[From Home Training Bulletin No. 1, by William A. McKeever, professor of philosophy in the Kansas State Agricultural College.]
ONE of the greatest menaces to our moral and intellectual well-being to-day is the fact that cigaret smoking is becoming a popular fad among boys and young men, while the use of a strong pipe is a close second in favor. Go where you will in this broad land of ours, and the pale faces, blear eyes, trembling fingers, and the foul stench of cigaret fumes, tell the same pathetic story. This most serious blight upon the bloom and beauty of our American boyhood is chargeable to paternal ignorance and carelessness. For the past eight years I have been tracing out the cigaret boy's biography, and I have found that in practically all cases the lad began his smoking habit clandestinely, at an early age, and with little or no thought of its seriousness, while the fond parents perhaps believed that their boy was too good to engage in such a practise. . . .
Plate A.—Nos. I, II, III, of a young man of 19, four years a smoker, inhales fumes. Tracings just before, during, and fifteen minutes after smoking. See No. III next plate. IV, V, VI, of another smoke inhaler's heart, before, during, and after.
Out of one hundred such men [smokers] whom I interviewed, ninety-nine frankly admitted that smoking tends to injure the health, and that they would not advise any young man to begin the habit. This practise is very offensive to many delicate natures, is somewhat filthy at its best, and disgustingly filthy at its worst, as the ordinary smoking-car will bear witness. Often, in public places, even refined women are forced to breathe the sickening fumes coming direct from the nostrils of some coarse, brutal cigaret smoker. Smoking is a practise entirely unnecessary to the development and refinement of the race. . . .
Most Hurtful in Case of Boys
But the serious nature, and even the cruelty, of this smoking habit among men is at once apparent when we consider its influence and its effects upon boys. I have tabulated reports of the condition of nearly 2,500 cigaret-smoking schoolboys, and in describing them physically, my informants have repeatedly resorted to the use of such epithets as "sallow," "sore-eyed," "puny," "squeaky-voiced," "sickly," "short-winded," and "extremely nervous." In my tabulated reports it is shown that out of a group of twenty-five cases of young college students, smokers, whose average age of beginning was thirteen, according to their own admissions they had suffered as follows: Sore throat, four; weak eyes, ten; pain in chest, eight; "short wind," twenty-one; stomach trouble, ten; pain in heart, nine. Ten of them appeared to be very sickly. The younger the boy, the worse the smoking hurts him in every way; for these lads almost invariably inhale the fumes, and that is the most injurious part of the practise. According to Dr. Sims Woodhead, professor of pathology in Cambridge University, cigaret smoking in the case of boys partly paralyzes the nerve cells at the base of the brain, and thus interferes with the breathing and the heart action. And yet, all this debility and more, as will be shown later, is brought upon thousands of boys who innocently imitate the example of their elders. . . .
Plate B.—Nos. I and II, heart tracings of a young man of 18, tobacco user two years. Note skip of heart at x. No. III, strong, healthy youth. No. IV, a cool, calculating person. No. V, heart tracings of a strong, healthy young woman.
During the past year I have made hundreds of sphygmograph records of persons of various ages, conditions of health, and temperament, about one hundred of these being boys and youths addicted to the smoking habit. The records reproduced herewith are representative each of its class. It might not be out of place to explain that the sphygmograph is an instrument with a clock-work-and-trigger mechanism, and that it is adjusted at the radial artery, the records being traced on a strip of smoked paper. This delicate instrument records very satisfactorily the comparative strength, regularity, and nervousness of the heart-beat. It will also show very quickly any changes in the heart movement resulting from either mental or physical stimuli. It may be said, too, that there is almost as much individuality in "heart writing" as there is in hand writing. But with the aid of this instrument it is an easy matter to distinguish roughly between healthy and unhealthy conditions. The discussions here will be confined to an attempt to throw additional light upon the nature and condition of the cigaret smoker.
