The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-11-30
The Sunday Journal has the largest and
best circulation of any Sunday paper in In
diana, Price three cents.
THE NEW ANEsTHETIO.

1t is but rev weeks slIlce Inc lOCdl cOAuhin9
of the Journal gave an account of the new
anmstbetic. the muriate of cocaine. Cocaine
is the active principle of the coca South
American shrub, which is cultivated in Bo-
Hvia and New Granada for its stimulating
leaves, which are chewed by the natives. The
leaves have strong, tea-hke odor, and the in
fusion resembles ordinary tea in taste. Though
unofficial in the pharmacopeia, the plant has
long been known to medical science, and first
through the historical notes of Sir Robert
Christison. Cocaine is an alkaloid having,
like morphine and strychnine, decided basic
properties, and uniting readily with acids to
form salts allied to sulphate of morpha
or of quinine. Cocaine crystallizes in rhom-
bic transparent and colorless prisms. These,
united with muriatic acid, form the salt in
question, which is exciting as much attention
now as ether or chloroform at the time Of
their discovery as an@sthetics. The salt has
rapidly found its way to Western cities, and
has come into such demand as to sell at
almost fabulous sums-several thousand dol
lars pound. The great value of the new
remedy is that it has only local effects, and
does not subject the patient to the nausea,
discomfort, and even danger, attending gen
eral an@sthesia. The attention of American
physicians was first called to the new agent by
DR.. Moves, in the New York Medical
Record of Oct H., while giving an
account of the proceedings of the
Heidelberg archaeological Congress. Sew
sral New York physicians, acting upon this
hint, used the new local anasthetic in oper-
ations on the eye with satisfactory and even
astonishing results, and now successful ap-
plications of it are being reported from every
medical center. A per cent. solution of
the drug is dropped into the eye at intervals
of three minutes for quarter of an hour,
and during the operation the application is
continued at intervals of five minutes. Its
application is not limited to the eye, as it has
been successfully used as local destroyer of
pain in various parts of the body. The only
drawback to its use at present seems its
cost, which has been one dollar
grain. Owing to the small amount of
the alkaloid found in the coca leaves
it will probably not be manufactured at less
than forty cents grain but as so little of it
is required, it will doubtless hold its own
with chloroform and ether for all trivial OPP
erations.
The fluid extract of the leaves has long
been prescribed to diminish the excitability
of the motor nerves 1t has long been known
to the mountaineers of the Peruvian Andes
that chewing the coca leaves increases the
respiratory power and lessons the sense of
fatigue. According to DR.. Barth olow it
was used by the celebrated pedestrian, Weston,
during his extraordinary walking feats. 1t is
estimated that 5000, 600 of the race use the
coca leaves, consuming annually over
10000, 900 pounds of the leaves,
made into balls by mixing with
lime The alkaloid was discovered by
Niernann in 1855; its physiological action is
apparently identical with that of theme and
,affene. Taken in large quantities it apower-
sul poison to the nervous, respiratory and cir
eulatory systems, and may terminate in death.
The history of modern medical anasthesia
covers less than forty years. Common sui
phuric ether was first used in the Massachu
sets General Hospital in the case of Alice
Mahon, by DR.. Warren. in the presence of
Dr. Henry J. Bigelow, Of Harvard University.
This eminent surgeon attributes its intro
duction absolutely to DIR. VIM. T. G. Morton,
a dentist of Boston. who had used it over
- hundred times in extracting teeth, before
Dr. Bigelow invited him to giveitto the girl Ma
hon, in the case of amputation, October, 1896
but Morton did not get the credit due him.
His preceptor, DR.. Jackson, Harvard pro
fessor of chemistry, claimed the discovery as
he had suggested ether to Morton jackson
got the ear of Humboldt and of the French
Academy, and compelled the European world,
to the confines of Turkey, to believe him, aud
the learned societies did what they could
awarded to Morton the same honors they had
wrongly granted Jackson, The history is a
sad one. DR.. Horace Wells, who went to
Paris just after the discovery, claimed it falsely
for himself. He died bereft of reason, as did
also Jackson, while the modest Morton,
ThO knew not %, machinery of