The Sun.
London, England, 1844-10-31 00:00:00

POISONS, THEIR TESTS, AND
ANTIDOTES.

At the Royal Polytechnic Institution, yetterday, Dr.
Ryan delivered to a very numerous audience the second
of his proposed series of lectures on the nature of poisons,
the tests for discovering their presence, and the mist
fffectuAl means of counteracting their effects. It
seems preferable to give his valuable discourse
as much es possib:e in his own words, although
it is impossible to detail his experiments or the in •
structive observations with which they were ac-
companied. The importance of the subject to the
whole public, and the popular and intelligible style of the
Professor, render his lectures equally desirable in the
columns of a newspaper as in the merely scientific jour-
nal. Ile said—Our former attempts to give a popular
view of some of the most dangerous mineral poisons, and
especially arsenic, having been well received, we have
been induced to continue the subject, for the purpose of
giving a brief outline of some of the acid poisons,
such as prussic or hydrocyanic acid. In bringing
these lectures before an audience necessarily
composed of many non-professional individuals, we must
deprecate at once anything like a disposition to pander
to the moi bid appetite of those who love to feed upon
the horrible ; our objects are, we trust, legitimate and
honourable, and worthy an institution which professes
the diffusion of knowledge. Our objects then are simply
to satisfy the rational curiosity of those who wish to
know something of the many disguises under which an
enemy may lurk—to point crt the means of detection
and of remedy in cases of emergency, and, as in the
lecture on arsenic, to guard the honest juryman against
the dangerous fallacies that may accompany medico-
legal investigations. We feel it our duty also here to
remark that although we shall be anxious to bring the
most important and prominent features before our
audience, yet we shall avoid as much as we can unne-
cessary scientific detail, and if we fail in rivetting the
attention by the usual brilliant experiments of the lec-
ture to all, yet we trust that the object we have
in view may lead our audience to forget the
spectacle in the value of the information given.
It is my intention, in this lecture, to divide the poi-
sonous acids into two distinct parts :—First, those result-
ing from certain natural processes—as respiration, com-
bustion, animal and vegetable decomposition. Secondly,
those which are found native, or are the result of art.
However, before we proceed to detail, it may be as well
for me to give a brief explanation of an acid :-1. As
the term indicates, an acid is generally sour, although
some acids are not sensiblrso. 2. They generally redden
the vegetable blues, having precisely the opposite action of
an alkali. 3. They combine with bases to form salts.
It was the opinion of some of the earlier chemists that
an acid was necessarily the union of a combustible base
with oxygen—hence the term—but although oxygen is
found in most acids, it does not exist in all. The two
great acidifiers are oxygen and hydrogen. We may di-
vide acids, therefore, into two great classes—oxacids
and hydracids. The oxacids have oxygen as their acidi-
fying principle ; the hydracids have hydrogen.
Atter a number of beautiful experiments, illustrating
the various acids of these two classes, and their effects—
including especially hydro-sulphuric acid, or sulphuretted
hydrogen, copiously and most perniciously disengaged
from our drains and other - numerous sources of mi-
asma, he. stated, one:eight-hundredth part of this
poison kills a dog, one-two-hundred-and-fiftieth a horse,
and one-fifteen-hundredth part a bird. The antidote is
chlorine. lie then proceeded to the immediate subject
of this lecture.

" Ilidrocyanic acid is an organic product, either of
the animal or vegetable kingdom. Its synonimes are
prussic acid, because it exists in Prussian blue; zootic
acid, because of its animal origin; and hydrocyanic acid,
because it is a compound of hydrogen and cyanogen.
Cyanogen is a compound of two volumes of the
vapour of carbon and one of nitrogen ; so that
our most extensive compounds, as well as our most active
poisons, contain nitrogen. Prussic acid, or rather its
base cyanogen, may be found in many vegetables, espe-
cially in the amygdalea and pomew, bitter almonds,
apple-pips, kernals of peaches, apricots, cherries, plums,
and damsons. In the flowers of the peach, cherry-

laurel, and bank cherry—in the 'bark of tile
latter and the root of the mountain ash. Laurel-
water has long been used as a poison. It is
also found during decomposition, as in old cheese.
It is developed (luring the combustion of blood, hoofs,
&c., in an iron pot. It is not my place to go into
the various methods of making it. Its history is briefly
told. Prussian blue was accidentally discovered by
Diesbach at the commencement of the eighteenth century.
In 1746 Dr. Brown Langrish published on laurel-water.
In 1752 Macguire announced that Prussian blue was an
oxide of iron and some colouring principle. In 1787
Bertholet discovered its composition. In 1801 it was
first used in medicine. The acid of the shops contains
98 per cent. of water and 2 of Prussic acid.
The tests by which its presence may be discovered
are :—first, its peculiar odour ; secondly, the formation
of Prussian blue. Add caustic potassa to the suspected
liquid, then add a protosalt of iron, and eventually a few
drops of muriatic acid. Thirdly, the formation of cyanide
of silver, by adding nitrate of silver to the suspected liquid.
The cyanide is distinguished by its solubility in hot
nitric acid. Fourthly, by the formation of cyanide of
copper, and its conversion into a dicyanide. This is
done by adding caustic potassa to the suspected liquid,
then introducing a few drops of solution of sulphate of cop-
per, the cyanide is formed of a yellowish green. On the ad-
dition of muriatic acid, a white dicyanide is precipi-
tated. And fifthly, by the action of tincture of guia-
cum. Add the tincture to the Prussic acid liquid, a
white resin is precipitated. Then introduce a few drops
of solution of sulphate of copper, and a beautiful blue re-
' sultg, made more intense by the addition of alcohol.
A fallacy may occur here, as tincture of guiacum will
produce a similar blue colour with spirit of nitric nether.
Sixthly, where the odour is not detected, distillation
will discover the acid. The antidotes are chlo
rine, ammonia, cold effusion, artificial respi-
ration, and finally, the recently discovered method
of the celebrated chemists, Messrs. Smith, of Edin-
burgh. Their antidote is thus prepared:—Boil
sulphate of iron with sulphuric acid and water, and add
a few drops of nitric acid. In this way a proto-
persalt of iron is formed. Give to the patient
first of all a solution of carbonate of potassia,
and then a dose of the protopersalt of iron. The change
which takes place is a most beautiful and effective one,
resulting in the formation of Prussian blue, which being
insoluble, is consequently inert.
The audience, at the conclusion, expressed their satis-
faction by applause, and several gentlemen stated, that
as they had not heard the lecture upon arsenic, they
hoped the Professor would find an opportunity of re-
peating it.

