The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-07-21
THE DEADLY BUTrERcUP.
Doctor Says That the Flower Cause
 Numerous Diseases.

Brooklyn EaRle. .
 The innocent buttercup, dotting the fields in all its yellow glory, myraid of brilliant spots in the sedate setting of green, has a terrible indictment to an- swer. A distinguished Philadelphia physician charges the buttercup with being the direct cause of cancer. Not some of 1t, not occasional isolated cases. but the sum total of all in- stances of this dread disease. In fact, he goes even further in his unlimited assertion. He challenges any one to cups do not grow.
 It is a startling blow at a flower that ranks in favor with the violet or the daisy. Theme of the poets, play thing of the children, the buttercue in the fields has ever been welcomed as one of the special joys of spring time. The love of the yellow bloom is innate in the heart of every child. The youngsters pick them, weave them into garIands, hold them under tiny necks to admire the golden reflection they cast. make them into bououets and take them into homes to become the most admired of decorations.
 If 1t be true that the buttercup is the agent for disseminating cancer then @ fell disease never found a more in- nocent or alluring way to do its dead ly work.
 Dr. Chalfant is a graduate of the Jefferson Medical College and the Phil- adelphia College of Pharmacy. Since the time when he made it his pFofes- sion to aid in the curing of fills to which the flesh Is heir, he has paid special attention to causes believing that the old saying about an "ounee of prevention being better than a pound of cure" applies especially to matters of health.
 He first became suspicious of the buttercup from a series of investira- tions that led him to suspect that li was the poison that brought measles Ills paper read on this subject at a conference of physicians raised con. siderable attention, and so strong wa, the case he made that a number of doctors have been applying the term
 puttercup fever" to the familiar and old-fashioned ailment known as the measles
 Then Dr. ChaIfant went thorouelaIV into the subject. He sought deenly in. 10 the medical lore of three centuries. ana found conditions that indicated a greater outbreak of cancer and si,,,i- Lar diseases in that period of the wear when the buttercups were In their full glory.
 From the data thus gained, fortified as 1t is with his own experiments and observations, Dr. Chalfant has felt warranted In pronouncing the butter cup as continuous menace to public health, and he intends to solicit the United States Government to make a campaign against 1t.
 There is nothing vague about the attack of Dr. Chalfant on the butter cup. He has discovered and proved the existence in the buttercup of the poll sons that do the business. These act i've poisons, he declares. are ramyculyn, anemonim and anemonimic acid. vola- tile acid substances, which produce in- fiammation at contact, and when taken internally may cause inflammation of the stomach and convulsions, and in extreme cases death itself. H.
 To the results of handing buttercups Dr. Chalfant traces many of the es- sentially juvenile troubles, unexplaIn- ed feverish conditions, which are so frequently treated as measles and chicken pox.
 But 1t is claimed, it Is not alone by buttercups that the dread danger Is sent on its way. The partiality of the cattle for browsing in the fields, it is declared, Is still more serious form of spreading the disease. The poison may be transferred in meat, especially that of mutton, and in milk and butter.
 
 by contact in the fields with the little yellow flower, and the result is the spreading of ills whose origin is a mystery.
 The familiar, and to some persons. dIsagreeable smell of mutton. pr. ChaI, fant says, is distinctly cancerous. This same odor can be readily detected In any kind of meat that has been infect ed with cancer.
 Having convinced himself that he was right in his diagnosis of the ma lignant possibilities of the buttercup Dr. Chalfant set out to demonstrate tu others the correctness of his position.
 Ills experiments were interesting and varied. In one of them he rubbed healthy flesh with buttercup and pro- duced an irritation very similar to that which marks the early stages of cancer.
 Then he tried another form. In sev- en days, by feeding a healthy man on mutton that had been infected by cooking with buttercups, he produced a condition resembling the first stages of cancerous irritation. and the frightened subject of the investigation ments be stopped at once, but under. went a most thorough course of cleansing 10 make sure that the last vestige of the poison had been removed from his system. Moreover, by feeding dogs with the mutton of animals that had been grazing in a buttercup- spangled field, he was able to pro- duce the kind of irritation that made even his opponents admit that the symptoms were all those of cancer.
 Another impressive experiment of Chalfant was to throw a handful of buttercup stems and flowers into a half gallon of boiling water. vapor of such power was produced that in- halatlon resulted in unconsciousness. and long exposure to the fumes brought about Authorizations, its and something not unlike temporary mad ness.
 In any vegetable. In milk or meat, by examining them after cooking, Dr. ChaIfant claims he can tell whether there has been any contact with but tercups. By mixing milk and rice to-