“The action of Coca is then, in my opinion, confined to an excitement, but an excitement of a peculiar kind, which I consider as very different from that resulting from the use of most of the ordinary excitants, and especially of alcohol. Brandy gives strength, as all know; but who does not know also that the ‘gift’ is but a _loan_ made out at the expense of strength reserved for the future? The action of this agent, though powerful, is transient. The stimulus produced by mastication of the leaf of the _Erythroxylon_ is, on the contrary, slow and sustained, characters which it owes, doubtless, in great part to the manner of its employment, since an infusion of Coca acts very differently from the leaf taken in the ordinary way. It will be said that tea and coffee, whose effects appear to have more analogy with those of Coca, would perhaps produce analogous results if taken in the same manner. I do not believe such would be the case. Tea and coffee (coffee in particular) act specially on the brain, on which they produce an antisoporific effect, but too well known to those who are not in their habitual use. But Coca, while producing a little of this effect, when taken in large doses, as I have often experienced in my own person, does not act perceptibly upon the brain in small doses. To account for the ordinary effects of the leaf, one must then suppose that its action, instead of being localised, as in the case of tea and coffee, is diffused, and bears upon the nervous system generally, producing upon it a sustained stimulus, well suited to impart to those who are under its influence that support which has been erroneously attributed to peculiar nutritive properties. “Finally, I think that in the fidelity of the Indian to the use of Coca, as with some smokers and their pipes, much is due to habit; and it is, I think, essential not to lose sight of the fact, that the force of habit must have an influence all the more powerful, since the habit in question is almost the only one he retains of past times, and that now, as then, he attaches to the use of the Coca-leaf superstitious ideas, which, to his imagination, must at least treble the greatness of the benefits he derives from it. Lastly, that in the mastication of Coca he finds the sole distraction that breaks the incomparable monotony of his existence.” Dr. Weddell supposes that the word _Coca_ comes from the Aymara (Indian) _Khoka_, signifying _the tree_ or _plant_, just as the shrub producing Paraguay Tea (_Ilex Paraguayensis_) is called _la Yerba_, i.e., _the plant_. Botanical specimens were first sent by Joseph de Jussieu to his brother in 1750; these Antoine Laurent de Jussieu referred to the genus _Erythroxylon_, and finally they served as types for Lamarck to give the plant his designation, _Erythroxylon Coca_, in the _Encyclopédie Méthodique_. CHAPTER VI. SCHERZER, FUENTES, AND OTHERS, ON COCA.