

POISONING BY YEW. 155 



With regard to injurious substances taken as food, it is 

 unquestionable that pheasants are sometimes destroyed by 

 eating yew, the seeds as well as the leaves having proved 

 fatal ; but it is singular that the precise conditions under 

 which they are poisoned have not been ascertained. The 

 poisoning of animals from eating these leaves is so well known 

 that damages have been claimed and obtained, after an appeal 

 to the higher courts, by persons who have lost cattle, horses, 

 or sheep, in consequence of the branches of yew trees being 

 allowed to hang over fences, or the cutting of hedges being 

 thrown upon the ground. In conjunction with the late 

 Professor Tuson, of the Veterinary College, I investigated, 

 several years ago, the poisoning of pheasants by yew 

 leaves, of which many instances are recorded. The action 

 of the poisonous leaves in producing inflammation of the 

 intestines was so well marked that there could be no 

 possible doubt of the cause of death ; but the circumstances 

 that led well-fed pheasants to eat yew leaves on some 

 occasions, and not to touch them on others, are difficult of 

 explanation. The poisoned birds that I have examined have 

 always been highly nourished, extremely fat, and in good 

 condition, and, so far from being hungry, their crops in many 

 instances have been filled with maize. 



Lieut. F. Stuart Wortley, then working at the Agricultural 

 College, Downton, wrote a letter to the Times of Aug. 19, 

 1892, in which he described a number of experiments 

 performed with a view of ascertaining the amount of the 

 poisonous principle known as taxine in the leaves of the 

 male and female yew respectively. His experiments went to 

 prove that taxine exists in a much larger quantity in the 

 leaves of the male than in those of the female yew. If this 

 taxine is the active principle, his experiments indicate that 

 only the male yew is poisonous, but no tests which can be 

 regarded as conclusive have yet been made. It would be 

 very desirable that some observer who has the opportunity 

 should ascertain by actual experiments whether there is any 



