1859.] BOTANICAL NOTES, NOTICES, AND QUERIES. 61 



berries wliich it is so desirable to impress on the infant mind, I think 

 there must be some mistake in this matter, as I believe the berries of 

 the Moinitain-Ash {Pyriis Aucuparia) are not poisonous. In ' Buxton's 

 Botanical Guide to the Plants about Manchester,' it is stated that these 

 berries, dried and reduced to powder, make wholesome bread. In the 

 same work, p. 34, occurs the following quotation from Withering : — ' It 

 is well worth observing how truly the insertion of the stamens into the 

 calyx, as in the class Icosandria, indicates a wholesome fruit. With this 

 simple guide a traveller in the most unknown wilderness might eat in 

 safety.' The Mountain-Ash belongs to the Linnsean class Icosandria and 

 the Natural Order Rosacece, and is, of course, one of the plants indicated 

 in the above quotation. If therefore the botanists are right, it cannot 

 be poisonous. As the berries in question were discovered on a post- 

 mortem examination, it is possible they may have been some other than 

 Mountain-Ash ; perhaps those of the Woody Nightshade. It might be 

 difficult to identify them positively under the circumstances, and they 

 may have been too hastily assumed to be Mountain-Ash. 



" Believing it to be desirable that correct information on this subject 

 should prevail, I hope you will insert this, and it may perhaps elicit from 

 some of your botanical readers an authoritative explanation of the point. 

 I am desirous that the fair fame of the Hose tribe should be cleared from 

 the imputation of having a noxious member among them. I am_, yours 

 respectfully, Eosa. 



" [We have always understood that the berries of the Mountain-Ash 

 were perfectly harmless, and agree in opinion with our fair correspondent, 

 that what had been eaten were the red berries of the Woody Nightshade. 

 . — Ed. Guard.y 



As several correspondents have appealed to the Editor, he feels in duty 

 bound to give his opinion. As an appeal has been made to botanists, it 

 may be observed, in the first place, that the poisonous nature of this fruit 

 is entirely unknown to them. F?'imd facie, they would say, it is perfectly 

 innocuous, because it belongs to a family — Pomacece — which contains no 

 plants bearing poisonous berries or fruits. 



Eay, the father of English botanists, gives the following account of the 

 fruit of the Mountain-Ash (Synopsis Stirpium Brit. p. 453, ed. 1724): — ■ 



" Aucupariae baccas succum exliibent acidum hydragogon egregium, 

 itemque scorbutico aptum ; Wallis in frequenti usu, quibus vice dictse 

 pui'gantis exhibetur. 



" Sativse fructus, immaturi prsesertim, adstringunt et fluxus quoscunque 

 sistunt. (Yid. Hist. Nost. ii. 1456.)" 



Sir J. E. Smith describes the fruit as foUow^s : — " . . . The fruit 

 soaked in water, to extract some of its bittenaess, makes a kind of jelly, 

 which is tolerably flavoured. A spirit is also reported by Lightfoot to be 

 distilled from these berries. Birds of the thrush kind devour them 

 with avidity, and our Mountain-Ash trees, planted for ornament in most 

 parts of England, are thus unfortunately stripped, early in autumn, of 

 their produce." 



Again, in the second place, no chemical analysis has hitherto been 

 published to warrant the inference that these berries are poisonous. The 



