Chapter IX: Part 9

In the Malays and Javanese we have the excitable temperament, accompanied by the unrestrained outward forms of expression, which are characteristic of Eastern nations. What affects us Saxons lightly or slowly, touches them instantly, and penetrates deep. The emotions which, when awakened, we are accustomed to restrain and hide, they openly and vividly display, and by indulgence heighten often to an overpowering degree. The negro tribes partake of a similar organisation. “In this respect,” says Mrs Beecher Stowe, “they have an Oriental character, and betray their tropical origin. Like the Hebrews of old, and the Oriental nations of the present day, they give vent to their emotions with the utmost vivacity of expression, and their whole bodily system sympathises with the movements of their minds. When in distress, they actually lift up their voices to weep, and ‘cry with an exceeding bitter cry.’ When alarmed, they are often paralysed, and rendered entirely helpless.” This susceptibility affects all their relations both to living and dead things. Opium affects different individuals among them in different ways, as it does the different individuals of European races, but upon all it produces those more marked and striking effects which, among ourselves, we only see in rare instances, and in persons of uncommonly nervous temperament.

_Second_, It is a curious fact, that the active narcotic ingredients of opium often escape the decomposing action of the digestive and other organs. They pass unchanged into the milk of the nurse who uses it, and have been known to poison the infant suckled by a female who had been dozing herself largely with opiates. The odour of the drug is to be perceived in the breath and in the perspiration; and morphia and meconic acid are known occasionally to escape through the kidneys, and have been found in the fluid excretions. This character the active ingredients of opium possess in common with many other narcotic principles, such as those of the deadly nightshade, the henbane, the thorn-apple, the intoxicating fungus, and with many other substances used in medicine.—PEREIRA, p. 102.

_Third_, Opium, as is well known, gradually loses its effect upon the habitual consumer, so that the dose must be increased from time to time, if the influence of the drug is to be maintained. But at length, even this resource fails the inveterate opium-eaters of Constantinople, and no increase of dose will procure for them the desired enjoyment, or even relieve them from bodily pain. In this emergency, they have recourse to the poisonous corrosive sublimate. Mixing at first a minute quantity of this substance with their daily dose of opium, they increase it by degrees, till they reach the limit of ten grains a-day, beyond which it is usually unsafe to pass. This mixture acts upon their long-tortured frames, when neither of the ingredients, taken alone, will either soothe or exhilarate. But the use of the new medicine only protracts a little longer the artificial enjoyment, which has become a necessary of life, finally bringing to a more miserable termination the career of the debilitated and distorted Theriaki.

We have said that, in moderate doses, opium acts in a similar way to our wines and spirituous liquors, and that it is as a substitute for these that the Chinese use it. By this we do not mean that its physiological effects are precisely the same, although the main purpose for which they are used by many—that of a care-dispeller—may be the same. On the contrary, there are many points of difference in the effects which alcohol and opium respectively produce. The following somewhat coloured and imaginative picture represents their relative effects on the constitution of the _English opium-eater_:—

“Crude opium, I affirm peremptorily, is incapable of producing any
state of body at all resembling that which is produced by alcohol; and
not in _degree_ only incapable, but even in _kind_. It is not in the
_quantity_ of its effects merely, but in the _quality_, that it
differs altogether. The pleasure given by wine is always mounting, and
tending to a crisis, after which it declines; that from opium, when
once generated, is stationary for eight or ten hours: the first—to
borrow a technical distinction from medicine—is a case of acute, the
second of chronic pleasure; the one is a flame, the other a steady and
equable glow. But the main distinction lies in this, that whereas wine
disorders the mental faculties, opium, on the contrary (if taken in a
proper manner), introduces amongst them the most exquisite order,
legislation, and harmony. Wine robs a man of his self-possession;
opium greatly invigorates it. Wine unsettles and clouds the judgment,
and gives a preternatural brightness, and a vivid exaltation to the
contempts and the admirations, the loves and the hatreds, of the
drinker; opium, on the contrary, communicates serenity and equipoise
to all the faculties, active or passive; and with respect to the
temper and moral feelings in general, it gives simply that sort of
vital warmth which is approved by the judgment, and which would
probably always accompany a bodily constitution of primeval or
antediluvian health. Thus, for instance, opium, like wine, gives an
expansion to the heart and the benevolent affections; but then with
this remarkable difference, that, in the sudden development of
kind-heartedness which accompanies inebriation, there is always more
or less of a maudlin character, which exposes it to the contempt of
the bystander. Men shake hands, swear eternal friendship, and shed
tears, no mortal knows why; and the sensual creature is clearly
uppermost. But the expansion of the benigner feelings, incident to
opium, is no febrile access, but a healthy restoration to that state
which the mind would naturally recover upon the removal of any
deep-seated irritation of pain that had disturbed and quarrelled with
the impulses of a heart originally just and good.... Wine constantly
leads a man to the brink of absurdity and extravagance; and, beyond a
certain point, it is sure to volatilise and to disperse the
intellectual energies; whereas opium always seems to compose what had
been agitated, and to concentrate what had been distracted. In short,
to sum up all in one word, a man who is inebriated, or tending to
inebriation, is, and feels that he is, in a condition which calls up
into supremacy the merely human—too often the brutal—part of his
nature; but the opium-eater (I speak of him who is not suffering from
any disease, or other remote effects of opium) feels that the diviner
part of his nature is paramount; that is, the moral affections are in
a state of cloudless serenity; and over all is the great light of the
majestic intellect.”

