The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1912-02-02
THE POISON FINDER.
How Net Is Drawn About Murder Sus-
poets in the Laboratory.

1t is not at Scotland Yard. with it's
clever brains and its wonderful ma
chinery, that detective skill attains its
deadliest perfection, but in the labora-
tory, where the magician of the test
tube and the re-agent bottle draws
around the poisoner a net from which
there is no escape.
1t is magic, nothing less( this detec-
tive work of the laboratory. Think for
a moment OF the stupendous problems
with which the chemical expert has to
deal.
It is suspected that a man has been
poisoned; his duty is to determine what
was the precise agent of DEATH and
what was the dose administered. The
poison may come from the whole do
main Of the vegetable and animal king
doms, aud it must be traced and proved
to the last lethal fraction of a grain.
OF strychnine, half grain is fatal
dose; and before death this minute
quantity has become mingled with ev-
cry tissue Of the body which weighs,
let us say, a hundredweight and a half.
OF arsenic, two and a half grains may
end a human life; a sixteenth of a
grain of prussic acid has proved fatal
to man. And there are many poisons
of which a deadly dose is smaller still.
1t seems inconceiva Bile that even
chemical magic can discover such in
finitesimal quantities of poison dis
tributed over a body, especially when, as
often happens, that body may have been
lying months underground.
But the chemist smiles at such diff
culties.
If the poison is there, he knows that
his kill will reveal the most micro
scopic trace Of it. If there is but one
twenty thousandth part of a grain of
opium, for example, O. few drops of
iodic acid will infallibly detect it by
changing the solution containing it to
chloride of zinc will reveal morphia by
a transformation to green.
Let us take an imaginary case for the
purpose of illustration. Poison is sus-
pected, but there is nothing whs tever
to suggest in any way which poison it
is. The first step of the analysis is to
place the stomach of the victim, with
its contents, into alcohol, and leave it
there for AZ hours.
The spirit is now carefully poured off
and filtered, and the liquid and residue
are ready for further examination. The
residue is now treated by alcohol and
tartaric acid, allowed to cool and once
more is filtered.
The solution thus obtained is shaken
up, first with ether, then with chloro-
form and ether, which dissolve out all
alkaloids: On evaporation now de-
posit is left. This, the expert knows,
consists of one or more alkaloids. But
which of them? Further tests follow.
The deposit is mixed with a preparation
of gold, the resultant deposit is weighed,
burned, and weighed again. Still the
goal is rot reached. The expert now
tastes the mysterious residue. An, that
peculiar tingling sensation of the
tongue! Nothing but aconite could
cause it. He has found the poison at
last. He tries a minute portion on 4
mouse. Within half a hour the mouse
is dead.
If his tests have revealed tropine, a
name can easily be given to it. If a drop
of a solution of only one part in $780,
600 be applied under the eyelid the pu-
pill viii dilate Immediately and conclu-
sively.
If arsenic is the poison employed, the