174 NIGHTSHADE. 



and in tasting unknown herbs, they found one which occasioned madness 

 and death. He that had eaten of it lost entirely his memory and his 

 senses, and employed himself busily in turning about all the stones he 

 could find, as if intent upon some very important pursuit. The camp was 

 full of unhappy men bending to the ground* ', and digging up and removing 

 stones, till at last they were carried off by a bilious vomiting, when wine, 

 the only antidote, was not to be procured." 



Koestler-f- has recorded the symptoms which occurred in five persons of 

 different ages, who ate more or less freely of the berries. They were a 

 man and his two sons, the one nine, the other five years of age, and his 

 two elder daughters. The youngest children ate the most, and in them the 

 phenomena were more distinctly marked. They became restless and delirious, 

 the wanderings only on lively subjects, and experienced loss of vision, extreme 

 dilatation and insensibility of the pupils, spasmodic action of the muscles 

 of the face, burning sensation in the oesophagus, spasms in the throat when 

 they were made to swallow liquids, great excitement of the genitals, and 

 involuntary passing of urine, bearing considerable resemblance to the symp- 

 toms of mania. 



M. Gaultier de Claubry J relates the cases of 150 soldiers, 

 who were poisoned by the berries of Belladonna, which they 

 gathered at Pima, near Dresden. The peculiarity in these in- 

 stances was the complete loss of voice ; instead of speaking, 

 they could only utter confused noises with a painful effort ; the 

 other symptoms were much resembling those before mentioned ; 

 with continual motion of the hands and fingers, and frequent 

 bending forward of the trunk. 



Mr. Brumwell § has described the cases of six soldiers who 

 were poisoned in the same manner. In these the delirium was 

 not particularly noticed till the morning after the berries 

 were taken ; two of the patients were delirious for three days. 

 Plench || mentions several instances in which the delirium con- 

 tinued as long, and in which the blindness remained after the 

 affection of the mind had disappeared. The dilated state of the 

 pupils also frequently continues for some time, and it is asserted 



* This symptom exactly accords with the appearance observed by M. 

 Gautier de Claubry in the 150 soldiers : — " frequent bending forward of 

 the trunk, and continual motion of the hands and fingers." Lib. cit. 



-f- Medicinische Jahrbucher. 



\ Sedillot's Journ. Gen. de Med. Dec. 1813, p. 364. 



§ London Med. Obs. and Inquiries, vi. p. 223. 



|| Toxicologia, 109. 