After this highly-coloured eulogium upon the comparative virtues of opium and alcohol, drawn from personal experience, who could blame us were we at once to propose the establishment of a national opium-eating, distillery-burning society, and, Father Mathew-like, should take up our staff, and preach everywhere the exceeding virtues of the inestimable drug, and propose for universal imitation the admirable example of the silver-piped Celestials? But it may occur to the reader, as it does to ourselves, that the English opium-eater himself was brought to death’s door by the use of his favourite drug, and was compelled to abandon his beloved enjoyment. For the present, therefore, we refrain, and recommend in preference our own bitters practice. Keep your morphia bottle carefully stowed away till a new attack of toothache or sciatica comes on, and your laudanum as a ready friend should the prevailing epidemic approach you.

And yet even grave and matter-of-fact men are to be found—persons who have had large experience of the use of opium in Eastern countries—who not only pronounce the use of the drug as a narcotic indulgence to be far from an unmitigated evil, but who especially prefer its general use to that of alcoholic drinks. Among these we may mention Dr Eatwell, of the East India Company’s service, whose knowledge of the history and action of opium is acknowledged to be most extensive. The deliberate opinion of this gentleman is deserving of much attention; and he argues the case as follows:—

“It has been too much the practice with those who have treated this
subject to content themselves with drawing the sad picture of the
confirmed debauchee, plunged in the last stage of moral and physical
exhaustion; and having taken this exception as the premises of their
argument, to proceed at once to involve the whole practice in one
sweeping condemnation. But this is not the way in which the subject
can be fairly treated. As rational would it be to paint the horrors of
_delirium tremens_, and upon that evidence to condemn at once the
entire use of alcoholic liquors. The question to be determined is not,
what are the effects of opium used in excess, but what are its effects
on the moral and physical constitution of the mass of individuals who
use it habitually, and in _moderation_, either as a stimulant to
sustain the frame under fatigue, or as a restorative and sedative
after labour, bodily or mental. Having passed three years in China, I
can affirm thus far, that the effects of the abuse of the drug do not
come very frequently under observation, and that, when cases do occur,
the habit is frequently found to have been induced by the presence of
some painful chronic disease, to escape from the suffering of which
the patient has fled to this resource. That this is not always,
however, the case, I am perfectly ready to admit, and there are
doubtless many who indulge in the habit to a pernicious extent, led by
the same morbid influences which induce men to become drunkards in
even the most civilised countries; but these cases do not, at all
events, come before the public eye. As regards the effects of the
habitual use of the drug on the _mass_ of the people, I must affirm
that no injurious results are visible. The people are a muscular and
well-formed race, the labouring portion being capable of great and
prolonged exertion under a fierce sun, in an unhealthy climate. Their
disposition is cheerful and peaceable, and quarrels and brawls are
rarely heard even amongst the lower orders; whilst in general
intelligence they rank deservedly high amongst Orientals.

“I conclude, therefore, with observing that the proofs are still
wanting to show that the moderate use of opium produces more
pernicious effects upon the constitution than the moderate use of
spirituous liquors; whilst, at the same time, it is certain that the
consequences of the abuse of the former are less appalling in their
effects upon the victim, and less disastrous to society at large, than
the consequences of the abuse of the latter. Compare the furious
madman, the subject of _delirium tremens_, with the prostrate
debauchee, the victim of opium; the violent drunkard with the dreamy
sensualist intoxicated with opium. The latter is, at least, harmless
to all except his wretched self, whilst the former is but too
frequently a dangerous nuisance, and an open bad example to the
community at large.”[45]

It strikes us that the tone of this passage is that of an apologist for an evil practice, rather than of a defender of a good one. But we leave our readers to form their own opinion upon the point not unably argued by Dr Eatwell. It may be that the ideas we have generally entertained in this country, hitherto, as to the necessarily evil effects of the use of opium as an indulgence, may be only unfounded prejudices. They may have arisen from drawing too hasty and general conclusions from the manifest evils of extreme cases; and it is possible that more knowledge may compel us materially to alter our present opinions. Meantime the medical missionaries inform us that the confirmed opium-consumers of China use daily from 30 to 200 grains of the pure extract, which is equal to twice as much of the crude opium. We might expect, therefore, a more frequent recurrence of melancholy spectacles arising from the use of the drug, than by the testimony of Dr Eatwell is really the case.

* * * * *

IV. HEMP.—As a general rule, little is popularly known in northern Europe of the use of hemp as a narcotic indulgence; and yet in the East it is as familiar to the sensual voluptuary as the opium we have been considering.