How the Smoker's Heart is Affected
There is much in the illustrations offered herewith to warrant the conclusion that the habitual cigaret smoker's heart is very weak and feeble, except for the few minutes during which he is indulging the habit, and that the pulsations at this time are unduly excited. Plate A shows three records each of two different subjects. Numbers I to III show the heart action of a young man nineteen years old who began smoking cigarets at the age of fifteen, and who inhales the fumes. The three records were taken without removing or adjusting the instrument, as follows; No. I, immediately before smoking; No. II, during the indulgence of the habit; and No. III, fifteen minutes later, after the narcotic effect had become apparent. Now, by reference to plate B, No. III, we may observe how this young man's heart should record itself, for the latter is a tracing of the heart pulsations of a young man of the same age and temperament. Nos. IV to VI, plate A, are representative of another inhaler twenty years old, who began the practise at thirteen. He now uses a strong pipe.
Plate C.—Heart tracings I and II, strong man of 36 years, weight 230, No. I before smoking, No. II after. No. III, low vitality of nervous fatigue. No. IV, young woman on the verge of nervous prostration. No. V, of a long tobacco user.
Plate B, Nos. I and II, are respectively before and after tracings of a sensitive youth of eighteen, who has been smoking only two years. Observe the skip in his heart-beat at x, and the corresponding partial skip under the stimulus of smoking in No. II. No. III, plate B, as mentioned above, is the tracing of the strong, healthy heart of a young man of somewhat choleric temperament. No. IV15represents the phlegmatic temperament, a person who is cool and calculating. No. V is the heart tracing of a strong, healthy young woman.
Plate C, Nos. I and II, are the pulse records of a man of splendid physique, 36 years old, and weighing 230 pounds. No. I was taken before, and No. II after smoking a cigar. He does not inhale. His responded readily to the stimulus, but, as the first tracing indicates, he does not seem to suffer from any heart prostration between indulgences. No. III is the record of a person whose vitality is temporarily low from nervous fatigue. No. IV is the record of a young woman who was on the verge of nervous prostration. No. V is representative of a heart weakened by long indulgence in the smoking habit. The young man in question began very early, and continued the practise till his physician convinced him of the extreme danger threatening his life. The pulse wave is nearly normal in length, but is entirely too weak. Under such a condition of the heart a man is capable of very little courage or aggressiveness.
From the foregoing evidence we are led to the conclusion that, in the case of boys and youths, cigaret smoking is very deleterious to the physical and mental well-being. Moreover, my investigations indicate that it makes very little difference in the effects whether the victim uses the pipe or cigaret, provided he inhales the fumes; and with very few exceptions the young smokers are inhalers. The ordinary case exhibits about the following types of conduct: (1) While the craving is at its height the victim manifests much uneasiness and often much excitation. (2) During the indulgence the cheek is alternately flushed and blanched, the respiration considerably increased, and the hands tremble. (3) About twenty minutes after smoking, the muscles become relaxed, and respiration slow and shallow, the skin on the face dry and sallow, and there is an apparent feeling of unconcern about everything.
Smoking a Most Serious Obstacle to Studentship
The injurious effects of smoking upon the boy's mental activities are very marked. Of the many hundreds of tabulated cases in my possession, several of the very youthful ones have been reduced almost to the condition of imbeciles. Out of 2,336 who were attending public school, only six were reported "bright students," a very few, perhaps ten, were "average," and all the remainder were "poor" or "worthless" as students. The average grades of fifty smokers and fifty non-smokers were computed from the records of one term's work done in the Kansas Agricultural College, and the results favored the latter group with a difference of 17.5 per cent. The two groups represented the same class rank; that is, the same number of seniors, juniors, sophomores, and freshmen.
The ordinary cigaret-smoking student often has a very peculiar experience in his effort to prepare his daily lessons, about as follows: He goes to his room in the evening with the full intention of studying, and opens his text-book, but a certain feeling of nervous uneasiness soon leads his hand automatically to roll and light a cigaret. He indulges the habit a few minutes, when, presto, the lesson task which a while ago looked serious and urgent now appears trivial and unnecessary, and he accordingly neglects it. He is now affable and companionable, but the higher moral judgments have lost their value to him, and he is now ready to yield to the evil suggestions of others. The partial brain paralysis resulting from the smoking makes the victim regard with indifference the most sacred promise he has ever made to any one, and he is likely to violate it upon the slightest provocation.
