112
nervous debility, spermatorrhœa, and impotence
may result.
50. A fortiori—will the excessive use of the
drugs tend to produce physical deterioration; and
also mental derangement.
56. (a) ' Massala' mixed with bhang is said to
modify the intoxicating effects, and in this way is
habitually used by ordinary moderate consumers.
(b) Dhatura and opium are mixed when more
pronounced intoxication is desired, and for criminal
purposes.
57. No experience.
Oral evidence.
Question 1.—I have been in the service from
1859 and in civil employ for thirty years. The
bulk of my service has been in Benares and Luck-
now. I had no lunacy experience in England.
Such general remarks as I have made in answers
30, 32, 36, etc., are generally chiefly based on
inquiries made from natives (both subordinates and
patients and the more educated natives one meets),
especially inquiries made in connection with this
Commission.
Question 32.—Probably 90 per cent. is a consid-
erably exaggerated figure, as I find by recent inquiry.
Of course, my percentage in any case was of adult
males.
Question 39.—I have not seen Dr. Prain's report
on hemp drugs. My opinion as to smoking being
worse than (bhang) drinking is mainly based on
asylum records. Beyond experience, I have no
scientific reason for holding this opinion. I have
not thought the matter over from the physiologi-
cal point of view. But I think that smoking the
drug into the lungs would be more injurious, as it
would affect the blood more readily.
Question 44.—My experience in regard to pri-
soners is that the effects of sudden deprivation of
hemp drugs are not so great as in the case of opium.
There is sense of deprivation, but not marked in
the case of hemp drugs. It seldom comes to the
notice of the Jail Superintendent. I have never
seen any serious effects from the sudden depriva-
tion.
Question 45.—My remarks about the absence
of ill-results from the moderate use of the drugs
in a healthy subject are based on inquiry made
from natives both recently and formerly. I have
not seen asthma or bronchitis due to smoking
ganja. I have no experience of such smoking as
a remedy for these diseases.
My remarks about insanity are the result of my
asylum experience. The second paragraph refers
to the drug only as the exciting cause, i.e., a pre-
disposing cause existed. Moderate use may pro-
duce insanity in such cases. Where there is
any tendency to insanity also, the moderate use has
a tendency to develop into the excessive ; and we
have a considerable proportion of such cases which
have the history shown in my answer. In a
healthy person (a person otherwise healthy) the
moderate use of the drugs is innocuous ; but in a
person with predisposition to insanity it is extreme-
ly risky. It is only recently that inquiries have
been made into the asylum cases in reference to
this Commission. An inquiry is now being made
into selected cases ; and I shall be better able to
deal with them when that inquiry is over.
Lunatics come to me in two different capacities
—(1) as Civil Surgeon, and (2) as Superintendent
of the asylum. When a man comes to me as
Civil Surgeon for examination, I receive as a rule
no information at all as to the cause. If friends
accompany, I make inquiries. That, however, is
rare: they rarely come. All I consider myself
bound to deal with is the man's state of mind, not
the cause of his insanity.
When the man, having been certified insane, is
sent to the asylum, he comes there with informa-
tion as to the circumstances of the case. That
information is contained in a statement prepared
under the Magistrate's orders, but (I should think)
not by him, but by some subordinate. The in-
formation is very scanty. That statement contains
an entry as to probable cause. My practice has
not been to enter the cause in my asylum register
at once, but to wait until a diagnosis of the case
has been made. Then if the supposed cause as
shown in the Magistrate's statement, is not incon-
sistent with the diagnosis of the insanity, or with
the information received from friends who may
have come, or with statements made by the man
himself if he recovers sufficiently, that cause is
entered in the register. In the majority of cases
friends do come, some time or other, to see patients
who are in the asylum. On inquiry made from
them the entry, if already made, would be cor-
rected if the information seemed to require
this. Such relatives may come at any time to
the asylum. Therefore the inquiries made from
them are not ordinarily made by me, but by the
Deputy Superintendent, who is a Hospital Assist-
ant. The cause assigned by the Magistrate's
statement has been altered thus in a considerable
proportion of cases, chiefly in respect to inquiry
from friends eliciting some hereditary tendency.
In the majority the cause entered in the Magis-
trate's papers (if they have shown a cause) remains.
In cases where the statement is carelessly prepared
showing little effort to obtain full information, I
assign no value whatever to the cause assigned.
When there has been a hunting out of relatives and
details are given, I should attach more value to the
assigned cause. As a rule, inquiry is careless, not
thorough. I say this chiefly because in many cases
friends come where the statement has shown no
friends traced. Taking the Magistrate's statement
alone, I regard this as an unsatisfactory method of
entering cause. Taken however in connection with
the inquiries which I have been in the habit of
insisting on at the asylum, I think the material
on the whole satisfactory. If no other cause of
insanity is assigned or elicited in inquiry, and the
history of use of any hemp drug is assigned or
established, I consider that a sufficient ground for
entering that hemp drug as the cause of insanity.
This entry would necessarily lead to the entry of
the case as one of toxic insanity.
In hemp drug insanity the excitement is not
generally so violent as in acute mania. There is
more mental excitement than physical violence,
confusion of thought and ideas, frequently delusion,
generally sleeplessness. All these symptoms will
be found in cases of insanity due to other causes
than hemp drugs. But in hemp drug cases, the
violence of the symptoms is of shorter duration and
gradually diminishes and without relapse, unless
the patient falls back into his habit.
The diagnosis is one by exclusion, excluding
other causes and taking the ganja history. There
are many causes which may occasion acute mania
in a modified form, e.g., heredity, mental strain or
brain exertion, shock, grief, abuse of alcohol,
starvation, privation, nervous exhaustion from
various causes, many forms of disease, and others.
In any case of insanity if we are to arrive at the
cause, an accurate history is absolutely essential,