Our common hemp (_Cannabis sativa_), so extensively cultivated for its fibre, is the same plant with the Indian hemp, _Cannabis Indica_, which from the remotest times has been celebrated among Eastern nations for its narcotic virtues. The plant came to Europe from Persia, and is supposed by many to be a native of India; but, like tobacco and the potato, it has a wonderful power of adapting itself to differences in soil and climate. Hence it is cultivated in northern Russia—whence our manufacturers obtain large supplies of its valuable fibre—in Northern America, on the plains of India and Arabia, in Africa, from its northern to its southern extremities, and throughout the whole of Europe. But in hot climates the fibre degenerates in quality, while the narcotic ingredients increase in quantity, and in apparent strength.

In the sap of this plant, probably in all countries, there exists a peculiar resinous substance in which the narcotic quality resides. In northern climates the proportion of this substance is so small as hitherto to have escaped notice. In the warmer regions of the East, however, it is so abundant as to exude naturally from the flowers, from the leaves, and from the bark of the young twigs. This is another of the many interesting facts now known, which show the influence of climate in modifying the chemical changes that take place in the interior of plants, and the nature and proportions of the several substances which are produced by these changes. We have already seen how the numerous constituents of opium vary with the locality in which it is collected.

In India the resinous exudation of the hemp plant is collected in various ways. In Nepaul it is gathered by the hand in the same way as opium. This variety is very pure and much prized. It is called _Momeea_, or waxen _Churrus_. It has a fragrant narcotic odour, and a slightly hot, bitterish, and acrid taste. In Central India, men covered with leathern aprons run backwards and forwards through the hemp fields, beating the plants violently. By this means the resin is detached and adheres to the leather. This is scraped off, and is the ordinary churrus of commerce, the _chirs_ of Caubul. It does not bring so high a price as the momeea. In other places the leathern aprons are dispensed with, and the resin is collected on the naked skins of the coolies. In Persia it is collected by pressing the resinous plant on coarse cloths, and afterwards scraping the resin from these, and melting it in a little warm water. The churrus of Herat is considered as one of the best and most powerful varieties of the drug.

The plant itself is often collected and dried for the sake of the resin it contains. The whole plant collected when in flower, and dried without the removal of the resin, is called _Gunjah_. The larger leaves and capsules without the stalks form _bang_, _subjee_, or _sidhee_, which is less esteemed than the gunjah.[46]

The gunjah, when boiled in alcohol, 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.

Among the ancient Saracens, 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 _husheesh_. The most common form of haschisch, and that which is the basis of all others, is prepared 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 becomes 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 ambergris 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. _Dawamese_ is the name given by the Arabs to that which they most commonly use. This is frequently mingled, however, with other substances of reputed aphrodisiac virtues, to enable it to minister more effectually to the sensual gratifications, which appear to be the grand object of life among many of the Orientals.

The Turks give the names of _Hadschy Malach_ and _Madjoun_ to the compositions they use for purposes of excitement. According to Dr Madden, the madjoun of Constantinople is composed of the pistils of the flowers of the hemp plant ground to powder, and mixed in honey with powdered cloves, nutmegs, and saffron.

Thus the hemp plant or its products are used in four different forms.

_First_, The whole plant dried and known by the name of gunjah; or the larger leaves and capsules dried and known as bang, subjee, or sidhee; or the dried flowers, called in Morocco _kief_, a pipe of which, scarcely the size of an English pipe, is sufficient to intoxicate; or the dried pistils of the flower in the madjoun of the Turks. It is possible that these latter parts of the plant may be peculiarly rich in resin.

_Second_, The resin which naturally exudes from the leaves and flowers, and is, when collected by the hand, called momeea; or the same beaten off with sticks, and sold by the name of churrus.

_Third_, The extract obtained by means of alcohol from the gunjah, and which is said to be very active.

_Fourth_, The extract obtained by the use of butter, which, when mixed with spices, forms the dawamese of the Arabs, and is the foundation of the haschisch of many Eastern countries and districts. Other varieties, however, are in use, under the name of haschisch, one of which consists only of the tops and tender parts of the plants collected after they have been in flower.

The dried plant is smoked, and sometimes chewed, while the resin and resinous extracts are generally swallowed in the form of pills or boluses. The newly-gathered plant and leaves have a rapid and energetic action. Their efficacy diminishes, however, by keeping, which is less the case with the natural resin and the extracts.

In one or other of these forms the hemp plant appears to have been used from very remote times. 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 Nepenthes, 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 knowledge of the qualities of hemp.

It is curious how common and familiar words sometimes connect themselves with things and customs of which we know absolutely nothing. The word _assassin_—a foreign importation, it is true, but long naturalised among us—is of this kind. M. Sylvester de Sacy, the well-known Orientalist, says that this word was derived from the Arabic name of hemp. It was originally used in Syria to designate the followers of “the old man of the mountain,” who were called _Haschischins_, because among them the haschisch was in frequent use, especially during the performance of certain of their mysterious rites. Others say that, during the wars of the Crusaders, certain of the Saracen army, intoxicated with the drug, were in the habit of rushing into the camps of the Christians, committing great havoc, being themselves totally regardless of death; that these men were known as hashasheens, and that thence came our word assassin. The Oriental term was probably in use long before the time of the Crusades, though the English form and use of the word may have been introduced into Europe at that period.

