On chloroform and other anæsthetics: their action and administration — Inside the Classic

Simpson, than he began to institute a series of independent researches, and having satisfied himself personally as to the effects and greater practicability of chloroform, he at once commenced its use, and forgot sooner almost than others all predilections for ether. In 1848, he commenced a series of experimental papers on narcotic vapours in the _Medical Gazette_, and continued them until 1851, when the _Medical Gazette_ virtually ceased to exist. The papers on narcotics, in accordance with his other and earlier productions, were stamped with the evidences of profound and careful research, and still more careful deduction. I infer that they have been more talked about than read, for few people seem to be aware of the enlarged and positive physiological arguments which they contain. Chloroform and ether are not alone discussed, but all narcotics. Narcotics are not alone considered, but various of the great functions of life. The records of a vast number and variety of experiments are here related, and an amount of information, original in kind, collected, which will always remain as a memorable record in the history of medical literature. But the great points in these papers are those in which the author enters on the physiological action of narcotics. Here appear the generalizations and insights into the relations of allied phenomena which mark the man of true power. His greatest deduction on these matters, and the proofs on which it is based, are to be found in his observations, where he explains that the action of the volatile narcotics is that of arresting or limiting those combinations between the oxygen of the arterial blood and the tissues of the body, which are essential to sensation, volition, and all the animal functions. He demonstrated that these substances modify and, in large quantities, arrest the animal functions in the same way, and by the same power as that by which they modify and arrest combustion, the slow oxidation of phosphorus and other kinds of oxidation unconnected with the living body when they (the narcotics) are mixed with the atmospheric air.

In his modest way, he often spoke to me, with honest pride, on this observation. He himself thought it the best observation he had ever made, and believed that it would not be lost as an historical truth. Placing a taper, during one of our experiments, in a bottle through which chloroform vapour was diffused, and watching the declining flame, he once said, “There, now, is all that occurs in narcotism; but to submit the candle to the action of the narcotic without extinguishing it altogether, you must neither expose it to much vapour at once, nor subject it to the vapour too long; and this is all you can provide against in subjecting a man to the same influence. I could illustrate all the meaning of this great practical discovery of narcotism on a farthing candle, but I fear the experiment would be thought rather too commonplace.”