98 FIRST STEPS IN GENERAL KNOWLEDGE. 



Kobert said that smelling-salts must be very 

 volatile, for when he left the stopple out of mam- 

 ma's smelling-bottle, all the scent and the salts too 

 went quite away in a few days. 



" British Spurgeworts/' said his father, " are re- 

 markable for the singular structure of their green 

 flowers, and for an acrid milky juice, which burns 

 the tongue and throat. The unripe seeds of one 

 species are pickled instead of Capers, but they 

 form a dangerous substitute. The Wood Spurge* 

 is a common shrubby plant, two feet high, with 

 golden green leaves and flowers, and having in 

 autumn a red tinge on its stems and leaves. 



'< Another very poisonous spurgewort," said his 

 father, " is the common mercury,! which grows 

 in bushy and shady places, and flowers in April 

 and May. This insignificant-looking plant has 

 produced convulsions and death, so that I must 

 again warn you against chewing any leaves, roots, 

 or berries of strange plants. Yet happily in this, 

 as in most poisons, the taste is so nauseous and 

 burning, that there is little temptation to trans- 

 gress." 



" Is there anything poisonous about the box- 



* Euphorbia atnygdaloides. f Mercurialis perennis. 



