes we have costiveness, some¬ 
times the contrary. Strange feelings are experienced about the chest, 
the eye may sparkle a little at night, but early in the morning it is 
hazy, the tongue becomes covered with a whitish fur, the pulse is 
but little affected and the urinary organs are not yet disturbed; But 
continue the vice, an l we have the nervous system still further giving 
way. The sensations in the head are now increased, the giddiness is 
troublesome and the headache annoying, the eyes now discharge a 
copious mucus secretion, and so does the nose, without doubt from 
relaxation of the vessels owing to impaired nervous energy. The 
stomach soon shares. Digestion becomes impaired, at first uncer¬ 
tain, at last it is destroyed. We know from experiment the power 
the nerves have over that function, so that if the Puumo Gastrics in a 
dog be tied, digestion is completely stopped and the gastric juice not 
evolved. In the opium smoker the nervous energy is impaired, the 
gastric juice is lessened in quantity, perhaps depraved in quality, and 
the muscular coat of the stomach, no longer receiving its usual sup¬ 
ply of nervous power, faila to perform its churning-like office. From 
these causes the food is only partially digested when it passes into the 
intestines. Some of it in its crude state is absorbed into the system, 
the remainder waits until it is dejected, this, in the commencement 
of the smokers career, and while he daily uses the drug, does not take 
place oftener than once in 5 or 6 days, nay, even it is extended from 
10 to 15. The urinary organs now become disturbed, micturition is 
not so easily performed, a discharge takes place, which some think 
seminal, but I should say rather mucus, and proceeds from the visi- 
culffi seminales. The generative organs, which formerly were highly 
excitable, have now, in a great measure, lost their aphrodisiac power 
and few and far between are their capabilit es of indulgence. It is 
at this stage that we have amongst the opulent the various aphrosidi- 
ac remedies used, as tigers’s foot jelly, eggs of the black fowl, mi 
