The Black Hills union. [volume] (Rapid City, Pennington County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1889-1904, 1897-02-12

yan8AaWEfrsA has been made by
~'H3SF a man who is him
xE self a famous ply
sician and special
st, and who offers in proof Of his ter
rible statement an array of statistics
which certainly seems to be conclusive,
Jays the New York Herald.
When ALBERT was arrested in Paris
the other day onthe charge of assas-
sinating the young philatelist, Della
haeff, it soon became apparent that he
was a confirmed morphine iend. Dur
ing his trial he suffered -agonies for
lack of the deadly drug and at last the
public prosecutor, fearing that he
would utterly collapse, instructed a
physician to administer a timely in
lection. This in itself, the prisoner be-
ing on trial, was a remarkable proceed
ing, but what surprised the public
more was the fact that a poverty-strick-
en- fellow like Aubert should have be-
come addicted to the use of such an
expensive drug as morphine. Hitherto
the popular opinion has been that only
the comparatively well-to-do could af-
ford a luxury of this kind, but now
this opinion has been shown to be base
less.
The question, then, which the French
people are asking is: How are we to
account for this strange epidemic, which
is evidently spreading among all
classes of society? To this question a
startling reply has been given by this
eminent French specialist and physi-
clan. Here is what he says:
II do not desire my name to be men
toned" he began, because what I have
to say is not very f1attering to a GER
tain number of my colleagues, and,
while I have nothing to conceal, I have
neither the time nor the inclination to
take part in any paper war OF the sub
ject."
1t may be stated here that this spe-
cialist is n of the best-known living
authorities on nervous diseases.
"The mania for morphine" he con-
tinued, sis growing daily among all
classes. Statistics on the subject are
not easily obtainable, because morphine
fiends are very crafty and because no
exterior symptoms condemn them in
public, as is the case with drunkards
and epileptics. From what many drug
gists and physicians have told me,
however, I estimate that there are not
less than $4,000 persons in Paris who
use morphine secretly and almost con-
stantly. Most of these who belong to
the army of degenrates are women;
indeed, 1 should put their number at
not less than 10000.
more instructive, however, than this
general statement are the following
statistics, which have been carefully
compiled and which show how the vice
has spread among persons of the vari-
u professions. Here is a table of
230 morphine fends who belong to
twenty-five different professions or
trades. You will see-and this is the
most startling point-that the first
rank on the list is occupied by physi-
clans and their wives, the number of
victims among them being sixty-nine.
In the second rank We find army Off
GERS and their wives, the number of
victims among them being twenty; in
the third, druggists and their families,
and in the fourth, workingmen and
workingwomen, the number of victims
among them being eighteen. Among
members of the other professions
namely. college professors, magistrates,
literary men, artists and others--the
number of victims varies from two to
ten.