Nor is the use of hemp less extended than it is ancient. All over the East, and in Mahomedan countries generally, it is consumed. In Northern Africa it is used largely by the Moors. In Southern Africa, the Hottentots use it under the name of _Dacha_, for purposes of intoxication; and when the Bushmen were in London, they smoked the dried plant in short pipes made of the tusks or teeth of animals. What is more astonishing, when we consider what broad seas intervene, even the native Indians of Brazil know its value, and delight in its use; so that over the hotter parts of the globe generally, wherever the plant produces in abundance its peculiar narcotic principle, its virtues may be said to be known, and more or less extensively made use of.

Its effects on the system, therefore, we must suppose, are very agreeable. In India it is spoken of as the increaser of pleasure, the exciter of desire, the cementer of friendship, the laughtermover, and the causer of the reeling gait,—all epithets indicative of its peculiar effects. Linnæus describes its power as “narcotica, phantastica, dementens, anodyna et repellens;” while in the words of Endlicher, “Emollitum exhilarat animum, impotentibus desideriis tristem, stultam lætitiam provocat, et jucundissima somniorum conciliat phantasmata.”

The effects of the churrus or natural resin have been carefully studied in India by Dr O’Shaughnessy. He states that when taken in moderation it produces increase of appetite and great mental cheerfulness, while in excess it causes a peculiar kind of delirium and catalepsy. This last effect is very remarkable, and we quote his description of the results of one of his experiments with what is considered a large dose for an Indian patient:—

“At two P.M. a grain of the resin of hemp was given to a rheumatic
patient; at four P.M. he was very talkative, sang, called loudly for
an extra supply of food, and declared himself in perfect health. At
six P.M. he was asleep. At eight P.M. he was found insensible, but
breathing with perfect regularity, his pulse and skin natural, and the
pupils freely contractile on the approach of light. Happening by
chance to lift up the patient’s arm, the professional reader will
judge of my astonishment when I found it remained in the posture in
which I placed it. It required but a very brief examination of the
limbs to find that by the influence of this narcotic the patient had
been thrown into the strangest and most extraordinary of all nervous
conditions, which so few have seen, and the existence of which so many
still discredit—the genuine catalepsy of the nosologist. We raised him
to a sitting posture, and placed his arms and limbs in every
imaginable attitude. A waxen figure could not be more pliant or more
stationary in each position, no matter how contrary to the natural
influence of gravity on the part! To all impressions he was meanwhile
almost insensible.”

This extraordinary influence he subsequently found to be exercised by the hemp extract upon other animals as well as upon man. After a time it passes off entirely, leaving the patient altogether uninjured.

In this effect of the hemp in India we see a counterpart of many of the wonderful feats performed by the fakeers and other religious devotees of that country. It indicates probably the true means also by which they are enabled to produce them. How much power a little knowledge gives to the dishonest and designing in every country over the ignorant and unsuspecting masses!

The effects of the haschisch of the Arabians, which probably do not differ from those of hemp in any of its forms, have been described to us from his own personal experience by a French physician, M. Moreau. When taken in small doses, its effect is simply to produce a moderate exhilaration of spirits, or at most a tendency to unseasonable laughter. Taken in doses sufficient to induce the _fantasia_, as its more remarkable effects are called in the Levant, its first influence is the same as when taken in a small dose; but this is followed by an intense feeling of happiness, which attends all the operations of the mind. The sun shines upon every thought that passes through the brain, and every movement of the body is a source of enjoyment. M. Moreau made many experiments with it upon his own person—appears indeed to have fallen into the habit of using it even after his return to France—and he describes and reasons upon its effects as follows:—

“It is really _happiness_ which is produced by the haschisch; and by
this I mean an enjoyment entirely moral, and by no means sensual, as
might be supposed. This is a very curious circumstance, and some
remarkable inferences might be drawn from it. Among others, for
example, that every feeling of joy and gladness, even when the cause
of it is exclusively moral—that those enjoyments which are least
connected with material objects, the most spiritual, the most
ideal—may be nothing else but sensations purely physical developed in
the interior of the system, in the same way as those which are
produced by means of the haschisch. At least, in so far as relates to
that of which we are internally conscious, there is no distinction to
be made between these two orders of sensations, in spite of the
diversity of causes to which they are due. For the haschisch-eater is
happy, not like the gourmand, or the famished man when satisfying his
appetite, or the voluptuary in the gratification of his amative
desires,—but like him who hears tidings which fill him with joy, or
like the miser counting his treasures, the gambler who is successful
at play, or the ambitious man who is intoxicated with success.”[47]

