1817.) On the Poison Tree of Java. 208 
origin of this celebrated forgery still remains a mystery. Foersch, who 
put his name to the publication, certainly was (according to infor- 
mation I have received from creditable persons who have long 
resided on the island) a surgeon in the Dutch East India Company’s 
service, about the time the account of the oopas appeared.* It 
would be in some degree interesting to become acquainted with his 
character. I have been led to suppose that his literary abilities. 
were as mean as his contempt of truth was consuimmate. 
Having hastily picked up some vague information concerning 
the opas he carried it to Europe, where his notes where arranged, 
doubtless by a different hand, in such a form, as by their plausi+ 
bility and appearance of truth, to be generally credited. 
It is in no small degree surprising that so palpable a falsehood 
should have been asserted with so much boldness, and have re« 
mained so long without refutation ; or that a subject of a nature so 
curious and so easily investigated, relating to its principal colony, 
should not have been inquired into and corrected by the naturalists 
of the mother country. 
To a person in any degree acquainted with the geography of the 
island, with the manners of the princes of Java, and their relation 
to the Dutch government at that period, or with its internal history 
during the last 50 years, the first glance at the account of Foersch 
must have evinced its falsity and misrepresentation. Long after 
it had been promulgated, and published in the different public 
journals in most of the languages of Europe, a statement of facts, 
amounting to a refutation of this account, was published in one of 
the volumes of the Transactions of the Batavian Society, or in one 
of its prefatory addresses. But not having the work at hand, IT 
cannot with certainty refer tu it, nor shall I enter into a regular 
examination and refutation of the publication of Foersch, which 
is too contemptible to merit such attention. 
But though the account just mentioned, in so far as relates to 
the situation of the poison tree, to its effects on the surrounding 
country, and to the application said to have been made of the oopas 
on criminals in different parts of the island, as well as the descrip- 
tion of the poisonous substance itself, and its mode of collection, 
has been demonstrated to be an extravagant forgery; the existence 
of a tree on Java, from whose sap a poison is prepared, equal in 
fatality, when thrown into the circulation, to the strongest auimal 
poisons hitherto known, is a fact, which it is at present my object 
to establish and to illustrate. 
The tree which produces this poison is called antshar, and grows 
ip the eastern extremity of the island. Before I proceed to the 
escription of it, and of the effects produced by this poison, I 
must premise a few remarks on the history of its more accurate 
® Voersch was a surgeon of the third class at Samarang in the year 1778, His 
account of the copas tree appeared in 1783, 
