240 THE ORDEAL BEAN OF CALABAR. 
useful application in ophthalmic medicine ; and the present moment is 
therefore appropriate for reviewing some of the facts hitherto ascertained 
respecting it. . 
The first important notice on the subject is contained in a most in- 
teresting and valuable paper by Dr. Christison read before the Royal 
Society of Edinburgh, 5 February, 1855. In this paper the author 
after alluding to various vegetable substances used by the natives of 
tropical Western Africa in ordeal by poison, describes as one of pre- 
eminent virulence, a large leguminous seed called Zséré, used by the 
negroes of Old Calabar in the Gulf of Guinea. This seed, which Dr. 
Christison called the Ordeal Bean of Old Calabar, and the botanical 
origin of which was at that time unknown, was the subject of some Te- 
markable toxicological experiments which amply proved it to possess 
powers of no ordinary character. Dr. Christison also made some ex- 
periments on the seed with the view of isolating its active proximate 
principle, but was: unsuccessful, partly owing, it is probable, to the 
limited amount of material at his disposal. “ All I can say," he 9 
serves, *is that the seed, like others of its Natural Order, contains - 
much inert starch and legumin, and 1:3 per cent of fixed oil, also pro- : 
bably inert; that its active properties may be concentrated im an alco- 
holic extract, which constitutes 2°7 per cent. of the seed; and that this 
extract does not yield a vegetable alkaloid by the more simple of the 
ordinary methods of analysis.” * 
Some of the Ordeal Beans in Dr. Christison’s possession having 
been placed in earth, germinated in the Botanic Garden of Edinburgh, 
and in the garden of Professor Syme, producing vigorous plants; but | 
as these did not flower, no determination of the genus to which the | 
plant belonged could be made. At length, about the year 1859, the - 
Rev ; 
. W. C. Thompson of Old Calabar, a good botanical observer, was 
so fortunate as to obtain, after many trials, complete and excellent spe- 
cimens of the plant, some of which, preserved in fluid, were communi- 
cated to Mr. Andrew Murray and Professor Balfour. Their examina- | 
tion devolved chiefly on the latter gentleman, who on the 16 January, 
1860, read before the Royal Society of Edinburgh a Description of the 2 
Plant which produces the Ordeal Bean of Calabar, which, illustrated by 
two plates, was subsequently published in the Society’s Tyansactions.t 
The Ordeal Bean belongs to the Natural Order Leguminose, the 
* Pharm. Journ. vol. xiv. (1855), p. 472. + Ib. vol. xxii. p. 308. | 
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