This glowing description of the effects of the haschisch, though given by one who had often used it, is yet on that very account, like the picture of the opium-eater, open to suspicion. We feel as if it were intended as a kind of excuse or justification of the indulgence on the part of the writer. Yet apart from this, the metaphysical question raised by M. Moreau is a very interesting one. To pursue it here, as a general question, would be out of place. We may observe, however, that it is intimately connected not only with the peculiar action exercised over the mind by each of the narcotics we are now considering, but with the probable cause of all those mental aberrations we include under the general term—_insanity_. Can we produce, for example, virtual insanity—imaginary happiness,[48] imaginary misery, or the most truth-like delusions—by introducing into the stomach, and thence into the blood which is passing through the hair-like blood-vessels of the brain, a quantity of a foreign body too minute to be recognised by ordinary chemical processes; and may not real natural insanity, in any of its forms, be caused by the natural production within the system itself of minute quantities of analogous substances possessing similar virtues? And, if so produced, will our future chemistry teach us to remove the mental disease, by preventing the production of the cause, or by constantly neutralising its effects? How important are these facts and considerations to a true pathology of insanity in general, and to every rational attempt to bring it, in all its phases, within the domain of the healing art!

When first it begins to act, the peculiar effects of the haschisch may be considerably diminished or altogether checked by a firm exertion of the will, “just as we master the passion of anger by a strong voluntary effort.” By degrees, however, the power of controlling at will and directing the thoughts diminishes, till finally all power of fixing the attention is lost, and the mind becomes the sport of every idea which either arises within itself, or is forced upon it from without.

“We become the sport of impressions of every kind. The course of our
ideas may be broken by the slightest cause. We are turned, so to
speak, by every wind. By a word or a gesture, our thoughts may be
successively directed to a multitude of different subjects with a
rapidity and lucidity which are truly marvellous. The mind becomes
possessed with a feeling of pride, corresponding to the exaltation of
its faculties, which it is conscious have increased in energy and
power. It will be entirely dependent on the circumstances in which we
are placed, the objects which strike the eyes, the words which fall on
our ears, whether the most lively sentiments of gaiety or of sadness
shall be produced, or passions of the most opposite character excited,
sometimes with extraordinary violence. Irritation may rapidly pass
into rage, dislike into hatred and desire for revenge, and the calmest
affection into the most transporting passion. So fear becomes terror,
courage is developed into rashness which nothing checks, and which
seems unconscious of danger, and the most unfounded doubt and
suspicion becomes a certainty.

“The mind has a tendency to exaggerate everything, and the slightest
impulse carries it along. Hence those who make use of the haschisch in
the East, when they wish to give themselves up to the intoxication of
the _fantasia_, withdraw themselves carefully from everything which
could give to their delirium a tendency to melancholy, or excite
anything but feelings of pleasurable enjoyment. They profit by all the
means which the dissolute manners of the East place at their disposal.
It is in the midst of the harem, surrounded by their women, under the
charm of music and of lascivious dances performed by the almees, that
they enjoy the intoxicating _dawamese_; and with the aid of
superstition, they find themselves almost transported to the scene of
the numberless marvels which the Prophet has collected in his
paradise.”[49]

The errors of perception to which the patient is liable during the period of fantasia, are remarkably experienced in regard to time and place. Minutes seem hours, and hours are prolonged into years, till at last all idea of time seems obliterated, and the past and the present are confounded together. Every notion, in this curious condition, seems to partake of a certain degree of exaggeration. One evening, M. Moreau was traversing the passage of the Opera when under the influence of a moderate dose of haschisch. He had made but a few steps when it seemed to him as if he had been there for two or three hours; and as he advanced the passage seemed interminable, its extremity receding as he pressed forward.[50]

The effect produced by hemp in its different forms varies, however, both in kind and in degree, with the individual to whom it is administered. Its general effect upon Orientals is of an agreeable and cheerful character, exciting them to laugh, dance, and sing, and to commit various extravagances—acting as an aphrodisiac, and increasing the appetite for food. Some, however, it renders excitable and quarrelsome, and disposes to acts of violence. It is from the extravagant behaviour of individuals of this latter temperament that the use and meaning of our word assassin have most probably arisen. There are some rare individuals, however, according to Dr Moreau, on whom the drug produces no effect whatever—upon whom, at least, doses are powerless which are usually followed by well-marked phenomena, as is the case with opium, long use making larger doses necessary. To some even a drachm of the churrus is considered a moderate dose, though sufficient to operate upon twenty ordinary men.

Upon Europeans generally, at least in Europe, its effects have been found to be considerably less in degree than upon Orientals. “In India, Dr O’Shaughnessy had seen marked effects from half a grain of the extract, or even less, and had been accustomed to consider one grain and a half a large dose; in England he had given ten or twelve or more grains, to produce the desired effect.”—(PEREIRA, p. 1242.) In kind, also, its effects upon Europeans differ somewhat from those produced upon Asiatics. It has never been known, for example, to produce that remarkable cataleptic state, described in a previous page as having been observed in India as the consequence even of a comparatively small dose of the hemp extract.

Of the chemistry of the hemp plant comparatively little is yet known. Had it been as long familiar to Europeans, or used as extensively as in the East, it would probably, like opium, have been the subject of repeated chemical investigations.

When distilled with water, the dried leaves and flowers yield a volatile oil in small quantity. The properties of this volatile oil have not been studied. It is not supposed, however, to have any important connection with the remarkable effects of the plant upon the living animal.

