e fully, related a case, a record of which he had
seen, in which a father destroyed the life of his little son, by the use
of tobacco spittle upon an eruption or humor of the head.

Immediately after the Doctor left the house, the mother besmeared the
tip of her finger with a little of the "_strong juice_" from the
grandmother's tobacco pipe, and proceeded to apply it to the ring-worm,
remarking, that "if it should strike to the stomach it must go through
the nose." The instant the mother's finger touched the part affected,
the eyes of the little patient were rolled up in their sockets, she
sallied back, and in the act of falling, was caught by the alarmed
mother. The part was immediately washed with cold water, with a view
to dislodge the poison. But this was to no purpose, for the jaws were
already firmly locked together, and the patient was in a senseless and
apparently dying state. The Doctor, who had stopped three-fourths of a
mile distant, to see a patient, was presently called in. The symptoms
were "coldness of the extremities, no perceptible pulse at the wrists,
the jaws set together, deep insensibility, the countenance deathly."
He succeeded in opening the jaws, so as to admit of the administration
of the spirits of ammonia and lavender; frictions were employed, and
every thing done, which, at the time, was thought likely to promote
resuscitation, but "it was an hour, or an hour and an half, before the
little patient was so far recovered as to be able to speak."

"Till this time," says Dr. S., "the child had been robust and healthy,
never having had but one illness that required medical advice; but,
since the tobacco experiment, she has been continually feeble and
sickly. The first four or five years after this terrible operation,
she was subject to fainting fits every three or four weeks, sometimes
lasting from twelve to twenty-four hours; and many times, in those
attacks, her life appeared to be in imminent danger. Within the last
three or four years, those turns have been less severe."

The foregoing facts serve to show, that tobacco is one of the most
active and deadly vegetable poisons known; it acts directly upon the
nervous power, enfeebling, deranging, or extinguishing the actions
of life. Is it possible, that the _habitual_ use of an article of so
actively poisonous properties can promote health, or indeed fail to
exert an injurious influence upon health? It will readily be admitted,
that the daily u