THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. 127 



manner of a venom, that is an animal poison. They state that M. 

 Goudot, who furnished them with the specimen they employed, had 

 resided many years in South America, and was fully aware of the 

 method of its preparation, and that he assured them that the poison of 

 the most venomous serpents constantly entered into its composition. 



He even described the manner of taking the serpents, and extracting 

 the poison. 



An intelligent traveller in California informs me that the Digger 

 Indians in that Slate possess the art of poisoning their arrows, and that 

 the substance which they use for the purpose is well known to be ob- 

 tained from the rattlesnake. 



Dr. George Johnson, of St. liOuis, also told me that several tribes of 

 Indians on the Rio Grande employ the venom of the serpent for this 

 purpose, and that there is a species known to them which have the 

 vesicles receiving the venom so large as to contain a quantity sufficient 

 to poison a great number of arrows. 



An intelligent missionary, who had resided many years in the East 

 Indies, states that tiie traditional account of the method of preparing the 

 woorara of that country is, that the venom of serpents is mixed with it 

 to ibrm the most active part. 



This substance called woorara, curare, corare, tiennas, has been va- 

 riously described by different travellers as being of an animal or a vege- 

 table nature, or a mixture of the two. Sir Walter Raleigh is said to 

 hav^e been the first who heard of its existence ; but certain missionaries 

 in South America gave at an early day an account of its effects, but so 

 mingled with fanciful details as to deprive it of most of its value as 

 authority. 



At the commencement of the present century, Humboldt gave a de- 

 tailed account of its manufacture," stating that it is prepared by heat 

 from the bark of a certain vine called by the natives on the bank of the 

 Amazon, hejiico de menacure mixed with the juice of certain other 

 plants to give it consistence. 



De le Condamine states that it is an extract made by heat from the 

 juices of divers plants, about 30 in number, and that the bejuco is one 

 ofthem. 



Robert H. Schomburgk* confirms in most respects the account 

 given by Humboldt. He named the vine from which it is obtained, 

 Stryclmos toxiftra. 



The Reverend Thomas Yond, who resided as a missionary in English 

 Guiana, describes its mode of preparation very minutely. He states 

 that two species of Strychnos and six other species of plants enter into 

 its composition. 



Mr. Schomburgk treats as entirely fabulous the accounts of the em- 

 ployment of animal substances, such as poisonous ants or the venom of 

 serpents, in its preparation; and most English writers seem to consider 

 it certain that it owes its activity to strychnine. 



On the other hand Boussingault and Roulin, (Annales de Chimie, Sep- 

 tember, 1828,) who made an analysis of it, state that it does not contain 

 strychnine but a vegetable principle very different from it. 



Its effects on the system sufficiently indicate that its action does not 



* Annals and Magazine of Natural History, vol. VII, p. 407. 