But the whole hemp plant is impregnated, as we have seen, with a resinous substance, in which its active virtues reside. When collected as it naturally exudes, this resin forms the churrus of India. It is extracted when the leaves are boiled with butter to form the basis of the haschisch, or when the dried plant is treated with alcohol to obtain the hemp extract. It is soft, dissolves readily both in alcohol and ether, and is separated from these liquids in the form of a white powder when the solutions are mixed with water. It has a warm, bitterish, acrid, somewhat balsamic taste, and a fragrant odour, especially when heated.

Both the resin which naturally exudes from the hemp plant, and the extract it yields to spirituous liquids, are probably mixtures of several substances possessed of different properties and relations to animal life. The remarkably complex composition of opium justifies such an opinion. And the analogy of the same substance makes it probable that the produce of the plant will differ in different localities and countries—so that the churrus of India, and the haschisch of Syria, may produce very different effects on the same constitution. But these points have not as yet been investigated either chemically or physiologically. This substance, therefore, holds out the promise of a rich and interesting harvest to future experimenters.

The extract of hemp differs considerably in its effects from opium. It does not lessen, but rather excites the appetite. It does not occasion nausea, dryness of the tongue, constipation, or lessening of the secretions, and is not usually followed by that melancholy state of depression to which the opium-eater is subject. It differs also in causing dilatation of the pupil, and sometimes catalepsy, in stilling pain less than opium does, in less constantly producing sleep, in the peculiar inebriating quality it possesses, in the phantasmata it awakens, and in its aphrodisiac effects. To the intellectual activity imparted by opium, it adds a corresponding sensitiveness and activity of all the feelings and of the senses, both internal and external. It seems, in fact, a source of exquisite and _peculiar_ enjoyment, with which, happily, we are in this part of the world still altogether unacquainted.

It is impossible to form any estimate of the quantity of hemp, of hemp resin, or of the artificial extract, which are used for purposes of indulgence. It must, however, be very large, since the plant is so employed, in one form or another, by probably not less than two or three hundred millions of the human race!

* * * * *

V. COCA.—When the Spanish conquerors overcame the Indians of the hilly country of Peru, they found among them plantations of an herb called coca, and the custom extensively prevalent of chewing its leaves during frequent short periods of repose specially set apart for the purpose. So universal, indeed, was the use of it, that it was the common money or medium of exchange of Peru, and after the introduction of gold and silver money, the principal article of traffic. The practice of using it was already ancient among the Indian races, and its origin is lost in the mists of remote antiquity. It continues equally prevalent to the present day among the Indian inhabitants of Bolivia and Peru. Coca is in reality the _Narcotic of the Andes_, and it is not less interesting than hemp, either in its social or in its physiological relations.

The _Erythroxylon coca_[51] is a bush which attains the height of six or eight feet, and resembles the blackthorn in its small white flowers and bright green leaves. It grows wild in many parts of Bolivia, but that which is used by the people is chiefly the produce of cultivation. Like our common thorn, it is raised in seed-beds, from which it is planted out into regular coca plantations. It is extensively cultivated in the tropical valleys of the eastern slopes of the Andes, in Upper and Lower Peru. The steep sides of these valleys, below the level of 8000 feet, are often covered with plantations of coca, arranged in terraces like the vine-culture of Tuscany and the Holy Land. The leaves, when ripe enough to break on being bent, are collected and dried in the sun. In favourable localities, the bushes yield three, and even four, crops of leaves in a year. When nearly dried, or exposed to the sun, they emit an odour similar to that of new-made hay, in which much mellilot, or sweet-scented vernal grass, is contained; and they give a headache to new-comers, as haymaking does to some persons among ourselves. These dried leaves form the coca of commerce. When of good quality, they are of a pale-green colour. Dampness causes them to become dark coloured, in which state they are less esteemed; and if they heat through dampness, they become altogether useless. Their taste is not unpleasant; it is slightly bitter and aromatic, and resembles that of green tea of inferior quality. It is more piquant and agreeable when a sprinkling of quicklime or plant ashes is chewed along with it.

The use of this herb among the Indians dates, as we have said, from very remote periods. Its cultivation was a care of the native government during the reign of the Incas, and it is still to the Indian of the mountains the delight, the support, and in some measure a necessity of his life. He is never seen without the leathern pouch (his _chuspa_) to contain his coca leaves, and his little gourd-bottle to hold powdered unslacked lime—or, if he is a Bolivian, the alkaline ashes left by the quinoa or the musa root when burned. Always three, and sometimes four times a-day, he rests from his mining or other labour, or pauses in his journey, and lays down his burden to chew in quiet the beloved leaf. When riding, or walking, or labouring, the leaves have little effect. As with opium and hemp, stillness and repose are indispensable to his full enjoyment of the luxury it produces. In the shade of a tree he stretches himself at ease, and from time to time puts into his mouth a few leaves rolled into a ball (an _acullico_), and after each new supply a little unslacked lime on the end of a slip of wood moistened and dipped into his lime-flask. This brings out the _true taste_ of the leaf, and causes a copious flow of greenish-coloured saliva, which is partly rejected and partly swallowed. When the ball ceases to emit juice it is thrown away, and a new supply is taken. The interval of enjoyment conceded to the labouring Indian lasts from fifteen minutes to half an hour, and is generally wound up by the smoking of a paper cigar. Repeated three or four times a-day, his average consumption is an ounce or an ounce and a half in the twenty-four hours, and on holidays double that quantity. The owners of mines and plantations have long found it for their interest to allow a suspension of labour three times a-day for the _chaccar_, as it is called; and the Indian speedily quits an employer who endeavours to stint or deprive him of these periods of indulgence. During these periods his _phlegm_ is something marvellous. No degree of urgency or entreaty on the part of his master or employer will move him; while the confirmed _coquero_, when under the influence of the leaf, is heedless of the thunder-storm which threatens to drown him where he lies, of the roar of approaching wild beasts, or of the smoking fire which creeps along the grass, and is about to suffocate or scorch him in his lair.

