70 VEGETABLE POISONS. 



the trunk and extremities were become paralytic; and n^ne retained 

 their action, but those of respiration, and those of the ears and eyes. 

 These creatures continued in this condition about two minutes ; 

 after which their respiration became so opcrose, that each inspira- 

 tion consisted of three successive attempts, and then followed a most 

 precipitate expiration, accompanied with so violent a hiccup, that 

 the body bending double, the hind legs were pulled quite to the 

 fore legs. In fine, this manner of taking in and letting out breath 

 lasted one minute 3 in which time their eyes were darkened, and 

 death ensued. 



He opened the dead bodies of these horses, and observed as 

 follows : the blood was of a deep.brown colour, and spouted out in 

 a full stream, which lasted near a minute, both from the arteries 

 and veins, which he cut. This phenomenon surprized him much, 

 as well as the horse-flayer, who attended him, and assured him that 

 he had never seen the like. The muscles were flaccid, blackish, and 

 very cold. The heart was so violently contracted, that, in cutting 

 it across, he could not see any appearance of the ventricles, till he 

 pulled their sides asunder by force. The ungs and liver were 

 stuffed with blood. 



In making the small wounds, for introducing the poison, great, 

 care must be taken, to avoid cutting any trunk of an artery or 

 vein ; because, when that happens, the blood that issues out, car- 

 ries off a good part of the poison ; which makes the animal pine 

 more or less without dying ; or, if he dies, it is in a longer or shorter 

 time, according to the quantity of the poison that has got into the 

 vessels, and been mixed with the circulating fluid. This thing hap- 

 pened to him in trying the experiment on a mare, which had been 

 condemned to the laystall. This beast lived about four hours, be- 

 cause the wound bled abundantly, and hindered the success of the 

 experiment, for the reasons alleged above. 



November 1 8, he took a small steel arrow, and poisoned it with 

 the poison of tiennas mixed with that of lamas. He caused this 

 arrow to be shot into the right hinder leg of a bear, belonging to 

 M. de Reaumur, which he wanted to have killed, in order to put it 

 into his cabinet of natural history. The creature immediately roar- 

 ed out, trom the anguish of the puncture ; after which he made a 

 tour round the stable, in which he was, without seeming to be ia 



