68 
CHINESE  POISONS. 
apparent  inconvenience.  From  reports  given  of  it  we  infer  that 
its  effects  on  the  Chinese  are  analogous  to  what  is  observed  among 
the  arsenic-eating  peasants  of  Austria.  The  use  of  arsenical 
vapor  by  inhalation  merits  the  attention  of  physicians  as  a 
remedial  agent. 
At  Peking,  where  arseniated  tobacco  is  most  in  use,  it  costs 
no  more  than  the  unmixed  article ;  it  may  be  known  by  the  red 
color  imparted  to  the  vegetable  by  the  powdered  proto-sulphuret. 
Its  introduction  is  attributed  to  Cantonese  from  Chauchau.  If 
this  be  correct,  it  is  probable  that  these  Southerners,  unable  at 
the  North  to  procure  the  masticatory  to  which  they  are  addicted, 
sought  to  appease  a  craving  for  the  pungent  but  harmless  lime 
and  betel-nut,  by  substituting  the  deleterious  mineral  gas.  Many 
of  the  miserable  victims  of  opium,  to  whom  that  narcotic  is  a 
necessity  and  not  a  pleasure,  have  eagerly  employed  the  new 
stimulant  to  prop  and  exhilarate  their  exhausted  bodies,  and, 
perhaps,  have  thereby  meliorated  and  prolonged  their  existence. 
We  would  fain  hope  that  the  use  of  arsenical  stimulants  will  not 
become  general ;  yet  that  pernicious  custom  is  extending,  and 
we  know  our  race  too  well  not  to  entertain  fears  on  the  subject. 
It  is  even  stated  that,  for  a  time  at  least,  the  reigning  EmperOr 
in  his  boyhood  preferred  tobacco  thus  mineralized.  Arsenical 
ores  are  used  in  the  arts.  In  domestic  economy,  the  red  sul- 
phuret  is  employed  for  making  away  with  rats  and  husbands. 
There  is  no  evidence  that  poisoning  as  an  art  has  been  prac- 
tised in  China,  and  we  search  her  annals  in  vain  for  a  case 
parallel  to  that  of  Hong-Kong.  Novelists  sometimes  describe 
the  poisoning  of  armies  or  large  numbers  of  people — the  account 
of  the  aboriginal  chief  Manghwoh,  who  poisoned  the  springs  of 
which  the  Chinese  army  drank,  will  recur  to  the  reader  of  the 
historical  romance — the  Three  States.  It  may  be  that  instances 
of  this  kind  are  founded  on  fact :  but  the  obvious  futility  of  any 
attempt  to  poison  fatally  on  a  large  scale  is  a  guarantee  that  it 
will  be  seldom  resorted  to  in  warfare.  Could  such  appliances 
be  made  subservient  to  the  destruction  of  masses  of  men,  they 
would  certainly  be  put  in  requisition,  as  total  annihilation  of 
antagonists  is  always  the  aim  of  Chinese  heroes — "  no  quarter" 
is  their  war-cry  and  "  peculiar  institution."— London  Pharm. 
Journ.  October  1,  1858,  from  Edinburgh  Medical  Journal. 
Ningpo,  March  2c?,  1857.  D.  J.  M. 
