Chloroform

Chloroform is made by distilling proportions of chloride of lime, alcohol, and water. The word chloroform is made up of chloros (grass-green) and formyle, a substance named from the Latin formica (anant), because it was first found in ants.

Chloroform was long known to the scientific chemist before its power as an anaesthetic or nerve-stupefier was discovered. Dr. Simpson of Edinburgh was the first to introduce it into his practice in 1847.

Dr. Morton, an American physician, was the first to put sulphuric ether to this use in 1846.

The Greeks and Romans used mandragora to annual the pain attendant upon surgical operations, and the Chinese used hashish for the same purpose; therefore, the administration of narcotic drugs was not unknown to the ancients, but they never attained to a knowledge of perfect anaesthetics.