Page:Houdini - Miracle Mongers.djvu/212

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
188
MIRACLE-MONGERS AND THEIR METHODS

air, then turn him over on the back so that the lungs may fill again, repeating this again and again till the doctor arrives. The best stimulants are strong tea or coffee; but when these are not sufficient, a tablespoon of brandy, whisky, or wine may be added.

Vegetable and mineral poisons, with few exceptions, act as efficiently in the blood as in the stomach. Animal poisons act only through the blood, and are inert when introduced into the stomach. Therefore there is absolutely no danger in sucking the virus from a snake bite, except that the virus should not be allowed to touch any spot where the skin is broken.

The following list of antidotes is taken largely from Appleton's Medical Dictionary, and Sollmann's A Manual of Pharmacology, Philadelphia, 1917, pages 56 and 57, and has been verified by comparison with various other authorities at the library of the Medical Society of the County of New York:

Arsenic Induce vomiting with a dessert-spoonful of ground mustard in tepid water. Also put the finger in the throat to induce retching. When the stomach has been emptied, give the patient all the milk he can take.