Arsenical poisoning by wall-papers and other manufactured articles / by Jabez Hogg.

  • Hogg, Jabez, 1817-1899.
Date:
1885
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Arsenical poisoning by wall-papers and other manufactured articles / by Jabez Hogg. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    [Reprintedfrom the JournAl of Science, September, 1885.] ARSENICAL POIByNING Bt \m:.L-PAPERS AND OTHER MAlS^^^CTU^p^^ARTICLES. By jABEZ Hogg/'lAM:^^, F.R.M.S., &c., Cousulting Surgeon to the Royal Westminster Ophthalmic Hospital. T has been very generally recognised that some persons are never well in any given place, or particular locality, long together. In such a case it is commonly said this or that place, or locality, does not agree with them, and, after failure of remedies, change of air is tried with marked improvement; but this proves, in the majority of cases, to be only of a temporary nature. The amount of distress inflidted in this way, in a large number of house- holds, is of no light or insignificant charadter, and the cause long remained concealed from observation. It is only of quite modern date that a clue has been obtained to certain of the *' mysterious illnesses referred to, and which for years were vaguely assigned to some inexplicable cause, —an idiosyncracy, antipathy, or peculiarity of con- stitution. It is now known that many remarkable and insidious forms of disease are entirely due to certain insanitary influ- ences ; tliat the lurking poison which infests our homes by night and by day may at one time, from defedtive drainage, find its V ay into the house through the sewer, to be absorbed in the crinking-water, or, by putting on other kinds of disguises, may for a time baffle the most observant and learned expert. Who would, indeed, have thought that a deadly poison could lurk in a pretty and attradtively coloured wall-paper, a newly-painted decorated room, an attradtive article of dress, the chintz of the window-curtains, the stockings, the gloves, the playing-cards of the whist party, the candles and lamp-shades, the children's toys, and the sweeties. Yet in all of these, and many other articles in domestic use, arsenic enough has been found to produce a large amount of disease, and in some cases death. It is an unquestionable fadt that the health of the com- munity is mperilled by the large use of arsenical pigments and other poisons in the manufadture of articles in general