Читать книгу The Seven Sisters of Sleep. Popular History of the Seven Prevailing Narcotics of the World онлайн

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“What are these,

So withered, and so wild in their attire;

That look not like the inhabitants o’ the earth,

And yet are on’t?”——Macbeth.

There is no reason to doubt that the ancients were, in a manner, acquainted with some of the narcotics known to us, although they did not indulge in them as stimulants or luxuries. The antiquarian, it is true, has failed to unearth the tobacco-box of Claudius, or the pipe of Nero—however much the latter may have been given to smoke. And no one has as yet discovered a snuff-box bearing the initials of Marc Antony, whence the taper fingers of Egypt’s queen drew a pinch of Princess’ Mixture or Taddy’s Violet, gazing with loving eyes on Antony the while. In those remote times the hemp and the poppy were not unknown; and there is reason for believing that in Egypt the former was used as a potion for soothing and dispelling care.

Herodotus informs us that the Scythians cultivated hemp, and converted it into linen cloth, resembling that made from flax; and he adds also, that “when, therefore, the Scythians have taken some seed of this hemp, they creep under the cloths, and then put the seed on the red hot stones; but this being put on smokes, and produces such a steam, that no Grecian vapour-bath would surpass it. The Scythians, transported with the vapour, shout aloud.”3 The same author also states that the Massagetæ, dwelling on an island of the Araxes, have discovered “trees that produce fruit of a peculiar kind, which the inhabitants, when they meet together in companies, and have lit a fire, throw on the fire as they sit round in a circle; and that by inhaling the fumes of the burning fruit that has been thrown on, they become intoxicated by the odour, just as the Greeks do by wine, and that the more fruit is thrown on, the more intoxicated they become, until they rise up to dance, and betake themselves to singing.”4