Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1901-01-05
FACTS ABOUT POIsONs.
Errors That Have Been Made by Nov
elists and Dram fists.

eIists and Drama lists.
| From the London Mail
| When Mr.. Grundy made one of the char
acters in "A Debt of Honor die within
a few minutes from the effects of taking
an overdose of Choral he committed
great physiological blunder
person with ordinarily sound heart
| almost every ones heart is little I'M
sound in some respect-could take a dozen
overdoses and not die for many hours; in
fact, he would probably be found alive
next morning, only it would be impossible
to rouse him. Choral morphine, opium,
sulphonyl-all the anaesthetics and sopor-
ifics and hypnotics-take time as we'll as
quantity to kill. An author or a dramatist
who wishes haste in dispatching his char
| acters must use prussic acid (hydrocyanic
acid. 1t is the deadliest drug in the
Pharmacopoeia, both in rapidity of effect
and in smallness of the lethal dose, and,
| acting directly on the respiratory organs,
kills painlessly and with awful sudden
ness in a very few moments.
When you the villain of play lad
minister cup OF poison, ha! ha!' to his
dead with the cup in his hand as If he
had received a bullet in the brain, you
may write the author Of the play down an
ignoramus; no poison will do that.
Strychnine runs prussc acid very close
in deadliness, both for time and quantity,
but, acting on the nerve centers, it causes
terrible. painful and by no means in
stantaneous end. 1t is, Of course, a vege-
ia BILE poison, derived from a nut, or bean,
the nux vomica. whereas prussc acid is a
chemically prepared artificial product
Both these deadly drugs are very readily
detected, not only from their physiological
effects, but also by means Of chemical
analysis. In fact, nowadays, so far has
chemical science progressed, that secret
poisoning is an absolute impossibility-a.
any rate, by means of drugs. 1t is not 80
he data 90
senic was considered something Of a feat
depending principally upon microscopicai
examination, and therefore unreliable ex-
cept in the case of large overdoses when
sufficient unassimilated particles remained
for recognition. Nowadays a forty-thou-
sandth part of a grain in the human body
can be identified with absolute certainty
and the utmost ease by chemical ANALYSIS.
by means of Marsh's or Rensch's tests
The most difficult drug to detect chem
lcally is atropin. the active principle of
belladonna. which is. of course, a deriva-
tive of the deadly nightshade. It is, how
ever, very fortunately, unmistakable in its
physiological effects, and although it is
dlfhcult to recognize 1t chemically, 1t is
by no means impossible: In old times
many of the vegetable poisons were unde-
tectable, especially beladonna, digitalis
from the foxglove. a very deadly Drug
and strephanthuS from the seed of dande-
lion). The last-named is one Of the fam
Gus South American poisons that figure
SO largely in romance. and is the active
principle in most arrow and dart poisons
for which purpose strychnine is also large
ly used
Indian and South American poisons have
for SO long had such a hold of picturesque
ness surrounding them that 1t is almost
an act Of vandalism to shatter their claim
to distinction. In these utilitarian DAYS
they are all scheduled in the British Phar-
macopoeia, and when you read of IAN OBJ
scure Indian poison you may console YOUR
self with the reflection that there are plen-
fv nf n w 3nfn
offer no difficulties whatever. The only
form of poison which you can use upon
your friends with any chance of the an
alyst not being able to state with absolute
certainty In what form 1t was administered
is an animal one and not drug-either
meteorological toxin, which you will find
costly either to produce or to purchase,
and difficult to administer, or some of the
ptomaines. the poisons that exist in putrtd
and putrefying fish and meat. These you
will not be able to get any sane person to
take, owing to the offensive smell and taste
of any food In which they are present. So
that, as already stated. secret poisoning
may now be reckoned a thing of the past
one of the lost arts.
But to return to drugs. All drugs vary
in their action on different people. They
are. as it Is put rather more scientifically,
personal idiosyncrasies in the action of all
drugs. Thus very commonly used one,
Santonin. makes everything look yellow to
some subjects while most Of the drugs al
ready mentioned vary in the amount of
physiological reaction on different persons
to a remarkable degree. Some people can
take quite a considerable dose Of bella
donna; others, though such cases are rare.
exhibit all the symptoms of atropin poi
soning when only small quantity of the
drug is present in lotion used externally
De Quincy, it will be remembered. used
to eat opium in large Jumps, whereas few
drops of laudanum constitute too large a
dose for patients with diseased kidneys or
for those unused to the drug.
The price of many drugs used in medi-
cine is astonishing to those who are not
acquainted with the subject There are
several which are worth their weight in
gold GA an ounce when sold retail, while
los, 15s. and Fl an ounce are quite COM
mon prices in pharmacy. The drug which
takes the palm for costliness is, curiously
enough. the one which Is perhaps the most
widely known by name Of them all to the
general public-namely, musk. Its retail
price at the present moment is about FLO
an ounce, f120 per pound apothecary. or
two and half times the value of pure gold
"a carats fine. It is obtained from the musk
deer, a very rare animal, and is contained
In a follicle of which there Is only one in
each animal, SO that an ounce Of the drug
represents approximately one of these
precious animals. AS it is largely used for
scent, the demand constantly exceeds the