On ether-drinking and extra-alcoholic intoxication / [Benjamin Ward Richardson].

  • Richardson, Benjamin Ward, 1828-1896.
Date:
[between 1876 and 1896?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On ether-drinking and extra-alcoholic intoxication / [Benjamin Ward Richardson]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    vapour being breathed, men and animals can be made insensible by the mere act of breathing it, just as they can be made insensible or intoxicated by the vapour of chloroform. Taken in water as a drink, methylic alcohol intoxicates in the same way as the ethylic spirit does, and with the same stages of intoxication. In accordance, however, with the physical character of methylic alcohol, the action of it in all its stages is less intense than is that of the ethylic alcohol. Four stages of action, one of excitement, a second of excitement with some slight failure of mental and muscular power, a third of failure of both muscular and mental power, and a fourth of complete unconsciousness and of actual prostration,—all these four stages are produced by methylic alcohol when it is taken in sufficient quantity, but are brought about more quickly by it than by the heavier ethylic spirit, and they pass away more quickly when they have been inflicted on the living animal. A good third of time for bringing on action as well as for recovery from action is saved by using the lighter alcohol. Those, moreover, who have learned to drink the lighter alcohol in its pure form acquire a taste for it which is as distinctive as the taste may be for gin or whisky or old port, while they tell you that the exhilaration produced is more refined and the after-effect less disagreeable than from other kinds of stimulating drinks. These are all advantages—the last named, that of the lightness of the after-effect, being the most intelligible. The man who is a drinker of wine and other strong drinks makes it almost a rule, in recommend¬ ing his own particular favourite drink, not only to praise its goodness while using it, but its comparative harmlessness after it has been used. He knows that even his model liquor cannot possibly be swallowed so as to produce some present effect which he may con¬ sider pleasant, witliout, of a certainty, leaving some after-effect which requires to be apologised for. Of such disagreeables his model causes or produces the least number and the least demonstrative; therefore it is the best. It does not give headache like brandy, heart¬ burn like gin, giddiness and spots before the eyes like whisky, gout or gouty rheumatism like old port, acidity like claret or cider, or drowsiness and stupor like beer. It does something perchance, but nothing that a man need be pitied for enduring ; therefore it is the best. One of my friends always drinks champagne. He does not like champagne so much as he does madeira or rich port, and he does not think it is so “sustaining” as either of those two wines; but then it never provokes a decided fit of dyspeptic gout, never lays him up for two or three days, as those fine old wines invariably do : it