Morphia, like opium, may occasion serous effects when too freely applied to a blistered surface. In a case related by M. Dupont, four-tenths of a grain of acetate of morphia, applied to a blister on the side, caused in twenty minutes dimness of vision, vomiting, and delirium; and though it was then removed, the patient had afterwards continued vomiting, dilated pupils, and great feebleness of the pulse. Recovery took place, but the patient was not quite free of incoherence next day.[[1766]] The dose here was so small, and the symptoms were so unlike the usual effects of morphia, that doubts arise whether the case was really one of poisoning.
The effects of narcotine have been examined experimentally by Magendie and Orfila; but their results do not coincide. According to Orfila it is not easy to poison dogs with it, as it excites vomiting and is discharged. But when the gullet is tied, the animal dies in two, three or four days, without any remarkable symptom but languor and hard breathing.[[1767]] In these experiments it was dissolved in olive oil; it does not act at all in the solid state. Magendie found that it produces in dogs a state like reverie, accompanied with convulsions. They lie still except when convulsed, and they are apparently asleep or dreaming; but they are really alive to external objects, and even in a state of acute irritability. In short, he considers the symptoms to constitute an aggravated form of the subsequent and idiosyncratic effects caused by opium on man. Vinegar, he says, destroys altogether the poisonous properties of narcotine. According to Orfila it only weakens them. Muriatic acid would seem to annihilate them entirely; for Orfila found no effect in dogs from forty grains dissolved in water with the aid of muriatic acid; and Bally gave sixty grains in like manner to a patient without injury.[[1768]] Forty grains dissolved by sulphuric acid, proved fatal to a dog in twenty-four hours.[[1769]]
Narcotine, like other narcotic poisons, is more powerful when introduced at once into the blood, but produces nearly the same effects as when it is swallowed. Orfila found that a single grain was as powerful through the former, as eight grains through the latter channel.[[1770]] Dieffenbach observed that half a grain dissolved in water by means of a drop or two of hydrochloric acid killed cats in five minutes when injected into a vein, and always produced congestion within the head, and extravasation on the surface of the cerebellum. A remarkable circumstance observed in the course of his experiments was, that leeches, applied to a rabbit under the influence of narcotine, died immediately in convulsions; and that a portion of the blood of the same rabbit when injected into the vein of another produced drowsiness, languor, and pandiculation for nearly a day.[[1771]]
The effects of narcotine on man have not been much inquired into. From the only researches on the subject I have yet seen, those of Dr. Wibmer of Munich, it appears to be but a feeble poison. He found by experiment on himself, that two grains dissolved in olive oil produced merely slight transient headache; that eight grains dissolved by means of muriatic acid had no effect at all; and that the same quantity of solid narcotine occasioned temporary headache, and in twenty-eight hours a singular state of excitement, with trembling of the hands, restlessness, and inability to fix the thoughts on any object. These effects went off in a few hours.[[1772]]
The effects of codeïa have been examined by Dr. Kunkel. He found that twelve grains, dissolved in water and introduced into the stomach, killed a rabbit in three minutes; that six grains in solution when injected into the cellular tissue occasioned death in little more than two hours; that the same quantity administered by the mouth sometimes had little effect; that when given in powder its action was very feeble; and that the symptoms were excitement of the pulse, convulsions, and tetanus, without any tendency to sopor or somnolency.[[1773]] Hence codeïa is conceived to be a stimulant of the nervous system, and consequently the cause of the excitant effects sometimes produced by opium. It may be doubted, however, whether its proportion in opium is sufficient for explaining these effects.
Meconic acid is inert. Sertuerner, indeed, thought the meconate of soda acted as a powerful poison in some experiments made on himself and on dogs; but more careful researches have since proved that he was misled by some error. Sömmering found that ten grains of meconic acid or meconate of soda had no effect whatever on dogs.[[1774]] Subsequently, in consequence of two people having died suddenly at Turin after taking each a grain of the acid, some careful experiments were made by Drs. Feneglio and Blengini, who gave eight grains to dogs, crows, and frogs, and four grains to various men, without remarking any injurious effects whatever.[[1775]]
The distilled water of opium was formerly considered an active poison; but Orfila found it nearly or altogether inert. Two pounds introduced into the stomach of a dog, and two ounces and a half injected into a vein, had no effect whatever.[[1776]]
Section III.—Of the Morbid Appearances caused by Opium.
In discussing this subject the appearances in the best marked cases will be first noticed; and then some account; will be given of the variations to which they are liable.
In Knape’s Annals there is a good example of the most aggravated state of the appearances left by opium. It is the case of an infant who was killed in the course of a night by a decoction of poppy-heads. There was much lividity over the whole back part of the body. All the sinuses and vessels of the brain were gorged with fluid blood; and a good deal of serosity was found in the ventricles and base of the skull. The pharynx was red. The lungs were distended, and so gorged with fluid blood, that it ran out in a stream when they were cut. The cavities of the heart contained the same fluid blood. There was some redness in the villous coat of the stomach and intestines; and poppy-seeds were found in the stomach. Although the body had been kept only two days in the month of February, the belly emitted a putrid odour when it was laid open.[[1777]]