A TOO COMMON TALE.—A young girl of eighteen
previously of unexceptionable chavacter, and who lived
about seven years in two places in Maidstone, was about
August last discharged from her place, on account of her
being in the family-way, and came home here (Boughton
Malherbe) to her friends. About a month since a full-
grown child was found by two boys in a pond at some
distance from the house, and was suspected by the
parishioners to have come from the cottage where she
lived. This was strenuously denied by the mother, who,
however, admitted that her daughter had recently mis-
carried, and said that evidence of this fact would be
found in the cesspool of the house. A coroner's inquest
was held on the child. A surgeon who had been called
in to examine the young woman, could not give an opinion
as to whether she had been delivered or had miscarried.
Her mother attended before the coroner, and stated that
her daughter had never been in the family-way, and
there being no satisfactory evidence to connect the
young woman with the bony found, an open verdict
was returned. Still, the case was of so suspicious a cha-
racter that the respectable parishioners determined on
prosecuting the inquiry. The cesspool was searched,
and no evidence of miscarriage found therein. The
young woman underwent a second medical examination
by the same surgeon who had examined her before, and
who now inclined to the opinion that she had been re-
gularly confined. The unhappy girl herself, weakened
by her situation, and doubtless agitated by grief, shame,
and remorse, became alarmingly ill, and we are told,
closed her miserable life on Wednesday week, in a state
of delirium, calling fur " her poor boy." She is now
" where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary
are at rest." We regret to be obliged to add, that the
reputed father of the child, and, we fear we must say,
the destroyer of this unfortunate girl, is a married man
living in Maidstone. This melancholy affair has cast a
deep gloom over our usually peaceful and happy hamlet,
and it is to be hoped that it will serve as a warning in
other places against reckless and immoral indulgence in
these first acts of thoughtless indiscretion, which involve
consequences so terrible as those we hare been called
upon to relate.--Maidstone Gazette.
FATAL WAGGON ACCIDENT.—Last evening Mr.
Higgs held an inquest at St. George's Hospital, on the
body of William Ricketts, aged thirty-five, carman in the
service of Messrs. Taprell and Holland, upholsterers to
her Majesty, in Marylebone-street, St. James's. It ap-
peared from the evidence of the two fellow-servants of
deceased that they were retiring from Windsor Castle on
the night of Tuesday, the 18th inst., with a waggon
laden with furniture. The night was wet and boisterous,
and the two witnesses took shelter on the waggon be-
neath the tarpauling, and when they were between
Brentford and Hounslow they felt that the wheels had
passed over some obstruction, and instantly heard de-
ceased cry out, " For God's sake come down, I am run
over." They descended from the waggon and found de-
ceased in the act of rising from the road and standing on
his left leg, the right one being useless and bleeding.
They wished to take him to the first surgeon's, but he
refused to go, preferring the hospital, to which they con.:
veyed him. He was slightly intoxicated, and they thought
that his sitting on the shafts and falling off caused the
accident. Mr. 0, candy, house surgeon, said deceased
was admitted with extensive laceration and fracture of
the small bones of the right foot which rendered instant
amputation of the toes necessary. Mortification ensued
two days afterwards, accompanied by delirium tremens,
which continued until he expired on Tuesday last. Ver-
dict—" Accidental death."

A curious and somewhat amusing incident occurred
in the Strand during the passing of the royal procession.
It is usual on all such public occasions to hare many of
the police stationed in different parts of the streets
dressed in coloured clothes, in order the more effectually
to keep an eye upon thieves and pickpockets. One of
these men had discovered a common thief in the act of
picking the pocket of a student of King's College, and
took him into custody. At the same moment, as some
of the constables;who were keeping the line were about
to pounce upon him, mistaking their brother ofti
the coloured clothes for a friend of the thiers who W)e wished
to to rescue him, they began to belabour him with their
staves ; and it wits not until after he had received
very severe blows on the head that l fieveriti
mak-
ing them believe that he was what hloesureePereestncitedn him
self. The thief was, however, secured.
Mr. F. R. Bowring, son of Pr, 13lowring, M.P.,
has been elected fellow fT • off' College, Cambridge.