Small bottle of compressed lead and opium tablets

Small glass bottle of compressed lead and opium tablets with tin screw top from a small steel medicine chest. 70 mm x 20 mm x 25 mm, 28g. Labels on the chest reveal it was created for travellers to tropic areas. White paper label with black type face reads, ' Burroughs, Wellcome & Co/ 'Tabloids'/ LEAD AND OPIUM./ Anodyne and astringent./ In obstinante diarrhoea or dysen-/tary , one every six hours./ Snowhill Buildings, London, E.C.' The word 'poison' is stamped over the label in red. The term tabloid' medicines in compressed and measured doses was invented by Sir Henry Wellcome as early as 1884.