The Indians of the Peruvian Andes are subject to fits of melancholy, or are generally perhaps of a gloomy temperament. “In their domestic relations,” says Von Tschudi, “the Indians are unsocial and gloomy. Husband, wife, and children live together with but little appearance of affection. The children seem to approach their parents timidly, and whole days sometimes elapse without the interchange of a word of kindness between them. When not engaged in out-door work, the Indian sits gloomily in his hut, chewing coca and brooding silently over his own thoughts.”—_Travels_, p. 481.

It does not appear, however, that the coca adds to his gloom; on the contrary, he takes it to relieve himself for the time from the peculiarities of his temperament. Silence and abstraction are necessary to the enjoyment, but the use of it makes him cheerful; and it is to the unhappy, often oppressed, and always poor Peruvian, the source of his highest pleasures. It has come down to him as a relic of the ancient enjoyments of his people, and during the phantasy it produces, he participates in scenes and pleasures from which in common life he is altogether excluded. Dr Weddell very sensibly remarks, that, as a relic of the past, he attaches “superstitious ideas to the coca, which must triple, in his imagination, the benefits he receives from it,” and that its value to him is further enhanced by its being the “sole and only distraction which breaks the incomparable monotony of his existence.”

We have no detailed account, by an actual chewer of the leaf, of the special effects which it produces; but these must be very seducing, since, though long stigmatised, and still very generally considered as a degrading, purely Indian, and, therefore, despicable vice, many white Peruvians at Lima and elsewhere retire daily at stated times to chew the coca; and even Europeans in different parts of the country have fallen into the habit. A confirmed chewer of coca is called a “coquero,” and he is said to become occasionally more thoroughly a slave to the leaf than the inveterate drunkard is to spirituous liquors.

Sometimes the coquero is overtaken by a craving which he cannot resist, and he betakes himself for days together to the silence of the woods, and there indulges unrestrained in the use of the weed. Young men of the best families in Peru become sometimes addicted to it to this extreme degree of excess, and are then considered as lost. Forsaking cities and the company of civilised men, and living chiefly in woods or in Indian villages, they give themselves up to a savage and solitary life. Hence the term, a _white coquero_, has there something of the same evil sense as irreclaimable drunkard has with us.

The chewing of coca gives “a bad breath (abominable, according to Weddell), pale lips and gums, greenish and stumpy teeth, and an ugly black mark at the angles of the mouth. The inveterate coquero is known at the first glance. His unsteady gait, his yellow skin, his dim and sunken eyes encircled by a purple ring, his quivering lips, and his general apathy, all bear evidence of the baneful effects of the coca juice when taken in excess.”—VON TSCHUDI, p. 450.

Its first evil effect is to weaken the digestion; it then gradually induces a disease locally named the _opilacion_. Biliary affections, with all the painful symptoms which attend them in tropical climates, and, above all, gall stones, are frequent and severe. The appetite becomes exceedingly uncertain, till at length the dislike to all food is succeeded by an inordinate appetite for animal excrement. Then dropsical swellings and boils come on; and the patient, if he can get it, flies to brandy for relief, and thus drags out a few miserable years, till death relieves him.[52]

This description is sufficiently repulsive, but it is only the dark side of the picture. A similar representation could be truthfully made of the evil effects of wine or beer in too numerous cases, without thereby implying that these liquors ought either to be wholly forbidden, or of our own accord entirely given up. “Setting aside all extravagant and visionary notions on the subject, I am clearly of opinion,” says Von Tschudi, “that the moderate use of coca is not merely innoxious, but that it may even be very conducive to health. In support of this conclusion, I may refer to the numerous examples of longevity among Indians who, almost from the age of boyhood, have been in the habit of masticating coca three times a-day. Cases are not unfrequent of Indians attaining the great age of 130 years; and these men, at the ordinary rate of consumption, must in the course of their lives have chewed not less than 2700 lb. of the leaf, and yet have retained perfect health.” Even the Indian coquero, who takes it in excess, reaches the age of fifty years. It is consumed both more abundantly, however, and with less baneful results, in the higher Andes than in the lower and warmer regions.

