ON THE
PREPARATIONS
OF
THE INDIAN HEMP,
OR
GUNJAH,
(CANNABIS INDICA).
THEIR EFFECTS ON THE ANIMAL SYSTEM IN HEALTH, AND THEIR UTILITY IN THE TREATMENT OF TETANUS AND OTHER CONVULSIVE DISEASES.
BY
W. B. O’SHAUGHNESSY, M.D.,
BENGAL ARMY,
Late Professor of Chemistry and Materia Medica in the Medical College of Calcutta.
LONDON:
PRINTED BY S. TAYLOR, 6, CHANDOS-STREET, STRAND.
[Reprinted from the Transactions of the Medical Society of Calcutta, 1838; and from the Provincial Medical Journal, 1843.]
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INDIAN HEMP, &c.
The narcotic effects of hemp are popularly known in the South ofAfrica, South America, Turkey, Egypt, Asia Minor, India, and theadjacent territories of the Malays, Burmese, and Siamese. In allthese countries hemp is used in various forms, by the dissipatedand depraved, as the ready agent of a pleasing intoxication. In thepopular medicine of these nations, we find it extensively employedfor a multitude of affections, especially those in which spasm orneuralgic pain are the prominent symptoms. But in Western Europe itsuse, either as a stimulant or as a remedy, is equally unknown. With theexception of the trial, as a frolic, of the Egyptian “hasheesh,” by afew youths in Marseilles, and of the clinical use of the wine of hempby Hahnemann, as shown in a subsequent extract, I have been unable totrace any notice of the employment of this drug in Europe.
Much difference of opinion exists on the question, whether the hempso abundant in Europe, even in high northern latitudes, is identicalin specific characters with the hemp of Asia Minor and India. Theextraordinary symptoms produced by the latter depend on a resinoussecretion with which it abounds, and which seems totally absent inthe European kind. The closest physical resemblance or even identityexists between both plants; difference of climate seems to me morethan sufficient to account for the absence of the resinous secretion,and consequent want of narcotic power in that indigenous in coldercountries.
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In the subsequent article I first endeavour to present an adequateview of what has been recorded of the early history, the popular uses,and employment in medicine of this powerful and valuable substance; Ithen proceed to notice several experiments which I have instituted onanimals, with the view to ascertain its effects on the healthy system;and, lastly, I submit an abstract of the clinical details of thetreatment of several patients afflicted with hydrophobia, tetanus, andother convulsive disorders, in which a preparation of hemp was employedwith results, which seem to me to warrant our anticipating from itsmore extensive and impartial use no inconsiderable addition to theresources of the physician.
In the historical and statistical department of the subject, I owemy cordial thanks for most valuable assistance to the distinguishedtraveller the Syed Keramut Ali, Mootawulee of the Hooghly Imambarrah,and also to the Hakim Mirza Abdul Razes of Teheran, who have furnishedme with interesting details regarding the consumption of hemp inCandahar, Cabul, and the countries between the Indus and Herat. ThePandit Moodoosudun Gootu has favor