The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1886-08-18
WHAT CHEWING GUM DOES.
Doctors Declare that 1t Causes Serious Bron-
chial and Other Troubles.
From the New York s.arl

(From the New York Starr
Inthe thousand and one shops sprinkled
through the narrow streets of this city,
where youngsters buy lollipops, where
boys invest their savings in base balls
ard cigarettes at a penny apiece, and
where the young ladies Of the tenements
purchase the latest yellow-bound itera-
ture, there is always for sale substance
known as black chewing gum. Whether
it is done up in spangled tinfoil, or re-
splendent in gaudy tissue paper, or
decorated with parti-colored ribbon, it is
still black chewing gum. It is made
generally out of refuse gum arabic-stuf
that cannot be used in the apothecary
shops, and is favored variously with the
cheapest of cheap extracts, icorice, win
tergreen, peppermint, or, more usually.
one of those poisonous favorings that
are compounded from acids. The manu-
facturers cut a huge slab of the gum into
quadrangular pieces about the size Of a,
domino. In cool weather the bits are
friable and break easily; when it is.
warm, they have the consistence of a,
piece of idea rubber.
It is surprising how much of this
black chewing gum is used. A little
girl gets hold of penny somehow, and
she cannot get to shop quick enough
to buy some of it. She chews and chews
and chews on it, her jaws working as
regularly and vigorously as those Of a
Fourth OF July orator. If she has a
wish to show particular favor to her
ive-year-old sweetheart, she gives him g.
morsel. The young ladies who de7our
the yellow bound novels devour gum,
too. They place a fragment of it be-
tween the hindermost Of their pearly
teeth, and while their souls go out to
Elvira in her prison, or their hearts fut-
ter in sympathy with Edgar de Mont
morenci in his attempt to carry off the
heiress, they don't forget to chew that
gum. Young beaus, the leaders in tene-
ment house society, chew it, too; for the
men who make it advertise that it per-
fumes the breath and lends the mouth
the odor OF a new-mown field, also that
it aids digestion and clears the voice and
is harmless and beautiful substitute for
tobacco; that it is, in fact, a penny bit
of ambrosial food for the gods.
It isn't. The physicians of Amster-
dam, n. Y, have Just declared in solemn
conclave that the practice of chewing
this black gum is most harmful and
pernicious. They have traced directly
to it innumerable cases of sore mouth
and sore throat that they have treated of
late. Their brethren of the medical pro-
fession in New York agree with them,
and not only condemn black chewing
gum, but all chewing gum Of whatever
color.
The physician who has charge Of the
throat dispensary in one of the largest
hospitals in New York said a few days
ago: ebay after day patients, nearly all
girls between s and IS years of age,
come in here and complain that it hurts
them when they swallow, or else that
their mouths sting when they drink any
thing warm. On examining their throats
I find the delicate mucous membrane
marked here and there with little in
famed patches. In nine cases out of ten
it is caused by chewing gum"
why is the gum hurtful?"
'The favoring is usually poisonous"
replied the doctor, 'tand by its constant
presence, in however small a quantity,
it sets up an Inflammation. But the
habit is otherwise pernicious. The un-
firing motion of a gum chewer's jaws
provokes superduous flow Of saliva
just as if there was always pinch Of salt
on the tongue-and wears out the saliva
glands. Gum chewing retards digestion.
If woman fills her stomach with water
or saliva she browns the gastric juices;
also the interminable attrition wears out
the teeth, and foreign favor by degrees
renders the breath more and more dis
agreeable. The practice is bad in every
way"