427
28. I have no personal knowledge in this matter.
29. I have only known of dhatura being mixed
with bhang to increase its intoxicating effects.
30. Never in solitude. The smoking of charas or
drinking of bhang is always practised in company
and generally on special occasions when it is desired
to produce an exhilarating effect on those assembled.
Seldom used by women or children.
31. I have often noticed that charas smokers on
first admission into this Asylum miss the habit very
much and crave for the indulgence.
36. I think among the more educated classes
alcohol is certainly taking the place of other intoxi-
cants, for the reason that it is pleasanter to the
palate and because its consumption is supposed to
be a more civilised habit. A charas smoker is
generally looked down upon by the educated natives
of India.
37. I am not aware of any difference beyond
the fact that charas-smoking impairs the appetite
while bhang-drinking rather improves it than other-
wise.
39. Among my asylum lunatics I have certainly
found a much larger number of cases of insanity
among charas smokers than among bhang drinkers.
41. (a) Moderate use of bhang increases the
appetite.
(b), (c) and (d) No.
42. I have known several natives who occasion-
ally use bhang as a drink and seem to be none the
worse for it. Charas smokers on the contrary
nearly always appear more or less weak-minded,
have bad memories and are eccentric in their habits,
if not actually insane.
44. Some stupefaction and exilaration of spirits.
Bhang is said to be refreshing as a drink and im-
proves the appetite. The effect lasts a few hours.
45. Charas smokers, even in moderation, are
generally emaciated and in poor health and are de-
praved creatures both mentally and physically.
This is not the case with moderate consumers of
bhang as far as I have been able to gather. The
excessive habitual use of charas and bhang does,
in my opininon, tend to produce insanity in indivi-
duals who have a predisposition that way, but
I do not think the drug would cause insanity in
every case, even when indulged in very largely. It
is the exciting cause, not the predisposing cause.
The insanity is nearly always of an excitable noisy
kind. The patient talks incoherently, is restless,
sings or weeps, and is never still for a moment.
He has no particular delusions or hallucinations, but
loses all sense of modesty and decency, is filthy in
his habits and often abusive and violent, though I
have never known a lunatic of this kind do any
actual harm to any one.
He is seldom or never homicidally or suicidally
inclined. There are no symptoms peculiar to this
form of insanity. The large proportion of cases I
have seen were people of low caste and with little or
no education. I do not think mental disease or
anxiety tends to make a man resort to hemp.
Toxic insanes always readily admit having used the
drug. The insanity is temporary and the patients
always recover if kept away from the drug, but
there is a tendency to a return to the habit when
released from the asylum, and in such cases the
patient generally becomes insane again after a
short time. Cases Nos. 1, 9 and 10, particulars
of which accompany* this report, are typical cases
of toxic insanity due to the use of charas.
47 and 48. I do not think so.
49 and 50. From what I can gather the use of
charas has no direct effect one way or the other on
the virile powers. The habitual use of charas im-
pairs the general health, and thus indirectly leads
to impotence, though the sexual passions return as
soon as the patient discontinues the use of charas
and is restored to health.
3. I have seen the plant growing in great profu-
sion in the Kangra valley and also in the Doon
below Mussoorie.
5. A somewhat damp climate with a moderate
temperature appears to be most favourable for its
growth.
6. Dense jungles of the wild plant are to be seen
in the Doon.
20. Charas is smoked almost entirely by the
lower classes and the uneducated. A charas smoker
is looked down upon by educated natives.
25. The general impression appears to be that
the use of charas and bhang is on the decrease, for
the reason that alcohol in some form is talcing their
place.
33. Charas smokers, as before stated, are despised
by the better classes, though bhang drinkers are not
as a rule considered so despicable. The reason no
doubt is that a charas smoker is generally more or
less insane and good for nothing while bhang
drinkers are not so.
43. Moderate consumers of bhang as a drink are
certainly inoffensive to their neighbours. I do not
think the same can be said of moderate smokers of
charas.
53. I do not know of any case of insanity due
to the use of hemp leading to temporary homicidal
frenzy.
Oral evidence.
I have been over fourteen years in the service. I
have had no special experience in regard to insanity
in this country beyond what I have indicated in my
written answer. I had no official experience of a
special character in regard to insanity at home ; but
I devoted myself specially to the study of insanity
for about a year, and frequently visited the Bickton
Asylum while engaged in this study. I know of
no special literature dealing with hemp drugs insa-
nity. I have not been able to lay my hands on any.
I can say nothing about the pathological changes
winch may occur from the hemp drugs. I have
made several post-mortem examinations of persons
with charas history, and made naked eye inspection
of the brains, but I have found nothing. None of
them were deaths in the acute stage. I made the
post-mortems with the view of ascertaining whether
there were any pathological changes, and found
none. I did not use the microscope.
I have not studied the physiological action of
hemp beyond what is given in text-books. I
cannot refer to any book where the effects of a
continued course of hemp drugs are treated. I have
been unable to find any.
Of the ten hemp drug cases admitted in 1892,
three cases (shown as No. 4, No. 5 and No. 6)
have been proved not to be due to the drugs, for
the lunatics were not addicted to them. One case
(No. 8) is not, I think, a hemp-drug. case. There
is no evidence as to the lunatic's habits ; but the
case is in no way like a hemp-drug case, and I do
not so classify it.
In regard to case No. 3, I have no recollection.
I am not sure whether it was a case of dementia.
vol. v.
* Vide Vol. II, Appendices.
3 M 2