1890 Coca and its Therapeutic Application by Angelo Mariani

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Peruvian Venus was represented as holding in her hand a leaf of Coca, was suggested as a proof in support of this opinion. Dr.Unanue speaks of"certain coqueros, eighty years of age and over, and yet capable of such prowess as young men in the prime of life would be proud of. Let us here add that the so-called unhappy consequences of the abuse of Coca are really much more rare than those produced even by tobacco, alcohol or opium. An entirely immoderate use of the drug must be made before any such result follows. The constant use of reasonable doses of Coca appears to produce a diametrically opposite effect, and the authors, who have had occasion to see a great number of Coca con sumers,report cases of astonishing longevity among the Indian coqueros(Tschudy,Campbell,Mantegazza,Unanue). They add that these instances are far from being excep tional.

COCAINE.

I.—A CHEMICAL STUDY. (1)

Cocaine is a crystallized alkaloid which Niemann, a •pupil of Prof. Woehler, succeeded in extracting,in 1859, •from someleaves of Erytliroxylon Coca and to which he gave -.the following formula: C32 Q Az Pefore it was known to him,Wackenroder,Johnston, Gar- deke and Maclagan analyzed this plant without succeeding in the isolation of its active principle. Some important works undertaken on this subject by Lassen,Humann and R.Percy are also quoted. (i) Rigolet. l^hise de Paris, 18S5.