130 
LIQUOR  OPII  COMPOSITUS. 
tains  4  grains,  or  very  nearly  that  amount  of  the  pure  alkaloid 
morphia,  and  probably  contains  very  little  of  the  other  active 
matters  of  the  opium.  Four  grains  of  morphia  is  about  equiva- 
lent to  5.33  grains  of  sulphate  of  morphia,  according  to  the 
formula  Mo  S03+ 6HO,  for  that  salt,  and  therefore  each  fluid 
drachm  should  be  equal  to  -66,  or  two-thirds  of  a  grain  of  sul- 
phate of  morphia.  Each  fluid  ounce  contains,  by  actual  experi- 
ment from  an  ordinary  one  ounce  vial,  448  to  450  drops,  (so 
that  in  the  case  of  the  solution  a  drop  is  very  nearly  a  grain,) 
and  therefore  eighty-two  drops  should  be  equal  to  one  grain  of 
sulphate  of  morphia.  But  in  actual  practice  with  the  prepara- 
tion the  effect  seems  to  be  somewhat  less,  and  has  been  esti- 
mated at  one  hundred  drops  for  one  grain  of  the  best  sulphate 
of  morphia.  The  ordinary  sedative  dose,  where  no  great  amount 
of  pain  or  irritation  is  to  be  combatted,  is  twenty  drops,  equal 
to  one-fifth  of  a  grain  of  the  morphia  salt.  In  such  doses  it 
sometimes  produces  tranquillity,  and  a  pleasant  calmness  and 
repose,  but  not  sleep.  In  such  cases  ten  or  fifteen  drops  more 
finishes  or  completes  the  effect  when  sleep  is  desirable.  In  a 
large  class  of  cases  an  increase  of  the  proportion  of  Hoffmann's 
anodyne  appears  to  be  useful. 
In  comparison  with  good  powdered  opium  and  laudanum  it 
seems  to  be  still  further  behind  them  in  power,  in  proportion  to 
the  amount  of  the  drug  represented  and  really  present  in  it.  If 
the  powdered  opium  contains,  as  it  should,  10  per  cent,  of  mor- 
phia, equal  to  12-5  per  cent,  of  sulphate,  then  12.5  drops  of  this 
solution  should  represent  one  grain  of  the  powdered  opium. 
Whilst  in  actual  practice,  nearly  double  that  quantity  is  required 
to  produce  the  effect  in  ordinary  cases  ;  whilst  in  such  affections 
as  delirium  tremens,  in  one  instance  two  grains  of  powdered 
opium  succeeded  in  procuring  sleep  after  one  hundred  drops  of 
the  solution  had  failed.  Indeed  it  does  not  appear  to  be  at  all 
adapted  to  fulfil  the  indications  to  the  heroic  use  of  opium,  and 
probably  the  opium  is  as  little  adapted  to  the  cases  or  circum- 
stances to  which  the  solution  is  most  applicable ;  and  the  diffi- 
culty of  producing  profound  narcotism  with  this  solution  in  due 
proportion  to  the  amount  of  morphia  it  contains,  in  comparison 
with  either  opium  or  salts  of  morphia,  is  not  easy  to  explain. 
If  this  discrepancy  be  established  as  a  fact  upon  more  numerous 
