Ten cents' worth of a certain bird seed, planted in any back yard, will grow into a yardful of marijuana. Marijuana is a variety of hemp weed (Cannabis sativa) long common in Mexico, lately becoming common in the U. S. Its leaves can be dried, ground and rolled into cigarets, which are bootlegged under the name of "muggles," "reefers," or "Mary Warners." Thinner, shorter than standard cigarets, "muggles" are made from the small delicate leaves of the female marijuana plant. The male plant has no potency. Smoking of marijuana cigarets produces a state of intoxication similar to that induced by alcohol, stimulates playfulness, suppresses fear. Thousands are smoked in Harlem, in New Orleans, in other nightlife centres. In New Orleans many a schoolchild is said to be an addict; prison authorities find muggle-smuggling a perplexing problem. Federal authorities say that marijuana, though a drug, is not a narcotic drug and therefore its users cannot be prosecuted under the Harrison Act. So in Louisiana the Legislature passed its own antimarijuana law. In California, Cornetist Louis Armstrong ("world's greatest Negro cornet player") was sentenced to jail for 30 days for taking poison when caught smoking a "reefer."
Last week in Philadelphia U. S. Customs officials discovered a ten-acre patch of marijuana. Marketed in cigarets it would have yielded a $125,000 profit.* Though it was apparently growing wild, the agents were sure so much marijuana had not sprung up by chance. Carefully guarding the secret of its location, they hurried to the Board of Health, had the marijuana patch declared a menace to public health and ordered burned with great public stench.
*Broadway Brevities, weekly smutsheet, last week reported: "Reefers are down to a nickel apiece in Harlem. Just ask for Benny."