SECALE CORNUTUM. 741 



The use of flour containing a considerable proportion of ergot, gives 

 rise to a very formidable disease, distinguished in modern medicine as 

 Ergotism, but known in early times by a variety of names, as Morbna 

 spasmodicus, convulsivns, malignus, epidemicus vel cerealis, Rapkaniaj 

 Convulsio raphania^ or Ig^iis sancti Antonii. 



Some of the malignant epidemics which visited Europe after seasons 

 of rain and scarcity during the middle ages have been referred with 

 more or less of probability to ergot-disease.^ The chronicles of the 

 Cth and 8th centuries note the occurrence of maladies %\J)ich may be 

 suspected as due to ergotized grain. There is less of doubt regarding 

 the epidemics that prevailed from the 10th century and were frequent 

 in France, and in the 12th in Spain. In the year 159G Hesscn (Ressia) 

 and the adjoining regions were ravaged by a frightful pestilence, which 

 the Medical Faculty of Marburg attributed to the presence of ergot in 

 the cereals consumed by the population. The same disease appeared in 

 France in 1630, in Voigtiand (Saxony) in the years 1G48, IGiO/aiid 

 1675; again in various parts of France, as Aquitaine and Sologne, in 

 1650, 1670, and 1674. Freiburg and the neighbouring region were 

 visited by the same malady in 1702; other parts of Switzerland m 

 1715-16; Saxony and Lusatia in 1716; many other districts of Germany 

 in 1717, 1722, 1736, and 1741-2.' The last epidemic in Europe occa- 

 sioned by ergot appears to be that which, after the rainy season of 

 1816, visited Lorraine and Burgundy, and proved fatal to many people 

 of the poorer class. Ergot disease is sometimes observed m Abyssinia 

 at the present day,' and a few cases of it have even been lately recorded 

 in Bavaria.^ 



Formation— The true nature of ergot has long been the source of 

 a great diversity of opinion, not set at rest by the admirable researches 



umac 



followincr account is for the most part extracted. -j • „ 



The formation of ergot often affects only a few caryopsides in a 

 single ear; sometimes, however, more than twenty. _. ii^ t'^*; i™' 

 case, the healthy development of the other caryopsides is not prevented 

 but if too many are attacked, the entire ear decays. The more isolated 

 ergots generally grow larger, and attain their greatest size on ije ^UllCt^ 

 springs up here and there among other cereals. , 



The first symptoms of ergot-formation is ^h^/o-f IfJ^^^Sj^ 

 rye, a yellowish mucus, having an intensely sweet taste, ^"f \\« f '^^^^^^^^^ 

 disagreeable odour frequently belonging to fungi. ^^'-'^R^^^^'j^^^^j'oJ 

 show themselves here and there on the ears m the ^e"^^,^"" ^ 

 diseased grains, and attract ants and beetles of various kinds, especially 



, 'Pereira, J,le„. of Mat. Med. ii. (1S50) e« rf« P^^- ^^^- -"^ '"''''■ '^^''■ 



/ L-lt mser, LeKrluck der G.sckicMe ' J^K von Heuglin, Meis. nack M.. n 



derJUdicin und der Von^krarMdten, 1845. <'*';-^^°^; ' "nd Husemann, Jahresberickt 



\ 2o6. 830, ii. 94 ; C. F. Heusinger, Re- ,J.f%r 



cft«-c/jes de Patholofjie comparie, Cassel, i. for I » u- oo • ^ g^t xx. (1853) 



(1853) 543-554 ; Ml'rat et De Lens, DM. '-^"^ 4 chTes -More recent ol.serva- 



Mat Med. iii, 131, vii. 268. }:^^ t">,', t found in St. Wilson's paper, 



,,^^Tissot of Lausanne, Phil. Trans. Iv. ^)^''^^„fikem Society of Edinburgh, 

 flTfifii ififi o.. .1.. 'i-,„,i„-j. M^«, ,U Tram. 0/ '"f •""'• _?,. t-l..' . .„j „,,,». 



(1/66) lOG.—See also Dodart, Mini, de -',r"'fA-fi< 4,0 434 'with figures ; and espe- 



'^Acad. R. desScience.% x., annees 1666-1690 ^''-./'l' V Tier^seu (quoted at p. 735) 156, 



(Paris, 1730) 561 ; Hist, de la Soc. Roy. de ofly in Luer3seu w 



M^d., anuee 1776. 345 ; and Mem. de Mid. et seqq. 



