; anaes _  LEGUMINOSH, | 443 
Toxicology.—The . Cattle Plague Commission, in their 
-Yeport dated 1870, remarked that a large proportion of the: 
Criminal cases of cattle-poisoning are effected through the 
Eeetey of Abrus seeds. In 1873, Dr. Center drew special. 
_ attention to this fact ; and more extended inquiry showed that 
this practice was common throughout the greater part of: 
E india. The Chamar or “Skinner’’caste are the class who 
mostly. practise this mode of poisonizig, and although their . 
_ object usually is to obtaia a supply of hides, they have been 
_ Known to use these seeds for the purpose of committing 
murder. These people ‘prepare smal] spikes by soaking the 
: seeds in water and pounding them ; these are dried in the sun, 
4 ‘oiled’ and sharpened upon a stone, so that when fixed loosely in 
_a@ handle they can be driven beneath and left in the skin of an — 
Batis. They are called by the natives swe (needles) or sutart 
avls). (Conf. Ann. Repts. of the.Chem. Hzaminers of Bengat 
and N.-W. Provinces from 1874 up to date.) 
Dr. Warden* says :—“ The preparation of ‘ suis’ isan opera- 
- tion. which apparently requires some little skill; and the 
_ following particulars are from an article in the Police Gazette 
for December 1880, communicated, I believe, by an officer in 
the Police Department, who obtained his information from a 
Chamar prisoner in the Patna Jail, who prepared ‘ spikes” 
before him, with one of which a bullock was stabbed in the 
. back of thé neck, death ensuing on the second day. The shell. 
of each seed is carefully broken and removed, and the seeds 
softened by soaking in water, aud pounded on a stone in order 
to form a paste. The lump of paste is then rolled-with the 
* palm of the hand on the stone, until it is of a cylindrical shape, 
With a sharp point. ‘The sigs, about ? of an inch long, is then © 
_ tut off and forms the ‘sui,’ or ‘ sutari,’ as it is termed in some ~ 
districts, from its resemblance to the point of a cobbler’s awl. 
_ After half-a-dozen or more ‘sutaris’ have been made, some _ 
straw is cut into lengths of about 2} inches, and a ‘ sutari? 
inserted in each end; the straws are then put in the sun to dry, 
‘care being taken that the ‘sutari’ points are not injured. As 
~* Notes on the seeds of the Abrus precatorius.—Ind. Med. Gazett 105 - 
