Madison times. (Tallulah, Madison Parish, La.) 1884-1???, 1885-03-28
TWENTY THOUSAND SLAVES.
In Bondage in This City. to the Nor.
phine Habit.
SecIety Women Who Go on Morphine Sprees
Five out Of Every Hundred Sometimes
Addicted to the Use Of Narcotics.
St. Louis Sunday Sayings.


the proprietor Of a well-known corner drug
store on Fifth street the other day to SAY
INas man: "If you acted as clerk in this
store for day or so you'd soon discover
how much the modern man, and especially
woman, Is addicted to the use of narcotics.
"But opium is being rapidly replaced by
morphine in the way Of sulphate Of mOrphia
pills o. a solution inserted simultaneously
by hypodermic syringe" continued the
man Of medicine, land this comparatively
recent mode Of taking narcotics has increas-
ed the sale and use Of the drug wonderfully.
Perhaps you'd hardly think it, but according
to q recent report on the subject, st. Louis
is credited with at least 10000 who are more
or less slaves to these drugs.
Fifty years ago opium in the shape Of
gum was the regular thing. This by chew
ing was taken into the system, producing a
similar effect to when consumed in pipe,
but now
MoRPHIA Is IN THE ASCENDANT,
as shown effectively by the revenue state
ments. don't know the exact figures OF
the local consumption, but in the report
mentioned, Albany, N. Y. was credited with
an unusual consumption of $500 lbs. OF
opium, $500 ounces of morphine, and 5OO,-
900 sulphate of morphia pills, and should
say St. Louis cannot be far behind these
figures.
"When you consider the fact that in many
Of the smaller southern towns even as high
as five out of every hundred use these drugs
II Is not surprising that the amount paid for
these In the United States last year amount
ed to IS 900, 900.
women are our principal customers in
these things as they are, in fact, in most
every thing, and the majority Of them are
members of the best families in St. Louis.
See that lady," continued the druggist nod
egantly dressed woman who had Just alight-
ed from q carriage, and was walking toward
the rear of the store; "She's one of our
REGULAR CUSTOMERS.
Her supply's run out and that accounts for
her walking away back to where she can tell
the clerk what she wants without fear OF be
ing overheard.
"Her husband is B, the dry goods man.
Poor old fellow. When he soothes his
q
supposed sicknnss, he little dreams that my
lady Is merely recovering from a morphine
drunk. But that's just how 1t Is, and there
are terrible number of st. Louis ladies
who are blighting the happiness of their
homes and hurTying themselves along to a
petite which was probably first created In a
case Of genuine sickness.
"Then the ELS the men. Most of these
commence to take morphine to alleviate
acute pain, afterwards keeping up the nabit
for the same reason that a topper keeps up
drinking. There's many a man In this city
whose Withholding eyes and drunken ap-
pearance at times leads people to believe
they have been drinking when in reality
they have been indulging their
APPETITE FOR MORPHINE.
One case of this kind could mention in par
ticular where thriving young business man
who was conducting one of the largest and
bestpaying groceries in the city almost lit
orally ran himself In the ground by feeding
an appetite for morphine acquired in this
way. For year or more he was never suf
ficiently himself to keep his affairs straight.
People said he had taken to drink, Tut the
little whisky he got away with never hurt
him. 1t was the mophine and opium that
did 1t. From q stout, robust fellow he
changed to a broken. half-imbecile man,
who didn't have sufficient sense or will pow
robbed on every hand; his trade left him
gradually; wholesale men grew afraid to
trust him and he went under. For q while
he was pauper, lowering between life and
death, youth at last succeeding in casting
OF disease.
II saw him the other day. He has
CONQUERED THE HABIT
lost the appetite during his sickness-but
ne has aged ten years In one. l asked him
what he was doing. Clerking In a grocery
store he said for $40 week-a pretty tough
thing for man who had been worth some
thousands.
by the way, there's another of my lady
morphine customers. I'll have to wait on
her myself" and the druggist hurried off to
greet laDguid-lo0king young woman,
whose eyelids dropped as though too heavy
to be long sustained appraised, while beneath
the lower lids dull. black ring gave 1evi-
dence Of slow-pulsing vitality.