a stimulating effect. And there is no doubt that the belief in the possession
of active properties by the seeds has been very widespread. Thus Dioscorides
remarks that if too largely used as food they destroy virility ; Pliny makes
the same statement, but says also that it was a custom to roast the seeds and
send them round after a banquet ; they were supposed to promote mirth,
and increase the desire to drink; if taken in too great quantities, however,
bad symptoms supervened ; the symptoms, it may be remarked, might have
been due to the wine. Galen repeats Pliny's account without augmentation.
The early Arab physicians Avicenna and Rázi follow the Greek writers, and
give only the properties mentioned by Galen. The belief that there is a virtue
in the seeds still prevailed among the people of the East when European authors
first became acquainted with the Indies, and Garcia d'Orta and Rumphius both
mention the practice of using them, but for the opposite purpose of increasing
the sexual appetite, which the early writers alleged to be destroyed by their
use. But Rumphius, a very careful observer, found that in Malaya at all events
the seeds had no effect, the one way or the other. If the preparations of the
Turks and Persians had some effect, he quite justifiably concluded that it must
be owing to substances which these peoples added to their hemp-seeds.¹ But in
Europe in the middle ages this same belief had arisen, for Matthiolus says that,
so far from having the effect of causing sterility, hemp-seeds render fowls fed
upon them more prolific, and. cause them to lay eggs in whiter, though they
are not naturally given to laying at that season.² The most recent statement
of any action being produced by the use of hemp-seeds is that by Burnett,³ to
the effect that bullfinches and gold-finches fed too long on them have their
plumage changed from red and yellow to black. Pereira, who quotes the
statement, doubts it, 4, but apparently no experiment has been made which
positively disproves it.
However, there is no doubt that O'Shaughnessy is quite justified in con-
cluding, as Rumphius had already, that the seed is " devoid of all narcotic
properties."5 In theg á n j á m a h a l
o f B e n g a l t h e s e e d s a r e e a t e n w i t h o u t a n y i d e a
of their being unwholesome and without any ill-effect.
The Persian epithet for the seeds, Shahdanay, or 'kingly grain,' would
appear not to refer to any power supposed to reside in them, but to be merely a
complimentary term conferred on them, because they produce such a power-
ful plant. Complimentary Sanskrit terms were Indrásana, Sakrásana (words of
great interest as embodying also the original Aryan name S' ana), 'food of
Indra,' terms equivalent to the Greek 'nectar,' and 'ambrosia.' Similarly
complimentary, as has been said, may be the terms haschisch and subji, which
also (subz) was used in Persia, though the fact that haschisch began life as a low
cant phrase would rather indicate its original use as an euphemism.
Dioscorides mentions the juice of the plant as being useful in earache,
which suggests a knowledge of its narcotic power, but as Pliny enlarges on this
property, and says that it is useful in expelling worms or other animals that may
have entered the ears, we must conclude that if its use in Greece was as an
anodyne, its powers in that direction were not relied on in Italy.
It is of interest to note that the Chinese have long used an extract of the
plant as an anæsthetic in some surgical operations, and that recently in England
it has been found useful in this way, when rubbed on the gums before the
extraction of teeth.
In the Susruta the plant with a masculine name, and therefore indicating
the female plant, is described as useful medicinally, and this idea has
prevailed in India to the present day. The powers ascribed to it are, however,
apparently more or less fanciful, and it seems that when the plant is yet
too young to be narcotic, beyond some diuretic properties, it possesses no
especial virtue. In the middle ages in Europe the plant in the same way had
medicinal powers, chologogue, styptic, and others, which are not borne out by
modern experience, ascribed to it.
¹ Rumphius thought that the inadequacy of the Malayan preparations might be at least in part
explained quod Mogollenses, Persœ ac Turcœ melius norunt prœparare quam viles harum insularum
(Herb. Amboin. v, 210.)
²Matthiolus, Kreuterbuck, ed. Camerarius, p. 316 (1580).
3 Outlines of Botany , p. 560 (1835).
4 Materia Medica , vol. 2, p. 1239 (1850).
5 Dispensatory, p. 581.