56 ' REPORT — 1856. 



mal charcoal is added to the filtrate, and, after repeated agitation during twenty-four 

 hours, the supernatant liquid is decanted off, and the charcoal received on a paper 

 filter, where it is well washed with cold water. The charcoal now retaining the 

 strychnine is allowed to dry spontaneously, thereafter placed in a flask, drenched 

 with alcohol, and the whole kept for two hours at a temperature short of ehullition. 

 The alcoholic extract is separated by filtration from the charcoal, and is evaporated 

 down to dryness in a porcelain vessel, at a water-bath heat. The residue so obtained 

 will generally be found in a fit condition to be at once tested for strychnine, by means 

 of bichromate of potash and sulphuric acid; but should such not be the case, a few 

 drops of oxalic acid solution are again added, and the process repeated from the action 

 of charcoal onwards. Proceeding in this manner, the author has many times suc- 

 ceeded in detecting strychnine in the various organs of an animal destroyed by means 

 of it. In a few instances, hydrochloric acid and acetic acid were severally employed 

 instead of the oxalic acid, but were found unsuitable. Tartaric acid, however, gives 

 results equally successful with those yielded by oxalic acid. 



When this investigation commenced, it was still an open question as to the possi- 

 bility of strychnine being absorbed and retained in the animal system. Accordingly, 

 in the first trials, large doses were gradually given, so aa to afford every chance of the 

 strychnine being afterwards found. 



A Horse received 24 grains of strychnine in small doses at repeated intervals during 

 one hour and fifty minutes, when a large dose of 12 grains was given. Tetanus 

 came on in two hours from the commencement of the experiment, and the animal 

 died in one minute thereafter. Strychnine was detected in (1) the contents of the 

 stomach, (2) the muscle, (3) the blood, and (4) the urine. 



A large Police Dog partook of four bread pills, each coi>taining ^\th of a grain of 

 strychnine, at intervals of about a quarter of an hour each. In fifteen minutes after- 

 wards 3 grains of strychnine were given, and in other fifteen minutes another dose of 

 3 grains. Tetanic spasms commenced in one hour and forty-five minutes after the 

 first dose was administered, and the animal died in thirteen minutes. Strychnine was 

 found in (1) the intestines, (2) the blood, (3) urine, and (4) muscle. The other 

 parts of this animal were not examined. 



Three Mice were poisoned with strychnine by the author's assistant, Mr. John J. J, 

 Kyle, who afterwards examined them according to Stas'pi-ocess, substituting chloroforn; 

 for ether. He detected the alkaloid in the stomachs and intestines thrown together, 

 but not in the muscle and other organs. 



The suggestion lately advanced, that antimony and other substances are capable of 

 destroying, retaining, or concealing strychnine, when such has been administered as 

 a poison, does not seem to possess any foimdation. A White Dog which had been 

 under treatment with tartar emetic for foiu* days, receiving four 3:th of a grain doses 

 each day, was poisoned with 1 grain of strychnine, and died in forty minutes; and, 

 when tested, the poison was found in every organ. A Black Dog, similarly treated with 

 tartar emetic, received IJ grain of strychnine along with 12 grains of extract of hem- 

 lock, died in one hour and two minutes, and when examined yielded evidence of the 

 poison having passed into nearly every part of its system. A Terrier Dog, poisoned 

 by I5 grain strychnine and 3 drops coniine, gave the same positive result. A Cat, 

 to which half a grain of strychnine and 2 grains of muriate of morphia were given, died 

 in fifty-six minutes, and afforded evidence of strychnine in six different parts. 



The effect of time in causing the destruction of the strychnine has also occupied the 

 attention of the author. Several parts of the Horse which had been buried for four 

 weeks, as also other parts which had lain above ground for three weeks, including the 

 stomach itself, and which were in an advanced stage of decomposition, on being tested, 

 showed the presence of stiychnine. A Dnck also poisoned by strychnine, and which 

 lay above ground for three and a half weeks (by whicli time maggots in abundance 

 were crawling in and through it), yielded strychnine. Further, the remains of a Dog 

 destroyed two and a half years ago by strychnine, as also those of another Dog poi- 

 soned three and a half years agoby tlie same substance, still yielded satisfactory indi- 

 cations of the agent by means of which they came by their death. 



As strychnine, like other organic substances, is liable to change in the animal 

 system, it is of imjiortance to know how far minimum doses may be given which in days 

 may prove fatal and yet be thereafter discovered. A Skye Terrier veceived |^th of 



