Daily independent. [volume] (Elko, Nev.) 188?-1915, 1891-05-20
MYSTERIOUS POISONS.

had been thrown into the kitchen stove,
and how physician had hard strug-
gle to save their lives. A New York
Sun reporter showed it to a well-l1nown
scientist, who has made the study of
toHicolOGy specially, and asked him
whether there could possibly be any
truth in it. Here is what the professor
says:
Young main, take out your note
book, sit down and listen, and l will
tell you something about q subject that
the public knows less about than any
other in the world. That story isn't
true, and nothing like it ever was true,
or ever will be TRUE. It's of exactly the
same character rs the following myths
which am going to relate to you.
"On the island of Java grows the boz
hun upas tree, which owes its notoricty
to Foersch, q surgeon in the employ of
the Dutch East India Company, who,
nearly 4 hundred years ago, told some
wonderful stories about it. He related
how the carnations of this tree killed
all animals that approached it; how the
birds that flew too near fell dead; how
criminals that were condemned to
death were allowed to collect leaves
from the tree, and that only two out of
twenty ever returned; how it grew in q
valley, with no tree or plant within ten
miles OF 1T, all being n barren waste,
strewn with human and other bones.
1t was beautiful story, and the world
believed it. Scientists discovered in
1910 that the upas was very poisonous
tree, whose effects were similar to those
of poison ivy.
Next is the manchineel, O poisonous
evergreen tree which grows in the
West India islands. This tree was said
to be even more deadly than the upas,
and it was generally supposed that
drop Of its juice falling upon the skin
had the same effect us the application
of a red-hot iron. The milky juice of
this tree is undoubtedly highly poison
Gus, but such stories as the above are
highly exaggerated. This poison, like
our poison Sumac, affects some persons
more seriously than others. 1t is said
that the smoke from burning manchineel
wood produces temporary blindness.
This is true in q measure, though it
does not effect every one in the same
way. Bcrthold Secmann, the botanist,
was blind for few days after he had
gathered some of the leaves of the
tree on the coast of Florida, and some
of the crew were blind for nearly a
week from having made fire of the
wood.
"DramatiSts, as rule. do not know
the first thing about poisons. Nathaniel
Lee, in his tragedy of Alexander,
makes one of his characters administer
Il poison to the conqueror of the world,
which,
MIXED with his wine, single drop gives deuth,
And sends him bowling to the shades below.
"And swallowing this terrible mix
turc, Alexander goes through the latter
part of the fourth and most Of the fifth
act, kills man, makes Il fine speech,
raves wildly, RECEIVERS his senses, and,
after Il fine dying address, goes
off. Now, there isn't poison in
the world which can produce such an
effect There is n poison, little known
to playwrights, which has much more
wonderful effect than this, but very
few people know anything about it.
After it is swallowed the person walks
about for time varying from half an
hour to two hours then his skin, and
even the whites of his eyes, become of
n strange purplish, livid color. He
may feel perfectly well, when suddenly
acute pain will set in, and in few mo-
ments he dies. This effect is produced
by nitrobenzine.
'Thcn there is Philip Massinger, who,
in his play, THE Duke of Milan shows
that he doesn't know the first thing
about toXicology One of the charac-
ters scatters poisonous powder over r.
flower, which is afterward given to n
female. Some of the powder falls on
her hand, and when her lover salutes
the tips of her fingers he dies. Pure
aconitinc itself, the most powerful Of
oil known, vegetable poisons, would
hardly produce that effect.
"Thc most powerful and deadly poison
in the world and at the same time the
oldest one known to mankind, is prussic
acid. TO illustrate it's antiquity: An
Psychologist has read on an Egyptian
papyrus preserved ut the Louvre, Pro