Yet upon that afternoon, whether it was the Beaune which I
had taken with my lunch or the additional exasperation produced
by the extreme deliberation of his manner, I suddenly felt that I
could hold out no longer.
"Which is it to-day," I asked, "morphine or cocaine?"
He raised his eyes languidly from the old black-letter volume
which he had opened.
"It is cocaine," he said, "a seven-per-cent solution. Would
you care to try it?"
"No, indeed," I answered brusquely. "My constitution has
not got over the Afghan campaign yet. I cannot afford to throw
any extra strain upon it."
He smiled at my vehemence. "Perhaps you are right, Wat-
son," he said. "I suppose that its influence is physically a bad
one. I find it, however, so transcendently stimulating and clarify-
ing to the mind that its secondary action is a matter of small
moment."
"But consider!" I said earnestly. "Count the cost! Your brain
may, as you say, be roused and excited, but it is a pathological
and morbid process which involves increased tissue-change and
may at least leave a permanent weakness. You know, too, what
a black reaction comes upon you. Surely the game is hardly
worth the candle. Why should you, for a mere passing pleasure,
risk the loss of those great powers with which you have been
endowed? Remember that I speak not only as one comrade to
another but as a medical man to one for whose constitution he is
to some extent answerable.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25