Am.  Jour  Pharir, 
Jan.,  1880 
Drug  Smoking, 
39 
well  prepared  and  preserved,  the  leaves  of  which  it  is  composed  being 
fresh  and  green. 
Remedies  for  asthma  are  supplied  in  three  forms  :  a  powder  which  is 
burnt  and  the  fumes  of  which  are  inhaled,  cigarettes  composed  of 
tobacco  combined  with  various  drugs,  or  of  paper  dipped  in  a  solution 
of  the  drugs. 
The  best  method  of  preparing  the  drugs  for  the  powder  form  of 
remedy  appears  to  me  to  be  this  :  the  leaves  of  the  vegetables  used 
should  be  procured  in  good  condition  and  perfectly  fresh  ;  they  should 
then  be  soaked  in  a  solution  of  nitre  (25  per  cent.),  and  the  leaves  then 
dried  by  gentle  heat  and  powdered.  I  have  made  use  of  the  various 
neurotics  in  this  manner  in  asthma,  first  separately,  in  order  to  ascer- 
tain the  individual  value  of  the  remedy,  and  then  in  combination,  and 
the  experiments  have  now  been  carried  on  for  many  months,  and  I  am 
disposed  to  place  them  in  the  following  order  of  merit  :  opium,  stra- 
monium, cannabis  indica,  conium,  lobelia. 
The  three  first  on  the  list  appear  to  be  the  most  potent  by  fumiga- 
tion, but  when  administered  in  the  wet  method  (if  I  may  use  the  term) 
cannabis  indica  is  so  uncertain  and  so  apt  to  produce  delirium,  especially 
in  women,  that  I  prefer  conium,  a  drug  from  which  I  have  obtained 
extremely  good  results  when  administered  by  the  mouth. 
With  belladonna  I  could  not  satisfy  myself  that  any  good  results 
were  to  be  obtained  by  fumigation,  and  I  consider  it  far  inferior  to 
those  given  above  in  whatever  way  it  is  administered. 
The  powder  may  be  used  by  those  patients  who  are  not  accustomed 
or  object  to  smoking  cigarettes,  or  it  may  be  added  to  the  tobacco  of 
thise  who  prefer  the  use  of  the  pipe. 
As  regards  the  composition  of  the  powder,  I  have  had  good  results 
from  gr.  ix  of  stramonium  and  gr.  i  of  cannabis  indica,  this  being  a 
quantity  which  will  cover  a  shilling,  sufficient  for  one  fumigation. 
But  if  the  patient  does  not  object  to  smoking,  I  much  prefer  to 
administer  the  remedies  in  the  form  described  in  my  previous  paper, 
namely  paper  cigarettes  impregnated  with  tinctures  so  that  the  dose 
may  be  accurately  apportioned. 
It  will  be  understood  that  in  suggesting  remedies  which  serve  to  alle- 
viate the  spasmodic  dyspnoea  of  asthma  I  do  not  consiJer  that  they 
constitute  a  mode  of  treatment  calculated  to  improve  the  general  con- 
dition of  the,  patent,  or  that  they  are  more  than  palliatives  of  an  urgent 
