Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1899-10-13

Some of the Venomous Mixtures Used
by the Barbarinns Retain Their
Life Destroying Properties For an
Indefinite Time.
From the age of stone mp TO the time
| when the art of killing ones neighbor
| led to the discovery of powder and fire.
arms primitive peoples, owing TO the
insufficiency of their weapons TO cause
prompt death, have invented means of
giving them poisonous qualities. Poi
| sOned weapons, whether they are ar
rows, knives. lances or what not, may
get their fatal properties from either
vegetable or animal pCi>Ons-
| The South American Indians use
curare; the natives Of India, Indo-
China. BorneO and the Moluccas EN-
ploy, or rather did employ, the upas 70
poison their weapons; the negroes IF
the sudan and the Kpugo still make
use of a poison extracted from different
varieties of strophanthus called III bou
m0u or inc, according 10 the regions
where II Is employed; the people of
South Africa, the Hotteut0ts the Bush
men, the Kafiirs and the Akkas.l poison
their arrows with the venom of divers
others; certain tribes IF equatorial
Africa, the y DriS and the Banjiris,
use their arrows after long burial in
decOmposing corpses. - communicate
blood poisoning. which results in
speedy death; in Ocranica the natives
of New Caledonia. the H"brides and
the Solomon group give their enemies
lockjaw by soaking :lIeir arrows in
1l,..r 4
the bacillus of tetauuS.
The first three kinds OF poison are
practically Of vegetable origin. though
the local medicine men mix with their
preparations red ants, snakes venom,
tOads' eyes etc. They are the charac-
teristic alkaloids Of plants which serve
as the basis Of d deadly poisonous mix
ture Curare upas and III bounou have
aS their principal elements plants
whose species vary with the tribe. and
which all belong to the stryrhuine fam
lily. The three last named r"i>uns, ex-
cept that of the South African negroes,
are of microbial origin.
What are the value. duration and
activity Of these poi~on~E Curare keeps
indefinitely. In 1851 n the course of
experiments in physiology made in
France with curarized arrows brought
in dJ2 from equatorial America by La
COndamine, Il fowl scratched with one
of these arrows died in seven minutes
Among the Ouitetc Indians. humps of
curarc handed down from father to son
have preserved all their poisonous ac-
tivity. although covered with mold.
The same may hc said for the upas,
which. kept in little sections of bamboo
for seven or eight years. retains the
same active qualities as when freshly
prepared. Malay weapons. even those
of steel, always keep their poisonous
properties.
The black races that use inc claim
that it will keep only short time be
fore it spoils. Now, inc. which is an
aqueous maceration of strophanthus
seeds. to which is added the Juice of II
fig or of a cuphorbi, and generally also
vipers' venom. becomes covered with
mold at the end of ii few weeks. but
Notwithstanding it has preserved all its
toxic properties Guinea pigs have been
killed i'll "a few minutes 10y being
scratched with arrows whose points
had nodded. In fact. the vegetable !
poisons used by primitive peoples for
their arrows keep indefinitely and al
ways make effective weapons.
This Is not the case with poisOns of
animal or micrubiau origin. As we
have seen above. the BuShmeu, the !
Kaffirs and the AkkaS poison the points |
of their arrows with serpent venom. |
especially that of the cobra. At the end |
of two or three weeks their arms have !
lost all harmful quality. This l. due to !
a single cause. The venom ot snakes. |
which is preserved indefinitely III alco- |
hoI, becomes covered III air with a pc |
Culiar mold, which has not been studied |
and which removes all poison /
Gus effect from the venom.
The poison used on the arrows of the |
y Dris of the Upper UbanShi Is moth |
ing else than tine septic vibrio (microbe I
of blood poisoning). which dies III the /
air If II Is not in the presence of de- !
Thus those arrows are /
harmful only during very short time. |
As for the arrows of the New Gale .
domains, which infect their victim with .
retanus. authorities do not agree about !
the duration Of their harmful action, /
although II Is proved that the bacillus ,
OF Nicolaier cannot live except in Il very
moist medium and together with other
hacilli, harmless or otherwise, such rs
the septic bacillus. which, a. We have .
seen, dies in a short time
Thus in all cases the poisoned arrows
of the races that make use of vegetable
alkaloids are much more 10 be feared .
than those of the tribes that employ /
poisons Of animal or micrObian origin.
-Sure Thing" Bet.