Year: 1873

Providence during the month of March, as re-
ported by the Superintendent of Health. he
adds that no doubt considerable number OF
deaths every year are due to the same cause.
During practice of six years l have seen at
least two instances in which immediate loss OF
life could be traced to this syrup.


The extent to which this powerful patent
medicine is used in our community would be
astonishing to any one who, unlike the physi'
sician, is not brought in direct contact with
the fact. .....


Apothecaries and the country storekeepers
testify to the immense amount Of the article
sold by them.


Frequently I find mother giving it, and
upon inquiry learn that the child was perfectly
we'll when the practice was begun, but that
some kind neighbor had told her that it
"helped teeth to come easy" Others begin
its use because baby, unable to digest some
unnatural diet keeps having collie or dar-
rhea. In fact, there are hundred and one
ailments, slight or otherwise, for which chill
dren are thus "soothed."


Now what is it that mothers, who love their
children better than themselves, give so Law
ishly? Its ingredients have been separated
repeatedly by chemists, all of whom report
that its soothing power rests in large amount
of the most active principles Of opium. Such
an examination made in San Francisco, of the
remaining contents of bottle from which
two teaspoonfuls had been taken (Which, by
the way, had killed a child,) resulted in OBJ.
tanning one grain of morphine. A grain of
morphine is equal to six grains ofpure opium,
or one hundred and fifty drops of laudanum,
or six tablespoonful Of paregoric. So that
when mother administers teaspoontul of
Mrs. Winslow's Soothing Syrup to her sick
baby, it is just the same as giving two teaspoon
fuls of paregoric, or fifteen drops oflaudanum-
frightfully dangerous proceeding. Physi.
clans are very careful in prescribing any form
of opium to young children, and for the fol-
lowing reason: Opium possesses a quality
which belongs to no other drug, that of occa-
sionally acting with tremendous power upon
infants. A dose, which is perfectly safe for
one child of a year old, to another of the same
age may be certainly fatal. 1t is on this &C.
count that doctors do not always relieve pain
in infants as quickly and surely as they do in
adults They think it better to feel their way
carefully with a small dose at first, rather
than to give the full quantity at once at the
risk of destroying life. Of the need of all
this care parents know very little; indeed, they
could not be expected to know. without special
teaching, and the inference to be drawn is,
that they should not use dangerous tools with
which they are unacquainted.


But they often tell us: II have given it to
all of my children, and they are still alive"
Well such persons are fortunate to play with
razors and never feel that they are cut Per-
haps, however, they have been injured with
out being killed outright. To my mind, a
greater harm can be done than simply to take
life


There is another point in the administration
of opiates to which physicians pay the closest
attention that is, not to continue their use
for long time, if it can possibly be avoided.
Most persons have read the experience Of
opium eaters. They invariably describe the
hold acquired by the habit as far greater than
that of drunkenness A writer in the atlantic
Monthly, few years ago, made remark to
the following effect: "Drunkards did have
some help, some feeble points of support, in
returning to life of sobriety; but to the
opium eater, reform was like crawling over
burning Goals of fire on bare hands and knees"


Thousands of mothers make just such
opium eaters of their darling offspring, for
whom they would shed the last drop Of their
blood. They constantly notice how the child
is wakeful, tossing and wailing, when the
habitual draught Of soothing syrup is with
held. Such agony is not caused by any To-
Called pain, but by the distress of craving
appetite, worse even than the drunkard feels
when denied his daily dram. Thus the first
few doses are often given for collie, while the
hundreds which follow are to cure the disease
produced by the medicine, and the longer the
habit continues the more difficult and even
dangerous is its cessation.


But this is not all. Fora time the effect Of
the drug is to constipate the bowels, to over
come which castor oil or some other health
destroying cathartic is frequently forced upon
the unwilling child. By and by reaction
occurs, the opiate now relaxes the bowels, a
prolonged diarrhea sets in, which, especially
if it be the hot season of the year, frequently
terminates fatally.


Any attempt of the family physician to
check such a disease is resisted by various
causes. The general health has been serious.
ly impaired by the imperfect digestion which
is invarAbly produced by anodyne medica-
tion; again, opium, the sheet-anchor Of the
physician in diarrhoa, is now useless. So an
other blossom fades while it is but tender
bud, and the registrars death-list has another
victim charged to summer complaint, when 1t
should be written, POISONED by Mrs. Wins
lows Soothing Syrup"


And in those cases where the children do
not die from the habit, the effects upon the
system long remain. If human being be-
half stupe6ed for the earliest months of his ex.
istence, when growth is most rapid, may we
not ex pect an iudelble impression to be made
upon the constitution Would it be strange
if the appetite for narcotics thus early formed,
should, in ripper years, develop into love for
opium or alcohol? But time does not allow
Of my tracing all of the ills which accrue from
the use of this one patent medicine


Now what is to be said in its favor? 1t
must be valuable, else people would not use it
to any such alarming extent. Certainly
opium is the most important of all drugs, as
we'll as one of the most dangerous. Knowing
this, if mothers still persist in making use Of
it, why not obtain one of the regular opium
mixtures used by physicians, which possess
the advantage Of having known strength,
and therefore known dose, are cheaper, and,
what is of real Importance, are declared to be
and to possess all the powers and none of the
dangers of opium.


Perhaps, however, the good women of the
Blackstone valley have sort of sympathy
with kind Mrs. Winslow, whom they look
upon as large hearted grandma, trying to
exc out precarious existence by the sale of
her comfort bearing Syrup" "Ah| you