It is certain that the Peruvian Indians ascribe to it the most extraordinary virtues. They regard it even at the present day as something sacred and mysterious. This impression they have inherited as a fragment of their ancient religion, for in all the ceremonies, whether warlike or religious, of the times of the Incas, the coca was introduced. It was used by the priests either for producing smoke at the great offerings to the gods, for throwing in handfuls upon the sacrifice, or as the sacrifice itself.

“During divine worship the priests chewed coca leaves, and unless they
were supplied with them, it was believed that the favour of the gods
could not be propitiated. It was also deemed necessary that the
supplicator for divine grace should approach the priests with an
acullico in his mouth. It was believed that any business undertaken
without the benediction of coca leaves could not prosper, and to the
shrub itself worship was rendered. During an interval of more than 300
years Christianity has not been able to subdue this deep-rooted
idolatry, for everywhere we find traces of belief in the mysterious
powers of this plant. The excavators in the mines of Cerro de Pasco
throw masticated coca on hard veins of metal, in the belief that it
softens the ore and renders it more easy to work. The origin of this
custom is easily explained, when it is recollected that in the time of
the Incas it was believed that the _cozas_, or the deities of metals,
rendered the mountains impenetrable if they were not propitiated by
the odour of coca. The Indians, even at the present time, put coca
leaves into the mouths of dead persons, to secure to them a favourable
reception on their entrance into another world; and when a Peruvian
Indian on a journey falls in with a mummy, he, with timid reverence,
presents to it some coca leaves as his pious offering.”—VON TSCHUDI,
p. 454.

And even Europeans cannot deny that, in addition to the ordinary properties of a narcotic, this leaf possesses two very remarkable properties not known to coexist in any other substance.

_First_, They lessen, when chewed, the necessity for ordinary food, and not only enable the chewer, as opium does, to put forth a greater nervous energy for a short time, but actually, with the same amount of food, perseveringly to undergo more laborious fatigue or longer-continued labour. With a feeble ration of dried maize, or barley crushed into flour, the Indian, if duly supplied with coca, toils under heavy burdens, day after day, up the steep slopes of the mountain passes, or digs for years in the subterranean mines, insensible to weariness, to cold, or to hunger. He believes, indeed, that it may be made a substitute for food altogether; and an instance given by Von Tschudi seems almost to justify this opinion.

“A cholo of Huari, named Hatan Huamang, was employed by me in very
laborious digging. During the five days and nights he was in my
service he never tasted any food, and took only two hours’ sleep each
night. But at intervals of two and a half or three hours he regularly
chewed about half an ounce of coca leaves, and he kept an acullico
continually in his mouth. I was constantly beside him, and therefore I
had the opportunity of closely observing him. The work for which I
engaged him being finished, he accompanied me on a two days’ journey
of twenty-three leagues across the level heights. Though on foot, he
kept up with the pace of my mule, and halted only for the _chaccar_.
On leaving me he declared he would willingly engage himself again for
the same amount of work, and that he would go through it without food,
if I would but allow him a sufficient supply of coca. The village
priest assured me that this man was sixty-two years of age, and that
he had never known him to be ill in his life.”—VON TSCHUDI, p. 453.

How this remarkable effect of the coca is to be accounted for, in accordance with the received notions as to animal nutrition, it is not easy to see.

_Second_, Another striking property of this leaf is, that, either when chewed or when taken in the form of infusion, like tea, it prevents the occurrence of that difficulty of respiration which is usually felt in ascending the long and steep slopes of the Cordillera and the Puna.

“When I was in the Puna,” says Von Tschudi, “at the height of fourteen
thousand feet above the level of the sea, I drank always, before going
out to hunt, a strong infusion of coca leaves. I could then during the
whole day climb the heights and follow the swift-footed wild animals,
without experiencing any greater difficulty of breathing than I should
have felt in similar rapid movements on the coast. Moreover, I did not
suffer from the symptoms of cerebral excitement or uneasiness which
other travellers have experienced. The reason perhaps is, that I only
drank the decoction on the cold Puna, where the nervous system is far
less susceptible than in the climate of the forests beneath. However,
I always felt a sense of great satiety after taking the coca infusion,
and I did not feel a desire for my next meal until after the time at
which I usually took it.”

The reason of this action of the leaf is not less difficult to perceive than that of its strength-sustaining capabilities.

When the Spanish conquerors took possession of Peru, the Indians, and all their customs, were treated by them with equal contempt; but everything connected with their religion was especially denounced by the Spanish priests. Hence the use of coca was condemned and forbidden. It was considered worthy the consideration of councils of the church, which denounced it in 1567 as a “worthless substance, fitted for the misuse and superstition of the Indians,” and of the thunders of a royal decree which, in 1569, condemned the idea that coca gives strength as an “illusion of the devil.” But these fulminations were of no avail. The Peruvians still clung to their esteemed national leaf, and the owners of mines and plantations, soon discovering its efficacy in enabling their slaves to perform the heavy tasks they imposed upon them, became its warm defenders. Even churchmen at last came to regard it with indulgence, and, stranger still, to recommend its introduction into Europe.