The Northern Guardian. — 1892-11-16 (Hartlepool, Cleveland, England)

STRYCHNINE AS A POISON.  Strychnine, which is taken everyday by hundreds of people by the prescription of medical men or in the form of patent nervine tonics and syrups, has again come into notoriety as a toxic substance by the doings of the miserable convict Neill. The medical virtues of strychnine and nux vomica, of which it is the active principle, as morphia is of opium, are in high repute, and it is reMarkable that the intense bitterness of these drugs does not deter the poisoner from using them. So small a proportion as one thirty-thousandth part gives a very bitter taste to any liquid in which strychnine is dissolved. Neill, by administering the poison in pills and capsules, gave it in a form most likely to conceal the bitterness. It will be remembered that the notorious Palmer killed his victim with strychnine pills, and that Lamson used capsules when he poisoned Percy John with aconitine. Strychnine has also been given with murderous intent in sarsaparilla and in Epsom salts. And the method of administration has much to do with the rapidity of the onset :of the symptoms. Taken in solution or with liquid likely to assist its solution, it is quickly absorbed and may destroy life in twenty minutes, as in the case of Dr. Warner, who took by mistake half a grain of sulphate of stryehnia, instead of a dose of morphia. Not a few deaths have arisen from similar mistakes. But the most common variety of death from strychnine is the suicidal. It is, of course, impossible for the public to go into a chemist's shop, and having made the request, to be supplied with a poisonous dose of strychnine. The national sentiment would revolt at the danger to which the community would be exposed. But the life-tired maid or the temporary monomaniac has only to pay a few coppers over the chemist's counter, give his name and address, fictitious or otherwise, to be set down in a book ; and if he can invent any plausible excuse for the use of his purchase, and does not object to have the poison mixed with a little lamp-blacklor Prussian Blue, he can with less trouble than he can make a deposit in the Post Office Saving Bank procure strychnine enough to kill two or three human beings. If the accidental or suicidal deaths from strychnine sold in this manner were carefully recorded, chemists would be more cautious than they are, and perhaps there would be a popular outcry ai*iisst a system which is an incentive to suicide, Pf not to crime. The chemist may act with every circumspection, and we believe that he does ; he does the best lie can in the circumstances which the law has imposed upon him. In the year 1890 alone there were nineteen deaths from strychnine sold in this manner. But if the man or woman succeeds in purchasing or by other means procuring poison, let him beware of using it on any human being but himself. The train of symptoms it sets up are so characteristic that even if the detection of the poison in the body after death be in vain—and strychnine does sometimes elude the search of the analyst—the manner in which it kills is to the trained eye sufficient to stamp the real nature of the case. In no case was this more clearly shown than in that of Palmer, the Rugeley poisoner, and the first detected case of murder by strychnine. Doctor Swain° Taylor and Doctor Rees, on making their analysis, found not strychnine but antimony ; yet on hearing the description of the fatal illness, had not the least hesitation in assigning it to strychnine. The sudden spasms and twitchings of the body and limbs setting in with great violence and without assignable cause, their rapid progress to a fatal termination, together with the clearness of the mental faculties, were enough to give Dr. Taylor the clue to the doings of the Rugeley murderer. The discovery of the antimony in the body of the victim was disregarded, and though strychnine was not found, its administration was not merely inferred by, but conclusively demonstrated, to the mind of Dr. Taylor by the symptoms, even though he had never seen the deceased at all. We may, therefore, rest comfortably assured that the:systematic strychnine poisoner will sooner or later bring his work under the notice of one who will recognise its hideousness, and take measures to rid society of such a villain. Otherwise the trial to which crowds have flocked would leave the impression that the secret assassin can go about with impunity, and without fear of detection, whereas the opposite is nearer the true state of the case.