Evening star., 1922-09-10

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| shows a diminished sense Of smell,
of sight and Of hearing: there may be
even temporary total blindness His
eyelids are wide open and the pupils
| are dilated and fixed. The continued
| wide-open state of the eyes may lead
| to inflammation and even clouding of
! the cornea. The pulse. which has
been rapid, suddenly becomes slow
and intermittent. There is greatly
| increased reflex irritability with. at
| times. spasmodic movement or even
| epileptiform or tonic commissions
Sometimes there is true tetanj,
spasm. The commissions are followed
by paralysis.
HTHE symptoms of chronic cocain-
ism are in general like those -.
morphinism, except that the mora
degradation which followed the con-
tinued use OF cocaine is much greater
than that of morphine. The victims
of cocaine lose all sense of the:.
moral and social obligations. and
their self-respect vanishes more
rapidly and more completely than
| with morphine. 1t is a curious fact
that 1t is rarely that we find clear
| cases of either morphinism or CO.
cainism in the underworld most of
the users being addicted 20 both NOR
phine and cocaine. In these cases OF
morpho coca inism. however the use
of one drug usually predominates over
that of the other. and the case shows
q
produced by the drug which is taken
in the greater amount. Those who
use chiefly cocaine show a greater
tendency to hallucinations and mani
acal excitement than the users of
morphine, in whom the desire for
sleep is more pronounced"
DR.. Rhees describes how a morphine
addict appears when deprived OF his
dope. The pen picture is not long.
but ii should be a warning to every
one who has ever thought of trying
one of these drugs for the purpose OF
experiencing new sensation. The
following is picture of a morphine
user upon being deprived of his usual
quantity of drug: He, is first aware
OF vague uneasiness. Testlessness
and sense Of depression. followed by
yawning. sneezing. excessive mucous
| secretion. sweating. nausea, uncon-
| trolled vomiting and purging. twitch-
ing and jerking. intense muscular
cramp and pain. abdominal distress.
marked circulatory and cardiac in
sufficiency and irregularity. pulse 60
ing from extremes of slowness to ex-
tremes of rapidity with loss of tone
deepening to grayness, exhaustion
and collapse"
T Mike whisky or the concoctions
they call whisky nowadays. CO.
caine. morphine and other drugs are
more easily concealed. They are han
died, as a rule. in decks" this being
the term applied to the little paper
packets in which they are secreted and
imported into this country. They are
brought in in many ways. Seafar-
ing men speak Of the Chinese hay
ing brought morphine into this coun-
try between sheets of blotting paper.
1t has been concealed in little glass
capsules. in fountain pens and the
ferrules of canes, hollow heels of
womens shoes, under the bands Of
mems hats; has even been passed into
the government penitentiary in fruits.
bread and other articles of food.
Sometimes it is concealed under Ave
two-cent stamps, used to turn the
ordinary missive into a special de-
livery letter. In fact there are
thousand and one ways that it has
been imported into this country. For
a time there was regular route from
Canada into the United States and the
majority OF the smugglerS were
women, who brought forbidden drugs
into the country in their cosmetic
cases. hot-water bottles and dozen
and odd different ways.
Recently Dr. Rhees and his assist
ants trapped drug seller who had
an appointment with government
agent in Washington who posed as a
distributor. and while il is true that
the government has caught many of
them and that our local judges have
given the convicted ones severe sem
tences. yet the evil cannot be stamp
ed out unless more government
agents are provided and the churches
and different civic organizations back
up the movement.