Medical properties and uses.-Poppy heads or capsules possess narcotic properties; they are chiefly employed, boiled in water, as fomentations to inflamed and ulcerated surfaces. An extract, which is employed as a substitute for opium, is prepared by inspissating the decoction; and also a syrup, which is used as an anodyne for children, and to allay the tickling cough in chronic catarrh and phthisis. (See Part III.)

If we judge from the quantity of Opium imported, it is more generally used than any other remedy, the average annual importation exceeding 40,000 lbs.; and the consumption in Great Britain alone being upwards of 16,500 lbs.1 It appears to have been introduced into the Materia Medica before the time of Hippocrates; but was little employed as an internal remedy until 300 years after his period. It operates -1st. as a powerful and very diffusible excitant, but its primary operation is soon followed by narcotic and sedative effects, in a degree much greater than could be expected from the previous excitement it induces. 2. It acts directly on the nervous system; and when taken into the stomach destroys irritability, and allays pain in the most distant parts of the body, independent of the circulation, and without inducing any change on the composition of the blood. 3. It produces sleep, both by an immediate action on the brain, and its power of allaying irritation. 4. It operates as an antispasmodic. And 5. excites diaphoresis. As the principle on which opium acts is the same all over the body, the topical application of it is capable of producing similar effects, only in a diminished degree, to those resulting from it when it is taken into the stomach.

The larger the dose is the more quickly its primary action is extended over the whole habit; and as every part is excited nearly at the same moment of time, the general consequent exhaustion must necessarily more rapidly follow, than when the dose is merely sufficient to induce a degree of excitement scarcely exceeding the powers of the system on which it operates. Hence either the stimulant or the apparently sedative effects of opium may be rendered obvious by the extent of the dose in which it is exhibited; and the early knowledge of this truth might have saved much of the keen controversy which the subject at one period occasioned. In moderate doses opium increases the fulness, the force, and the frequency of the pulse, augments the heat of the body1, quickens respiration, and invigorates both the corporeal and mental functions, exhilirating even to intoxication2: but by degrees these effects are succeeded by languor, lassitude, and sleep; and in many instances head- ache, sickness, thirst, tremors, and other symptoms of debility, such as follow the excessive use of ardent spirits, supervene.

In very large doses the primary excitement is scarcely apparent, but the pulse seems to be at once diminished, drowsiness and stupor immediately appear, and are followed by delirium, sighing, deep and stertorous breathing, cold sweats, convulsions, apoplexy, and death. When the dose has been very large, the appearances on dissection are those which indicate the previous existence of inflammation of the stomach and bowels; but no particular appearance of an inflammatory state, or even great fulness of the vessels of the brain are perceived.

1 The quantity of opium imported into England from Bengal and other places, from the year 1786 to 1801, amounted to 286,271 lbs.; and the consumption to 247,619 lbs.-Morewood on Inebriating Liquors, p. 106.

On account of its primary excitant influence opium is efficaciously administered in some cases of debility, as, for instance, fevers of the typhoid kind, and intermittents; and, when combined with calomel, to check the progress of gangrene. In typhus opium is given with two intentions, namely, 1. as an excitant, 2. as an anodyne.

For fulfilling the first intention it is given in small doses frequently repeated, as an useful assistant to wine in supporting the vis vitas: it proves injurious when local inflammations exist; and, under every circumstance, its employment as an excitant in fever requires much caution. For the purpose of allaying irritation, and obtunding the susceptibility of those morbid impressions which occasion watchfulness, delirium, tremors, and subsultus tendinum, opium is useful when the inflammatory state of the brain has been previously relieved by bleeding and cold applications to the scalp. If the pulse be soft, the skin cool, .the face not flushed, the tongue moist, and there is no suffusion of the eyes, its salutary influence is striking. It is to this effect of it that Alibert and others ascribe its power, when moderately used, of rendering the human body less susceptible to different diseases.1 Some caution, however, is required in its exhibition; for if the heat of the body be much above the natural standard, and the skin dry, opium increases these symptoms, augments thirst, and occasions restlessness. But if moisture be coming on, opium accelerates it, and tranquillity and sleep follow.

Hence the propriety of Dr. Currie's advice, not to give the evening dose of opium in fevers till very late, or about one or two o'clock in the morning, when the heat is subsiding; or first to lower the temperature, and excite sensible perspiration by the effusion of cold water, or tepid sponging.2 It is especially hurtful where there is a disposition to local inflammation of the chest.

1 It is extraordinary that Dioscorides, Galen, Aurelianus, and many of the ancients, believed that it produced cold.

2 The Turks call opium afioni; and in the teriakihana, or opium shops of Constantinople, they take it in graduated doses from ten grains to one hundred grains in a day. It is mixed with rich syrup and the inspissated juices of fruit, to render it more palatable and less intoxicating; and is taken with a spoon, or made up into small lozenges stamped with the words Mash Allah, literally '* The work of God." The Tartar couriers, who travel great distances, and with astonishing rapidity, take nothing else to support them during their journies. (Dallaway's Constantinople, 4to. 78.) There is, however, some reasons for supposing that the Mash Allah, or Maslach of the Turks, contains other narcotics, as those of hemp and of lolium, as well as opium. The Chinese, the Bornese, and the Sumatrans, smoke opium as Europeans smoke tobacco; and do not appear to suffer in health. The Limum and Batany Assei, who indulge in this practice, "are, notwithstanding, the most healthy and vigorous people to be met with in Sumatra."' -Marsden's History of Sumatra.